Prime Highlights
- LinkedIn’s AI writing assistant is failing to capture the user interest LinkedIn had envisioned.
- CEO Ryan Roslansky revealed that the tool, while revolutionary, hasn’t caught the fancy of the professional user community.
Key Facts
- The AI assistant was meant to facilitate Premium users in writing profile sections and starting conversations more effortlessly.
- In spite of being billed as a productivity feature, it has used surprisingly little across the platform.
- The feature exists currently only for a segment of Premium users, cutting down its availability further.
Key Background
LinkedIn has consistently introduced AI-related features over the past few years to improve user experience and make professional interactions more efficient. The introduction of an AI-assisted writing helper designed to assist users, particularly Premium users, in creating and editing their profile information and direct messages was one of the key moves in this direction. This helper utilizes large language models to craft engaging profile summaries, job descriptions, and icebreaker messages.
But in a recent interview, CEO Ryan Roslansky disclosed that the feature hasn’t gained as much popularity as the company had anticipated. Although the idea was to make profile creation and communication easier for professionals with busy schedules, the assistant has not yet gained significant momentum among its users.
A number of factors can be held responsible for this underperformance. To begin with, use of the tool is still accessible only to a small segment of Premium subscribers, limiting its visibility within the wider LinkedIn user community. Next, there is seemingly a reluctance on the part of professionals to trust AI with creating personal stories—particularly one where authenticity, tone, and uniqueness are so important. A lot of users might worry that AI-generated material sounds mechanical or formulaic, which may erode their personal brand.
In addition, experts may rather compose their own profile items or messages to keep their voice authentic. There’s also a trust deficit in relying on AI for sophisticated, career-defining material, where emotional tone and personal accomplishments must be accurately described. This reflects a larger issue for AI application in professional environments—it must not only be competent but also trustworthy and simple to incorporate into actual workflows.
LinkedIn has spent significant resources on AI innovation, especially after Microsoft’s overall AI integration strategy. Nevertheless, this case suggests that the success of any AI tool is not solely based on its technical potency, but also on the value perceived, trust placed in it by users, and whether or not it can address actual-world requirements. In the future, LinkedIn would need to reconsider the way it rolls out and promotes such features, possibly emphasizing improved onboarding, explicit benefits, and greater availability to increase usage.
