COLLEGE RECRUITING ON A SHOESTRING BUDGET Best Practices in Low-cost Recruiting
ere.net WebinarFebruary 11, 2009
© Dr. John SullivanProfessor, Author and Advisor to Management
www.drjohnsullivan.com
Dr John Sullivan
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Dr. John Sullivan’s summary bio
Former Chief Talent Officer of Agilent Technologies, the HP spinoff with 43,000 employees
Has advised over 250 major organizations in 30 different countries. His appeal is so broad, that work has been translated into 23 languages
Monthly column in Workforce Management Magazine Columnist for the Electronic Recruiting Daily Author of eight books and more than 750 articles. SHRM called him “One of the industries most respected strategists” & the Best
Practice Institute honored him as one of the Top 10 Leading Thinkers in HR Staffing.org noted that he was “the father of HR Metrics” and Fast Company
magazine called him the “Michael Jordan of hiring” He has been quoted by the Wall Street Journal, Fortune, the NY Times, the
Financial Times, CFO Magazine and have been interviewed by CNN and the CBS and ABC nightly news
Currently he is a Professor of Management at San Francisco State University and the chief consultant of the management advisory firm DJS
BMW HP B of ASiemens Cisco Intel Oracle Pfizer Macy’sSprint World Bank WhirlpoolMcDonalds Corp. Dell SunCharles Schwab Mc Kinsey & Co Valero Microsoft JP Morgan YahooDeloitte Consulting Marriott Intl. NIKEPepsiCo MGM Grand StarbucksChevron Morgan Stanley SC JohnsonGeneral Mills Coors NestleLockheed Martin Stanford facebook Johnson & Johnson GE Google
Dr. Sullivan has a monthly column… on the “last page”
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Dr. Sullivan’s current books
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My three goals for today
Ø To demonstrate the best practices in no or low cost college recruiting
To excite you about trying new things
To answer your questions
Note – Please post questions at any time!Questions not answered live will be answered via an
upcoming ere.net article.
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Topics areas for today
We will cover three broad topic areas
Ø Introduction to recruiting during tough times
Ø Increasing recruiting impact by leveraging other people’s time
Ø Low-cost but effective recruiting tools
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Part 1
Opportunities and problems related to
Recruiting during tough times
Is it worth it to seek out the very best?
One top-notch engineer is worth "300 times or more… than the average"
(Google) “would rather lose an entire incoming
class of engineering graduates than one exceptional technologist”
-- Alan Eustace, VP of Engineering, Google
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Opportunities - Why recruit now?
A chance to “cherry pick” - the same talent quality is there but there is less competition
Some firms have weakened employment brands due to “public” layoffs, ethical issues and mergers
Candidates will be easier to sell because they have fewer options
A chance to develop the capability to explode out of the box when things turn around
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Potential problems with recruiting now
Travel budgets are reduced or frozen (Need for remote recruiting)
A loss of trust and confidence in business
Managers are less focused on recruiting
Technology budgets are reduced
A flood of applicants
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Potential problems with your current approach
Pizza & slide shows might yield average students
Is free food the best way to draw in innovators?
Are slideshows great sales tools?
Do the best students have time to come to meetings?
Do diverse students like pizza?
New style academic programs and abundant web resources mean that fewer students are on campus/utilize the Career Center
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Part 2
Recruiting using OPT (Other People’s Time)
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Leverage other people’s resources
“Do more with less” using “OPT”
Premise – with reduced budget and recruiter time, the best way to do “more with less” is to… utilize the time of your employees and others
Now some tools and approaches… for leveraging other people’s time
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Leverage other people’s resources
College referrals
The very best students are connected to each other (they share classes, clubs, social connections)
Expand your reach by turning students (and those that know them)… into your recruiters
Referrals produce both volume and quality
Referrals also have assessment and sales components
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Intuit - Best practice example
Intuit
Offered a $50 award to students who referred
someone that was hired
They have hired over half of those who were
referred through the program
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Best practice example
Valero
Offered a $25 gas card to grad assistants that
made successful referrals
They filled every slot in one day
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Best practice example
Referrals - Endeca gives a flat screen TV as a referral bonus for college students referring a friend from Harvard, MIT etc. that gets hired
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Mom’s are better recruiters than recruiters
Use those that influence – This site was launched in response to research that showed mothers were more likely to believe other mothers than recruiters
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Referral tools
College referrals tools“Give Me Five” – approach individuals and focus their thinking (Google)
Approach everyone - interns, grad assistants, student club/honor society leaders, staff, alumni
Reference referrals – Who else do you know?
New hires - Who else is really good?Use referral cards – have paper & electronic versions. Hand them out at events or while on forums and social network sites (Example)
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An illustration
Because there are so few
really talented people
in the world… I just
wanted you to know that…
you really impressed me
www. Apple/innovators.com
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Leverage your employee’s time on social networks
Students are constantly on social network sites
Encourage your employees to develop a social network profile
Educate them on the type of content that will attract college students (offer materials)
Offer referral prizes
Facebook - is the most popular (used by HP, GE, Microsoft, Accenture, IBM)
MySpace, Twitter, global sites, LinkedIn
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Leverage your employee’s blogs
Blogs can make your firm appear “real”
Encourage your employees to add recruiting
related information to their blogs
Set company blog rules & expectations
Reward individuals for writing blogs
Offer referral bonuses for related hires
Users - Coca-Cola, Marriott, Kodak, SW Air,
MGM Grand, Dell & MS (11% have them)
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Encourage employees to make videos
Videos can show the “passion” within your firm
A moving picture is worth 1,000’s of words
Post them - on your corporate site, YouTube and provide links on their blogs and social network sites
Users - Google, US Army, Microsoft, Cisco, USMC
Podcasts – can also be effective (IBM, BMW)
Hold a video contest >
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Encourage your employees create and post videos
Deloitte film festival
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Hyatt’s “Make your mark” video contest
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Sony Ericsson produced great results with video
“Received three times the amount of applications”
48 hrs was equal to five months using ads
Mobile phones are an ideal single contact platform
Mobile phone recruiting
Cool factor with text
Everyone has it continually
Used during idle time
Global capability
Verizon, Fidelity, HCA, U.S. Army and Microsoft
Single platform – push job alerts, text messages, social networks, blog feeds, GPS and web links
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Leverage employees attending events
Recruit them when they gather in “1 room”
Identify events where students attend
ID employees that also attend (travel desk)
Consider – walks/runs, charity events, sporting events, student clubs, professional association meetings, rock climbing clubs, robot competitions
On-line too – encourage your employees to frequent chatrooms, forums, Google/Yahoo groups and other online discussion groups
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Other approaches that leverage your employees
Additional approaches to consider
Employment branding – have managers and key employees speak and write to build your brand (Universum and BusinessWeek best place to start a career)
SecondLife – encourage employees to identify innovators when they are active
CEO and executive calls to candidates
PDA parties
Offer e-mentors
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Part 3
Low-cost recording approaches to consider
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Leverage your interns
Interns can be great ambassadors/recruiters
Benefits – they expand your on-campus presence throughout the year and are more credible
On campus ambassadors – Microsoft, Qualcomm and Google have on campus Ambassador Programs
Educate them – about the features of the firm and assessment in recruiting techniques
Encourage them to attend events
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Contests attract and assess
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Put together contests
Contest for college recruiting
They excite and assess potential candidates
Contests can be anonymous ( diversity)
Contests can be global
Some examples…
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Google attracts math majors
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Looking for talent through contests
Used by Google, Yahoo, Sun, Intel and Microsoft
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“Summer of code” contests
Google Summer of Code™ for 2008 is welcoming 1125 student contributors on 175 Free and Open Source projects.
They received 7,100 applications from over 1,300 universities in 98 countries around the globe.
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Contests to excite HS students
Google – Highly Open Participation Contest
(Open source for Pre-University students)
http://code.google.com/opensource/ghop/2007-8/
Contests are low-cost recruiting tools
Ernst & Young uses contests to attract and assess
The "Strategy Zone” - combined technology and games in their recruiting initiatives by offering interactive case studies on their web site, it resulted in 500 MBA hires
“Your World Your Vision” - a student competition where teams create an event or initiative that has the greatest impact on their local community. The three winning schools are awarded a significant cash prize
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Facebook’s puzzle page contest
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Facebook invites budding computer engineers to try one of their ‘puzzles’…in order prove their worth and attract the attention of the company bosses
Microsoft’s fifth annual college puzzle challenge - a competition for 1,400 computer engineering, computer science & math students at 18 universities
Microsoft college puzzle challenge
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There are “contest websites”
www.innocentive.com
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There are “contest websites”
GrouperEye live case competitions
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Consider “Green recruiting”
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Demonstrate your “green brand”
Green approaches
Sustainability
Corporate social responsibility
Carbon offsets
Recycling
Solar panels
Bike to work
Mass transit support
Alternative energy (Wind, wave, bio-fuel etc.)
Toyota sends a clear “Green brand” message
http://www.graduates.toyotajobs.com/html/about_vision.asp
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GE is a green recruiting leader
Ecomagination challenge
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Green recruiting
Solar panels, hybrids and electric cars
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Low cost tools for recruiters
Low cost tools for recruiters
Google searches for names
Utilize the Google “alert” feature – it will automatically notify you when information about and target a candidate appears in the news or within blogs
“Speed dating” format to interview candidates for manager jobs (Travelodge)
Information for “helicopter” parents (Enterprise rent a car)
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Low cost things that recruiters should use
Low cost tools
School specific facebook pages (E&Y)
“Friends of” e-newsletter (Deloitte, Google)
Bid on short term projects (Whirlpool)
Conduct a search for “negatives” - Yahoo finance, Workrant.com, JobVent.com, Glassdoor.com, Employerscorecard.com Rateyouremployeramerica.com
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Corporate website features
for the “next” generation
Corporate web sites can excite
Advanced web site features
The page morphs to fit their interests
Customizes information to your location
Video profiles of employees (people like me
work here)
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Microsoft has the best corporate site
Microsoft shows it’s perks
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Microsoft’s “Genius Lounge” attracts
Virtual recruiters – Chat and Q&A
Discuss the possibilities with one of our recruiters!
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Nut’s about Southwest
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The Luckiest Girl in the Whole World
By: Beverly Behrens
06-05-08
My name is Bev B. and I am a Southwest Employee at our University for People, a self-proclaimed bookworm, and a lifelong learner. And, I think I just might be the luckiest girl in the whole world. Allow me to explain why ....
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Are you ready for this?Individualized recruiting is here
They plastered her name on billboards, pizza boxes and gas pumps -- and even aired a commercial on
MTV -- in hopes of getting her to enroll. As one message put it: "We just hope you're on your way to
Wilkes University next year."
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Did I make you think?
Any questions?
www.drjohnsullivan.com
