recruiting

All the cool kids are doing it

For looking up people that you meet professionally and seeing if they are linked to any of your enemies.

Helpful for people moving to a new city to see what connections they didn't know they had, using search function.

Not very much, any more.

I've landed jobs with it and I find it useful for separating work v. Personal contacts. But I typically ignore its "newsfeed".

My sister has a profile on LinkedIn, and though she wasn't looking for a new job, she was scouted, interviewed, and offered a job. She didn't want the new job, but she took her offer to her current employer, and they offered her a multi-thousand dollar raise just to keep her from leaving. WINNING!

to connect with my professional network

For when you have a meeting with someone you've never met, and you're standing in line at the coffee shop trying to find them.

Mostly for recruiters to stalk people online. Also for people to share stories that aren't work related at all that should be shared actually on Facebook.

It's that place where people you've never met endorse you for skills you don't have!

well, now it's for microsoft

to make you feel like your are really connected. It outsources all that reaching into your pocket for a namecard to some guy named Mr. Alga Rythym.

Its a great connection platform for career highlights.. but the media you put out dosnt have a great reach so it seems like more of just a "hey look at me and my cool shit" platform in reality..