The "Principal" Dilemma

A post appeared in my LinkedIn feed yesterday from a gentleman announcing he had left his employer to start his own consulting firm.

When I saw his post, I noticed his LinkedIn headline.

It read: "Principle at [His Company Name]"

My editing skills kicked in immediately.

"Yikes," I thought, "He means "Principal, not Principle. Should I say anything to him?"

The easy choice would have been to do nothing.

But I sent him a private message to let him know about his mix-up.

This man is a connection of a connection (which is how his post showed up in my news-feed) but we've never met and don't have a direct relationship of any kind. That means it's possible he won't realize I had positive intentions in gently pointing out his error. He might be insulted by my note. He could see my message as arrogant and condescending, which is generally not how I want people to think of me.

But I sent the note anyway, for no other reason than if I had made a simple error that could potentially make me look bad to others, I'd want somebody to let me know so I could correct it.

Wouldn't you?

- dp