I am sitting at the job site today in front of my laptop reading a few blog posts while I eat my lunch. This probably sounds very familiar to a lot of you. While I was reading and eating I started thinking …. a very dangerous pass time indeed.

I started to wonder how long it has been since I last made a post on my own blog. I checked the date of my last post and found it was on July 22^nd of this year! Wow, it has been two and a half months since my last post.

Now why has it been so long since I made a post? Well there are a lot of reasons or more accurately excuses but the most likely culprit is that I have been setting aside this task to be done in my personal time. Now, the technology industry generally requires a lot of hours above and beyond the “standard” 8-5 work day and by the time I get home I don’t want to be anywhere near a computer. Also most of my thoughts that I want to write about come to me while I am working and by the time I sit down to write about them in the evening I have to spend time to get my head back into the right space, find all the articles that I was reading and so on. It makes total sense to me that I should write my posts when the ideas are fresh, which means during work hours.

Now I would say that most companies today would most likely frown upon blogging during work hours. I think that is old thinking that needs to be changed. Companies should encourage their employees to continually better themselves and blogging is one way we can execute on this goal. Reading blogs is a way to keep up to date on the latest news in their industry. Writing blogs is a way to express our own thoughts and feelings on the latest industry news. It keeps us engaged and knowledgeable in the world we work in and as a result we can be better informed in our day to day interactions with co-workers, clients, businesses and whomever we need to deal with.

Blogs also allow us to validate our thoughts by the world community. When we make a post, the world can see it, read it and comment on it. Other minds will help us formulate our ideas and build on them. Everyone is a winner here, the blog reader, the blog writer, the co-workers, clients AND the company you work for!

I would of course encourage you to investigate your company’s policy about blogging during work hours before you do something that can adversely affect your carrier. I also would encourage everyone to help change the minds of your companies to embrace blogging during work hours.