Jeremiah Owyang talks a bit about traditional corporations and media needing leadership in web strategy and social media. This is an interesting knowledge gap that I have seen as well. There are those that are savvy at social media and can counsel clients and then there are those that can build businesses/divisions around social media. However, there seem to be fewer of the latter.
I have been contacted by a few headhunters looking to fill some social media jobs at some large corporations. In each case they needed a person with a blend of social media know-how and corporate smarts. Specifically, they wanted people that could build an entire division or team and thus handle all the standard business stuff, i.e. budgets, personnel, etc.
In almost all the cases the headhunters said they were having a difficult time finding the right person. They were easily able to identify some strong players in the social media space, but none of them were interested (or qualified) in the corporate side of things. This really didn't surprise me. I told the headhunters that many of my peers are independents like myself, and we didn't really want to work full-time for a corporation. We enjoy our freedom too much.
It seems then that there might be a job market for a strong corporate types that understand social media. Perhaps I should build a job board, ala CrunchBoard :-)
Visitor Comments
This is exactly the type of role I'm now searching for; send the headhunter's my way ;-)
http://www.linkedin.com/in/timwelliott
Posted by: Tim Elliott | November 27, 2006 2:58 PM
In my opinion and experience there is plenty of opportunities out there for this type of work.
Blogging really helped me to get the word out of my focus on Social Media. By experience at Hitachi helped to balance out the corporate aspect.
A nice blend is indeed hard to find.
Posted by: Jeremiah Owyang | November 27, 2006 6:26 PM
This is similar to an issue we are creating a Podcast for in my PR Online class right now. Our assignment is to build on awareness for Kent State's new PR Master's program. The area we are chosing to focus on is the benefits of a PR Master's for other fields, one being a business undergrad.
With job markets being so hard to enter, and this corporate-social-media-expert you notice people are seeking, we may be on to something. Business students have often resigned themselves to corporate life anyhow, yet have nowhere to go with it.
Posted by: Andy Bergman | November 28, 2006 6:41 AM
Josh,
I totally agree. I'm an Operations guy with ten years in the travel industry and have just begun learning social media.
I'm a firm believer that social media is the future in the corporate world, but I don't think the tipping point has been achieved yet.
I'll give you two examples of the corporate mentality:
Two weeks ago I met with a small consulting firm and I started to talk about blogs and RSS feeds as avenues for customer feedback and streamlined distribution for distressed inventory. I received a blank stare on the RSS feeds and a "I'm not convinced on this whole blog thing..." regarding customer feedback.
Next, I had Thanksgiving Dinner with three consultants from a large Orlando firm and when the issue of blogs came up, one remained silent while the other two joked about how they are nothing but a simple trend of useless ramblings.
I recieve similar responses at the company I currently work for. Unfortunately the mindset of today's corporate world has yet to accept these tools as the positive resources that they are.
I'm sure in 2-3 years this will change.
Posted by: Mark Krupinski | November 28, 2006 9:52 AM
Hi, I just wanted to let you know that I referenced your blog in my latest post, under "Become a social media consultant" at http://www.consultantjournal.com/blog/become-a-social-media-consultant
Posted by: Andrea >> Become a Consultant Blog | November 29, 2006 2:32 AM
Hi Josh - after receiving a few inquiries to buy my domain http://www.socailmediajobs.com/ I decided to launch one myself - maybe we should talk about working together on promoting it and running it?
Posted by: Chris Heuer | January 20, 2008 8:47 PM
You're probably right for the most part Josh. But I do think social media jobs are an up and coming niche in the job market. Thats why I launched
http://www.jobsinsocialmedia.com
Posted by: Chris R | January 27, 2008 11:50 AM
I think what Chris Heuer meant to say was: http://www.socialmediajobs.com/
Posted by: Nathan Ketsdever | March 6, 2008 3:07 PM
Although this post is 2yrs old it still makes a lot of sense today. As a social media consultant I realize especially in my region I've had wait until now for companies to understand consumer social media in other to appreciate social media as a technology to drive the corporate world. I'm so looking forward to re-engineering a company's internal and external business around social media.
Posted by: Paulette Erijo | November 7, 2008 8:04 AM