When I first joined LinkedIn, it was during a phase in my life where I felt I had to be part of every social networking site ever created. I quickly decided that LinkedIn was for old people and neglected to update my profile except for adding a picture and a description of my laughable work experience (I was only 19).
More recently though, I've found LinkedIn to be the most valuable online tool for my job search. Based on my profile, it highlights job postings that I may be interested in and qualified for. There is nothing more frustrating than scouring a site for "recent graduate" positions, only to find that most require more than three years of experience in the industry. For the most part, LinkedIn has done well to provide me with a plethora of exciting entry-level options, two of which I applied for directly from the site.
This leads me to an experience that I imagine is rather new to the job search environment. I received an email earlier this week that one of my applications has been viewed. LinkedIn assures me that this is a good sign; however, they can not guarantee I will get an actual response from the recruiter. This is only slightly frustrating. If someone from the company does not contact me, I can only wonder what my application was missing. I'd rather assume it simply got lost among a surplus of applications and was never viewed at all. Because in my mind, there's no way someone could read my beautifully crafted cover letter and not be aching to meet the sparkling girl who wrote it. So now I sit and wait.
As I prepare to enter the workforce after my May graduation, I realize that a blog can be an useful tool in securing employment in today's technology-driven environment. I thought I had a job lined up, but recent events have led me to think otherwise and I'm terrified I'll end up unemployed and living in suburbia with my parents for the foreseeable future (not ideal). Speaking of my parents, my dad is in a transition from managing an in-house creative agency at a large corporation to running his own marketing consultancy. He is constantly asking me for social media advice, with questions like "do you like pin?" (meaning Pinterest), and "what's the value in tweeting?". I answer his questions as best I can, and imagine how different the world of social media must be for someone who didn't grow up in the new millenium. I can't picture a life without relationship status updates or Angelegging, so here I am writing about my online experiences for my dad and anyone else who's interested in social media without getting too technical.
