If you know me, you know I love LinkedIn.  It’s been DAYS since I’ve posted about, I know.  I talk about a lot, not just on the blog.  I've said before and I'm sure I'll keep saying that LinkedIn is groundbreaking and will evolve into an even more incredible tool for the professional world over the next few years.  It seems every week there's more than one new feature, tool, or tweak of an existing tool to make it even better.

That being said, there are things I'd like to see added or altered on LinkedIn. This is a fairly off the cuff wishlist. 

Alternative Position Listings
Different way to put Invited Speaker in experience, possibly other non-standard experience.  There's a point where profiles just get too long to be readable.   I imagine this might be useful for some consultants as well, who have short term engagements.  I have two of those right now (speaking engagements), and while I don't expect to have a flood of those, it would be nice to have a single entry for the type of talk given, and be able to list the organizations to which is was given under it. 

Selective Position Visibility
Selective visibility for each experience position listed. At least a way to just see the companies, and not the dates (A gal doesn't like to show her age, and this can be a concern for older professionals). You may only want to have the last few years visible, but still have the older positions listed so old colleagues can find you. 

RTF Description Formatting
RTF formatting instead of plain old TXT formatting for larger text fields (not the titles, obviously).  Here, Monster has it over LinkedIn (and pretty much the only way!!).  I can post my resume using word formatting on Monster.  Now, most fields should not be customizable, it'll just get ugly fast (think MySpace pages... **shudder**).  But being able to use bullets, that's a great idea.  Resumes need you to list accomplishments, and that's best done in bullet points.  It makes it easier to read, and therefore more user friendly. 

Unique “Interested In” Options
Separate phone and email consulting separate items. That may just be me, but I'm easy about email contact, but a lot more skittish about phone contact. 

Certification Section
Separate section for certifications. I earned these, I want to highlight them, dammit!  Also, this is something that people who are looking for talent need to have an easy way to find. Sometimes those certs make the difference between consideration and being overlooked.

Categorized Industry Listings
It's just not simple to navigate this.  Maybe find a way to break it down by very top level, then list the specialized areas under that, so people can find a better match. I've seen my last employer listed three different ways for people at the same location, in the same business unit.  Another option would be to have some sort of a keyword search, so you can see a list of related choices, and pick the best match.  It seems to me this is an under thought functionality, that would have great data mining opportunity for LinkedIn to be able to provide anonymous stats to its sales force and potential clients, as well as help demonstrate to potential users the value of having an account. 

Prominent Group Information
Have a section on the Dashboard for Groups in the same way that there is for Network Updates and Just joined LinkedIn. Or put something about the groups under the Network Updates.  I don't like having the groups section down in the right-hand corner

Unlocked Group Directory
What’s with it being locked? I tried to find out, but got a non-answer it.  Frustrating. One would think it'd be a good marketing tool for LinkedIn.

Stats Page
Under the About LinkedIn section, it would be great to see stats broken down by Fortune 500 representation, and an ability to see the number of members in a particular industry, or specialty.  This is not the same as the stats module on your personal dashboard; this would be for the entire 10million+ and not customized. I think that could be another useful marketing tool.