LinkedIn - this isn't Facebook

IceBus

IceBus

IceBus

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
9,817
Location
, Washington DC
This is kind of a mild rant thread, but I'd be interested to hear other people's thoughts on this.

LinkedIn is pretty big in my sector (international aid) and so I use it quite a lot to network with colleagues (particularly based in the USA). I've always only added people I've worked with or who I would happily give a reference about etc.

Recently however, I've started getting loads of requests from people I knew at university. Now in the nicest possible way I have no ******* idea if they'd be any good at any job, as I could mainly tell you what drinks they liked and who they hooked up with.

I don't know if it's the whole 'OMG must add more people' attitude of Facebook or what, but I really don't want LinkedIn to turn into a stupid social network, as at the minute I find it pretty useful for professional networking.

What do other people think? Would this sort of thing bother you?
 
Afraid I agree with the above and have purposely avoided creating one even amongst the 'craze' at work. For the same reason I have not created an account on Yammer.
 
i have lots of people i studied with at uni, as we are all involved in the same industry, can make networking/introductions easier if you have a common friend - don't actually communicate with them but they have their uses!!
 
I beleive that people are of the assumption that the more people they have on Linked In, the better they will be perceived by potential employers and their peers.

Unless I work/worked or had been introduced to someone on a professional level, I would not have them on my Linked In. They are not in the perview of my career and as such they will not be visible to those who are.
 
I HATE linked in. Even more than Facebook.

I created a profile about 2 years ago, and haven't logged in since about a week after that, yet they still insist on emailing me updates about twice a day* from which it's next to unsubscribe from unless your trawl through about 5 pages of settings, finding the right alert type you want to stop them sending.



*slight exaggeration, it's about 5 a week.
 
I myself do not have one however most of my colleages do as it's a useful tool for working with however they do not use it for personal socialising or networking it was created as a professional networking tool and thats the way it should stay!
 
I don't go adding many people myself but I work with sales, inside sales and marketing people in my job, networking and contacts are vital to them.

It's all to do with the adage "it's not what you know but who you know". I know the sales guys at my place add loads of people because if you're prospecting or making a sales pitch to a company and one of your friends/contacts works there, they could get you a direct email address, phone number or even have some influence.

Even if you're not in sales or marketing you never know when someone you know could give you a leg up in the future.
 
I purely use it to keep track of people I've worked with. You never know when there might be an opportunity you could seize through your contacts (this is the way I've often got jobs, but this makes it easier to stay in touch).

I've not added friends, recruiters and the like as I see it as a professional networking tool only. Some of the user groups are handy too. :)
 
Yup, see a lot of my connections do that; add as many people as possible.
Personally, I don't go out of my way to add someone who I don't know too well, but if they add me however, I wouldn't block/ignore them because of that. As mentioned you never know when you might need a favour from someone.
 
I use LinkedIn a fair bit for work - to network and to contribute towards thought leadership in our sector. I still have old contacts from previous employment on there too - doesn't really bother me. Just filter it out.

What does annoy me are those people on there who discovered that you can linked Twitter to it and think that everything said on Twitter is appropriate for a LinkedIn audience.

Yes, fellow professional. I'm very glad you had a great night, are hungover and are now eating doughnuts. As will be the next person that looks at your LinkedIn profile...

That said, LinkedIn looks to have received insufficient investment and the functionality is very poor.
 
PianoBasher said:
I purely use it to keep track of people I've worked with. You never know when there might be an opportunity you could seize through your contacts (this is the way I've often got jobs, but this makes it easier to stay in touch).

I've not added friends, recruiters and the like as I see it as a professional networking tool only. Some of the user groups are handy too. :)
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This really. I do have two friends on there, as well as current and ex colleagues, but they both work in the same sector and I would be happy to work with/for them or vice versa and has allowed me to introduce them to people when they have had specific resource requirements.

Treating it like facebook though ... not a good idea, I know when we are looking through new CV's one of the things we do is see if the applicant has a LinkedIn profile.
 
Greebo said:
Networking may get you a job. My gf got head hunted for £75k job via LinkedIn so don;t knock it.
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That's hardly out of the ordinary - its what most people I know use it for tbh...

I signed up out of interest and thought it would be useful to at least put myself out there - sure enough within a day or two I'd had about 3 fairly relevant (to me) recruiters adding me - some of them pretty much seem to search for specific companies, skill sets etc.. and try to add as many relevant people as they can.

As for who I add - I'm not fussed - I'll happily add old uni mates, friends etc.. I don't see how it can hurt your profile in any way. If you think stuff like that matters anyway then surely a diverse group of people in decent positions makes you look well connected.
 
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