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Social Recruiting & Your Job Search
If you are in a job search or just thinking about finding a new job, revise your assumptions on what works these days for job search. While you were happily employed the past few years, recruiting methods have changed, impacted by emerging technology and the economy.
We now have this method called "social recruiting." What is it? Social recruiting is what companies and recruiters do when they use the "social networking sites," like LinkedIn, Twitter, and/or Facebook to find candidates for their job opportunities
The Rise of Social Recruiting
In early 2011, the Society of Human Resource Management (SHRM.org) released a study comparing employer recruiting activities in 2008 vs. 2011. The 2011 survey shows that 56% of employers were using social networks for recruiting and and an additional 20% were planning to use them. So, social networks were a recruiting source for over 75% of employers in 2011, an increase of over 20% since 2008.
By far, LinkedIn is the leader with 95% of employers using it in their recruiting efforts.
The Dangers of Social Recruiting
Social recruiting is not an un-mixed blessing. It provides employers with a more robust representation of the job seeker than any resume or application provides. However, too much information may be available - from party photos which should not be viewed by a potential employer to information about chronic illnesses, politics, religion, financial, and family situations, etc. This personal information is not normally considered in an employer's hiring decision. With social media, the boundaries between personal and professional networking can become dangerously blurred.
Job seekers (and employees!) must carefully consider what they post in a public network. Before you post something, ask yourself - what could be the consequences if my current or future boss saw this? Is this post safe for public consumption?
Google and the other search engines devour social postings, so everything Tweeted or posted on Facebook, LinkedIn, your personal blog, or a comment on someone else's blog may be shown to a potential employer by a search engine today or next year.
Leveraging Social Recruiting for Your Job Search
Carefully using social media when you’re actively job hunting - and when you are employed - can boost your job search, connecting you with opportunities you didn’t know existed and would never have discovered any other way.
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Separate your personal and work lives.
If you must share your views on religion, politics, and other personal and controversial topics, establish and use social network identities that are not easily traced to you, or use a different version of your name. When using LinkedIn, which is clearly a professional network, stick to topics related to - and enhancing - your professional image. And be sure to check - and periodically re-check - your privacy settings on all the social networks to keep those roles separate.
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Connect with people you know.
All of the social networks offer search capabilities to help you connect with people you know (family, friends, former classmates, former co-workers, customers, clients, professors, neighbors, etc.). Your network! They may help you do your current job better and also help you connect with that next job when the time is right.
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Connect with the important people in your field.
For example, if banking is your field, look for new connections you can make in banking to expand your network. You can follow/friend/connect with banking industry sites, banking news sites, banking industry career and job search experts, as well as other thought leaders. These connections will enable you to stay up-to-date in your field as well as providing the connections and advice that will help expedite your job hunt.
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Connect with your target employers.
Facebook and LinkedIn have pages specifically for companies, filled with excellent information for potential customers and potential employees. LinkedIn shows both current and former company employees who are in your LinkedIn network as well as, often, job postings. Many employers have established company pages on Facebook, promoting the company and also, often, making job postings public. Many, many employers have an HR or recruiting account on Twitter used to Tweet out job postings. Find and follow them. (Job-Hunt's list of 500 Employers Recruiting on Twitter)
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Establish your "brand."
Show potential employers your depth of knowledge, your good spelling and grammar, your ability to find and share excellent information, and, if possible, your writing skills. For more on "personal branding," read Job-Hunt's Personal Branding Expert Meg Guiseppi's articles: Branding with Your LinkedIn Profile, Branding with LinkedIn Groups, Amplifying Your Brand with Twitter, plus Meg's free ebook Branding and Your LinkedIn Profile.
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Stay active in social networks.
Focus on establishing and maintaining one social network profile when you are getting started with social media. Then, add additional networks as your time and attention allow. When you "go silent" after establishing a profile, few recruiters will spend the time trying to contact you. Perhaps your Tweet was excellent and exactly on-topic for the job they have open. However, if you posted it mid-2010 with nothing else posted since, your account is obviously abandoned. Recruiters will move on to the obviously active accounts where someone is paying attention. If you have time for only one social network, LinkedIn is probably the one which will be most effective for professional social networking.
Bottom Line
Social recruiting is a fact of life. It is not going away, and job seekers must learn how to manage it. People have been fired for using social networks inappropriately, and they lose job opportunities for the same reason. Check out this blog post about online reputation management for more information.
© Copyright Susan P. Joyce, 2011. All rights reserved.
Online job search expert Susan P. Joyce, USMC veteran, has been observing the online job search world and teaching online job search skills since 1995. Susan is a two-time layoff “graduate” who has worked in human resources at Harvard University and in a compensation consulting firm. In 1998, her company, NETability, Inc. purchased Job-Hunt.org, and Susan has been editor and publisher of Job-Hunt since then. Follow Susan on Twitter at @JobHuntOrg.