Video Blog – Episode #1
In the traditional workplace, where you go into an office every day, you need to dress up for the job and make sure to socialize with people in the office in order to be successful. In the digital workplace, you might not even have a physical office to go to. So instead, you need to dress up your digital profile and you need to socialize with people by providing them with information and feedback and ideas online.
Tips for taking a good headshot
The most important part of your digital profile is your headshot. Professional photographer Marko Zirdum, from Studio Zee Photography in Dubai, gives the following recommendations for getting the optimal headshot:
- The most important is your facial expression. This is your ID. It is with this image that you are communicating what you want to say and send out to the world.
- Secondly, it’s the quality of lights. If you want to hide wrinkles or things like that you can soften the light. Or if you want to show more personality then you can sharpen the lights.
- Finally, the equipment, including the camera and the lenses.
To think about in terms of clothing:
- Do not match the color of your clothing with the color of the background. (So, if you have a white background – don’t wear white.)
- Stick to solid colors – stripes and polka dots produce moiré – a strange-looking wavy pattern which is the result of repetitive details. In addition, these types of patterns are not good for printing.
Having the picture taken by a professional photographer in a studio is, of course, the best option for getting an optimal headshot. But if you don’t have that option, here are some things to think about when taking a headshot:
- Find a nice source of light, like a big window or go outside. If you can, pick a cloudy day for your headshot since clouds make the light very soft and nice. Also, outside you can find nice backgrounds for your picture.
- Ask someone to take your picture – don’t do a selfie!
Variations of headshots
Some people I meet say they are not comfortable uploading a close up of their face to their profile. Personally, I always encourage people to show their face in their profile picture so that if meet in real life, you will recognize each other. With that said, if you are not comfortable, you can still have a profile picture that doesn’t show your face, but that still says something about you. One example could be reading your favorite book or hiding your face behind a camera, or using a photo of you doing something that represents you well.
Updating your digital profiles
Once you have a headshot, your happy with, upload it to your digital profile. If your organization is using Office 365, log in to the portal, click your profile in the top right corner to go to your profile page.
Click the profile picture and upload your headshot. It might take a while, but eventually, the picture will be synchronized across all Office 365 communication channels such as Skype for Business, Outlook, Yammer, Teams, and so on.
The profile picture is the most important because that’s what people see the most, but it’s also important that you share other information about yourself – such as which schools you went to and degrees you have, your skills and expertise and projects you are working on. When you are done with your corporate profile, you should also make sure to update your public profile on LinkedIn, which is where people outside your organization see you.
Some people only think of LinkedIn as a recruitment platform and they only update their profile when they are looking for a new job. You should think of LinkedIn as a large corporate directory where you can connect with people all over the world. So, it’s very important that you update your profile here as well.
Your profile on LinkedIn isn’t just visible when people go to the LinkedIn website, with the new updates of Office 365, people outside your organization that you are connected to on LinkedIn, will see your profile picture in Outlook.
There, now you have dressed up your digital profile, you are ready to get into the spotlight!
I hope you enjoyed this first blog. In upcoming episodes, you will learn how to manage your private and work information in the cloud, how to become an expert digital note-taker, how to capture your audience through storytelling and much more! Make sure to subscribe to the Storyals YouTube channel to get instant access to future episodes!
– Ulrika Hedlund