Why do we have to use so many platforms?

Adding a new feature to LinkedIn

For some years, LinkedIn has become the reference platform in the work environment, as a social network. Obviously we will find sectors in which the use of this tool can be more remarkable than in others, but, apart from that, it is undeniable that LinkedIn has marked a before and after in the relationship between professionals.

LinkedIn is an excellent tool to share ideas with the community, publish and apply for job offers or contact colleagues. Specifically, in this last case, is where we can find a possible weakness, since the platform does not provide all the necessary channels so that two or more professionals can maintain the best possible contact. Let me explain, LinkedIn only offers the possibility to exchange text messages and voice notes, this causes that, if the contact between the people extends and reaches more advanced phases, probably a closer communication than a simple text will be needed, like a video call. This lack of channels causes other platforms to be used aside than LinkedIn itself, two common examples are Skype and Google Hangouts.

Grouping all the channels and functions in a single application eventually results in that all the general action of maintaining contact with another professional becomes easier and more fluid. For example, a problem using multiple platforms is that of the passwords:

How many times a password has been forgotten due to the unusual use of a platform?

But… is this true?

All of these are, basically, my assumptions. For this reason, I conducted some interviews to find out if this situation was widespread.

The questions were the following ones:

• Do you use LinkedIn?
• Have you ever chat with any recruiter through a digital device?
• Would you like to use a camera to get in touch with these professionals?
• Would you prefer to just use one platform for all the process?

The results of the interviews were clearly favorable to my initial thoughts, which made me think that a new feature to make video calls within LinkedIn would be well received by users.

Through the new feature

In order to implement this feature, the icon of a video camera was placed in the message menu, which only is activated when the person with whom you want to talk is also online.

In the following image you can see how the video call icon stays disabled until the other user is connected

Then, during the video call, the possibility of speaking with more than one person at the same time is offered, thanks to a button located in the lower right corner. This can be a great help in order to speed up communication between several people.

Next, we can see the screen of the person who makes the call (left), the screen during the call (center) and the screen that the person who receives the call sees (right).

We can also find the possibility that someone does not want to receive this kind of calls, if that was the case, this person should only go to the message options (top right button, inside the search box) and disable this feature.

To make sure that the person is aware that he/she can not receive video calls, the icon will appear in red. Who wanted to make the call would only see the icon disabled even if the two were online.

If the person with the disabled calls wants to receive them from only one particular person, should keep the icon tight until it appears in an enabled state. This way will be able to receive video calls from the desired person but not from other people.

The following image shows the screen of the person who does not want to receive calls (left), the screen of the person who wants to call one with the disabled video calls (center) and the screen of a person with the calls enabled (right). The difference is found in the icons of the video camera from the lower menu.

I hope this writing can be profitable for you, and if you want to give me some kind of feedback you can contact me through LinkedIn!