Here goes:
As well as posting occasionally here, I also post quite regularly on another (much larger) website, which has a subforum relating to FI. I posted a comment on a post today which drew a substantial amount of traffic, and then received a message from a journalist working for a pretty large American media company asking if I'd be willing to be interviewed on the subject of financial independence on a non-STEM salary. The thing is, I work in a customer-facing role in financial services, and if my name is quoted beside anything that could be construed as financial advice then my employer needs to know about it (which is entirely fair: I'm listed on LinkedIn as an employee, and I'm on the relevant regulatory register as staff with them). In other words, if I want to be interviewed, I have to speak to my boss and seek permission.
There are a couple of potential negatives here:
-The first is probably pretty trivial, but I'm still a little leery of risking any kind of public connection between my own name and my username here and elsewhere. Being interviewed probably won't have much of an impact, but there is a small chance that someone could realise the link.
-The second is fairly substantial: no matter what I say to my employers, they may assume going forward that my long-term plan is to walk out the front door the moment the numbers add up. I'm actually no longer certain this will be the case (let's be honest, this all came about because I, a financial advisor, chose to write about financial planning in my spare time), but going to my boss and explaining the situation may mean the higher-ups write me off as willing to walk away early, or may even mean I'm regarded as a "safe" option if numbers need to be cut given that they'll at least strongly suspect I hold enough savings to get by for months.
-The third is a really odd one. They may decide to take a look at my posting history and accuse me of posting too often during working hours. I don't think this is very likely at all, but it's a non-zero possibility.
-Lastly, there's a very strong chance that if I'm allowed to speak, it'll be heavily controlled and our legal and marketing teams will insist on vetting every word, which doesn't exactly fill me with joy.
Against that, however, is a fairly substantial positive:
-From a career perspective, being interviewed by a major news outlet on the subject of financial planning could be a massive boost. My employer is currently focusing pretty strongly on overall financial health, and being "that guy who got interviewed by American media because he wrote about financial health" would be a very strong calling card.
-There's also a very strong focus in a lot of the kind of jobs I'm looking at on written communication skills. Again, it would be a hell of a story to be able to pull out in an interview when asked whether I have a demonstrable record of strong written communication.
I have to decide whether to go to my boss and ask permission to speak to the journalist. In my situation, would you?