My Top Ten Posts for 2013

The New Year holiday is often a time for reflection and for looking ahead.  While circumstances prevented me from blogging as much as I wanted, I still had a successful blogging year!  Below are my top 10 posts (number of views) written in 2013:

10)  Do You Have A Twin On LinkedIn?  Why duplicate profiles exist on LinkedIn and how you can remedy it if you have a duplicate profile.

9)  The $209,200 Question  My answer to the question, “What is the skill a graduating senior would need most in order to secure employment?”

8)  We Take Care of Our Own  What do Bruce Springsteen and networking have in common?

7)  The Value Of First Impressions  How first impressions of schools and universities participating in a college fair passed/failed.

6)  The Secret to a Successful Job Search  My answer to the question, “If you had to narrow down all of the various pieces of job search advice into the singular most important thing someone could do, what would that one thing be?”

5)  Twitter Players  What’s a “twitter player” and how do you spot one?

4)  Follow Up To:  LinkedIn Policy Is Guilty Until Proven Innocent  Responding to reader questions for more information, this follow-up post provides additional detail on LinkedIn’s #swam policy.

3)  Check Your Facebook Privacy Settings Ahead of Graph Search  A review of how to check and change your Facebook privacy settings.

2)  LinkedIn Policy Is Guilty Until Proven Innocent  This was the most commented on post I wrote in 2013, which criticizes LinkedIn’s Site Wide Automatic Moderation (#swam) policy for group posts.

1)  Recent Examples of PR – The Good, The Bad & The Ugly  In any given week, if you look for it, you’ll find examples of public relations; good, bad and ugly.  Here’s what I found at the time . . .

As 2013 winds to a close, I wish my readers a happy, healthy and prosperous 2014.  Thank you for reading, commenting and sharing my posts this year.  I look forward to sharing my knowledge, expertise and thoughts with you in 2014.

Advertisement

Follow Up To: LinkedIn Policy Is Guilty Until Proven Innocent

Despite my previous post “LinkedIn Policy Is Guilty Until Proven Innocent” being only three weeks old, it’s already climbed to be the third most viewed post I’ve written to date.  I guess the perceived injustice of LinkedIn’s policy on discussion posts and spam touched a nerve with many.  It should, if you actively post discussions to groups.

Many people asked me where on LinkedIn’s website they could read about this policy.  I tried to find it before I wrote that post and couldn’t.  All I had at the time was private correspondence between me and LinkedIn Support, as well as what other have shared (also correspondence).

You can read about other users’ experience with this policy in a LinkedIn forum:  http://community.linkedin.com/questions/573/why-are-my-updates-all-submitted-for-review-now.html

While the above link illustrates that users have been impacted by this policy, it’s still just a forum.  It’s not something “official” from LinkedIn.  Therefore, I’ve decided to share correspondence that I received from LinkedIn, because I feel it’s important to back up my criticism of their policy with something factual.

Correspondence One:

Here’s my polite request to LinkedIn support asking if they could provide me with a URL on their site that specifically talks about this policy:

Correspondence Two:

LinkedIn has a tendency to use canned responses.  I guess that’s understandable given the amount of messages they receive.  This didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know from their other correspondence.  It also didn’t give me a URL, which is all I wanted.  Here’s what they had to say:

Correspondence Three:

In a final attempt, I asked them once again for a link or URL they could point me towards which specifically details this new policy.  Sadly, they hide behind a generic user agreement and apparently do not address this specific policy on their site.

So at the end of the day, LinkedIn is a free site.  You’re not forced to participate.  They get to make the rules.  If you don’t like them, that’s your problem not theirs.

But, that doesn’t mean I have to be silent about an unfair policy that treats its users as guilty until proven innocent.  If you share these feelings, let LinkedIn know how you feel by contacting them directly through their site.  You can also help spread the word by sharing this post and the original post this links to.  And if you disagree, that’s fine too.  You’re still innocent until proven guilty in my eyes.  😉

LinkedIn Policy Is Guilty Until Proven Innocent

“Guilty until proven innocent” is the message that LinkedIn is sending with one of their recent changes (and there have been many) that you probably have not heard about.  LinkedIn is making a concerted effort to reduce spam in groups.  That’s a good thing!  The problem is, they’ve created a new policy that’s an over-reaction along the lines of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

Group managers in LinkedIn have a lot of power.  They can create rules for their group and decide if group membership should be open to all or closed (requiring approval).  As a closed group, they’re able to create criteria to join the group.  They have the ability to restrict the types of discussion posts that are allowed.  They could move a discussion to a promotions or jobs board instead of the main discussion board.  Group managers are able to delete a discussion they felt was inappropriate for whatever reason.  Further, should a group member be a repeat offender or have an egregious post, a group manager could place that member into a restrictive status where future posts would have to be moderated for approval.  As a final step, group managers have the ability to remove someone from a group and/or block them.

That’s a lot of power!  And as a Voltaire (allegedly) originally said (in French), “with great power comes great responsibility.”  If you belong to groups on LinkedIn, you undoubtedly belong to some groups that are managed well and some that do not.  That’s either the hard work and dedication of good group managers or the failure of poor ones.  Either way, it’s on the managers’ shoulders (and should be).

LinkedIn now has a policy that if one group manager or owner flags just one of your discussion threads as spam, your account is flagged as a spammer.  As a result, your account is flagged for moderation in every group you belong to, not just the group that originally flagged you.  It’s automatic.  There’s no review of your posting history.  There’s no investigation to see if what was posted was truly spam.  There’s no appeals process.  You’re guilty.  Period.

What constitutes “spam” becomes arbitrary and inconsistent.  If you want to be unrestricted, you have to ask the group owner/manager of every group you’re a member of to remove you from moderation.  It places additional administrative work on both the user and the group owner/manager.  Rather than letting managers manage the groups the way they want to, LinkedIn has become “Big Brother” and will paint its users with a broad brush, fairly or unfairly.

Yes, LinkedIn is a free site and they get to make their own rules.  But, with great power comes great responsibility.  Unfortunately, LinkedIn’s efforts to curtail spam by assuming guilty until proven innocent is lacking responsibility.  What’s your opinion of LinkedIn’s policy?  Is it appropriate?  Effective?  An over-reaction?

Update as of March 20, 2013:  Read my follow-up post here:  http://wp.me/p1LHj0-n7