As I get settled in to our new LinkedIn offices at the World Trade Center in Amsterdam, I can’t help but think of my first interview for this position with Arvind Rajan, our vice president of international operations. He told me that of the 55 million professionals on LinkedIn, the member base in the Netherlands was one of the most active and highly engaged groups with the highest number of LinkedIn members per capita outside of the U.S.
Echt? (English: Really?)
That’s impressive.
As I dug deeper into LinkedIn’s proposition to professionals around the world, it made plain sense why my peers have taken to online professional networking.
Last week, Hari Krishnan, our country manager based in Mumbai, launched our India operations with the objective to connect all of India’s professionals. Here in Central Europe, the bar is just as high. By creating programs and partnerships to raise awareness and engagement with LinkedIn in the Netherlands, I believe we can help Dutch professionals succeed in the new decade and beyond and put them on a path to business and career opportunities that otherwise may pass them by.
We already have a strong team here on the ground in Amsterdam. Our near-term focus will be to establish local partnerships and ramp up our general operations. Critical to that will be hearing from you on what we can do to make LinkedIn more helpful to you in your business and career in the Netherlands.