LinkedIn wants to make it easier to hire internal talent
LinkedIn has added a new feature designed to help employees develop their careers and to make it easier for recruiters to identify internal job candidates.
In a tight job market, hiring internal talent for open jobs is getting more attention, if not more tools. The latest is from LinkedIn Corp., which added a new feature to its talent platform to make it easier for employees to find a new job with their present employer.
LinkedIn is adding to its learning platform, LinkedIn Learning Hub, with more personalized skill building. Employees can set goals and priorities, and get specific skill recommendations. They'll also be able to see their employer's open jobs within the learning platform.
The idea is to give employees more control over their career development "so that they can qualify for these internal opportunities," said Jill Raines, director of product management at LinkedIn.
[Learners] have to be able to see the ROI.
Jill RainesDirector of product management, LinkedIn
The connection between learning and career outcomes is critical; learners "have to be able to see the ROI" to be motivated to complete learning goals, she said.
For recruiters, LinkedIn is adding a search feature to spotlight internal candidates for open roles.
LinkedIn is not alone
LinkedIn detailed these new features at Talent Connect in Los Angeles this week. Meanwhile, at Gartner ReimagineHR, sourcing internal talent was also a conference topic, where analysts and HR representatives illustrated the different ways to recruit internal talent that are taking root.
Stephen Owens, vice president of talent acquisition and leadership development at Protective Life Corp. in Birmingham, Ala., is preparing to pilot Eightfold AI Inc.'s talent acquisition technology to source internal candidates.
Owens said the goal is to help the insurance company's 3,700 employees plan their careers and discover what skills they need for a particular position, but it will also use Eightfold's industry skills and jobs data.
The company plans to load information about the employees, including the jobs they've held at Protective Life and for how long. Employees can opt in to add other material, such as their LinkedIn profile, to the platform. Building internal employee profiles will enable the company to compare internal and external candidates, he said.
"We're really getting an objective view," Owens said, but when it comes to a final choice, "culturally, we're going to push the internal."
Related to LinkedIn's internal marketplace is a new integration from Betterworks Inc., a performance management company based in Menlo Park, Calif. In the LinkedIn Learning platform, the Betterworks integration will translate the amount of work completed toward a learning goal into a percentage completed.
"That transparency turns into accountability," said Arnaud Grunwald, chief product officer at Betterworks, who believes it will also improve course completion rates.
Patrick Thibodeau covers HCM and ERP technologies for TechTarget Editorial. He's worked for more than two decades as an enterprise IT reporter.
