Must I represent my company or can I speak in a personal capacity?
If preferred you can interview in a personal capacity with no reference to your employer. It is up to you.
Sometimes our invitees seek permission from colleagues responsible for corporate communications / media relations before taking an interview.
Approval is usually given as today people post their professional views freely on LinkedIn anyway and also (1) any senior professional worth their salt will observe employer confidentiality, (2) all thought leadership content that is shared online is approved before publication, and (3) we make it clear in our publications that ‘the opinions expressed by our contributors are solely their own and do not necessarily express the views or opinions of their employers’.
However in some cases requests are turned down. We find this puzzling. Some of you will remember back in the early days of LinkedIn 2006 - 2008 companies would try and restrict their employees from creating a LinkedIn profile and connecting with other professionals. This command and control culture was known as 'institutional thinking'.
How times have changed!
Today, of course, connecting with other professionals regardless of who their employers are, and sharing professional opinion is not only the norm but seen as table stakes and definitely do not require permission from employers!
This current situation would not have been possible if 'institutional thinking' had continued. Fortunately, most organisations have changed to a culture of 'network thinking' which is based on the principles of being 'Open, Random and Supportive'.
If you are interested in this topic watch a video of Ecademy Founder Thomas Power back in 2010. The Ecademy was the first ever online professional network which predated LinkedIn.
If preferred you can interview in a personal capacity with no reference to your employer. It is up to you (we can add later should you wish to seek permission).
The interview was a very enjoyable experience that caused me to look back at particular aspects of my work experience and think about how certain events and technical evolutions have impacted the way we work and the services we provide.
MARK MORONEY
Network Planning, Frontier Communications