How to engage successfully with recruiters on social media

By Neil Patrick

Today, I read an interesting and insightful piece by the ever clever Glen Cathey here, called ‘14 Tips on How to Use Twitter for Social Recruiting’.

Glen’s piece was about how recruiters needed to up their game in terms of using Twitter as an effective tool to find suitable candidates.

It got me thinking that there’s another side to this equation, which is how job seekers should use social media to engage with recruiters effectively.

Over on my Twitter account, I have set up lists of recruiters, so anyone who wishes to can find and follow relevant recruiters more easily. I have organised them by continent here. Please feel free to subscribe to any list that you feel may be helpful to you.

As Glen pointed out though, many recruiters have yet to fully grasp how to use Twitter effectively in their hunt for the best candidates. Many simply use Twitter to tweet jobs as a means of free advertising.

This is far from ideal for a recruiter. Unless they have a lot of followers who are the right type of profile for their search, they won’t achieve much reach on Twitter.

But this post is about job seekers not recruiters, so here are my thoughts on a strategy for job seekers to engage effectively with recruiters on Twitter.

Ensure your profile on Twitter is right for a recruiter

It may well be that when you first set up your Twitter account you were not job hunting. If that is the case, and you are now looking to job hunt, it’s time to adjust your Twitter bio so it describes you in your professional capacity rather than a purely social role. You have 140 characters to do this - but less if you include a link to your LinkedIn profile which I recommend.

Because space is so limited, you cannot talk about your accomplishments and nor should you – that’s for LinkedIn. Instead describe yourself succinctly and professionally. What’s your area of specialism? In what industry or sector? What experience or capabilities set you apart from your peers?

I do not recommend that you mention you are presently job hunting. This will exclude you from the screening for some recruiters who (wrongly in my view) are only interested in candidates who are presently employed.

It’s also time to adjust what you are tweeting about. Try and focus your tweets on matters which are relevant to your career and professional interests.

Find and follow all the recruiters relevant to your search

My Twitter lists are a good start point for this, but you’ll find many more if you do a Twitter search for recruiters in your city/area such as recruitment Dallas, recruiter Dallas or jobs Dallas.

Don’t worry about whether or not they follow you back

It’s great if they do, but what you want is to get their tweets in your tweet stream. 

Get noticed by RTing them

There will probably only be at most a dozen or so recruiters that are appropriate to your sector and geography, so it’s not a great deal to manage.

RTing of job tweets isn’t that common, so you’ll find it’s an effective way to get noticed by a recruiter. If you RT them regularly, some will acknowledge your support and follow you back.

 
You now have the start of a relationship

So it’s now time to invest a little more. Apart from helping the recruiter spread the word about their jobs, by RTing them and earning some goodwill in the process, you can now take it to the next level.

And the way to do this is to pay it forward by helping them some more. Don’t just think about your own job hunt. Think about the recruiter’s goals. Do you happen to know someone that would be a great fit for a role they are seeking to fill? Yes? Tell them - but talk to your contact first to make sure they are happy to be referred. 

Take the relationship to the next level

Once you have exchanged some tweets with a recruiter, and hopefully an identifiable person at the recruitment firm rather than just an anonymous corporate account, you have a basis to connect with them on LinkedIn too. To avoid the risk of rejection though it’s best to ask first on Twitter. This has the double benefit of showing them some courtesy and giving you the highest probability they will accept your LinkedIn invitation.

Continue the process on LinkedIn

The pay it forward approach I am recommending can continue on Linkedin. You are now in a higher visibility and higher impact relationship and platform with the recruiter. If they are using Linkedin well, they will be posting information here, not just jobs but other pieces too. You may well feel qualified to comment on some of their posts. Do it. This is a great opportunity to show what you know and add value to the discussion.

 
You are now in a privileged and high visibility position

By following this strategy, you should have managed to build a relationship with a handful of the key recruiters in your area of specialism and territory. Do not abuse this status. You might think I recommend taking the relationship next to face to face. I don't.

Whilst this is great if the recruiter initiates such a move, don’t invite it yourself. Recruiters are extremely busy people and they have to prioritize their time for getting the best prospects for their clients. But you can now be sure they’ll contact you when the right position comes along if you've pursued this strategy. After all, you are one of probably just a handful of people that they have such a close relationship with.

As Glen pointed out, 'Ultimately, people like helping people they like, and people like people they feel that they know'.

I think the time to carry this process out is only about 3-4 weeks. It’s not a substitute for other parts of your job hunt activity, but it’s probably more likely to yield results than spending the equivalent amount of time sending off another pile of resumes.

If you’ve followed this strategy or a similar one, I’d love to hear about your experiences in the comments below. And if you're a recruiter. I'd love to hear what you think too.

People think sleeping with your boss can boost your career…but it’s still a really bad idea

By Neil Patrick

'Unconventional' tactics to win promotion and pay rises in the workplace are as common as ever it seems. So too is sexual harassment.

Unfortunately sometimes the boundaries between the two become blurred, despite the fact that one is consensual (if ill-advised) and the other is obviously non-consensual and hence illegal.

These days, it seems rarely a week goes by without a high profile individual facing accusations of misconduct.

This week, the UK press has been full of the story of how senior Lib Dem, Lord Renard is facing claims of sexual harassment by co-workers. The peer resigned the party whip last year amid allegations he made unwanted sexual advances to several women and touched them inappropriately.

The alleged victims are asking for at least an apology. But Renard and his allies claim the complaints are unfounded and that he is the victim of a witch hunt. Nick Clegg seems to disagree and has said that Renard should issue an apology even though the accusations are presently unproven.

Whatever the truth of the matter, one thing seems clear to me - letting your personal conduct slip in the workplace is almost guaranteed to wreck your career and quite possibly the rest of your life.

The stakes are terrifyingly high

High standards of professional behavior at work seem to me to be as important as any other aspect of our career.

Engaging in sexual relationships with colleagues risks the breakup of your family if you are married, will possibly cost you a small fortune and will wreck all those years of investment in your career.

The risks were highlighted in another high profile case when Mark Hurd, the chief executive of computer giant Hewlett Packard, resigned his job over the alleged sexual harassment of Jodie Fisher, a former reality TV contestant turned marketing consultant.

But it cost him more than just his job. Hurd who was married, settled the matter out of court for a sum which was undisclosed, but I’d wager it was substantial.

Perception is reality

If the risks of family break up and devastating legal and financial penalties are not enough to convince you, what about your reputation and relationships with other colleagues?

I looked for research into the topic of how such actions are perceived by colleagues. And discovered that Vanderbilt University had carried out a study on this topic in 2010.

In this study, having an affair with the boss was perceived as likely to boost your career by respondents, especially if you are a woman.

37% of office workers said that from their experience those who slept with their superiors were rewarded with a career boost.

But is this fact or perception? I don’t know, but perception is reality in its own way - and it seems that at the very least, even suspicions of such behavior will gain you more enemies than friends.

A function of gender inequality?

The study for the U.S. Centre for Work-Life Policy also claimed that, no matter how successful, female executives will not reach the very top of their profession unless they find a 'sponsor' who will speak out on their behalf. More often than not such sponsors are in a position of power and influence, and almost always male and married.

If this conclusion is reliable, it suggests that some women seeking to reach the peak of their careers consciously or unconsciously may be tempted to secure the ‘patronage’ of an influential man.

This is a high risk choice for both parties. The woman risks being seen as given unmerited advancement, the man risks possible legal ramifications in future. Both risk loss of personal credibility.

Your peer group respect level plunges too

In terms of morale, 61% of men and 70% of women lose respect for a leader involved in an affair.

Don’t expect that colleagues will have no idea what is happening - 60% of male executives and 65% of female executives suspect that salary hikes and choice assignments are traded for sexual favours.

And once they find out, don’t expect any sympathy if it all turns sour.

Some 48% of men and 56% of women feel animosity towards the involved couple, and both report a fall off in productivity as the team splinters.

But none of this seems to deter people

Despite all the risks, affairs in the workplace are still a common occurrence. Some 34% of women in executive positions said they knew a female colleague who had slept with their boss.

Even at director level or above, 15% of women admitted to having had an office fling.

Do you really want to play for such high stakes?

For everyone involved, office affairs are a really bad idea. The more senior person already has power - why put that status at risk? For the junior person, once you start the relationship, how do you know your boss is going to fulfill their end of the implied deal?

Even if it happens in the short term, everyone will know what’s going on and you’ll lose their respect.

It also poisons the atmosphere of your team, damaging the performance of the whole group.

And the label you’ll gain is almost as permanent as a tattoo. Especially if you are female, the gossip will likely follow you around your industry for years and years.

You really have to ask yourself, "Am I so committed to this relationship, I’m prepared risk everything for it?"

If the answer is no, then don’t even start it.

Why the Euro is bad for jobs, admits EU Commissioner

By Neil Patrick

Yesterday I read something I thought I’d never see. Lazlo Andor, the Hungarian economist and EU Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs has admitted that Europe’s single currency has created ‘increased unemployment and social hardship’.

Back in November 2012 here, I criticised Mr Andor for failing to acknowledge the social impact of the EU’s policies on employment. Essentially, I felt the EU policies he was presenting then would result in a deterioration of employment opportunities, particularly in the weaker EU member states, since most people cannot easily move freely around the EU for work.

Yes there may be few legal migration barriers, and a minority of young and educated people have moved to find jobs. But is a 50 year old Greek shopkeeper with a failing business really going to up sticks and set up business in say Helsinki? I doubt it.

In an astonishing turnaround, Mr Andor has published a 496-page report this week, entitled ‘Employment and social developments in Europe 2013’. It argues that the surrender of national sovereignty and local currencies has led to a lack of flexibility in tackling the economic and jobs crisis.

This will be viewed as heresy by his peers

He has thus turned heretic in EU circles, but it is refreshing to see such an admission of policy failure coming from the heart of the European Commission itself.

Essentially, the problem admitted to in the report is that with the loss of the ability to devalue national currencies, the poorer Eurozone members in particular have been forced to drive down living standards. For example in Greece, average incomes have reduced by more than 30%. This collapse is unprecedented in Europe since the great depression of the 1930’s.

The report concludes, “In the absence of the currency evaluation option, euro area countries attempting to regain cost competitiveness have to rely on internal devaluation (wage and price containment). This policy, however has its limitations and downsides, not least in terms of increased unemployment and social hardship.”

Worse, the single currency is impeding recovery

The criticism of the European Central Bank and the Commission’s own policies continues in the report, stating that internal devaluation isn’t working and indeed has fueled a continuation of the recession in the Eurozone, which has fallen seriously behind Britain and the US in terms of economic growth.

(In a more or less simultaneous announcement this week, the IMF upgraded the UK's growth forecast from 1.9% this year to 2.4%, whilst UK unemployment levels were reported with glee by the government to have fallen faster than expected to 7.1%).

Martin Callahan, leader of the European Conservative and Reform Group of MEPs said, “Wage compression and weakened economic stabilisers in individual member states spilled over into others in the form of weaker external demand.”

The report charts a gulf emerging between north and south in the Eurozone. The average unemployment is 17% in southern countries compared with 7% in the northern countries.

Mr Andor has urged the EU to reform its policies to deliver “…a fairer distribution of costs and benefits among the participating member states”.

The recession is far from over in the southern Eurozone, but if this report is acted upon, instead of rubbished, perhaps we'll see some more sense coming out of the EU and ECB. Mr Andor is to be congratulated I think for having the courage to speak out against the idiotic policies created by his own employer.  I take back every criticism I laid at his feet and hope that his stand gains support rather than a backlash from his peers.