This document provides advice from John Tunison on optimizing a LinkedIn profile. It includes tips on choosing an effective headline and summary, structuring the profile sections, and using keywords throughout to be found in searches. Tunison recommends including experience, education, languages, additional information, projects, certifications, courses, volunteering, skills, honors and recommendations to give recruiters a full picture of the job seeker's qualifications and background. The goal is to tailor the profile to clearly communicate one's purpose and make connections that can lead to new opportunities.
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1.āÆ Do you have a purpose in your life and your career? (IMPORTANT: if you do not, please stop
here and work on that before sorBng out your LinkedInĀ® proļ¬le!)
2.āÆ If you do, your LinkedInĀ® proļ¬le needs to be deļ¬ned by it.
3.āÆ How you use LinkedInĀ® will depend on what your purpose is. Fortunately you have some
ļ¬exibility and it provides several helpful features to help you tailor your proļ¬le to you.
4.āÆ I am a āBusiness Generalistā and āSenior Execu,veā with a focus on āFinanceā who has made
one signiļ¬cant career changeā¦so my proļ¬le (and much of my advice) is tailored for this ā
please keep that in mind and take liber,es as needed where your purpose diļ¬ers from mine.
5.āÆ I will try to address some of the other sec,ons of LinkedInĀ® that I donāt use in the āOther
Stuļ¬ā sec,on.
Tips & Tricks:
1.āÆ Use your purpose to guide you when deciding answers to key ques,ons.
2.āÆ Examples:
1.āÆ āwhat should I put in here for that year I took oļ¬ between grad school and star,ng in investment banking?ā ā if you
travelled the world you might say āIndependent Researchā as the Job Title and allude to gaining depth of
understanding of some key world cultures in order to be able to becer evaluate companies as an investment banker.
2.āÆ āhow should I describe roles prior to my career change?ā ā talk about your prior career roles in terms that make
sense for your current career ā focusing on lessons you learned and skills you gained that transfer. If you were a
nurse who changed to teaching, skip the ārecognized as best catheter and IV nurse in the Childrensā Wardā but
include āDeveloped ability to relate to and put children at ease when faced with new or diļ¬cult things while caring
for them in the Childrensā Ward.ā.
Your Purpose
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1.āÆ Tie everything together ā use same fonts, sizes, colors ā use the same general structure for
roles. Your proļ¬le will be easier to read.
2.āÆ Pay acen,on to everything in your proļ¬leā¦it is all visible...every stray comma, every spelling
mistake, every odd inclusion that has no bearing on your purpose...
3.āÆ Make sure your proļ¬le and your resume complement each other ā things like ,tles, dates,
companies, and chronology should all match exactly. Things like job descrip,ons,
responsibili,es, and accomplishments may be worded diļ¬erently but should s,ll boil down
to the same thing. (see next point)
4.āÆ Donāt lie! (wonāt lecture here but I stop reading about a candidate if I detect anything that
does not pass the sniļ¬ test or is in clear conļ¬ict with a known fact)
Tips & Tricks:
1.āÆ Use a background image for your proļ¬le to add some character to it. Make sure you own the legal rights
to it...
2.āÆ Pick company and school names that match exis,ng ones in LinkedInĀ®that have the most users (for
example I could have put āShell Oil Products USā but chose to put āShellā instead ā the former had a few
hundred employees while the lacer had over 100,000...colleagues, classmates, and recruiters/hiring
managers will ļ¬nd you becer this way.
3.āÆ Skip nicknames...unless you are a military pilot who intends to remain one indeļ¬nitely, nobody will really
care what your callsign is/was (Sorry Maverick & Goose) and wonāt think youāre more professional for
lis,ng it...if you use a nickname professionally (and not your real name) then skip the real name...
4.āÆ Jargon should be translated as much as possible...
The Licle Details
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1.āÆ List all formal degrees.
2.āÆ Include at least years acended and degrees earned.
3.āÆ The other details ā if you were a 4.0 student Iād include itā¦if you were a 3.4 student maybe
not? Ac,vi,es ā canāt hurt as long as they support your purpose...
4.āÆ Media/Other materials ā if educa,on cons,tutes the bulk of your marketability you may
want to include important and very well done presenta,ons, papers or other academic
work...otherwise and once you are more than a couple years out of college, please donāt (I
suppose unless the work you did just received the Nobel Prize).
5.āÆ High School ā to include or not? Well I say include it...if for no other reason than helping an
old high school buddy who is now CEO of a company to ļ¬nd you easier on LI...
Tips & Tricks:
1.āÆ This sec,on should be straight-foward ā donāt overthink it!
Educa,on
āAn investment in knowledge pays the best interest.ā
-Benjamin Franklin
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Cer,ļ¬ca,ons:
1.āÆ If you have one and it is important to your purpose, list itā¦if not donāt.
2.āÆ If it has expired, list it but show that it is expired...
3.āÆ If it is no longer relevant...your choice...being a cer,ļ¬ed 8-track repairman if you are an
electronics technician might just make you look a licle old?
Courses:
1.āÆ If you took it, list it as long as it is important to your purpose.
2.āÆ Link these to jobs if applicable...then will show up in the Experiences Sec,on.
Tips & Tricks:
1.āÆ This sec,on should be straight-foward ā donāt overthink it!
2.āÆ But do list everything that applies! (but if you are an MMA ļ¬ghter and TV personality, you
might leave the Doctor of Mixology from Harvard oļ¬)
Cer,ļ¬ca,ons & Courses
āI had a cer,ļ¬cate that said, 'Doctor of Mixology, Harvard University,' that I actually got
from Harvard University. A friend of mine was a research assistant over there and it was
one of those student or university perks and she brought me in on that. So I am a
doctorate from Harvard and it only took me one axernoon.ā
-Rhonda Rousey