Open Letter to LinkedIn: Arts & Culture Belongs Here
Dear LinkedIn,
For arts and culture professionals, LinkedIn makes it surprisingly hard to identify our profession. There’s no “Arts & Culture” category. Instead, we’re left cobbling together an identity from options like:
→ Entertainment (flattening a sector that is so much more)
→ Performing Arts (excludes museums, visual arts, etc)
→ Performing Arts and Spectator Sports (why??)
→ Artists and Writers (are writers not artists?)
→ Museums, Historical Sites, and Zoos (totally different animals—literally)
Source: LinkedIn
It’s fragmented, inconsistent, and incomplete. And it reflects a shallow understanding of the sector.
→ Museums show up twice.
→ Performing arts are awkwardly mashed up with spectator sports.
→ Artists and musicians are treated like isolated freelancers, not part of a larger ecosystem.
→ Visual & literary arts, public art, cultural service orgs are invisible.
These industry categories just don’t match reality. Many of us are forced to choose "Nonprofit Organizations" when we can’t find our actual field listed. But nonprofit is a tax status, not a profession. And a platform for professionals should properly recognize all professions—including ours.
Our sector contributes over $1 trillion to the U.S. economy, representing 4.3% of the nation’s GDP. It’s a major economic engine—bigger than Agriculture, Transportation, and Mining, and about the same size as Construction. (Surprised? Most people are.)
It's time to untangle this confusion and create a coherent Arts & Culture category.
👉 It's broad enough to encompass all disciplines.
👉 It's specific enough that we aren’t lumped in with zoos, sports stadiums, or Entertainment.
When arts and culture professionals are forced to misrepresent themselves just to be findable, that hurts visibility, recruiting, networking, and professional recognition.
We’re not scattered—LinkedIn’s categories are.
Update: One Month Later
Well, that escalated quickly! With 1,728 likes, 169 comments, 154 reposts, 66,700 impressions, it’s clear this has been a longstanding pain point for arts and culture professionals—and it’s finally getting attention.
I’ve heard back from LinkedIn:
→ They acknowledged that the current categories (like "Entertainment," "Performing Arts and Spectator Sports," and "Artists and Writers") don't fully capture the professionalism, scope, and diversity of the arts and culture field.
→ They called the need for a more accurate "Arts & Culture" category both COMPELLING and VALID.
→ They've shared our feedback with their product and categorization teams. While change may not be immediate, they emphasized that voices like ours help set priorities.
I’ll continue to engage with them—and I’ll keep you posted. Thank you to everyone who lent your voice to this issue. You are making a difference.
