Today, Tim Sackett wrote a piece called I’m unPinterested which talks about how Tim believes Pinterest is a waste of space and breath for HR and no good will come from it. A few weeks ago I wrote an article for Escouter Magazine called the Future of Social Media Recruitment that highlights Pinterest as well as a few other social media sites. But back to Tim:
Tim says “You see, Pinterest has nothing to offer HR or Talent Pros. This is one of those odd quirks of our new social media world – we too often get caught up in the new shiny object and although we don’t know yet how it will help us, we just jump feet first into it, believing that it must – because why would so many other people be joining”.
So Tim’s right Pinterest today is pretty low-key from a benefits factor for recruiters and employers, potentially helping them engage and or brand themselves depending on their industry and market but so far that’s it. But the future of Pinterest holds so much more promise. So here you go Tim:
What if candidates were visually represented on a “Pinterest like site” and were grouped by skill set. See my simple example down below focusing on the HR skill set:
By clicking on each profile we would then have an opportunity to view a candidate’s condensed web history, curated with comments as appropriate. It would also bring in pictures from Flickr, info from Digg and Tumblr and much more such as digital dirt: It would look like something like this:
Once we were satisfied that Tim was a top end candidate and met our criteria we would PIN him: 
Tim would now be in our top candidates page, pinned and awaiting next steps with clients. His status could change as additional information becomes available via the net and or if curated content is added.
So Tim give it some thought and see if it sticks or pins or whatever. Pinterest may not be recruiting’s savior but sooner or later, a tool similar to it is going to make some big waves. I for one cannot wait. Let me know what you think!
