Facebook recruiting is still relatively new to many employers, but luckily there are still lots of innovative early adopters to learn from. This article will look at specific best practices employed by family-run business Gordon Food Service, hospitality giant Hotel Marriott, and the province of Saskatchewan. All three of these businesses provide fantastic examples for any employer interested in giving Facebook recruiting a try. We’ll explain how you can learn from their example and apply their strategies to your own recruiting.

Gordon Food Service

Gordon Food Service has made their Facebook Career Page a place where people can get a more in-depth look at what their company culture is really like. How their staff interact, what their values are, and what the company prioritizes are all showcased on their Facebook Career Page.

GFS uses Facebook to communicate their brand message not just to candidates, but also to current and potential customers. This is why they make branding a key part of their Facebook Career Page.

What can you learn from Gordon Food Service’s strategy?

Use your Facebook Career Page to express company culture and promote your brand.

All of Gordon Food Service’s content is valuable, in that it is useful to clients and potential candidates. The GFS Facebook Career Page is fully branded with company colors and a custom banner to maintain brand consistency. They post updates about community service projects, fun staff activities, and sponsored events. GFS also posts food-related questions to their fans, topical articles, and great tips on grilling. GFS engages with their fans by creating dialogue and asking and answering questions, which has garnered them a very loyal Facebook following. Check out their Company Page and you’ll find tons of positive comments and thank yous from their customers and employees.

Follow their lead and your Facebook Career Page will grow your brand and your talent pool.

Next up, Hotel Marriott

Hotel Marriott turned the social recruiting world on its head by using a social game to recruit thousands of hourly workers for their massive expansion outside of the U.S.

Potential hires create their own virtual restaurant, buy equipment and ingredients on a budget, hire and train employees, and serve customers. Gamers earn points for happy customers… and lose points for poor service. Players’ success is based on their operation turning a profit.

What can you learn from Marriott?

Experiment

I’m not suggesting you invest thousands in creating a virtual game – far from it! But trying new social strategies will set your employer brand apart.

Try out different kinds of content, posting on different days or at different times, and maybe even make a short recruiting video. You won’t know what works best for you unless you experiment.

And last, but most definitely not least, Think Sask Jobs!

The Think Sask Jobs campaign is an effort to brand the Province of Saskatchewan as an awesome place to live and work, in order to fill the many new jobs created by its booming economy. Phoenix Group has been incredibly successful in using Facebook to create an Employer brand for Saskatchewan. Their page has over 5,000 Likes and their average daily reach is around 1.7 million users.

What can you learn from the Think Sask Jobs campaign?

Have a Game Plan

Much of their success is owed to the creation of a brilliant and specific social strategy. Phoenix group researched how frequently they should post, what days and time work best, and what kinds of content are the most appealing to the workers that Saskatchewan needs.

They then created a game plan based on their research.

For example, the content posted on the Think Sask Company page is divided evenly into three categories: job postings, posts about how to get hired in Saskatchewan, local culture and fun lifestyle-related content. That way they know exactly what kind of content is needed each day.

Even the choice of Facebook as a medium for their social recruiting effort was based on solid research into where potential candidates were looking for jobs.

Researching before beginning a social recruiting campaign is a must (you can start with this article about how to use Facebook for recruiting), as is creating a plan to guide your efforts.

What do all three have in common?

Each of these businesses uses metrics to measure their success. Tracking what works and what doesn’t is an important part of any recruiting campaign, social or not! That’s why the Jobcast Facebook recruiting app supplies an easy way to view reports and statistics. You can’t move forward without knowing where you’ve been, so make sure you keep your metrics up to date.

Happy social recruiting!

To make recruiting with Facebook even easier, try using the Jobcast Facebook recruiting app. Jobcast works with BC Jobs, so it’s easy for you to sync your BC Jobs posts with the app, and start using Facebook to find awesome candidates.

For more information about making your recruitment better using Facebook, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with Ryan by email at ryan@bcjobs.ca or by phone at 778-331-2122.

Alright, so it’s not really. But for some reason Facebook recruiting is still daunting to many employers.

Well, hopefully this article will show that getting started with Facebook recruiting is actually pretty simple.

The first thing employers need to do to start recruiting on Facebook is create a Career Page, or even better a fully branded Facebook Career Page.

There are two options for doing this: you can either create a new Company Page for recruiting or you can install an app that allows you to post jobs on your current Company Page.

Creating a new Page is relatively easy, but the problem is that you’ll have to build up your Likes from scratch. By using a Facebook recruiting app like Jobcast, you can capitalize on the Facebook community you’ve already worked so hard to build. This means much higher visibility for your job posts so that they will be seen, liked and shared. This is so important because your job posts must be seen in order to attract applicants.

Here’s a step by step guide to creating a fully branded Facebook Career Page.

Once you have an awesome Career Page, it’s time to post some jobs.

Writing effective job posts for Facebook recruiting is slightly different than for a newspaper, or typical job board. Think of your Facebook job postings in the same way that you would any other content shared through social media networks. Try to make them relatable, relevant, and easy to read. If you can make them interesting, you’re golden.

For best results:

• Keep your posts short, clear, and fun.
• Have them centered around a “Call to Action”. For example: “If you’re an awesome graphic designer, Like this job!”
• Have employees Like and Share every job post you create.
• Share consistently, but not constantly. You can re-share posts as often as you’d like, but over-sharing can alienate your Facebook community. Three posts per day, morning, afternoon, and evening, is a good bet.

If you create a Career Page with the Jobcast app, you can skip this step entirely. The jobs you post on BC jobs can be easily synched to your Facebook Career Page, so you’ll never have to post more than once.

Now it’s time to engage.

Engaging with your Facebook community is a must, as increasing Facebook Likes means more eyes on your job posts!

Engage with your Facebook Community by:

• Posting great content.
• Asking questions, and always responding to comments.
• Keeping your tone friendly and using casual language.
• Show your face — let your community see who they are engaging with.
• Figure out what works best for you, and be consistent.

Here’s a more in-depth look at effective Facebook recruiting through engagement.

Create a Career Page, post your jobs, and then engage with your Facebook community. These three steps will have you recruiting in no time.

To make recruiting with Facebook even easier, try using the Jobcast app. Jobcast works with BC Jobs, so it’s easy for you to sync your BC Jobs posts with the app, and start using Facebook to find awesome candidates.

For more information about making your recruitment better using Facebook, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with Ryan by email (at ryan@bcjobs.ca) or by phone (at 778-331-2122).

From handing in resumes face-to-face, to following up with candidates by phone, to the hologram interviews I’m convinced the future will hold, recruiting is, always has been, and always will, be about human interaction.

That’s why the idea that social recruiting is new, or somehow more complex and risky than any other kind of recruiting, is a bit strange.

The medium is all that is new — the message and goals are the same. Like always, find the best way to interact with, attract, and hire great candidates.

This is why the introduction of social networks, like Facebook, actually makes recruiting less complex, more efficient and much more fun.

Still not convinced, here’s more:

• Social recruiting increases a job post’s “reach”. This means your job posts get seen by more potential talent.
• As the name implies, social networks are inherently social. Unlike posting an ad in a newspaper, sharing jobs on sites like Facebook and Twitter facilitate real-time interaction.
• Candidates recruited with social media have a higher acceptance rate.
• Social recruiting gives you access to higher quality candidates. It grants you greater access to passive candidates and, especially with Facebook, allows you to target specific populations with your job posts.
• Social recruiting does more than just fill positions. By using Career Pages on Facebook, posting jobs on Twitter, and creating recruitment-driven Circles on Google+, not only are you getting your job listings out there, you are also growing your “employer brand.”
• Recruiting videos, photos of company events, and public interactions with current employees can all be shared with Facebook. This strengthens your employer brand by giving candidates a glimpse into your company culture.
• Candidates expect to see a strong employer brand. Your Facebook Page, Twitter and Career Site are their first impression. It counts.
• With the introduction of recruitment apps, posting jobs to multiple social networks is easier than ever. You save time and money and get your jobs seen more easily, all while not having to post the same jobs over and over.

And, the most important reason to get social with your recruiting:

• It’s where the talent is. The number one rule in recruiting? Cast your net where the fish are. Facebook has an active user base of over 1 billion. That’s a whole lot of fish.

So, there we have it. Social networks are an awesome addition to any recruiting effort. Technologies, like the Jobcast app, make social recruiting simple, quick, and effective.

Jobcast works with BC Jobs, so it’s easy for you to sync your BC Jobs posts with the Jobcast app, and start using Facebook to recruit right away.

For more information about making your recruitment better using Facebook please don’t hesitate to get in touch with Ryan by email at ryan@bcjobs.ca or by phone at 778-331-2122.

Oh, and stay tuned for our next post, where we’ll give you some practical advice on getting started with Facebook recruiting.

A number of years ago, a very dear friend of mine (who has significant credentials in dealing with conflict management), gave me four simple steps in how to resolve disputes.  I have used the steps many times over and can attest to the fact that they frequently work successfully.  While conflict is not an easy thing to manage and there really is no ‘fail-proof’ method for dealing with it; having this knowledge should certainly help.

So, what are the steps?

1. Confront the behaviour – call the employees involved into your office.  (If there is a department in conflict, call in the supervisors.)  Let them know how unhappy you are with the behaviour and that you fully expect things to turn around.  Be clear in identifying what the poor behaviours are.

2. Talk it out – let them know that you expect they will listen to one another to work out a solution to the conflict.  Remind them they are professionals and they are here to work.  Let one employee begin by explaining his/her issues.  Tell the other party (and tell yourself the same) that he/she must listen.  Once the first person has finished speaking and addressing the issues at hand; allow the other employee to do the same.  The main benefit to doing this is that you are an outside party and that makes it more difficult for one party to misrepresent the issues.

3. Hold the employees accountable – now that the two of them have had the chance to talk things out; let them know that you have confidence in their abilities to work things out.  Tell them you expect a plan from each of them as to how they will move forward and possibly deal with any problems in future.  You must give a time limit on this plan and reconvene so they can show you what they have come up with.  2 – 3 days is best.

4. Follow up and follow through – this is probably one of the most difficult pieces for managers.  We’re all busy and it’s easy to think that you have rectified the problem once you’ve seen their plans.  Hold short weekly ‘check-ins’ to ask each employee, in front of the other, how things are going.  This ensures they remain accountable for the new behaviour and it relieves you of the ‘policing’ role.

As you see positive behaviours, recognize them.  Let employees know that you are proud of the example they are setting for other employees and the demonstration of proessionalism.  On a broader scale, this not only reinforces the positive behaviours; it also sends signals to others in the organization that you encourage and model a cooperative culture.

Fairness is very important in this whole process.  Beware that one or both of the employees may try to work his/her way back into your good graces and try to sway you to his/her side when out of earshot of the ‘problem’.  Do not let that happen – ever – because if you do; you inadvertently give the impression that you favour one over the other.

Last but not least; give the process time.  Things such as conflict in the workplace do not go away over night.  You must be diligent in your follow up until you are satisfied that the employees are willing to work with one another professionally.

As a final note; I want to be clear about the fact that I am speaking to unwanted conflict here; because I also believe that some conflict is healthy. It helps us to be more creative, willing to share ideas and concepts, and that will ultimately help an organization grow. However, not dealing with conflict that can be destructive will cost an organization in terms of morale problems, lack of respect around leadership, and most definitely can lead to a toxic environment.

I believe this is an area of concern for most HR professionals in that they are frequently called upon by managers and employees alike, to guide others through conflict – so any other suggestions or ideas would be welcome. Please feel free to share!

Bringing in a partner to your established business can be the answer for an entrepreneur looking for the following:

• Additional cash to pursue new growth opportunities;
• Additional talent in an area that is foreign to the original owner or cannot be pursued due to managerial constraint;

If a business is struggling with cash flow it will certainly help to attract an outside investor, BUT what else can they bring to your table?

If you are to expand your business you must identify your own weaknesses beforehand.  More valuable than money is to bring in a partner who has the expertise you don’t; for instance, marketing, social media, internet, accounting etc.  By complimenting each other’s skill set you double or triple your success factor.  It’s better to share with someone you trust and can work with than to suffer failure because you thought you could do it all yourself.

Here are the Top Benefits of attracting a partner:

• Brings new talent and offers growth opportunity into areas not previously identified;
• Splits the reins of accountability and allows more social freedom for family, friends and for personal or trade skills development;

What should you consider when seeking a partner?

1. Attract someone who knows what you do not.  Someone who respects you and there is the ability to establish mutual trust;
2. Attract someone who can add value to your vision and share equity risk;
3. Seek legal advice when preparing a partnership or shareholder’s agreement.
4. DO NOT treat your new partner or shareholder as an employee with cash but as a contributor to success.

Hiring an HR Consulting firm will help to improve the quality of your search and selection.

With today’s technology, companies of all sizes can take advantage of video to showcase the unique culture within their organization.

Be real, be honest, and focus on presenting your company in an authentic way to potential applicants.

Star employees are on the hunt for more than just a J.O.B and want to work for an organization whose values and mission are in line with their worldview. Great organizations are built when like-minded people come together to work on projects they believe in. What does your organization stand for and how can you present that in a recruitment video?

Ideas for producing your recruitment video

Allow candidates into your world and give them a true feel for who they’ll be working with, what the company’s vision is and why it’s important. Try incorporating some of these ideas into your video footage:

• Add an introduction from the CEO or founder
• Conduct interviews with existing employees
• Provide tours of the office
• Show staff interacting at a company event
• Highlight benefits and perks that make your company unique

Need a little inspiration? In a recent blog post, Jennifer King, HR Analyst at Software Advice provides some great examples of excellent recruitment videos by Zendesk, Rackspace and Hubspot which are embedded below. You can find her full article here.

Example Recruitment Videos

Rackspace

Hubspot

Ps. Did you know you can embed YouTube Videos into your employer profile on BCjobs.ca? Please visit Starbucks and Sage Software’s links below for two more great recruitment video examples on BCjobs.ca!

Starbucks Jobs | Sage Jobs

I once had a customer tell me, “If you don’t grow big you will never get a vacation”. Such is the life of the passionate business owner who spends as many waking hours as possible in start-up phase to make sure his/her business reaches sustainability. I call it “gas in the tank” in short working capital. Where does it come from? In start-up phase you provide the cash needed to pay the bills until sales reach a level where net of expenses you actually have a profit. Without profit you have to keep subsidizing your working capital requirements. If you are subsidizing you are not yet sustainable, so profits are the key.

To ensure you have command and control over your numbers you have to review your numbers either every day or at least weekly. If you don’t, how do you know you have reached your sustainability target? Sometimes you will know within 3 months of start-up if you are going to make it. Notwithstanding when profits become assured you will know because you are no longer subsidizing the bill payments. The danger is in thinking cash flow not profits are sustaining your business.

When you pass the sustainability test you enter the growth mode of your enterprise because you have honed your financial command and control skills and have added infrastructure that will improve sales and garner greater stability. Sustainability and stability are required for long-term success. At this stage you may still not be taking a holiday because you are still married to the day-to-day supervision of staff and cannot let go of being in charge. If you do not actively mentor someone who can take over your duties you may suffer burn-out. Every business owner needs to recharge their batteries. Taking the time and patience to work with someone you can leave in charge will go a long way to improving your business’s stability.

So when do you hire an operations manager? Just before you go crazy with stress but after you have attained sustainability. If you are frequently angry with your loved ones and people around you take note.  Profits improve propensity for growth and are the key to your specific answer to this question.

• Making language the most important selection factor by establishing new minimum official language thresholds and increasing points for language;
• Increasing the emphasis on younger immigrants, who are more likely to acquire valuable Canadian experience and remain in the workforce longer;
• Introducing a new skilled tradespersons (with experience) class;
• Increasing points for Canadian work experience and reducing points for foreign work experience; and
• Simplifying the arranged employment process to prevent fraud and abuse yet enable employers to staff positions more quickly.

The intention of these new regulations is to benefit both Canadian employers and applicants. By implementing updated selection criteria which emphasizes language, education, age and skill profile, the new framework is aimed at identifying immigrants who are better equipped to establish themselves more quickly.  In addition, the government will be streamlining some of the administration burden placed on employers who wish to hire and retain foreign workers. Those individuals who are currently on a work permit through an international agreement such as NAFTA, GATS or a Working Holiday Program will be better able to bridge the transition time required to qualify for permanent residency.

The federal government has currently imposed a moratorium on the existing Federal Skilled Worker Program except for PhD Graduates or those with Arranged Employment. The proposed regulations will be likely to take effect on January 1, 2013.

Amelia Chan is an HR and Immigration Consultant who specializes in skilled foreign workers. She can be reached at amelia@hr-options.com.

What excited me about the article was in part that it spoke to Canadian statistics; but mostly that it confirmed a belief that I have held thorough most of my working life with respect to the importance of employee engagement. I’ve been in positions from front line, to middle management as well as in human resources and training and development and I have often talked about my belief that to obtain better productivity, employees need to be ‘present’ at work (also known as engaged). They need to feel that the work they do really matters and they need to feel acknowledged and appreciated. Yes, I know – touchy feely words – but true!

I know there have been those who have accused of being too much of an ‘employee advocate’ at times when I listened to concerns employees brought me about their supervisors or management or perhaps struggled with changes they didn’t understand. I truly believed that listening and giving employees an opportunity to speak and to feel as though they were contributing in some way to the organization was good for business – I felt it was incumbent upon employers to help employees understand changes they didn’t understand – and to listen to concerns as well as potential barriers to change. Often, just giving them a voice helped them in understanding and supporting change, which definitely benefitted the company. In some cases, it even helped to consider another course of direction when changes were being considered for implementation.

The article I have referenced above provides some statistics from a Towers Perrin survey that I think organizations would be wise to pay attention to. (The survey was global in nature but below is just the Canadian statistics). In Canada:

• 17% of employees were highly engaged
• 66% were moderately engaged
• 17% were actively disengaged

In terms of global stats, Mexico and Brazil have the highest percentages of engaged employees, while Japan and Italy have the largest percentages of disengaged employees. What this demonstrated to those who collected the date, is that employee engagement has relatively little to do with macro-economic conditions but rather relates to the unique elements of the work experience that are most likely to effect engagement.

The work experience is the key – and this study validates what I have believed for years.

So, why should organizations pay attention to employee engagement?

New Century Financial Corporation, (a U.S. specialty mortgage banking company) found:

• 28% less revenue was produced by account executives that were ‘actively disengaged’
• 23% less revenue was generated from moderately disengaged account executives

Engaged employees also outperformed the not engaged and actively disengaged employees in other divisions.

What this further demonstrates is that employee engagement not only correlates with bottom line results – it drives results.

Employee engagement can not only make a real difference, it can set the great organizations apart from the merely good ones.

If you really want to have a better grasp of how to achieve employee engagement, I strongly encourage you to take a look at the article.

The authors also provide what they refer to as the 10 C’s of engagement.

In my mind, this article makes an exceptionally strong business case for the value of employee engagement.

I truly do believe that it is the people in an organization that make things work, the right people in the right jobs for your company. Good employees really are a company’s best assets – and yet it seems there isn’t a lot of effort put toward helping our ‘assets’ deliver their peak performance through engagement.

“Leaders should actively try to identify the level of engagement in their organization, find the reasons behind the lack of full engagement, strive to eliminate those reasons, and implement behavioral strategies that will facilitate full engagement.” Ivey Business Journal March/April 2006

This is especially true when matters are related to Human Resources.  How many business owners really know how to establish profit sharing or competitive benefits programs complete with life insurance, dental and disability?  An entrepreneur needs serious planning and research at their disposal in order to make the best decisions.

If you are a Small and Medium sized Enterprise maybe it’s time to engage a professional to help you with your personnel policies and protocols?  Hiring a Certified Human Resources Professional (CHRP) can get you started.  Hiring outside counsel in this arena is no different from working with your lawyer or accountant.  The beauty of hiring for advice means not necessarily hiring for a full-time in-house HR professional.  Yes there are consulting fees but they may in fact be less costly than hiring that full-time person.  Think of it as a pre-requisite to growth.

Having a professional in the wings at your beck and call can give you piece of mind on matters that until now have been foreign to you.  The benefits are; you can stay competitive by attracting talent to your organization which increases the propensity to grow profits. Being competitive means you can hire the best and be ahead of your competition.  Of course if you are not expanding or planning sales growth or just plain not planning to stay ahead of the curve you can always just go with what you know (status quo).  The question is do you want to be left sitting at the curb in your market place?