Insights into the forces shaping our industry.

As a recruiter in the electrical industry, I have a lot of tools at my disposal to help present a qualified candidate to one of our clients. LinkedIn is certainly one of the most important.

While I always receive a resume from my candidates, the LinkedIn profile is all about branding yourself to the world. That’s why the LinkedIn profile should always differ in tone and style from the resume.   A resume is typically a to-the-point dissertation of your qualifications and achievements. LinkedIn can provide more detail into the candidate’s passion and what drives and excites them about their current position. It can also offer a glimpse into the candidate’s personal life including the causes they care about, groups they care to join, and volunteer / charity work they perform.

So how do executive recruiters use LinkedIn?  For some, LinkedIn is just as important as the resume.

LinkedIn profiles provide a great introduction vehicle for potential candidates to recruiters and hiring managers.  In fact, if the candidate exists in our 100,000+ contact data base, we will still always go to their LinkedIn profile, even if their resume is already on file with us. If they don’t exist yet in our database, and we find them on LinkedIn as we compile our initial list of candidates to contact, it’s our first introduction to that candidate.  If the LinkedIn profile is solid, it will give us a reason to pick up the phone and reach out to the candidate.

LinkedIn profiles provide a narrative model to describe the candidate. Ultimately, when we present a candidate to our client, we create a written summary (1-2 pages) in narrative form to share the candidate’s successes as related specifically to the open position. This summary provides a solid picture of what the candidate can do for the company and serves to ‘connect the dots’ on the bullet points contained in his/her resume. The LinkedIn profile can further complete a picture of the candidate as a person, also in narrative form.  A candidate’s LinkedIn profile should include each step of a candidate’s professional career, the same as their resume would.

LinkedIn is ripe with recommendations and endorsements to use in presenting a candidate to a hiring company. The staple statement “references available upon request” is for resumes. On LinkedIn, references and recommendations are front and center and for an executive recruiter, it’s a great place to reference the candidate’s past, seeing the candidate’s satisfied employers, co-workers, and business contacts.

LinkedIn is a form of inbound marketing, and therefore perhaps the most authentic expression of the candidate. When a candidate engages with a recruiter, they often tailor their resume to best suit the position they are applying for. However, since LinkedIn profiles are usually sought and found, or viewed upon recommendation from someone else, they present a candidate in his/her truest form.  After all, the candidate has created the LinkedIn profile to “market” him/herself to the world. The executive recruiter will probably also discover, by reading the profile, what the candidate has achieved in their career and more importantly, where they’re looking to go.

So always make sure your LinkedIn profile is branding yourself to the world! If you are hoping for an executive recruiter to help you locate a new position in the electrical industry, we can help at Egret Consulting; don’t hesitate to contact me at 847.307.7129.