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Up to ten references showing on your LinkedIn profile will be very valuable. Right now, it’s good enough for transactions and contracts, and doggone it, good enough for permanent hiring. Five well-written, detailed recommendations or more will increase your interest and visibility if you don’t have that many now.
Hiring could be quicker.
Hiring would be efficient.
Hiring would take a common-sense approach. Well, maybe.
We can debate what permanent hiring will look like later. Let’s say employment with benefits.
Consider the person who wrote the recommendation:
The reference credentials as a direct boss
Maybe they wrote it as a mentor or sponsor.
If they worked closely as a teammate
If they can speak to skill, character, or were providing fluff
If they are exchanging recommendations (there are good and not-so-good)
The employer interested in interviewing and hiring you may have standard connections with your reference(s). Forget six degrees of separation as relevant for employment’s sake. Second connections and weak ties will be more significant than ever. They’ve been notable for a while, but a deeper dive will occur once employers realize recommendations don’t grow on trees.
It will be worth going back and connecting with your reference long before needing them or realizing they no longer have relevance as a reference. In other words, the supervisor who permitted you to do projects on Lotus in 1992 is not helpful to the employer who needs an Excel ninja. The social media director who allowed you to master Google Plus in 2014 will not serve you in 2025.
I was not arguing about Oxford Commas in 2024. I’m claiming a refresh on your references from the last five years will matter more than 15 or more years ago. We can argue that there are no broad strokes depending on the position’s market, C-Suite or mid-professional. What you’ve accomplished in the last year to three years will matter more.
Your references should change. Relationship building is a necessary strategy as a job search is a lifestyle. Your knowledge and skills applied with various degrees of difficulty matter. Your ability to demonstrate them in front of employers and embody the articulation of their value shines more as someone witnesses them rather than you bragging about them.
A good example is how you have repositioned your skills to increase their value during the pandemic and work remotely. If you have bosses and former bosses who can positively speak to how quickly and adeptly you adapted to the completion of work in this time of a worldwide crisis, it is something employers will want to see. Resilience and perseverance always have value, no matter the job.
An employer or recruiter may also check the validity or substance of the person recommending you. In fact, with the current reference check process, they could do that. I told a story about a former client who was disqualified as a job candidate during a reference check.
Although this happens more often than most people think, this should give you more reasons to keep relevant references as part of your tools to close the deal, secure your reputation, and give employers great reasons to hire you as a valuable asset.
About Mark Anthony Dyson
I am the "The Voice of Job Seekers!" I offer compassionate career and job search advice as I hack and re-imagine the job search process. You need to be "the prescription to an employer's job description." You must be solution-oriented and work in positions in companies where you are the remedy. Your job search must be a lifestyle, and your career must be in front of you constantly. You can no longer shed your aspirations at the change seasons. There are strengths you have that need constant use and development. Be sure you sign up to download my E-Book, "421 Modern Job Search Tips 2021!" You can find my career advice and work in media outlets such as Forbes, Inc., Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, Glassdoor, and many other outlets.