Twitter for Corporate Recruiting. Part One: WHY?

Twitterfor Corp Recruiting

View more presentations from Maren Hogan.

I feel pretty, oh so pretty…no wait, I feel harassed!

(I’m so excited I have finally been around recruiting and HR long enough to say…)

I remember when Visual CV made it’s pitch at ERE Spring last year. None of us knew the economy would soon be in the crapper and while there were lots of questions at the presentation, most felt the product was cool but a bit of a vanity tool. When I came back and mentioned tools like Visual CV and its counterparts to local HR Practitioners, I almost got tarred and feathered. The main concern was discrimination.

My answer was, “if discrimination is going to happen, it’ll happen, all these tools change is WHEN.” In other words, the problem is with the discriminator, not the tools that bring a visual component into the screening process sooner.

In any case, this all came up recently when a young college student came to me to ask for help in her job search. Findning a position that would not only pay her an approriate hourly rate (her background is as an executive assistant) but also allow her to finish her last few courses before graduation in December, was proving difficult in a market where few concessions are given.

One quasi-interview had her near tears. She walked in, feshly armed with a suit she’d spent her last paycheck on, ready to expound on her resume (pretty robust for someone her age) and excited about the new opportunity that lay ahead. The interviewer looked her up and down, read a few lines of her resume and put it aside, saying:

“You know, here at CorpTrack, we’re not just about sending out a pretty face.”

Surprised but determined to forge ahead, she said “Well, that’s not really what I’m about and I think if you take a look at some of my experience, you’ll see that.”

He didn’t and she managed to fumble her way through the rest of the interview, embarrassed about her looks and unable to concentrate on her presentation. (Note: she was in no way dressed provacatively and her hair was pulled back into a neat chignon.)

Of course, it goes without saying that this guy was out of line. But HOW out of line? What if you put another descriptive adjective in the place of “pretty”? What if he had said:

-fat

-black

-mature

-sexy

-ugly

Not just a terrible story but perhaps a lawsuit. Possibly. Have you ever faced discrimination before the interview even started? Have you felt like the interviewer bypassed your information once he or she took a look at you?

What about for HR Pros or Hiring Managers? Have you ever decided to judge a book by its cover? Is there ever a time that is justifiable (such as overtly sexy clothing, sloppy appearance, inappropriate appearance for the specific position)? I want to hear from you!

Come Together, Right Now or (What’s Wrong with Conferences?)

I had breakfast with a very smart person this morning. Eventually, the conversation wound around to conferences, and some good and bad experiences the two of us have had, as participants, as audience members and as speakers. We started discussing our ideal conference and what it would look like and it took us down some interesting paths.

But first some things I LOVE about conferences:

- the ability to connect face to face

- the opportunity to learn new and exciting things

- the free stuff

- the free food

- the camraderie

- the networking opportunities

- the glam locations (sometimes)

- the amazing dedication and organization it takes to pull something that big and involved off

Hmmm, what’s missing from this list? I feel like some pretty important things such as “innovation” and “intimacy”. Here’s what I HATE about conferences:

- there’s never enough time to talk

- while the opportunity is there to learn new things, often those things are not highlighted in the sessions, but outside, over smoke breaks and in impromptu get togethers

- conversation is not encouraged in any meaningful way

- we never turn off our gadgets and engage

As my  friend and I discussed these things, we realized that this is not necessarily the fault of the conference organizers, nor has it always been the problem. For years, conferences and expos were the places to learn new stuff, attract all kinds of business and hear from the leaders in your field. Now with the leaders in my field doing webinars every single day, white papers on industry trends being published hourly and exponential amounts of information available in increasingly attractive packaging, what can conferences give me? What will make me pay hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollars and fly halfway across the country? Some ideas:

-Encourage discussion. Folks lined up against a wall may promote blogging but it doesn’t promote conversation. Conversation is winning out online and if conferences want to stay in the game, they need to follow suit. Round tables, networking sessions or (gassp!) what about an idea that’s never been tried before?

- Promote Intimacy- Cue inappropriate 7th grade giggles. Ya done? Great. Intimacy is necessary for CONTEXT. How can I know where you’re coming from unless I know where you are COMING from? As social media, increased portability and a thousand other factors shrink the globe, people expect more when they show up somewhere!  One speaker telling his/her story every hour? Uh-uh, try leading a discussion, asking interesting questions and drawing people out. How about something that sets folks out of their comfort zone from the moment they begin? Why do you suppose unconferences are so popular? Because anyone who thinks they have something valuable to share DOES share and folks from all different disciplines learn something valuable they can apply to their process.

- Throw away the speaker handbook- How do you find speakers? Do you find yourself hearing that so-and-so was great at thus and such conference and so you book em? How about this person just wrote a book so they must be a good speaker? Or, this person has an incredible blog so they must be a good speaker. You know where that gets you? A whole lot of speakers that look alike and talk alike and have little practical experience. Or conversely the industry superstar, who’s SO busy doing he/she thinks all they have to do is show you his/her roadmap. It’s deeper than that. Conference organizers should look at their speakers with the same scrutiny as sponsors look at conferences.

-Accountability from conference GOERS- For months, friends of mine from all over the country (many who don’t even know each other) have been talking about a retreat where we get intimate, get comfortable, turn off the BlackBerries and  really dive into what we want for the future. Why has no one done it? Because in the world of conferences, step 1 is you get the idea, step 2 is you find some big fat company to pay for it. If the first step is changing the way a conference looks, then the we must be willing to go out on a limb for that. If that means subsidizing what you think a conference ought to look like, then maybe that’s how change occurs.

-Enough with the celebs- Okay so it was sort of exciting to ask Kevin Costner a question via live video and I will deny I ever wrote this post if SHRM has John Mayer keynote BUT celebrities don’t do our job. If we’re honest, they don’t care. So (SHRM) stop giving them the spotlight. I’ve seen more talented people in this business than I don’t know what, so don’t tell me you can’t find someone dynamic, innovative, wise, beautiful, funny, smart, exhilirating, ____________ to keynote your conference. If you can’t call me. I have a list of names of people who would love to do it AND knock it out of the park.

Don’t get me wrong. I LOVE conferences. They are tremendous opportunities for people new to the industry and offer a unique snapshot that webinars, videos and blogs can’t capture. However, maybe we need to change it up just a little. Maybe what worked ten years ago, isn’t going to work forever. Maybe, unlike so many other industries, we could swallow this pill and start changing now instead of when we’ve become so irrelevant there is nothing pulling us back from the brink. Okay so maybe that’s a bit dramatic. But unless fresh water flows in and out of a cistern, the water becomes stagnant and sometimes poisonous. And I wouldn’t want that to happen to my beloved conferences. They’re way too much fun!

Social Media University

Education has always been a bit of troublesome spot for me. None of my grandparents had their degree and so my parents were all very insistent that I get mine and they get about three apiece of their own. Between my folks, there are whole lotta letters trailing after their names. My mother is STILL in school, pursuing her doctorate…again.

Anyway, I got my degree and thought (emphasis on THOUGHT) about getting my Master’s in Fine Art before mounting school loan debt brought me to my very pragmatic senses. I wasn’t that jazzed about it anyway, since what I wanted to do was still very amorphous in my mind. Now, nearly ten years later, a degree in Social Media is being offered. And I don’t know how to feel about that.

My first impulse is to snark about it. After all, some very good questions by very smart people are bubbling to the surface:

-What do you teach?

-Who will teach it?

-How quickly will the curriculum be out of date?

-How do you teach something that hasn’t had sufficient history to be studied?

And on and on and many of these questions have to be answered. I’ve also been introduced to these folks, who seem to have some grasp of the education needed to move this forward. But it’s pretty hard to move forward with education in a certain subject, when the nature of that communication style is changing. . .well. . .education.

The thing that is difficult for me to grasp is how an accredited university can pace with how quickly social media is moving along. Viral is hard to stay on top of. If you can’t keep up, how do you design curriculum, find teachers, promote classes and give students the education they are looking for. And for that matter, where does social media fall in the course catalog anyway? Is it inherently “social”? Do students need to learn more about humans and they way they behave and react to certain messages and situations? Is that sociology? Or is it more based on marketing and communications? Or do you want to learn how to create these tools and dive into the technical aspects?

If I were looking for myself, I would want to focus on the social and marketing aspects of social media. The analytics and nuts and bolts of it interest me only inasmuch as they provide tools for my clients to measure my success, which makes clients happy, which leads to more clients. But that’s what I want to learn more about. I know people who are talking about the same world, tools and techniques I use but they toss out terms like semantic search and algorithms. And those things are just as important to them. Other colleagues are deeply interested in why social media affects people the way it does and how to make it work better and develop products that elicit better usability. So, I think  MSM (Masters of Social Media) would look very different for a lot of folks and would include professors from a wide range of subjects.

Add to that the fact that half the reason Social Media is so game-changing is that there is so much information from smart people out there for FREE. No you’ll never receive a pretty piece of paper with your name on it and get your wild mane of curls smooshed down by an ugly hat or have to don a shapeless and musty smelling gown, but how great was that experience for everyone? It’s hard to muster up the desire to get my degree in something when I am bombarded by information I can barely get through every day, and it’s usually good stuff!

This post isn’t meant to be authoritative. I’m just asking questions here. What do you think?

Do Recommendations Matter?

I was recently directed to a post on Brazen Careerist that stated it was okay and sometimes even necessary to burn bridges. The article was interesting and certainly sparked some industry debate. But it brought up some questions I’ve always had regarding the Linked In Feature “recommendations” and I figured it was time to write a post about it. Obviously, LI recommendations is a newer version of the old (use to be obligatory?) references on a resume. However, there are times when this feature can work against you. Here are some things that, while they may not send a recruiter running, might make one wonder:

1) Tons of connections and very few recommendations. This signals to me that you are excited to connect (good) but unable to follow through with real relationships or to ask former colleagues for recommendations (not so good). Why is this? It also makes me wonder if you used some “formula” to grow your network, something that makes me wonder if you really know what you’re doing when it comes to social networking (this is really only a valid concern if you are in line for a job that would entail the use of social media but . . .still).

2) An equal amount of recommendations and connections. While some may be able to get away with this, this practice generally looks like you’re “using” your network to brag. And no one likes that. If the only purpose of your network is personal preening, don’t link to me please.

3) An average amount of connections and no reccomendations. While not a great sign, this simply makes me think you don’t know how to use the technology and have never really explored the options available. But if you are looking for a job in sales or marketing, I would hope you’d get on the stick pretty quick.

4) You’ve applied for positions at companies that expressly indidacte they want to see a profile with reccomendations and you still don’t have any. If you apply for a position listed by a company, headhunter, internal recruiter or corporate HR and they say they want to see reccomendations, have the courtesy to seek those out before you apply. It shows you’ve read the rules and willing to play by them.

5) Tons of reccomendations from everyone, all over the place. It’s not that you can’t be reccomended by lots of people. Maybe you are a consultant and you’ve moved around a lot. But the truth is, most people see this as “iffy”. A recruiter wants to hear from people who’ve actually worked with you, not vendors eager to please, or folks from your BNI group. Maybe there are cases where asking someone you’ve never spoken to to reccomend you are a good idea, I just can’t think of any.

So what’s an eager job seeker to do? The basic guidelines are pretty simple:

1) Recommend GOOD people. It’s okay to say you are not comfortable recommending someone. If you have worked with them and you liked your experience, by all means. If not, click “archive”

2) Ask if they will return the favor. Most people are eager to do what they can to help a friend, colleague or even an acquaintance, so long as they can support that with integrity. Did you shine on a particular project? Was your old boss fond of you? Ask them if they’ll mention your best qualities not only for a good old fashioned reference but in electronic format on LinkedIn as well.

3) This is a bit of a personal rule. Don’t ask people who work for you (currently) to recommend you. If they choose to do it, great. If not, let it go. I’m sure it’s not officially written anywhere, but the power imbalance seems a bit sticky to me.

4) Write a good one! Don’t use the same old tired phrases, words etc. If someone kicked butt at something specific say so. Don’t generalize and leave people wondering what you just said. Also, don’t speak to thing you have no clue about. If they are a great vendor, say that

How about you? What are your personal rules for LI Recommendations? @marenhogan me OR leave em in the comments.

I recently read a great post by Steve Levy, that outlined his career progression, his lesson learned and his personal views on recruiting over the last quarter decade. It was fascinating and humbling and it got me thinking. First about my career as a marketer (a decade old now!), second as a recruiter (just a toddler at 2) and my new addiction to social media (an enfant terrible, just 12 months old). I’ve been criticized for thinking that the world only began to notice something once I became a part of it, a narcissistic trait to be sure. I’ve always done this with other media:

“How can that show be popular? I’ve never seen it!”

“I’m reading this great new book, oh Oprah just did a show on it?”

“You have to hear this great new singer. What do you mean you already have his greatest hits album?”

So to sum up, I understand I am not the first to receive a robust supplemental education from the internet.

Anyway, the only one of my career fields where I received a formal education was marketing. Recruiting was a bit of a school of hard knocks and Social Media has been a passion turned new tool for clients. But either way you slice it, I had to take the time to learn, sell and implement. Which is a little tough when there are only 24 measly hours in a day.

To try and supplement my informal education, I take advantage of every opportunity I can.

-National Conferences. Sometimes the education is better than that you can receive online or even at local events. Sometimes it isn’t. The point is that there are usually powerful influencers in your industry there. Often, this is a great way to fast forward your relationship, particulalry if the conference provides a great deal of time to network and converse (many don’t). If the conference includes an expo or vendor hall, it’s a great place to spot trends in what’s happening in the industry and to get to know what vendors are thinking, feeling and expecting.

-Local Events. Local events (particularly if you don’t live in a conference town like, say, Omaha) can be a great place to brainstorm theories, work through issues pertinent only to you and to learn more about what kinds of industry tools will work in your space. People may disagree with me but I believe that regardless of where you are doing business (less than 30% of my business is local) these are excellent places to learn and grow. Chambers of Commerce are great but may not be enough for high level service providers or B2B marketers. Finding (or founding!) a grass roots group is one of the best ways to learn more about your craft and what’s working in other industries (Hint: it could work in yours!)

-Online. The Intahnets can be both powerful and insidious. I say powerful because of the information contained HERE and because of the sites, links and awesomeness always out there to distract you. List of sites that have distracted me just since the beginning of this post:

Comments here

Your Social Media Strategy

Long Tail Search

The Investigative Recruiter

Does my picture suck?

Awesome Mashup Music Site (also served as the soundtrack for the post)

White Papers/e-books/magazines: One of the ways I try to supplement my education is by downloading white papers and reading them when I have no internet access (becoming rarer all the time, soon I shall have to utilize my GASP! willpower). The nice thing about these is that if you can keep in mind that they are generally attempts to market something, albeit with very good information included, they are usually laid out and designed very nicely, making for a pleasant reading experience. They are “scannable” for many of the main points. Pictures help!

Slideshare: I have been using this tool more and more lately. Not only can you browse through thousands of online lectures, now slideshare has added slidecasts, so there can be audio as well. And the best part is, when you have a “report” of your own to deliver, it might go up in one of their Alltop-esque categories, thus broadening your reach. However, make sure your stuff is exactly as you want it to appear (since PPT hates my pretty fonts, I shall have to use PDF from now on) before posting. Mine recently made the career catergory, janked fonts and all!

Conversations: These can happen online or off. Online chat rooms, Twitter and friendfeed, facebook and other chat functions have made it easier for an online community or group to discuss things of interest in the industry. These work best if you are willing to ask stupid questions. Trying to pretend you know it all makes for a dull chat, particularly if everyone else is doing the same thing. In person, the equation for an education conversation is simple, ask more than you tell.

Timing: I’ve had many people ask me about how to navigate this. I was offered several  assingments to do social media strategy or to promote certain brands when I first started my blog and began cruising around the internet. But (here’s the rub) I knew I wasn’t ready. Not only did I not know enough about recruiting, I knew even less about social media, except that I liked it. The whole stinking field was new and while I could certainly see parallels and applications in marketing, a field I was comfortable with, I didn’t feel it would be wise or honest to “experiment” with other people’s brands. Create your own “internship” while allowing yourself to explore new oppotunities and tools.

Getting an informal education

I recently read a great post by Steve Levy, that outlined his career progression, his lesson learned and his personal views on recruiting over the last quarter decade. It was fascinating and humbling and it got me thinking. First about my career as a marketer (a decade old now!), second as a recruiter (just a toddler at 2) and my new addiction to social media (an enfant terrible, just 12 months old). I’ve been criticized for thinking that the world only began to notice something once I became a part of it, a narcissistic trait to be sure. I’ve always done this with other media:

“How can that show be popular? I’ve never seen it!”

“I’m reading this great new book, oh Oprah just did a show on it?”

“You have to hear this great new singer. What do you mean you already have his greatest hits album?”

So to sum up, I understand I am not the first to receive a robust supplemental education from the internet.

Anyway, the only one of my career fields where I received a formal education was marketing. Recruiting was a bit of a school of hard knocks and Social Media has been a passion turned new tool for clients. But either way you slice it, I had to take the time to learn, sell and implement. Which is a little tough when there are only 24 measly hours in a day.

To try and supplement my informal education, I take advantage of every opportunity I can.

-National Conferences. Sometimes the education is better than that you can receive online or even at local events. Sometimes it isn’t. The point is that there are usually powerful influencers in your industry there. Often, this is a great way to fast forward your relationship, particulalry if the conference provides a great deal of time to network and converse (many don’t). If the conference includes an expo or vendor hall, it’s a great place to spot trends in what’s happening in the industry and to get to know what vendors are thinking, feeling and expecting.

-Local Events. Local events (particularly if you don’t live in a conference town like, say, Omaha) can be a great place to brainstorm theories, work through issues pertinent only to you and to learn more about what kinds of industry tools will work in your space. People may disagree with me but I believe that regardless of where you are doing business (less than 30% of my business is local) these are excellent places to learn and grow. Chambers of Commerce are great but may not be enough for high level service providers or B2B marketers. Finding (or founding!) a grass roots group is one of the best ways to learn more about your craft and what’s working in other industries (Hint: it could work in yours!)

-Online. The Intahnets can be both powerful and insidious. I say powerful because of the information contained HERE and because of the sites, links and awesomeness always out there to distract you. List of sites that have distracted me just since the beginning of this post:

Comments here

Your Social Media Strategy

Long Tail Search

The Investigative Recruiter

Does my picture suck?

Awesome Mashup Music Site (also served as the soundtrack for the post)

White Papers/e-books/magazines: One of the ways I try to supplement my education is by downloading white papers and reading them when I have no internet access (becoming rarer all the time, soon I shall have to utilize my GASP! willpower). The nice thing about these is that if you can keep in mind that they are generally attempts to market something, albeit with very good information included, they are usually laid out and designed very nicely, making for a pleasant reading experience. They are “scannable” for many of the main points. Pictures help!

Slideshare: I have been using this tool more and more lately. Not only can you browse through thousands of online lectures, now slideshare has added slidecasts, so there can be audio as well. And the best part is, when you have a “report” of your own to deliver, it might go up in one of their Alltop-esque categories, thus broadening your reach. However, make sure your stuff is exactly as you want it to appear (since PPT hates my pretty fonts, I shall have to use PDF from now on) before posting. Mine recently made the career catergory, janked fonts and all!

Conversations: These can happen online or off. Online chat rooms, Twitter and friendfeed, facebook and other chat functions have made it easier for an online community or group to discuss things of interest in the industry. These work best if you are willing to ask stupid questions. Trying to pretend you know it all makes for a dull chat, particularly if everyone else is doing the same thing. In person, the equation for an education conversation is simple, ask more than you tell.

Timing: I’ve had many people ask me about how to navigate this. I was offered several  assingments to do social media strategy or to promote certain brands when I first started my blog and began cruising around the internet. But (here’s the rub) I knew I wasn’t ready. Not only did I not know enough about recruiting, I knew even less about social media, except that I liked it. The whole stinking field was new and while I could certainly see parallels and applications in marketing, a field I was comfortable with, I didn’t feel it would be wise or honest to “experiment” with other people’s brands. Create your own “internship” while allowing yourself to explore new oppotunities and tools.

Monday Morning Ramblings or Getting your Informal Education

I recently read a great post by Steve Levy, that outlined his career progression, his lesson learned and his personal views on recruiting over the last quarter decade. It was fascinating and humbling and it got me thinking. First about my career as a marketer (a decade old now!), second as a recruiter (just a toddler at 2) and my new addiction to social media (an enfant terrible, just 12 months old). I’ve been criticized for thinking that the world only began to notice something once I became a part of it, a narcissistic trait to be sure. I’ve always done this with other media:

“How can that show be popular? I’ve never seen it!”

“I’m reading this great new book, oh Oprah just did a show on it?”

“You have to hear this great new singer. What do you mean you already have his greatest hits album?”

So to sum up, I understand I am not the first to receive a robust supplemental education from the internet.

Anyway, the only one of my career fields where I received a formal education was marketing. Recruiting was a bit of a school of hard knocks and Social Media has been a passion turned new tool for clients. But either way you slice it, I had to take the time to learn, sell and implement. Which is a little tough when there are only 24 measly hours in a day.

To try and supplement my informal education, I take advantage of every opportunity I can.

-National Conferences. Sometimes the education is better than that you can receive online or even at local events. Sometimes it isn’t. The point is that there are usually powerful influencers in your industry there. Often, this is a great way to fast forward your relationship, particulalry if the conference provides a great deal of time to network and converse (many don’t). If the conference includes an expo or vendor hall, it’s a great place to spot trends in what’s happening in the industry and to get to know what vendors are thinking, feeling and expecting.

-Local Events. Local events (particularly if you don’t live in a conference town like, say, Omaha) can be a great place to brainstorm theories, work through issues pertinent only to you and to learn more about what kinds of industry tools will work in your space. People may disagree with me but I believe that regardless of where you are doing business (less than 30% of my business is local) these are excellent places to learn and grow. Chambers of Commerce are great but may not be enough for high level service providers or B2B marketers. Finding (or founding!) a grass roots group is one of the best ways to learn more about your craft and what’s working in other industries (Hint: it could work in yours!)

-Online. The Intahnets can be both powerful and insidious. I say powerful because of the information contained HERE and because of the sites, links and awesomeness always out there to distract you. List of sites that have distracted me just since the beginning of this post:

Comments here

Your Social Media Strategy

Long Tail Search

The Investigative Recruiter

Does my picture suck?

Awesome Mashup Music Site (also served as the soundtrack for the post)

White Papers/e-books/magazines: One of the ways I try to supplement my education is by downloading white papers and reading them when I have no internet access (becoming rarer all the time, soon I shall have to utilize my GASP! willpower). The nice thing about these is that if you can keep in mind that they are generally attempts to market something, albeit with very good information included, they are usually laid out and designed very nicely, making for a pleasant reading experience. They are “scannable” for many of the main points. Pictures help!

Slideshare: I have been using this tool more and more lately. Not only can you browse through thousands of online lectures, now slideshare has added slidecasts, so there can be audio as well. And the best part is, when you have a “report” of your own to deliver, it might go up in one of their Alltop-esque categories, thus broadening your reach. However, make sure your stuff is exactly as you want it to appear (since PPT hates my pretty fonts, I shall have to use PDF from now on) before posting. Mine recently made the career catergory, janked fonts and all!

Conversations: These can happen online or off. Online chat rooms, Twitter and friendfeed, facebook and other chat functions have made it easier for an online community or group to discuss things of interest in the industry. These work best if you are willing to ask stupid questions. Trying to pretend you know it all makes for a dull chat, particularly if everyone else is doing the same thing. In person, the equation for an education conversation is simple, ask more than you tell.

Timing: I’ve had many people ask me about how to navigate this. I was offered several  assingments to do social media strategy or to promote certain brands when I first started my blog and began cruising around the internet. But (here’s the rub) I knew I wasn’t ready. Not only did I not know enough about recruiting, I knew even less about social media, except that I liked it. The whole stinking field was new and while I could certainly see parallels and applications in marketing, a field I was comfortable with, I didn’t feel it would be wise or honest to “experiment” with other people’s brands. Create your own “internship” while allowing yourself to explore new oppotunities and tools.

I recently read a great post by Steve Levy, that outlined his career progression, his lesson learned and his personal views on recruiting over the last quarter decade. It was fascinating and humbling and it got me thinking. First about my career as a marketer (a decade old now!), second as a recruiter (just a toddler at 2) and my new addiction to social media (an enfant terrible, just 12 months old). I’ve been criticized for thinking that the world only began to notice something once I became a part of it, a narcissistic trait to be sure. I’ve always done this with other media:

“How can that show be popular? I’ve never seen it!”

“I’m reading this great new book, oh Oprah just did a show on it?”

“You have to hear this great new singer. What do you mean you already have his greatest hits album?”

So to sum up, I understand I am not the first to receive a robust supplemental education from the internet.

Anyway, the only one of my career fields where I received a formal education was marketing. Recruiting was a bit of a school of hard knocks and Social Media has been a passion turned new tool for clients. But either way you slice it, I had to take the time to learn, sell and implement. Which is a little tough when there are only 24 measly hours in a day.

To try and supplement my informal education, I take advantage of every opportunity I can.

-National Conferences. Sometimes the education is better than that you can receive online or even at local events. Sometimes it isn’t. The point is that there are usually powerful influencers in your industry there. Often, this is a great way to fast forward your relationship, particulalry if the conference provides a great deal of time to network and converse (many don’t). If the conference includes an expo or vendor hall, it’s a great place to spot trends in what’s happening in the industry and to get to know what vendors are thinking, feeling and expecting.

-Local Events. Local events (particularly if you don’t live in a conference town like, say, Omaha) can be a great place to brainstorm theories, work through issues pertinent only to you and to learn more about what kinds of industry tools will work in your space. People may disagree with me but I believe that regardless of where you are doing business (less than 30% of my business is local) these are excellent places to learn and grow. Chambers of Commerce are great but may not be enough for high level service providers or B2B marketers. Finding (or founding!) a grass roots group is one of the best ways to learn more about your craft and what’s working in other industries (Hint: it could work in yours!)

-Online. The Intahnets can be both powerful and insidious. I say powerful because of the information contained HERE and because of the sites, links and awesomeness always out there to distract you. List of sites that have distracted me just since the beginning of this post:

Comments here

Your Social Media Strategy

Long Tail Search

The Investigative Recruiter

Does my picture suck?

Awesome Mashup Music Site (also served as the soundtrack for the post)

White Papers/e-books/magazines: One of the ways I try to supplement my education is by downloading white papers and reading them when I have no internet access (becoming rarer all the time, soon I shall have to utilize my GASP! willpower). The nice thing about these is that if you can keep in mind that they are generally attempts to market something, albeit with very good information included, they are usually laid out and designed very nicely, making for a pleasant reading experience. They are “scannable” for many of the main points. Pictures help!

Slideshare: I have been using this tool more and more lately. Not only can you browse through thousands of online lectures, now slideshare has added slidecasts, so there can be audio as well. And the best part is, when you have a “report” of your own to deliver, it might go up in one of their Alltop-esque categories, thus broadening your reach. However, make sure your stuff is exactly as you want it to appear (since PPT hates my pretty fonts, I shall have to use PDF from now on) before posting. Mine recently made the career catergory, janked fonts and all!

Conversations: These can happen online or off. Online chat rooms, Twitter and friendfeed, facebook and other chat functions have made it easier for an online community or group to discuss things of interest in the industry. These work best if you are willing to ask stupid questions. Trying to pretend you know it all makes for a dull chat, particularly if everyone else is doing the same thing. In person, the equation for an education conversation is simple, ask more than you tell.

Timing: I’ve had many people ask me about how to navigate this. I was offered several  assingments to do social media strategy or to promote certain brands when I first started my blog and began cruising around the internet. But (here’s the rub) I knew I wasn’t ready. Not only did I not know enough about recruiting, I knew even less about social media, except that I liked it. The whole stinking field was new and while I could certainly see parallels and applications in marketing, a field I was comfortable with, I didn’t feel it would be wise or honest to “experiment” with other people’s brands. Create your own “internship” while allowing yourself to explore new oppotunities and tools.