linkedin profile update after hiatus

[Anonymous]

I left my job about one year ago, to help settle my family during the move from the west coast and deal with the ADHD / anxiety diagnostic, treatment and accommodations for one of my 2 children. My LinkedIn profile was not updated, and as I'm looking to start a job search, I'm realizing that it still list my old job as current. What is customary in these situations?

1) leave it be, and enter the new position when one lines up? (Plus: I avoid having to document a one-year absence from the work force but Minus: LinkedIn automatically calls it job continuity, so my profile is technically inaccurate)

2) Set an end date to that job and leave the current employment open? (Plus: accurate on the job front but Minus: instantly flagged as a job continuity, and does not reflect new skills I learned this year, even while managing the move)

3) Scratch my brain for the ways researching schools and ADHD resources will make me more relevant to my technical management position and invent a title to support that? (homestead relocation officer, general household manager ... principal medical researcher... education executive or similar <grin... looking for better ways to do this, obviously!) (Plus: *very* accurate, minus: labels me as a mom, targets me as unemployable in the tech sector)

How do others manage their profiles when they have had to take some time off?

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[Anonymous]

#2.

[Anonymous]

I think it's unethical, if you're actively managing your linkedin page and using linkedin to advance your job search, to leave it be. If you were totally not using your page, that potentially would be one thing (one could say it's just outdated), but if you're actually using it, it's unethical to leave it. It's not "technically inaccurate," as you characterize it; it's "inaccurate." And I'm not sure where it would get you, anyway. When you apply to a job, presumably you'd have to send them a resume. Do you plan on continuing this deception on your resume? I think most of us can agree that would be wrong.

If you have indeed learned new skills this year that would be relevant to the technical management position you are seeking, I would work those into your linkedin profile.

But No. 3, or coming up with some stupid title to characterize what you've been doing the past year, is a horrible idea. "Principal medical researcher"? Really? In your current title on Linkedin, you can say something like "technical management professional" and then list your skills, what kind of job you're seeking, in the description.