My 'Pet Peeves' on LinkedIn

First and foremost, I have to acknowledge that I am not a digital native and still relatively new to social media. However, I have been using LinkedIn for some time now and have recently concluded that we probably need some guidelines on LinkedIn etiquette; especially when we make new connections.

So here are some things that I would strongly advise folks not to do - based on my experience in recent times with some of my new connections.

• Don't send messages like "hi ma'am" or "hi, how are you". Really, this is not WhatsApp and you are not buddies with the professional you have just connected with.
• Don't ask someone if they are from a certain community because you are a genius and have deduced it from the family name - it is not meant to be an ice breaker!
• Don't request for a recommendation or a 'reference' for a job - since you have just connected. Your new connection doesn't know you and can't possibly endorse you or your work
• Don't ask your new connection to check out your profile and then recommend jobs (not just within their company but their entire network) - because you don't have a ready overview or choose not to spend time creating one but expect the new connection to do research on your behalf.
• Do a spell check before you send out that message intended to make that lasting first impression. Mis-spelling the name of your new connection or referring to them by a completely different name isn't going to help your case. Especially if you subsequently claim that one of your strengths is attention to detail!