Time to Review Your LinkedIn Profile?

Is your LinkedIn profile in need of an update? 15+ years on, are your roles written in a relevant way to your career now?

How to craft your roles 

Rather than listing the duties from your job description, write previous roles in relation to the outcomes you achieved, results delivered, and what you took away. Infuse keywords and phrases into your descriptions in a conversational manner.

The older the role, the less there is to say.

There comes a time when a role becomes irrelevant, and no longer adds value. Especially if the company no longer exists and doesn’t have a Company Page to connect to. When is that time? Some recruiters will say that anything over 10 years ago is no longer relevant, but don’t throw it away. Look at how you can compact the experience and summarise into one ‘role’ to show your journey in a succinct manner.

What about Projects?

You can collect a truck load of projects, but once again, it may be time to retire them to make space for the new.  You could summarise or list projects in the role description, or create a document listing all your projects that is added to your profile as rich media, either to the relevant role or summary section. That way you still have the data, but it isn’t bloating your profile.

Publications?

Use this section to share any type of publication, but keep it relevant and recent. If you authored a best seller, then sure include that, but this is also a section you can use for ebooks, articles, podcasts, in fact, any type of publication you wish to showcase. Some publications have a longer shelf life than others, so review yours from time to time. The beauty of this section is the direct link to the publication URL.

Before making any major updates, do save a back-up copy of your profile, just in case you ever want to refer or revert back to previous roles.

What is missing from your profile, and what needs to be packed away?