LinkedIn is the new cigarette break. Or at least, it should be. Not convinced? Here’s why …
Cigarette smoking used to be the thing. Smoking at your desk, then later, smoking in designated places around or outside the office. Multiple times a day – 6x? 10x? 18x? Depends on the person.
Yeah, smoking is bad for you. But a lot of people have said:
???? “I like it.”
???? “It relaxes me.”
???? “It’s a good break before I get back to work.”
???? “It helps me collect my thoughts.”
???? “It’s time well spent with colleagues.”
???? “A great idea came to me.”
???? “It’s a past-time, not a habit.” (That last one was my grandfather, who smoked a pipe.)
If you weren’t doing something unhealthy like smoking, most of the quotes above would be viewed as, well, healthy approaches to life.
If you want to get value out of LinkedIn, just treat it like a cigarette break. Get in, enjoy, then get out and do great things with the rest of your time. And do this in bits and pieces during your work day.
Nicholas Kosar
Some people admit that spending more time on LinkedIn can be a good thing for their business, for their professional life. But they don’t commit, and unfortunately, they think it needs to take a lot of their time. Here’s what they say about LinkedIn:
???? “I need to spend hours to get this right.”
???? “I don’t want to spend hours everyday on social media.”
???? “I don’t have time for that.”
And so on. Here’s my take on it:
If you want to get value out of it, just treat it like a cigarette break. If you’re spending hours on it, you’re doing it wrong. Get in, enjoy, then get out and do great things with the rest of your time. And do this in bits and pieces during your work day.
➡️ Did you publish a post on LinkedIn? Are people commenting? Are you responding to those comments in real time (not five hours later and not next week).
➡️ Did your peers and clients and friends take the time to publish something on LinkedIn? If so, were you there for them to acknowledge their work with at least a simple Like? People do appreciate that. In real time.
???? Is there a better analogy than a cigarette break? How much time is not enough on LinkedIn? How much is too much?
