I am not a finished product by any means. Neither are you.

Yet we strive for “terminal degrees,” chase ultimate retirement goals, offer final comments, pen opinions, publish books, and/or have the last word on any contested topic: one, some, or all of these can be seen as the elusive gold ring on the merry-go-round.

Yet, is the race to the best-in-class ever over? Aren’t we all in beta, as Reid Hoffman suggests in his essential book “The Start-up of You”?

The goalpost keeps moving. Research opens new frontiers, authorities write provocative works to make us think in new ways, we push ourselves to new, further limits.

Most people I know have had multiple careers. My learning curves steepened with every new industry or job function I cycled into.

I am still learning. I am still offering what I learned.

Many never want to retire (including me). We have too much to convey, too many interests, too far to go, a yearning to provide the usable expertise I spent my careers developing, all along this same never-ending continuum.

We never rest. We are ever perfecting, absorbing, and applying new knowledge.

We must bubble it up.

So how do you show your command of almost anything you tacked in your career, past-present-future, on LinkedIn?

First you let it bubble up, because it is buried deep down inside.  Give yourself permission to tell why you.

Heed the words of my old high school pal, Marcus, above, as true today as he spoke it in my world history class.

Then you commit to write it from the heart, with a plan to develop the narrative, and tell that story, chapter by chapter, like Stephen King wrote his many novels, so the reader becomes so engrossed in the development of your story that they can’t stop reading your profile, all the way to the end.

You have to plan to know what’s next in your roadmap.

That will crystallize one (or more) reason(s) for your reader to contact you, your ultimate call to action.

You’re not nearly done and the next project for that reader is your next chapter to develop along the plotline. I know that’s my case.
(not) The End.