2024-2025 Purdue University Career Planning Handbook

Profile Photo Your profile photo should be a professional, high-quality headshot of yourself. Party photos, cartoon avatars, and cute photos of your cat do NOT fit here. Leverage Your LinkedIn

Name

Professional Headline Your profile headline provides your profile viewers with a short and memorable way to understand who you are, in a professional context. Think of the headline as a slogan for your professional brand. Keep it to first and last or first middle last if your name is common. Don’t use nicknames here.

Customize your LinkedIn URL to make it easy for people to find you.

URL

linkedin.com/in/purduepete

linkedin.com/in/purdue-pete12758293

About

Recommendations & Endorsements Nothing builds credibility like third-party endorsements. Think about soliciting recom mendations from professors, internship coor dinators, colleagues, employers, and profes sional mentor Endorsements are a great way to get recognized for your skills and help build your professional reputation. Overused Words & How to Avoid Them Instead of using the word “Leadership”, highlight the specific impact you’ve had with quantified results. Instead of using the word “Motivated”, highlight your work ethic and dedication by adding a few experiences where you’ve gone above and beyond. Instead of using the word “Creative”, describe a creative strategy you’ve used to highlight your creative value. Instead of using the word “Passionate”, talk about WHY you’re passionate or what you appreciate.

Your about section is where you get to introduce yourself to anyone who may look at your profile and your chance to show your best self. The about section can be informal, but still be sure to use correct grammar. You should be concise and confident about your goals and qualifications. Present your information in short blocks of text for easy reading. You may also format your information in bullet points. Aside from your headline, this is where viewers will get a sense of your personality and who you are. Include all career-relevant work experience, both paid and unpaid positions are fair game. Include more than a job description; tell the reader what you contributed and ac complished, quantify it to make the strongest impression. Be sure to look at job postings you are interested in and use those keywords in your experiences as appropriate. Include information about the institutions you have at tended and the degrees you have obtained or are pursu ing. Include your major(s) and minor(s), as well as high lights of your activities. This is also an appropriate place to show oo your strong GPA and any honors or award Experience Education

Join groups to find or be found by like-minded people and build your professional network. Join the “Purdue University Center for Career Opportunities” page to stay updated with us!

Focus on using examples to highlight those traits.

Be sure to schedule a quick chat to get your LinkedIn profile reviewed and see what updates LinkedIn has added to make sure that your profile is using all of the resources available to you!

NETWORKING

www.cco.purdue.edu 43