Three Years at LinkedinAs Told Through Shirts

Leela Srinivasanwww.linkedin.com/in/leelasrinivasan

2010

THE MYSTERY GOLF SHIRT (Jan?): This looks like it might have been a sales kickoff giveaway. Women and baggy golf shirts don’t mix too well, so this one is still on the hanger. On the plus side, I do like the white stitching.

If this is indeed from our 2010 sales kickoff, it was probably about one-fifth the size of the sales kickoff we’ll have in 2013.

THE INTERNATIONAL LAUNCH SHIRT (April): this one commemorates LinkedIn’s launch in Italian .I had a choice that day, as there were also bright yellow shirts available to celebrate our Brazilian launch - but yellow really isn’t my color, and I’d move to Tuscany in a heartbeat, so Italy it was.

THE ORIGINAL (Jan ): this shirt was presented to me on my very first day of LinkedIn. It’s simple, classic: LinkedIn logo on navy blue background.

There were about 500 of us then. There are over 3,000 of us today. But the shirt still fits me incredibly well.

2010 (continued)

THE SUMMER OFFSITE SHIRT (July): this one was the product of a T-shirt contest run by the ever-creative Patrick Crane. The winning design was elegant, the pun playful -so very Steve Pecko.

THE BAY TO BREAKERS SHIRT (May). Here’s proof that we were still a small company: we decided to try to break a Guinness World record for the longest centipede in a race. So there I was at 7.30 on a Sunday morning, standing in downtown SF, tied to complete strangers with caution tape. Wearing this T-shirt of course.

TALENT CONNECT (Nov): our first annual customer conference for the Talent Solutions business took place in San Francisco. I ran the track for decision-makers and blogged. I remember being amazed that we could pull off a conference at such scale (almost 500 customers showed up).

Little did we know…

2011

THE 100 MILLION MEMBER SHIRT (March): the first really big member milestone we passed at LinkedIn. There were close to 60 million at LinkedIn when I joined, and we just announced 200 million, so the 2 members per second growth continues…

THE IPO SHIRT (don’t recall the date)(kidding): an exciting day at the ranch. I was at home that morning and I recall being glued to CNBC as I watched the feverish activity on the trading floor at NYSE. It took them forever to price our stock as demand exceeded supply..

I remember texting one of our business leaders when he was in the background of a shot on TV – ‘smile, you’re on camera!’ – and he texted right back We still feel like a small company in many ways.

THE CONSOLATION T-SHIRT (Aug): I wasn’t at this marketing offsite, because I was still on maternity leave, and my twins had just been released from the NICU. No scavenger hunts for me! But Dee still sent me the T-shirt anyway.

2012

THE INTORONTO SHIRT (May): Steve on my team pulled off a minor miracle in staging our biggest ever Canadian customer event. It was my first time in Toronto and I loved it.

This is the only white shirt in the collection!

THE LINKEDIN JAPAN SHIRT (Jul): this was gifted to me by Rei after I ran a workshop at our summer offsite. Not sure what the arrows are all about, but I rather like them.

THE TALENT CONNECT 2012 SHIRTS (Oct): we hosted well over 3000 people combined at our London and Vegas customer conferences.

In Vegas, for the first time , the buck stopped with me. If we didn’t succeed, it was on me, Tejal and Catherine. But with an NPS of 72 and strong industry response, we came through it well and we’re already planning for ‘13, and beyond.

Missing in action at time of photo shoot: the LinkedIn Hiring Solutions fleece; the LinkedIn Marketing jacket; and the LinkedIn dri-fit jacket