Get Up From Behind Your Computer

Technology has given us the opportunity to network through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Coworkers, and more. These social networks allow us to reach out to people that we might not have been able to connect to with otherwise. But, you still need to get out from behind your computer and go meet people.

Your online social networks are far more valuable to you if you use them to widen your network of people to meet in person. Online social networks have the advantage of quantity, but meeting face-to-face give you quality.

Online Collaboration

We have dozen of different forms of online communication and more and more they are being used to promote and conduct business. Online collaboration is essential for the future success of businesses. However, businesses implement these technologies and then wonder why they don't work.

Supportive management within corporate cultures is the key to successful online collaboration. Employees need to be trained and encouraged to use new technologies on a regular basis. Technology is constantly changing, new tools such as GroupTweet, ooVoo, and Stixy all provide unique ways for employees to work together. Companies must continually communication to their employees on the benefits of online collaboration.

4 Parts of a Team

We all have to be in teams. In school, at work, life in general; you are pretty much always in a team. But the tricky part is being in an effective team.

When making a team to efficiently get a project done you need four key players:

The Leader

The Brain

The Anchor

The Soldier

The Leader see the big picture and come up with new ideas. The Brain creates a strategies to put the Leader's ideas into action. The Anchor looks for problems and plays devil's advocate when new ideas are brought up. Finally, the Soldier executes the plan.

The next time you need to create a team consider these four components. Do your teams now have these key players?

Learning in a Virtual World

Second Life provides countless opportunities for business, education, and socialization all in virtual world. With the use of Virtual Environment Real User Study (Verus) Second Life, one day, could look completely realistic.

Will all of our social interaction one day be done through Second Life or some other form of social media? Although Second Life is extremely convenient in some cases, for example long distance business transactions, but what happens when we depend on it too much?

Some people are already complete addicted to their computers through video games; will everyone be addicted through social media? I do not want to end up like those video gamers (check out the link).

Link To Me, I Need a Job

There a dozens of different ways to use LinkedIn, from improving connect-ability to increasing the relevancy of your job search. Just look at Guy Kawasaki or The Mashable Social Media Guide or even the LinkedIn Learning Center.

If you don't have a LinkedIn account already, get one. This social media is specifically to help build people's career. It's like a resume online for everyone to see. By connecting with people (friends, students, colleagues, prospective employers, groups, etc...) you have more of an opportunity to network for future job.

Link to me!

We Will Find You

Mobile Social Network Software, or MoSoSo, is down right scary. According "Students' New Best Friend: 'MoSoSo'", under-25s are the hot new market for using GPS combined with cyber-social networks to find people. Anyone. All the time. All you need is phone.

I'm under-25 and, again, that scares me. I don't want my parents, crazy exs, siblings, and friends to have the ability to know where I am at all times; it feels like an invasion of privacy just thinking about it.

I feel like that kills the term "weekend getaway" and completely kills any chance of the up and coming generations from sneaking out without their parents find out. Do people really want other people to know where you are at all times?

Not me. But, at the same time I definitely can't give up my Blackberry...

We "Yelp" for Reviews

Online reviews of products and services are becoming more and more common. If you have ever shopping online, you have probably read a review. Amazon.com is one of the leaders in online reviews, but Yelp is now one of the most popular websites specifically for reviews. Yelp offers reviews on restaurants, shopping, night life, hotel, spas and beauty...anything your area that you want to know about.

I personally love online reviews. I used them when buying all my furniture online and I use it to find local restaurants. I believe it holds producers to a higher standard; if people don't like a product or service they can write about it online for everyone to see. From a business owners perspective, one bad review can make or break a company.

So online reviews; good for buyers, bad for sellers?