Most people utilise this section to simply outline all of the organisations that they have worked for and provide an overview of what they did within each role.
When considering what to include, always remember the core purpose of your Linkedin profile is to get the reader to engage with you, to make contact with you and to enter into a discussion with you.
As such, the same principles that we have been discussing throughout this course matter – to put yourself in the shoes of your ideal client/ employer and talk their language.
Also, ask yourself whether the content that you have within your existing profile adds to your story and increases your credibility and more importantly, does it help you to stand out from the crowd and make it easier for people to find you.
If you can answer ‘Yes’ to these two questions, then leave the content in. You may need to adapt it but it is useful content. If you answer ‘No’ to either, I’d seriously consider leaving it out, as it is not adding any value and remember the old adage ‘less is more’.
Employers/ clients/ recruiters tend to skim over CV’s and online profiles, so filling your profile with lots of ‘stuff’ will make it very hard for them to pick out the golden nuggets.
ACTIVITY
The most effective way to utilise your ‘Experience’ section is to include all of the roles that you have undertaken and then briefly highlight the value that you delivered, again using the S.T.A.R. approach;
- The Situation – what happened, what position you were in at the time, and what were the impacts or potential implications?
- The Task – what needed to be done as a result?
- The Action – what did you do to ensure these tasks were fulfilled and the desired benefits/ value were delivered?
- The Result – what was the overall outcome and value that you delivered?
Always lead with the Value that you delivered and make it tangible where possible.
For those roles over say 8 years old, I recommend that you focus completely on the Value that you delivered and don’t cover the Situation/ Task/ Action – the reader will get a sense from your more recent experiences of what you tend to work on and is more interested in the outcomes that you delivered.
Be creative with the titles of the roles so that you can attract most attention – you have 100 characters available – instead of saying Programme Manager or Transformation Director, why not inject a more dynamic title such as “Director leading Transformation of Global Finance Function”. Again, it’s a way to attract attention and also has the added benefit of including relevant keywords that search engines pick up on (in this case, Transformation, Director, Global, Finance).
One final thought on the Experience section, include any extra curricular activities here too – it will demonstrate to the reader that you are more than just a …. (programme manager etc.).
So if you are a School Governor or involved in supporting Not for Profit organisations/ sporting organisations, include a brief summary.