Mind Soup

A while back I was asked to give a couple of lectures at the American University of Beirut for the Strategic Career Planning course on how to use the internet and social media to find a job or present oneself professionally. It seems that not many people are aware about the potential that social media holds in recruitment and job search. Many students and job seekers have found this presentation useful from the number of comments and messages that I received so I decided to share it here in hopes that it can reach more people. This presentation starts off as general tips that can apply to everyone in the world, but the job recruitment websites are resources are mostly tailored to Lebanon and the Middle East. If you have any questions or if you'd like me to check your professional online presence, feel free to drop me an email: moudz [at] mindsoupblog [dot] com. Good luck on your job search! Finding a job online in 10 simple steps from Mohammad Hijazi

If you own or manage a Facebook page for a brand, cause or personal reason, you are bound to get spam messages from people claiming to get you more Facebook likes for cheap or free, something like the below: What is more annoying is how they try to convince you that their services are legit. Check out the below conversation that occurred on one of my client's pages. To begin with, I do not allow any of my clients to purchase fans or likes on any platforms. If you know anything about marketing, you would know that purchasing bulk followers does not get you anywhere, for the following reasons: These users approach uniformed or uneducated page owners to take advantage of them. These "companies" work by hiring a bunch of underpaid people in China, India or Egypt and stuff them in an overcrowded room to create fake Facebook accounts with randomized named and their only job is to like "client" pages. ( Side article:   83 million Facebook accounts are fake...

Twitter users and the media are amazed and impressed by the amount of followers that celebrities and some influencers have acquired since they started using twitter. To avoid any sampling bias from myself, I chose to use the " 20 Most Powerful People on Twitter in Lebanon " list by 2famous.tv . I then used a service by Status People that allows you to figure out the percentage of fake followers a user has in addition to the percentage of inactive and good followers. I obtained the following results: So what do we take from the above figures? Most celebrities (singers, actors, presenters, etc...) have a big percentage of fake and inactive followers. This is mostly due to them (or their agencies) buying followers for bulk. Notice that most celebrities have 40% or less good followers. Notice how evident this is with Zaven's follower analysis: 69% are fake (which is a whopping majority) and only 11% are real followers. If we do the math, he would easily be ...

Below is a guest post by my favorite politician in Lebanon, HMA Tom Fletcher , the British Ambassador to Lebanon. In Lebanon's Hands Lebanon tends to be high on our August watchlist. This year there was no major single crisis, but five developments raised anxiety. Israel accused Hizballah of involvement in the Bourgas terrorist attack. A pro-Assad former Minister was arrested. Kidnappings returned in a dangerous 48 hours. Some Gulf countries told their nationals to leave. The Tripoli powder keg re-ignited. Throughout, the media were quick to accentuate the negative. Lebanon has learnt to live with a certain level of instability. Periodically, for millennia, it has gone through phases of fragility, as regional tectonic plates and delicate demographics shift. The result is often conflict and political realignment. Are we in such a phase? Not yet. But I think there is an increasing realisation among Lebanese that Assad’s ability to directly influence political life in Lebanon is...

Tobacco control legislation will come into effect in Lebanon on September 3rd, 2012. As usual, the Lebanese government will implement random laws without studying the effect it will cause on society and the economy. Don't get me wrong, I am not against the smoking ban, but it should not be like this. This law that was approved is out-dated and comes back from the early 1900s and is technically very strict that I doubt it will even be properly enforced. What's mainly wrong with this law is that it does not allow for smokers to have specialized places to go to. It is also incomplete as it sets the stage for poor implementation, corruption and a non-negligible negative effect on the country’s tourism and hospitality sectors. The figures and infographics below are prepared by The Syndicate of Owners of Restaurants in Lebanon and are part of a study conducted by Ernest & Young in Lebanon. It makes you think twice before following the tobacco ban law blindly. UPDATE...

I’m gonna say it once and for all: Blogs are not a medium for free advertising or pushing press releases. If this is what your sell to your clients as community management or blogger relations, you have to reconsider, and this is why. If you send a press release to a blogger every day, they have most likely spammed you by the third day. On the occasion that they haven’t, you would have probably just pissed them off. Shall I demonstrate? (I have been taking screenshots about this topic for a while to build up for this post). Let's start with this PR Agency in Dubai. Every quarter, they send bloggers an email as below: complete with very annoying follow up emails: Not only are they spamming bloggers with their advertising, they don't have the decency to find the blogger's contact information themselves but keep harassing bloggers to send it to them. It's as if someone is asking you to shoot yourself in the face. And if you don't reply to...

I am a firm believer of the work of NGOs especially in Lebanon where politics and the government do nothing toward a more civilized society. A recently founded NGO, " 4 a Cause ", organizes events of which the profits go to associations and causes in need. The events are variated, fun and offered to the youth to raise awareness about where help is needed. The first event is going to be a concert: Music 4 a Cause in which the profits will go to Baitna , a non-profit charitable organization, that aims to provide homes for impoverished mentally handicapped people, particularly orphans and those uncared for to welcome them in a family atmosphere. So save the date, this August 30th , Bands and DJs are on board with us to entertain you 4 a very noble cause! Standby is opening 4: - Joy Fayad - Lazzy Lung - Meen the Band . They're followed by: - Mini B (NRJ) - Underrated . Doors open at 6.00pm. Presale tickets: 20$. But you'll also be able to get a ti...

Prepare your red carpet outfits and dancing shoes, it's going to be a blast!  Geekfest 5.0 will bring out all that is geeky in fashion and blend it into the urban tunes of modern Lebanese Bands and Performers. Though geeks would not admit they are into fashion, we do know that there is a certain subcultural attire associated with them and we are about to expose it to the world!  REGISTER NOW The Program  7:30 PM | Registration Early registration secures spots for special sponsor goodies and Geekfest branded swag. Come early before the good stuff runs out 8:00 PM | Let’s Talk the Talk Maya Metni | Le Geek, C’est Chic! How to dress like a Geek? A practical guide |  Maya is a visual communication consultant. She gathers her musings & inspirations in her blog  www.mayametni.com  & @ mayametni  Toni Yammine | Crowdsourcing Music Videos – Meen the Band |  Toni is a Lebanese musician/director. He likes chocolate so much, and...

Two weeks ago, I was attending the Arabnet Digital Summit and I insisted to attend the sessions about Education to understand more about the view of professionals and educators towards the use of technology in education. Needless to say, I was disappointed with what most of them had to say. The speakers still had a traditional approach to education, a Web 1.0 approach as I like to call it. They only cared about using technology to push material to their students rather than stimulate and encourage them to learn. They were promoting 20-year-old technologies such as Blackboard and Moodle (which are basically sites that host the lectures and are traditionally structured to minimize interaction). Some were bragging that they  have implemented these programs in their schools and universities as if it was the most advanced technology and will bring great benefit to their students. Others were promoting them because they sell these programs for millions of dollars to Arab educa...

Who's gonna get me a cupcake? This week, Mind Soup turns three, though it seems that I have been blogging for a much longer time. It has been a great year for the blog; featured several times in print and on Al Jazeera as well as cited in several studies and MBA thesis projects so I'm proud :') I'd love to thank all my readers especially my friends who have always shown great support in my blog and kept it going even when I had absolutely no time to update it. At the beginning of this year, I was thinking that this would be the last year for the blog but with all this encouragement and exposure, I just couldn't retire it. Yesterday, Mind Soup's facebook page  received its 1000th like, and that is possibly the best birthday present :) So here's to many years to come and may you always come back and find fresh posts!