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I'm a student at a bush league school that doesn't have many connections to my field. Would it be in my interests to make a LinkedIn account for internship purposes?
I'm a student at a bush league school that doesn't have many connections to my field. Would it be in my interests to make a LinkedIn account for internship purposes?
But I agree with Nick Corcodilos, which is almost a tautology, he's by far the best author I've ever found on these subjects. One of the best things you can do for yourself in the long run is to read the appropriate stuff on his http://www.asktheheadhunter.com/ site, and you might want to sign up for his weekly newsletter, the July 23rd one was on this topic, and previous ones and/or items on the site have generally and specifically covered job boards.
His general specific advice for getting a job is not so relevant until you, say, get some of those internships or otherwise get the experience necessary to make a good case to an employer that you can do the job, but it's all worth reading. It's also very well written.
While you're at it, read his "Death by Lethal Reputation" essay and avoid what it talks about.
I'm a student at a bush league school that doesn't have many connections to my field. Would it be in my interests to make a LinkedIn account for internship purposes?
You should absolutely have a LinkedIn account and begin to build the network. Just don't PAY for your LinkedIn account.
I don't get why LinkedIn gets a free pass on a lot of the shady stuff it does. Case in point: if I have a free account, public details are hidden when browsing profiles and I'm told I need to "upgrade" my account to view them. Viewing the same profile in an incognito window reveals the "restricted" details. That seems like an ExpertsExchange level trick.
Not being that sort of recruiter I've only ever wanted to see that kind of thing to confirm if a particular "John Doe" is the one I'm thinking of before asking to connect to him, and personalizing the note takes care of that well enough. Otherwise I can see the profiles of people in my network just fine.
> But the question for everyone else is, why are employers
> (who pay to access the database) and job seekers (who
> pay for database positioning) playing along while
> LinkedIn sells everyone out with this game of payola?
>
> And where does it leave LinkedIn users who just want to
> meet one another to do business? While some of us are
> working to help job seekers form appropriate,
> substantive relationships that they can cultivate --
> and benefit from -- over time, LinkedIn keeps coming up
> with silly products that cheapen the meaning of
> networking and connecting with other people.
There's probably some interesting social science here. If anyone can enlighten me, I'd love to hear about it.
(edit: by "change behavior" I mean relying on the old system of: "you send me your resume, I'll put it in the trash." Supposedly 80-90% of jobs go unadvertised, and yet the vast majority "job search" by hurling resumes at the remaining 10-20%.)
Something definitely feels slimy about the practice from a job seeker standpoint. Simply because I can't afford it, or place a high value on the cost I'm now at a disadvantage to another applicant. To borrow from another HN comment, it's akin to entering a cheat code while I'm just here normally playing the game. While I don't mind cheating in single player games, this is akin to wallhacking in a FPS.
Having said that, I also don't mind it at all because if I get a job this way it proves I did so on my own merit and those that paid were complete suckers. There is definitely a sense of achievement that comes with that.
I will always wonder how this came about though. How this became acceptable. I understand it's a business but creating unfair advantages in what amounts to some people's livelihood (in their mind at least) seems like playing with fire. There's also the very real threat that this is snake oil. Can anyone prove paying actually improves your chances? These companies could easily be charging for a "service" that only exists in name and actually does absolutely nothing behind the scenes.
> But the question for everyone else is, why are employers > (who pay to access the database) and job seekers (who > pay for database positioning) playing along while > LinkedIn sells everyone out with this game of payola? > > And where does it leave LinkedIn users who just want to > meet one another to do business? While some of us are > working to help job seekers form appropriate, > substantive relationships that…
I'm a student at a bush league school that doesn't have many connections to my field. Would it be in my interests to make a LinkedIn account for internship purposes?
You should absolutely have a LinkedIn account and begin to build the network. Just don't PAY for your LinkedIn account.
I devoted consistent effort to building my LinkedIn network over time so I have a very large number of connections now. I get the sense that the system is underprovisioned for me, because the site is slow as hell, often I can't see the messages and invitations I've been sent until I've done several reloads.
I actually would pay for a premium service that is overprovisioned for me and fast enough for me that I'd want to spend more time with it.