LinkedIn Posts Are Decadent and Depraved

LinkedIn is the worst social network, in my opinion. The company sits at a fork in the road where hustle culture branches off into boomer stereotypes and automated sales pitches. While somewhat useful as a digital resume and Rolodex, the website seemingly has the lowest level of collective empathy of any social network.

Full Line Break

The entire point of LinkedIn posts is to be seen as a professional who should be hired, promoted, or retained. To be seen as a professional, you must talk business.

For some reason, on LinkedIn, you must also write fairly long social media updates exclusively using one-sentence paragraphs.

Trust me, one-sentence paragraphs help with engagement.

Don’t forget the first sentence is your hook.

Remember, the first three sentences are above the fold.

Oh, and use words like “trust”, so people know to trust you.

And on and on, these posts will go. Until the logical conclusion, with a single word;

“Thoughts?”

Guys This Really Happened

Most of these posts are trite. They are ads intended only to remind people that the poster exists as a professional who should be hired, promoted, or retained. Reach and frequency matter in advertising. If you’re worried your ads explaining how two kittens playing in a box is a metaphor for B2B sales aren’t being seen enough, crank it up by adding some tales of mystery & imagination.

There are many guides out there for telling a compelling story. So I won’t go into general tactics here. But you don’t need to find a moral within a box of kittens. You can start with a moral in mind and make up a story around it.

Fake stories with a clear moral are a popular subset of viral LinkedIn content. Sort of modern-day Aesop’s Fables, all tied to the corporate workforce and mostly with the author as the protagonist. I’ve seen at least 20 variations of a story where the hiring manager (always the post’s author) is treated rudely in the lobby of a building by the very person they will soon be interviewing.

The moral of that story, for those who may think it’s “be kind to all”, is actually “don’t mess with me [the person who wrote the post], I do big business, and I deserve respect. I am a professional who should be hired, promoted, or retained.”

Another recurring storyline of viral LinkedIn posts is recruiters complaining about people no-showing interviews and sending the recruiter an image of a wrecked car they found on Google. This parable offers a build-your-own lesson.

You may choose to learn not to cross recruiters, as they are clever and can use reverse image lookup, or to avoid working with that recruiter. No matter how hamfisted the moral in the script, it’s up to the audience to define the meaning. It’s all just the creative for an ad, anyway.

The Advice

As the goal of any good LinkedIn post is to establish you as a professional, someone important who should be given more importance and more money. It’s best to showcase the characteristics of a professional. This means advising those who are less senior in their careers.

You could dispense advice by publishing a 29,000-word allegory with one-sentence paragraphs. Or you could use other people’s advice, already repackaged, as a graphic for easy posting. Work smarter, not harder, am I right?

I recently saw an image describing 10 Things that require no talent. These commandments, possibly handed down by god himself, were:

1. Being On Time
2. Making An Effort
3. Being High Energy
4. Having A Positive Attitude
5. Being Passionate
6. Using Good Body Language
7. Being Coachable
8. Doing A Little Extra
9.  Being Prepared
10. Having A Strong Work Ethic

The fact post like this go viral is why I said LinkedIn has the lowest level of collective empathy of any social network. I do not consider any of these advice nuggets to be inherently bad. But, most are context-dependent and assume a degree of order in life that is not afforded to all.

Being on time is good, but it’s much easier for someone who is transportation independent. I’ve known many people who didn’t or couldn’t drive; they took mass transit. A drive to one client’s office is 44-minutes, but it would take me 1.4 hours by mass transit requiring two buses and two miles of walking.

Making an effort is context-dependent and very often unnoticed. If the big business boss is currently upset that someone is 10 minutes late for work, will his entire attitude change if he hears the tardy party made an effort and left the house three hours early but missed the second bus?

Who is deciding what meets the standard for being high energy? Should people be taking crack-smoking breaks to hit a benchmark for high energy? What about when it’s better to sit quietly?

Having a positive attitude, being passionate, using good body language, and being coachable are all to some degree or another in the eye of the beholder. Is the beholder who matters a level-headed and observant person who is good at coaching? In other words, is every person in every company from the shift supervisor to the CEO a reasonable, and non-petty human? Keep in mind, that Elon Musk is attempting to buy Twitter mostly for attention and to own the libs.

Also, what are the meanings of doing a little extra, being prepared, and having a strong work ethic? Because those three, in particular, can easily mean, working for free at home, unpaid, and off the clock, so you are prepared.

My point is that this list, and the many others like it, could have the same meaning as my list of 5 things that require no talent:

1. Showing up to work early
2. Staying at work late
3. Fasting so you can work without a lunch break
4. Drinking dangerous amounts of coffee so you can work more hours
5. Not complaining about OSHA violations

I’m not writing all this to condemn everyone who suggests working hard or being on time. I’m not trying to defend every lazy person in the workforce. Honestly, I’m writing this because I run a digital ad agency, and I need people to think of me as a professional who should be hired, promoted, or retained.

Thoughts?

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Edit: grammar correction 6/24/22