When CTO, Rik Heywood, acquired WorkFu he had big plans and promised WorkFu users  ”a whole host of new ideas to make it even better than it already is”. True to his word, today we launch the first of many additional features - the “Influence Graph”. We’ll let Rik explain…

I’ve been hard at work for the last couple of weeks working on a brand new feature called the “Influence Graph”. If you’ve used WorkFu, you will have seen the slightly blurred out teaser for this feature for quite a while now, but the first step is now live. Why not go and check out my Influence Graph, so you can see what it’s all about.

So what is the Influence Graph? We wanted to take the idea of WorkFu’s unique Smart Profiles further and help talented individuals promote their skills. The idea was to use all your social networks and other data to give you a rating for each of the skills that you claim to have. With a traditional CV you can make bold claims about your skills and achievements, but there is nothing much to back up those claims. WorkFu is able to look for evidence of your skills and allocates points to each of them, based on that data. The more points you have for a given skill, the more experience and reputation within the industry you have on that subject.

The important thing is that you don’t need to do anything to generate this score, other than be the best you can be in your core disciplines. WorkFu will do the rest, so you can say goodbye to trying to get people to endorse you, or click your like button or whatever. Just carry on being awesome at what you’re good at, and WorkFu will recognise your strengths and proudly show it off in your Smart Profile.

Now I am a PHP developer who has been around a fair while. I’ve also started my fair share of new businesses and enjoy being a bit of an entrepreneur. When I look at my WorkFu Influence Graph, my top 10 skills include PHP5 (number 1), web development, MySQL, entrepreneur, founder and ‘geek’ (errr, glances to the side to see a crowd of Lego mini-figures sitting on top of my Sonos, shrug, fair enough, back to work). In fact, all the things I would want to be near the top are near the top, plus I get really good scores in the most important ones.

The WorkFu Influence Graph is the first in a series of new features on WorkFu that we hope will really help talented individuals in the tech industry stand out from the crowd and find the most interesting new work opportunities. In addition to this, if you are looking to hire the best talent, we’ll also be working these new features into that part of WorkFu, making it easier to find talent with the right experience and compare candidates against each other. 

We’re very pleased to say that WorkFu has been acquired, ensuring its continued growth and development going into 2013.

There will be more details in early January but for now ourselves and new CEO Rik Heywood would like to thank the community for their support and inspiration these past 12 months.

Merry Christmas,

Neil, Mike, Pete, Adam & Rik

Happy to join @tribalgroup to work on Mobile UX. Thanks to @workfu for letting me spot the opportunity and @jamesfenton for connecting me!

— Anusha Iyer (@anushaiyer) August 7, 2012

Look at Us Topping the Leader Boards on @Workfu for the Coolest Place to Work! bit.ly/Lf0sFt

— Floxx Media Group (@FloxxHQ) July 11, 2012

@TheNickFrost Whoa - @workfu is awesome! Who’s behind that?

— Zach Cole (@ZachACole) July 5, 2012

The most meaningful way to differentiate your company from the competition, the best way to put distance between you and crowd, is to do an outstanding job with information. How you gather, manage and use information will determine if you win or lose

Bill Gates

Workfu.com is what LinkedIn would have looked like if Apple had designed it…

— Simon Lilly (@simonlilly) July 2, 2012

The WorkFu Mission … 

@mikekus are you about to become the new Myspace Tom? @workfu

— Andy Parker (@theavangelist) June 22, 2012

.@workfu have added great new features so now your dream work opportunity is more accessible. Get ready to connect! ow.ly/bJPfB

— The Lovie Awards (@lovieawards) June 21, 2012

Now @WorkFu too got the only thing it was missing it can start conquer the world dominated by dull and intimidating LinkedIn

— Alessia Elettra C. (@uponacloud) June 21, 2012

Connect with me on one of the coolest new sites to come along in a longgg time - @workfu.workfu.com/johnhubler!

— John Hubler (@johnhubler) June 21, 2012

@workfu the influence graph makes us feel like we’re under the influence …

— Codemunkys! (@codemunkys) June 21, 2012

That’s our mission statement and today signals our next step in realising that.

We’re introducing our own network, in the form of ‘following’ and ‘connections’.

Users will have the ability to follow other users and if a follow is reciprocated then this will become a ‘connection’. Connections will allow the users additional social features such as messaging and much more.

As part of this development we’ll be enabling you to sign up using other networks, such as Facebook and Google+.

Another important reason for bringing in following and connections is that we can use the data collected in smart ways to add more value and improve features around the site such as the FuScore and our upcoming release of the ‘Influence Graph’.

By making a connection you’ll be able to message each other and view all your correspondence within your Messages tab.

It’s been incredible watching the WorkFu community grow over the last few weeks and understanding and listening to people’s working needs. 

Establishing connections is just part of a much larger vision to enhance your working life, so let us know what you think. 

@workfu cool how can it be any better ;-)

— Alan Tucker (@alantucker) June 20, 2012