Do You apply Reciprocity to your Social Media activities?

Practice what you preach!  That is an old saying from my youth...And at a speaking engagement I had to  practice what I had just preached...

My presentation was to a group of local Job Seekers, Facilitators and Job Developers and 4 other excellent speakers - the title of the event was #UnJobsearchKW.   Being the last speaker, it was my task to pump the attendees up and provide them with some insight to what social media tools recruiters use in finding candidates.

After all the presentations were completed, an open forum took place, where each of the speakers availed themselves to the audience to answer questions more specific to the attendees needs...

One gentleman made a beeline for me and introduced himself as someone who had been trying to 'attract my attention' through various social media and traditional outlets, and sought my help with his job search.  Within a few seconds I recognized 'him' from his previous attempts to connect and asked why he had not returned my messages I had left for him previously (he had some excellent and in demand skills and experience).  He said "he only talked to people in person as he found that he had greater success that way".  He did say how much he enjoyed the shared information I put out on the various sites and that my presentation was very good, especially one particular slide:

So why did he 'only talk to people in person'?  Simple really - he has a severe hearing impairment and even with modern technology has found people on the phone mis-hears him or he mis-interprets what they say. One of the features I suggested he utilize is video calling [Skype or Google Hangout] either of these would all him to see and be seen by the interviewer.

So what does this have to do with 'Reciprocity'?  Not only had he seen information that had been shared by myself and others - to his benefit - but he had also heard the words and deeds put into action at the presentation and then shared his experience [challenges].  Reciprocity is 2-way, everyone must share knowledge, experience, views, opinions, thoughts, etc... with the wider world - you will never know who might 'see it' - but someone will.

May 2014 prove to be more reciprocal than 2013 - John

A Cautionary Tale - Mobile Messaging Apps

What you might say has 'Mobile Messaging Apps' to do with recruitment, sourcing or job seeking? [my usual topic/subject of area]

Let me explain, but must start with a location based bias for my recommendation at the end of this post...I live in the Waterloo Region of Ontario, Canada, home of Global HQ of Blackberry (formally RIM or Research In Motion) and despite the changes in the companies fortune - they are still technologically ahead of the competition for its secure messaging and email service.

Explanation by way of a question - What happens to your connections when you die, or change phone number?  Read this recent article "WhatsApp users are identified only through their phone number, rather than a user name."  and then yourself What if...?

The mobile space is growing and individuals and businesses are [if not already] engaging and interacting with customers, consumers, potential employees, etc... on their mobile device, so it is important that contact information and details are up to date, an App that by design fault, would provide incorrect data is a vulnerability for users and suitors alike.  Also, security is a concern - and the with the question [Just how much does big brother know about me from my digital footprint, messages, email, etc...?] hanging over our head - Is there a way to minimize the risk?


Security and cross platform compatibility has been the challenge up to now, with the launch of Blackberry Messenger [BBM] for Android and iPhone, this week - 10 million downloads already and growing - rumours are strong that BBM for Windows devices are close to release - a gaping hole has been filled in somewhat.

So, why does this make sense for recruitment, sourcing and job seekers - with BBM updates, status and information can be broadcast and viewed with your audience without needing to send a message, and when you do want to send a message, you can see when it has been delivered and subsequently read.  One of the downsides [but great security feature] is that if you change platform/devices/number you will need to get a new PIN and let your connections know - small price to pay me thinks...

If you are on BBM [no matter which device or platform] you can send me an invite to connect to my PIN: 284DE350

Happy BBM'ing and share the message and keep secure....

UPDATE 27/10/2013:
Thank to Jeff Lam, MSE for providing this service comparison table:

 

Do all businesses give thought to the risk?....

Being resident in a geographical area that has copious ‘Wannabees’ who aspire to be the next Mike Lazaridis, Jim Balsillie, Steve Jobb, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Ilya Grigorik or other such greats in the local technology entrepreneurial marketplace.

According to sources, the region has a very strong ‘geek culture’ mainly due to the proximity of a university ranked 113^th overall by Times Higher Education World University Rankings and the region has positioned itself to support through commercialization of innovation, creating economic prosperity by removing barriers to the creation and growth of technology companies.

Despite all the kilowatts of brain power and ideas emanating from these ‘Wannabees” (…and I hope they all work out, succeed and become rich and famous), I am truly amazed at how limited they understand the people side of their business, most often relying upon their financiers (Venture Capitalists, Angle Investors, etc…) to provide people solutions for them.

With all businesses, RISK is a key factor when it comes to any decision making, applying a RISK ANALYSIS approach to your present/future peoples needs, is critical:

Risk = Probability of Event (PoE) x Cost of Event (CoE)

For the Hiring/Recruitment process, the Probability of Event analysis would (or should) have been completed, now comes the often omitted part of the process – Cost of Event analysis. Using the same decision tree/mind map used in the PoE, attribute a true CoE, ensuring hidden/in-direct costs a attributed. When considering the true cost, consider – not only the time spent conducting the event, but the cost of not doing other events/activities. The cost of not doing could very well out strip the cost of doing. So if you are involved with a business/organization that has developed the product/service and are now growing your team, ask yourself: What is the REAL CoE?

So what has CoE to do with the Recruitment? Simple really (don’t let your internal influencer's tell you anything differently!):

Probability of Event is extremely high due to 4 key factors:

1. The need for additional people to support growth/expansion
2. The need to replace people who move on to new/different challenges
3. The need to replace existing people that are not a ‘fit’ for the future culture/needs of the business.
4. The need to Invest In (the right) People is paramount

Cost of Event (Direct and In-Direct)

1. Time required to properly scope, define, determine, identify, qualify, solidify and secure consensus on the position and person specifications
2. Time required to identify and secure the new person
3. Time taken away from all other duties, responsibilities’ and activities whilst conducting points 1 & 2
4. Material cost of marketing opportunity to outside world
5. Material cost of activities related to securing new person
6. Non recoverable lost time costs
7. Cost of un-suitable person in the position
8. Cost of lost reputation with customers, through Inaction/Slow action

Using a simplified weighting chart, lets consider the RISK of using the wrong solution for the on-boarding of your people;

Weighting values – 1=low, 2=moderate, 3=high. Now apply to formula:

R = PoE x CoE

• Option 1: Need people = 3 | Using Internal resources = 3 | therefore R = 9
• Option 2: Need people = 3 | Using External Professional resource = 2 | therefore R = 6
• Option 3: Need people = 2 | Using Internal resources = 3 | therefore R = 6
• Option 4: Need people = 2 | Using External Professional resource = 2 | therefore R = 4

A qualifying note here; External Professional resource is 100% focused on the events related to Recruitment, they are not diverted by other duties, responsibilities or activities. Internal resources have their primary functions and recruitment is an also do function.

All professional external resources will always want to make sure that the PoE analysis has been completed and clearly establish the CoE before proceeding to ensure complete and satisfactory delivery to mitigate R.