MrTedTalentLink Sourcing Anxious Generation Y Jobseekers Through Social Media

Concerns over the job market are pervasive among new college grads -- the so-called Millennials or Generation Y -- finds new research from the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE); in fact, 63.6 percent of the college Class of 2009 are concerned about finding a job, and 61 percent see the economy itself as an impediment to finding a job following graduation, according to NACE's findings. Even so, 52 percent of the more than 35,000 students from more than 840 colleges and universities nationwide who took NACE's survey are confident that they will be employed withing three months of graduating.

Delving deeper, NACE's news release on Generation Y employment concerns not only notes that nearly three-fifths (59 percent) of these same Millennials had yet to begin their job search as of April 2009, but also that only a paltry 19.7 percent had secured jobs so far, and two-fifths seem to recognize that their first job may not be as lucrative as they had hoped and might force them to rely financially on their parents, at least partially.

Despite these numbers, investments and partnerships in the realm of talent management technology suggest that companies are (or soon will be) keenly interested in recruiting the best of the crop of 2009 graduates and others who fall under the category of Generation Y talent. International talent management technology firm MrTed, for instance, has teamed with e3 unlimited, an HR specialist in generation trends, to enhance MrTedTalentLink, which allows HR professionals to participate in social recruitment, by linking recruitment efforts with social networking sites. The idea is that e3's expertise in the behaviour, wants and needs of the next generation will be a crucial addition, complementing MrTedTalentLink, itself a readymade tool because of its ability to integrate with the social media that Millennials know so well.