You already manage a version of yourself online, even if you have never named it that way. Old posts can resurface years later, tags stick to your name, and privacy settings drift without you noticing. Today you audit one profile for what is on it and who can see it, then commit to one specific management change. The Social Network Management Sheet you complete is the written communication piece for this lesson: file it in your Communication Portfolio.
Three ideas do the real work when you manage a social identity. Get them straight before you open a profile.
| Term | What it means for you | Real example |
|---|---|---|
| Content audit | You scroll back on purpose so you can decide what stays, what goes and what gets limited, instead of hoping nothing awkward is there. | Scroll back twelve months and list three posts you would not want an interviewer to meet first |
| Archiving | You take a post off public view while keeping a private copy you can restore later, so you can clear a profile without wiping the whole history in one go. Instagram's Archive is the common case; other apps use different labels for the same idea. | Archive three old party posts so they leave the public grid but stay recoverable |
| Audience visibility | You check who can actually see a post, a story or a whole profile right now, not who you meant to reach months ago. | A post set to friends that a tagged person then reshared more widely |
Three different moves do three different jobs. Archive hides a post from your public grid but keeps a copy you own. Delete takes the post off your profile. It does not scrub screenshots or copies other people already saved. Lock down changes who can see content or the whole account without removing anything.
Here is how that looks in practice: a student called Niamh cleaned a public profile before work experience. She archived three old party posts, deleted one rant she no longer stood over, and locked the account to followers only. The grid still looked like her. It no longer led with three-year-old noise.
Six posts from one fictional profile could surface together. Put them in the order you would show first, then watch what a feed chasing different goals does instead. Write down your top two, the goal you compared, and one sentence on the gap. The Social Network Management Sheet in the next step is the Portfolio piece; this is the warm-up that trains your eye.
Now audit one real profile. Rate each line with honest evidence from what you actually checked. Then complete the Social Network Management Sheet: platform, privacy summary, one committed change and why. This sheet is the written communication piece this lesson produces: a clear record of what you checked and the one change you commit to. Save a copy as m2_l42_social_network_mgmt_<your-initials> in your Communication Portfolio. Keep the detail private; the sheet is yours.
If you have no personal account, or prefer not to open one here, audit a public figure or creator you follow and still write one management change you would make on a profile of your own.
If the bell goes before you finish, complete and file the sheet after class or for homework. Use the filename above, and keep the committed-change line specific enough to do this week.
Talk this through with the person beside you, or sit with it quietly.
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