How many times do you see a maths problem, a family photograph, a politic entry, a meme or a quote from a famous person at a networking event, convention or conference? Not very often?
How about on LinkedIn? How many times do you read them and think oh good, wow? Not many I bet!
There has been an interesting polarisation on LinkedIn of people thinking it is a social media platform (but it’s not, read more here), and hence these sorts of posts reflect personality and life outside their professional world.
There has been an even bigger pushback against such posts because:
- They demonstrate a lack of awareness and respect for the professionals around them on LinkedIn. Being seen to clog feeds of others seems to be a consistent comment and others asking how to stop people appearing (simple remove them – here’s how)
- It also shows that whilst that person has personality they also have time to waste or are easily distracted in their professional life. Not the best if you want your brand on LinkedIn to appear efficient, on top of your game and attractive to clients, partners or employers is it?
- Users are often unaware that all of their public activity on LinkedIn is visible, demonstrating to someone doing due diligence or credibility checks their level of professionalism on LinkedIn and in life
Some people would argue that these types of posts show personality and engagement, but whilst I agree to a certain extent (and indeed to be encouraged on other social platforms I am told by experts in those spaces), I believe that these types of posts do not belong on LinkedIn which is after all a business networking site, and you don’t get someone behaving like that in a business event or meeting do you?
Perhaps another New Year’s resolution (see previous one here) should be to treat LinkedIn like a room full of professional people and not share or tell the world that your kitten has a maths problem and you have time to waste?
Perhaps keep that for Facebook, Twitter or the pub …