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Women can make good use of LinkedIn as a tool to network and showcase themselves and their skills, but fail to do so!
Did the title make you curious and you found yourself here? Or did the title make you angry and you found yourself here?
Either way, I’m glad you are here, and hope you get to take away some value, thoughts, and questions at the end of this.
Women are said to have started working (officially) after the 1930s in the US post the World War II. Various changes in the education, health and labour systems of the country aided them. This was also when they officially started contributing to the GDP growth of the country.
India sure has a long way to catch up, to increase our current share of women at work of about 36% in India as reported in Statista, as compared to about 59% in the US as reported in Gallup.
The opportunities for women to work or return to work are increasing, but we still see that there are many hurdles for women to cross to have a successful career.
LinkedIn is a great platform; if leveraged can help women grow professionally. Founded in 2002, it became a one-stop solution to all recruitment, networking and professional growth. Professionals leverage LinkedIn to continue to grow, to explore, and to find opportunities. According to LinkedIn (reported on Hootsuite), it has over 756 million users across 200 countries, with over 76 million in India and 43% of them being women.
Did you know? Women have a lower level of confidence and greater fear of failure as compared to Men. (LinkedIn Opportunity Index 2021). It disheartens me to see how these amazing women are not leveraging LinkedIn and missing out.
Here are 5 things women must do to make good use of LinkedIn.
Although LinkedIn is the first platform they think about for jobs, it is seldom leveraged as a platform to network, follow leaders in their industry and keep updated on the companies they aspire to work with.
Networking leads to opportunities beyond jobs and can help them grow personally and professionally with a possibility of helping another women on the way.
This is a notion that is fed into them, that career breaks are bad. This should not be the case, as career breaks are taken due to strong personal or professional reasons.
Most recruiters and companies are looking at relevant skills for the job and look beyond the career breaks when the candidate is ideal. Women need to take career breaks in their stride, and look at them as experiences that helped them grow and add skills.
Career breaks become a taboo when they believe it is. Instead, they should showcase the skills added on during the break and work on staying updated with the working of their industry.
Quite often, women are pitted against each other as competition, and encouraged not to root for each other. It’s time for them to move away from these toxic notions and work on upholding each other.
Even liking, sharing, and commenting on a connection’s post can help them grow and show encouragement. Also every opportunity you may get or see, recommend a fellow.
Most times, women focus on just talking about their job or staying silent.
LinkedIn is a platform to showcase not just your skills, but your personalities. Women need to put forth their thoughts and opinions on subjects they are interested in. There would be many other girls and women they will be inspiring by using their voice more often. It may also give your future employer an insight into what you may bring to the culture of the company.
Women should take out time explicitly for LinkedIn – even if it is 15 mins a week to engage with their network and expand it. They need to make sure to keep at the activity consistently, and be assured to see results.
Take that step towards growth and be sure that you will pull up more women along with you. Use your voice for yourself and for the others.
Happy LinkedIn’ng.
First published here.
Image source: shutterstock
Feminist, Ecopreneur & a Zerowaste aspirant. Believes that my life purpose is to influence people to be ecofriendly and to help the girls/women of the future be more free - in who they are, what read more...
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People say that women are the greatest enemies of women. I vehemently disagree. It is the patriarchal mindset that makes women believe in the wrong ideology.
The entire world celebrates International Women’s Day on March 8, 2024. It should be a joyful day, but unfortunately, not all women are entitled to this privilege, as violence against women is at its peak. The experience of oppression pushes many women to choose freedom. As far as patriotism is concerned, feminism is not a cup of tea in this society.
What happens when a woman decides to stand up for herself? Does this world easily accept the decisions of women in this society? What inspires them to be free of the clutches of the oppression that women have faced for ages? Most of the time, women do not get the chance to decide for themselves. Their lives are always at the mercy of someone, which can be their parents, siblings, husband, or children.
In some cases, women do not feel the need to make any decisions. They are taught to obey the patriarchal system, which makes them believe that they are right. In my family, I was never taught to make decisions on my own. It was always my parents who bought dresses and all that I needed.
14 years after her last feature film Dhobi Ghat, storyteller extraordinaire comes up with her new film, Laapataa Ladies, a must watch.
*Some spoilers alert*
Every religion around the world dictates terms to women. The onus is always on women to be ‘modest’ and cover their faces and bodies so men can’t be “tempted”, rather than on men to keep their eyes where they belong and behave like civilized beings. So much so that even rape has been excused on the grounds of women eating chowmein or ‘men will be men’. I think the best Hindi movie retort to this unwanted advice on ‘akeli ladki khuli tijori ki tarah hoti hai’ (an alone woman is like an open jewellery box) came from Geet in Jab We Met – Kya aap gyan dene ke paise lete hain kyonki chillar nahin hain mere paas.
The premise of Laapataa Ladies is beautifully simple – two brides clad in the ghunghat that covers their identity get mixed up on a train. Within this Russian Doll, you get a comedy of errors, a story of getting lost, a commentary on patriarchy’s attitude towards women, a mystery, and a tale of finding oneself, all in one. Done with a mostly light touch that has you laughing and nodding along.
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