Not the real cover (yet to be designed)
Yes, it’s a huge gratifying relief to see an electronic version of what pages of your first book will look like.
And even more so, a small lump in your throat to know you conceived it, you managed the guests, the quotes, the citations, the permissions, and that you did it as a labor of giving back.
There is huge psychic compensation (as my friend calls it) in this self-fulfilling process of writing a why-to (not a how-to) book like this. Alas, no one writes a book on LinkedIn to get rich from it. But it’s a career milestone I am proud of, not just for my purposes, but as I say in the end chapter excerpted below, It’s the urge to help others who need to think more broadly of themselves as a brand. So I sum up what I have been blogging to you for years, regifted and rewrapped in prettier package in the book as well:
Let’s acknowledge that it perfectly admirable to brand market yourself in a finely tuned LinkedIn profile. Talking about yourself is expected. Let’s not endure the paralysis of self-branding many people experience.
My point: if you don’t get to renovating, reworking, self-expressing and rebranding, and do it soon, you will find other things get in the way. No time like the present to dig in. And if you don’t tell about yourself well, someone else will and it will never be as good as you can say it. Perhaps it will really not reflect well on you at all.
As a result, no one will be apt to refer you if you cannot speak well about yourself. Any (former) resistance to using LinkedIn is so 20th century! But when you do optimize the WYDWYD on your profile, the referrer is pleased to refer your LinkedIn profile as part of a message to the target. Those warm referrals backed up by your self-expressed values and skills, experience and past-to-present-to-future vision expressed coherently and amiably go a long, long way.
Make connections or receive new ones; how and to what level of careful pre-evaluation depends on your demeanor or how the referrer enabled the two of you to proceed, but do it! When your profile is presented well, LinkedIn makes it easy for the recipient to know you better before the call. They fall in “like” with you on LinkedIn, contact is made and from that point it is up to you two to make business sparks.
