In the Midterm Evaluation Feedback, you asked that I add some job application resources to the course. Even if you have already landed your dream job, it’s a good idea to keep your materials fresh and up to date. The Muse offers a four-step guide on How to Get Your LinkedIn Profile Ready for Your Job Search in 30 Minutes.
Read through the guide and apply the tips to your LinkedIn profile. Once you finish, share a comment based on step two of the guide, which instructs you to “Change Your Headline.”
For your comment, give us a before and after version of your headline. Here’s the example from the guide:
Before: Marketing Associate at XYZ Company
After: Marketing Associate | Content Strategist | Copywriter | I help companies build brands, engage audiences & drive revenue
You can also read through the comments that others post for ideas on how to improve your own headline. If you have additional things to say about LinkedIn, you can include them in your comment as well.
Photo credit: Linkedin Office by Open Grid Scheduler / Grid Engine on Flickr, used under public domain.
14 Comments
I listened to a presentation over the summer at my internship about improving your LinkedIn profile and that information was very similar to what I read in the article for today.
Before: Food Safety and Quality Assurance Intern
After: Food Scientists I Safety and Quality I I help companies develop HACCP plans and improve supplier approval processes.
I found this article pretty helpful about fixing your LinkedIn profile.
Before: Roadway Design Intern at RK&K
After: Civil Engineering Intern | Roadway Design | I help companies on roadway infrastructures to improve the quality and safety.
I’ll be honest: I have yet to see the benefit of having a LinkedIn. I have a profile out of obligation but I do not give it proper care or attention as I feel many of my peers do. When I reach the point in time when I see its importance more, I will use this article to help revise my profile. As of this moment, I have an internship lined up for the summer so I am not concerned with a job search. That being said I did revise my heading.
before: Summer 2018 Research and Development Intern – PepsiCo
after: Food Scientist I R & D Intern I I assist companies in their research and development projects,
Before: Student in Civil and Environmental Engineering
After: Civil Engineer | Water Resources and Environmental | I help communities develop sustainable water treatment and quality solutions.
I liked all the different links in this article that had more detailed advice about improving my LinkedIn page. I was reading the article on “5 Templates That’ll Make Writing the Perfect LinkedIn Summary a Breeze” helpful because it said which types of professions should use the different templates. For example, it said the “short and sweet” template is best for people in conservative or technical industries. It only includes your experience, qualifications, and the type of work you specialize in.
Similar to Mackenzie, I actually have not used my LinkedIn profile to look for or connect with people for jobs. I know it is a useful tool, and I created one originally because I felt like I needed to, but I have a summer internship lined up and I have a co-op in the fall already lined up, so I do not feel the need to look for jobs that way. I will most likely need to use in to start networking more, but until then I will probably hold off on investing a lot of time into it. Based on what other people have changed with their headings this is most likely what I would make mine.
Chemical Engineer | Manufacturing | Process Improvement | I assist companies develop more efficient ways to facilitate production and manufacturing of products.
Simlarly, I don’t pay a whole lot of attention to my LinkedIn (although I know I need to). Either way, this article was very helpful to point out a few things to pay attention to when updating your profile.
Before: Senior Computer Engineering Student at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
After: Computer Engineer | FutureHAUS Electrical Engineer | I assist in optimizing solar array energy production
Before: Undergraduate Researcher at Virginia Tech
After Undergraduate Researcher | Front End Designer | Computer Science | Bioinformatics | Algorithm Development
I made my linked in profile when I was taking foundations of engineering, and have not really changed it since. I realize lots of companies use linked in to reach out, but I also realize that it is also hard to reach out to recruiters since it usually takes longer to response through linked in. The article was very useful to re-innovate my linked in profile, and I will be working on other parts of linked in profile soon
Original: Intern at Johns Hopkins University Center for Image Guided Animal Therapy
Improved: Clinical Intern I Translational Research I I am passionate about science and patient care
While on the topic of linked in, has anyone gotten a job through it? Does anyone have the premium plan, is it beneficial? I hear Linkedin is a powerful tool but Im not convinced yet.
I found this article extremely helpful and it definitely helped me fix my LinkedIn profile.
Before: Statistician for Long Fence Company
After: Statistician | Data Scientist | I helped a sales company make more money by looking at their sales data.
LinkedIn profiles seem very easy to create and build but it is very easy to overlook the little details that make it better. I never thought of rearranging things so long as everything was listed. The post and the underlined article was very helpful.
Before: Civil Engineering student focusing in structures.
After: Structural Engineer | Consultant on structural integrity | I help determine if a building can withstand the loads that are exerted on it.
This article is very helpful. I made changes to my profile.
Before: Electrical Engineering for undergraduate student
After: Power electrical engineering | Substation design | I help companies on substation designs to improve safety and quality.
Before: Building Construction student at Virginia Tech
After: Assistant Superintendent | Hokie | I help Build the Future
This is the headline I plan on using after graduation. The “Build the Future” tagline was recently featured on some department t-shirts that a student organization sold as a fundraiser. I like the nod to the old university tagline as well as the fact that it represents what I hope to do in my career.
I honestly have not started my LinkedIn page yet because back in my hometown at Malaysia it is not a very popular tool used by employers to search for new employees. However, after reading the page above I find it quite interesting and might want to start a page of my own.
Before: Chemical Engineer at Dupont
After: Chemical Engineer | Processing | I assist companies in conducting the unit operations in labs and carrying out various plant processes
Before: Software Engineer at NASA
After: Software Engineer | Project Manager | Systems Architect | I manage risk and complexity; code is poetry
I took down my LinkedIn profile a while back, and haven’t missed it. I get more that enough job offers and none of the good ones came as a result of that profile. I additionally have ethical objections to the site in general, since it relies strongly on dark patterns and, like all social media sites, is primarily interested in packaging me (my personal information, attention, engagement, etc.) as a product and selling me to whoever they can.
Regardless, the site exposes your writing to too broad an audience for it to be useful. I think the best way to get a good job is to write more directly to the specific audience you’re targeting, and personalize your approach. A well-tailored cover letter, resume, and portfolio is incredibly effective, assuming you have a reasonable pool of content to draw from in tailoring it.