🔗 Share this article Professional Network Visibility Boost: Female Professionals Find Better Results By Pretending to be Men Do your professional networking connections recognizing you as a industry expert? Do numerous commenters applauding your advice on growing your venture? Are headhunters making contact to explore collaborations? If not, the reason might be your gender. The Experiment: Changing Gender Identity to achieve Better Visibility Dozens of female professionals joined an organized LinkedIn experiment recently after viral posts indicated that changing their profile gender to "male" enhanced their network presence. Some participants rewrote their professional summaries to incorporate what they termed "masculine-oriented" terminology - inserting action-focused business buzzwords like "drive", "transform" and "expedite". Based on reports, their exposure similarly increased. Algorithmic Bias Concerns Raised The improved metrics has caused some to wonder whether a built-in sexism in the platform's system prioritizes men who use professional networking terminology. Similar to many large networking sites, LinkedIn utilizes a computerized system to determine which content are shown to which members - promoting some while suppressing others. Platform Response Through a company announcement, LinkedIn recognized the trend but stated it does not factor in "demographic information" when deciding content distribution. Instead, the company explained that "numerous factors" affect how content are received. Changing gender in your settings does not affect how your content appears in results or timelines. Personal Experiences A social media consultant, who modified her gender identifiers to "he/him" and her profile name to "Simon E", described remarkable results. "The numbers I'm observing show a sixteen-fold rise in visitor traffic and a thirteen-fold jump in content views," she commented. Another professional, a marketing expert, started testing after noticing her reach decline significantly. The Process First, she changed her gender to "male" Then, she used AI tools to rephrase her professional summary using "male-coded" language Finally, she recycled previous content with comparable "agentic" language The result was immediate: a more than fourfold rise in reach within one week. The Downside Although the positive results, Cornish expressed unhappiness with the approach. "Previously, my posts were more personal - brief and clever, but also friendly and human," she stated. "Currently, the masculine version was forceful and confident - similar to a white male being overly confident." She discontinued the test after one week, stating "Each day I persisted, and outcomes improved, I became more frustrated." Mixed Results Not all participants encountered favorable results. Cass Cooper who changed both her gender to "man" and her race to "Caucasian" reported a reduction in visibility and engagement. "We know there's systemic preference, but it's extremely difficult to comprehend how it operates in specific cases or the reasons behind it," she commented. Wider Consequences These experiments occur alongside ongoing conversations about LinkedIn's unique position as both a professional network and social space. Platform modifications in recent months have apparently resulted in female creators experiencing markedly lower visibility, resulting in unofficial tests where identical content by male and female users received vastly different reach. Technical Explanation According to LinkedIn, the network uses artificial intelligence to categorize and spread content based on multiple factors, including post content and the user's professional identity. The company states it frequently assesses its algorithms, including "checks for inequalities based on gender." A spokesperson suggested that recent declines in some users' reach might stem from higher volume due to additional posts on the platform. Changing Landscape As one participant noted, "bro-coding" appears to be growing on the platform. "Users typically consider LinkedIn as more professional and refined," she remarked. "This is evolving. It's becoming increasingly aggressive and unpredictable."