The social network, now under the wing of Microsoft, continues to acquire startups, and expand its offering.

Why build it if you can buy it? Founded in 2002 LinkedIn, the world’s largest business networking site has acquired a total of 21 companies in its assent to eminence. A number which includes three acquisitions since becoming a subsidiary of Microsoft in June of 2016; with the latest prize, Glint – an employee management platform – announced on Monday.

With almost 600 million users to date, LinkedIn has made no secret of wanting to expand their reach into phases of the employee lifecycle beyond hiring, and Glint is one more acquisition, in a long line of acquisitions, that will help them do just that. CRM and employee education are two examples of areas where LinkedIn is hoping to engage companies and boost profits, and now, with Glint, employee engagement is likely to be the third.

Since its launch in 2013, Glint has raised $80 million in the past two years and, in the latest valuation, was estimated to be worth $220 million. Microsoft, however, was willing to shell out almost twice that amount purchasing the startup for $400 million reports CNBC.

Glint’s mission is to help organizations, and managers, turn employee feedback into actionable results through surveys and data collection. Basically, it helps employers understand if their workers are happy, and in the current economy where tech talent is scarce and flighty, that’s actually vital information to know.

LinkedIn itself was a former Glint customer, naming the platform as a “top startup” for the last two years. The VP of talent solution, careers, and learning for LinkedIn, Daniel Shapero, says of the merger, “I’m so excited for the potential of what we can do together. We believe that Glint has uncovered a modern HR best practice that every company should do: Regularly gather employee feedback on work, culture, and leadership, and give leaders the tools they need to translate those insights into action.”

Glint will continue to operate as a salient entity under the leadership of the current CEO and founder, Jim Barnet, and no disruption in service to current customers is expected during the integration, which is estimated to take between 12-18 months.

On the heels of the Glint news, LinkedIn also announced that it will double down on what it’s known for – recruiting! With a total rebuild of it’s recruiting suite which will include “Talent H” an ATS for small-to-medium-size businesses as well as sourcing tools with diversity insights. A strong message to rising competitors like ZipRecruiter and Facebook that LinkedIn isn’t afraid to innovate, and a 130 percent spike in profits reported at the end of its fiscal year in June means they have the money to do it too.

“We’re not operating under the same rules as before,” John Jersin, LinkedIn’s VP of Talent Solutions admitted in a recent interview. “Candidates can be found online, and the process is more agile [than it used to be]. So we are evolving our product roadmap to [match] the talent ecosystem.”

Image via LinkedIn.

We talk to the woman behind one of the most successful localized TA communities, and it turns out being social in 2018 means straddling the online and offline worlds.

Online groups are no longer the domain of trolls and haters, there’s a whole world of cyber communities centered around skill/profession/interest that are galvanizing members to follow these passions, and even taking it IRL with meetups.

The localization of internet groups is an interesting turn for the technology synonymous with globalization and anonymity, but it could be a great one. People who once lamented the disappearance of in-person interaction may now dry their tears and logon, or at least that’s what one social recruiter predicts.

Kasia Borowicz started on the localization trend three years ago and is now seeing great returns in the network of Polish recruiters she built from scratch out of a UK basement. We sat down with Kasia ahead of her session at Hiring Success 18 EU to understand what this new trend means for recruiters and what businesses need to do offline to stay relevant online.

Is there a secret to building online communities?

My guiding principle of social media is to think: would I do this on my personal channel? A personal channel is usually about conversations and multi-level interactions where you like, comment, tag, crowdsource, and stay in touch, whereas business channels almost exclusively broadcast their own needs and send mass messages.

To steer away from the latter, I always suggest starting groups. Groups give you the opportunity to share your content, but more importantly, they provide a space for your community to be social together.

What are you into right now?

Something that has caught my eye recently are local online communities. I started a Facebook group for Polish recruiters three years ago, just me in a basement hoping for one or two likes, now it’s 2,300 active people.

Groups like mine are springing up all over. I’ve seen recruiter groups pop up in Germany, Spain, Israel, Estonia, and more. I think it’s really positive that a global phenomenon like the internet is helping people connect locally and learn in their native languages.

However, even though these groups are local, they welcome recruiters from wherever. So someone who wanted to ask about recruiting norms of a particular area could learn from practitioners who work there.

How does recruiting vary by region?

When I first got into sourcing it was in the British market. To be honest, my English wasn’t so good. I’m from Poland originally, and it was, shall we say, obvious. Not just in my accent, but in how I held conversations. In Poland, we don’t do small talk. If you ask someone how they are doing, you better be ready for a 30-minute answer, because you’re about to hear about their whole life.

Once I moved to London and became accustomed to British norms, the cultural mishaps began happening, funnily enough, when I talked to candidates back in Poland. One of the main differences I noticed was salary discussions. For British candidates, the money talk happens before the offer, whereas Polish candidates expect compensation negotiations to start post-offer.

Some people look at these differences and want to say one is wrong and one is right, but when you look at these particulars as a product of culture, each method makes sense in context.

Do you have any networking tips for the wallflowers out there?

I don’t think of myself as a natural networker. I often get really nervous, but what helps me is preparation, not just memorizing LinkedIn profiles – which I do as well – but thinking about what I want to learn at a particular conference or event. Once I know my objective, I start posting about it on my social media and see if anyone else is having similar conversations, and then I reach out to those people. There may still be moments where I’m standing alone, or feel a little awkward, but I find that making those online connections pre-conference helps a lot.

What’s the number one way people mess up social recruiting?

I think it’s a misconception that social recruiting is tied to the online world and social media in particular. A job advert doesn’t become “social” just because it’s posted on Twitter or Instagram; there has to be an enjoyable human interaction that earns the label “social recruiting.”

To make your recruiting truly social, you have to turn away from the expectation of tangible results and put time into building relationships. Social media is one avenue for building your community, but for me, true social recruiting happens when we shut down the computer and go talk to candidates.

As we all approach three degrees of separation, businesses are collaborating in new ways. Porter explains how and why we should and can add value to our networks. And that value is shared.

Edited by Dominique Saavedra with help from David Smooke. Filmed by Ely Tran.

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