Apparently, Linkedin is using their resources at Linkedin Learning (formerly Lynda) to create pass/fail tests with adaptive questions for specific skills. If you pass the timed test and find yourself in the 70th percentile you receive a badge.
You can choose whether you’d like to display this badge on your profile to represent that you’ve passed the assessment for that given skill. If you don’t pass an assessment for a given skill, you’ll be able to retake it one more time after three months and failed tests are not displayed on your profile.
This re-imagination of skills is far more reliable than someone checking a box on your profile to endorse a skill. I do like the idea that skills on LinkedIn profiles are becoming reliable but will recruiters take the time to consider this? There hasn't been much discussion about this on the web. Please let me know what you think.
Top comments (31)
I used to not give any value to any of these assessments/challenges. Hackerrank, Leetcode, StackOverflow... I didn't even care to keep my github clean. I've been a developer for 5 years... why should I care what my status looks like?
One senior developer said something profound to me. He said it was evidence - a history of work. He said the biggest regret was not leaving a public digital trail of work behind, and wish that HE started a decade ago. He had to fight tooth and nail to get his company to get his role, and felt it would have been easier if his background was searchable online.
So while YES... in the moment, it seems kind of useless and unnecessary. But if it takes you 15 minutes, why not? It's another time-stamped piece of proof that you know your stuff. And while it won't directly lead to a job... in the aggregate, it's helping support your story that you're a good developer.
I once had a recruiter warn me in advance that a particular technical interview would be tough. When I got there the interviewer told me that we would just skip the technical interview because he'd seen some of my information online. That's a one-off. It hasn't happened since, and he might have just been really tired. But anecdotally it shows that there is value in the footprint. It makes some interviewers realize that they don't need to ask you lots of trivia questions.
Your boss is a very wise person, especially to admit to something like that. Great inspirational post!
These tests are f***ed up.
Some of the questions are so big that you even don't have time to read and understand them. So it's more depends on luck than on real skill.
On other quizzes with I have 95-100% results, here - less than 70%, just due to lack of time. That's ridiculous.
LinkedIn believes that I don't know CSS3 despite 8 years of development experience and despite the fact that all my software works correctly and customers are satisfied. Yeah, well, LinkedIn is more obvious to you)))
LinkedIn tests get me to take into consideration the nitty gritty of my skillset so I can adequately pass them. A passed skill test gives you so much confidence. I just hope recruiters will turn their attention to it and often request linkedIn profiles during recruitments rather than CVs.
Just mention it when applying for jobs. I will.
I feel the same way. Thanks
After the first question on the C# quiz I stopped and sent feedback on why none of the multiple choice answers made sense. That was the first question. If the person who wrote the quiz can't formulate a coherent answer to why classes have properties then they don't get to evaluate my skill.
It's like going to school all over again.
LinkedIn Assessment question is not standard. its seems you should learn to their Lynda.com tutorial. They do not know how to do question? its all stupid question.
I agree
Agreed. Not very practical questions. I found HackerRank certifications seem to be more reasonable.
My honest opinion is this.
When your being asked a paragraph long
Question; the entire stack of answers is over a paragraph long; you’re given less than two minutes. Then where does that leave you time to formulate a proper answer? Unless you guess for every question. These quizzes were obviously formulated by people with outrageous egos also very obnoxious
Who had time while sitting with their instruction manuals to figure how to make you feel as stupid as possible while not considering that in the real world. Guessing
Can make or break projects. And real world skill is not based on luck. But knowledge. Life is not a guessing game. It’s a game of logic and reason. And it takes more than mere seconds to answer these questions. Considering that it takes almost 2 minutes just to read the Question AND the Answer. I’ve used ProTools for years. And they are asking the most random and vague questions based on options you rarely use and the options rarely make sense given that in ProTools
You mostly create a universal template and rarely deviate from that setup because of time constraints and deadlines. It is the most efficient way. This quiz was written by someone who never could understand this
I know that I am totaly late for the party, but now that more quizzes are available
you can see how low quality they realy are. I would never take this seriously, the questions are either just stupid or have nothing to do with the skill or how you use it IRL. But this is just my opinion.
I agree I feel the same way. I took three
And the questions are based on portions
Of each program we almost never use. I’ve worked with Grammy Winners and Oscar Winners we don’t touch on these subjects and portions of ProTools in any MasterClass at all and I’ve led quite a few myself
On video. No quiz can duplicate that or vouch for my skill which has been proven live and on video
How is the test in terms of difficulty?
I just failed the Java quiz (LOL). It was kinda hard because you have to know very intricate details about how the compiler works. To me, this kind of quiz proves nothing. It's nothing more than a flair badge on your profile. Useful for recruiters probably, useless to the companies hiring you. Our job is much more than memorizing syntax.
edit: I also took the C quiz and passed but I've never written more than 200 lines of C code in my life. Would you hire me based on that information?
Americans are obsessed with tests, though the tests are out of touch with real life.
lol
They only give you enough time to read the question and the answers. You have mere seconds to answer the question.
I took Git and JavaScript. They were both a little challenging but not that difficult.
I did 4 quizzes yesterday having read your post. Git was challenging but Java was easy. I also did AWS and GCP and passed all of them although i would have loved to see if i got 90% or more consistently.
My general impression is that any of my recent hires would have failed Git test although they will pass React.js or Python which is what they would be predominantly doing. I am keen on doing a Salesforce quiz if there is one.
Almost one year from this post and I just recently finished a Visio examination with failing score, I have worked a lot with this and seems like it was enough for passing this kinda dumb questionnaire.
My concern is that those exams has been formulated by people outside the core fields related with the topics indeed.
I took a few of these tests. I passed the first and thought OK, let's get a few badges or whatever, but the next two asked the most obscure unnecessary questions that no-one would ever actually use in real life development that I started to question myself and didn't fancy doing any more. Badly worded, obscure, and on one there were four different large code snippets with the difference between all of them one tiny part of one line, it took me ages to work out what the difference was!
Knowing some obscure, never used functionality/definitions doesn't make you good at your job; conversely, not knowing some obscure behind the scenes rhubarb doesn't make you bad at your job.
Quizzes and exams just show that you know how to pass an exam, not the subject. Only fools deal in absolutes, especially recruiters who bank everything on test results. The world is not black and white, even though these capitalists seem to think it is. More fool them. Linked in quizzes - waste of time. It just gives jobs to jobsworths.
No I do not believe they will take the time a consider it but for those using the platform to find new hires it makes it "more" effective. Its a social platform and as any we deal with various algorithms to be seen.
engineering.linkedin.com/blog/2019...
the thing i like the most about this is just that you know that youre better than 70% of all the other people that took the test
it doesnt mean that youre good or bad at that particular skill just that you did better than most other people
i also like how this system works to stop cheating, because if you can look up the answer anyone can
I'm wondering though about not being able to pass html. If more than 70% score a hundred percent and I miss one. I don't pass.
I found this course to be helpful, if others are interested in signup udemy.com/course/linkedin-skill-as...
After giving the test I felt my profile is being viewed more than it used to. I'm appearing in more searches than earlier.