I have left this blog unattended for a while during which I
was alternately employed and unemployed. After more than a year's service, one
employer generously provided the outsourcing services of Right Management
Corporation. Right Management is a Subdivision of Manpower, so what is
happening at Right is generally current with what the rest of the Human
Resources industry is doing. And there are a few things that, at the end of
July 2012, every job-hunter ought to know.
Right's counselors will provide some help in getting your
employment materials lined up with LinkedIn. Linked-In operates something like
a kiosk where people who have jobs let it be known what jobs they have. Job
seekers create a visible profile that is usually based on what they want the employing
world to know about them. LinkedIn is a a social media network for
professionals and emphasizes the job placement process. But as social media, it
also establishes groups within industries where ideas are exchanged to the
benefit of group members. Groups determine relevant topics for themselves, and
posting is voluntary.
So what a person gets from a service like Right is a lot of
advice about two things:
- networking
- making an impression on LinkedIn
As far as networking goes, there is a general truth that
what leads people to jobs is usually something other than the display of their
qualifications, and that the presence of many people who know you and think
well of you is likely to lead to you and your next job connecting more quickly.
Networking is a subject that should not be dismissed lightly, and, as this
writing progresses, expect to see the subject arise again. But for this
article, I would like to concentrate on
Making an Impression on LinkedIn
I hesitate to say this, but the key advice to be given here
is to anticipate that the people looking at your profile will be so swamped
with things to look at that they are unwilling to explore beyond the first
line. They ate similarly unwilling to look at at profiles that are not 100%
completed. The technical reason for this reluctance is that the programming of
LinkedIn prioritizes and orders its databases with priority apportioned
according to the completion percentage of the profile. Frankly, this simply
creates a disadvantage for anyone using LinkedIn who honestly wants to
acknowledge their existing status of unemployment. In other words, I'm accusing
LinkedIn of discriminating against the unemployed. Here's why:
When a person is unemployed and
honest, the first line of the profile editing within the system will show:
Current + Add a current position.
And unless a current position is
added, the percent of completion cannot rise above 90%. This feature is the
equivalent of having the technology automatically shuffle the unemployed
person’s profile to the bottom of the list. So, if you are going to avoid the
automatic shuffling, you need to fill in something. In other words --- Lie! Or
you might, as an alternative, fake something to fill the spaces that are
keeping you from successfully completing the form. Here are the spaces that
must be filled in:
·
Company Name:
·
Title:
As you fill these in, keep in mind
that your profile will be broadcast to potential employers in the form of:
<Title> at <Company
Name>
You cannot control the appearance of
the word “at”. It will be there regardless of what you choose to place into the
Company Name and Title blanks. For instance, you could fill in the blanks with
<unemployed>
at <the moment> which would
tell the world that you are
Unemployed at The Moment.
Think about this for a moment and
you may come up with better things to say about yourself. For instance, you
might say that you are
<Very proficient> at
<making money for clients>.
OK! So you fake something that gets
you past the need to bring your profile to 100% completion. At that point, you
have your posted profile in place where it can be seen by potential employers
and their recruiters. Now you become concerned with the issue of how the
recruiters find you. This is where the content of your profile comes into play.
You have listed your strengths and accomplishments in your profile. But how did
you know what to list? Here’s how to use technology to get employers to notice
you.
1.
Decide on an ideal (for yourself)
next job.
2.
Use a service like indeed.com to
find 5 positions for that next job that you think you would be qualified to
hold
3.
Copy the descriptions of all five
into a word document. Go through the list and delete words that are used to
frame the description – words like “qualifications”, “work history”,
“education”, etc.
4.
Take what is left of the document,
go to tagcrowd.com, and paste the document into the part you want “visualized.”
Choose to show frequencies. Then visualize the document.
5.
Look at the visualization and write
down a list of the 10-15 physically largest words. These are words you will
want to get into your profile.
6.
Write your profile so that it
describes you and contains your top words. Each of your top 5 words should
appear in your profile at least twice. Also make sure that each of the top 10
words becomes a keyword for your profile.
You are doing this because it is a
high-tech tool that recruiters use. The recruiter is asked by the company to
find talent. They are given a job description. It is often the same description
that was used the last time the company hired for that position. They will be
doing keyword searches on words from that job description. Your profile will
pop up if it matches enough keywords. Only after this search has been conducted
will the recruiters take the additional step of reading your profile.
This may seem like a game. It is
one. But it is one that you will need to play in order to have the profile that
pulls the recruiters too look at you.
