chinwagjobs

Creative and Digital Media Apprenticeships offer a great way to harness fresh new talent that understands the digital world.  They provide £10k worth of industry designed training, professional development  and up skilling of existing or new staff across a 12 month period and at no cost to your company (excluding the wage that you pay them).

Many employers are taking on apprentices to help support project delivery, build and run their websites, develop social marketing strategy and run events.

Following on from our recent launch of the Creative and Digital Media Apprenticeships at Apple’s headquarters we have a further 20 free and fully funded apprenticeships available to employers now.

As the year draws to a chilly close, we were wondering what your most significant thing of 2010 would be?  Just one!

Your thing could be an event, a moment, a launch or a technical development in the Digital sector that occurred during 2010.

A post to Chinwag's uk-usability email discussion forum asked for help in putting together a salary survey for UX (User Experience for the uninitiatied) Freelancers.

Leisa Reichelt, herself a UX Freelancer asked for the subscribers help to fill out a salary survey for freelancers working in this booming area of the digital world. Dissatisfied with other surveys that concentrated on agency staff rather than freelancers, Lisa put together her own survey:

It’s almost Christmas, and therefore a fantastic excuse for a festive themed Chinwag Shindig.

With Social Media Week London hoving into view in February, we thought it’d be great to bring together the community that we work with, across Chinwag.com, Chinwag Jobs, Digital Mission and, of course, Social Media Week.

Nothing too formal, just a friendly knees-up on 8th December, so put the date in your diaries now. We’ll be providing a merry drink or two, so you’ll just need to bring along some festive cheer.

As a result of organisations becoming increasingly aware of the burgeoning power of social media and consequentially seeking to grow their online presence, a new breed of candidate has emerged.

The self-proclaimed ‘social media guru’, but with no bench mark set to aspire to and no qualifications to back up this status, couldn't anyone call themselves a Social Media Guru? And what effect will this have upon the industry as a whole?

New Yorkers are known for their straight-up, tell-it-like-it-is attitude. One of the points I make during the pre-event briefings for the Digital Mission to New York, is the speed and brevity the mission companies will experience during the networking events in the Big Apple.

In 2009, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport reported that 1,978,400 people were employed in the creative media industries and that this sector accounted for over seven per cent of GDP – a contribution of £60 billion per annum to the British economy.

In recognition of the sector’s importance, last year the Labour Government set out in Digital Britain its developing strategy to ensure that the UK remains a global leader in the creative industries.

In the last few months we have seen a marked shift in the number of clients requesting cutting edge programming languages like HTML5, Ajax and CSS3. This is great news for candidates but how many can capitalise on this burgeoning area?

Hiring companies are moving away from jobs boards and recruitment companies and moving towards social media as their dominant recruiting tool.

Between current economic conditions, the evolution of the internet and dwindling HR budgets, the traditional approach of finding a candidate is becoming increasingly redundant. Are we counting down the days to the demise of the recruitment consultant?

A recent online survey, the Jobvite Social Recruiting Survey 2010 asked 600 participants between May and June if they plan to use social media. 92% of those answered that they were planning on using social media to find future candidates.

It's not just Soylent Green that's made of people, it's the digital industry, too. Six of the world's leady tech heavyweights, Adobe, Apple, Google, Intel, Intuit and Pixar have just agreed settlement of a complaint by the US Department of Justice into "anticompetitive employment practices" between the firms.

The genial relations between personnel teams is in stark contrast to frosty relations on the product front. The massive pressure to attract and retain the best talent will certainly have played its part.

As a recruitment company we're lucky enough to get great visibility on what's going on in the digital sector as a whole - where the demand for talent is greatest, which roles attract the most interest, and more besides.

We thought that a lot of the information we see would be useful to a wider audience, which is why we recently published our inaugural Digital Salary Survey. Using our data from the second half of 2009, and the first half of 2010, it shows some interesting trends in the sector - some of which I thought I would share here on Chinwag (thanks for the invite guys!)

Chinwag is on the hunt for a new member of our events team. Interested or know someone who might be? Read on...

Event Dynamo Required (3 month contract) £25,000-£35,000 pro-rata

Chinwag is a community of people working in digital media and marketing, primarily in the UK, but increasingly across the world. Our small but busy team runs a whole heap of exciting events, websites and trade missions including Chinwag.com, Chinwag Jobs, Chinwag Live, the Digital Missions, Social Media Week London amongst others.

We're lucky enough to work with some of the most dynamic and exciting companies in digital media, from start-ups to FTSE 100 corporates and government departments. Our tag-line 'connecting digital people' encapsulates what we're about, and the aim of our work on the web, social media, email and our live events.

And that's where you come in...

We need someone special to help deliver a series of exciting events this Autumn. Initially, this will be a 3 month contract starting immediately, but if things go well, there's the opportunity for something more permanent.

Project Canvas, a partnership formed by some of the biggest names in broadcasting and digital, has recently received its backing from the BBC trust. The project could change the way in which commercial entities communicate with consumers and the scope for digital content development and interactive services could be huge. So how can digital designers attempt to capitalise on this new venture? And how will it change the market place?
 

When the UK UPA (UK Usability Professionals' Association) listed their careers event on Chinwag's events listings, we asked UK UPA Head of Professional Development, Leslie Fountain, to share her insight.

Our annual June Careers event this year was more than just about which employer had the flashiest displays or cupcakes. Our attendees weren't concerned with how many goody bags they could get, this year we got really serious, enter Speed Dating...