CYBERSORTER:This week our social-media agony aunt looks at the implications of recommending someone on LinkedIn and what to do when your tweets are ignored
Dear Cybersorter,
Last year I moved to London. When my old company in Dublin recently went into liquidation, I wasn’t surprised.
One of my ex-colleagues asked me to recommend him on LinkedIn, the social network for business people. But I don’t know if this ex-colleague is mixed up in what went wrong. If I recommend him I worry I’ll be tainted with the company’s failure and I don’t really know all the facts.
But this person was loyal to me at the old job and I feel like I should help him. Should I recommend him or not?
AF
Dear AF,
Writing a recommendation on LinkedIn goes one step further than an ordinary one. All your contacts and theirs can see what you have written.
This is why recommendations on LinkedIn are more highly valued, and less easily given, than a To Whom it May Concern envelope.
In any recommendation, you can write only about what you know of the person.
You should give your ex-colleague benefit of the doubt. Business failure, especially in this climate, does not automatically denote wrongdoing.
It is sensible to be mindful of your reputation, but individual relationships are the building blocks of good reputations. If you believe this person is competent and of good character then you should say so.
Returning the loyalty shown to you is good – and also good business.
Dear Cybersorter,
Am I right in blocking people on Twitter who never reply to my tweets?
I was following and being followed by someone who was in my industry and I admit they were in a position to help me out so I connected with them on Twitter and would retweet some of their better stuff and occasionally replied to a question they put out.
They never responded to me, though they did follow me.
I think it’s incredibly rude, but my boyfriend says some people with loads of followers can’t answer every tweet they are sent.
MP
Dear MP
It’s a personal choice. Your boyfriend is right to some extent. If someone in a position of power has many followers (more than 2,000) then it would be a full time job for them to respond to everything tweeted at them.
However, it is bad Twitter etiquette not to acknowledge a follower, whom you also follow, when they have tweeted and re-tweeted you many times. A quick shout out to a few followers who have contributed in the past week is good manners.
Cutting off someone on Twitter who can potentially help your career is not smart.
While they might not respond, they are reading you, offering an endless opportunity to impress.
Of course, you can also impress on them that you are an idiot, so think about what you are tweeting.
Don’t delete them; keep at it.