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Building Talent Communities on LinkedIn

by on Mar. 31, 2011

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linkedin network

In the last few months, building talent communities on LinkedIn with like-minded individuals got a lot easier. First off, they have made a bunch of changes to groups that make it easier to host job feeds and distribute jobs to your group discussions.

However there are a couple other more subtle changes that really made an impact on building communities on LinkedIn. Until recently, one fundamental thing was missing; the ability to easily determine a user’s interests on LinkedIn, but this has all changed thanks to a ton of new developments to LinkedIn’s Updates, Companies, & Groups sections.

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Global Sourcing, Technology & Resources

Editor’s Pick: A Glimpse at Sourcing in India — Network To Recruit

by on Mar. 30, 2011

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Internet has opened up a plethora of opportunities and has been a major platform for information dissemination. With increasing accessibility the popularity of the Internet is at an all time high in India today. The introduction of Web 2.0 has revamped the face of networking and over these last few years, corporate consumers have adapted to this internet revolution and have been using it to optimise results on all fronts. The traditional method for job hunting through consultants and career bureaus have not yet become completely obsolete, yet in India the concept of Internet networking has taken the recruitment industry by storm. 

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Phone Sourcing

Thorough Sourcing, Part V

by on Mar. 29, 2011

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telephone

Here is this Tuesday’s Phone Sourcing Tip. It is also listed in the ASK Maureen group on ERE.

I hope you’ll join and contribute to our discussion!

Much of phone sourcing is like taking a test.

If you hit a lot of headwind at one company skip to the next.

Don’t get hung up and don’t let it discourage you. 

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Social Media, The Sourcing Function

Sourcing: The Next Sexy Thing

by on Mar. 25, 2011

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Even Chris Brogan thinks that you’ll still need skilled people to analyze and manage data in the future. In a recent post on his blog, Brogan goes through some of his thoughts on job (consulting) opportunities for social media in the coming months and years. While his focus is on the consulting opportunities, he makes a strong statement that I think applies very appropriately to our world:

…we’ll see a push even further into sexy data, into using the marketing data that unstructured data gathering has brought to us all, and that analytics tools and people who know how to drive them will be the next sexy thing.

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Social Media, Technology & Resources

Using LinkedIn Groups to Source Effectively

by on Mar. 23, 2011

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LinkedIn Wizard

Have you looked on LinkedIn lately in the Groups that are dedicated to job-related networking? You know all those people that put:

Looking for an opportunity in XYZ. My background is ABCDEFGH. I accept all networking invitations; visit my profile…

I see a lot of recruiters and hiring managers share with candidates that this is an ineffective way to use LinkedIn. So, why oh why are recruiters around the globe doing almost that exact same thing when looking for other recruiters?

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Industry News

Can’t Make It to the ERE Expo This Week? We’ve Got You Covered

by on Mar. 23, 2011

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Over the next few days, hundreds of recruiting leaders will be boarding planes and making their way to the 11th annual ERE Expo Spring conference, which is put on by SourceCon.com’s parent company, ERE Media, Inc.

But for those of you who can’t make it to the event in person, we have some exciting things planned for you on Thursday and Friday.

In addition to streaming the keynotes, general sessions, and several of the breakout sessions live, and at no charge, we have teamed up with Steve Boese and his popular HR Happy Hour radio show to bring you a world-class virtual experience. The live streamed programming will be available on the ERE.net homepage.

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Phone Sourcing

Thorough Sourcing, Part IV

by on Mar. 22, 2011

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telephone1

So here we are on the second day of the onsite MagicMethod phone sourcing training.

We’re about to embark on the actual calling that is an integral part of the training.

It’s 8:15 a.m and my MagicMethod student and I are all cozy sitting next to one another in his cubicle with his phone and his screen before us with his worksheet pulled up .

It’s an Excel doc. Remember, I had asked everyone, the day before, to set the following day’s work up in Word.

I work in Word because it’s easy to manage and I can easily navigate it when I’m on the phone; filling it with notes and information from each call.

I find Excel exceedingly jumpy and confusing and the last thing I need when I’m on the phone is to become flustered because I can’t handle the document in front of me.

Handling Gatekeepers is hard enough.

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Editor's Corner, Technology & Resources

The Future of Search

by on Mar. 21, 2011

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past-present-future-sign1

Can we ever truly know what the future holds? Not really, but we can certainly provide theoretical predictions based on previous knowledge, contextual clues, public opinion, and momentary relevance. Ironically, when considering the future of search, these are all descriptors of what search will continue to evolve into as time moves on.

I recently had the opportunity to learn from a couple of very smart men – Bob Pritchett and Perry Fizzano. Bob Pritchett is one of the co-founders of Logos Bible Software, a company that produces electronic Bible study resources that are made available to customers around the world. Perry Fizzano is an assistant professor of Computer Science at Western Washington University and one of the developers of Treelicious, a system that allows hierarchical navigation of tagged web pages.

From my time learning from these two men, I was able to understand a little about where they believe search will be in the future. Obviously, the products they’ve both helped to create are good indicators of where they think search is headed. Both rely heavily on semantic technology, which is, in my belief as well, the basis of the future of search. 

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Industry News, Metrics

Referrals Lead; Social Media Thrives; Job Boards Survive as Hiring Source

by on Mar. 18, 2011

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SOH-2011

Job boards are far from dead. For the second consecutive year, internal transfers and promotions were the primary source of hire. A quarter of the companies that have a contingent workforce have no idea how big it is. More than half the companies use social media exclusively or as a significant part of their direct sourcing programs.

And finally, and least surprising of all, referrals continue to be the leading source of external hires.

These are among the highlights of the 10th annual Source of Hire study by CareerXroads. Released this week, the study reports the results of a survey of 36 large, “well-branded” but anonymous U.S. companies who cumulatively employ 1.32 million workers and hired not quite 133,000 employees in 2010.

This is the 10th year that Gerry Crispin and Mark Mehler have conducted the survey to see where companies source their hires. As has been the case from the beginning in 2001, referrals from employees, vendors, alumni, customers, and other sources was the leading source of external hires. Last year, the surveyed companies reported 27.5 percent of their external hires came from referrals. The percentage has fluctuated only modestly over the years.

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The Sourcing Function

Kettlebells and the Parallels to Sourcing and Recruiting

by on Mar. 17, 2011

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kettlebells

My Introduction to Kettlebell Training

Three years ago I had a bone spur ground out of my right shoulder. I waited longer than I should have to move forward with the surgery because I was getting married and didn’t want my arm in a sling for the wedding photos. My own sense of vanity overrode my common sense, although the pictures did come out great. There was a very intense 3-times-a-day rehab phase where I wondered, “Is this shoulder ever going to regain full motion, and will it ever be the same?” I have been working out for 30 years so not being as strong or active initially was a bummer. The kettlebell turned out to be an experiment that proved to be the solution.

Off I went to Dick’s Sporting Goods where I bought my 16kg Kettlebell (recommended starting weight for most men) and a little DVD. 16kg or 35 lbs., not much for a guy used to incline benching 315lbs in a workout…or so I thought. 45 minutes later I was drenched and promptly lost eight pounds in the first two weeks doing this “simple” “basic” routine. My mental gears went off and began to equate basic with fundamental, which sent me off into some thoughts… “There is something here that feels so much like sourcing/recruiting.” The results were great and I decided to dive deeper, buy some books, begin educating myself, and follow my intuition, which ultimately proved very accurate. (Note to self, don’t overthink things too much.) 

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