7 Top LinkedIn Profile Tips for STEM Students

I admit it. I binged last Sunday. I binged on a new book that had just arrived. It's titled, Linked TO INFLUENCE: 7 Powerful Rules for Becoming a Top Influencer in Your Market and Attracting Your Ideal Clients on LinkedIn.

I was attracted to this book for two reasons. First, I found the author’s personal story of reinventing herself at age 40 (with the help of LinkedIn) to be quite compelling and interesting. Second, I’ve been wanting to learn more about LinkedIn for myself, but also for the benefit of my readers.

As the subtitle alludes, the author, Stephanie Sammons, wrote her book primarily for business people working in the B2B marketplace.

However, it’s also chock full of great career advice around building your personal brand with LinkedIn and building a “smart” network of supportive relationships. Both of these activities are critical for STEM students. However, for this post I’m focusing solely on the first activity, building your brand by following Stephanie’s RULE #1 - Power Up Your Profile (with Precision).

LinkedIn is a tremendous asset for a STEM student in many different ways, but I believe the #1 benefit is how your LinkedIn Profile let’s you showcase the “real” you in a way that’s dramatically different than a static and boring resume. With this in mind, here are my favorite:

7 Top Tips for “Powering Up Your Profile”

Tip #1: Display A Confident, Welcoming Profile Picture

Nothing has a greater impact on viewers/readers. Your picture either prompts them to dig deeper into your Profile to learn more about you or it turns them off and scares them away. Make sure yours does the former.

I agree with Stephanie Sammons that your picture must be a “professional image”, that you must have a welcoming “smile” on your face, and that for “building trust, looking ahead with your eyes up works best”.

The picture below of Iowa State engineering student, Kyle Mensen, does a nice job of representing him professionally. Something he did that I think is especially important for students is to display a professional image by dressing the part of a working professional, instead of dressing like a student.  

Tip #2: “Craft a Compelling Headline Statement”

There's no question in my mind, this is the second most important element of your Profile (after your picture). Why? Because the 120 characters (or less) in your headline quickly tell your story.

As Stephanie Sammons states, “Optimize your LinkedIn headline statement by describing what you are known for, (or what you do) and whom you serve.”

The words and phrases you pick for the headline are the first thing that viewers read, so be very choosy. The screen print image below shows how OK State engineering student, Willis Cook, has chosen to craft his current Profile headline statement:

Of course, I’m not a student, but notice below how I’ve used single words and short phrases in my headline to help readers quickly get a sense for what I’m all about these days.

As you craft your headline, use words that describe you well, but that will also motivate readers to dig deeper into your Profile. One of your headline goals should be to keep them reading.

Tip #3: “Craft a Compelling Summary”

In the book, Stephanie shared a ton of great ideas about crafting a compelling summary, but two things really resonated with me:

- First, she says your Summary “is where you get to tell your story and share your message.” As a student, I would encourage you to share something personal that’s related to why you chose your specific STEM discipline.

- Next, she said, “I’m a believer in writing it in the first person, as if you’re speaking directly to the viewer.”

Kyle Mensen’s Summary below beautifully represents what Stephanie recommends. In first person, and very succinctly, he tells us who he is and why he’s passionate about mechanical engineering.

Tip #4: Showcase Your Most Relevant Work Experience

I regularly look at the Profiles of STEM college students, and it seems that the Work Experience section is often either too sparse, or it’s overflowing with way too many bullets and too much text.

The trick here is to only include Work Experience that’s relevant to your audience. If you’re a college student, you’ll probably want to consider your primary audience to be company recruiters, reps and/or HR personnel. As such, be sure to share experiences which will best illustrate the value you could bring to a future employer.

Tip #5: “Collect and Showcase Your Endorsements”

Endorsements, and Recommendations, are both ways that others can help you showcase your skills and talents. Of course, a key to having others provide these to you is to ASK FOR THEM.

Having the confidence to ask can be tough at first, especially for students, but after you snag your first Endorsement and first Recommendation, the rest will be super easy to go after.

One of the best times to ask your peers and/or coworkers for Endorsements and Recommendations is towards the end of a successful intern session. I mention this important action in Secret #7.5 of my GUIDE titled, DOMINATING YOUR INTERNSHIP: 7.5 Secrets to Creating an Awesome and Invaluable Experience as an Engineering or STEM Intern.

Tip #6: “Make a Human Connection through Rich Media Content”

I say this option “kicks butt”. This is what I call the "Super Differentiator" option.

Stephanie Sammons says, “The ability to add rich media content (video, audio podcasts, images, presentations, e-books) throughout your profile is something that makes LinkedIn quite unique. Rich media can bring your profile to life!”

I think we’re both right.

While I will probably write a series of articles in the future about this topic, for now I simply want you to start thinking about what kind of rich content you could add to your Profile to help differentiate yourself.

Two of the easiest examples to get started with are adding images and publishing articles.

Below you can see a sampling of how Iowa State aerospace engineer, Joshua Moreno, has done a superb job of leveraging images in his Profile:

To see an example of a student who’s already become a LinkedIn Publisher, check out the article I wrote titled, 7 Excellent Reasons Why STEM Students Should Be Publishing on LinkedIn.

Tip #7: “Add Your Volunteer Work, Awards and Certifications, Associations, and Causes”

This final tip may sound like a “catch all” tip that offers little value, but don’t be fooled. Personal tidbits that you add to these areas can often be what catches the eye of a particular recruiter or other reader.

Facts and other information you add to these categories can serve as connecting points and important conversation starters, especially during interviews. I always encourage students to fill in these areas as best they can.

The category titled, Interests, is another good one to make use of. Here’s how mine looks currently in my Profile:

Now It's Your Turn

Can you believe I only touched on Rule #1 from the book? WHEW!

We covered a lot of ground together in these 7 Top Tips, but it's important ground for sure. Creating and continually updating your LinkedIn Profile is one of the best things you can do in today's marketplace to build a strong personal brand as a STEM student. 

There’s A Lot More in the Book!

Even though it’s written within the context of B2B marketing, there is a lot more great information in Rules #2-7 of Stephanie Sammons' book. A lot of it is very applicable to the needs of STEM students.

If you're serious about maximizing your use of LinkedIn (and you should be), this book could be a good resource for you to dig into deeper.

NOTE to Readers: I don't know Stephanie Sammons and have no affiliation with her. I simply thought her book and ideas were worth sharing with you. My thanks go out to Stephanie for helping all of us learn how to use LinkedIn more effectively.

Also, I want to thank engineering students Kyle Mensen, Willis Cook and Joshua Moreno for allowing me to use portions of their LinkedIn Profiles in this article. 

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Thanks for reading. I'm Don Gallagher, founder of the engineering/STEM career and soft skills development site: EngineeringCareerLauncher.com.

Educated as a mechanical engineer, I spent 25 years in engineering, recruiting, training, sales and marketing roles with John Deere. Today I have a passion for helping engineering (and other STEM) students start and build remarkable careers.

If you found this article helpful, you might also like my FREE 57-page STRAIGHT TALK GUIDE titled, DOMINATING YOUR INTERNSHIP: 7.5 Secrets to Creating an Awesome and Invaluable Experience as an Engineering or STEM Intern.

 There are other free GUIDES and resources in the ECL Learning Store.