The New Rules of Professionalism: As Written By the Belligerents of LinkedIn
I’ve been noticing LinkedIn circling the drain for the better part of the last year (at least). Instead of looking like the community of professionals I had originally envisioned, it’s been looking more like the most garbaged aspects of every other social media platform out there. Constant flexing, polarization of perspectives, toxic opinions. A space originally built for professional networking and career development isn’t feeling so buttoned up anymore. Rather, the ties have come undone. Hell, the shirts have come off. And more and more people on LinkedIn are looking for a fight.
Which I might have shrugged off and not thought much further about beyond “that’s social media for you.” Until people on LinkedIn started taking swipes at me. Not just me but my peers, friends and colleagues, too. Medium articles, Reddit threads, and news publications were all noticing this shift in the behavior on LinkedIn and calling it out. And after seeing my friend and mentor Rob Campell, CSO at Colenso in New Zealand, become the target of aggression, I linked with him to have a discussion about why this is happening and what this all might be teaching the next generation of professionals.
Before I jump into my diatribe I must admit that I am a man of too many damn opinions. And I can be a bit of a troll in these opinions — online and offline. Not in the intentionally vicious sort of way. But in the “I’m going to say things with a blunt tone of wit because I know it will be remembered and get me noticed.” And, really, isn’t that what we’re all trying to do on LinkedIn? Get our own professional brand noticed? All this to say I’m self-aware enough to know I, too, fall into the trap of some of the very critiques I’m about to make.
To understand the implications of this shift towards the Twitterification of LinkedIn, it’s important to first touch on why this shift is happening right now. As the pandemic brought jobs into the living room, the lines between office and home were blurred. This also blurred the distinction between “professional social media” vs. “personal social media.” More and more they’re one-in-the-same. And if influencers have taught us anything, it’s that using your personal to promote your professional is profitable. It’s no wonder, then, that LinkedIn looks like Twitter or Facebook. But there’s another reason in particular I’m interested in for the purposes of this discussion. As Rob notes, “History has shown the increased likelihood of war and aggression post any pandemic.” Look no further than Ukraine to see this play out. This isn’t just true in the real world, but online too, where culture wars feel like they have gone into overdrive on our feeds over the summer. Combine this with the fact that pandemic layoffs and fear of recession looming over our heads have driven an obsessive need to prove ourselves. And what you have is that LinkedIn has, in fact, become a war zone. Corporate Hunger Games. Where only the most cutthroat survive.
As LinkedIn becomes a battlefield, the combatants must forge a law of war. And in doing so rewrite the rules of professionalism. LinkedIn is the kingdom of career-conquerors, after all. We’re just trading in our armor for our too often ill-fitting suits.
Introducing The New Rules of Professionalism: As Written By the Belligerents of LinkedIn.
1. If you don’t have an opinion, you’re a nobody.
Perhaps moreso than even Instagram, LinkedIn encourages one-upmanship. Perfectly packaged under the pursuit of career advancement. If people can’t see that you’re moving up, then it creates the perception that you’re moving nowhere. And career stagnancy is professional death. But one-upmanship need not come merely in the form of a promotion. Like any other social media platform, glory can come from likes and shares, too. From being SEEN. But in order to do that you need to have something to say, first. To have an opinion and make that opinion heard.
This does one of two things. It makes those of us most determined to rise to the top shove that opinion to the front of the hoards of other opinions by whatever means necessary — even if that means belittling other opinions or stealing other opinions under the guise of “reposting.” And for those of us who may not have an opinion — at least not a professional opinion — it pushes us to talk about something we do have an opinion on instead. Ourselves. Our families. Our health. Just like we do on Facebook. I may not have an opinion on Nike’s new ad campaign but my kid just got some new Nike shoes. Pretty neat, huh?
On LinkedIn, proving you’re a somebody — or at least not a nobody — is a survivalist instinct. One in which our opinions have become the ultimate resource to ensure our professional longevity. Which has turned survival of the fittest into survival of the most opinionated (even if what we have to say isn’t even really an opinion).
2. If your opinion gives you an advantage, I will try to fuck you over.
If opinions are about professional survival on LinkedIn, then opinions give you a chance of survival over me. And I’d just as soon professionally kill you than give you that advantage. OK, I’m being intentionally extreme and hyperbolic. But when you look at some of the verbally aggressive ways people behave on LinkedIn in a misguided effort to give them the edge, is it really that far off?
Here I reference one of Rob’s experiences on LinkedIn:
“I recently got a mountain of abuse on LinkedIn for commenting on a post about a woman who gave fellow plane passengers a small package to pre-apologise for their baby potentially crying on the flight. All I said was that I didn’t think a woman should ever have to apologise for taking their small baby on a plane and my god … I copped genuine hate. All from men, obviously, but it went personal and vicious within the blink of an eye.”
There’s a couple things to unpack about this experience. First, there’s some patriarchal power play happening here. In this instance it’s less about Rob’s opinion giving him an advantage and more about Rob’s opinion giving women an advantage. At least in the eyes of fragile male egos. And because the nature of professionalism is patriarchal, the backlash to Rob’s opinion was swift and merciless. But there’s also a seniority hierarchy at play here, too. For as much as I’ve received backlash from people on LinkedIn, it’s never been to such hateful extremes. And I believe part of the reason for this is because the amount people want to fuck you over is directly correlated to how much they perceive your opinion and status gives you an advantage over them. Rob ranks higher on the professional totem pole than me. His professional opinion carries more weight (rightfully so, you cheeky bastard). Which means people swing harder at him to ensure he falls.
3. If I don’t have credibility about your opinion, I’ll change the topic to give myself the upper hand.
In June, I commented on what I see as a misplaced LGBTQIA+ Pride effort from Burger King Austria:
I am a very out and proud gay man (gasp, who knew?) who has been working in advertising for 15 years. Surely that qualifies me to comment on the above with some level of credibility. At the very least it gives me permission to have an opinion on it. And yet I found myself being attacked for my perspective. Not from some anti-LGBTQIA+ extremist. Not from the CMO of Burger King (I wish). But from an Asian man who had experienced similar misrepresentation and tokenism in the media due to his gender and ethnicity who felt I was being overly sensitive.
Even when I offered an olive branch, ”Can’t we ask for change for the better for more than one thing,” my concern as a gay man was dismissed for being less legitimate than his struggle as an Asian man. This person did not jump into my comments with any intention of having a healthy conversation or pushing towards progress for marginalized groups. He came in with the intention to shut me down and shut me up by using his Asian experience to take away from my Queer experience. The irony of course being, there’s no reason the two needed to compete. Both experiences should be working together to demand more holistic change from the industry.
4. If I can’t challenge your professional opinion, I’ll just attack you personally. It’s an easier fight.
Again referencing the above example. In this commenter’s attempt to delegitimize my experience he tells me to “Stop crying” and to “Lighten up.” The implications that I’m being overly-sensitive are infuriating. (Seriously, his argument that Asians have it worse so I should just shut up is fucking absurd). But by attacking me personally he also maneuvers another tactic into his fight. He shifts the blame from Burger King to me. And suddenly I’m no longer having an opinion on Burger King, I’m having to defend my emotions. It’s not that Burger King is so much in the wrong. It’s that I’m being too sensitive (an unfair criticism men too often lob at women in the workplace). He’s stripped this debate of its objectivity. Because it’s easier to “win” this fight. Objectively he doesn’t have a leg to stand on. But if he turns it emotional he just might be able to sneak in a few jabs.
5. Undermining and minimizing different points of view will get you further than actual discussion of the topic.
A lot of what these rules of professionalism really boil down to is pushing your opinion with the least amount of resistance to achieve “a win.” Which means eliminating points of view that don’t fit your narrative because they might make you look wrong. And in the business world, wrong equals weak. And honestly, because discussions take some time and empathy and we’ve all gotten a little too lazy to put in the work. Within this same Burger King Pride thread, a separate conversation played out between me and another commenter:
Full transparency. I was probably needlessly sarcastic and dismissive here due to a misinterpretation of intentions. I genuinely wasn’t sure what this person meant in his first comment. But because this new “wanna fight” brand of LinkedIn has put me on the defensive, I assumed that he was implying that if I got paid by Burger King, surely I wouldn’t be so critical of this work. As if money would change my morals. Which rightfully pissed me off. So I responded with my troll claws out. And the whole conversation unravels from here with him resorting to attacking my intelligence and professional ability as a strategist. An eye for an eye. It was only later that I paused and reassessed the situation that I admitted to myself maybe I misunderstood his original intentions. But by allowing myself to get swept up in the LinkedIn gladiator arena, I ended up missing an opportunity to have a civil conversation in favor of going in for the kill. Proof that I am not infallible of my own critiques.
The irony of these above rules: They’re not really new at all. Isn’t this how professionals have been behaving since…forever? Rather than create new rules of professionalism, really what LinkedIn has done is expose professionalism for what it really is. A dirty set of tactics designed to establish dominance and power in the workplace. Congratulations, LinkedIn, on revealing what companies have been trying to hide for a century. A second irony is that professionalism desperately needs to be rewritten. Because professionalism is outdated, racist, patriarchal and elite. Professionalism is a barrier that prevents you from being your most real you — which ultimately holds you back from excelling to your best at work. And that most often works against those who are already marginalized and start from a deficit.
Instead of writing new rules of professionalism, then, what we really need is to do away with professionalism all together. And just start acting more human in the workplace — LinkedIn included. Combine our opinions to move discussions forward rather than force opinions needlessly into competition to push ourselves to defeat. Even as I write this piece, it’s prompted me to be more aware of my approach on LinkedIn. I’ll never lose my punchy attitude. But I can be more cognizant of how I respond to my network. Instead of coming to the feed with my shield in hand and my spear raised to shut down people I don’t think agree with me, I’m learning to be more open to engaging with the conversation. As Rob explains it’s about shifting our posture from “you’re wrong” to “have you considered this?” In making these changes, it doesn’t just make me a better professional. It makes me a better person. The kind of person I want my network — professional and otherwise — to really see me for.
