 Whilst your headline, image and summary are the first things that someone reviewing your profile will read, what you want them to do is actually read further on down, to your work experience. However, sometimes there are small mistakes that are being made that will put off the reader. So here are my tips to improve the appearance of your job descriptions on LinkedIn.1. Link your job to the companyWhen you add a job on LinkedIn, you are asked for the name of the company that you worked for. |
Use 2 or 3 sentences to give the reader an overview of what your job entails, including some facts and figures. So if for example you are a manager, who do you manage, what do you manage, budget? 3. Use action words
Nowhere in your job description should it say “responsible for…” or “duties included”. Say what it is you do, using action words such as managed, led, grew, reduced, saved etc. 4. Use keywords
With all your research, you should have a good idea of the keywords that you should include for each job. If in doubt, take a look at your actual job description and the essential and desirable skills required for the job you are doing.
5. Keep it clear and concise
This means don’t use 4 words when one will do.
6. Use the correct tenses
This means use the present tense for your current job and past tense for previous jobs. This may seem like common sense, but it doesn’t always happen.
7. Don’t overdo the bullets
We’ve all seen it, the job description where it is just a long list of bullets. They are daunting to read and personally, I don’t bother. To make a job description more readable:
- Have an overview of the job
- Leave a space then add a section header such as “ACHIEVEMENTS” followed by the bulleted information
- Break down your achievements in that role so that they are grouped in no more than 3-5 achievements. If you have more than that, create different section headers
8. Frontload your achievements
So instead of saying
“Promoted to my current position where I excelled in sales, increasing them by 12% in the first year.”
Try
“Increased sales by 12% in the first year following my promotion”
The first thing the person reads is the achievement, but you can also see that it is much more concise.
9. Check for spelling and grammar
One thing that always lets people down is poor spelling. Just remember, in a survey cited by Susan Britton Whitcomb in her book “Resume Magic” 83.3% of recruiters cited typos and misspelling as their no.1 pet peeve closely followed by poor grammar (80.6%).
10. Don’t forget to link other sections to your job
Some sections like courses, projects and organisations can be linked to the relevant job. They can highlight professional development as well as achievements.
11. Ask for recommendations
When someone makes a recommendation on LinkedIn, they link it to the job that it relates to. These are a very powerful endorsement of your work, often seen as references in advance, and so shouldn’t be overlooked.
12. Add supporting information
LinkedIn allows you to upload images, PowerPoint presentations and pdf documents to specific jobs. These can be used to demonstrate and support what you have written in your job description.
If you found this blog post helpful, then please let me know, and if you feel you would benefit from some help with your LinkedIn profile, then consider getting a full, systematic review of your profile or some one to one training and support.