Is LinkedIn Making Us Lazy?
LinkedIn is a great
networking tool and sees more users added by the day. When it first started, it was much more
basic, but as demand and technology have grown and improved, it has added other
“bells and whistles”.
We can now (among other things):
- Ask someone to connect;
- “Recommend” contacts for skills(this seems to have been withdrawn now);
- Congratulate contacts on achieving another year in their business;
- Wish contacts Happy Birthday.
My question: is LinkedIn making it too easy (and making us look unprofessional) as a result? For example, there’s a standard message to ask people to become a professional contact. Now if it’s a friend
or colleague, that’s one thing, but if it’s a total stranger, we should be
introducing ourselves and explaining why we would like to connect. We don't just walk up to strangers in the
street and ask, “Will you be my friend”
Yet this seems normal on LinkedIn…
What about when we recommend someone for a skill? How many times have we clicked on a skill of
one of our contacts without really asking ourselves “Do they possess this to the
degree that I can honestly recommend them?”
Remember, we are endorsing
them for a skill, which might make the difference between being put on an
interview shortlist or not. There’s also
no idea of to what extent they possess that skill. I’ve been surprised (and gratified) by some
of the recommendations that I’ve received from people I consider don't know me
that well.
For the congratulations messages: again nice to receive, but
when I get the “boilerplate” text, I wonder how much the other person really cares. I always try to personalise it (but that’s
just me). Same applies for the birthday
greetings.
In short, LinkedIn risks depersonalising
relationships and making us look unprofessional
if we aren't careful.
Labels: Career, Social, Strategy
posted by William Martin @ 10:03
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