LinkedIn product

How LinkedIn is Helping Millions of People Get Back to Work

The economic toll of the COVID-19 pandemic is expected to leave more than 140 million people out of work and another 1.6 billion at risk of income loss -- with low-income workers, women and underrepresented communities the hardest hit.

LinkedIn is in a unique position to help. With 14+ million open jobs and a professional community of more than 722+ million people worldwide, we have the tools and resources to help many of those derailed by the pandemic reclaim their careers. We’re seeing people come to LinkedIn in record numbers to search for jobs, nearly 40 million each week, and despite a challenging job market, three people are getting hired on LinkedIn every minute.

During this unemployment crisis, it's also time to change the stigma associated with unemployment. Contrary to what people think, we know from talking to hiring managers that almost all of them (96%) would hire someone who had been laid off due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

For anyone searching for a job, the hardest part is knowing what to do next. That’s where we want to help -- providing job seekers with insights to identify the right career path, learning opportunities to get the skills they need, and a community to connect them to opportunities.

Discovering new career paths -- and how to get there

Sometimes there isn’t a clear path forward. Our new Career Explorer tool can uncover careers you could transition into and might not have considered by mapping the skills you have to thousands of job titles. Explorer will highlight additional skills you may need and LinkedIn Learning courses to help you get them. Also, we’ll highlight connections who already have this job or can make an introduction. 

For example, a food server in the U.S. has a 71% skills similarity to customer service specialist, one of the in-demand jobs we identified with Microsoft as part of our broader reskilling commitment, making it a possible career transition based on skills. Our data also shows that 26 million members globally could have all the skills they need to qualify for one of the most in-demand jobs, customer service specialist, by learning just two more skills. 

We’re rolling out the beta of our Career Explorer tool globally in English starting today, with additional localizations and enhancements in the coming months. To see what career you could transition into, get started here

Identifying in-demand skills and learning opportunities -- with 150M more open roles

Demand for digital skills is increasing, and our data shows that nearly 150 million more technology-related jobs could be created globally in the next five years. To help you prepare for those opportunities, we’ve identified the top trending skills among professionals from digital skills like data analysis to digital marketing and programming. We’ve also added more Skill Assessments so you can easily showcase your skills proficiency for these skills right on your profile. In fact, candidates who complete LinkedIn Skill Assessments and display the badge on their profile are up to 20% more likely to get hired than those who don’t. 

We’re already seeing results from our efforts with Microsoft to help 25 million people learn the digital skills they need to land their next job. I’m excited to share that in the 4 months since June that nearly 13 million people around the world have learned new skills related to the most in-demand jobs. 

Tapping into the community -- you’re not alone  

We know that some unemployed job seekers are hesitant to share their status with their community, worrying that being out of work could hurt their search. But our data shows sharing your status may be key to finding your next job. More than three million members globally have tried our new #OpenToWork profile photo frame; those with an Open to Work photo frame receive on average 40% more InMails from recruiters and are 20% more likely to receive messages from the broader LinkedIn community.

For example, Danielle Turner shared an honest #OpenToWork story on LinkedIn about her job search and asked her network for help finding new opportunities in the underwriting field. A recruitment manager at One American Mortgage replied to Danielle’s post, and in a matter of weeks she landed a role as a Mortgage Underwriter with One American Mortgage. 

Another member, Tierney Conlon shared a story about how seeing a long-time connection with an #OpenToWork photo frame on her profile inspired her to reach out and help that connection get her foot in the door for a role at her company.

These are just a few of the thousands of stories we see on LinkedIn every day. People want to help: in our recent survey 84% of people said they would be willing to help someone in their professional network who has lost their job due to COVID-19 find a new role!*

Open to work

Finding the people who are hiring 

We’re excited about our new #Hiring profile photo frame, which makes it easy for anyone -- from someone at a large company to the owner of small businesses -- to add a job directly to their profile and a #Hiring frame around their photo. Job seekers will be able to see who’s hiring directly in their LinkedIn feed, and apply to relevant jobs. The ability to post a job for free will be available to all members globally in the coming months.

Improving virtual interview skills

70% of talent professionals globally say virtual interviews are here to stay, and members have told us our interview prep tools are a great way to practice answers to the most commonly asked questions and improve interview skills. The feature has been so well received that we are introducing new interview prep for in demand jobs, like project manager and software engineer, so you can improve your chance of landing those most sought-after roles. 

We know the challenges facing job seekers today can feel overwhelming and daunting, and we are here to provide the tools, resources and community to help anyone who is unemployed get back on their feet. We are committed to creating economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce.

You can learn more about these and other resources at opportunity.LinkedIn.com.  

###

*Survey methodology: Censuswide conducted the survey for LinkedIn from October 7-20, 2020 among 2,000 survey respondents ages 18-74 across the U.S. who became unemployed within the last eight months, 2,000 working professionals, and 1,000+ hiring managers.

**Top trending skills Methodology: Among the top 100 skills claimed by LinkedIn members on their profiles, we identified the skills that had the greatest growth in the number of professionals with the skill from March 2020 to October 2020.

*Professionals on LinkedIn have added over 140 million more skills to their profiles since covid-19 hit from March 1, 2020 to October 1, 2020