While LinkedIn can prove to be a wonderful recruiting tool, too many companies don't understand how to best use the social media site, HR blogger Laurie Ruettimann warns.
She says recruiters use LinkedIn without much imagination, just as they used Monster and Career Builder when those sprouted up in the 1990s and offered a new technological avenue for hiring. Companies are targeting people in existing roles instead of looking for undiscovered talent who could do the job brilliantly with a dash of training and development.
"Good talent won't emerge from a job posting on LinkedIn – just like it didn't emerge from putting ads on a job board in 2002. And while the global economy is ready for a change, talented people aren't interested in changing jobs and doing the same exact job they're doing right now. That doesn't make sense. They are interested in doing something new and different. And they expect to be compensated appropriately when they finally decide to make a change," she writes on her blog, The Cynical Girl.
Companies are focusing heavily on job titles when searching LinkedIn for candidates. But she believes they would be smarter going after someone with 60 per cent of the requirements for that job but the potential for growth. Also, check for people whose profiles indicate character and resiliency.
"We rarely ever find exactly what we're looking for in life," she notes. "But you might find someone better if you try a little harder."
Harvey Schachter