Advancing through social media
Ken Pelczarski | TLT Career Coach January 2013
These six tips can help you find a new job using LinkedIn.
Your goal on LinkedIn is to continually enhance your professional image.
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SOCIAL MEDIA HAS EXPLODED in growth in recent years and is a significant part of our daily personal and business lives. There are seemingly endless social networking venues, with Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Plaxo, Flickr, MySpace, MyLife, Tagged and LinkedIn having big membership numbers in the U.S.
In this column we’ll focus on LinkedIn since it is by far the most popular networking site among business professionals. LinkedIn has 187 million members and is adding two new members every second.
Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are being used increasingly as hiring tools by company recruiters, with LinkedIn as the leader being used by over 90% of recruiters. No matter what your job situation, it is wise to maintain a LinkedIn profile. It will help you stay connected with your peers and provide you with industry visibility regarding your background, accomplishments, interests and goals.
Below are six actions to implement on LinkedIn to maximize career benefits:
1. Post your background profile. Your background profile is the core of your LinkedIn page and is, in effect, your resume in a non-traditional format. Length and detail depend upon your goals and your job search intensity. Items to consider for your profile include:
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Employer list. Emphasize the last 10-15 years of your career.
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Skill set. Your main talents and functions should appear before your employer list.
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Accomplishments. Emphasis should be placed on successes during the past 10-15 years.
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Education. Formal college education and certifications should appear after your list of jobs.
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Volunteer work. Volunteer efforts should be included along your job timeline if they are career-related.
If you are conducting a confidential job search, your background profile on LinkedIn will likely not alarm your current employer. If your search is not confidential, convey clearly that you are looking for a new position.
Whether you are job searching or not, it is common to list on your LinkedIn page all eight potential areas of interest for being contacted, including Career Opportunities and Job Inquiries. You can receive unlimited InMails on LinkedIn and are more likely to be contacted in this way about career opportunities if these areas of interest are listed.
2. Build your professional image. Your goal on LinkedIn is to continually enhance your professional image. Your background profile should be kept updated and is a big part of the image you present. Other actions that can improve your image and visibility beyond industry peers include:
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Join industry groups. Consider starting your own industry group or subgroup.
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Participate in group discussions. Start a new discussion as well. Become recognized as an expert in your field.
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Include a professional headshot photo.
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Nothing off-color, controversial, religious or political. Most employers screen candidates on social networking sites by looking for inappropriate material, especially on Facebook.
3. Network and connect. You may be the most accomplished professional in the lubricants industry, but few people will know it if you do not build and maintain a strong professional network. LinkedIn is an outstanding venue for professionals to network in many ways.
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Locate colleagues and classmates. Search for other LinkedIn users with different keywords and criteria and view 100 results per search.
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Invite others to connect with you. Write a message along with your invitation as a personal touch.
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Accept invitations to connect with others. Write a thank you note along with your acceptance.
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Congratulate others on their accomplishments. A nice touch to reach out to others.
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Introduce others to your contacts: You can also request up to five introductions at a time.
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Make your connections available for viewing by those in your network. For maximum networking benefits, both parties should be able to view each other’s connections.
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Offer to help others. State clearly in your profile that you are willing to help, advise and network with others. Be more accessible by listing your e-mail address and/or phone number.
4. Request and provide recommendations and endorsements. Recommendations and endorsements bolster the image of both the giver and receiver:
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Provide an endorsement. Endorse others for one or more of their skills.
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Provide a recommendation. Especially if others request a recommendation and you know them well, write a short recommendation letter stating (1.) how you know them, (2.) how long you have known them, (3.) how well you know their work and (4.) their skills and attributes you recommend.
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Request an endorsement or recommendation. Don’t hesitate to ask others if you know them well.
5. Gather new information. LinkedIn offers many resources for learning:
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Research potential employers. Study profiles of companies, their management and other employees in order to evaluate company culture.
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Find hiring manager profiles. For possible direct contact about employment or networking.
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Read feature articles. Review articles by thought leaders on career and industry topics.
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Follow group discussions. Learn new ideas, technologies and industry trends from experts in your field.
6. Review job postings.
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Search for career opportunities. There are currently more than 100,000 job postings on LinkedIn, including 100-plus using the key word “lubricants.”
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Find job postings in your field. Discover personnel plans and changes at competitor companies.
LinkedIn should remain the dominant social networking site among professionals for a long time. Facebook will not be competing directly with LinkedIn as it announced last November a new job site much different from LinkedIn or other job boards. Facebook will be an aggregator and has already posted 1.7 million job listings from various partners.
Premium LinkedIn memberships are utilized mainly by recruiting professionals. A basic free account is sufficient for most lubricant industry professionals and allows you to implement the actions described above.
Good luck—and stay connected!
Ken Pelczarski is owner and founder of Pelichem Associates, a Chicago-based search firm established in 1985 and specializing in the lubricants industry. You can reach Ken at (630) 960-1940 or at pelichem@aol.com.