This fellow, a self-proclaimed social media expert who’s name I changed to “Chris” to protect, asked me to endorse him.
I’ve never met him and don’t know who he is, but he expected me to pump up his endorsements.
I remember the same thing happened to Tim Ash, where a random person asked him to write a recommendation.
He flipped out on this guy, pointing out how lazy it was to spam so many people this way.
But if you make random LinkedIn connection requests (or do the same on other social networks), are you guilty of the same?
See what happened below. I’d like to know what you think:
Hi Dennis,
I need to boost my endorsements. Would you be willing to help me?
Thank you,
“Chris”
Since the initial message was vague, I asked for some clarification:
Hi “Chris”,
Sure thing. You mean personal endorsements on LinkedIn or something related to <redacted> or clients?
Dennis
Turns out, he was looking for a “leg up”, which translates to artificially padding his LinkedIn so he would be more favorable to employers:
Hi Dennis,
Well I was only asking for skill endorsements on LinkedIn but if you would be willing to say something about the skills that I have listed that might have an employer consider hiring me that would be gold. I graduated with my Bachelor’s of Science in Computer Science in ’08 and last year I earned my MBA with a Marketing concentration. I am working on bringing a tech department to the local paper but nobody there uses social media or technology, we are talking flip phones, if not brick phones. My skills are seriously being under utilized and I want to grow but being a recent graduate makes things difficult and with that push back the department will never be what it should be.
If you are willing to give me a leg up I would greatly appreciate it.
“Chris”
As Tim Ash demonstrated above, it’s dangerous to ask random strangers for professional recommendations. It’s dishonest, and has the potential to hurt your reputation. There are no shortcuts to becoming a professional, only hard work backed by many hours of experience. Don’t rely on shady methods to inflate your skills and deceive others- earn your praise by demonstrating your abilities.