Career Secrets We're Never Told | Mini Episode

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
Okay, I have to tell you, I was just looking on eBay, where I go for all kinds of things I love, and there it was.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:06)
That hologram trading card, one of the rarest, the last one I needed for my set.

**SPEAKER_3** (0:10)
Shiny like the designer handbag of my dreams. One of a kind. eBay had it, and now everyone's asking, where did you get your windshield wiper?

**SPEAKER_4** (0:19)
eBay has all the parts that fit my car. No more annoying, just beautiful.

**SPEAKER_5** (0:25)
Millions of finds, each with a story. eBay, things people love.

**Dr Faye Bate** (0:30)
We're going to do our section, buy or bye bye. So basically, I'm going to show you a card, and you're going to tell me whether you would buy this, so you like it, or whether you'd say bye bye as in like, goodbye. No, we don't want this.

**Heather Elkington** (0:43)
Yeah.

**Dr Faye Bate** (0:44)
Starting with LinkedIn.

**Heather Elkington** (0:46)
Yeah, buy, definitely.
LinkedIn was, it's a great way to share your wins. Women are far too humble. We are far too, we do incredible work as much, if not more, as the boys. We do incredible, credible work. And we just don't shout it out enough. We don't talk about our wins. We're just so, so humble. And for me, LinkedIn was a platform where I started posting on LinkedIn before any other platform. And it was a place where I could just document like stories and team wins and career wins. And it's a great way. I think LinkedIn was one of the big reasons why I got such big pay rises when I was at Sage, because the CEO knew my name. He was a CEO of a FTSE 100 company. Like this guy manages technically like 20,000 people. I'm like however many rungs below him. He shouldn't know who I am. But because I was posting on LinkedIn, and he was obviously interested in the narrative around the business online. He knew who I was. He came to see me. He would message me occasionally.
I got put forward for opportunities on like internal panels. And so, yeah, massive buy.

**Dr Faye Bate** (1:57)
Yeah. I hate LinkedIn.

**Heather Elkington** (2:00)
So far.

**Dr Faye Bate** (2:00)
I hate LinkedIn.
And I think maybe it is the whole womanly thing if you don't want to talk about your wins. If you're listening right now, and you also hate LinkedIn, what advice would you give to just get in your foot in the door trying?

**Heather Elkington** (2:17)
Yeah.
LinkedIn is a place where there's just huge opportunity. I would argue that, I don't want to say Instagram and TikTok are saturated because there's always space, there's always room for brilliant people. But LinkedIn is a place where it is so pale, stale male that if you come to the table with something interesting to say, everyone look like it's so needed, the different opinions on there are so needed. I hate LinkedIn probably in the same way that you do in that, I know what it looks like, I know what it feels like and sometimes you go on there and it's people shout, I've done this and I've done this with my B2B SaaS business and tech and blah, blah, blah. And I get that. But if you can look past that, it's just a huge opportunity. So the reason I started posting on LinkedIn was years and years ago, there was two reasons. One, I hated networking. I still do hate networking events. I avoid them like the plague, right? And everyone's like your network is your network, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, but I hate these events. I hate small talk, hate the awkwardness. I leave just feeling drained. I just don't enjoy it. So, but I know it's important for people to know me and know my name. So LinkedIn was my tool where I was like, okay, how do I get my name to people? And so they know what I stand for. They know the work I'm doing. They know what I'm about without having to put so much time and energy into these events. That was one reason. The second reason was, this time five years ago, I was skinned. Like paycheck to paycheck doesn't even cut it. It was like paycheck, then a loan, and then, you know, like eating the rice that's at the back of the cupboard kind of skin.
And, but I kept hearing people saying, like, you need to be investing in your 20s. It's the time to invest at, you know, compound interest, blah, blah, blah. But I was like, I don't have any money.