Looking For A Job? Apply And Have Your Interview Via Facebook

Some tongue-in-cheek Facebook taglines would tell you that it’s the one site that makes it easier for one to stalk people, or to find another reason to hate your friends. But, now Facebook is taking their slogan of helping you connect and share, which is its true tagline by the way, to a whole new level.

The social networking giant has introduced a new way to connect employers and their prospective employees by giving the former the option to create job postings on their pages and the latter to apply and even get their interview done without having to leave Facebook. Now, this is definitely one way to make use of your time on Facebook more productively.

Facebook Is Now A Social Networking Site For Professionals, Too

The business team of the social networking site is hoping that they can take the work out of hiring, and help businesses zero in their recruitment efforts on the right people for the job. For now, the option is only available for businesses in the US and Canada.

The employers can also track and review the applications for the job listing on their page, and talk to the applicants via Messenger. They also have the option to pay and reach a larger and more relevant audience.

On the applicants’ end, they can now find job openings on their Facebook news feed and the business pages, or they can head to Facebook/careers. Using their mobile phones or desktop, they can apply for the job by clicking the Apply Now button. They will then be provided with a form that already contains some of their details based on their profile. The applicants can make some changes before making the submission.

Facebook Saw The Need For This Latest Business Move

Andrew Bosworth, Facebook vice president of advertising and business platform, said that small businesses in the U.S. are having difficulty when it comes to hiring qualified people for their job openings, Business Insider reports. In fact, they are struggling with their hiring process more than they do with finding new customers and getting sales, according to their survey.

Facebook has already made some earlier tests to gauge the new business ploy, and Bosworth said that there is a positive response from businesses.

“It was great because it was easy,” said Wendy Grahn who is one of the owners of Lakeview Kitchen and Market in Chicago. “It took three minutes to fill out the information and put it out there. Then someone saw the post, we talked, and it was done.”

Bosworth also added that job postings on Facebook is nothing new and that businesses and employers have already been using the site to reach out to potential recruits.

“Pages were already making these posts, they were just doing it ad-hoc,” he said. “We’re bringing a little structure to it.

Privacy Issues Could Be A Downside

Is privacy overrated? Now, it seems like Facebook is somehow blurring the lines that delineate the boundaries between personal and professional matters.

According to a study conducted back in 2012, the Facebook profile of a person can be a good indicator of how one will likely perform when it comes to his or her job. Some employers and hiring managers believe that it is, actually, a good idea to check out the Facebook and other social networking accounts of their applicants to see if they can find any red flag, or how “employable they seemed,” Forbes reported.

Would the Facebook users be willing to use their own personal account to communicate with an employer? According to Jan Dawson, chief analyst for Jackdaw Research, some people might have reservations on this one. And, it could very well be the advantage of LinkedIn and other job listing sites, notes USA Today.

“It’s an interesting space for Facebook to get into, but I think most users would find it awkward to apply for jobs through a personal social network rather than LinkedIn,” said Dawson. “That’s LinkedIn’s great strength when it comes to applying for jobs: It already has your resume and it’s a social network tailor made and sanitized for work and job applications.”

Now, this could be one more reason to keep yourself in check with how you behave publicly thru your social media accounts. And, probably it is also the best time to update your profile photo and make it a little bit more comely and dignified. You just never know when a business owner or recruitment manager might be prying into your Facebook personal page.

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[Featured Image By FotoCuisinette/Thinkstock]