Policy of truth

In theory, social media is composed of electronic platforms that help you connect to friends and family via the Internet.

In truth, social media is the cover that allows you to chat with your first girlfriend, while snooping through your ex-girlfriend’s posts, all behind the back of your current girlfriend.

In practice, there are platforms that excel at allowing you to be a part-time sleuth and a full-time pretend-friend, like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

And then there is LinkedIn.

Insidious LinkedIn. Liar, liar, pants on fire, LinkedIn.

It allows us to post a perfectly touched-up photo of ourselves in pearls and a business jacket, but behind that benign hair cut and business casual smile, lies the menacing truth that we all know about each other.

Truths that are only learned once you share an office space with someone for forty hours a week.

(Seriously, when was the last time you wore a jacket on a Tuesday, just because? And you know those pearls have since been hawked.)

This vanilla-fied-facebook is just as effective in discerning a good worker from a psycho-path as a human resources professional or a pre-employment drug screening test.

Therefore, for a more accurate picture of who you are in the office, the following categories should be added to the endorsement tool:

• Chronically absent
• Smells like dirty bed sheets
• Uses strong perfume/cologne
• Drives the bus after throwing you in front of it
• Takes credit for anyone/everyone’s work
• Spends all day doing nothing, complains about workload
• Supply hog
• Holiday-party-hot-mess
• Home-wrecker
• Eats other people’s food
• Never chips in for anything
• Loud on the phone
• Violent type-r
• Gum-popper
• Too cheery
• Too moody
• Flirt
• Dress-code-breaker
• Keeps alcohol in bottom drawer
• Talks to themselves
• Talks to no one
• Can’t speak English

I think my co-workers would really enjoy being endorsed under any of the categories mentioned above. It would certainly add a little spice to their bland profile. And, according to their LinkedIn profiles, each of them appreciates honesty.

P.S. Remember to hit me up on LinkedIn and if you don’t see an endorsement category you like, write one in. http://www.linkedin.com/in/maridearmas