Peak Careers

Professional Development for Career Practitioners

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is your toolbox – Here are four “tool” tips to maximize LI

by Leave a Comment

There are thousands of blogs, articles, webinars, workshops, and more out there about how to use LinkedIn and how to make sure your profile is 100% complete, so I’ll keep this simple.

toolbox

LinkedIn is a toolbox.

I thought about ending my blog there but for the sake of reaching 650 words, I’ll add a bit more.

Everyone has their own career development path. You are either looking for work or you will be. Even if you retire it is likely you will be looking for ideas of where to spend your time and energy.

Here are four tips on using the LinkedIn toolbox.

[Read more…] about LinkedIn is your toolbox – Here are four “tool” tips to maximize LI

It’s Not ‘Rocket – Surgery’…but it is a lot of work.

by Leave a Comment

JasperBeach

Finding the work you want to do is not like brain surgery or rocket science.  Yet too many people think a little bit of effort will result in a lot of benefit.  They’ve been tricked into thinking this for years. Don Asher’s book, How To Get Any Job With Any Major states that people looking for work should have a 100 leads at all times. You should have seen the face on the college senior I said that to!!  He figured he would apply to a couple jobs and pick the one he wanted.

It is all about effort. If you want to find work, you need to put the time in. I have to agree with Don on this one, create many options and keep creating options until you find work.  Don Asher’s “100 leads” is purposefully a large number to keep people from creating 3-5 leads and then sitting back and letting those five leads play themselves out, only to find that NONE of them “played out” and now you have to go find five more. If you have 100 leads going at all times then there is no down time.  Yeh, except for a fortunate few it is a lot of work finding work.

Turn over a lot of rocks. I tell students and clients this all the time, “You have to turn over a lot of rocks to find what you want.” I want people to know that it might not be “rocket science” or “brain surgery” but it IS a lot of hard work and that it is one rock at a time. You make that one phone call for an informational interview and hope that it leads to another informational interview or that you discover by accident that the job you REALLY want is something else now. But it all starts with the first phone call which leads to the second call, which leads to the third, etc…

[Read more…] about It’s Not ‘Rocket – Surgery’…but it is a lot of work.

Backing up your LinkedIn profile & contacts

by 1 Comment

IMG_0010
Picture taken on my IPad – 2 of me!
linkedin.jpg

I updated this post in January 2022  to reflect changes LinkedIn has made.

Every 6 months I back up my profile & contacts. I suggest you do too, you’d really hate to lose all this hard work you’ve put in, wouldn’t you?

Remember, you do not OWN LinkedIn and should protect your investment of time.

1. Go to your Profile Picture at the top of the page and click on the little down arrow

2. Select SETTINGS & PRIVACY

3. In left column, Scroll down to DATA PRIVACY
4. Select GET A COPY OF YOUR DATA

5. Select what you want to save. You should at minimum choose PROFILE and CONTACTS.

They will email you the files.

Save it 🙂

The profile backup is a PDF that you could use to replicate all your text if needed.

Sleep well knowing you’re hard work and connections have been saved.

————————————————–

Jim Peacock is the Principal at Peak-Careers Consulting and writes a weekly email for career practitioners. Peak-Careers offers discussion-based online seminars for career practitioners focused on meeting continuing education needs for CCSP, GCDF and BCC certified professionals as well as workshops for career practitioners and individual career coaching.

He is the author of A Field Guide for Career Practitioners: Helping Your Clients Create Their Next Move and the recipient of the 2020 Kenneth C. Hoyt Award from National Career Development Association.

Sign up here to receive my  TOP 10 TIPS WHEN WORKING WITH AN UNDECIDED PERSON.  You can also receive the career practitioners newsletter which includes a variety of career topics, industry news, interesting events, and more. 

LinkedIn – Start From The Beginning

by Leave a Comment

inigomontoya

linkedinInigo Montoya in the Princess Bride (my favorite all time movie) “I am waiting for you, Vizzini! You told me to go back to the beginning… so I have.“

With over 450 million people (as of 10/2016)  on LinkedIn and most of them in professional positions, to be current you need to learn what LinkedIn is and how to leverage the power of LI in your future.

For many people I work with they really need to “go back to the beginning” and create or update their profile and know WHY they are doing it. Below is my attempt to summarize “Why LinkedIn?” and some excellent resources to support many of the sections of your profile.

Why LinkedIn?

  • Create a professional online presence
  • Identify & make connection to develop your network
  • Identify groups that are discussing topics of interest
  • Research companies
  • Find employment

You want to ensure you have presented yourself as professionally as possible.  Below are tips on how to create / improve your LI profile.

To EDIT, simply go to your Profile page and click on the “pencil” in the upper right corner.

PICTURE:  You should have a professional looking picture of yourself, preferably with a blank background. i.e. not taken at the formal dance.  Do a quick search for people on LI and see how their pictures show up for ideas.  Not too close.  Not too far away.  Not too busy in the background.    Additional information

TAG LINE / HEAD LINE:  The area immediately under your name is your ‘tag line’ or ‘head line’ and is pulled automatically from a section in your profile with your most current position. Edit this section to highlight your career interests, skills or passion.   When people search for you they see your picture and this tag line, so it is important to capture a highlight of who you are in this section. Check out other peoples profiles and generate some ideas on what might work for you.  Additional Information

Example:  Career Coach |  Passionate | Creative | Problem Solver
Example:  Higher Education Professional | Collaborator & Connector

ABOUT SECTION (formerly called SUMMARY):  Near your name and Headline, you will see a blue box “Add Profile Section”. Click on this and add ABOUT. Think of this section a bit like your cover letter.  This is an area where you can write about yourself, strengths, passions, interests, etc… that you would NOT find on a resume. Keep it short, bullets work well, and think of ways to set yourself apart from the other college students looking for employment. Additional Information.

CUSTOMIZE YOUR LINKEDIN ADDRESS:  You can change your LinkedIn address / public profile URL and can then add it to your resume, business cards, and/or in your email signature.

  • On your Profile page, look to the right column for EDIT YOUR PUBLIC PROFILE
  • In the upper right of that page is “Edit URL”
  • Simply put in your name or if your name is taken, use your name with a simple number after it. SAVE is at the bottom.
EXPERIENCE SECTION:  This is the one area that will look much like your resume.  You can add a few ‘bells & whistles’ here, but start with replicating what you have on your resume for experience.

SKILLS SECTION:  Take some time and look at people’s profiles who are working in the industry / occupation you are interested in.  Check out their SKILLS listed and if you have those same skills, add them to your section.  Think about the top skills employers are looking for as this is one of the sections RECRUITERS use to search for candidates.

 
There is so much more LI can do for you in developing your network, learning from others in groups, and finding work, but I will save some of these topics for a future blog.  
————————————————————-

Jim Peacock is the Principal at Peak-Careers Consulting and writes a monthly newsletter for career practitioners. Peak-Careers offers discussion-based online seminars for career practitioners focused on meeting continuing education needs for CCSP, GCDF and BCC certified professionals as well as workshops for career practitioners and individual career coaching.

Sign up here to receive my  TOP 10 TIPS WHEN WORKING WITH AN UNDECIDED PERSON.  You can also receive the career practitioners newsletter which includes a variety of career topics, industry news, interesting events, and more. 

Have you thanked your network recently?

by Leave a Comment

A network is only as good as you make it.  Have you thanked anyone in your network recently?
Thanksgiving seems like a great time to show my gratefulness to a few people in my network.  I have so many people to thank that I have decided to start today with five somewhat random people in my network and simply thank them for being a part of my network.

A couple of years ago, I read a blog titled “Four Easy Network Tips fro 2011” by Shoya (see link below) that encouraged people to do four things each month to keep your network current.  These pop up on my calendar each month as a reminder I am not alone in my profession.

[Read more…] about Have you thanked your network recently?