If you were a fly on my wall, you’d see me deep in books, sitting at my desk for most of the day.

It looks passive. But don’t be fooled. I’m a goal-driven professional. 

I have a vision for my career, and it’s big:

?Expand my client list

?Secure a traditional book deal (or several)

?Set up podcast partnerships to fully expand the Faithful on the Clock brand

?Pursue guest speaking and coaching opportunities

?Create courses and resources to support fellow writers

And LinkedIn is supposed to be the place to connect with like-minded professionals and achieve our goals…

…right?

We’ve been saying it is. 

But what if we’re focused so much on brand building and seeming relatable that we’re not actually helping each other make tangible progress?

Are we spending so much time sharing stories that we’re not helping each other actively move to the next chapter?

I explore those questions in this week’s Mind Uncensored.

Has LinkedIn Lost Its Pragmatism?

Unlike a lot of professionals, I didn’t put a lot of stock into LinkedIn right out of the gate. Part of the reason for that was that, when the platform launched, I wasn’t even out of college yet. Once I got out of college, I soon had my children, which led me to start freelancing. My perception was that LinkedIn wasn’t a place for creative freelancers, but rather for those who went to real, already-established businesses and wanted to climb the traditional ladder. Networking and finding a job were the core functionalities.

A lot’s changed since then.

Now, the gig economy is booming, and it’s not unusual for freelancers to have LinkedIn profiles at all. LinkedIn offers a host of tools that can help payrolled and independent professionals alike to connect with others in their industry (e.g., the ability to create an event), and it’s expanded with new media formats and options like courses.

But something else has changed, too.

The shift toward relatability

As the corporate world embraces the ideas of authenticity and storytelling, LinkedIn also has gained a much more personal vibe. There are jokes. Health and family updates. Vacation stories. You’ll still find classic how-to content and sales pitches. People still advertise themselves, and people do try to help each other out by resharing posts about needing work. But now, the single requirement is to make everything relatable.

So, can I search for a company or individual and follow their content? Can I share a resume, browse job listings, or link to my company website? Sure can.

But in leaning toward the personal, LinkedIn has become a true social media platform. People aren’t there just to find work. They aren’t there just to stay on top of conference options, share industry insights, or take a class. They’re also there to make some friends who can be genuine sources of understanding and support throughout their career journeys.

Engagement has become the primary goal

In an article for Inc.com, Joe Procopio notes how companies transitioned in the 1990s from plain, “musty” organizations to true brands with clearer purpose and character. They brought this new idea of brand differentiation and relatable customer connection into the social media space as platforms became mainstream. He argues that, like other social media platforms, LinkedIn has moved from friend-to-friend relationships to influencer-follower relationships. In his logic, companies and high-level leaders are influencers, while employees and customers are followers. He asserts that

“…LinkedIn’s job isn’t finding you a job, it’s getting you to engage with other influencers (companies) and followers (employees) by constantly maintaining a — hold on, let me go back up and copy/paste some words from that quote above — ‘comprehensive LinkedIn profile.’

LinkedIn is doing its job as long as it makes you ‘feel’ like you’re finding a job.”

“I won’t do, but I’ll teach”

Another piece of the puzzle? The trend toward DIY coaching. In a post, Frederike Harms notes that there’s a proliferation of LinkedIn professionals who focus on teaching skills to others. They won’t design your website, but they’ll teach you WordPress. They won’t do your analysis, but they’ll show you the steps to get and interpret the data yourself.

On the surface, this looks fine. There’s nothing wrong with learning new skills, after all. But if you’re not looking to acquire those skills and simply need a hand for whatever the duration of the current project is, the flood of coaches makes it more difficult to find someone who will actually provide the service you’re looking for.

Silence, success, and confusion

In my own experience, I’ve seen how LinkedIn also can blatantly fail to help a person achieve a work objective. Over the past month, for instance, I consistently posted about a Kickstarter campaign I was hosting. The efforts didn’t yield a single inquiry or pledge. Similarly, when I’ve advertised for a traditional book cover designer, I’ve met silence, too. Even polls seeking general feedback have been ignored, and no one made inquiries when I posted about my husband seeking a new IT position.

Some of this can be attributed the fact I’ve admittedly been pretty awful about one-on-one engagement. (I’m working on that.) And it’s also possible that there’s a mismatch between what I need and what people think is worth supporting.

But the number of impressions on those posts compared to posts from some other users also leaves me questioning the algorithm and general visibility. Even when I’m using hashtags, include images and video, and using all the other tricks like putting URLs the the comments, there doesn’t seem to be any sort of predictability to what gets seen and what doesn’t.

I’m curious about people now really absorb genuine requests for help or feedback, too.

Could it be that, because most LinkedIn content now is about “delivering value” in a personal way, people are so used to being beneficiaries that they struggle to reciprocate? If people don’t perceive that their main role is to actively participate in real objectives, especially if they think of themselves as followers (everyday workers) who don’t have the power of influencers (companies with hiring or decision-making power), it stands to reason that we’d see apathy.

But on the other hand, I have seen people rally for each other. I’ve seen people who had polls that worked. I’ve had people reach out to me because of a referral.

So, how pragmatic is LinkedIn, really?

LinkedIn isn’t a complete failure for getting things done. The effort you put in and the approach you take can influence whether people come on board when you need something.

But some users likely will find it easier to get help and move forward than others if certain posts get more visibility points than others. And the entire, passive-and-personal vibe of the platform might be making people less willing to get out of their chairs for others.

The pragmatism is still there, but it’s not at all consistent. It’s worth putting out the ask, but use LinkedIn as part of a larger strategy, and know what you’ll do if the response on the platform is crickets.

The original version of this post appeared in Wanda Thibodeaux’s Mind Uncensored newsletter April 10, 2025. Like this content? Subscribe to Mind Uncensored!

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