There are well over 300 million people worldwide on Linkedin. In the UK, it’s reported there are 19 million people. In and around Aberdeen, Linkedin shows over 138,892 people registered on the site – that is people with the word/location ‘Aberdeen’ in their Linkedin profile. Given that the adult population of the city is 196,409 (2015 statistic from National Records of Scotland), that’s a huge percentage of the working population.
Linkedin, sometimes referred to (incorrectly in our view) as “Facebook for business”, is a recruiter’s dream. After all, there are over 300 million potential candidates on there! Recruitment is where Linkedin makes most of its money, with recruitment consultants paying for premium accounts so they can search for and find potential candidates who they then ‘sell’ to their clients, usually based on a percentage of first year salary for a successful placement. However, there is nothing to stop anyone from paying for a premium account and then using Linkedin to search for candidates. If you know what you’re doing, then it’s fairly straightforward and, of course, you don’t have to pay any fees to recruiters.
At the risk of sounding stereotypically Aberdonian, we don’t like spending money – always bearing in mind that it’s public money, aka your and our taxes! That doesn’t mean we don’t use recruitment consultants – we do when it’s appropriate to do so – but if we can find candidates ourselves then we do so.
The RGU recruitment team is highly experienced at using Linkedin. We post details of all our vacancies there and, of course, you can apply there and then or simply note the job and apply at home at a time of your convenience (in case you don’t want your boss seeing you applying for a job!).
However, supposing you’re one of the many who are happy enough in your current position but wouldn’t say no to the chance of a new role if you became aware of a great new opportunity? That’s the subject of our next blog.
Julie Skinner, Resourcing & Benefit Specialist
Link in with me at: Julie Skinner