Unlocking nearly 10 billion years worth of knowledge to help you tackle everyday work problems

I was at a conference not long ago and the person sitting next to me was struggling with something he had to deal with that week. He needed to reorganize his startup and had no idea the steps to pull it off without causing an uprising. I asked him where he turns for help on issues like that and he shrugged: “The internet, I guess?”

That’s a terrific solution for some things in life. But when you’re trying to solve problems that could make or break your company or that could put your career on a new path, you want to know who you’re learning from and what they’ve been through that's helped shape their advice. You want guidance from someone you can trust who has the experience (and, let’s be frank, the scars) to help you avoid pitfalls. 

That got us thinking: What if we could enable every member to tap into the universe of experience on LinkedIn? Members possess a mind blowing ~10 billion years of professional experience. Billions of trials and experiments, of mistakes and successes, in nearly every country and every industry. That’s an incredible store of knowledge. But unlocking that information has long required connections few of us have. 

Today, we’re starting to change that. We are introducing collaborative articles — knowledge topics published by LinkedIn with insights and perspectives added by the LinkedIn community. These articles begin as AI-powered conversation starters, developed with our editorial team. Then, using LinkedIn’s Skills Graph, we match each article with relevant member experts who can contribute their lessons, anecdotes, and advice based on their professional experience. 

And, that’s when the real magic happens: when professionals share real-life, specific advice by contributing their perspectives to the work questions we’re all facing every day. Because starting a conversation is harder than joining one, these collaborative articles make it easier for professionals to come together and add and improve ideas — which is how shared knowledge is created.

Of course, feedback is part of this, too. When you read the collaborative articles, you can react to the contributions by clicking the “insightful” reaction, helping your network and peers quickly find great insights. Through the articles, you’ll discover new people to follow who will keep you learning about topics key for your job and career.  And to make sure that contributors are rewarded for giving their time and experience, they can earn a new Community Top Voice badge in their skill areas (e.g., “Top Sales Voice”) for adding their insights. You’ll be able to see the badge on profiles and next to contributions on the articles.

We’ve long been driven to help every member of the workforce develop their skills, advance in their careers, and improve their economic prospects. Almost always, that path starts with knowledge — from people you know and from people you wish you knew. With collaborative articles, we’re investing in creating more equitable ways to unlock this knowledge across the professional world. 

And we're continuously learning, as well. So, like with collaborative articles, we’d love your insights and feedback on this new approach — please leave them below!