LinkedIn Profile Tips 1.4 – Relevant Work experience and Education

LinkedIn Work Experience and Education section are synonymous with the Professional Experience and Educational Qualification column of a resume. But the LinkedIn version is digital and dynamic. You can retouch, refine, revise, rewrite and rearrange as many times as you prefer, without wasting precious sheets.

And another benefit is that a detailed work experience improves your online presence. It increases your visibility through the use of appropriate keywords.

So, open your resume, copy the content to pertinent sections in the LinkedIn profile and tweak it to bring the best out of it. Here are a few tips.

This is Part 1.4 of “How to use LinkedIn to get jobs?” series.

List all jobs

Your resume needs to be concise and tailored to the role every time you apply for a job. But, in your LinkedIn work experience field, you can mention all the jobs you have undertaken. It should be in reverse chronological order with the recent ones leading the list.

Put in your job title, name the company you have worked for and then, mention the dates. Also, make sure that you include the official LinkedIn page of the company if one exists.

Pro Tip – List a “current” experience even when you aren’t having any. For example, if you’re searching for a position dealing with accounts, create a dummy listing with “Accounts Manager” as the title. The company can be “Seeking new opportunities” or “Looking for a change”.

Use relevant keywords

Okay, you might be the Marketing Mogambo, Chief Chatter or The Alchemist at a company, but recruiters don’t use such terms to hunt for candidates. So, have general terms, aka keywords, in the description field. I told about keywords in brief in my article about LinkedIn profile headline.

Marketing Manager, Call Centre Assistant or Product Development Strategist, whatever you’re in the real world, use those terms in the work experience description field. You can write up to 2000 characters to describe your role; start with an overview.

Describe your achievements

Once you know the keywords, use them in the job title field and also, in the LinkedIn work experience description box. Provide an overview of the company and what’s your role there. And then, bullet down your day-to-day tasks. You can incorporate “coffee-making” on the list too, but make sure that the list isn’t humongous. 3-5 points should be fine.

When making the bullets, start with your accomplishments and contributions.

• Sold 538 drones within 7 weeks?
• Improved battery efficiency by suggesting design changes in the camera module?
• Surveyed the customers and proposed a secret capsule chamber in the drone?
• Changed the colour for better visibility?
• Managed 3123 minions?

Well, whatever your achievements are, highlight them.

Make it visual

Similar to your LinkedIn profile summary, LinkedIn work experience section allows you to include related links and documents. Whether it is a letter of recommendation by your manager, the employee of the year certificate or a PowerPoint presentation you created, add them all.

Visuals have a stronger appeal than text. So, make optimum use of the feature.

Index your qualifications

A well-laid LinkedIn education section can just be the missing piece of the puzzle which leads you to your dream job. Apart from telling the recruiters about your professional competencies, it also allows your batch mates to connect with you. You can thus ask for referrals and recommendations from people who already know you.

List your education in reverse chronological order like you did with your jobs. And enter the official names of your classes/degrees. Pay attention to details and CAPS. Don’t write everything in ALL CAPS or small caps. It applies to LinkedIn work experience, LinkedIn education section, certificates and everything else.

And while you’re indexing your educational qualifications, don’t forget to include that you were the top performer in your batch for 3 years straight. Yeah, add all that’s important, in bullets.

Put up your certificates

Once the LinkedIn work experience and education section are complete, don’t stop there. LinkedIn provides space to add other relevant certificates which you’ve earned separately. Your “Coffee Sommelier” certificate might get you selected for the role of an intern, just saying.

Include volunteer experiences

Volunteering for a cause can throw some light on various skills which otherwise aren’t prominent in your professional and educational qualifications. So, keep that section complete with relevant information.

Languages you speak, awards you won, projects you took part in and any other activity which you undertook professionally, include them all. Those might be optional, but having a complete LinkedIn profile can impress people. So, go through your resume and check for any information which you might have missed to include in your LinkedIn profile.

And ensure that the details in your resume are in sync with your LinkedIn work experience, education and other information.