🔗 Share this article

Do your professional networking followers recognizing you as a industry expert? Do numerous commenters applauding your advice on growing your business? Do recruiters reaching out to explore collaborations?

If not, the explanation could be your gender.

The Test: Changing Gender Identity to achieve Increased Reach

Dozens of women participated in a collective LinkedIn experiment this week following popular discussions suggested that switching their gender to "male" enhanced their network presence.

Other testers rewrote their professional summaries to incorporate what they termed "bro-coded" terminology - inserting results-driven business buzzwords like "drive", "transform" and "expedite". Based on reports, their visibility similarly increased.

Systemic Preference Concerns Brought Up

The improved metrics has led some to speculate whether a built-in gender bias in LinkedIn's algorithm prioritizes male users who use professional networking terminology.

Similar to most major social media platforms, LinkedIn utilizes an algorithm to decide which content appear to which users - promoting some while reducing others.

Platform Response

In a recent blog post, LinkedIn acknowledged the phenomenon but claimed it does not consider "personal characteristics" when determining post visibility. Instead, the company mentioned that "numerous factors" influence how posts perform.

Changing gender on your profile does not influence how your content shows up in results or timelines.

Individual Results

A social media consultant, who changed her pronouns to "male pronouns" and her name to "Simon E", described extraordinary results.

"The statistics I'm seeing show a sixteen-fold rise in profile views and a thirteen-fold jump in impressions," she noted.

Megan Cornish, a marketing expert, started testing after noticing her reach decline significantly.

The Process

• Initially, she changed her gender to "man"
• Subsequently, she used AI tools to rewrite her profile using "masculine-oriented" language
• Finally, she repurposed old posts with similar "assertive" style

The outcome was immediate: a more than fourfold rise in reach within one week.

The Downside

Despite the success, Cornish voiced unhappiness with the approach.

"Previously, my posts were softer - concise and clever, but also friendly and relatable," she stated. "Currently, the masculine version was forceful and confident - similar to a Caucasian man swaggering around."

She discontinued the test after seven days, stating "Each day I persisted, and results improved, I became angrier."

Varying Outcomes

Some testers encountered positive results. Cass Cooper who changed both her profile gender to "male" and her ethnicity to "Caucasian" described a decrease in visibility and engagement.

"We understand there's systemic preference, but it's very challenging to comprehend how it operates in specific cases or the reasons behind it," she remarked.

Wider Consequences

These experiments occur alongside continuing discussions about LinkedIn's distinctive role as both a business platform and social space.

Recent changes in the past few months have apparently resulted in women professionals experiencing markedly lower exposure, leading to informal experiments where identical posts by men and women received vastly different reach.

System Details

According to LinkedIn, the platform uses AI systems to categorize and spread posts based on multiple factors, including what's shared and the member's career profile.

The company states it regularly evaluates its systems, including "examinations of gender-related disparities."

Company representative suggested that current reductions in some users' reach might originate from higher volume due to more content on the platform.

Evolving Environment

According to a tester noted, "bro-coding" appears to be increasing on the platform.

"Users typically consider LinkedIn as more professional and polished," she commented. "That's changing. It's turning into increasingly aggressive and less controlled."