GatewayRedbirds.com

My rave is that my IT contacts at Emerson are honoring me for their Pedal for the Cause bike ride. I am sharing my story and I'm going there Fri. for a pic with an Emerson biking shirt on (I am not a biker). I told them they should spotlight someone who was a serious warrior. I got off lucky (so far, knock on wood), but they insisted survivor stories were important/inspiring as well.

My rant is the people that link a ton of people on Linked In when they're looking for a new job. Past co-workers, acquaintances, people they don't know, etc. I don't know why, but it bugs me that they're only linking to people during their time of need for a network to find a new job. I know it's kind of irrational and I hope they get the support they need to find a new job, but why only link to people when you need them? Seems gratuitous to me.

Can you do anything with LinkedIn other than look for a job? To me, there's not much incentive to login or spend time linking people, until, of course there is, so not surprising that this is when people do it.

My wife got a series of job seeker training seminars free when she was laid off a year ago and was advised that you should have 500+ connections (because that's impressive somehow?), so I can see why people are just going for whoever they can get to accept. I'm curious whether this really matters. Seems totally nuts if it does.

I get a couple emails a month through linked in either touting a candidate looking for a job or seeking a candidate to fill a position. I'd guess over the past 5 years I've probably helped 7-8 people find homes. One was a friend who had been laid off and was looking for a job. The others have been people that fit a need in our company. It can be annoying and cumbersome since they do so much, but it's not terrible.

This thread just reminded me to change my Linked In status. I have an account strictly to stalk people, I don't really use it. I get requests from time to time that I just ignore, and I always wonder if I've pissed people off by not accepting them.

My new official Linked In title is now "I don't actively maintain this account".

Who cares about LinkedIn. Congrats, planet! Your story is inspiring and I'm glad it is being shared.