Most of the posts in my LinkedIn timeline cause me a lot of cringe, more than what I can bear and what I was expecting. I feel that half of them want to sell me something (including CEOs sharing how amazing their teams are), and the other half are self-promoting. It is effectively a job market, and I am suspicious of every booth.
The other day, I tried to be brave and post my unfiltered comments. It was my first post after a couple of years. It was immediately banned by the author. It’s so ridiculous that I cannot access the post (it throws a 500 error) when I’m logged in on LinkedIn, but if you search for it on Google, you can still read it. LinkedIn still tells me it reached X number of users, but if I click on the notification, it redirects me to a blank 500 page.
And after all, I understand it. This is a place where your boss reads your comments, and your future employers have a hint of what your company looks like. It is literally part of the job of the CEOs. I would also be careful about what I say because I would be afraid of any misinterpretation by Ronnie or Dan, and I am aware every word here represents not only me but also the impression that people get from my employer, but that doesn’t mean you need to stop being authentic. The “LinkedIn” style is so ubiquitous that I’m sure a high percentage of these posts are generated by ChatGPT. I mean, look at what it throws when I asked to describe what happened last week in a LinkedIn way, it just made it lose its essence.
There is hope, however. My network is full of very talented and cool people. Imagine if I could have this curated network on Twitter (I refuse to name it X) or Mastodon, or if discovering these profiles were as easy. Or imagine if most of the posts were more creative. I’m not saying that everything on LinkedIn is soulless; there is definitely stuff I find interesting that I reshare, but there is definitely a lot of noise.
So, I encourage you to be more authentic and post out-of-the-box. Don’t be afraid to be less corporate; I am eager to hear more. Not all companies are the same, and not all employees are the same as well. I am sure we can have a more diverse and vibrant community focused on our jobs, which anyway takes up a big part of our days. I am eager to get on LinkedIn and feel like I am not at some venture-capital virtual conference but more like in a public professional square.
Someone the other day said that “I am walking chaos.” I am not sure I can live up to that assertion, but I’ve learned that embracing a little chaos does not hurt and can lead to unexpected results. It’s a testament to the uniqueness of each person’s journey—chaos and all.