Your new undocumented LinkedIn operator (in addition to the ones I covered in a few recent posts) is functions:, with the values from Job Function Codes.
Example: functions:4 looks for people in Business Development.
As with other operators, you can search for several values at the same time, and LinkedIn does assign several functions to some people (example: functions:(4 8 9) ).
As a summary, below is the full list of LinkedIn search operators that work with any basic or premium account, in the main search box. Many of the discovered search facets have only been available in LinkedIn Recruiter, and the operator headline:, uniquely, works only in a basic/premium account!
[edited: no longer true – use the brackets ()] For each operator, you can use it with several values in the quotation marks, which means an AND of terms. For example, headline:”engineer senior” searches for both words senior and engineer to appear in the headlines (but not for a phrase).
You can certainly combine the operators and use the Boolean logic.
Note that the values calculated by LinkedIn are less reliable than those entered by members, no matter which account you use to search (I have marked those in the last column).
Tip Sheet – LinkedIn Search Operators
Operator | Meaning | Values | Calculated by LinkedIn |
headline: | search for keywords in Headline | no | |
skills: | search for keywords in Skills | no | |
spokenlanguage: | search for language proficiency by a language name | no | |
startyear: | search for the start year in college | no | |
endyear: | search for the end year in college | no | |
geo: | search for a Geoname | Geonames | no |
title: | search for current job title | no | |
company: | search for current company name | no | |
school: | search for school name | no | |
firstname: | search for first name | no | |
lastname: | search for last name | no | |
industry: | search for the industry by Industry code | Industry Codes | no |
seniority: | search for seniority | Seniority Codes | yes |
profilelanguage: | search for profiles in other languages by a two-letter language abbreviation | Language Codes | no |
functions: | search for functions | Job Functions | yes |
yoe: | search for “years of experience” | yes |
The Webinar “Sourcing Hacks” presents an in-depth guide to LinkedIn operators and twenty-four other cool hacks for your productivity. The webinar is based on our new ebook “Sourcing Hacks” (2019)