Does anyone really care about Linked endorsements?

[Rich Lemert]

In his response to another thread, Dave mentioned how the original poster had very few endorsements in his/her LinkedIn profile. My question is just how valuable anyone considers these to be.

Personally, I pretty much ignore the endorsements when I look at someone's profile. They're too easy for someone to make. Half the time LinkedIn says "Does X know about left-handed bear traps?" and gives you the option to endorse that person then and there. I also see too many endorsements coming from people who have no clue whether or not the person in question actually has any skills in that area.

What does catch my attention are Recommendations. These actually require the person making the recommendation to take an active role in the process. Furthermore, you can generally tell from the text whether or not the person making the recommendation has any clue how the person being recommended performs in that role.

What do the rest of you think?

[D.X.]

Hi Rich,

From my view no. The Problem with the endorsements is that the credbility behind them is questionable because in my experience those making the endorsements can't really comment to the extent that I versed in those skills. I would never ask most of those endorsers to talk to that skill set on my behalf in an official capacity.

For example, I had one Person endorse me for "Hospital Sales". That's all well and a nice, and I appreciate the endorsement, but I never did do Hospital Sales. I may have supported sales in a hosptial Setting, I may have provided some material and data to be used in a hosptial Setting and included Hospital access as part of my strategy, but never have I done hosptial sales. Then after that endorsement others, started to add to the number of endorsements for Hospital sales. Then one can then look at Job history and see i never did that, there is no "key accounts manager" title in my history. I had a number of Folks also endorsement for a TA i've never worked in, maybe I touched it briefly from a 38,000 foot view but can't say i did anything or know anything there, so I deleted that.

Then I've had others who have never worked with me, endorse me for skills. So another crediblity issue here. Well intended but for the most part I would never Point to many the Folks who endorse for a skill as a credible reference. Lets face it, you log on to Linkedin and you are asked to endorsed People for skills that are pre-populated and if you're in the mood you click off without thinking much.

I believe the Primary purpose of that function is really to serve as a "key word" search function. So from a key work perspective, what skills do I want to Highlight if a search based on key words are done.

From my Company HR department Point of view, they don't place any weight on endorsements either due to the credibility issues I mentione d above.

The only harm I see with the endorsement, when used to list skills is that one can run the risk of being viewed as too techinical if one only list techinical skills or has too many of them. So if one puts PCR, or Western Blot as skills, well that's good maybe if you're looking for a Job as Research scientist, not so good if you looking for a Job as a pharmaceutical sales rep.

So for me, I use the endorsements as a key word function and as a strategic list of "subject matter" skills I want to communicate for others who view my Profile (as the eye is drawn to that Location). And I try to avoid being too broad with my skills. I wont' have "Management" - what's that? or "leadership". What's that exactly (as a skill)?

So for me, I'd have Marketing, Medical Affairs, Health Economics, Publications Management, Commerical Strategy, Market Analytics etc. etc. etc. Maybe some TA's I worked in, i.e. Oncology, Rare Disease, Biosimilars, ADHD etc. I don't care who endorses.

The recommendations function I use as well, not for all my Jobs due to laziness of asking, but whereas that is well and nice, like any recommendation, they are subject to bias, i'm not going to ask someone I didn't collaborate well with to write me a recommendation, or even serve as a recommendation in an interview process right? And then if you look deeply, you'll find that in General there is an Exchange of recommendations, so you get one, and then you return the favor and write one back. No bias there ..uh huh. Scratch my back type Approach. But nonetheless that has more crediblity than endorsements.


Hope I gave some insights there, so for endorsements, no value really, for a list of targeted skill sets (key words), then hey good to go.

Dx

[Dave Jensen]

Good point, Rich and thanks DX for the advice as well.

I called it endorsements, but I was referring to recommendations. I do think that the endorsements section of the person's page has meaning, however, as a list of skill areas and to separate out the spammers from the real linked-in pages. They say that the #1 way you can tell a spam linked-in request from a real one is when that person has ZERO endorsements for skill areas. If that's the case, it's likely a spammer.

Dave

[Ana]

They say that the #1 way you can tell a spam linked-in request from a real one is when that person has ZERO endorsements for skill areas. If that's the case, it's likely a spammer.

Great point! take it as if they were saying "this is a real person that I've met before".

[Parker]

No LinkedIn has this funny feature where they suggest skills for you to endorse your contacts for. I routinely get endorsed for things I have never done by people I barely know (usually someone I met at a conference or networking event adds me on LinkedIn (or vice versa) endorses me for a technique that I've never performed in my life). I reject those but I wouldn't be surprised if some people's profiles are filled with such endorsements.

[Dave Jensen]

No LinkedIn has this funny feature where they suggest skills for you to endorse your contacts for. I routinely get endorsed for things I have never done by people I barely know (usually someone I met at a conference or networking event adds me on LinkedIn (or vice versa) endorses me for a technique that I've never performed in my life). I reject those but I wouldn't be surprised if some people's profiles are filled with such endorsements.

Because you are selected for a call or request from employers (or their agents) based on the number of endorsements you have in the major fields of your expertise, I would suggest you accept them from anyone and everyone when they come your way. Nothing unethical about that -- of course, not if you haven't done that type of work! But seriously, if there are a hundred LI profiles in front of a recruiter looking for a Cell-Based Assay specialist, and you have 10 endorsements for that and someone else has 50, that other person gets the call. These "endorsements" are only to get you in front of someone -- then, you have to prove you know the field, so the fakers get dropped don't worry about that.

Dave

[Rich Lemert]

Sorry, Dave, but I can't help feel this advice adds to the stereotype of the "lazy" recruiter. Rather than actually look at the quality of one's background, you fall back onto what's little more than a popularity contest.

I'm not a recruiter, nor am I a hiring manager. However, if I was I cannot see myself paying any attention to how many endorsements someone has received on LinkedIn because I've received too many myself from people who have no idea what my skills are. Show me a quality recommendation, though, and now you've got my attention.

Heck, I don't even accept most of the "please connect with me" requests I get. If it's LinkedIn's default request and comes from someone I don't know - even if I recognize the name, it's probably not going to get accepted. As a minimum, at least tell me why you want to connect with me.

[Dave Jensen]

Sorry, Dave, but I can't help feel this advice adds to the stereotype of the "lazy" recruiter. Rather than actually look at the quality of one's background, you fall back onto what's little more than a popularity contest.

I'm not a recruiter, nor am I a hiring manager. However, if I was I cannot see myself paying any attention to how many endorsements someone has received on LinkedIn because I've received too many myself from people who have no idea what my skills are. Show me a quality recommendation, though, and now you've got my attention.

Heck, I don't even accept most of the "please connect with me" requests I get. If it's LinkedIn's default request and comes from someone I don't know - even if I recognize the name, it's probably not going to get accepted. As a minimum, at least tell me why you want to connect with me.

Rich, don't be sorry -- recruiters ARE lazy. You have hundreds and hundreds of profiles to scan. You give each one about 3 seconds. You choose the ones that have the highest number of endorsements (those have the little pictures of people on them) or people who just fit the best with the job description. You are RIGHT about "recommendations" though -- that's something different! Those are important, because people who know you well can say whatever they want, and I always notice when there are recommendations and read them if I have the time. So we've got to keep straight the commentary about recommendations versus endorsements. The latter is just a visible way of showing that you have certain skill areas.

You can be as fussy as you'd like about whose invitation you accept or don't accept -- for me, I ensure I look at the profile, check to see if there are endorsements (because if there are no endorsements, it is likely a scammer), and take most of them. That's because I want to have the largest amount of connections possible, because it helps me see others when I am doing a search. You may not need or want that, but to some extent, you will be "found" more often with higher numbers of connections. I agree with you Rich -- it's so tacky to send out those standard language invites, when all it takes is a few seconds to customize them and make it more personal.

So, at the risk of repeating myself, "endorsements" are important only because they ARE INDEED a popularity contest, no one take them seriously, but if you've got hundreds supporting you in some area of expertise, you're going to get calls about that niche from employers or recruiters.

Dave

[Parker]

Because you are selected for a call or request from employers (or their agents) based on the number of endorsements you have in the major fields of your expertise, I would suggest you accept them from anyone and everyone when they come your way. Nothing unethical about that -- of course, not if you haven't done that type of work! But seriously, if there are a hundred LI profiles in front of a recruiter looking for a Cell-Based Assay specialist, and you have 10 endorsements for that and someone else has 50, that other person gets the call. These "endorsements" are only to get you in front of someone -- then, you have to prove you know the field, so the fakers get dropped don't worry about that.

Dave

Thanks for pointing that out. I should state that what I don't want is to fill my profile with skills that I don't want to highlight because I don't want hiring managers or recruiters thinking I'm more suitable for a certain type of job that I'm not interested in (e.g. too many bench skills when what I'm looking for is something else). Like you said, people don't pay careful attention. I would rather draw their limited attention to a specific skill set that I want to highlight rather than the number of endorsements for something that I don't really care about. How much are 150+ endorsements for Western Blotting worth when I'm looking for a job in regulatory affairs? For this reason, I personally reject >50% of my endorsements because they are endorsing me for skills that I either don't have at all or don't want to highlight. But that's just me. I wouldn't be surprised if some people just randomly endorse everyone on their network for everything hoping that the favour is returned.

[Dave Jensen]

Because you are selected for a call or request from employers (or their agents) based on the number of endorsements you have in the major fields of your expertise, I would suggest you accept them from anyone and everyone when they come your way. Nothing unethical about that -- of course, not if you haven't done that type of work! But seriously, if there are a hundred LI profiles in front of a recruiter looking for a Cell-Based Assay specialist, and you have 10 endorsements for that and someone else has 50, that other person gets the call. These "endorsements" are only to get you in front of someone -- then, you have to prove you know the field, so the fakers get dropped don't worry about that.

Dave

Thanks for pointing that out. I should state that what I don't want is to fill my profile with skills that I don't want to highlight because I don't want hiring managers or recruiters thinking I'm more suitable for a certain type of job that I'm not interested in (e.g. too many bench skills when what I'm looking for is something else). Like you said, people don't pay careful attention. I would rather draw their limited attention to a specific skill set that I want to highlight rather than the number of endorsements for something that I don't really care about. How much are 150+ endorsements for Western Blotting worth when I'm looking for a job in regulatory affairs? For this reason, I personally reject >50% of my endorsements because they are endorsing me for skills that I either don't have at all or don't want to highlight. But that's just me. I wouldn't be surprised if some people just randomly endorse everyone on their network for everything hoping that the favour is returned.

Sounds like you have a good handle on it, Parker. Yes, you should remain in control (and LI allows you to control it) of the endorsements. I see your point and it's a good one about directing endorsements into given areas. Trim off the others you don't want!

Dave