In 2022, because no social network is safe, LinkedIn is an ecosystem in which a new type of influencer—a LinkedInfluencer, if you will—can thrive. But “creators,” as the platform officially calls them, aren’t out here sharing their Amazon hauls or what they eat in a day. They’re writing inspirational posts about how they market themselves to recruiters despite having no “real” “job” experience and getting deep with personal stories about bad bosses. Go ahead and check (we’ll wait)—their earnest memos are probably cutting through the noise of your LinkedIn feed right now, attracting thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of followers.
And also attracting job offers, side hustles, and cold hard cash. Take Natalie Riso, 25, arguably one of the world’s first Linked Influencers. In 2018, she became the most followed college student on the platform with posts like how her first-ever job, in the fast-food biz, prepared her for her first post-grad gig. Riso’s original intent was to use her LinkedIn posts as a writing portfolio when applying for positions. But as she kept publishing remarkably candid work stories, often three times a week, her audience grew, eventually reaching nearly 400,000 followers. This helped her get a marketing job, after which she pivoted her LinkedIn content to go more in depth on her dream industry: tech. You can guess where she works now.
And along the way, her LinkedIn clout led to paid speaking engagements and a sponsorship deal with Bumble Bizz. In These Times, stories like Riso’s make a lot of sense. Like it or not, work-life boundaries have all but disappeared, thanks to the switch to (seemingly endless) remote work and to major social and racial justice reckonings. Employees want their workplaces to be and do better—and the LinkedIn algorithm seems to support the real-talk cause. It amplifies members with important things to say, and unlike Instagram or Twitter, you’ll see their voices on your feed even if you don’t follow their accounts.
That’s why Madison Butler, 30, who first posted on Linked In in 2017 about what it feels like to have blue hair and tattoos in corporate America, says she loves the platform. She started writing frequently about diversity, equity, and inclusion and how she navigates the workplace as a queer Black woman. “I reached CEOs and founders and venture capitalists who have never thought about the topics I do,” Butler explains. Now she is the VP of people and impact at cannabis company Grav and has 90,000 LinkedIn followers, sponsored content deals, and a consulting business on the side. Oh, and she just founded the Black Speakers Collection, which helps connect companies to Black thought leaders.
Butler’s goal is to educate people in power to make decisions that benefit those who’ve historically been ignored. She also uses her LinkedInfluencer status to let others who share her perspective know they’re not alone. Which, honestly, feels pretty damn amazing after the long reign of girlboss culture and its insistence that money and power are the be-all and end-all of success.
Maybe this new wave of genuinely honest, vulnerable career influencers—and the democratic algo in which they thrive—is what we need to heal the deep cut between the expectations of our work lives and the limitations of our real lives. Or maybe they’ll just make us feel a little bit better about it, one post at a time.
Photographs by Ruben Chamorro
Jessica Goodman is the New York Times bestselling author of young adult thrillers They Wish they Were Us, They’ll Never Catch Us, and The Counselors. She is the former op-ed editor at Cosmopolitan magazine, and was part of the 2017 team that won a National Magazine Award in personal service. She has also held editorial positions at Entertainment Weekly and HuffPost, and her work has been published in outlets like Glamour, Condé Nast Traveler, Elle, and Marie Claire.
