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 Engaging Recruitment Strategies
By Karen Schmidt
If you want to attract the
attention of the best candidates in the market, you need to stand
out from the crowd of employers by creating an engaging experience
from the start. This is particularly relevant if you want to attract
younger candidates or you are targeting a different style of
employee than your competitors. Here are some examples of what
leading edge organisations are doing to stay ahead of their
competition:
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The US Military now uses the
concept of ‘entercruitment', the packaging of an employer brand
message in an entertaining experience to attract young recruits
using an online video game called ‘America's Army'. Playing the
game is free but agreeing to ‘additional contact from the Army'
comes with signing up as a player.
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A group of retail employers in
Queensland,
Australia,
has introduced ‘speed recruiting' to increase their hit rate for
entry-level positions. The idea comes from the popular speed
dating and speed networking models. Each potential candidate and
employer sit down for a short chat before one of them moves on
to the next potential match. At the end of the evening each side
can indicate if they have any interest in taking the
conversation further. It's low cost, non-threatening and
efficient.
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Australian airline Virgin Blue
uses more of an audition process than a recruitment process when
selecting flight attendants. When they first started up, they
deliberately targeted people without airline experience as they
wanted to create a completely different style of cabin crew than
their competitors. So rather than the traditional interview,
potential candidates take part in a group process that can
involve anything from putting on a stage show to designing a new
company slogan or logo. The idea is to identify those people who
really live the unique values they espouse.
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Some progressive employers are
using podcasting to help attract and educate potential
candidates. Hiring managers record short video clips explaining
the role and the organization to give applicants the most
realistic picture possible of what to expect, including some
insights into the manager they will be working for.
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Tourism
Queensland
launched a combined recruitment and marketing campaign online.
The job on offer involved living and working on Hamilton Island
for 6 months and reporting via a blog on the experience to help
boost tourist numbers. Applications were invited via video and
the campaign received major media coverage. It was an innovative
way of finding the right person and showcasing their brand in
the marketplace.
So if you are using the same
boring old recruitment strategies and wondering why you can't seem
to attract highly engaged candidates, consider introducing one of
these innovative ideas and see what impact they have.
About the
author: Karen Schmidt, of Let's Grow, is the re-engagement expert
who is on a mission to refresh, reignite and re-engage teams for
success. Her contact email address is
enquiries@letsgrow.com.au
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