BBC's social media guru Robin Hamman leaves

The head of the BBC's blog network Robin Hamman is leaving the corporation to become a social media consultant.

Hamman will join IT consultancy Headshift as a senior consultant later this month, where he will be responsible for leading the firm's growing social media arm.

Hamman is leaving behind his dual role as a senior broadcast journalist for BBC English Regions New Media and as senior communities producer.

He initially joined the corporation in 1998 as a community producer, leaving a year later for the TalkCast Corporation.

He returned in 2001, after a stint with Granada, where he was an executive producer and co-head of communities.

"I've learned much of what I know about social media, and gained most of my professional experience, at the BBC. There are those who will say that my leaving is an indication that the BBC has difficulties keeping talented people, but I'm only one of many people doing exciting things with social media at the BBC," he told Journalism.co.uk.

"Some very highly regarded people working in social media have launched their careers at the BBC which is, I think, far more extraordinary than the fact that some of those people have come and gone over the years."

Further to his appointment with Headshift, he has also been named a visiting fellow of the college of journalism at City University.

More on his departure.

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