Welcome to the year of Career 2.0!

2006 may have been the year of Web 2.0, but I am confident that 2007 is poised to be the year of Career 2.0. Allow me to elaborate. Starting in 2007 we will see a greater acceptance and adoption of Web 2.0 tools in the human resources world and a great use of these tools by job seekers to communicate their worth to HR professionals. Thereby, creating a Career 2.0 hiring world.

1. Pop Culture Acceptance - I am confident that the Web 2.0 world is going to gain in popularity by the general public in 2007. It is already, and has been, very popular in the tech world and with the early adopters but I feel 2007 is set to be the year of web 2.0. Blogs, vodcasts, podcasts, wiki’s, widgets, social networking, blog communities, RSS, XML, and the like will become more and more common place in our culture.

2. Career 2.0 – What does this mean for career development and workforce education? Since these Web 2.0 tools will be more widely known they will begin to make their way into the hiring practices of HR professionals and the job searching methods of job seekers. We will begin to see more and more HR professionals using thinks like widgets, smaller targeted job boards like Job Thread, blogs, social networking sites, podcasts, wiki’s, Google adwords, text advertising on blogs, and even vodcasts. Likewise, more and more job seekers will begin to use these tools to advance their hiring chances. We already have some great examples in this arena according to a new web site, Blog For Jobs.com. By in large, these examples are few and far between, but throughout 2007 that will all change.

3. Human Resource Need – Many of these tools will take effect because of the upcoming labor shortage. If you read other workforce futurists’ opinions about the future labor force you will find a trend. Most of them are of the belief that there is a fast approaching labor shortage in America. In fact, many of them believe this labor shortage will make the labor shortage in the 90s pale in comparison. Therefore, since there is going to be the beginnings of a great labor shortage companies will need to be innovative in their hiring methods, specifically their sourcing methods. Web 2.0 is in a perfect position to take advantage of the upcoming labor shortage because it can offer solutions to HR managers as a way to help them find qualified candidates faster. There is never a shortage of people in a labor shortage, but a shortage of qualified people.

4. Job Seekers Need – Not only will this labor shortage force HR professionals to be innovative it their hiring practices but it will also force job seekers to be even more innovative in their job searching methods. In the past tools such as online job boards, the newspaper, and company web sites were to major sources of job leads for seekers. That is of course not to mention the large majority of people who found their jobs via referrals. However, even when a candidate is referred to a company via professional networking they still need to show that company how valuable they are and how qualified they are for that position before they would land the job. In the past this has been done strictly via a cover letter and resume. Starting in 2007 I believe we will begin to see more and more movements toward things like video resumes, a greater reliance on job seeker blogs and /or sites that display a persons worth to a company. Since the labor shortage will be great in some industries those people who work in those industries will need to have tools in place to be able to communicate their value to the HR professionals who are looking for qualified talent. Web 2.0 tools will be that delivery method.

These are just a few ideas on how 2007 is poised to be the year of Career 2.0. I will begin to add more and more ways Web 2.0 is going to be Career 2.0 in 2007 over the next couple of weeks.