Your Network

[00:00:00]
>> Paul DeBettignies: I didn't start this presentation. It dawns on me, I probably should have with this. I am actually an introvert by nature. Just so y'all know. You're like, no. Really, I am. So I can do these presentations. This is fantastic and a lot of fun for me. And I will go home, and the girlfriend and the kids already know I won't talk to them tonight cuz it's just how I'm wired.

[00:00:19]
So I'm an introvert by nature, I have to use these tools. But the cool thing about doing it online is it's a little bit like,
>> Paul DeBettignies: It's a little passive-aggressive. I can post that status update and run. I didn't actually have to talk to anybody, at least not for the short run.

[00:00:35]
That's fantastic for me, okay. I love people, I love you all, but you all drain me cuz I'm an introvert, okay. And so this gives people an opportunity to be able to reach out but maybe not in so a personal way that you start feeling uncomfortable. So for the introverts in the room, I got your back.

[00:00:53]
>> Speaker 2: So what is I guess the general purpose of connecting on LinkedIn? I get that there's like networking, but I often get people, some rando in New York wants to connect with me, and maybe they have a job kind of similar to me. Usually it's some rando and it's unclear.

[00:01:11]
In my other networking profiles, like on Facebook, I'm not gonna friend you unless I know you and am a friend. Is there any value in accepting connections from people that-
>> Paul DeBettignies: The idea that if you are in the United States, I pretty much accept anyone's invitation, okay. I also get really good at, because of the role that I'm in, figuring out who the fake profiles.

[00:01:34]
That photo just doesn't look like one that someone would have on LinkedIn. And I'll actually at times do a reverse image in Google to figure out if it's someone's stolen photo and they mash some things together.
>> Speaker 2: So you as a recruiter, that makes a lot of sense.

[00:01:49]
>> Paul DeBettignies: For you as individually, if it's someone who's in the tech space, if it's someone, you're in the fashion space, right? If it's someone, so you may be getting a bunch of invites from people who are from LA or New York or Chicago or whatever it is. You kind of have to set your own, I don't want to use the word boundary, but frame how it is that you want to do that.

[00:02:11]
If a recruiter or an HR person is gonna connect with you on LinkedIn, If they're in your home country or if they're in the Mid-West and you're in the Mid-West, I would accept those all the time. And it's just like on Facebook too, right, you can disconnect with someone and they don't know.

[00:02:29]
So that's okay too. But find out what your, find out what your reason for being on here is. Some of you will just connect with everyone and send invites to everyone, that's okay. So my network, I sent out an email this morning that my network is very wide and shallow.

[00:02:46]
I know a lot of people this well, it's just the nature of the business that I'm in. There are CTOs in town who only have 150 connections, and 150 of them are with other CTOs in town. And that's how they use LinkedIn as a real private sort of network sort of thing.

[00:03:02]
>> Paul DeBettignies: Other questions before I keep going?
>> Speaker 3: I was gonna say, you can actually follow people without connecting with them as well.
>> Paul DeBettignies: Yep.
>> Speaker 3: And then as much as you creep on everyone's profiles and everything, but with a basic account you actually can run out of page views.

[00:03:16]
>> Paul DeBettignies: You can run out of page views on a free account now? I was unaware of that. So what happens is if you also start to send a lot of connections in a short amount of time, LinkedIn will put you in LinkedIn jail, as we affectionately call it, and they'll suspend your account for two to four days.

[00:03:31]
And then you have to send a message to LinkedIn support, say I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do that, I wasn't spamming a bunch of people, and grabble, grabble, grabble, right. Hope nobody from LinkedIn ever sees me say that. But there are there are some constraints to the tool.