...to think that LinkedIn isn't so mum-friendly?

[semi]

I am a working mum with quite a few professional contacts on Linkedin and have found that most self-employed women/mumpreneurs I've spotted in the press haven't got a Linkedin profile. What's that all about? Don't virtual networks well lend themselves to busy mums? Or is it that we just don't like to share what we are up to? Talk about our successes/achievements?

"Alas, my greatgrandmother died of mumtrepreneur..."

Grrr. The title of your post just made me curl my lip. But scanning down you've already been told why.

My opinion is that it's not so widely used in the UK - and it's ripe for abuse anyway. It has the potential to be used the way some people collect friends on FB - and who need to be endorsed by a complete stranger?

Oh, and linked in is shit - should've mentioned that.

Does LinkedIn need a special MUM symbol so
a) little women can be offered lower status jobs, and not get any technical terms about cashflow as their husband does all that when he gets home from the City?
or
b) 'Mumtrepeneur' means the goods will be of low/ varying quality and standard as BUSY MUM is making them on the kitchen table inbetween breastfeeding Tabitha and helping Sebastian with his school project?

Good idea. How about a dripping nipple. You could "Click the nip" to link up with other mums. If a professional is willing to work with a woman who has procreated they could have a dripping nipple with a thumbs up next to it on their profile; if not, then a dripping nipple crossed out.

LinkedIn is NOT anonymous. That is why you probably wont see any of us there.

I am there as a professional, networking with people I have met in a professional capacity. I am not there as PureQ !

But you would not know me, unless you knew my real name, or my company.
And I am not about to declare that to all mumsnet just to get a few more connections!

I'm on LinkedIn but I don't have kids. If I have them in the future, do I have to notify them? Y'know, leave hospital, register the birth, inform LinkedIn that I am now a mother...

@ 'click the nip'.

Has anyone yet worked out why LinkedIn isn't "mum friendly"??? What would being "mum friendly" mean on a networking site? Should it be pink with lots of those bouncing emoticons they have on Netmums? Surely women who are professionals and wish to be on LinkedIn will do so regardless of whether they are mothers or not? Confused by this thread.

There is no cupcake icon on the right hand side? Or twinkly banners and timelines?

I think we all need MUM tiaras. You know, to distinguish ourselves from other mums. You know the sahms and those who are non-preneurs.

Ooh, I might start a new website. LinkedMum.

Would that make me a mumpreneur?

or MummedIn

Or how about MotherDin ??

Hmm, not twinkly enough.

WillYouBeMyMummyFriend

LinkedHun?

It really hasn't entered the vernacular, OP.

Linkedin is useful to some people who are in business. Whether they have passed a small person through their vagina* or not appears to be completely irrelevant to that.

*Or had a CS of course. But that made the sentence rather unwieldy.

I'm thinking through my friends who are working mothers and I'm struggling to think of even one who isn't on LinkedIn. Possibly one civil servant who doesn't really use the internet (was the last person I know in my generation to get online at home). And possibly one dr friend. But I can't think of anyone in business who isn't. Some are self-employed, some are employed. But they are all on there.

Anyway Linked In are annoying and shite.
And they keep emailing me with "reminders" just like Friends reunited did just before they folded...

You can change your settings to not get reminders.

Anyway, lots of spammers send fake linked in reminders, which will download malware to your computer if you click the links.

My status as a parent has fuck all to do with my profession. I am self employed and on LinkedIn. I am also a Mother. They've feck all to do with one another.

Educated at LinkedHun!

I think for many jobs Linked in is useless. I see it as aimed at the self employed or those in the sorts of businesses where networking with people you hardly know is important to try and get you more business.
If you work in most public sector jobs then it's all pretty irrelevent as most of us have more work than we can handle..

I'm not sure what this is all about tbh, but for the record I'm a self-employed mum with a LinkedIn profile. Also for the record, I find LinkedIn a really useful tool for my business.

I am a freelance journalist. I am on LinkedIn. It is occasionally useful.

I also gave birth twice. That fact is not on LinkedIn.

are fathers dadprenuers or are they allowed to be people too?

Plenty of professional men do not have a Linked In profile either. Just like facebook, some people do not feel a need or a desire to use it. I am not at all sure that being a er...'mumpreneur' has anything to do with it whatsoever.

LinkedIn is no place for any discussion or recording of my familial or romantic relationships. It's a professional networking tool. I only put information on there pertinent to my CV (I am freelance so don't even have mat leave on my CV).