Category Archives: The Recruiting Rules

The Reason You’re Being “Ghosted” After Your Interview!

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Dear Timmy,

I recently applied for a position that I’m perfect for! A recruiter from the company contacted me and scheduled me for an interview with the manager. I went, the interview was a little over an hour and it went great! I immediately followed up with an email to the recruiter and the manager thanking them, but since then I’ve heard nothing and it’s been weeks. I’ve sent follow-up emails to both the recruiter and the manager and I’ve gotten no reply.

What should I do? Why do companies do this to candidates? I would rather they just tell me they aren’t interested than have them say nothing at all!

The Ghost Candidate

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Dear Ghost,

There are a number of reasons that recruiters and hiring managers ghost candidates and none of them are good! Here’s a short-list of some of these reasons:

– They hated you and hope you go away when they ghost you because, conflict in uncomfortable.

– They like you, but not as much as another candidate they’re trying to talk into the job, but want to leave you on the back burner, but they’re idiots and don’t know how to do this properly.

– They decided to promote someone internally and they don’t care about candidate experience enough to tell you they went another direction.

– They have a completely broken recruitment process and might still be going through it believing you’re just as happy as a pig in shi…

– They think they communicated to you electronically to bug off through their ATS, but they haven’t audited the process to know this isn’t working.

– The recruiter got fired and no one picked up the process.

I would love to tell you that ghosting candidates are a rare thing, but it’s not! It happens all the time! There is never a reason to ghost a candidate, ever! Sometimes I believe candidates get ghosted by recruiters because hiring managers don’t give feedback, but that still isn’t an excuse I would accept, at least tell the candidate that!

Look, I’ve ghosted people. At conference cocktail parties, I’ve been known to ghost my way right back up to my room and go to sleep! When it comes to candidates, I don’t ghost! I would rather tell them the truth so they don’t keep coming back around unless I want them to come back around.

I think most recruiters ghost candidates because they’re over their head in the amount of work they have, and they mean to get back to people, but just don’t have the time. When you’re in the firefighting mode you tend to only communicate with the candidates you want, not the ones you don’t. Is this good practice? Heck, no! But when you’re fighting fires, you do what you have to do to stay alive.

What would I do, if I was you? 

Here are a few ideas to try if you really want to know the truth:

1. Send a handwritten letter to the CEO of the company briefly explaining your experience and what outcome you would like.

2. Go on Twitter and in 140 characters send a shot across the bow! “XYZ Co. I interviewed 2 weeks ago and still haven’t heard anything! Can you help me!?” (Will work on Facebook as well!)

3. Write a post about your experience on LinkedIn and tag the recruiter and the recruiter’s boss.

4. Take the hint and go find a company who truly values you and your talent! If the organization and this manager treats candidates like this, imagine how you’ll be treated as an employee?

Career Confessions from GenZ: What Attracts GenZ to Your Work Place?

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Career Confessions from GenZ is a weekly series authored by Cameron Sackett, a Sophomore at the Univesity of Michigan majoring in Communications and Advertising. Make sure you connect with him on LinkedIn:

I’m going to be frank: the prospect of working for the rest of my life is absolutely terrifying. I’ve been saying for years that I can’t wait to retire, and I’m only 19. Nothing makes my skin crawl more than the thought of waking up early every day (I’m such a teenager it hurts) and going to sit in uncomfortable clothing at an ugly office surrounded by people I don’t even like.

Whenever this gets brought up, people always try to reassure me that I might enjoy working and I might really like my job. While I hope this is the case, I do believe that a major part of making those 40 hours a week a little more enjoyable is the company and its culture.

There are definitely things that I know will make me more attracted to work for a company that can hopefully combat some of my worries. First, I would love to have flexible work hours. Something about 10-6 instead of 9-5 (Editor/Dad Note: This made me LOL 10-6! Oh, boy, reality is really going to hurt!) sounds so much more appealing to me. Waking up at 8 sounds infinitely better than 7, and I can tell you that most other teenagers will say the same.

Additionally, the thought of 10 vacation days a year HURTS. I feel physical pain when I hear that some people have that. The European Union mandates a minimum of 22 vacation days a year with 13 paid holidays. Now, I know we’re in America, the land of opportunity, where you make your own fortune. But please just give me some dang vacation days! This plays into one of my biggest fears which is working my life away. I can confidently say that so many of my peers have the same worries and a way to ease this pain is some time off!

On one of my first interviews for an internship this past year, I got to tour one of the coolest offices I have ever seen. It was right out of my Gen-Z dreams: brick walls with modern finishes, an open floor plan, Apple products everywhere (#TeamiPhone). If I’m going to sit in an office for 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year, I would like it to look nice, not like a doctor’s office.

Similarly, my Dad has instituted something at his work that I love: a casual dress code. I really enjoy dressing up, but wearing a suit or even dress pants and a nice shirt everyday sounds exhausting. Please let me come to work with my shirt untucked and in a nice pair of sneakers, and I promise I will be much more focused than I would be with a tie and dress shoes on all day long.

Most important to me is the culture. I want to work in a place where everyone collaborates and there’s a mutual respect. Ideally, I’d love to be friends with my co-workers, but at least I’d like us to be able to work together in an environment where we aren’t in constant competition. Being a member of the Sackett family means that you are inherently a monster competitor and it’s exhausting. As much as I love to be competitive from time to time, I don’t want to work in an environment where everyone is constantly pitted against each other, instead of working together to achieve a common goal.

An added little bonus to my list would be food related days/events. I hear that a common event in some companies is Bagel Fridays and I’m ALL about it. I strongly relate to Stanley on Pretzel Day at Dunder Mifflin and if you don’t get the reference, exit the page (once you finish reading of course!) and go watch season 3, episode 5 of The Office. 

My job wish-list might not seem as wild as you may think. I’m not asking for a new iPhone or a new car when I commit (although that’d be nice!); I’m asking for things that are pretty common. Although I still can’t wait until my mid-60s when I’ll have no responsibilities, getting some items checked off my wish-list could help make my time in the workforce more pleasant.

 

 

HR and TA Pros – have a question you would like to ask directly to a GenZ? Ask us in the comments and I’ll have Cameron respond in an upcoming blog post right here on the project. Have some feedback for Cameron? Again, please share in the comments and/or connect with him on LinkedIn.

1% of Job Descriptions have Pictures or Video! Why?

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Smashfly, the enterprise recruitment marketing platform, released their 2018 Recruitment Marketing Benchmark Report this week and it’s loaded with data. As you can see from the image above, some things have gotten better than others!

What’s up with Job Description and why the hell can’t we figure this out!? 

So, apparently, we are really against having pictures and video in job descriptions! 1% of job descriptions having this type of media is actually a really strange stat to have in 2018. You would think by now we would have shoved just about anything into a JD to make it more appealing for job seekers. But, we haven’t!

Why?

A few things are at play here that I think corporate TA folks will want to point out:

– Job descriptions are a legal document, not a toy like job postings are, so we treat them appropriately. Okay, yes, a JD is a legal document. But, that doesn’t mean you need to bore people to death to read it! “Legal” doesn’t mean you can’t add pictures or videos. Just be smart.

– Our ATS only allows text. Okay, you need a new ATS that was built in the last decade!

– JD’s are an HR issue, not a TA issue. We’re lucky if we can get the hiring manager to look at them, let alone update them!

So, there are problems. No real problems. Mostly made up, we don’t like change problems.

There is no reason that your Job Descriptions shouldn’t have pictures and video. Some organizations have gone completely to video-based job descriptions, and guess what!? They didn’t even take those TA pros to jail! No, really! Not even a ticket from the EEOC or OFCCP or anything!

Here’s what we know. Having a job description that actually gets people excited about a job will get people to apply, at a far higher rate than a text-based document with paragraphs and bullet points. Also, you don’t have to have a production studio to do this! You have an iPhone, go down to the department and take some pics and video. Take ten minutes to work with your ATS and IT to figure it out.

We think JD’s don’t matter but they do. They matter because the JD is the one thing every candidate reads about the job and your company. They might not visit your career site, or stop by your lobby, or your social feeds. Everyone reads the JD. Also, the JD is basically the only thing we share socially and within our talent networks (which is an entire another post!):

95% of organizations in the Fortune 500 only send JD’s to their Talent Networks. Oh boy, that sounds like a great network to be apart of! Come on! We’re better than this!

Some other cool facts from Smashfly’s Benchmark Report:

– There’s a correlation between having Recruitment Marketing strategy and Revenue growth. Be careful. That doesn’t mean those with Recruitment Marketing Strategies will grow Revenue, there’s no causation, just correlation. There’s also a correlation between me starting to blog and the stock market going up 1265% since I started writing!

– Those who do really great at Recruitment Marketing will have higher Glassdoor ratings. Make sense, right! Tell people you’re awesome and people will say you’re awesome. I love marketing! It works!

– Only 15 Fortune 500 companies won a Candidate Experience Award in 2017. All 15 had Recruitment Marketing Strategies in place! Want a better CX? Probably helps to have a strategy.

– Only 1% of organizations have implemented the most talked about technology on the planet! A chatbot! Seems low. Seems like I’m running into them more and more as I look at career sites, but not surprising. We like to wait and see when it comes to TA Tech. I’m guessing that number will be higher next year!

Check out the full report, it has some great data and some great ideas as well on Recruitment Marketing!

 

 

Career Confessions from GenZ: What Does GenZ Want From You at a Career Fair?

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Career Confessions from GenZ is a weekly series authored by Cameron Sackett, a Sophomore at the Univesity of Michigan majoring in Communications and Advertising. Make sure you connect with him on LinkedIn:

Honestly, there is nothing more terrifying to me than a career fair! It seems almost like speed dating, where you have to make a lasting impression and a meaningful connection with someone in a matter of minutes. While I’m not sold on this option as a way to find potential jobs/internships, it is a great resource for most college students to find jobs.

Disclaimer: I have never been to a career fair, so my opinion is based on hypothetical situations. When I attend one, there are certain things that will definitely catch my eye.

1.SWAG: I honestly don’t care what it is, but I’m a “broke” college student and I love free things. Whether it be a notebook, lanyard, or even a dang pen, swag draws me in immediately. At the University of Michigan’s club and activities fair my friends and I will walk around for hours with the sole purpose of collecting as many free things as possible. My suggestion is to bring snacks to give away, slap a company logo sticker on the package and your set!. While this might not be as long-lasting as maybe a lanyard, I am way more likely to actually use it and therefore, think more fondly of your company!

2.PEOPLE: This is completely opinion based, but I personally feel more comfortable talking to women than men. Personally, I think that talking with a male fosters a more competitive atmosphere, thus making me nervous and less likely to approach a table. Now when it comes to women, especially in their 30s and 40s, I feel right at home. This is probably because my Mom is my best friend, but I would feel more comfortable approaching a table with a middle-aged woman at the front.

3.BRANDS: Obviously recognizable brands are definitely going to have a leg up on the competition. I’m going to be way more compelled approaching the Google table rather than a company I’ve never heard of. This is when you have to play the game by creating a cool/modern display (maybe with some technology) and bringing some sweet swag (free T-Shirts are golden for getting college students – especially if you incorporate the actual school logo). I believe the most important goal for less recognizable companies at a career fair is to be memorable and remembering the audience you’re catering to is vital to achieving this.

As I get closer to the impending doom of adulthood, I will probably have more experience with career fairs, so look out for part 2 in about a year! My biggest piece of advice is to remember the audience you’re working with: insecure, desperate, tired college students that want a job as badly as you want to fill your positions! And if you need anyone to try out some swag, I think I could help you with that 😉

 

 

HR and TA Pros – have a question you would like to ask directly to a GenZ? Ask us in the comments and I’ll have Cameron respond in an upcoming blog post right here on the project. Have some feedback for Cameron? Again, please share in the comments and/or connect with him on LinkedIn.

Career Confessions from GenZ: How Does GenZ Want You to Communicate With Them?

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Career Confessions from GenZ is a weekly series authored by Cameron Sackett, a Sophomore at the Univesity of Michigan majoring in Communications and Advertising. Make sure you connect with him on LinkedIn:

One of the things that my generation is most notorious for is our cell phone usage. According to The Washington Post, current teens are spending over 1/3 of the day on their phones. Now, I’m going to be upfront and say that I’m an avid phone and social media user, and I understand the potential dangers of spending too much time on your phone. On the other hand, I don’t foresee my cell phone usage habits or my generation’s changing significantly any time soon.

Due to this, companies are looking at changing how they recruit their candidates. As I am just dipping my toes into the workforce, I am starting to see how the interview process may be changing in the age of cell phones.

The majority of my communication with potential employers for all jobs that I’ve had has been e-mail. This is something that I’m all about. E-mail is like a more formal version of a text, where you don’t have the pressures to respond immediately and you can spend time thinking of a more formulated response.

Personally, I think that e-mail should stay as the main form of communication for communicating with candidates. I’ve heard that some companies are trying to implement texting or text messaging like platforms into their hiring process. Here’s the way I see it: when I text someone, I’m usually typing in an informal way and I typically respond ASAP. Also, a lot of errors occur in texting, like typos or texting the wrong person. These are easily fixed when you’re talking with your friends but not necessarily a potential employer.

I’m totally open to texting in the interview process, but I have my concerns.

Now when it comes to the more direct form of communication, let me dispel a common myth about Gen-Z: we don’t hate talking on the phone, we hate calling people on the phone. There is a HUGE difference between answering a phone call and calling someone and personally, I would much rather answer the phone than call someone. In addition, I think most of my generation does better in a face-to-face style of an interview because it allows for more of a personal connection. This may scare many people, but when a relaxed environment is created in an interview, I think that many of us would come to prefer in-person interviews.

Lastly, I don’t want to see recruiters messaging me on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat or any other social media platform. This isn’t because my social media profiles are inappropriate, thankfully I have some monitors on my profiles to keep them nice and clean (I see you Mom and Dad), but it’s because I see social media as a place that I can use for fun and enjoyment. I don’t want to have to constantly worry about messaging potential employers back on these platforms when I just want to use them to share/follow people and things I like.

Now, I am on the older side of Gen-Z (my 14-year-old brother is in Gen-Z too, how crazy!), so my opinions might not hold for the kids currently in middle and high school. I can say this: I (and most other college students) check our emails just about as much as you do, so that’s a good place to start!

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HR and TA Pros – have a question you would like to ask directly to a GenZ? Ask us in the comments and I’ll have Cameron respond in an upcoming blog post right here on the project. Have some feedback for Cameron? Again, please share in the comments and/or connect with him on LinkedIn.

Besides being a Dad with a network, I thought the best way to get my son some ‘real-world’ experience would be to put himself out there as a writer! Let him know what you think and let us hear what you would like to learn about the next big generation entering our workforce!

Someone Is Banking on You Being Lazy!

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I work in an industry where I’ve been told for a decade technology is going to take my job. The staffing industry is a half a trillion dollar industry worldwide. The entire industry is built on us banking on the fact that someone in corporate TA is going to be lazy.

Ouch! That should sting a little!

So, I don’t really bank on you being lazy at my company. We do contract work so we are looking to fill contingent roles, not direct hire staffing, which is an industry almost completely built on lazy! For my staffing brothers and sisters out there, I hear you, I know you’re ‘just’ filling in when ‘capacity’ is an issue. (wink, head nod, wink)

There are other industries that bank you us being lazy. The entire diet industry! You’ve got overpriced awful foods, bars, shakes, workout gyms, at home gyms, etc. Because we won’t eat less and move more, because we are “lazy”, we pay a lot for that! Believe me, I pay my fair share! Just because I’m too lazy! Ugh, it’s embarrassing!

Direct hire staffing as an industry could be gone tomorrow if corporate TA just did what they were hired to do. You have an opening, you fill the opening. We aren’t trying to put a woman on the moon! This isn’t rocket science!

But, we don’t fill the opening. In fact, we do just about everything except fill the opening. We post the opening. We meet about the opening. We send whoever applies to the manager of the opening. We meet some more about candidate experience. We have another meeting about employment branding. One more meeting with the manager to see if anything has changed.

That doesn’t sound lazy, does it?

But, deflection of more difficult work is just another form of lazy.

My kid doesn’t want to go out in 90-degree heat and mow the lawn. It’s a hard, hot job. So, they come up with ‘alternative’ work that they have to do that just happens to be inside in the air conditioning.

As TA Leaders, we have to understand how are others are banking on us being lazy, and then make adjustments to stop lazy. So, how do you do that?

Well, I wrote an entire book on the subject – The Talent Fix – which is coming out in April – but until you can get it, here are some tips:

  1. Have clearly defined measurable activity goals set for each member of your TA team.
  2. Make those measures transparent so everyone can see them every day.
  3. Have performance conversations immediately when measures aren’t met.
  4. Course correct as measures need to be adjusted to meet the needs of the business.
  5. Rinse, repeat.

1 -5 above is like page 37 of the book. So, you can imagine what the rest of the 300+ pages will be like! 😉

If you follow the five steps above about half of your team will quit in 90 days. That’s a good thing, those idiots didn’t want to recruit, to begin with, they just wanted that fat corporate check and Taco Tuesdays. They were being lazy and it was costing your corporate bottom line.

The talent acquisition function is not a charity case. I think in the history of HR we’ve done some corporate charity where we let people keep collecting money even though they were costing us money. They weren’t giving back the value we needed for what we were paying. Great leaders stop this from happening.

Great leaders understand that there are people in the world that are banking on us being lazy.

The Top 100 Fortune 500 Employment Brands Report @WilsonHCG

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RPO provider WilsonHCG released their annual Employment Brands Report for 2018. The report lists the top 100 employment brands based on an algorithm Wilson put together, and they are:

#1 – Johnson & Johnson

#2 – Intel

#3 – IBM

#4 – Lockheed Martin

#5 – Proctor & Gamble

#6 – General Motors

#7 – J.P. Morgan Chase

#8 – Dow Chemical

#9 – Cummins

#10 – ADP

So, how does that Top 10 feel at first glance?

I had some problems. The top 10 list seems a bit dated. Like it might be better titled, “Employment Brands People Over 40 Would Love to Work for!”. If someone on the street came up and said, “Tim, you can win a million dollars by telling us the 3 top Employment Brands in the U.S.” I would immediately say – Google, Apple, Facebook.

Google is on the list and in the top 20. Facebook is down at 61. Apple is NOT on the list! Also, no Nike. Very strange.

So, I looked at the criteria. How did this big RPO firm that sells to the Fortune 500 come up with this list? Here are the criteria for having a ‘top’ employment brand:

  • Career Page – Okay, that’s important to a great employment brand, solid start!
  • Job Boards – Um, what!? Your use of Job Boards has nothing to do with your Employment Brand! In fact, I would argue organizations with great employment brands don’t even have to use job boards.
  • Employee Reviews & Candidate Engagement – Okay, we get it Glassdoor has data.
  • Accolades – By whom? Me? You? This is also gamed as it’s “Best Places to Work”, “Most Admired”, etc. Which are all pretty much pay to play schemes.
  • Recruitment Marketing – RM is not EB. You can be great at RM – Amazon, and still have a weaker EB.
  • Corporate Social Responsibility & Recruitment Initiatives – Recruitment Initiatives? Could one of those happen to be – “Use RPO”? Just asking for a friend.

Okay, I’ve had enough fun with Wilson and the report, there was some actual good data that came out of it as well.

The biggest one that really hits home is this: The top 100 on the list scored 805% better than the bottom 100 on the list! That’s a giant disparity and really talks to the fact that EB (or more RM in this case) still has so far to come, but many top brands are beginning to separate from the pack.

Wilson found that top scoring companies had better alignment with marketing, which completely makes sense and it should be that way. Employment branding and recruitment marketing done in a silo, is a whole lot of wasted effort and resources. Your candidates are often your consumers, and while marketing messages can be vastly different from recruiting messages, the tone and voice should be similar.

Go check out the report, you can download a copy here! Under each of the six measures, the report does a great job of giving specific things organizations can do to better themselves.

The One Big Problem with Being Pretty

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Don’t you hate pretty people? We are addicted to ‘pretty’ in America. Let’s face it, most of the world is addicted to pretty.

Pretty people get all the jobs. Pretty people get all the money. Pretty people get all the fame. Life as a pretty person is a heck a lot easier than being an ugly person! How do I know this? I’m a short, ginger with a Dad bod, I’m like the poster child for birth control!

This is why today, I’m a little excited!

Some new research shows that Ugly people actually have a leg up on pretty people when it comes to hiring! Yeah, baby! Give me a job! Here’s a bit from the American Psychological Association study:

While good-looking people are generally believed to receive more favorable treatment in the hiring process, when it comes to applying for less desirable jobs, such as those with low pay or uninteresting work, attractiveness may be a liability, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.

“Our research suggests that attractive people may be discriminated against in selection for relatively less desirable jobs,” said lead author Margaret Lee, a doctoral candidate at the London Business School. “This stands in contrast to a large body of research that concluded that attractiveness, by and large, helps candidates in the selection process.”

The research was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology®.

Yeah – take that Discrimination you highly beautiful and desirable hunk of humankind!

Oh, wait, Ugly people have an advantage in getting crappy jobs…

Am I the only one crying in my office right now?

So, turns out you’re ugly. You basically have no advantages in life because the mix of your mom and dad’s genetic code produced something most people don’t find attractive. It’s like a lottery, but you lost. You lost the life lottery.

The one benefit you get is when you go to apply for a menial, low-end job, you’ll have an advantage over people who are attractive. “Sorry, Ashley, take your beautiful ass back Abercrombie, I’m running the fryer today, bitch!”

Don’t you love Life’s sense of humor?

So, the one big problem you have if your pretty is you will find it hard getting a crappy job. Yep, I don’t care that your dream is to have dirty fingernails, Stephen! Go back to that desk job making six figures and try not to get tears on your cashmere sweater.

I think what we see here has less to do with ugly and pretty, and more to do with selection profiling by hiring managers. It goes a little something like this:

  1. A pretty person applies for a low-end dirty job.
  2. The pretty person shows up for the interview.
  3. Hiring manager sees the pretty person and thinks “there is no way this beautiful person will ever stay working at this job”.
  4. Hiring manager continues to interview waiting to find an ugly enough person who the hiring manager feels lacks enough self-confidence to go look for a better job.
  5. The pretty person is denied work and is discriminated against.

We have this psychological belief as hiring managers that your looks play a role in tenure. We have a level of attractiveness internal meter we believe correlates to longevity. The better the job (and compensation) we tend to believe we can hold out for skills and attractiveness.

Go ahead and do some real-world research. Look at the most successful companies in the world and you’ll see, on average, they are more attractive across the board, then those companies that are the least successful.

It doesn’t always work out, but it mostly works out. Basically, 60% of the time, it works every time.

So, my ugly friends and peers. Go out today and walk with your held slightly higher knowing we have the advantage. Let’s just not talk to loudly about what that advantage is, okay?

2018 Talent Acquisition as a Career Survey! Take it now! @ATAPglobal

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I need your help!

As you may know, in 2018 I became the President-elect for the Association of Talent Acquisition Professionals (ATAP). I’m pretty proud of that because I love our industry and spend countless hours advocating for Recruiting and TA pros worldwide.

One of the member benefits of joining ATAP is access to some great data and research. Our most recent project is our inaugural Talent Acquisition as a Career 2018 survey. This survey is meant for any and all Talent Acquisition and Recruiting professionals, including ATAP and Non-ATAP members.

So, PLEASE take a few minutes and complete the survey!

The results should provide us great insight into how TA professionals truly feel today about their roles and their opportunities to be successful in their TA career. We will be sharing the results of this survey publicly first at the Spring ERE Conference in San Diego (April 2-4, 2018), and then on the ATAP website.

Please do me this favor and take the survey. We are trying to get over 1,000 responses! Click here for the survey.

ONE MORE THING:

What the heck is ATAP?!? I get asked this question almost daily. ATAP stands for the Association of Talent Acquisition Professionals. Founded in 2016, ATAP’s mission is to develop a body of unified educational, ethical and measurement standards, advocate on issues that impact those in our profession, and build a global community of inspired and informed professionals. Not only am I a member, but I’m the President-elect (Hair Club for Men joke!) You should be one too – Join Here – use my code to get $5 off your first-year “ATAPDISCTS”! 

The Power of Your Network is Still the Most Valuable Thing You Own!

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If you’re even a casual reader of this blog you know I have three sons. Two of those sons are in college. Being that my life’s work has been in HR and Recruiting you better believe they understand the importance of good grades and internships!

Being the Dad I am I thought it would be a good idea to use my network to try and help my boys get an internship. Let’s be honest, this is how most recruiting still works today. It’s about who you are, combined with who you know. My kids know me and a few hundred friends and family, 99.9% of which are absolutely no help in finding them an internship.

They’re a lot like most kids, besides this one exception.

I know a ‘few’ more people than they do. I’ve been writing for about ten years now. I’ve spent a career building a network. So, I put a very simple message out on LinkedIn. Here it is:

You see the number, right!? 99,973 views of this post as of me writing this post!

I don’t care who you are, or what your network is on LinkedIn, 99K views is a lot! I know a bunch of marketing pros who would give me their left arm for 99K views of anything they put out!

The outcome is still undetermined. Both boys have had interviews, so I’m confident they’ll find something wonderful. I’ve had amazing friends, peers, and people I’ve never met, reach out to help. Some with actual positions. Some with other connections who might have something. Others with just words of encouragement.

I was overwhelmed with gratitude.

When you write a free blog for ten years you really don’t have any idea what the ultimate outcome will be. I don’t ask for much of my network. I really didn’t expect much from the post above. I sent it out into the world and magic came back. It’s very cool!

Some learnings I’m taking away from this experience:

– LinkedIn for how much we love to hate it sometimes can be very, very powerful tool for networking.

– When a post goes viral, you are never prepared! If I didn’t reply back to you I’m sorry, it was unintentional!

– The next time you decide to ‘ignore’ a LinkedIn connection request, think about how that person might help your network.

I had a friend point out that some folks might be upset over this. The reason my kids will get an internship is because of ‘who’ they know (me, there dad). They have the advantage of having a network that can deliver these opportunities. What about all those kids that don’t have that same ‘privilege’. It’s not fair.

I can’t change the fact that as a father I want to help my kids get every opportunity they can. I didn’t do their homework and take their tests, that’s all on them. I don’t sit in on the interview, that’s all on them. I help out people not related to me every day in the best way I can. I’m not going to apologize for helping my own kids find a job. That’s just silly.

FYI – still on the outlook for a summer Accounting internship for a Junior Accounting Major with a 3.85+ GPA, who is a student-athlete playing college baseball on scholarship. It turns out most Accounting internships are in the Winter and Spring during tax season. He can’t do that with his athletic commitment. So, if you know of anything, let me know!