Video Transcript:

"Welcome everyone. Thank you for joining us today.

What is one thing that you could do to be a more effective finance leader? What would you do if, when you left this webinar today and walked into your office, you were told to pack up your things? If you lost your job, would you have the network, contacts, and resources in place to move smoothly into another role with little or no financial impact in your life?

As a career coach who works with public and private finance leaders across a variety of industries, I bring the 10,000 foot view to a CFO career that is often not even on a finance chief's radar screen. Where do you want to go? When do you want to be there? And, how can you get there?

My work with clients usually occurs about 9 to 12 months in advance of them needing to move or even wanting to make a move. It is a process driven strategy that moves through identifying core strengths, what do you do well, love doing, have a track record of success doing, and want to do more of, to crafting that unique marketing message identifying a targeted audience who needs what you bring to the table, and then creating a strategy to get that value message in front of the right people.

Positioning is key and perception is everything. How do you want to be known, and how are you known? The difference can drive a career, derail it, or even cause a career to stagnate?

Three years ago a typical prospect would call me asking for a resume. Today, finance executives have heard the buzzword branding enough that branding is now more often their initial request. Being a purple cow in a field full of brown Guernseys works well for a financial executive.

My job is to help a finance chief draw his unique shade of purple while he is still very coachable. I am Cindy Kraft, The CFO Coach, and I am really glad that you have joined us today. Here we go.

According to LinkedIn, on average, two people join the platform every two seconds. It boasts 250 million members. There are two very valid ways of viewing that statistic: that's a lot of competition, or that's a great place to cull valuable information.

The first step to LinkedIn effectiveness is having a complete and compelling profile. The resource bonus you received as part of signing up for this webinar hits the high points of creating a profile that impacts. Don't shortcut. Start with your profile. It is your first impression and you want that impression to be right before you start driving people to it.

If you haven't yet transformed your profile but you are going to, be sure to turn off your activity broadcast settings while making your changes, and then flip it back on when you're happy with the outcome. If you don't turn it off, every - and I do mean every - change you make will show up in your connections news feeds, undoubtedly the last thing you want sensitive connections to see if you are beginning a confidential job search.

To get to these settings, hover over your picture on the top right, click privacy and settings from the dropdown box, re-enter your password, uncheck the box, and hit save.

So, once you've built your profile, then what? Just because your profile is there, will recruiters and decision makers visit? Since it is a passive strategy, can you just put up your profile and then ignore it? Is it really effective as a reconnaissance tool? In order, will anyone visit just because your profile is there? Not necessarily. Don't build your profile and ignore it if you really want good results.

Today I'm going to show you how to use the LinkedIn platform to generate information you need and want to know. Let's dig a little deeper into a couple of basics you might know about, at least superficially, and then we'll talk about a few insider tricks.

Basic does not equal unimportant. Rather, they are a foundational piece of your overall strategy.

Let me add a disclaimer. LinkedIn changes their features about as often as I do laundry these days, so if what you hear today doesn't correlate 100% with what you are finding on LinkedIn, they might've upgraded that feature, and upgraded is a relative term.

According to a recent 'Forbes' magazine article, the most popular and valuable LinkedIn features are who has viewed your profile, people you may know, and groups. According to the same article, LinkedIn has enabled its members to research people and companies, reconnect with associates and colleagues, build new relationships with influencers, and increase face to face networking effectiveness.

It is interesting, is it not, that securing a new position does not occur anywhere in these stats despite the fact that LinkedIn continues to merge all things job hunt with its networking platform. While the stats may not reflect it, everything listed relates to your visible positioning or lack thereof, and that relates directly to proactively managing your career."

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