To think you don’t block new colleagues on LinkedIn?

[Everyoneisunreasonable]

I work in a global team, and my boss announced a new starter yesterday, based in San Francisco. So, I looked him up on LinkedIn, as you do, to see what his background was. But he wasn’t there, which is highly odd as our job involves a LOT of networking and LI is an important tool in that. I asked a colleague in San Diego if she could see him and she said she had been involved in interviewing him, and that she could.

I couldn’t think of any other explanation than he had blocked me, so I looked him up on my husband’s LI, and could see him. So, he had blocked me!

I asked another European colleague this morning if she could see him, and she couldn’t. So she had been blocked too. Neither of us have ever met this guy before, so it’s not like either of us had offended him! AIBU to think this is a massive red flag and the guy has something to hide? Does anyone have any potential reasons why someone might block new colleagues they haven’t even met? Never come across this behaviour before!

I’m going to ask him at some point, but I’ll wait until I’ve interacted with him a bit first.

Did you ask him in the end?

Say what now?

Let it go 😂 obsessing over why someone has blocked you in work or not is strange behavior

he may unblock when he starts work or he may not which is his choice

I doubt he’s blocked you.

Maybe it’s to do with connections… you can’t see him because he’s a 3rd degree connection or something like that idk.

Or maybe it’s just a problem with LinkedIn search. Have you tried actually going to his specific profile URL while logged in to your account?

If he has blocked you then yeah that’s pretty weird. But it’s also one of those “oh well” things that you just shrug your shoulders over and move on from. Please don’t question him about it!! That’s even weirder than him blocking you in the first place.

I find it far weirder, tbh, for potential colleagues to go and find his profile. He's already been employed, just talk to.him when he starts, and find out about him that way.

It's not intrusive, it's exactly the point of Linked In.

The whole point of LI is for work networking and for other people to be able to see your professional information.

doesn't make sense why he would block colleagues.

Finding profiles is exactly what LinkedIn is for though. I get that a lot of people on this thread don’t seem to be utilising LI like this but it’s completely normal especially for American companies. When you’re using LI like this for networking within your role, it’s not your personal social media. Your company logo will be emblazoned everywhere, your posts and reactions will be a reflection of your company, and sometimes you’ll even have to leave the email & password with your manager when you leave the role.

I've blocked prople I didn't know as my online info is private. Maybe he us doing the same.

It's not weird at all, people use Linkedin like Facebook but for work now. It's not just about looking for work but about building your own personal brand and networking, and it's perfectly usual to have all your colleagues added as contacts. It's weird that he's deliberately prevented this from happening. It's his work life, not his private life.

This! He was probably having a look at other colleagues in the team and didn't want you to know he'd been looking!