Managing Your Public Domain CV online: complete series 1 to 6

Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt
Centre for Academic Success

Managing Your Public Domain CV
Why Mahara?

1. What is Mahara?

Mahara is an open
source ePortfolio and
social networking
system

Poster Series
No. 1 of 6

4. Sharing Content

• An ePortfolio is a collection of materials,
including text and images, that can
evidence achievement to date, present an
audit of current skills and outline plans for
the future.
• Mahara allows the individual to articulate
their knowledge and skills, collate files of
evidence and build electronic pages
securely behind a password protected
system. The user can control access to
these electronic pages.
• Mahara also offers a range of other
features including blogging, group
formation and linkage to Moodle

The diagram below of example artefacts, pages and
groups illustrates how content in Mahara can be shared
and reused in different contexts and for different
audiences.

2. What can Mahara do for You?
Provides an easy way
• To capture your thoughts on your
skills and ability
• To produce an electronic page to
showcase your skills to a potential
employer
• To deliver an assignment or
reflective learning journal to your
tutor
• To produce an electronic page for
friends and family

I am certain the
Mahara experience
made a difference to
my successful job
application.

Ninis,Nancy MBA September,2011

3. Adding Content
Your content is always safe behind your password unless
you choose to give access.
• Let Mahara guide your resume building e.g. you will find
sections on education, employment, skills and interests. You
can always review and revise in the future.
• Try using a range of materials e.g. Excel spreadsheets,
Images, PowerPoint presentations, Video. You can always
delete a file.
• Try some of the features like making a collection of pages,
forming your own group or making a plan for the future.

Source: http://manual.mahara.org/en/1.4/intro/introduction.html

An Example of a
Student Page

Source: http://manual.mahara.org/en/1.4/intro/introduction.html

5. Benefits and Limitations
Mahara aims to move
learning from passive
to active

Students learn by doing
and reflecting, developing
digital literacy and other
skills pertinent to
employment as they
progress

Mahara can help provide that
first contact and memorable
good impression so difficult to
achieve with a paper CV.

Mahara is a good tool provided
students engage with it,
meaning training and examples
of how others have used
Mahara is essential at the right
time to inspire new users

Christa Appleton: eLearning Advisor Higher Education,
JISC Regional Support Centre West Midlands

6. What Next?

Use
Mahara to:

• describe the skills you have
and employers will value
• keep a record of your
achievements
• create electronic pages to
showcase your skills
• create your own ePortfolio
webpage (LinkedIn can
connect to this)
• For more ideas visit:
https://mahara.org/

How to contact us:
Jon Curwin
Senior Learning and Teaching Fellow
Business School
Jon.Curwin@bcu.ac.uk
http://www.linkedin.com/in/joncurwin
https://twitter.com/joncurwin

Posters available from:
http://www.slideshare.net/
michaelschmidtuk/

Michael Schmidt
Academic Skills Development Tutor
Michael.Schmidt@bcu.ac.uk
http://www.linkedin.com/in/schmidtuk
https://twitter.com/mschmidtuk
Posters available from: http://www.slideshare.net/michaelschmidtuk/

Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt

Why LinkedIn ?

1. What is

4. Sharing Content

• LinkedIn is a professional networking site that had
over 175 million members in over 200 countries and
territories by August 2012
• It allows members to create a summary of
professional expertise and achievement to share with
others
• The network consist of connections and connections
to connections that provide links to exchange of
knowledge, ideas, and opportunities
• More than 10 million users in the UK (Sept. 2012)

•

1.

is the likely choice of
employers. Google accounts for
94% of searches in Europe
91% of searches worldwide.
98% of Mobile Phone searches
2. Expect LinkedIn to show first on a
Google search
a) builds professional relationships
with past and potential colleagues
b) allows participation in communities
with a shared interest
Q: Do you or your company use
social networks or social media
to support your recruitment
efforts?

Don’t know
4%

Plan to Begin
9%

Yes
73%

Sharing content you want
others to see on LinkedIn is
easy

/

Why is LinkedIn important

No
14%

Poster Series
No. 2 of 6

•

Being visible in search
results is essential to
participating in Internet
commerce and
discourse.
THE TOP 3 RESULTS
RECEIVE 88% OF
USERS’ CLICKS
…and those appearing
past the first three pages
of search results receive
NONE.

Requires an email address
and password to setup an
account

You are given options to add
details of your work
experience, education and
links to personal websites
which include blogs and
Mahara pages

You decide whether to share
with your connections, join
groups, and accept other
networking options

5. Benefits and Limitations
Limitations

Benefits
• Be seen – Stand Out from the Crowd

Q: Which social media do you or
your company use for
recruiting?
None
MySpace
Youtube
Blog
Twitter
Facebook
LinkedIn

Series1

0

20

40

60

• Develop and maintain a
professional profile and set
of connections.

• Adding limited content
may do little for your
professional profile
and show lack of
‘public domain’
awareness
• You need to maintain
your LinkedIn profile –
a neglected page will
give dated information
and potentially the
wrong message

80

Jobvite Social Recruiting Survey 2010

2. What can LinkedIn do for You?
• Get you connected to other
professionals
• Allow you to find new professionals
for your network
• Stay in touch with friends and
colleagues
• See new professional opportunities
• Build professional relationships
with individuals and groups

3. Adding Content

6. What next?

Useful Steps
forward:

• Develop your LinkedIn
Profile.
• Add evidence in form of
website links or Mahara
pages to it.
• For more information
visit www.linkedin.com

How to contact us:
Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt

Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt

Ethical Issues to be Considered.
2. Is There a Problem?

1. A Public Domain CV?

Paper CV
•
A self
presentation
to be found
online (for
others to
see)

A profile that is
likely to differ
from a
traditional
(paper) CV because of the
means of
communication
and audience

Interdisciplinary
Ethics Event,
Winner
21st June 2012
Poster No. 3 of 6

An opportunity
to showcase a
range of skills,
characteristics
and attributes
like ‘a can do
attitude’ by
multimedia

An
opportunity
to connect to
other
business
professionals
and their
organisations

‘It’s not who you know but
who knows you‘

•
•
•

Online (public domain) CV

Produced for a specific
•
purpose, perhaps using an
employer specification
Known and limited
circulation
•
No picture
•
Controlled references to
age, ethnic origin and other •
personal data

Created using social
media for self
presentation and
networking
Open
Extensive use of
images
Included material a
matter of choice

4. Think about …

(David Avrin)

3. Ethical Issues (online)

If these were YOUR Mahara pages, who
would you like to see them?

We need to make choices about the:
• boundaries between our personal and
professional lives
• person we present to others (our selfevaluation) – our image
• information we share with others – what
we include and exclude

5. Ethical Issues (online)
•

•

•
•

Inclusion
Exclusion
‘Following the crowd’ –
• Do we present only
do we do what others
strengths and
do?
achievements?
What ‘picture’ do we
• Do we profile only
present. Images will
the person we want
stereotype!
to be rather than the
person we are?
To what extend do we
‘big ourselves up’?
• Are we honest about
our aspirations?
How selectively can we
share information (use of
settings)?

6. Sharing Research Outcomes

How should
students be
advised given
that:

• many employers will Google
search a job applicant’s
name, check social media
• an impression may be
formed within seconds of
looking at social media
• a picture may be noticed first
• an individual’s social media
presence may advantage or
disadvantage their
employability

How to contact us:
Jon Curwin
Business School

michaelschmidtuk/

Michael Schmidt

Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt

How to make Twitter work for you?

1. What is Twitter?
Twitter is an online social
networking service and
micro blogging service that
enables its users to send
and read text-based
messages of up to 140
characters, known as
"tweets".

Since its launch, Twitter
has become one of the
ten most visited websites
on the Internet, and has
been described as "the
SMS of the Internet."

Poster Series
No. 4 of 6

2. What can Twitter do for you?
Twitter was created in
March 2006 and has as
of 2012 over 500 million
registered users,
generating over 340
million tweets daily and
handling over 1.6 billion
search queries per day.

Unregistered users can
read tweets, while
registered users can
post tweets through the
website interface, SMS,
or a range of apps for
mobile devices.

Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org
/wiki/Twitter

.

another platform to selfpresent with a profile
including a photo, short bio
(biography) and web links

another form of public domain
presence where you can be
following others or have
followers

Like other social
media, Twitter can
give you:

a chance to follow the ideas
of others, their tweets and a
chance to share your ideas,
your tweets

a chance to network with
others who have similar
interests e.g. become
professionally known

4. Company Connections

3. Become more Employable
Your Tweets can evidence your
social media skills – think about
what you tweet and who will
read them
Think about why you are
tweeting – is it to share your
sense of adventure or your
Build a network and news will
professional insight? Few will
come your way but be aware that
be interested in your latest
Twitter is not for everyone and you
coffee but some might be
may just lose interest before you
interested in your holiday
have an effective presence
travel to China and your latest
market research

Follow employers and
recruiters active on
Twitter

Re-tweet interesting industry
tweets, blogs or other news
including job opportunities for
others

Use hash tags to follow topics of
interest. You can find job listings this
way e.g. #jobs # recruiting, #jobsearch,
#mediajobs, #gradjobs, #londonitjobs,
#fashionjobs, #marketingjobs

5. Twitter Messages
Don’t do @JMChadd's no-fuss approach: "Fancy hiring me then @guardiannews?"

Better: Communicate with your existing contacts showing potential employers and
others that you have something interesting to say.’

Try to understand the company you are following. Build an
interest. Do that additional research.
The idea of any company's feed is to come across as a unified
trail of thought coming from a company as a whole. Try to
understand how the company is managing their (complete) social
media presence.
Remember, at the end of the day, you will be connecting to a
person. This person may not effectively represent the company
or even have much influence. You need to balance your wish to
connect with judgement.
Be aware that it is tempting to build a social media persona that
does not match the reality. Individuals and companies expect to
see honesty and integrity.

6. The Way Forward
Build a Twitter presence that is of interest
to others including potential employers
Present your professional self in the
Twitter bio
Use a professional looking photo or avatar
Tweet about your job search in an
interesting and insightful way

Follow up an initial meeting: "Enjoyed the day, challenging interview, did not get
the job this time but learned a lot."

Show that you have done your research about a company,: "I blogged about
you a while ago & have followed your growth @pennies.org.uk. Can I join your
team?“
Confidence and creativity also stands out (but needs judgement). "GSOH
advertising student seeks attractive Advertising Agency for work placement, possibly
more.“
Use your work history and be not afraid to tweet it: "Highly experienced
administrator/assistant buyer looking for work in London. I type to 70wpm with good
IT skills.“
Demonstrate digital skills and beat the space constraints by adding links to
an online CV: "@Publicasity interested in graduate opening positions please check
out my digital CV at http://mywebsite.net… or of course: use your LinkedIn profile.
And the most successful way:
Keep an eye on company twitter feeds and swiftly respond when an
opportunity arises. Most companies value it when people approach them via
Twitter – so don't be shy!“

Create a link to an online CV in your bio
(LinkedIn is perfect)
Become an expert in something that may
be of interest e.g. travel to London, the
state of beaches in Kent or exchange rates

How to contact us:
Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt

Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt


Poster Series
No. 5 of 6

Make LinkedIn Work Harder and Smarter
for You

1.

2. First: What to Avoid

‘You have only one chance to make a first impression’

The Top 10 overused buzzwords in LinkedIn
Profiles in the United States: Avoid!!

What does your LinkedIn account says about you?

This poster will highlight
• Strategies to enable LinkedIn to work
better for you
• Additions (add ons) to help you stand out,
even of the LinkedIn crowd.

 Extensive Experience
 Innovative
 Motivated
 Results-oriented
 Dynamic







Proven Track Record
Team Player
Fast-paced
Problem solver
Entrepreneurial

3. 10 Tips to Maximise Your Impact
1. Add a professional picture. Ask yourself while browsing
LinkedIn: are you giving connections without a picture the
same attention? If you prefer pictures yourself, what type do
you find most suitable? Invest the time to get it right. This is
your one chance to make a good first impression.
2. Be creative with your image (photo) space. Use an avatar or
embellish with Photoshop effects.
3. Edit your LinkedIn web address into something more
meaningful. (see section 4)
4. Use your LinkedIn account address on your business cards
and email signatures.
5. Link externall websites to your profile or create/record
evidence using Mahara, Eblogger or Wordpress. Instead of
just writing about your abilities demonstrate them in a picture
or video clip (a good picture says more than 1000 words)
6. People need to know in less than 20 seconds what you can
offer them (Elevator Pitch) and then want to see evidence
and testimonials that you can do the job.
7. Others want to know what you can do now and what you can
offer in the future. This showcase should be an honest
representation of your strengths and abilities.
8. Remind your existing networks that you exist by:
• Updating your profile – keep it fresh – it creates activity
which is shared across your network.
• Endorsing other people
• Sharing your innovative ideas and recent insights e.g.
a link showing Prezi as an alternative to PowerPoint
9. Easy Resume builder: LinkedIn allows you to save all your
details into one document, creating a very presentable
resume of yourself. To print your profile as a PDF, go to the
profile menu and view either Edit Profile or View
Profile. Click on the Edit icon and then Export to PDF
10.Use Facebook and Twitter to enhance your visibility. LinkedIn
allows you to inform your contacts on other networks about
any important changes if you choose to do so.

4. An Example Job Search
Search Job
Keywords:
Summer Internships

Sort by: Relevance

20 Jobs + Save

5. An Example Profile
Jon Curwin
Lecturer in Business Analysis with interests in creativity and photography
Birmingham, West Midlands, United Kingdom (Birmingham, United Kingdom)
Higher Education

Current Enthusiast of e-Portolios and Digital Storytelling at Birmingham City
University
Principal Lecturer in Business Analysis at Birmingham City University
Education Aston University
University of Southampton
Recommendations 1 person has recommended Jon
Connections

108 connections

Websites The creative problem solver
My ePortfolio
My photos

Jon Curwin's Summary
What I do
I teach creative problem solving, quantitative methods (statistics) and stategy. I love to see the
difference education can make and believe that it is important to balance continuing learning with
other interests and activities.
My academic interests
I believe that improved digital literacy can offer new creative insights in a variety of ways
particularly with the use of digital storytelling and video. I use the ePortfolio, Mahara with my
students and believe it offers an effective way for them to articulate the skills valued by business.
Other interests
I love to sea dive and believe that the marine environment needs to be valued for the amazing
place it is. I instruct with a local diving and snorkelling club and see this as an ideal way of
introducing others to water sports.
Specialties
Statistics, Quantitative Methods, Creative Problem Solving, Mahara, Seasearch,Snorkelling,
Diving, Marine Environment, Photography, ePortfolio, digital storytelling

6. Customise your LinkedIn address
Your first Linked web address is usually generated randomly
and is a mix between a name you have chosen and a long
string of numbers e.g /joncurwin143668p4 Why not simplify
and personalise it? It creates a more tidy and memorable web
address for you which you can easily use on your Business
cards or email communications. For an example please see
box below (How to contact us). If you want to adjust your
address:
• Go to Settings and click "Edit your public profile".
• In the "Your public profile URL" box on the right, click the
"Customize your public profile URL" link.
• Type the last part of your new custom URL in the text box.
• Click Set Custom URL.

Aon Summer Internships
Aon - Aberdeen - Jan 15, 2013

Job Title:

How to contact us:

IBM Summer Internships & Industrial
Placements
Company:

Jon Curwin
Business School

IBM (UK) Ltd - North East - Jan 11, 2013

Engineering Summer Internship
Location:

McLaren Automotive Ltd - Woking - Jan 21, 2013

Summer Internship in the Blades and
Razors Process and Engineering Group
Procter & Gamble - GB-England-Reading - Jan 28,
2013
22 people in your network at Procter & Gamble

michaelschmidtuk/

Michael Schmidt

Jon Curwin
Business School
Michael Schmidt


Poster Series
No. 6 of 6

How to ‘clean up’ your reputation online?

1. Introduction

5. Get the Good Stuff to the Top

 A study from Microsoft Research indicates that 70% of online
recruiters have turned down candidates because of search results.
 You may never know if your potential employer will Google your
name but you can find ways to manage what they see and what
they don’t see.
 “The Internet knows a lot about you, maybe too much. So how do
you clean up your online reputation and get control of your image to
reflect who you are now — or how you want a prospective
employer to perceive you” (Becky Worley, http://yhoo.it/Xfz292)

Manage the content of the sites that a Google search is likely to find first:
LinkedIn is known as the network site for business professionals. It will
show early, if not first, on a name search. You control the content seen.
Google+ is big and getting bigger. Your Google+ account will quickly
climb toward the top of any listing. Again you control the content but
watch the settings.
Visit NameChk.com just to see the social networking sites open to you.

2. Show the Good Stuff
At the end of the day it is content that
makes the difference. A poor photo,
standard information or dated
information about where you live and
work and little of real interest will tell a
story! If your social media
appearance is not going to showcase
your skills, knowledge and aspirations,
then perhaps you need a strategy to
minimise your presence.

An effective social media presence
needs an investment – your time. You
need a photo or image of you that
speaks for you (just look at me). Your
photo should make you stand out as
the business professional (or anything
else) you want to be. .

Be careful with this one. You may be present on some of these sites and
this may not show on the results. Also you don’t want a clutter of out-ofdate, poorly presented profiles.

Focus on the skills that make you uniquely good and try to evidence
those skills. If you can speak publically with confidence, show that in a
linked YouTube video. If you have certificates, even a recent First Aid
qualification, try to include it. If you have realistic goals that are
relevant, like improving language skills through travel, share them.

6. Action
You need to be clear about your longer-term aims, manage limited
resources (like time) and find an approach that is sustainable.

3. Bury the Bad Stuff
We all move on and employers do understand this. Your swimming
badges from primary school will be of diminishing importance. You
want your social media presence to paint an acceptable picture of
you.
As the more recent (hopefully) good stuff rises, the dregs from the
past will sink.
Take comfort from the fact that:
• most search time is on the first page
• one picture on LinkedIn that is seen early can make a big difference
• few searches get past the third page
• any ‘bad stuff’ can be forced down to the fourth page or beyond

If your aim is to be a more
employable then:
a. you will need to update
your (traditional) CV
anyway and your related
public domain profile
b. you might consider
uploading your CV to a
website like Guardian jobs

There is a pool of resources
waiting for you:

4. Build a Strategy
Tweak your name. Any chance
you can apply for a job using a
slightly different form of your
name? If you are Bob Smith with
a slightly murky online reputation,
applying for jobs as Robert Smith
and representing yourself online
as Robert going forward could
help you distance yourself from
that rascal "Bob."

a. use Wordpress for your
website
b. sell using an eBay or
Amazon shop
c. use Flickr to share your
photos

Setup your own business,
a. Your profile should reflect
this capability and your
previous experience.
b. It could show you at work:
if you offer outdoor pursuits
or training, why not share
the pictures of your recent
long-distance walk or open
water swim.

But is your approach
sustainable?
a. Are you going to create a
presence now that will look
dated and incorrect in one or
two years? Just look at the
number of graduates that are
still students on LikedIn!
b. Will you tweet or blog for a few
week until you move on to
something else? Are you trying
to live several lives online?
The sports person, the
employable business
profession, the entrepreneur?

We would love to hear from you:
Use images to your
advantage
Start a Flickr photo sharing
site and write your name
on all the (appropriate)
pictures you post. Do the
same with Instagram,
Tumblr and Photobucket.

Jon Curwin
Business School

Manage social sites
Go over to namechk.com,
type in your real name (or
your new professional
name) and sign up for
those sites that add to your
presence AND those that
you are prepared to
maintain..
michaelschmidtuk/

Michael Schmidt

Managing Your Public Domain CV online: complete series 1 to 6

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Managing Your Public Domain CV online: complete series 1 to 6