Prepare your boss and coworkers.
Say what? Yes, this is actually a very important step! The last thing you want to do is to add stress to your life by worrying about your boss or coworkers noticing that you are using LinkedIn. Let your boss know that you are taking your career seriously and that you have been reading how important LinkedIn is becoming in business in general. Casually ask coworkers if they are using it and share the same "party line." No one will be surprised then, when they notice that you are looking pretty darned good online, now!
Turn off your activity broadcasts.
This will keep all your connections from being notified when you make changes like:
- Adding a new current job position
- Adding a new current school
- Adding a new link to a website
- Recommending someone
- Following a company
- Adding a connection - We'll send an update if you've chosen "Your connections" when you control who can see your connections.
- Adding additional skills to your profile.
- Sharing content with your network.
- Editing the title of your current position
- Current work experience anniversaries
Limit who can see your activity feed.
Similarly, you will want to limit the activities that are displayed to visitors to your profile who, if they look will see the activities above.
Click here to turn off your activity feed.
Spend the time and/or money on an overhaul.
Review others' profiles, both in your industry and out. Note the things you like (or don't) and do your best to emulate them. Upload samples, your resume at least - you would be surprised, but only one of my LinkedIn clients had a PDF version of their resume uploaded.
Follow, read, and share.
To keep connected and remind your network who you are and what you do - share something every day. It can be newsworthy, industry related, personal (but suitable), or specific to you and your situation. Follow industry leaders or business and career gurus. I personally, share general career and business related content regularly so my clients have a ready source of good input to share with their networks.
Join relevant groups.
There are all sorts of groups out there; if you on on a basic plan you will be limited. Don't panic if you reach that limit, it is easy to leave a group. Just click on the group's name and to the top right you will see MEMBER. Hoover over the top right of that button and it will change to LEAVE group. Join career, business and industry related groups. If you choose to join a job search group,
click here to join mine, you may want to hide it on your profile.
Clickhere if you need help with that.
There's a lot more you can do on LinkedIn, of course, but that covers the basics and I did promise to make it quick!
Articles on Interviewing
Articles on Job Searching
Articles on Career Planning
Additional Resources
Mary is a CAREER AND OCCUPATIONAL CONSULTANT who is masters - prepared and certified. She has nearly 20 years experience in Management, Career Assessment & Counseling and in writing Career Articles and Educational Materials. Besides several blogs, Mary also writes career related articles for Examiner.com and Careerealism.com.
Her professional experience includes working as a CORPORATE MANAGER, hiring, firing and managing a staff of professionals with a multi-million dollar budget. She enjoys WRITING AND EDITING and has many years developing Marketing Materials and Presentations, Writing Proposals and Plans, and Conducting Staff Development Sessions in addition to working as a vocational consultant. Learn more about her and her services: www.Life-Works.Info