WIN! WIN! WIN!

If you haven’t had a chance to complete the 2013 Recruitment Benchmarking/Best Practices survey (and be entered to win an iPad with Retina Display), please take 5 minutes to answer the short 12 question survey. (If you already did, thanks very much for your participation.)

The start of a new year is an ideal time to take stock of your recruiting function. Benchmarking against organizations in your field and against companies in a wide range of industries will give you a good idea of where you stand as you develop programs to attract talent.

To complete the 12-question survey, please click on the link below. Individual answers will remain anonymous.

Click here to take survey

We will report the results in a white paper in early January. Thanks in advance for your help and participation in this survey.

Sincerely,

Mike Tedesco

COO

While perusing Time Magazine the other day, I came across a subject that’s of great interest to me, both at home and at the office. With two college age kids at home (and one just finished!), I’ve always wondered if being awarded a degree from an online college was on an equal basis with a traditional school in helping a person land a job.

It’s no secret that over the last 15-20 years online learning has exploded. According to Time, a November 2011 report by the Babson Survey Research Group found that more than 6.1 million students took at least one online class during the fall of 2010, a 10% increase over the previous year and nearly four times the number of students taking online courses a decade ago.  The quality of online education has always been questioned but today the reputation of traditional e-based schools and the addition of more established universities in offering e-courses and degree tracks are slowly becoming more positive.

But, the $64,000 question is, can an online degree help you land a job? Attitudes of HR professionals, as surveyed by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), have improved over the past five to 10 years (79% percent said they had hired an applicant with an online degree during the previous 12 months). However, 66% said candidates who obtained degrees online were not viewed as favorably as those with traditional degrees, although that’s down markedly from a 2006 study that showed 96% of employers would choose a candidate with a traditional degree.

Times change and attitudes change with them so it’s only a matter of time when the distance between the two grows shorter and shorter. Me? I’ll vote for brick and mortar schools if only to get the kids out of the house!

Videos are taking an increasingly prominent place among recruitment tools. What better way to present your company to potential employees than showcasing a slice of life? I mean, what can go wrong?

When your video (or any portion of your recruitment materials that promotes your employer brand) is off target, the result is poor hiring choices and disenfranchised employees that could take your company years to overcome.

Take a look at this recruitment video from the Newport Beach, California police department:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Very well done. Nice camera angles, editing and soundtrack. As a potential police officer recruit in Newport Beach you might think you’ll be in the middle of the action all day, every day. But a few facts:  The city violent crime rate for Newport Beach in 2009 was lower than the national violent crime rate average by a whopping 63.58%. And take this little tidbit from CNNMoney.com which placed Newport Beach #1 on their list of Best Places to Live for the Rich and Single:

 “This hip coastal town offers the glamour of nearby Los Angeles without the grunge of the big city. Add the sun, surf, and sand to this suburban paradise, and it’s no surprise Newport Beach ranks at the top of our list of best places for affluent singles. After you land that date with a wealthy surfer, take a romantic gondola cruise — or better yet — shop for yachts which are plentiful here. Afterward, take a romantic stroll along the mile-long stretch of Corona Del Mar with a latte in hand for a day of window shopping at fashionable boutiques, vintage stores and even a doggy spa.”

In fact, the only crime rate which is above average in Newport Beach is robbery – I guess that kind of goes with the territory if more than 25% of households have an annual income greater than $200,000 and the median value for homes is approximately $1 million.

So work with your recruitment advertising agency and think long and hard about what your recruitment message should depict. It shouldn’t just be videos, ads, brochures, or a career site which look good, but fail to match the perception with reality in your organization, an issue with lots of employment brands. Your recruitment materials need to accurately portray your company by being true to your values, mission and daily worklife. The consequences of bad hiring decisions are too high – both for the new employee’s department as well as the company as a whole.

In honor of the 20 year anniversay of hypertext markup language (HTML–the computer language that made the graphical web what it is today) I thought it would be an interesting project to see how company career sites have progressed over the years.

Thanks to the Wayback Machine anyone can see archived versions of websites. One in particular that I checked out is IBM’s. Back in 1996 it’s interesting to see that IBM had a very plain site overall and only an employment link on their home page leading you to rudimentary job information. In 2000 there’s a dedicated, branded page for careers listing a series of questions (answered when clicking on the link) that reflect different aspects of their employer brand. Those links just brought you to an inner text heavy page that expanded on the question–but not by much.

In 2001 it was more of the same, albeit with different imagery. They listed reasons to work at IBM and again, clicking on the statements took you to an inner text page with a little more info.

2002 saw different graphics but much the same content displayed in a different way which pretty much stayed the same up to 2008 when their site took a major step forward. Now they had flash images, a careers newsletter, and more in-depth content about the company. There’s even a mention of social networking, however, it was talk of how it was used in the workplace, not necessarily as a recruitment platform.

The use of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to connect to candidates was implemented on their site in 2010 along with a video, which was inconscpicous at the bottom of the page. But, content became more personal.

Today their career site has a cleaner, more thought-out layout, tabs at the top of the page leading to “Life at IBM,” “Diversity” pages and a separate section on “University Recruiting,” along with downloadable pdfs, and a ton of other content. And that video? Still there but in a more prominent place.

So, what’s the takeaway? Your career site needs to take advantage of the leaps in technology and become a multi-media resource for applicants, not just a listing of jobs and benefits. This is where you have the most control over how your company is presented to new applicants. Make sure you take advantage of video, social media, links to career development information, job feeds, interactivity, retargeting candidates who have visited your site but left, on and on. And, also pay particular attention to the candidate experience. View your career site from the perspective of the applicant. Doing less defeats the purpose of your most widely viewed recruiting tactic.

Always looking for the next big thing in recruitment to pass along to our clients, I stumbled upon a site called SkillPages (formerly weedle). Interesting concept, sort of like a LinkedIn/Facebook fusion, it aims to connect job applicants who possess certain skills with employers seeking them.

Touting themselves as the “One place to find people with any skill you need,” their online bio states: “SkillPages is transforming the way people with skills connect to the people who need them. The platform brings together a member’s real life social connections so they can find skilled people they can trust and also, to get found by people who need their skill. Right now, members world-wide are benefitting from SkillPages – finding skilled people they can trust and getting found by new customers, employers, business partners and more.”

The only issue I have, and it’s a big one, is that those who are on the job market currently looking for jobs would be the main users. With this model, you’re not going to find hidden talent or those top performers who are happy at their current jobs. And, I’m wondering how quickly a user would become disinterested in the site once they do find a job that meets their salary/career goals.

Currently boasting over 3,400,000 members in 160 countries, SkillPages is still too small to use successfully as part of a recruitment tactic. For example, a quick search of the site for various skills in different geographic locations brought the following results:

Registered Nurses, Philadelphia: 7 matches

Attorney, New York City: 13 matches

Retail Manager, Florida: 33 matches

Accountant, New York City: 61 matches

Pharmacist, California: 77 matches

And, some of the results are faulty.  Searches for accountants included account directors at ad agencies and the pharmacist search brought back assistants and techs. As the site grows and its techies refine the algorithms, I’m confident matches will be more relevant. But it’s the entire concept that may need tweaking in order for SkillPages to become a must-use resource.

Consider the image of your company as a place to work, your employer brand, in the eyes of applicants. At each touch point you have when sourcing for new talent: ads, postings, social media interaction, landing pages/Microsites/company career portals, job descriptions, applicant tracking systems, relationship tools, interviews, office environments, staff, salaries and benefits, and onboarding and training, you have the opportunity to impart a positive image of your company in order to attract the best and the brightest, as well as discourage those who don’t seem to be a fit. A positive, engaging employer brand is priceless and needs to be protected at all costs.

This brings up an interesting phenomenon popping up these days: brandjacking that’s going beyond undesirable tweets, blog posts and comments from disgruntled applicants and ex-employees. According to multiple news outlets, Bank of America’s Google Plus page was brandjacked, meaning someone not affiliated with BofA created a false page that trashed the bank by including mocking photos, images and posts. (For more on Google Plus pages, see our November 8^th blog post titled, “Say Hello to Google+ brand pages.”) Here’s a snippet, “Starting tomorrow, all Occupy Wall Street protestors with Bank of America accounts around the country will have their assess seized as part of BofA’s new Counter Financial Terrorism policy.” Another post read, “We took your bailout money and your mortgage rates are going up.” Amazingly, the page stayed visible for an entire week! It’s pretty damning stuff and you can imagine what this does to the bank’s image (not that it hasn’t taken a number of hits over the last couple of years but that’s another story).

With social media taking on an increasing role in engaging with and recruiting potential employees it’s important to take a lesson from this. Even if you have assigned someone internally as your designated social media person or if you use an agency like Alstin to coordinate your efforts, make sure you monitor the web for any and all information related to your company. A daunting task? Nope, just use technology in your favor. Create a Google Alert to email you on a daily basis everything on the web related to your company. (In the black box at the top of the Google home page, click on More…, then click on Even More. Scroll down to Specialized Search and fill in your preferences. ) You’ll keep on top of what’s out there and can take steps to control it, ensuring that the message you want to convey is the only message seen by applicants.

Being a grizzled veteran of the recruitment advertising business (and how I hate being considered a veteran much less grizzled), I got to thinking about how much of our business has changed. Not so much how Alstin is more strategic these days in helping clients with everything from employer branding, website design, social media campaigns, pay per click and so on, but how much technology has changed the way we do business. Without the leap in faster computers, cable modems, email and software programs I honestly don’t think we can do our jobs these days.

With that in mind, here’s a very unscientific (and I’m sure incomplete) list of what I don’t miss about the good old days.

1.) Computers with no hard drives. Yes, our very first computer models consisted of two floppy disk drives (the big 5 1/4 size). Drive A ran the program and Drive B stored your data. Programs were very simple and data was stored on hundreds of floppies. Trying to find a recent ad (or anything for that matter) was a Herculean task not to mention the aggravation with frequent crashes.

2.) Dot matrix printers. I remember running a 50 page green bar accounts receivable report that took an hour to spew out and then another hour to go through it to find the information you wanted.

3.) 6 minute faxes. High-speed at the time, it took a fax 6 minutes to go through to its destination. Believe it or not hundreds of ads each week were sent to newspapers this way.

4. ) Dial up modems. These were ok for sending data but when trying to load a web page you were be able to read War and Peace while waiting for an image to load line by line.

5.) Typesetting equipment that took up a whole room. Yes, the blue monster lived on for quite awhile until “desktop publishing” took its place. Even with this so-called typesetting equipment you had to count characters and guess how the ad would look before printing it to see the actual finished product. All hail the Apple Mac.

6.) Writing ad copy at 2:30 on a Thursday afternoon when the phone was ringing off the hook and you still had a dozen phone messages to return. Thank God for email and voice mail which leads us to…

7.)  Not having email. It’s been such a time saver that it deserves two places. Despite the drawbacks in not having face to face (or phone to phone) contact, email has allowed us to do five tasks at the same time without compromising quality (had to put that in).

8.) Lugging around dozens of heavy black boards that contained our presentation and proposed ad campaigns. Carrying a simple laptop and flash drive sure beats that any day, although my biceps are noticeably weaker than before.

9.)  Media outlets that didn’t accept credit cards or electronic transfers. Not having to mail out thousands of payments each month sure cut down on our postage costs.

10.) Late night Thursdays. My all time favorite. 25 years of working until 11PM on Thursdays is something I’m sure everyone in our agency appreciates not having around anymore.

Well, there it is. I’m sure many of our clients can add to the list (no applicant tracking or HRIS systems, etc.). If you do have any you’d like to share please drop us a comment.

It’s no secret that more recruiting tools and platforms have emerged in the last few years than in the last two decades combined. Recruiters have seen the value of LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook and are actively pursuing strategies to incorporate these media into their toolbox.

What will 2011 bring? There’s a lot of talk about mobile finally catching on. When we think about mobile most of us assume it only means recruiting through text messaging (SMS). According to the ITU, the leading United Nations agency for information and communication technology issues, SMS was expected to exceed 6.1 trillion messages in 2010. That means more than 200,000 text messages are sent every second! For recruiters, however, this method will gain traction only if opt-in lists of career disciplines are developed, with the key being opt-in.

But there’s another mobile that many companies are missing today. That’s the mobile web.

According to a study by ComScore, out of a total of 234 million total phone subscribers in the United States, 45.5 million people owned smartphones in 2010. A recent report released by technology research company Gartner revealed worldwide mobile device sales to end users grew to 1.6 billion units in 2010, up 31.8 percent from 2009. Furthermore, smartphone sales increased by 72.1 percent from 2009 and accounted for 19 percent of all mobile device sales in 2010. 

And within five years the number of people accessing the web through mobile devices is expected to overtake the PC. What’s more, many mobile web users are mobile-only. They do not, or very rarely, use a desktop, laptop or tablet to access the Web. Mobile-only in the US is 25 percent of subscribers. And with 4G, network speed makes accessing the mobile web through smartphones even more attractive.
All these stats make it clear that talent acquisition departments should focus on making their career sites mobile ready. Take a look at your website on a smartphone. If your company is like most, you’ll probably see a miniscule version of your career site. Not a great first impression especially when you want your company to portray a positive employment brand. So, everything that’s available on your regular career site should be reconfigured. Job openings should be simply listed with links to your application so people can apply directly. Links to your LinkedIn and Facebook company pages, Twitter and RSS feeds, videos (including YouTube) should be readily accessible.

Mobile is here and growing. Job seekers are using it more and more every day, and not many companies are ready. Get the jump on your competition in the hunt for talent.

Checking my inbox today I saw an email from RecruiterEarth offering the opportunity to win $500 for answering the question: What is the most unique recruitment method you employ that powers your recruitment function?

That’s a pretty complicated question especially as it relates to driving your overall recruiting strategy. But it got me wondering about some of the out of the box projects we here at Alstin have been involved in over the years.

Some of our most successful campaigns involved non-traditional recruitment items/venues. An early job fair we helped organize in the late 1980′s was centered on sales professionals and their ability to sell anything to anyone. The crux of the creative centered around a sales kiosk selling cool drinks in a desert setting. Giveaways included bottles of lemonade with custom designed labels that led to additional word of mouth advertising long after the event ended.

A campaign for a health system included advertising on coffee cup sleeves which were distributed to coffee shops in competitor’s hospitals. A campaign for a chain of west coast pizza restaurants included advertising to their customers on their pizza boxes. Beverage coasters were distributed to restaurants in close proximity to another client’s biggest competitor. Transit advertising for another client targeted the commuting routes of their competitor’s employees. 

In 2010 we’re using technology to do much the same by developing SEM campaigns using competitive companies as keywords. The ideas are endless. If you have a unique recruiting method you’d like to share, please comment!

With social media and other forms of Internet usage being integral to our daily recruiting and sourcing work lives, it got me to thinking about workers’ personal use of the Internet in the workplace in 2010. While an issue for over 15 years, it seems that Internet abuse on company time has reached epidemic proportions, yet employee productivity has gone through the roof. It’s increasingly harder to make sense of Internet access at work and getting the most from your employees. 

Consider a trio of recent studies done by a web-monitoring firm, an anti-virus company and the University of Melbourne in Australia.

Cyclope-Series, which produces computer monitoring software, found that 24% of employees spend more than one hour on social networks during working hours and are checking personal email up to 5 times per day. Interestingly, you’d think that the study would be biased since the company is selling productivity software to employers but the employees in the study knew they’d be monitored and even signed agreements permitting the recorded activity.

Trend-Micro, makers of anti-virus software conducted a similar study and found that 66% of employees checked personal email, 51% browsed websites not directly related to their jobs, 39% did personal online banking, and 31% made a non-business related online purchase.

Certainly if you’re looking at all this activity from an employer’s perspective it seems like the majority of workers are slackers. But how to explain record worker productivity? Enter the University of Melbourne. Flying in the face of conventional wisdom, researchers there have amazingly found that employees who use the Internet at work for personal reasons are 9% more productive than employees who don’t. They reason that perhaps surfing the Internet for pleasure or personal reasons increases worker’s concentration levels or eases anxiety about other parts of their lives, enabling them to concentrate more on their work. “People need to zone out for a bit to get back their concentration,” said Dr. Brent Coker from the University of Melbourne’s Department of Management and Marketing. “Short and unobtrusive breaks, such as a quick surf of the Internet, enables the mind to rest itself, leading to a higher total net concentration for a days work, and as a result, increased productivity.” Of course, even the researchers admit there are limits. Workers spending 20% or more of their time at the office watching YouTube or bidding on eBay auctions aren’t likely to be improving their productivity.

As with everything in life the whole issue comes down to one of moderation. Short personal breaks on the Internet seem to be okay but overuse cuts into meaningful work. The solution, as it’s always been, is strong management and personal oversight. However, in today’s technologically connected world perhaps companies feel their management has become overtaxed and are fighting technology with technology. Cyclope-Series has found that in 2009 54% of US companies have decided to block social networks at work.

Laptops. Netbooks. iPhones. Blackberrys. Smart Phones. Mobile Devices. WiFi. Broadband. 3G. 4G. Mobile Broadband. The list of technological advances of the past 10 years is mind-boggling. It also means most office workers are connected to their jobs 24/7. The efficiencies we’ve gained IN the office mean we have more work to do OUT of the office. It may be one of the hidden reasons why worker productivity continues to rise while employee counts drop. 

As more and more of us work from home on our days “off” and telecommuting becomes more popular, it’s interesting to note that not being seen in the office can have a detrimental effect on your career. 

According to a recent article in the Sacramento Business Journal, the University of California Davis conducted the first-ever academic study of “passive” face time – when workers are seen in the office without any interaction. They found that bosses think more favorably of employees who are present. 

“Merely being seen – often from a distance and without any interaction or real understanding of what a person is doing – that in itself has value,” Professor Kimberly Elsbach says. “People notice.”

Workers who telecommute or have flexible hours often focus on quick and constant communication via phone or text messages. Others send e-mail late at night to show their dedication. But if you’re a telecommuter it pays to periodically come into the office–to see and to be seen because researchers have also found that face time has a direct, and sometimes unconscious, effect on how managers view employees. 

Career mobility still hinges on working hard, working smart and reviewing accomplishments with superiors. But even with all new technologies swirling around us, it seems that in 2010 good old face time still carries much weight when being evaluated in the workplace.

The Great Recession has seen a remarkable number of laid off workers reenter the work world in less prestigious positions. We know the reasons why they are willing to accept a lower paying step down: with personal and household wealth taking a hit in the past year, almost any job (with benefits) is better than the uncertainty of continued unemployment. But is hiring the overqualified a smart recruiting strategy?

Obviously, as every company’s situation and definition of “overqualified” are different, there is no clear cut answer. But several recent studies, as reported in the International Journal of Human Resource Management, have shown that, however defined, an overqualified employee is more apt to perform at a higher level. The problem, as you HR pros know, is that an overqualified employee is more likely to be dissatisfied with his/her job and leave the company more quickly when a better opportunity arises.

The Journal of Applied Psychology concludes that some of these negative effects can be mitigated based upon the way workers are treated. A sense of autonomy and respect from supervisors and co-workers can have a big impact on lessening job dissatisfaction, causing a win-win situation for the company (high performance for a longer time) and the employee (a feeling of accomplishment and value even in a lower level position).

It seems that with the right supervisors in place, hiring the overqualified can be a smart strategy that can move a company forward.

With record numbers of unemployed workers banging on your door you might think it’s ok to handle applications with an automated response telling them their application will be reviewed and they’ll be contacted if a match exists. With the ease of application realized through the internet it’s easy to view candidates as a necessary evil. But, recent surveys and signs show that hiring may soon be on the uptick-and you’ll lose the best prospects if your recruiting strategy doesn’t adapt.

In February US companies cut the fewest jobs in two years according to a private report from ADP and a positive Labor Department report. Jobless claims are falling and productivity is surging, and The Conference Board, which monitors online advertised job openings, reports a “positive sign of a turnaround in employer labor demand.” All of which point to a coming time when job seekers will have their choice of jobs-and companies–they want to work for. So it’s imperative to begin (or enhance) your dialogue with applicants in order to cultivate a relationship that lands you “A” talent.

No longer are applicants content with the bare minimum of an employment site. They demand a user experience that is interesting, informative and easy to navigate. The first order of business is to act like a candidate and take a good, hard look at what your site is delivering. Does it engage applicants in a visually appealing manner or does it just have a link to a mission statement, a list of benefits, and job openings? Consider a dynamic video that positions your company as a vibrant employer that values its workers. Deliver job-specific mini-sites or videos that take an applicant through a “day in the life” of a current employee, spotlighting a department, its achievements, staff and technology, and showing typical career progression. Consider FAQs, message boards, chats, blogs and other means of communication. Beef up your social media presence and make sure you have functioning backward and forward links. And don’t forget about that initial email: make it interesting, visually appealing and offer the opportunity for two-way communication. Also consider re-targeting those who visit your site (retargeting is the act of delivering specific advertising to those who have landed on your site and are now surfing the web somewhere else, either right away or maybe even weeks and months down the road.)

The time has come to cultivate applicants with relationship-based recruiting. You don’t have to fear the numbers–technology can help. Top talent will love it and you’ll be positioned as an innovative employer everyone will be clamoring to join.

2009 is ready to go into the record books. The worst year of economic news since the Great Depression is just about over. But what did a year of stimulus packages, TARP, CARS, bailouts, layoffs, and extended unemployment benefits teach us in the recruiting world?

Sitting on the sidelines is ok, as long as you do not become complacent and fearful of acting.

In the financial world 2009 turned out to be a great year to stay put with your investments and do nothing. Since March, many investors who stuck with their stock index funds watched portfolios rise 60%, a $1.5 trillion return to American’s nest eggs. But remember, workers’ 401(k)s and savings plans are still below their peaks and with inflation and tax hikes on the horizon other actions to gain returns are going to be necessary. So, staying the course works to an extent. And now with GDP and worker productivity rising, workweek hours getting longer and temp hiring continuing to rise, signs point to companies getting ready to add staff. If you’ve been waiting out the recession, there’s a change in the air when it comes to recruiting. Be active or have strategies in place in order to act or you’ll fall behind.

One of the biggest changes occurring in the past year has been the realization that one of the most effective ways to recruit talent in the new recruiting landscape is through candidate engagement. It’s the impetus behind the rapid adoption of utilizing social networks and talent hubs as an essential recruitment strategy. Remember, though, that technology is a tool, not a crutch, and shouldn’t replace common courtesy and common sense when dealing with candidates. So many companies still view recruiting as a chore and candidates as a bother. Witness what happened to Anne Kadet, author of a great SmartMoney article entitled “My Battle For A Sales Job.” She tells of her desire to land a part time holiday job in the retail industry to get first hand experience in what candidates are going through in today’s job market. Her experience shows that many HR departments still don’t get the idea of cultivating candidates and engaging them in meaningful dialogue. Curt replies from irritable company representatives, computerized interviews with no human interaction, and harshly worded email responses that end the interaction between the candidate and HR were the norm. Admittedly, her experience is with the retail industry but I bet there are other companies and even whole industries that operate this way. Even though there are record numbers of potential employees out there, make sure you treat them in a fair, thoughtful and professional manner in order to promote your company in a way that reflects a positive image. In other words, your employment brand must be enforced on all levels and with all strategies you employ.

The time is now to act as a forward-thinking recruitment function and engage those candidates who will be crucial to your firm’s success. Be ready for 2010.

Alstin Communications is on the move. Literally and figuratively. After a very eventful ten years at 1401 Walnut Street – a decade that saw an almost total transformation of our business – we’re pulling up stakes and heading up the Avenue of the Arts to 121 S. Broad Street. 

We’ll be taking over the 16th floor of yet another historic Center City building, allowing us to showcase our work in exciting ways that are reflective of the times. Much of that work is electronic, from graphic e-mail campaigns, websites and microsites, and candidate relationship management tools to talent hubs, videos, social networking pages, and other Web 2.0 tools. 

We won’t have a fountain, framed front pages, or the mannequins that greeted you when you visited our park. What we will have is a contemporary look that’s more in tune with the direction Alstin Communications is traveling and, most important, the talented teams that continue to drive our success. 

Thanks for your continued business (and be sure to stop by our new space the next time you’re in Philly). 

· We’ll be up and running in our new space on Wednesday, September 30th

· Our phone/fax numbers and our email addresses will stay the same.

· Check out our blog  for updates on the move. We’ll have photos posted in October.

· Look for us at the Phillies’ next World Series Championship parade along the “Avenue of the Arts”- we’ll have great seats!

Will we start to see an increase in hiring before year’s end? What do some of the promising stats mean to HR and specifically talent management? According to Mike Tedesco, Alstin’s Senior Vice President, it’s time to use this 6-month period wisely and get strategies in place for when it’s time to act. Here’s Part Two of his 10-Step Plan. (Click here for Part One.)

6. Resume Searching/Mining
Most organizations purchase access to resume databases because they see the need to proactively recruit new talent. Unfortunately, usage of this important resource is usually lacking, either through difficulty in their inherent search platforms, the complexity of setting up search agents or just having too many different databases to search.  But it doesn’t have to be so hard. We’ve come across a powerful platform that unifies search efforts and screening steps for all your sources from one single central location. It even offers automatic advice for search strings, sweeps all job board subscriptions (and free web sources), matches and ranks results and delivers them to the recruiter’s inbox. Search results can also deliver new candidates to market to – even if you don’t have a current need. That way you can build relationships with top talent that can be acted on in the future.

7. Develop an Alumni Networking Program
This idea is referred to in many ways: ex-employee recruiting; alumni networking; boomerang employees. Whatever terminology you use, reaching out to your organization’s best former employees is a great idea. We’ve all had employees we were sad to see move on. Try to entice them back or use them for referrals. Developing an online community may not be as daunting as you think!

8. Develop a Search Engine Marketing Campaign
Although this is listed further down on my list it should definitely be top of mind. Studies have shown that tons of job searches are started from the search engines, and not with a specific site like Monster or Careerbuilder. If you’re not implementing an SEM campaign you’re missing out on a lot of talent. Purchasing search keywords from Google that are specific to your industry, region or specialty will generate clicks and spread your employment brand awareness for a surprisingly modest investment.

9. Optimize Your Career Site
You have lots of jobs that need to be filled. Trouble is, they’re buried in your ATS/TAS and only accessible to candidates if they’ve visited your site. So, a physical therapist who takes a shortcut and uses Google or Yahoo to search for jobs won’t see that you have openings. We’ve come across an ingenious solution that unlocks those jobs. Consequently, you won’t have to post all of them to job sites in order to get exposure, thus reducing your job board expenditures.

10. When You Do Advertise
Utilize job and niche boards, targeted journals and publications, newspapers for mass market appeal, job fairs, virtual fairs, and other less-traditional means to advertise your message. And, when you do, make sure you’re not using internal job descriptions. Nothing turns off a candidate more than seeing a list of core responsibilities to tertiary tasks that’s twenty items long. Instead, market to them. Let them know how the position fits into the company’s structure, why it’s critical to the organization’s success, and how it’s an entry into a lifelong career path. Just this simple change will bring more top talent to your firm.

And one last word: measure, measure, measure. Track your expenditures, advertising sources, candidates, and hires so you’ll know what’s performing and what isn’t. You’ll refine your strategies and put systems into place that will result in less expenditures.

The recession will ultimately be over. Your company will be faced with growing operations and the need for talent to move it into the next decade. For you and your company, it’ll pay great dividends to follow these sound strategies today because you and your staff will realize better tactical performance tomorrow. Your organization will expand and prosper with help from HR. And your CEO will notice.

Want more ideas, strategies and Alstin’s solutions that will help get this done? Shoot me an email at blog@alstin.com.

A 10-Step Plan. (In Two Parts)

Is the recession over? Depends on who you talk to or where you get your information on whether we’re seeing green shoots or just weeds. But the fact is there are indications that the worst is behind us and we’ll be traveling flat ground until Fall, when we’ll start to see an uptick in hiring. So what does this mean to HR and specifically talent management? Time to use this six month period wisely and get your strategies in place for when it’s time to act.

How to get started:

1. Develop/enhance your Employment Brand
There may be a glut of talent on the market but top talent always has a number of options available. You want to make sure your company is among those choices. So first and foremost, you must make sure your employment brand is well defined and implemented/ready to be implemented. A brand is much more than a compelling graphic and a memorable phrase. The most successful employer brands take the connection between organization and audience to an empowering level – encompassing values, systems, policies and behaviors with the objective of attracting, motivating and retaining current and potential employees. Whether the message is translated for immediate gratification or stored away for long-term use, an identity has been introduced. A promise has been made. A relationship has begun. And you’re steps ahead of your competition.

2. Develop a Microsite/Talent Hub to implement your brand
Studies have shown that many HR and talent executives are unhappy with their current career website. That’s because a career website tries to be everything to everybody. An accountant will desire different information than a management trainee. A nurse will want a separate engagement than a pharmacist. The answer, just as it is in advertising to consumers, is in targeting your message. The way to do this is with a microsite/talent hub – a mini-website with content that is a highly personalized, detail-rich window into your corporate culture, environment, benefits, and opportunities for that specific hire. You’re essentially speaking their language and you’ll start to see a higher rate of qualified applicants in the process.

3. Develop Web 2.0 tools
What is Web 2.0? And, why is there so much hype surrounding it? In terms of recruiting, one of the best definitions we’ve come across is one referring to Web 2.0 as the “Writeable Web.” Web 2.0 creates a Web environment where you are no longer talking “at” your customers (or potential job applicants), but “to” or “with” them. It adds interactivity to your web content and a greater experience for applicants. Bottom line, you’re marketing directly to an individual instead of a faceless group. If you’re not currently doing so, be ready to implement employee blogs; social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter; podcasts and videos; discussion areas on your career site; and more. They may not be a panacea, but collectively you’ll open up more sources and better engage candidates, in whatever platform they’re using.

4. Develop Email Sourcing/Candidate Relationship Management tools
A surefire way to target individuals instead of groups? Develop an active sourcing pipeline by finding your candidates (through your ATS/TAS, resume mining/searching, social networks, general advertising and job postings) and market to them on an individual basis by email. Once they’ve visited your career site, keep the communication going with candidate relationship management tools (emails, eCards, animated flash landing pages) to keep interest piqued. You’ll ensure a steady stream of talent that has been cultivated for when hiring does pick up and a “first option” for when a requisition needs to be filled ASAP.

5. Develop an Employee Referral Program
At its most basic level, an Employee Referral Program is networking at its best. One built on solid planning, organized implementation and smart data collection takes networking to the next level, making it the cornerstone of a world-class recruiting plan. Companies with best practice ERPs routinely attribute them to generating around 50% of all hires. An ERP should be in place and marketed to employees on a regular basis.

Want the rest of this 10-Step Plan for HR and Sourcing? Check back next Monday right here at Alstin’s blog for more.

Welcome to the inaugural post to Alstin Communications’ blog! Here you’ll continue to find an objective view of the recruitment advertising and employer marketing landscape as well as an accessible window into what’s happening inside the halls of Alstin – be it new products and services we’re developing, conversations with our clients, solutions to common HR issues, or a snapshot of how our “a-team”, the Account Execs, Interactive department and Creative staff, weave their magic. There will be new posts everyday.

Since blogging is a casual, conversational manner of presenting information we hope you’ll find our blog to be both informative and fun to read. And as with all Web 2.0 tools (that we hope you’re using for recruiting, but if you’re not please let us know how we can help!), interactivity is key. We’d like to hear what you have to say. So, please consider this a forum for you to share your thoughts on our posts, ideas on any topics you’d like to see covered, or anything that’s on your mind. Thank you!