LinkedIn partners with 7 online education firms to let users add certifications and courses to their profiles

LinkedIn today announced it has partnered with some of the biggest names in online education to help users include educational accomplishments that go beyond the traditional institutions. As part of a new pilot program called Direct-to-Profile Certifications, users can now add certifications and courses to their profiles.

The pilot features “premier” online education firms, of which LinkedIn lists seven that it has partnered with: Coursera, EdX, Lynda.com, Pearson, Skillsoft, Udacity, and Udemy. The company wouldn’t share if it plans to expand this list if the pilot is successful, but even if it doesn’t, it looks like the professional social network has its bases largely covered.

Here’s how it works. Once you complete a course with a participating provider, you will receive an email from LinkedIn that includes a link with an automatically populated certification field.

The details of the course you just completed are provided by the online education firm (so no, these aren’t easy to fake), as you can see in this Coursera example:

All you have to do is hit “Save,” and LinkedIn will add the certification or completed course work to your LinkedIn Profile. LinkedIn plans to work further with the online education community “to explore even better ways to make it easier for you to seamlessly update your LinkedIn Profile,” but it wouldn’t explain exactly how.

Yet this doesn’t end at online education firms; LinkedIn says this is its “first step” in making it easier for users to keep their professional profile updated. We can thus expect that the company will be partnering with other providers of courses and classes.

See also – LinkedIn lists 2013’s most in demand employers: Google, Apple keep first and second but Microsoft, Facebook slip and LinkedIn redesigns its apps for iOS 7, adds endorsements and beginner’s guide to mobile site

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