Do I really need a brand? I'm not convinced I do. I already had a Linked In profile, albeit an incomplete one but I don't think I have suffered professionally because of it or the lack of a more complete profile.
Anyway, in the honour of Rudai23 and Thing 3, I brushed off the Linked In profile (once I had remembered the username and password) and set about updating it.
- Create a linked in profile - complete
- Develop your professional brand, including a photo and information - complete
- Join Rudai23 group and introduce yourself - I have sent a request so hopefully it'll be accepted.
- Write a blog post about your experience - in the middle of it.
I will of course write a supplementary post about what I thought about the whole activity and how I found Linked In as a platform or tool, but my initial thoughts are here:
I adopted an incognito approach to searching for me on Google Chrome. Slightly scary that this is possible but a useful tool. Of all the social media tools I use, the only one that was even slightly visible was my profile on twitter. I had no Google+ information appearing, the Facebook profile was locked down and the Linked In profile wasn't even me. Who'd have thought that there was more than 1 person with my name? All of this is fine. I'm quite a private person so I'm pleased that Google+ wasn't there and Facebook was locked down. One of the common factors I realised was that none of the tools had a photograph of me - some didn't have anything while others had an avatar. This is something I mentioned in a previous post and still need to rectify. I also might need to lighten up slightly on the privacy thing; maybe slightly but not completely.
Once the Linked In profile was dusted off, I searched for a photo. I know that there is a better more professional photo of me in my workplace, but I didn't have access to it at the time. This can easily be rectified at a later stage. I filled in my experience and education, sorted out my URL and added other bits and pieces to the profile. Linked In can easily lead you through all the steps; however I found the whole experience complete torture. I found the tool quite un-userfriendly and struggled to fill in sections. In fact I had to pull out old job applications to get dates and job information correct. I'm still not sure what the difference is between companies and groups, and as for some of the suggestions of people that Linked In thought I might want to connect with - some of them don't even work in the same field and I can't see what the connection is. At the time of blogging, I'm still waiting to receive confirmation that I'm accepted to the Rudai23 group but it has only been an hour. Once that arrives, I still need to introduce myself. I'm not sure how to do that and I feel that Linked In hasn't given me the knowledge to do so.
In short, it felt too much like homework. Not many people in my workplace use it so it isn't really in the culture in my work. I also think that selecting your own skills etc isn't something that comes naturally to librarians as a group - we don't usually like 'blowing our own trumpet' (a bit stereotypical, I know but it's true!). I'm still not convinced that I need a brand or that I can use it as a tool for networking. I'm sorry to say that after a lot of work (and it was a lot of work), Linked In and I are not new BFFs.
Getting the balance between public and private is a challenge isn't it? It would help if I could achieve a consistent level of comfort with it!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. As mentioned I'm quite a private person so even writing my thoughts down in a blog or replying to a comment is quite out of character for me. It's all probably down to how much do you want to reveal to the world (and potential new employers)!
DeleteSorry you and LinkedIn can't make the friendship work. I feel the same way about About.Me. I've spent long hours working on my LinkedIn profile, I don't want to do the same thing again on another site. Setting it all up is the hardest bit though. I am finding it useful at the moment because I am on the job hunt and it's good to have eveything in once place (so I don't forget things). I suppose once I am in a permenant position though I won't be as important anymore. Good post :)
ReplyDeleteHi Amy, thanks for the comment. I didn't look at About.Me so I don't even know what it looks like. I can see the benefit of Linked In if you are job-hunting or are freelance but on the whole I didn't feel 'linked in' to it.
DeleteIn my experience, too, LinkedIn isn't quite as user-friendly as something like Facebook. I fairly often find myself baffled by LinkedIn, and in different ways across different devices, whereas Facebook always somehow makes it seem easy.
ReplyDeleteStill, I do find that my News Feed is reasonably busy in LinkedIn with people updating, sharing, etc, unlike my Google+, for instance, which is usually just full of spam. The activity isn't necessarily by librarians, however, perhaps more often connections in the business community. That might not be a bad thing, though, as it seems that libraries are increasingly expected to be run like businesses, so these connections might potentially share items of interest.
As for the difference between companies and groups, I think groups are usually oriented around topics of interest or around organizations that aren't primarily employers (eg. the ALA, CILIP).
Thanks for the post!
#rudai23
Hi Kris. I'm glad it isn't just me that found Linked In to be difficult to use. I'm just not really sure that it's necessary if you aren't freelance or work in some type of research. I'm sure it can be useful if you are looking for someone to work collaboratively with. I don't think I have connected with enough people, joined enough groups or followed enough companies to have a busy newsfeed yet. Thanks for the comment and for the explanation re companies and groups. It makes some sort of sense now.
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