Identity and behaviors in the era of social recruiting: The Millennials’ perspective

Drawing on social media and identity literatures our study aims at investigating the use of social media in the recruitment process by adopting the job seekers’ perspective. Using a qualitative methodology with the analysis of pre and post task diaries made by 171 Millennials, the paper explores their behaviors and the tools they used in searching for a job position. Furthermore, the paper investigates how online identity and its co-creation process influence Millennials’ willingness to use social media for recruitment purposes. Lastly, the research aims at exploring if and, potentially, how professional and non-professional social media, with their different features, users and goals, are constantly changing the recruitment process, thus offering suggestions for the design of effective recruitment practices.