How to Turn Your LinkedIn Profile into a usable Resume

If anyone's ever performed a job search before, the first thing you usually need is a resume...but where to begin in this day and age right? Turns out there's good news for anyone with a LinkedIn account. LinkedIn has a resume builder, found at: resume.linkedinlabs.com which can help you set one up with just a few clicks.

Image from the Grovo Blog at blog.grovo.com

Something to remember with this tool, is that information is pulled directly from your LinkedIn profile...so the more filled out your profile is, the better your resume is going to look. It is worth taking a few minutes to refine your LinkedIn account profile first if you have the time.

Once you're happy with your Account Profile just head over to: http://resume.linkedinlabs.com and sign in. You will notice quite a few options they provide for you after you've selected your resume format including among others: 1) A public url where your online resume is located and can be accessed from anywhere, 2) a 'PDF' option lets you save the document elsewhere for printing or whatever else, 3) You can manage the share settings to send to social networks if you wanted, & 4) There are privacy settings you can enable per resume regarding the visibility of the document.

So if you've already taken the time to fill out a profile on LinkedIn, and find yourself needing a resume, this option might be a great time and stress saving tool. Hope it helps and have a great day!

Creating a Complete Profile on Google Plus

Creating a Complete Profile

If your using a personal profile, your 'About' tab gives the option to fill in personal information about yourself. It's similar to the type of information Facebook or LinkedIn might ask you to fill in. Depending on how you want to use your Google Plus account (business, networking, just for fun) you can just fill in what is relevant for you.

Intentions

A helpful thing to think about before filling in your 'About' tab, is how you intend to use your Google+ account. Is it going to act as an online resume, just for fun account, networking and business connections only, or maybe a bit of everything? Figuring this out beforehand can help you streamline the type of information you choose to include and will help others determine if your a relevant account for them to follow.

Privacy Settings

When you click on your 'About' tab, you'll notice that when you scroll down your page, you'll see a bunch of sections, each with an 'edit' button in the lower left hand corner:

When you click on your 'edit' link you'll have the option to change the privacy settings for each of the sections of your Google Plus profile. After clicking the 'edit' link, look toward the upper right hand corner, for a box which will say 'Public' (depending on your settings)

Once you click on the 'Public' tab you'll see a menu of privacy options to choose from. Select the one most appropriate for you and you're all set with that section.

In this way you can control who does or does not see any piece of information about you, but it can still be unnerving to enter phone numbers, addresses or other bits of personally identifiable info - so use your best judgement when filling in personal info about yourself, while still trying to be thorough.

In Summary

Ultimately the more information you include in this section, the more your potential followers can learn about you in determining if they want to follow back. It also alerts others to the type of content they can expect you to post, which can help them decide to follow or not. In my own experiences, I've found that I'm more likely to follow an account with at least the basics filled in including a profile photo.