Three Surprisingly Underused Strategies for Attracting the Best Candidates.
Most execs and managers don’t spend enough time on their best competitive advantage: acquiring talent. That’s just crazy. While it doesn’t take long for competitors to replicate processes or products, it is nearly impossible to duplicate employee knowledge and talent. By getting top performers to apply for your open positions, you’ll be staying ahead of the competition and helping your bottom line.
Need more convincing? Take a look at these real job-recruiting posts (identifying information has been changed to avoid company embarrassment).
This one seems to be based on the belief that using lots of exclamation marks will capture the attention of high performers:
Sr. Account Manager!!! Digital Media/Media Planning/Buying exp!!! Great salary, awesome company with plenty of perks!!! Downtown Chicago! This will move quickly!! Call me!!!!!
And this kind of job posting just makes readers yawn:
XYZ Group is looking to hire an amazingly talented Data Systems Engineer to join the Data and Intelligence group. Our purpose is the acquisition, storage, classification, processing, and ultimately the surfacing of information to our audiences. You will be responsible for transforming big ideas into real life products using the latest technologies.
Clearly articulates thoughts and ideas verbally and/or in writing
Enhancing and adding new features to existing systems
Have a passion for solving problems for a fast-paced business
Translating functional requirements into detailed design
Develop code using Python and/or Ruby
Data modeling
Develop and maintain http APIs
Provide guidance to other developers in best practices
Participate in our Kanban driven team
Maintain/use our continuous integration and deployment system
Job postings like these simply beg top talent to click away. Better postings are possible! Here are three talent management secrets to writing postings that get the best candidates to apply for your jobs.
Too many job postings focus on the job or the company rather than on the applicant. The company bills itself as awesome, and next there is a list of job duties. There is often no mention of why the job would be good for the employee.
To help top talent picture themselves at your company, don’t use the job description as the announcement. To a job-searching employee reading dozens of descriptions per day, a dry announcement may come across like this:
Enriched bleached wheat flour, sugar, corn syrup, niacin, water, high fructose corn syrup, partially hydrogenated vegetable shortening – contains one or more of the following: partially hydrogenated soybean, canola, or palm oil), dextrose, whole eggs. Contains 2% or less of: modified corn starch, cellulose gum, whey, leavenings (sodium acid pyrophosphate, baking soda, monocalcium phosphate), salt, cornstarch, corn flour, corn dextrins, mono and diglycerides, soy lecithin, polysorbate 60, soy lecithin, natural and artificial flavors, soy protein isolate, sodium stearoyl lactylate, sodium and calcium caseinate, calcium sulfate, sorbic acid (to retain freshness), color added (yellow 5, red 40). May contain peanuts or traces of peanuts.
Instead, approach job recruiting as marketing—“package” and “sell” your company and the job. Paint a picture of the job and explain how the work could benefit the top applicant, especially how your company will help the employee learn and grow. Applicants want to know your story so they can see how they will fit in. In a sea of dry job descriptions, a well-crafted, engaging posting comes across like this:
If you let potential candidates know what’s in it for them, high performers will click your “apply” button. Here are some more tips for writing good postings:
Here’s one more set of examples. Would you take the time to apply for this posting?
C#.Net, ASP.Net, and MS SQL. Experience with ASP.Net a plus. Bachelors in Computer Science required. Experience with large database experience a plus. Excellent technical and non-technical communication skills required.
Or this one?
Want to get great experience working in an exciting startup? Want to work directly with the founders of the company? Want to build really cool technology? Want to learn what it takes to succeed in business?
Want to be in a job you love? If you’ve said yes to any of these questions, read on or start the application here: http://greatjob.com/Job/636.
Not ready to click yet? Keep reading!
This job is a chance to get in on the ground floor—our company was founded a few years ago, and we have a few employees, but we’re growing this year. We design software that helps project managers track and control their time and costs. You would work at our location in north Austin. Come on . . . go ahead and apply! Start here: http://greatjob.com/Job/636.