On 2/12/12 Forbes published an article titled “LinkedIn is Disrupting the Corporate Recruiting Market” (http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbersin/2012/02/12/linkedin-is-disru...).  The article attempts to connect some dots between strong revenue growth (and assume market share) that has been captured by LinkedIn’s recruitment services and while the author agrees it is positive disruption,  the article can lead organizations to the impression that recruitment firms are losing value and organizations can replace strong recruiting firms with LinkedIn.  This conclusion would be wrong.  We don’t know what is actually driving the revenue so it should be even more difficult to draw this conclusion – yet some will feel free to do so.

LinkedIn is doing a fabulous job, and where a crowd starts to gather, more are drawn in to see what all the excitement is about.  Of course no one really understands the excitement; they just want to be part of it.  So it is with LinkedIn recruiting.  Organizations may be lulled into a sense of ‘if you post it, they will come.’  This is a false understanding and a misguided interpretation that we have seen online time and time again with dot com businesses.  Joleen Goddard, Senior Recruitment Consultant at Executrade identified that unless an organization has an active recruiting team this approach will lead to frustration.  Without deeper engagement on LinkedIn organizations will connect with searching candidates, and there is a high probability they are the same candidates they would have found using Monster or other tools – after all, active candidates are motivated to search all venues.

The benefit of LinkedIn is the ability to seek out passive or non-engaged candidates more effectively and qualify the candidate before contact.  After all, even if someone is not looking for a career change, people tend to believe the grass could be greener for the right opportunity.  Finding passive or non-active candidates is hard work and takes a great deal of connecting, inquiring, searching, and marketing.  By posting a job on LinkedIn you are no more likely to find a passive candidate than before (relatively speaking).  Gaining access to this ideal and important group of potential candidates is not done in the twitch of a mouse and a click of a button (no matter how much we wish it could be).

LinkedIn is a great tool for recruiting; enhancing the industry reach.   The key understanding that is missing in the article is the level of time and energy it takes to master even the best of the new tools available for recruiting in order to access great candidates! LinkedIn cannot replace people from a people business. For example, and similar to other firms, at Executrade there is over 35 years of connections, tools, methodology, relationships, expertise and cultural considerations – these are qualities that cannot be replaced, even by the best tool.

Simplicity would suggest, if you want a job done right, ask a specialist.

Darryl

Executrade

Your Recruiting Specialist

References:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbersin/2012/02/12/linkedin-is-disru...

Joleen Goddard: http://ca.linkedin.com/pub/joleen-goddard/10/203/89