LinkedIn for College Students: Why Join Today?

April 03, 2024 :: Admissionado Team

Argh! Gmail, Facebook, X, Linkedin?! You may be thinking how you’ve had enough of all this technology. The phrases “online presence” and “professional network” may make you nauseous. Well get over it, my friend. It’s time to join Linkedin. Linkedin is a great site to help you stay connected with people in your field, and to learn about potential employers. Here are some scenarios in which Linkedin can be helpful:

Job or Internship Interviews: If you have an interview scheduled, you can look up the professional background of the person who is interviewing you. This gives you a sense of who they are, what their knowledge is, what they might be looking for, and any key interests that you have in common.

Planning your career: You want to be an asset manager and run your own company one day, but you have no idea how to get there. You can check out the profile of someone on Linkedin who has the career that you want, see their past job experience, and get a sense of how they got to be where they are.

Staying in touch with colleagues: You met some great people at a career fair, but they ran out of business cards (or didn’t have business cards). You don’t want to friend them on Facebook, because that’s too informal. You can most likely find them on Linkedin.

Your resume is too long: Maybe you are just so totally awesome and have a ton of job and internship experience, so much so that you can’t fit it all on the standard one-page resume format. On Linkedin, you can share everything that you want to share, and potential employers can go to your page to get a better picture of who you are and what you bring to the table.

Deciding on a job: Oh wonder of wonders, you’ve been offered a job at two different companies and are in the rare and glorious position of getting to choose. You can research those companies on Linkedin and see what kinds of people work there currently or worked there in the past to find out whether it’s a place that’s right for you.

Relationships with professors:

Most of the time, you don’t just drop your professors an e-mail after you graduate to keep them informed about what you’re doing with your life post-grad. That’s a little awkward. But if you connect with them on Linkedin, they can see your resume, where you’re working, what jobs you’re looking for, and might be able to help you in the future if you need a recommendation because they will feel like you’ve stayed in touch.

Relationships with fellow students:

You might be connected to many classmates on Facebook, but you might not be friends with others. Or, your friends may have some background in a field that you didn’t know they had, either because it never came up in conversation or because they never posted it on Facebook. But your friend may post it on Linkedin, which could be a potential connection for a job later on.

Inform people of what you’re doing:

Updated your blog or website? Got a new job? Looking for a new job? Started a Masters program? Graduated from your Masters program? When you update your Linkedin profile, all of your connections can see the update and what has changed. And whatever that change was might come at the right time if an employer who you’re linked to sees it, which could land you a job interview.

Share common interests, stay in the loop:

You graduated from college or grad school and are looking for a job, but in the meantime you’re feeling somewhat intellectually isolated. With no courses or academic conferences or papers to write or exams to study for, you feel disconnected. On Linkedin you can join groups that cater to your specific professional and academic interests, connect to thought leaders in those areas, and get to know others who share your interests.

Find a job:

Yes, there’s many, many, MANY job websites out there, from Monster to  Craigslist to your university’s career website to a billion others. But on LinkedIn, you can see other people in your network (or in your friends’ networks) who work at the companies that are hiring. This allows you an entryway to connect with people who could help you get that job when you apply.

In summation, as long as you create a professional and thoughtful profile, LinkedIn can really only help your career. Whether you’re preparing for job interviews, planning your career path, staying in touch with colleagues, or finding your next job opportunity, LinkedIn offers invaluable tools and connections. Now go sign up and start building your professional network today!