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What do global talent acquisition leaders say are their biggest obstacles to attracting great candidates? What are they most concerned their competitors might do? And which long-term industry trends are they most focused on?

These were just a few of the questions we set out to answer in our third annual Global Recruiting Trends survey, fielded in June and July this year. Over 3,000 corporate talent acquisition leaders from 15 countries weighed in, sharing their thoughts on recruiting budgets, hiring volume, the latest trends and more. Today, we’re releasing our findings across the Americas, with individual country reports now available for the US, Canada and Brazil.

I predict that the market is finally heating up. Of course, I’ve been wrong for the past few years, so you might want to take the next few ideas on how to get ready for 2011 with a grain of salt. Or not.

The market for top talent is definitely heating up and you need to take some serious steps to stay on top of your company’s recruiting activities. In five informal surveys I’ve done in the last 15 days, three out four recruiters (sample of 1000) suggest that for the professional worker, 2011 will represent the tipping for significant job growth, with 2012 being a banner year. At last.

As you know, we listen very closely to customer feedback here at LinkedIn. This year alone, LinkedIn Recruiter customers have submitted hundreds of comments and suggestions on ways to further strengthen their core sourcing tool. And to date, we’ve acted on over 50 of them.

One comment that has continually bubbled to the surface is this: “Your refinement filters are incredible, but I’d love to be able to tailor them to suit MY specific sourcing needs, especially for the searches I run all the time.”

LinkedIn is focused on connecting talent with opportunity at massive scale. Today, we’re proud to announce the upcoming LinkedIn Referral Engine (coming in 2011), which will connect companies with the best talent resource they have—the thousands or millions of people their employees already know.