A recent rumor has been circulating the web and creating a buzz that Facebook is going offline forever on March 15^th. Apparently Mark Zuckerberg stated, “Facebook has gotten out of control. The stress of managing this company has ruined my life.” The Weekly World News, widely known for stories such as “Megan Fox is a Man” and “Bat Boy Found in Cave”, seems to be where the rumor started from. This accusation is obviously false, but it does bring up a prominent question: If social networking and other online methods of job hunting were to disappear, would the recruiting community be drastically hurt?

Social media has become a major player in the world of recruiting. It goes without saying that millions upon millions of teens would most likely throw themselves off buildings in mass piles if this did happen, but the recruiting field has been around long before the new technology. If it disappeared, recruiting would survive to tell the tale, but would it want to go back?

Most recruiters agree that life would go on. Recruiting’s primary method of success still stems from cold calling and networks built up from years of connections. Losing the new techniques would be more of a thorn in the side of recruiting than an actual destructive force. Sure, going on LinkedIn to find a resume and to form connections is helpful, but it is not the only means of success. That is like saying losing high-definition televisions would destroy television!

Breaking through the clutter of other recruiting companies would become more of a hassle. Marketing a brand would be a little harder without the use of social networking as most recruiting companies gain a portion of new clients nowadays through connections made from social networking. Listing jobs would also be a lot harder if there was no way to post them outside of the company website.

On the other side of the fence, the candidates would suffer a little bit more. Without social networking and sites to place their resumes, the world of job hunting would become a little more stressful. Candidates would have to actively search for recruiting companies and jobs. They would need to email resumes directly to recruiters and it would be much harder for recruiters and sourcers to come across new resumes.

This rumor really puts things into perspective on how far the world of recruiting has come. It is an ever changing field and utilizing the new technology has been a great success. Facebook is not going away, and the new technology is likely to just keep growing. One cannot forget its roots though, and recruiting had its own long before the internet became widely used.

The discussion on just how well recruiting would get along without social networking is for you to discuss! Personally, I still think standing on a soap box and yelling for talented people to come forth would be amusing to see, but I’m just old fashioned.