If you want to learn how to promote yourself, read Dan Schawbel‘s CrunchBase entry. Alternatively, you could read Schawbel’s new book (out next week), entitled, appropriately enough, Promote Yourself: The New Rules for Career Success. The 29 year-old Schawbel – the Managing Partner of the consulting and marketing firm Millennial Branding – has made a successful land grab at becoming the Millennial authority on the work habits and fashions of his fellow Gen Y’ers. And now with Promote Yourself, Schawbel turns his considerable talents to advising Millennials about how to succeed in today’s increasingly competitive marketplace.
Partnering with American Express on researching Promote Yourself, Schawbel has some up with some intriguing conclusions about the new rules for career success in our digital economy – particularly in terms of the real value of social media networks like Facebook and Twitter. “Social media is not respected in the work place,” he told me. Indeed, he has found that 40% of students believe that too much social media usage has hurt what he calls their “soft skills”. Geeks, Schawbel insists, aren’t taking over the workplace. Instead, the key to success in today’s economy is replicating Dan Schawbel himself and mastering a niche so that you become a trusted authority on a specific subject.
So, Gen Y’ers, if you want a decent job, get off Twitter and Facebook and learn what Schawbel calls “interpersonal skills” (ie: how to talk to other people). The bad news, he reminds his fellow Millennials, is that not everyone gets a trophy in today’s workplace. But the good news, Dan Schawbel believes, is that those who “take responsibility” for their own skills and knowledge can still become winners in today’s networked economy.