Social Media has influenced Human Resources function like nothing before. In the talent acquisition domain the last major impact was when job portals came into existence and it was believed that they changed the face of talent sourcing forever.

The advent of social media has lead to new frontiers and Social Hiring is quickly emerging the new face of talent sourcing. Talent Acquisition Professionals and experts may debate on the impact but will surely agree that it cannot be ignored for long.

Among the various platforms it an been widely perceived that LinkedIn is a platform for professional side and Face book is for personal side. Many would also debate because of this understanding LinkedIn is a good and only source for talent sourcing.

The reality is far different it is not a question of either of these platforms but how to synergize both of them and optimize for Talent Acquisition. Statistically Face book has four times the profiles of professionals in the age group of 18 ~35 vis-a-vis LinkedIn which makes it a compelling enough to explore. With the lines blurring of social & professional life, with professional spending at least 20 minutes on Face book per day when compared to 20 minutes on LinkedIn per week, Face book can be a good hunting ground for scouting for Talent.

With robust Social Hiring Applications like myparichay.in and others, issues of privacy are well addressed from the talent side and with quick optimization engines the recruiters feel the ease of hunting the ‘dormant’ talent too.

At The Strategist we believe Social Media platforms can be a good source for Talent Planning Strategy in terms of Talent Landscaping and Talent Scouting also. Talent Landscaping is all about gathering market intelligence where the skills lie and what is the pricing point. LinkedIn can facilitate in knowing which organization is doing what – Skill Metrics, Locations etc., while Face book can reflect what is the mood meter in the organization thereby helping recruiters to know when to bombard.

Talent Scouting is all about Validating the credentials of the Employee either before or after hiring. LinkedIn enables to know more about the candidate by referring to What kind of recommendations the prospect has, Who are in the contact list and we can pick randomly for reference check if required, while Face book will enable us to know who are prospect friends, What are the social credentials, Which groups he / she associated with in personal life, Is the personal lifestyle (pics / wall statements) in line with org. Ethos and so on.

As the world shrinks and transparency increases among stakeholders it is imperative for all of us to go back to the drawing board and explore avenues to synergize and distinguish us . .