Getting Personal on LinkedIn

Welcome to episode 169, lets get personal this week……or maybe not! Is is right to chat about non-business matters on LinkedIn? That is the main focus this week but first….

Interesting Stuff I Saw This Week

When is public information not public? When LinkedIn says so What LinkedIn Will Look Like In The Future Posting Job Opportunity On LinkedIn Profile For New Employer Did Not Violate Non-Compete

Should we get personal on LinkedIn?

This subject was instigated when I saw the following post. It’s a very interesting thread and really got me thinking about this subject which many people seem to feel very strongly about.

Rather than just share my views I thought I would gather some views from LinkedIn and boy did you respond! This post is currently averaging 1000 views per hour!

I’m actually quite happy to share topics that are not strictly business with my network. There is almost always a tenuous link to business in everything I do but I believe people are more interesting in you than what you do. They can easily see from your profile what you do but the key difference in deciding if they want to work with you (or employ you) is who you really are.

In contrast I utterly detest using my Facebook profile for business. I’m not saying it’s a detestable thing to do…everyone to their own but I personally find it excruciatingly uncomfortable to either talk about work and business on my Facebook or alternatively ‘friend’ work related contacts and have them looking at things that are entirely personal.

I can control what I reveal about myself personally on LinkedIn, whereas using Facebook for business feels like I am opening my front door to people who are not appropriate share such things with.

I wondered if that was a contradiction…..

On balance I don’t think it is but maybe you disagree. I would love to know what you think about this subject.

There will not be an episode next week as I will be here;

The podcast will return the week after (22nd July) with a pre-recorded interview with Millennial LinkedIn Trainer Alex Galviz