How have blogs influenced you?

Posted Dec 17 2008 7:50 AM by Gretchen Ledgard
Gretchen

Over in Scobleland, they're talking about how blogs can influence (positively and negatively) potential applicants to a join a company.  What do you think?  How have you utilized blogs to better understand Microsoft's opportunities, structure, or culture?  Have they helped you better prep for interviews?  Any particularly helpful blogs out there?  Any blogs that made you step back and say, "Whoa ..." :)

gretchen

16 Comments

  • Mike said:

    This blog makes me say "Whoa!"





    3,000 resumes and 137 jobs is pretty "whoa" inspiring.

  • Brant Gurganus said:

    I forget how I came across the Microsoft blogs originally, but I felt that they definitely helped me understand what really happens inside Microsoft, getting a more complete picture than recruiting/marketing fluff.

  • kim said:

    I commented on scoble's blog but I'll repeat here:





    - Blogs weren't the reason I decided to come to MS, but they were a big weight on the 'pro' side of the pro/con list when looking at a couple options.





    - Scoble's, yours, channel 9, and yes, even mini's were useful in selling me on the corporate culture.





    - My blog's initiated many new relationships for me, a couple of which were folks I ended up bringing in as referrals - I wonder the effect the blogosphere (people more connected than ever before) has had on teh referral stats?

  • Max Battcher said:

    I have the overall blogs.msdn.com aggregator in my RSS reader.  Because there are so many bloggers posting at Microsoft now, and because my RSS reader is not always open, I get 20 psuedo-random selections from across all of Microsoft blogging.  (I remember when there weren't that many Microsoft bloggers and you could read it all on the blogs.msdn.com homepage.)





    I found that when I was interviewing this proved pretty useful as one of the groups I interviewed (in fact the one I'll be working with in the Summer), I learned about their product in some random blog entry about it at some point on blogs.msdn.com.

  • vdk2006 said:

    About a year or two ago I stumbled across Raymond Chen's "The Old New Thing" blog. Now today, I regularly read about 13 blogs hosted on blogs.msdn.com and I really enjoy it. They are giving me such a wonderful insight into MS that I started (slowly but profoundly) dreaming about working there. Too bad I do not live in US but maybe one day... who knows?

  • Rajeev Gopal said:

    I am not sure about preping for the interviews, but Channel9 has been my fav recently... and I spent my lunch hour before that..

  • JobsBlog said:

    Mike - I agree. :)





    Brant  - Hey, good to hear from ya!  Recruiting/Marketing fluff?  I don't know what you are talking about. ;-)





    Kim - good to hear from you, too!   That's a great point about referrals.  I do bet it's increased the referral rate (but don't know for sure.)





    Max - Happy to hear you'll be joining us this summer.  Yeah, the MSDN feed is super overwhelming now.  Have you seen the new "clouds" feature?  It helps somewhat.  <a rel="nofollow" target="_new" href="http://blogs.msdn.com/categories/">http://blogs.msdn.com/categories/</a>





    vdk2006  - Raymond's blog is the best.  It's so funny.  I loved the 7th graders' thoughts. :)  We do hire a lot out of the US so be sure to check out this page if you haven't already ... <a rel="nofollow" target="_new" href="http://blogs.msdn.com/jobsblog/archive/2005/08/26/international.aspx">http://blogs.msdn.com/jobsblog/archive/2005/08/26/international.aspx</a>





    Rajeev - Channel9 is a fav of mine, too.





    Thanks for the comments, everyone!!!

  • Julio Casal said:

    Of course they have. Specially Jobsblog have told me the story about what it really means to enter the process of being a Microsoft Employee. I frequently read this blogs and they are helping me so much! Thanks!

  • Walter Lounsbery said:

    I'm afraid there is bad news on this front.  Except for the wonderful Microsoft transparency and job news (here and other blogs) the world is a cold, cold place.





    I'm in the Dallas job market.  Truthfully, it is dominated by recruiting firms and more layers of selective information filtering than any one person can deal with.  If you are in IT, you could show up to apply at a prospective company in person and get hauled away in the padded wagon.  Employers don't want to talk to prospects, and they definitely don't blog.





    Y'all are still the cutting edge.  Thanks!

  • Technical Careers @ Microsoft said:

    Since Jim is on vacation this week, our buddy Glenn&amp;nbsp;Gutmacher offered to fill in for him.&amp;nbsp;...

  • Nisha Raj said:

    I am just 5 days old to this jobsblog site.But it was a wonderful experience knowing so much in details about Micosoft and would love to know more.

  • JobsBlog said:

    Steve - Yeah, me, too. ;-)





    Julio - Yay!





    Walter - Yeah, it's true.  But hopefully, we're setting a good example!!





    Seshagiri- thanks!





    Nisha - hopefully, we can provide that to you!





    g

  • Microsoft's JobsBlog said:

    Since Jim is on vacation this week, our buddy Glenn Gutmacher offered to fill in for him. Glenn works

  • Steve J. said:

    I always read this and Mini Microsoft blogs together, they probably bring me a more complete picture of MS than reading this alone, also equally entertaining.

  • Seshagiri said:

    While jobsblog@msdn is absolutely fantastic it would be wonderful to have such blogs run by HR from other countries too.

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