LinkedIn Connects to Office 365

Fetching Information from LinkedIn

Today’s Petri.com article explores to connection between Azure Active Directory and LinkedIn that permits Office 365 users to see LinkedIn profile data in people cards for contacts viewed through OWA and other browser applications.

It’s a nice integration and it’s done in a way that preserves personal privacy. Apart from the tenant deciding that the link can happen and for whom, it’s up to each user to decide whether to connect their Office 365 account with their LinkedIn account to fetch data. In other words, the connection is completely under the control of users.

Once the connection is established, you see a LinkedIn logo appear in people cards (the card shown with details of a person, such as their email address and phone number). This only happens in browser apps because the desktop apps haven’t yet been updated.

If you click the LinkedIn logo, Office 365 tries to find a match for the person in LinkedIn using their email address and name. It’s possible that several matches (or none) are found, in which case the user is asked to choose the best match.

Some will find this integration invaluable. Some will hate it. And many will ignore it because they’re not interested in consulting LinkedIn about anything. But I suspect that a reasonable population of Office 365 users will like to have the chance to view career information about internal and external recipients. After all, that information isn’t held anywhere else in your tenant’s Azure Active Directory.

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For more information about the LinkedIn integration with Office 365, read Chapter 3 of the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook.