I never used LinkedIn until I was looking for an industry job.

And honestly that’s a little too late to fully maximize the possibilities of LinkedIn, which I didn’t know until I was there.

“Why use LinkedIn?” you might say. “Isn’t it Facebook for business people?”

That was my perspective and - wow - was I wrong.

You should use LinkedIn for (at least) one reason: because it’s where the jobs are.

Nearly 90% of job recruiters use LinkedIn as their primary way to find new talent. 

That means the majority of job openings are on LinkedIn.

If you are considering a career in industry, LinkedIn is a must.

And it’s better to go ahead and get that account created now than wait until the last minute. 

Because you don’t just need an account. You need a good account. And making one takes a little work. So let’s get started.

How to Make a Good First-Draft LinkedIn Profile

Here’s my quick-start guide to getting your LinkedIn set up!

The obvious first step is to sign up with your email and a password.

Then let’s start from the top - the head to be exact.

Use a Great Headshot (and Background Photo)

Your main profile picture should be of your face, and it should easily be able to tell that it’s you from a quick glance.

None of these full body shots to show off your sheik outfit. Your face should take up the majority of the picture. 

Pro-tip: Steal whatever headshot you have for your grad school stuff and use that until you want to upgrade it to a better photo.

Next is the background photo. It’s the wide one up top that people only see when they go to your profile.

Your background photo should be something that provides insight to folks on who you are and what you do.

It allows folks to see a bit more of your professional personality on LinkedIn.

You should probably appear in the background photo but it should be more of a candid or action shot showing you in your professional environment. 

If you have a photo of you giving a presentation, that’s perfect. Use that.

If not, consider asking someone to take a photo of you while you’re working at your desk. But make sure you clean up the desk first.   

Deeply Consider your Headline and Summary

Your headline shouldn’t just be your current job position, it should start to tell the story of who you are professionally (a story which you will fill out more in the summary).

Bad Headline: Data Analyst

Better Headline: Healthcare-Oriented Data Analyst with a Passion to Optimize Organizational Systems 

Next is your summary.

Your summary is the main opportunity for you to fully flesh out your professional story.

You have 2,000 characters for this section, but you should probably only use half of that (remember, brevity is best - not just in academic writing). 

Aim to have 3-5 sentences total. The sentences should respectively answer these questions: 

Who are you professionally?

What do you actually do at your job?

Why should we care?

People should be able to read your summary in 30-45 seconds and have a good impression of your professional identity. Don’t make it overly complicated or clever. Make it clear.

Add Your Past Job Positions and Education

You aren’t done storytelling about yourself yet.

Past jobs (including research assistant positions!) show that you have longevity and depth of experience.

So add everything you have on your resume in the Experience section.

Honestly, you can probably copy/paste what you have in your resume into those spots.

And no, don’t put “student” down as a job. Recruiters won’t like that.

You add your education in the education spot and include your GPA as long as it was 3.0 or higher.

Fill Out All Your Skills (Everything Is a Skill)

Microsoft Word? It’s a skill.

Scientific writing? It’s a skill.

Project management? It’s a skill.

Fill them out!

Many recruiters will look at these skills, and even those that don’t will probably see a summary of how well your skills match their current open position.

LinkedIn is honing their algorithms more and more to make finding candidates easier and easier for recruiters, which keeps businesses searching for candidates on their platform.

Recruitment is a big portion of where their revenue comes from.

So play the game by filling out all the relevant skills you have so that LinkedIn will show recruiters how great you are and then you’ll be more likely to make it to the interview stage.

Kapeesh?

Note: You can only have up to 50 skills and only 10 of then will show up in your “Top Skills” (which you can select). Make sure you have at least 10 skills, and make then good ones that you are actually skilled in and are sought after by recruiters looking to fill the positions you want to obtain.

Connect With All Your Colleagues 

Connections are a big part of what makes LinkedIn a must-have resource for getting a job these days. 

Why? Because it’s not always about how good you are but also about who you know.

Recruiters can see your connections and, if they themselves are connected with anyone who is connected with you, this information is highlighted for them.

It’s almost like a passive reference. “Oh, this applicant knows XYZ too!”

So connect, connect, connect with all your colleagues.

You might be surprised to find that lots of folks you wouldn’t expect to be on LinkedIn are actually there (they might not be that active but it’s still good to connect).

One FYI: LinkedIn now prevents you from adding more than 100 connections per week, so add early and add often. Aiming to get to 500 connections before you hit the job market is a great goal to have (your account will have a “500+” designation after you hit 500.

If you don’t know 500 people IRL that are on LinkedIn, you can connect with new people in various interest groups. However, gathering real connections over time is best, which is another reason to get start with this today and not the day before you want to apply for jobs.

On that note, EVERY TIME you meet someone cool at a conference, special lecture, or professional gathering, add them on LinkedIn. For real. That’s what this app is for.

P.S. Get your LinkedIn network started by connecting with me! :) And make sure to include in the note that you know me from Grad School Sucks. And hey, follow the PhD Going Industry LinkedIn Page while you’re at it!

Onward and Upward: Keep Building As You Go

There’s lots more that you can do to fill out your LinkedIn profile, but this short guide is just about getting started (I’ll probably make more of these LinkedIn-focused blog posts in the future).

One place to go to see what you can do to further bolster your profile is to check the LinkedIn Profile Strength measurement. It can guide you in other ways on how to fill out your account.

That’s it for now! Hit me up on Instagram and let me know what you thought of this guide. Thanks for reading!

P.S. Don’t forget to add me on LinkedIn and follow the PhD Going Industry LinkedIn Page! Cheers. :)