Out-of-the-Box Recruiting

Over the course of this semester and throughout my time in Dr4Ward’s Social Media Theory & Practice (#NewhouseSM6) class, each student had the opportunity to research a topic of their choosing. As you learned in my earlier posts, I choose to deep dive into social recruiting. My intent was to find out about all the cool things happening in this space, specifically, how were companies and recruiters using this space to not only brand themselves, but find talent. Through my research I came away with more amazing stories than I thought were out there. Even better, new stories and examples come out everyday – this industry is definitely changing and it was cool learning about it.

Through my interactions with @VASegovia, @JimStroud, @kimincuse, @OWStarr, Kristy Webster (@TheMarketingArm) and the reading of multiple recruiting blogs (recruitingblogs.com, ere.net, and others) I was able to come to grasp with what social recruiting was about – it is more than just a method of hiring or finding passive talent. It’s about sharing content, creating stories, and connecting with people in new and interesting ways. It’s about incorporating all aspects of the company or individual to give another a view into what makes that company or individual. As more companies integrate social into their recruiting strategy it’s becomes more about connecting an outsider with a company and making them feel like they belong. This is an amazing space to be in right now, and companies love meeting people in the spaces they already frequent.

This SlideShare of my presentation gives a fuller story of how the companies above have understood this message, take a look –

To get from an idea to that presentation was a long road. It consisted of a lot of reading and gathering information. To keep all the content in one place I used Google + (especially Google Drive – my links went everywhere I went), Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook. It was great being able to have the information I found easily accessible as everyday I read new articles that introduced me to new people and companies. If I didn’t have an easy place to put it all, I don’t even want to think about it. In addition to keeping my resources in a convenient place I also had a Google Hangout with Dr4Ward which helped finalize a direction and we had some fun with Obama and the Kid President to top it off –

During our hangout, Dr4Ward and I watched the Kid President meet Obama.

To make it easier to access all my sources I also curated them all using PearlTrees –

After the presentation I ran the analytics of #SMRecruit’s through TweetReach –

A look at the #SMRecruit analytics through TweetReach.

Top mentions and retweets through TweetReach.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SocialMention Analytic

 

Hashtracking Analytics

 

I then complied all the information and tweets into a Storify –

[View the story “Social Recruiting 3.0 #SMRecruit” on Storify]

Thank you for checking out my project, hope you learned something new.

Please leave your comments below 🙂 and if you come across other great examples of social recruiting, let me know either below or through Twitter – @jmsdreaming.

Standing Out …

As I continue researching social recruiting, the more I uncover.

I know the job market is tough at the moment, and I know more and more people are getting creative with the ways they present themselves online – but it still amazes me how creative people really are – how out-of-the-box they actually think

Throughout the two months I have been working on this project one women (and her vine video) has been making national and local headlines. I read (and saw her video) when it was first posted, as well as read when she finally achieved employment. While it was amazing to see this example and cheer her on. It quickly dawned on me she was not the first person, nor will she be the last, to display her qualifications to the world in eye-catching ways.

As more people head online and create content, it becomes harder to shift through all the noise. Job seekers and recruiters alike have to continuously create and post quality content, that not only get people talking about it, but also sharing it, and commenting on it. A few examples I came across that caused me to immediately explain – this is awesome was a #socialCV done on RebelMouse! I’ve seen #socialCV’s done on Pinterest, on Prezi, whole website’s created to showcase a portfolio – but this was the first time I saw one done on RebelMouse.

Jonha Revesencio, curated her content from across the internet and put it all in a neat little package from which it is easy to read, scroll through, share, and connect with her. You can easily see the channels she is involved in, her career highlights, her resume, recommendations, and more. I can really see many others using RebelMouse this way in the future. It is different from how most people use RebelMouse- thus it stands out from the pack.

Another example I found that really caught my eye was Lindsay Blackwell’s campaign to get the attention of the Vice President of Communications for the University of Michigan. Lindsay wanted to become the schools first Social Media Director – which means managing multiple channels, which she did even before she stepped foot on the campus for an interview. The website included video, text, pictures, it showed off Lindsay’s personality AND as the site gained traction she took her audience with her on her journey. She didn’t just stop adding to the site when she got her first interview, she kept posting and updating to her engaged audience – that is what made this campaign stick out in my mind. She proved she could do the job, before she even stepped foot on the campus.

It’s always amazing and inspiring to see all the cool things people do with their brand. As well as how they put their best foot forward and catch the eye of the employer they seek. I can’t wait to see what other spaces people use to display their skills.

If you have any other examples, please do share!

Progress so far.. 1 interview done

It has been a while since I wrote a post about my progress with my project, #SMRecruit. I have to say it was difficult at first to find exactly what I was looking for, but once I sat down and found the first resource, the others were no problem. Now I can’t stop finding articles about interesting ways that recruiters and job seekers are connecting. One is literally leading me to another.

One way that really caught my eye early on was a little something called a #TMATwitterview.  The Marketing Arm, a marketing company, began searching for its summer interns via Twitter, posting five questions over the course of five days that had to be answered in 140 characters. In short 5 days, 5 questions, 5 interns – how cool is that. This company was not only searching in the space its demographic would be in, but also the space the interns would work in during the summer (and beyond). I knew I wanted to reach out and talk with someone at the Marketing Arm to find out more about their Twitterviews and the results.

One of the most amazing things about social media and people in general is how open and willing people are to talk about their experiences and their projects, I say this because I reached to the Marketing Arm and right away I was able to talk to Kristy Webster about the Twitterviews. She was extremely helpful in giving me a deeper look into the process. We talked about the behind the scenes of setting the program up, the metrics and more. She even pointed me in the direction of Pizza Hut who did 140 second interviews at SxSW!

I’m excited for my next interviews and my presentation slated for April 18th – stay tuned.

Social Media Deep Dive: Recruitment

As part of our Newhouse class, every person in our class has the opportunity to do a deep dive into a topic of their choice. They will explore how that topic intersects with social media and teach it to our class.

As I am a career services professional, I am always intrigued how social media intersects with recruitment and higher education. In today’s changing recruitment landscape, social media is becoming ever more present in hiring decisions and recruitment strategies. Companies are turning to social media to screen candidates, target passive job seekers, engage potential candidates, and showcase company culture.

As more companies are incorporating social recruiting into their strategies, some companies are going a step further than just tweeting their job posts or creating LinkedIn company profiles. I want to find those companies and ask them about their strategies, how they came up with that strategy, if they will continue hiring in that manner, if they see the industry follow in their footsteps and more.

You can follow along with my progress for the next month via Twitter with the hashtag: #SMRecruit