Archive for December 15, 2009

Social Media IS the Silver Bullet, for everything…..

December 15, 2009 / Justin Hillier / One comment

Sounds outlandish I know, Social media is the solution to all of our problems. This simply can’t be true, can it? Well it really just depends on how deep in to the rabbit hole you want to look. We are all aware of the rage surrounding it at the moment, you can’t turn on the TV, pick up a paper or talk to a friend without Twitter, Facebook or Youtube being mentioned. There are so called “experts” popping up left right and centre and their is a new site almost every hour.

According to Wikipedia this is what the term “Silver Bullet” means:
The term has been adopted into a general metaphor, where “silver bullet” refers to any straightforward solution perceived to have extreme effectiveness. The phrase typically appears with an expectation that some new technology or practice will easily cure a major prevailing problem.

So how can this be related to Social Media? It is not exactly straight forward with so many platforms out there to use. But there has been a clear problem in the world, the lack of effective communication between countries, governments to citizens, companies to consumers, so on and so on.

Communication is the key. We all live fast and frenetic lives, always on the run and never a spare moment to sit down and catchup with people we haven’t spoken to in 6 months. And we always complain we never have enough time to talk to everyone in our lives. Social Media has enabled us to communicate, engage and collaborate with the wider world like nothing ever seen before.

Not only are these tools helping connect with lost friends and relatives, but also the business world is using social media to connect and communicate in ways we only dreamed of 10 years ago. I now know more people in my industry then I did 2 years ago, and that’s not locally, that’s globally, all due to social media. The fact you are even reading this article right now is full testament to that.

Without communication we have nothing. Without the ability to tell people our stories, share our wealth of knowledge and experience we do not grow as a society or as human beings.

There have been many people pitch, state and scream to the world that social media is not a silver bullet. Well in my mind your not thinking laterally enough and probably trying to protect some other revenue stream of your own, hello newspapers, job boards (although JB’s just need to get more social).

The key to using social media all comes down to your approach. There are so many methods making up the “bucket” of social media that it can be hard to know where to begin. For those who “get it”, know its a very powerful communication and engagement platform. We know that we can reach a wide audience and have our voices heard and people will in turn talk with us.

Social Media was a catalyst to help promote change with Obama, it has allowed the rest of the world to know what is going in Iran when all other media outlets have been banned. We saw lives saved in the Mumbai attacks with hostages using it to inform police of the location of the terrorists via Twitter. It has allowed communication to flow far more freely and for people to connect and engage with each other in way that we only dreamed of 10 years ago. It’s a powerful tool that can deliver powerful outcomes.

Now is that not the silver bullet that everyone has been so desperately trying to find?

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Employer Branding – Practice what you intend to Preach

December 7, 2009 / Justin Hillier / One comment

As you all know I am heading home soon to Melbourne, and have been searching feverishly for a job focusing on Social Media use in recruitment. Whilst these jobs are hard to come by anywhere, (and I am more focused now on going solo) something that utilises Social Media as a tool in any aspect is obviously of keen interest. My thinking has been that ad agencies would be the ideal setting and environment to move towards and many have agreed.

So when I recently found out that a particular employment ad agency (who shall remain nameless) was looking for a Account Director/Employer Branding I got excited. The focus is to be on social media as applied to employment market and best practice while focusing on the Employer Brand. You can imagine when I discovered this, that I thought I had found exactly (or close to) what I was looking for.

Now given this role is to advise pitch, propose and deliver solutions regarding Employer Branding, you would expect that this ad agency has their own systems in place to show candidates that they care about their own Employer Brand.

Well it seems that this isn’t the case. It was a over a week ago that I last heard from this ad agency, and the intention was to simply organise an initial phone call.

Now I normally wouldn’t do this, but if you are going to go to market to your clients the best methods or practices in a certain area, you need to be doing those same things yourself. Whether is be replying to candidates, returning phone calls, an open and honest interview process or ensuring that if you say their is a set of steak knives upon joining the company or 20% of your work time is free to work on what you want then there is, think Google. All of this can harm your Employer Brand is misrepresented or not followed through on.

How can I now consider this position when the company advertising, does not fulfill these areas themselves?
Can I honestly now consider this company and potential job opportunity in the same light? The job is to inform clients of best practice, and my own Employer would be at fault themselves.

We are all at fault at times, of being somewhat hypocritical in what we advise our clients to do, and then do not do these same things ourselves. Does this make it right, or our advice any less important? Certainly not. But for me this case is before I have even started working for a company, and the potential messages and solutions that I would be advising future clients on.

Perhaps I am being a little to pedantic, or they are just really busy. Which really is just a poor excuse. We can sometimes to be focused on winning new business or advising clients, that we forget about our own backyard. If you’re at fault, don’t stress, admit it, fix it and move on. Mistakes happen.

Now will this agency do the same? And no I’m not going to tell you who it is…………..

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Down Under Update

December 3, 2009 / Justin Hillier / No comments


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For those who don’t think social media is a useful tool for finding a job, YOU’RE INSANE. As I mentioned last week I am heading home to Australia to get back in to the sunny way of life and I am searching for a role in the Social Media Recruitment space.

To date I can tell you the response and support has been amazing. Since tweeting about it all last week my call out to Australia has been Re-tweeted 20 times, I think this is amazing. The blog article itself has been viewed 64 times. Not bad.

Through all of this activity I have connected with some great people in various states that have offered their assistance and further contacts within the industry. Whilst the Australian market is still quite “green” in terms of social media recruitment adoption, there is certainly a growing awareness that their is an opportunity to be had.

Given all of this I have been advised from many circles, that given my 2 years experience in the UK, focus on enterprise social media solutions in the last 14 months and their faith and trust in my knowledge and ability, that I should consult to recruitment agencies and corporate’s on their social media recruitment strategy upon my return home to Australia. Quite flattering I must tell you.

So hoping not to stretch the Social Media friendship to far, if there are any recruitment agencies or companies in Australia running around in circles as to where to start with Social Media and it’s benefit’s then drop me a line. You will find many of my thoughts on this blog site and if they sound interesting then we should talk. Don’t worry about a heavy sales approach, that’s not my style.

I am easily contactable via this blog.

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Jobs Boards – Ditch The Resume DB Please, get SOCIAL

December 1, 2009 / Justin Hillier / 6 comments

Ah, the good old resume database. How I hate thee. Might sound a little harsh but having worked at job boards in a sales capacity for 6 years I think I have every right to say they are fundamentally floored in today’s market. You see if I had a $ for every time I had a client say “It’s a waste of money, all the candidates are old or not relevant” I’d be a millionaire.

The major problem with the Resume Database as we know it, is that it is WAY to simple for a candidate to put the resume up there and do nothing else with it. This causes many problems. Often they sit there for years and more often then not they classify themselves in the wrong way. So how can job boards take the resume database forward and socialise this aspect of their sites.

I have one word for you, “Community”. The Resume database on most job boards is a formant sleeping giant. The candidates are asleep and the Employers/Recruiters are getting lost in the maze. Where is the interaction and engagement, what’s the point of having 300,000 people on a database if talking to them is near impossible. Greater engagement would mean greater value, not only to the job board in terms of revenue but to the candidate and employer in terms of faster matches.

So rather then candidates simply uploading a word doc, here is what it perhaps should look like.

1. Candidates creates Profile similar to Visualcv.com with added fields to create competencies that show specific situations of soft skill usage ie Leadership, Organisation, Decision making etc. Provide examples.
2. All Fields are searchable and the candidate has the ability to keep any fields “Private” as to avoid current Employer finding them.
3. Employers have their Company Profiles integrated in to the Community to enable candidates to shop around, search jobs, leave messages for HR or line managers.
4. Candidates and Employers can engage via SM tools such as chat, video messages, twitter feed, Forum engagement, connecting with like skilled candidates (similar to connecting on LI or Facebook)
5. Candidates can communicate with each other about current job searching issues or experiences and Employers have the ability to see this and react.
5. Employer talks/finds candidate they like. Candidate and Employer can organise “Virtual” interview via video next time they are both on line.
6. Candidate and Employer meet face to face and candidate is hired.

And this is just a start…….

Not only will the whole process be more transparent, but the interaction and engagement will be far more beneficial for both sides. And I’m sure far easier to justify the price of the database “Community”, then it is now.

Katherine Robinson wrote a great blog this week that focused on the front end for the advertisers. I totally agree with her comments.

Perhaps we are both barking mad, but I seriously think job boards will need to adapt and move with the times in order to maintain their value. The Greg Savage “Post and Pray” methd is simply not effective, and allowing candidates to just “spray” their CV’s off also needs reviewing. Something does need to change.

Job boards may not die, but they certainly will if they don’t move with the times.

And don’t get me started on ATS platforms, grrrr, but that’s for another blog.

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