Why are people using LinkedIn? And what does it mean to Recruiters and those wanting to be Recruited?

We ran a poll on LinkedIn recently to try and find out why people are using it.

We did so because we are fully aware that so many people are using LinkedIn to solve their recruitment issues. And we did so because we wanted to know if we could prove that LinkedIn is actually just becoming a Job Board as we have argued previously

We appreciate that 194 people responding to a poll can hardly be described as a comprehensive polling of the LinkedIn community but a couple of things did stand out for us.

A majority of people are using LinkedIn for reasons that are not to do with recruitment.

49% of people are looking to keep in touch with a business network

13% of people are looking to share commercial/business knowledge.

OK as a recruiter you could conclude this as proof that there is a vast untapped pool of passive candidates out there (and lots of people do).

But the other conclusion that you can draw is that recruiters using LinkedIn should be aware that 62% of people may not want to be pestered about jobs. They are not on LinkedIn because they want random recruiters (in-house and agency) to send them the “I’d like to add you to my professional network” email.

So if you are one of those many recruiters on LinkedIn you need to bear this in mind. You need to make sure that you are not just pushing job adverts out there and you are not just posting about CVs and Recruitment. You need to think about who your audience might be and make sure you respect the fact that people may not want to engage with you for the purposes of getting a job.

We would also argue that perhaps LinkedIn themselves need to consider that by pushing the recruitment angle as they so obviously do they run the risk of alienating a majority of users. They could be killing their own product if they hand over the keys to the recruiters.

30% of people are on LinkedIn and are keen to be noticed and recruited.

Consider that there are in the region of 12 million users on Linked In in the UK & Ireland. If this poll is an accurate representation then that means that 3.6 million people are on LinkedIn and looking for a job.

If you are one of them you clearly need to take some time thinking about how you can stand out and be noticed in a crowd of 3.6 million!

Once upon a time when LinkedIn  was smaller it might have sufficed to get a full profile up, select a nice photo and sit back waiting to be found. But surely this is no longer the case.

You need to be actively engaged with LinkedIn which means commenting on group discussions, sharing updates (and not just the ones from Richard Branson and James Caan that everyone else shares) and being prepared to give a little. For example be prepared to recommend people and ask for recommendations.

There are plenty of people prepared to argue that LinkedIn is killing the traditional CV but that doesn’t mean that you have to just transfer your traditional CV to LinkedIn. LinkedIn allows you to now showcase your talents and expertise in more creative ways. You can add PowerPoint slides and video. And perhaps even use your status updates as a mini blog site.

There is no doubt that Linked In is a big issue and has had a major impact on the way we behave as businesses and business people. It has certainly changed Recruitment Processes and it is not going to go away any time soon.

BUT our poll suggests that

• It is not JUST a job board and recruiters (inhouse and/or agency) who want it to be one need to think whether they are alienating a majority in doing so.
• The sheer numbers of people using it mean that it makes it difficult to stand out as much as you would like as a Job Seeker.

Also don’t forget that if this poll is an accurate representation then 360,000 (3%) of the 12 million UK & Ireland users of Linked In are on it for no obvious reason and lots of people aren’t on it at all! 

 

                                                           

Wright Solutions is a specialist HR Consultancy. We attract, place and develop the highest calibre candidates in Executive, HR and Learning & Development roles. Our service is more than recruitment with our training solutions that give Leadership and Management teams the competitive advantage for today and tomorrow.

 

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You can't 'un-invent' email. So........

We are often frustrated about how difficult it can be to get people to pick up the phone and talk to us and we are known to moan about how some people just seem to want to write an email rather than talk.

We are also pretty sure we are not alone.

But you can’t 'un-invent' email.

It is an invaluable business tool and whilst some of us can remember a time when we did do business without it none of us could imagine doing business without it now.

So how come no one is ever asked at interview about their email skills? How come we have never been told to ask a candidate to show evidence of their emailing as part of the interview process?

We are often arranging for candidates to deliver a 10 minute presentation for a role where they unlikely to ever have to do a presentation as part of their job. It is also very common for us to arrange a Telephone Interview (and not just because of ease but because the interviewer wants to see how they can communicate over the phone given that they will be doing a lot of it in the job).

BUT those same candidates are never tested for a skill that they will need to use all the time (ie. Emailing).

So we wanted to pose some questions....

 

Should you be thinking about arranging Email Interviews as part of your interview process?

Or is this a ridiculous idea?

Should we all actually be using email less and talking to people more?

                                                           

Wright Solutions is a specialist HR Consultancy. We attract, place and develop the highest calibre candidates in Executive, HR and Learning & Development roles. Our service is more than recruitment with our training solutions that give Leadership and Management teams the competitive advantage for today and tomorrow.

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Do you use Linked In? Why?

We are running a poll on Linked In at the moment and would be grateful for your votes. And any comments you might want to add.

Why do Recruitment Consultants do that?

Sometimes candidates and clients must wonder what goes on in the mind of a Recruitment Consultant and why they do some seemingly ‘odd’ things during the course of a Recruitment Campaign.

We thought we could tackle some of those questions on this blog site as most of the time there is a logical explanation.

Why won’t you tell me who the end client is?

We recently took a call from a candidate who we had never spoken to before. They had seen one of our adverts and had a few questions before they applied. First question was “Can you tell me who the end client is?”. The consultant declined to answer that question and the follow up question was “Why do Recruitment Consultants not tell you?”

The Recruitment Sector is very competitive with 1000s of Recruitment Consultants out there working vacancies and building relationships with candidates and clients alike. When a recruiter advertises a job they are, of course, looking for candidates for the role but they are also alerting some of their competitors to the fact that they are working on a vacancy and that the end client in question has made a decision that they are prepared to pay an agency fee. That alert can be like a red rag to a bull!

It is therefore not uncommon for Recruiters to try and make an educated guess as to who the client is and then pick up and phone them to get their hands on the spec and permission to work the vacancy.

One of the ways that they can do that is to pretend to be a candidate and ring the consultant and ask. “Hi my name is Bob and I have just seen the role that you have advertised. Before I do so can I ask who the end client is?”. Funnily enough CVs often never materialise after you have told them!

This is far from ideal as a Recruiter but it is also far from ideal as the Recruiting Manager. Suddenly they are getting 10-20 calls from enthusiastic consultants all telling them how amazing they are and how they have just the perfect candidate. It is for this reason that we will always ask clients for permission to advertise a role and often have to reassure them that the role will be advertised anonymously and vaguely so they won’t end up being unnecessarily pestered.

Also bear in mind that the end client might not have communicated to their team and business that they are recruiting. You only need to have a look at your Linked In profile to realise that most people know someone who knows someone and the wrong bit of information released by a Recruitment Consultant to a prospective candidate might be relayed to that someone before it should be.

Having said this though, it should be very unusual for your CV to be put forward to a role without you knowing who the end client is. It would seem to be unfair that they know who you are but you not know who they are. You just might need to get to know the recruiter and engage with them before you will get that crucial bit of information.

                                                          

We will be tackling further questions like this on this blog. Your questions can be put to us via Twitter, Facebook, Linked In or the comments below.

                                                          

Wright Solutions is a specialist HR Consultancy. We attract, place and develop the highest calibre candidates in Executive, HR and Learning & Development roles. Our service is more than recruitment with our training solutions that give Leadership and Management teams the competitive advantage for today and tomorrow.

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Free Webinar: Compliance Training - A Game Changer?

Gamification of compliance and regulatory training could save organisation millions of pounds in fines.

People absolutely hate compliance training, they don’t remember it and they don’t take it seriously, yet it is costing organisations massive amounts of money and reputations. 

By introducing game elements to compliance training employee engagement can be increased, with real time analytics also generating data that can be used by organisations.

Our FREE 20 minute webinar will demonstrate how we have created data-rich compliance games based on regulatory rules, combining a user-friendly interface with narratives based on real life compliance failures, and 'gamified' tasks designed to keep users attention.  

Gartner has predicted that 40 percent of Global 1000 organisations will use gamification as the main method of transforming business operations by 2015

Find out how you can better identify and manage your risk through gaming technology. 

Webinar Dates:

26^th March -  4.45pm GMT (20 minutes) 

27^th March -  8.45am GMT (20 minutes) 

MORE DATES TO BE CONFIRMED FOR THE FUTURE.

You can register your interest for future dates by registering with us. 

Register NOW.

Call Paul Wright on 0121 222 5599 or email: info@wrightsolutionsltd.com

                                                           

Wright Solutions is a specialist HR Consultancy. We attract, place and develop the highest calibre candidates in Executive, HR and Learning & Development roles. Our service is more than recruitment with our training solutions that give Leadership and Management teams the competitive advantage for today and tomorrow.

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