Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B

Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by dimino on Monday June 13, 2016 @11:26AM (#11894621)

This would be great, if you're right, because this is how we get to a place where we maintain our resumé in one place (LinkedIn) and don't have to play the whole "Please upload your resumé. Now please enter in all the details of your resumé." hellhole.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by ssharp on Monday June 13, 2016 @02:03PM (#11895831)

There is a Fortune 200 headquartered in my area that, by far, has the worst application process and software I've ever seen. Aside from REQUIRING you to type in information like your high school's address and your high school GPA, they also have pre-screening booby-traps which you may need to lie to get past (e.g. my wife was applying for an HR job there and they asked if she had a bachelor's degree in HR, which she didn't, she has a JD and has worked in HR for years and she was filtered out of the applicant pool because of that). One of the last pieces of the process is answering a few long-form answers on why you'd be a good fit. They have four or five questions but the gotcha is if you lose focus on the textfield and have to click it again, it erases your answer.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by SilasX on Monday June 13, 2016 @02:54PM (#11896320)

I'm pretty sure they have a "real" hiring channel that bypasses this; there's no way they could function if everyone had to go through that without error.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by hackaflocka on Monday June 13, 2016 @02:25PM (#11896041)

Great story. It's a sure sign that a strong bureaucracy has set in when one sees this. It's common in government organizations, but becoming more common in non-government (especially large) organizations.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by stcredzero on Monday June 13, 2016 @04:44PM (#11897463)

becoming more common in non-government (especially large) organizations.

Been like that for awhile. You're just getting to know more of the vast ocean of all the bureaucratic mindset that is out there.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by hackaflocka on Monday June 13, 2016 @07:18PM (#11898558)

I think it's a strategy by "those in power" to tightly control who gets hired. They make the application process so bad that people with options opt out of applying.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by rhizome on Monday June 13, 2016 @09:11PM (#11899089)

It's common on Craigslist amongst the spamming services [sic] like Resumator, Sourcery, etc. Furthermore, experience has taught me that any time I see a job ad on LinkedIn that says, "Apply on Company Website," I assume there will be a tedious form to fill out (not to mention account creation).

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by autokad on Monday June 13, 2016 @10:06PM (#11899284)

tech companies have done a really good job at stream lining the process. Most of them you just click on the job and click apply with an upload resume button and optional upload cover letter button.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by rhizome on Tuesday June 14, 2016 @02:16PM (#11904057)

I'm sorry if LinkedIn doesn't provide the analytics these companies desire, but LinkedIn already provides that functionality itself.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by shostack on Monday June 13, 2016 @05:22PM (#11897772)

Those sorts of processes are great for requiring information with people might not be inclined to give if they had a real person they were conversing with, particularly past salary questions that only accept an integer value.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by KB1JWQ on Tuesday June 14, 2016 @08:50AM (#11901643)

Let me guess-- they use Taleo?

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by jsprogrammer on Monday June 13, 2016 @02:01PM (#11895808)

I get messages through LinkedIn asking for my resume.

Also, why would it be great for a company to exclusively maintain your resume?

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by shimon on Monday June 13, 2016 @02:27PM (#11896055)

A few reasons:

- There's one widely accessible database where resumes can be found. Since many people want to be found by prospective employers, this gives them an obvious place to put it.

- The resume format can be standardized, so you can focus on meaningful differences instead of the cognitive challenges of extracting meaning from a heavily stylized document.

- There can be a commonly available API for exposing this information e.g. in job applications (see "Apply with LinkedIn", which does exist).

- Because it's a centralized database, it's more up-to-date with professional developments and changes of contact information.

Not to say that it has to be a single company, let alone a linkedin-style company, maintaining all that infrastructure. But there is definitely value to a standardized infrastructure, and a company like LinkedIn seems to be a pretty successful way to build that.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by Retra on Monday June 13, 2016 @10:38PM (#11899397)

There are just as many benefits to a standardized infrastructure as there are downfalls caused by adopting the wrong standard, by forcing people onto it, or by using it for too long.

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Re:Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn for $26B by ethbro on Tuesday June 14, 2016 @01:20AM (#11899953)

Wasn't that what the whole LinkedIn "I vouch this person knows X" was supposed to be about?

I assumed that was basically for the purpose of ignoring your resume and selling recruiters a more accurate social graph backed summary of your skillet.

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