Think before parking your profile on a networking site

Job seekers must understand the pros and cons of profile creation on any networking site. Prospective employers are also tech sawy and reports suggest that employers survey the net very thoroughly and collect all the personal information of the job seekers from the networking sites before meeting them face to face. Comments on sites like facebook, MySpace and Orkut are of casual nature and may not sketch a very perfect picture of these subjects in the eyes of future employers. On the other hand, social networking sites such as LinkedIn and Profexions allow their members create a sound professional profile and restricts users making absurd comments. Profexions is a growing and clean site where females constitute a quarter of its population.

Its true that networking has become the way of life and social networking is substituting gradually the traditional periodical group meetings of organizational associations. There are hundreds of network sites for professionals engaged in teaching, research, medical, law, hospitality, tourism and technical sector. Scope of these sites is, however, limited either by the specific objectives laid down for these sites or by restricted membership allowed to people practicing specific professions. There are several professions which are interrelated with each other but scope for interaction is limited due to lack of communication channels between organizations of such professionals. There are few sites which allow professionals from different sectors to network with each other but these also lack in some aspects such as providing proper space to network members to highlight their professional achievement, non-existing opportunities for discussions on working environments, and no scope for grouping of like minded persons. Teaching, Research & Allied profexions.com is an attempt in right direction to network professionals from diverse sectors.

Ten reasons to join Teaching, Research & Techies Network

1. First thing first: Membership is free to this unique network and members of the network represent diverse professions and come from following sectors:

Education

Main stream College, University and Institute Teachers: Teachers engaged in teaching, research and administration in colleges and universities forms majority of the members of Professionals.Net. They belong to state/central universities, technical institutions (NIT, IIT, private & public sector institutions engaged in imparting education in fields of business administration, fashion technology, medical colleges, law institutions etc.). Teachers engaged in teaching and research related to veterinary, horticulture, home science education in agricultural universities, tutoring students to help them succeed in competitive examinations have joined in large numbers. There is no restriction for teachers joining the network as they belong to same profession irrespective of their affiliation to institutions and organization.

Associated stream Teachers: Library, Physical education teachers, vocational studies teachers and coaching institutes teachers are participating as active members of the network. Private tutors are also benefited by joining the network and there are several such members availing the opportunity to highlight their educational excellence using profile page.

Educational website owners: Website owners associated with education sector are taking advantage of highlighting their products to such a vast educational community without making any investments on advertising products.

Research

Researchers & Scholars: Research officers, scholars and Scientists belonging to colleges, universities, institutes and scientific organizations of public and private sector have joined the network and interacting with their counterparts in various organizations. There are hundreds of research scholars who have joined the network and contributing the content to the network community.

Manufacturers: Manufacturers of chemicals, glasswares, research equipment and instruments are finding it a good platform to showcase their products. They get opportunity to highlight their activities through profile page.

Technical Education

Engineers, medical and law practitioners: Profexionals.com is unique in composition as it has several engineers, doctors and lawyers as members who can provide technical advice to members when they are in need of such help.

2. Individual profile page:

Network is a source of rich information as each member has its own profile page where personal and professional information of the member is displayed. There are other professional network but they all lack in certain aspects. 'Teachers, Researchers & Techies Network' gives opportunity to its members to display their publications so that research, teaching and other technical business houses looking for professionals of a particular field not only find professionals they are looking for but also get an idea about the depth of technical competence of a professional.However, some information is kept private if professionals prefer not to display it publicly.

Although Profexionals.com is an endeavor to provide a platform to teachers, researchers and allied professionals for networking, members not only discuss several issues related to their profession but also find it useful to highlight their achievements through individual profile page, it has tried to keep its member updated about the happenings in the world using several live feeds listed below:

i) Information about Conferences/Seminars: As shown in the snapshot, members get information well in advance about upcoming symposium, seminar and conferences in various parts of the world.

ii) Events like meetings,cultural events and fests: Members also get an opportunity to post information about events in their organization so that other members have an option to participate.

3) It updates knowledge of its members willingly or unwillingly as news headlines and summaries from different sources (newspapers, websites, television channels' rss feed) keep scrolling/flashing on the main screen, side bars and on different pages such as library etc. Hence, members staying for few minutes on network gets update of what is happening in college, universities, India and all over the world. In my opinion, an educationist must have an "IQ" higher than the average to become an true educationist. IGN takes care of it.

4. Network take care of all members' interest as news are displayed theme-wise like "Education", "Entertainment", cricket, bollywood news, life style, health etc. and nothing is left beyond the reach.

5. Some of the members have gathered lot of respect by replying to the questions of specific nature such as pay fixation, increments and about other service rules. These members help other members in forum and through live chat by replying answers to their questions.Further there are 25 groups that serve specific purposes such as finding solutions to local problems through local groups like HP Faculty, UP Faculty ; specific groups such as Pay Fixation Help to render help on pay related issues etc; techinical institution faculty group to deal with issues pertaining to NIT or IIT Faculty.

6.Members post blogs on the site on issues related to the community and society. These issues are discussed at length by the members.

6. Member are free to initiate discussion on any topic of their interest. Such discussions help community members in knowing several new things.

7. Network has a virtual library where books of famous authors are placed in PDF format. Members can read books of their interest.

8. A "Chat" room is available for straight talks between members. Internet TV provides entertainment to members and they can link to TV channels of their choice.

9. Members can upload photos and videos of their interest which can be shared by all members.

10.Network provides opportunity to its members to highlight their achievement on individual profile pages.

Besides there are hundreds of pages providing information related to topics including "Income Tax calculation", "Admission notification", links to educational websites, and several other topics. Opportunities exist for members to form groups of like minded people or join already existing groups formed by other members.