They haven’t quite made sense to me. Probably because of a complete lack of previous effort on my part.
Well, David Albrecht has a post that opens the door. Check out LinkedIn Endorsements and Accountants. He gives some background on the endorsement feature at LinkedIn. He thinks it is a good thing in terms of providing a basic level validation of your skill sets.
His comment:
Receiving an endorsement is a good thing, I think. And I appreciate every one. They can only come from people who know you the best. Most LinkedIn users seem to be stingy in issuing endorsements. If the endorsements come from a large enough group, they are reliable measures (in a similar fashion to IMDB film ratings).
He provides a link to a great article by Susan Adams at Forbes, “Everything You Need to Know About LinkedIn Endorsements.”
Ms. Adams’ article provide helpful background on the endorsement function. She thinks it is going to be around quite a while. That means we probably ought not ignore it.
She also provides superb tips on how to manage your listed skills and hide endorsements that don’t fit you, including a list of the specific boxes to click to find features.
Her suggestion is that endorsements aren’t a really big deal now to recruiters and potential employers. However, now would be a good time to start building your endorsements before they become a big deal.
I’ve just fine tuned my listed skills. Also added a bunch of endorsements for people whose work I know well.
Might be time to check out your endorsements and listed skills. If you don’t ‘get’ this endorsement thingie, check out the two articles above.
Jim,
One thing to remember is that endorsements are only for people who have made investments in the LinkedIn platforms and who have cultivated and nurtured their LinkedIn network.
If you are like so many CPAs, or professors, with a LinkedIn network of 50, then you are fairly inactive. With a LinkedIn network of only 50, you can only be endorsed by 50 people, at most. If some are relatively inactive like you, perhaps you’ll discover receiving endorsements from 10% of your network. And 10% of a size 50 network works out to 5 endorsements. Five doesn’t look very impressive.
For a lot of local CPAs, I think a network of 250-500 is a fair target. With a network of that size, it’s possible to ask for, and receive, endorsements from 25-30 on your key skill. To me, that is impressive because I know how difficult it is to get to that level.
Dave
Hi Dave:
Just browsed through my connections with that in mind. I do have a much smaller network than most of my contacts. Have only a slightly smaller number of endorsements than most.
How long will it be until having a respectable number of endorsements will be important? I perceived it isn’t that big of a deal right now, but don’t know when that will change.
Jim