Everything You Need To Know About LinkedIn Recommendations

With 135 million members and two people joining per second, LinkedIn is becoming ever more important as a professional networking and job search tool. Recruiters and hiring managers increasingly rely on the site to scout for talent. I’ve written previously about the usefulness of having a robust LinkedIn profile, and writing status updates when you’re at a turning point in your career.

But how important are your “recommendations,” the LinkedIn equivalent of job references? For many LinkedIn members, recommendations read as an empty list of accolades. Here’s a typical one, from one of my contacts: “Alicia’s energy and enthusiasm is [sic] contagious—she knows how to motivate and get the best from the people on her team. I had the privilege of working for her and she is a rare gem!”

Given that recommendations are mostly solicited and always vetted by members, and hiring managers and recruiters know this, does anyone take them seriously? Does it hurt you if you fail to get recommendations? Is there a saturation point where you have too many? A way to make your recommendations count? I got in touch with a LinkedIn spokesperson, three career coaches, four executive recruiters, a recruiter at a high tech company, and Larry Nash, a recruiting director for Ernst & Young, the giant accounting and consulting firm. Here is their accumulated wisdom:

1. Recommendations can help your cause. Recruiters and hiring managers do read recommendations and take them into account, though it’s unlikely that a recommendation would make or break a LinkedIn member’s chance of getting hired. “It’s additive but not evaluative,” says Ernst & Young’s Nash. Brian G. Clark, a managing partner at executive search firm Kensington International, says his firm treats them like references: recruiters always probe beyond information submitted by the candidate.

2. Failing to get recommendations won’t hurt you. Despite LinkedIn’s exponential growth, the site is still not ubiquitous, and hiring managers know this. Although some high level executives have active LinkedIn profiles, including Michael Dell, Richard Branson and Meg Whitman, plenty of people do not, or they only display minimal information. Recruiters and hiring managers don’t discount candidates based on incomplete or absent profiles. The one place it may matter: If you are a small business or independent contractor using LinkedIn to find work. Potential clients expect to read recommendations from satisfied customers.

3. Recommendations have unpredictable potential. The best case scenario comes when a recruiter or hiring manager happens to know the person who wrote your recommendation, either personally or by reputation. Sometimes a second degree connection can pop up and bolster a recommendation’s strength. For instance, if I’m thinking of hiring Fred, and a close contact of mine knows the person who is recommending him, I may reach out through my friend to get in touch with the person who wrote the recommendation.

4. Recruiters use recommendations to search out new candidates. Writing a recommendation can produce an unexpected benefit for the writer. Katherine Charapko, executive director of New York executive search firm, Amrop Battalia Winston, says her recruiters use recommendations to hunt down new prospects. “It’s a wonderful way to link through to people you may not otherwise find,” she contends.

5. Recommendations can help you get promoted. LinkedIn spokesperson Krista Canfield suggests cultivating recommendations from colleagues, superiors and clients who express gratitude when you’ve done a good job. For instance, if a client sends you an appreciative email, consider asking them to put a recommendation in your LinkedIn profile. When it’s time for your performance review, you can bolster your case with recommendations.

6. Reach out personally when you ask for a recommendation. The quickest way to ask for a recommendation is to put your cursor over the word “Profile” on the grey bar at the top of your LinkedIn page, click “Recommendations” in the pull-down menu and then follow the automatic prompts. Do not do this, unless you have already had an exchange with the recommendation writer. Even though we all communicate increasingly by email and text, this is an instance where you should pick up the phone and talk about your request. At the least, if you go the automatic email route, delete the generic text and write something personal.

7. Only ask those who truly know your work. This may seem obvious, but I’ve heard of people receiving recommendation requests from folks they hardly knew, or who worked with them only tangentially. This is a waste of everyone’s time.

8. Help the writer out. Especially if you worked with the writer on a particular project that you saw to fruition, it’s helpful to jog their memory verbally, or in a note. It’s even fine to offer to draft the recommendation yourself, or to send a draft along in an email. If the writer sends a draft and you see room for improvement, do write back and respectfully suggest changes.

9. Specificity is best. Ideally, recommendations should describe exactly what the person did, including the outcome of the project. Example: “In the last six months, Carla exceeded every monthly sales target by an average of 40%.”

10. Get a range of recommendations. It’s best to have recommendations from a boss, a colleague and a subordinate, to give readers a sense of how you work at all levels. If you are an independent contractor, get recommendations from at least three clients.

11. Don’t get too many recommendations. Charapko of search firm Amrop Battalia Winston says she is turned off when she sees a glut of recommendations, say, 50 or more. “It means the person is awfully showy,” she says. One of the people I know who is most adept at using social media, a sales professional in his late 30s, has 14 recommendations, and they are all strong. It’s possible to go over a dozen and not hit overkill. Though his wife, a digital design project manager who is also a social media whiz, only has five. Her profile seems equally strong because each of her recommendations is both stellar and specific.

For now LinkedIn is by far the most dominant professional networking site. If you’re on the hunt for a new job, expect the hiring manager will look at your profile, including your recommendations. If your recommendations tell a specific story about you, and they come from a broad range of sources, they will help you. “We look at the profiles on LinkedIn as a puzzle,” says Neil E. Peek, senior recruiter at Brocade, a network equipment company in San Jose, Calif. “The recommendations are a piece of the puzzle that helps us get a better picture of the person.”