title: Why the stem cell sector must engage with social media.
abstract: In 1995, I was a first-year associate in a downtown law firm excited to be invited to my first firm retreat. Undoubtedly because of my incessant whining on the matter, I was asked to present to the management committee the case for why the firm should have a website and perhaps even consider implementing email. It was not an easy sell. In the figurative blink of any eye (and literally within 3 years) websites and email were considered an absolute essential to even the most wrinkled partner with a dictaphone glued to their thumb.We are just barely beyond similar days in terms of social media acceptance. Social media is still considered by many to be a tool of frivolity, best limited to personal rather than business use, or perhaps at best only of real commercial utility in business-to-consumer applications. Certainly nothing could be further from the truth and in less than the blink it took for the commercial world to accept websites and email, it will seem similarly ridiculous for professionals, academics and companies to operate and succeed without actively using social media.
authors.affiliation: Cell Therapy Group. www.celltherapygroup.com
authors.forename: Lee
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Buckler
mesh_terms: D002321:Career Choice; D003142:Communication; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D006801:Humans; D012108:Research Personnel; D061108:Social Media / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D057905:Stem Cell Research