The Importance of Being LinkedIn

By: Karen Choucrallah

In the social networking family, LinkedIn is Facebook and Twitter’s professional older uncle. It seems that if you’re looking to climb the corporate ladder, this is the only networking site that matters. According to CNN, more and more companies are searching for potential hires through LinkedIn. As reported by the CNN article “How LinkedIn Will Fire Up Your Career,” the consulting firm Accenture plans to hire 50,000 people this year. Forty percent of Accenture’s hires will be made through social media. For professional job hunters, having a 100% complete profile on the site is crucial.

What makes this site so important? One of the most useful features of Linked in is that it shows employers an applicant’s professional life, experience and connections before an interview, thus eliminating the need for the interviewer to glean these details in person.

Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn, told the Economist that revenues from employers looking for recruits have risen consistently throughout the economic downturn. Recruiters use this easy and inexpensive way to find their future employees. They want to see your recommendations, connections and degrees of separation.

A LinkedIn profile is easy to manage and maintain. It’s more of a living document than your resume. When you do something as simple as joining your school’s alumni group on LinkedIn, you make yourself available to an entire network of professionals holding discussions. See a question posted that you can answer? Get in there! LinkedIn provides you with a way to open up communication without even exchanging business cards.

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