LinkedIn is a social networking site, very much like Facebook or Myspace, except it has a professional twist. Facebook and Myspace tend to focus on all the stuff that revolves around one's personal life, and not much on professional life. LinkedIn fills that gap. It's purpose, on the most basic level, is to facilitate the maintenance of professional relationships.
It allows users to enter professional information, including employment experience, both past and present, education details, and a lot of other information. It basically allows you to upload your resume. Then, the social networking portion kicks in. Based on where you worked, where you went to school, etc., it will link you to other professionals in that same position. But that's really only the beginning. Here's a screen cap of my public profile:
To see my entire public profile, go to linkedin.com/in/kregan.
Now, the beauty of this site is that it allows you to connect with business professionals from across the globe. The only requirement is that they have a LinkedIn account. And there are various ways you can find people to connect with. You can upload your email contacts and see if any of them have an account, you can search based on your past positions and workplaces and find colleagues, you can search for classmates that attended the same school when you were there, or you can just search them by name, email address, etc. Personally, I am only linked with 6 people (as you can see above), and while I have a few pending connection invitations, I plan to use this site liberally. By that I mean I'm not going to connect with people I don't know, like I sometimes have done on Facebook. (I don't have a Myspace, and don't even THINK about trying to talk me into it, I HATE Myspace). I plan to use this as a tool, which is how I think it was intended to be used, so having contacts I know and can communicate with will be valuable.
One of the great things about this site is that it's only open to college students and graduates. Hypothetically, you could sign up and falsely attribute yourself to a school or something, even if you didn't attend, but there is no value in that here. This is, and should be treated like, another way, in my opinion an easier way, to keep your business connections in order and potentially make new ones. I don't think this should be used as a tool to base hirings on, because it someone could just as easily lie about going to Harvard Law as they could about graduating with a major in underwater basket weaving from Kettering University. However, I think it is a very valuable personal tool for business professionals, and that is why I am using it.
I encourage all of my friends and others to sign up for this site if you haven't already. I think it can become, and is actually becoming, a very powerful tool. It may be new, but I think it would be foolish not to take advantage of the power of this tool, especially as it grows. If you are a member already, or sign up after reading this, I encourage you to seek me out and add me as a contact. If you're a reader of the Blogarrhea, you're a friend of mine, and I would love to be in contact with you.
My public address is http://www.linkedin.com/in/kregan, but you can also search for Kevin Regan and I believe I'm the first (and only) one that comes up. Hope you enjoyed the post, and I look forward to seeing you all on LinkedIn!
