Microsoft starts using Linkedin data to help you get a better job

Source: Microsoft | YouTube

Satya Nadella and Jeff Weiner on Microsoft acquiring LinkedIn, June 13, 2016.

Microsoft is doing more with its big LinkedIn acquisition, and it could help you score your next job. On Wednesday the company is taking the covers off something called a Resume Assistant for its Word program.

Drawing on LinkedIn data, the tool shows you how other people have described jobs that are similar to yours if you’re working on a resume in Word, and it will highlight skills of people who have the job you want — along with relevant LinkedIn Learning courses through which you can pick up new skills.

Plus, the tool makes the job hunt a little easier, by bringing into Word certain job openings that you might be interested in. “Along with job openings, you’ll see details of what the job requires, allowing you to tailor your resume to a specific role,” LinkedIn senior product manager Kylan Nieh wrote in a blog post.

The Resume Assistant also gives you a shortcut to turning on LinkedIn’s Open Candidates feature, which tells recruiters that you’re interested in learning about new job openings. Open Candidates makes you twice as likely to get contacted by recruiters, Nieh wrote.

It’s has been almost a year and a half since Microsoft agreed to buy LinkedIn for $26.2 billion. In April the company introduced an integration between Dynamics 365 for Sales and LinkedIn Sales Navigator, and introduced Dynamics 365 for Talent, which draws on LinkedIn’s recruiting tools. More recently, Microsoft said it would start to show LinkedIn contact details in Office 365 apps like Outlook.

In the most recent quarter, LinkedIn contributed $1.1 billion to Microsoft’s top line.