How I got into LinkedIn

I often get asked about how I got into LinkedIn, and I realised that I have not posted about my journey for a while, well for as long as I can remember anyway.

It was back in the middle of 2008 and the big recession that we had in the UK (yes, a real one) got me in the second round or redundancies and I found myself looking for a job. I was forty-eight at the time and in my mind that was the best part of 32 years’ experience, but the job market had a different idea. Although there was no official ageism in the country then and now, it affected me.

I tried all the traditional routes as well as Monster, Indeed etc but I was getting nowhere fast. Then I got advised to look for job clubs and in particular Executive ones. I do wish I could remember who advised me as this was great advice and indeed the Windsor and Maidenhead executive job club met locally and was funded.

During the training it became clear that to stand a chance it would be a really good idea to start networking and to use LinkedIn properly.

Well, the word “networking” I then associated with something to do with computers, the IT department, and cables!!!! So, it was interesting to find out what it meant in relationship to finding a job. I later decided it was meeting a lot of strangers in a hotel and building relationships, not scary at all!!!!!!

As for LinkedIn, well like most people I was on the platform, but was I using it properly? No, I was not like most other people. I was on it by transferring my CV to the profile and, well just waiting for people to reach out to me. Well, this has never worked and in my opinion never will.

I decided that I needed to learn more but as I still say I needed to use an expert. Things aligned for me when a LinkedIn expert was the speaker at an event I had started going to. So, networking and LinkedIn combined this was gold.

After a fantastic presentation I stayed back to speak to the expert and explain my situation. To my surprise he was more than happy to help me and gave me some pointers and then followed this up with an offer of some training at his nearby office.

He gave me some thorough training and introduced me to a group of LinkedIn experts who were globally based and said that if I git asked a question that I did not have the answer for, then ask them they will be able to assist.

That training and the access to the group of experts have helped me ever since. I got jobs using Networking and LinkedIn and when I decided to jump from the corporate train it again held me in good stead as it does still to this day.

So that is how my LinkedIn Journey started and why it plays such an important part in my life today, it also is the reason that I give my clients such a deep dive where often they have only ever had a broad-brush advice.

If you need some deep diving then let us have a chat, LinkedIn is powerful when you know how to use it but so few do.