OPINION
Nothing is more embarrassing than sharing or forwarding something that you think is true and then getting slammed because whoever got it knows better and thinks you’re an idiot.
Back when I worked for a multinational, I’d send out an email newsletter of things I thought were interesting and applicable to our work. Folks were fine with that until I forwarded something about our company that wasn’t remotely true because I had not verified the source. That was the end of my newsletter, and I suddenly had a ton of executives convinced I was an idiot. That didn’t do my career any good.
That was before we had the internet, though we did have email, and things have gotten far worse since then. Now we can announce our idiocy to not only our bosses and coworkers but to family, friends, and thousands of people we’ve never met over social media.
None of us have time to research or fact-check every piece of incoming information we get. If you are like me, you get a ton of stuff that…
