Know What You Are “About”

LinkedIn is one of the most powerful tools you can use to have our clients move their careers forward. It’s also a considerable paradox. On the surface, it seems straightforward. It is anything but.

Consider the “About” section. How natural for uninformed users (that’s most of them and nearly all of our clients) to think they should use this section to tell readers about themselves. They narrate their history with perhaps a smattering of keywords. 

If only things were that simple. 

Writing the “About” section can be the most difficult writing you’ll ever do. Earnest Hemingway called good writing “more difficult than anything else that I have ever done.” 

This key section spells out what your clients offer recruiters, hiring officials, and potential members of their network. Those are the people who will determine our clients’ success. Said another way, it isn’t so much about the clients as it is about the value they offer others. Their “About” sections must be irresistible statements of your clients’ brand.

You must write concisely. Consider this approach. Begin by striving to get the words on paper. Your first proof is just to be sure the key ideas are present. Your second proof is to be sure your writing follows a pattern. Typical patterns include problem-solution, chronological, topical, reasoning, cause and effect, and general-to-specific.

The last proof strives for conciseness. Use the simplest words that work. Cut every single word that doesn’t carry its own weight.

Your stories must show how your clients’ skills can be used in other industries, other companies, and other markets. Quantify results whenever you can. The person with the number often wins. And above all everything you write must fold in, seamlessly, the key skills your client offers.

Scan applicable announcements. Consider making AI queries. Here’s an example:

“I am an experienced career coach. My client is a senior program manager. It’s important I illustrate his ability to employ the key skills associated with the best in his field. Please tell me what those skills are. Use simple wording and active voice. Include how someone can prove those skills.”

The results you will get will be general, overall skills. But those are the very capabilities leaders in the field need. 

To capture the more specific capabilities you should include in the LinkedIn profile, see how skills are described on the websites of  professional organizations tied to your client’s industry.

As you capture the skills include examples of your clients using them very well. Yes, recruiters and the like are looking for named skills, but they value proof.

While your clients may tell you which skills are involved, you must go beyond that. They think like a practitioner. But your writing must appeal to the way your readers, employers, think. 

Here’s another example. My client was transitioning from sales into public relations. When I asked her what skills were required, she said PR people should be organized. If I used her words, I would inadvertently document the minimum standards. Nobody would ever hire someone who wasn’t organized. 

When we talked to a PR mentor the skill required became vivid. He said PR people cannot organize what’s happening today. They must be able to “organize” what most likely will happen in the future. That’s the key to finding the difference between a fad and a trend. Leadership values the latter and doesn’t want to be distracted by the former.

Of course, you must go beyond trotting out a collection of skills-related words in the “About” section. Be sure you include them in the skills portion of the LinkedIn profile just as you did when you wrote the résumé. You’ll get even more impact when skills are natural parts of the Services, Activity, Experience, and Project sections as well.

Even before you proof your work, may I suggest you ask these key questions? What do you want readers to do as a result of what you wrote? Have you given them clear and compelling proof your client will make them a great deal more money than it takes to hire them?

What do you want your clients to do as a result of what you’ve written? The short answer is: be active. They must capture those skills in what they write (or you write for them) in the articles they submit in trade newsletters and publications, in their contributions to their own and others’ blogs.

Skills make all the difference in authentic networking. Most clients think networking is a mutually mortifying ritual as they impose on every friend, relative, and total stranger to ask for something that none of them can give: a job. You, of course, know genuine networking offers value to those most likely to reciprocate, but without any anticipation of results.

LinkedIn should be your clients’ key networking platform. Since so few of their competing jobseekers use it well, your client’s efforts will stand out. 

Your client can add valuable potential members of their network. LinkedIn’s search engine and its filters can uncover specific names of those who can truly help.

Here’s an example from one of my clients, a marketing executive seeking to broaden his knowledge of AI. His search uncovered an expert named Jon. Jon’s a rising star exploring new ways to use AI to grow market segment. Here’s the invitation he sent:

“Jon:

When I came across your profile, I think I’ve found opportunities for mutual benefit. 

Let me say right away I am not selling anything.

I would value your thoughts on this opportunity for mutual benefit. 

I have ten years’ marketing healthcare products. I’m happy to give you insider information on how to forecast those customers’ needs quickly and accurately.

You’re at the forefront applying AI in new markets. I could use some advice in that area.

When it comes to important things, emails just can’t replace people speaking with people. Could we arrange a ten minute conversation to see how we might help each other?

Mike”

I hope you now have insights on how to use the “About” section to transform LinkedIn from the “file and forget” approach most members use, to the active and forceful networking tool it should be. 

While I concentrated upon one section, the basic ideas apply to every part of your clients’ LinkedIn profile.

I am indebted to Robin Reshwan, the Program Manager for PARWCC’s new Certified Digital Career Strategist (CDCS) program. She’s done more than the deepest dive into all the value LinkedIn offers. She integrates the key ideas smoothly into a body of wisdom that will serve your clients better than ever. And there’s an added value: you can apply what you learn to your own profile.