A few weeks ago I met an entrepreneur (who’s much more accomplished and older than me) for lunch. At the end, he said, "I’m glad to find out that you’re real. I read some of your blog and my big question was whether you’d be real or not."
I try to be as authentic, honest, and transparent as possible in this blog. Yet, in an age of spin, I can appreciate someone’s caution in this respect.
So, while I’m perhaps disappointed that it took an in-person meeting to establish a kind of transparent credibility I strive for in my blogging, I’m grateful that, in the eyes of a former stranger, who I am in the real world is aligned with who I am in blogland.
My goal in "transparency" is a simple litmus test: if you read my blog for a few weeks and then meet me, you will say, "Yeah, he’s pretty much what I expected."
When I meet people who blog regularly, if their online identity doesn’t match their in-person one, I know somewhere along the line they’re probably a bit inauthentic, or not totally genuine.