To Peak LinkedIn or Not Peak LinkedIn?
A few weeks ago, a LinkedIn post went viral for the wrong reasons. Someone allegedly met the former CEO of DBS, Piyush Gupta while on vacation in Bali and posted a reflection about her encounter. Then things went south. First, Piyush Gupta humorously refuted meeting the author. Then the real person whom she had met and taken a photo with surfaced to clarify that he had explicitly told her he is not Piyush Gupta. All of these had ignited a viral discussion about her lying and fabricating a story for the sake of social media engagement. Some call it #peaklinkedin.
But what came after was more striking to me. After some days of silence, the LinkedIn user re-emerged to explain that the post was written by a freelance social media manager whom she had engaged, and who had allegedly put up the fraudulent post to blackmail her. This caught my full attention. It is one thing when the CEO of a Fortune 500 company has their social media profile managed by a professional team, given they are likely posting many firm related updates. But it is an entirely different discussion when you hand over your full digital identity into the hands of someone else, without your own final oversight.
A Separate Platform
When I started this Substack, there were a few platforms considered. A LinkedIn newsletter was perhaps the most intuitive option for it is where most of my professional connections converge and therefore most easily reached. But it has always bothered me that LinkedIn was becoming increasingly noisy. Sometimes it’s cringey humble-brags, and other times it sounds like coming up with something out of nothing. Or worse! AI generated posts that read nothing but AI — I have my thoughts on the place of AI in the workplace and daily lives which I should probably pen down at some point. That’s why I wanted to host these writings on a separate platform where there is a site I call my own and the collection of essays can come together to build my voice. LinkedIn newsletters can most definitely serve the same function. But having the separation of platforms and hence separation of purposes – one for social networking, the other to process my thoughts in words– felt intuitive.
Our Digital Identities
This brings to mind questions about why we post what we post as part of our digital footprints. Is it for corporate brand building or personal brand building? Are the posts intentional, born from something genuine to opine on or posted consistently for the sake of building engagement? Who can we trust anymore if I no longer know who is behind the words I am reading?
Over 10 essays in, I hope I’ve not bored you by now. I most certainly hope they don’t fall into the category of #peaklinkedin trash. Although, maybe an essay about #peaklinkedin is actually the most #peaklinkedin one can ever get? Maybe you can take comfort in knowing that I reflect and write everything that I post?
