Today’s guest post is written by Janet Tyler.

The brats of the digital world—Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest and a brood of other social networks—will spend all day talking at us if we aren’t careful.

Communication pros spend big chunks of their time conversing on these social sites, treating them like kids – nurturing, taking their pulse, measuring their height and weight, and testing their temperature.

We take pride in watching them grow and seeing our influence in the conversations. Before we know it, however the day is shot—and then we go home and talk with the kids some more.

We can’t even escape them when we leave the house, because they’ve grown mobile appendages. Every social network worth its baby teeth has a mobile app. While we may be cautious about texting and emailing behind the wheel, we’re increasingly inclined to share, follow, and post photos of the idiot driver who just cut us off. (more…)