Linked Into LinkedIn
Some people have been rediscovering LinkedIn lately. Whenever someone talks about this site, the same kind of things come up. For example, Jared talked about how it was like collecting baseball cards, which seems logical given that most social networking sites have the Pokemon effect (“gotta catch ‘em all”) but that’s the problem. If you approached LinkedIn like you did MySpace, the value of the site is zero.
Here’s how I see LinkedIn: I know a fair number of people, especially in the tech and design industry and they span quite a few companies. If a friend wants to apply somewhere, and I know someone at that place, I would love to be able to say, “hey you should talk to my friend so-and-so at that same company.” Problem is, I don’t always know when someone is looking and further, they don’t usually realize I know someone.
“What? You applied there? You should have told me. I’d have hooked you up,” is what I usually say. If it can benefit my friends and acquaintances, I’ll gladly share but it’s really hard to know if one of your friends is connected to a company you’re interested in without something like LinkedIn.
That value goes way down when you start adding everyone, even those you’ve never met or interacted with, to the network. Which is why I find the ex-colleague feature both a blessing and a curse. Especially in a company the size of Yahoo!, I get requests to link with people I’ve never even heard of. What’s the point? My litmus test for accepting invitations is, “I don’t have to feel like i know this person so well I can give a reference but I should feel comfortable enough with them that I can introduce them to others on my network without worry.” That means I just need to know one or two things about who they are and what they do with some level of meaningful interaction (even a 10 minute conversation at a conference, so long as I remember the person).
Others are worried about offending people by not accepting all the invitations that come in. LinkedIn is one place I actually feel perfectly comfortable not accepting invites because I really want to retain the value of the network. It’s easier to not accept an invite than it is to reject a request for an introduction because you actually don’t know the person.
Oh and one more thing that bugs me. People who don’t share who their network members are with people linked to them. Again, what’s the point? If nobody shared that information (and it’s only sharing with people you approve anyways), then the whole tool is meaningless.
Anyways, if you’re not already on, feel free to look me up. Just don’t be offended if I don’t accept.
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