Having trouble filling positions in today’s hypercharged employment market? You’re not alone. Between the “Great Resignation” and shortages in key skill categories, employers everywhere are struggling.
Don’t think of it as a recruiting problem—think of it as a design problem.
Too many employers are trying to meet the recruiting challenge by just doing more of what they’ve always done. But the workforce has changed dramatically, and traditional formats like job fairs are off the table until the pandemic is truly behind us. By adopting a design thinking approach, employers can find more of the right candidates in the right places.
Design Steps
The first step in the design thinking process is “Empathize.” That means understanding the user—in this case, the candidates you want to attract—and knowing what they value. It’s worth the effort to get to know their aspirations and pain points, motivations and dealbreakers.
Here are some key questions that will help you empathize with the jobseekers you most want to reach:
-
What qualities does your target employee audience look for?
-
What is at the core of why current employees chose you? (Have you asked them?)
-
Why do employees stay with your organization?
-
What makes working at your organization different than working anywhere else?
-
How are you integrating your differentiators throughout the employee experience?
-
How can you highlight your value in recruitment channels (website, job postings, LinkedIn, career events)?
The next step is “Define (the Problem).” Traditionally recruiters do this from the employer’s point of view—for example, “we need 10 developers with these skills.” A design thinking approach might reframe this as “Talented developers need a workplace where they can contribute to projects that they find meaningful, along with a flexible schedule.” With this strong foundation, recruiters can move on to “Ideate,” “Prototype,” and “Test” recruiting methods and messages that will deliver significantly better results.
The Recruiting Journey at Yes&
We’ve been fortunate to experience tremendous growth at Yes& in the past year, so we applied some of the same design thinking we’ve used in meeting clients’ recruiting needs to our own. To Empathize, we wanted to truly understand why employees work here – and what was key in drawing them in; so we conducted our own internal brand and positioning survey.
The top attribute among both prospects and current employees was our Yes& Values—I-Got-This-ness, Let’s-Try-It-ism, Figure-It-Out-ability, I’ll-Get-Your-Back-itude and Yes-ence. We shifted both our messages and methods to emphasize this authentic and distinctive part of our culture, and as a result helped drive a 138% growth in our team over the past 12 months.
YOUR ORGANIZATION, AMPLIFIED.
Referrals and networking are one of the best ways to recruit new employees, but how do you expand to reach more potential candidates? Here are three ways we’ve helped clients build awareness and create a pipeline of top talent.
Digital Advertising in a Virtual World
Pre-pandemic, in-person recruiting events were a key way for recruiters to meet with potential candidates and introduce them to your organization. Needless to say, things have changed. In late 2020, we helped a government agency maintain a pipeline of new candidates in hard-to-fill positions by geotargeting video and display advertising within a 20 mile radius of their offices around the country.
Ad Retargeting
Before applying for a position, candidates will undoubtedly visit your website to learn more about your organization, leadership, and review open opportunities. Tagging key pages on your site means you can build audiences for future retargeting. Simply keeping your brand top of mind can mean the difference between a stream or just a trickle of applicants. In addition, ad retargeting does not require large media budgets because the audiences tend to be smaller and have already shown interest.
Lead Generation
Hunting for a new job is time consuming, and potential candidates may pass on opportunities if they are unsure of their chances for consideration. For a client in the financial sector, we lowered the barrier to entry by having potential candidates complete a simplified pre-screening form, so that recruiters can nurture the most qualified candidates and encourage them to apply through direct contact. Applicants will feel more comfortable applying for positions where they have made a connection with an actual person.
