Uploading Your Resume To LinkedIn Or Other Social Media

In a word: Don’t. LinkedIn has made it very easy to upload your resume as a .pdf to make it part of your LinkedIn profile. While it’s tempting to do this rather than to do a full profile (and it’s tempting to do it even if you already have a full profile!), please do not.

There are good reasons to not to upload resumes. First, there are major privacy concerns. Your LinkedIn profile is fully (or at least semi-) public. Your contact information (address, phone number, e-mail etc.) are not necessarily public on your LinkedIn profile, but will become public if you upload your resume. Even if you remove this private information from your resume before you upload, by uploading your resume, you have made the resume itself public. You no longer have control. That means that anyone is free to view, copy, download, use, pirate, and distribute your resume—all without your knowledge or consent. Whatever information you’re given by LinkedIn about views of your profile and downloads your resume is after the fact—after your resume has been downloaded and is in the possession of someone else.

Secondly, posting your resume on LinkedIn changes your job search from a private one to a public one. It practically screams, “I’m looking for a job!” While it helps your job search for the trusted people of your professional network to be quietly notified that you’re looking for new opportunities, it does not help to announce to the world. Why? Because recruiters, employers, potential clients, and quality networkers are looking for top candidates. Top candidates are, by definition, people who are in demand. A top candidate therefore rarely “needs” a job, although she is open to opportunities. By publicly screaming, “I’m looking for a job!” you are simultaneously announcing that you are not a top candidate. Your LinkedIn profile needs to showcase your value and appeal, not your (real or perceived) desperation.

Third, resumes work best when they are tailored to specific openings or employers. Posting your resume online means you have given up the chance to best present your resume to any legitimate recruiters or employers who view it. And the substance of the resume should be worked into your LinkedIn profile anyway.

Remember—if your LinkedIn profile is compelling, then a legitimate recruiter or employer surfing through LinkedIn will contact you. And then you can decide whether to provide your (targeted) resume. So posting your resume online gives you additional risk, but no corresponding additional reward.