Follow professionals in your dream career

Written by Lisa Cranfield, Careers Consultant

“I’m not looking for a grad job or internship so no need to get on LinkedInyet, right?” Well, not quite. 

LinkedIn is so much more than an online CV for job hunters. Browsing profiles of people working in companies or careers that you aspire to can offer you invaluable career inspiration and insight.  If you are up for a bit of networking as well, you can reach out to people in careers you are aspiring to for insider tips and advice on how to break into their profession.  To increase the likelihood of a response, reaching out to University of Reading alumni is a good tip! If you are not sure about taking this step to reach out, perhaps knowing that such conversations could result in a job offer further down the line might encourage you.  It could be that the person you contact makes you aware of a job being advertised in the future or offers you the chance of some work experience – who knows what doors it might open.

As well as browsing other people profiles to find out the secrets of their success, you can follow individuals, organisations and companies to view articles/blogs, to help you build your knowledge of topical issues related to the career path you are interested in.  If you just carve out a bit of time each week to browse this social media platform instead of your usual favourites, just think how much topical knowledge and career insight you can build over the next year to impress once you are ready to start job hunting!

So, if you are interested in getting started on LinkedIn but not sure where to start, or maybe you have a profile but not sure if it’s up to scratch before you start reaching out, book a quick query appointment to get some feedback from a Careers Consultant, or look out for one of our LinkedIn workshops in our events listings.