Writing Your LinkedIn Work Experience Section (Examples + 3 Tips)

LinkedIn is one of the most useful sites for finding a job and building your network. Most hiring managers and recruiters use LinkedIn to find qualified candidates. Many hiring professionals and recruiters will also view candidates' LinkedIn profile before inviting them for a job interview.

With that in mind, it's important to have a LinkedIn profile that is polished and professional.

This article will focus on what to include in your LinkedIn work experience section. We've also included our top tips to catch the attention of a hiring manager with your LinkedIn. Finally, we share a formula for taking the work experience listed on your resume and making it suitable for LinkedIn.

How your LinkedIn work experience section differs from your resume

First on the agenda: how your LinkedIn is different from your resume. Should you copy the work experience section from your resume and paste it into your LinkedIn profile?

No!

As we cover in-depth on this post, your LinkedIn profile and your resume need to be different because they serve different purposes. Your resume is tailored to a specific job, while your LinkedIn expands upon your resume for a general job search. Both documents should have the same job titles, date ranges, and basic information regarding each job. You need to present the information in different ways, though.

Writing your LinkedIn profile work experience section

Your resume should contain detailed descriptions of your work experience that are relevant to the position you're applying for. There is no need to include all of those details on your LinkedIn profile.

You don't need to include as many details, but you can include more experiences. Your resume needs to include only relevant experience, but your LinkedIn can highlight additional professional experiences, responsibilities, and accomplishments from your most recent 10 to 15 years.

For example, if you have been doing freelance work on your resume that doesn't fit in with your day job, you may want to include it on your LinkedIn.

There's also a difference in perspective while writing a resume versus a LinkedIn profile. Your resume should avoid pronouns (I, we, she, our, them) but your LinkedIn should be written in the first person with a conversational tone. This is most important in your LinkedIn Summary section and Experience section.

How to add new work experience on LinkedIn

To add a new job to your LinkedIn profile, click on the "+" symbol at the top of the Experience section.

Fill in your job title, company, location, and dates of employment. LinkedIn recently added an "employment type" menu, so you can specify if you were a full-time employee or not.

In the same box, you can detail your description of that experience. You're going to want to include keywords like your resume that are specific to your industry and career goals.

Unlike a resume, your LinkedIn work experience entries should be general, less detailed, and not tailored for a certain position.

Your LinkedIn experience descriptions should start with a written summary of your achievements specific to each role. Bullet points are great for a resume because they contain a lot more information without huge blocks of text. However, paragraph form is acceptable on LinkedIn because you won't be including a ton of information.

Here is an example of what that looks like after you click save:

Writing LinkedIn experience versus resume experience

Now let's take a look at an example of a resume work experience section, and how it translates to the work experience section of your LinkedIn profile.

Example of a resume experience section:

Director of Sales, Southwest Region - Chase | Los Angeles, CA

Led a team of two account executives. Together we managed a portfolio of 50+ clients and agencies. Our client base consisted of Fortune 500 companies from a wide range of industries including Entertainment, Auto, Technology, Fashion, Technology, and Travel.

• Launched the company’s first app download campaign with a re-targeting strategy resulting in a two-day $500K package.

• Managed risk by partnering with clients and other stakeholders for a seamless campaign launch.

• Achieved sales pacing of 70% for the year a 150% year-over-year increase in annual revenue to $7.5M.

• Built relationships to foster better communication between the sales and operations teams, including weekly calls to collaborate on campaigns that resulted in a 33% increase in performance.

• Streamlined client communication to be more responsive and timeline management that increased staff productivity.

Keeping in mind our tips from above, here is how that same information would look on LinkedIn:

Example of a LinkedIn experience section:

Led a team that managed a 50+ client portfolio, launching the firm’s first app download campaign while partnering with stakeholders to minimize risk and streamline client communication. Increased annual revenue by 150%, and team performance by 33%.

Do you see the difference? Your LinkedIn work experience section doesn't need to be as detailed as your resume. It should instead be a summary that highlights your main achievements.

Formula for changing your resume work experience for LinkedIn

Here is a three-step formula you can follow to convert work experience from your resume to your LinkedIn:

Step 1: Copy the information

Copy the work experience from your resume over to your LinkedIn profile. Break it up by company or position.

Step 2: Reformat

Remove the bullet points. Select your major achievements--quantifiable if possible--and remove the rest of the content. Put the most important information in the first four lines (before the cutoff).

Step 3: Edit

Make your content conversational and engaging. It's okay to say "I did XYZ." Switching to the first-person perspective might take some rewriting, but it's worth it!

Summary

Your LinkedIn work experience section should both complement and support your resume. Whittle it down to the most important achievements with general keywords from your industry. Keep it conversational and up to date.

With a little effort, you can optimize your resume's content to work for your LinkedIn profile, too! If you need more help optimizing your resume or your LinkedIn, head over to our resume writing services page.

Good luck with your job search!

Related reads:

• LinkedIn Background Photos for Every Industry

• How to Add Your Resume on LinkedIn (4 Options)

• Best LinkedIn Profile Writing Services