Linkedin?

lazy recruiters love LinkedIn as they can just search for a skill and immediately 1000s of people pop up on screen

Are they jusr dredging through 1000s of profiles without properly reading them ?

Mainly, yes.

As an example, I have one of those anonymous 'IT' jobs that exists in lots of big corporations. However, I once got sent details of an Offshore Drilling Engineer job, I think because they'd found the word 'platform' on my CV. Best of all I occasionally get sent details of vacancies for bishops, real, actual, working in a cathedral type bishops, I assume because there's an old CV of mine floating around somewhere, with an old address which was in a place called Bishops Cleeve, and they've got their keyword search a bit screwed.

I find it works better when you dont have judge death as your profile pic.

Thanks. Should be some fun phone calls net week!

I find it works better when you dont have judge death as your profile pic.

I'm really tempted to go with Calvin and Hobbes, just like my STW profile.

@mrsheen - some essential reading for you

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/crappy-handbook-linkedin-profile-pics-dan-kelsall/

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/bullshit-job-title-awards-dan-kelsall/

With Linkedin it is now easy to get job offers and get to initial contact with potential employers but in my experience it just means that the next phases for the recruitment process are more crowded than before. It still takes time and effort to get to be the among final canditates.

Linked in Sales Navigator is great for finding contacts.

My wife works in insurance and constantly gets recruiters offering exagerated salaries. Amazingly these jobs vanish when you get in touch but ‘they have others’ at a lower wage and a two hour drive away! 🤣

She’s learn which recruiters actually have jobs available now.

I found the job I'm in now through LinkedIn so it get's the thumbs up from me.

Best thing I did this year was shut down my LI profile. Endless spam from recruitment agents about jobs that don’t exist, and a feed full of people glorifying working excessive hours and outright lying about their abilities. Only Twitter surpasses it as a hive of scum and villainy.

I suppose it depends what industry you're in, I find it far more positive and enjoyable to scroll through than the likes of twitbook

Best thing I did this year was shut down my LI profile. Endless spam from recruitment agents about jobs that don’t exist, and a feed full of people glorifying working excessive hours and outright lying about their abilities. Only Twitter surpasses it as a hive of scum and villainy.

I see very little of this. But then I’m not in sales…

Unfortunately I got the above 'negative' experience as well , with the addition of endless friend requests from foreign PhD's looking for a job. I'm not in sales wither, so I left a couple years ago

I found the job I’m in now through LinkedIn so it get’s the thumbs up from me.

Same. Bloody good one it is too.

I’m in a small technical field and LinkedIn is a very common form of recruitment. I get pinged weekly and have searches set up to see who is recruiting. I also post science when I can find the time. Content is relatively low compared to announcements of the latest job move but the chat is useful.

Recruiters gonna recruit. They’re paid for it and it’s their tool. If you’re not paying the subs you’re the product.

I'm in the TEFL field and all my work has come through alumni or LinkedIn. I'm also in a country where they hobbled the app so we can't search outside our walled gardens. Full website usage comes through a VPN enabled browser, not the Android app.

I do feel that many solo recruiters are just trying to get the numbers onboard for initial interviews to make themselves relevant and keep themselves "on the books" for employers in future.

Bigger name, financially backed recruiters are actively used by employers to sort through the pack. For instance, my current agency is paid to provide staff, not interviewees. The employers have to trust my agency, probably because they can't do what the agency does, wouldn't know where to start. Also, the candidate backgrounds the employer requires are very specialized, even within my field, for visa purposes. Any candidate not in that 10%, who tries to blag it, will find police coming onto campus within a couple of weeks to cart them away in cuffs on a path to deportation. If I want to change city/school, I will likely ask my agency to place me first, rather than take a risk openly putting myself back on the market.

I’m in a small technical field and LinkedIn is a very common form of recruitment. I get pinged weekly and have searches set up to see who is recruiting. I also post science when I can find the time. Content is relatively low compared to announcements of the latest job move but the chat is useful.

Recruiters gonna recruit. They’re paid for it and it’s their tool. If you’re not paying the subs you’re the product.

Similar for me, i'm in a niche engineering field and LinkedIn recruiters, as well as company recruiters do send a fair few emails/messages over the year looking to recruit, there's also quite a bit of word of mouth, so being named to recruiters as being someone in that field.

For me LinkedIn is effective if you have the right connections and are part of the right chats, we're always looking for more recruits and LinkedIn is used quite a lot for putting up the job ads and discussing with potential recruits, unfortunately we are losing more just now, due to inflation they are better off taking retirement now, and seeing their pension go up, rather than staying in a job with nowhere near inflation rises, so another round of hunting for 20-30 years olds with 30 years experience!

If you’re not paying the subs you’re the product.

Indeed.

My better half berates me frequently for my slack attitude to Linkedin. Most of her best employment has come through Linkedin. Seems there are two ways for it to work - the first is an up to date but dormant account sat there to be found on searches. That way lies monsters. Or recruitment agents doing crude searches. The better way (she tells me) is to be proactive, post industry relevant stuff, comment on other industry relevant stuff, make carefully curated links (and cull the chaff). Then it becomes effectively a virtual word of mouth system where you get meaningful approaches from people who feel they kind of know you already.

There are some holes to be wary of however.....in your searches the 'looking for opportunities' status of your current company's employees won't show up - so in theory your line manager can't see that you are looking to jump. But if your line manager asks their mate who works elsewhere to search for you (and tit for tat) then they'll know. Whenever she's started at a new firm she's used her 'pro level' account whilst linked to the old place of work to search for the people she's about to line manage and viola all their grubby secrets are revealed - just gives you a feel for the level of engagement/unsettled of what you are about to walk into.

The two articles linked made me laugh. I've got a photo from a wedding although no buttonhole.

Every other photo of me I'm wearing a hat or helmet doing something like riding or hiking.

I find it useful. It's helped with job searches. I follow companies I'd be interested in working for.

I've had some useful recruitment conversations with people. One lead to a job.

When I worked as a consultant I used it a lot. Searching for new clients, promotion, following companies and groups of interest.

Even now I use it when I'm back in the lab. I follow competitors as it's simple to see what they are launching, product wise. Industry groups to find trends in markets.

I keep my profile up to date and occasionally post. It's bought me some independent consulting work. I'm always open to job offers. My employer should realise this. I'm as loyal as my notice period. Having been through many rounds of redundancies in only 15 years of working I know this works both ways.

I'm in a niche field and an expert so it probably makes it more useful. Adhesive and coatings chemists are relatively rare. Those of us with fire protection experience even rarer. It's a bit of a merry go round in terms of jobs as there are only a handful of players in the UK.