Social Tools and Recruitment

One of the things I have often been discussed on this blog is the impact of New Social Networking tools on Organizations. On the other hand these tools are also having a significant impact on the Recruitment and Staffing functions.

This post on has some interesting observation on the latest Buzz in the Virtual world.

“Social Networking is the Internet's latest darling. And throughout the last year it has been moving quickly into the professional arena of recruiting and staffing. The loudest of these entrants is LinkedIn and Jobster. Jobster was first and loudest but LinkedIn and others are making noise and you can bet there will be many more coming soon, including existing recruitment software and services powerhouses adding this functionality to their offerings.In many ways what is currently happening with "social networking" and variations of this business model (like Jobster, etc.) reminds me a little of the dot-com days. Lots of hope and excitement, new and inspiring technology/ideas, yet no clear consensus the model will workfrom a business standpoint - in other words, can the model generate a steady stream of profitable revenue from the business community beyond just advertising dollars?”

I have been an active member of LinkedIn for quiet some time now and although I am yet to see any major impact of my membership on my personal career. However I’ve been approached by numerous people showing their interests in various positions and also asking for personal reference to other members in my network. But I am yet to come across some one who has been able to make a fortune out of it.Althought a recent survey by ERE showed that 8% people used Social-networking sites such as MySpace for recruitment ,but the sample size was only 80 and I'm sure that most of the respondent would be Blog and Social tool savy.

Like all new tools (such as blogs) we may see a bunch of over enthusiastic guys taking on it and making a big noise but eventually things will settle down .But I’m sure this will be useful and a novel addition to the existing sources of attracting talent and employer branding.