Larry’s on LinkedIn – are you?

 

With our CE Larry writing his public blog on LinkedIn, we decided to brush up on our LinkedIn skills with our resident expert from Ribit, Matthew Sayer.

We all know that great science requires collaboration to succeed. While there are so many different ways of building professional networks – whether it’s social media, conferences or events, LinkedIn is a great medium to complement your existing networks.

It works by letting you create a profile and make ‘connections’ with people you know and trust professionally. Once you’re up and running, you can start sharing ideas and joining groups related to your interests and expertise.

Still not sold? We dug up some pretty compelling stats:

• 2 new members join LinkedIn every second (around the world)
• More than 546 million users in 200 countries and territories use LinkedIn worldwide.

It only takes a couple of minutes to create a new profile, or update an existing one. But we know you’re strapped for time, so we thought we’d round up some tips from our resident career expert on getting the best experience from the site.

Matthew Sayer is the Operations and Growth Manager at Ribit, an online platform that connects students with digital, STEM, research and business skills to innovative companies and startups.

They also run curated ‘speed networking for jobs’ events. Let’s pick his brain.

The essentials

Start by filling out your profile in as many sections as possible – focus on using keywords in your job history and skills section to make your profile more likely to turn up in the search function (potentially by your future partners and collaborators!)

Take a look at the ultimate LinkedIn cheat sheet

Aim to complete as many sections of your profile as possible – and remember that your profile is 11 times more likely to be viewed if you have a professional profile picture.

‘Having a decent profile picture is a pretty big deal,’ says Matthew.

So ditch the selfie and aim for a recent professional headshot – or at least a nice photo of you in a social setting in professional clothes – no pets, kids, or friends – sorry!

Make sure you complete the headline and summary fields for a more compelling profile. Be sure to write about yourself in the first person, like Larry:

I’m Chief Executive of CSIRO, Australia’s National Science Agency and innovation catalyst. CSIRO solves Australia’s greatest challenges, turning excellent science into profound impact in partnership with industry, government, universities and the community.

‘Think of it as selling yourself – in the most grandiose way you feel comfortable,’ says Matthew.

Connect away

Matthew recommends that if you meet someone interesting at an event, add them as a connection to stay in touch.

You can take your networking to the next level by joining groups and following influencers (like our CE, for starters!).

Get sharing

We have a company page where we post the latest CSIRO news, so why not follow suit? Start posting about conferences you’ve attended, photos from the field, or a recent paper you have published.

‘If you’re going to post, set yourself a goal to try and post regularly – whether it’s weekly, or monthly – whatever works for you,’ says Matthew.

If you’re struggling with ideas on what to post, you can search the CSIRO Alumni events calendar to find out if there are any significant dates or awareness days you could post on or comment on, or use as a hook to highlight research or commercialisation opportunities.

If you need some inspiration on building a great profile, check out these staff members’ profiles: Leon Prentice, Scott Martin and Lisa Harvey-Smith

Don’t forget that by having a public profile, you’re also helping to boost awareness of CSIRO and demystifying what we do, increasing overall brand awareness towards CSIRO. So make the most of your spare 5 mins and get updating!

Check out Larry’s latest LinkedIn blog and follow him for more updates.