Brenda Burch Dumont's Blog

After thirty years of recruiting and providing various recruiting platforms to the retail and hospitality industries in Canada, I’ve met a lot of people.  Many still stay in touch, many are clients, many are past candidates, colleagues, etc.

I received this LinkedIn InMail earlier this week from a long term member of my network.  He is a senior level recruiter who has worked for three of Canada’s largest retailers in increasingly senior levels over the last 15 years.  Along the way I played a part in his career progression and he has been a client.  Currently, he recruits at the supervisor to senior management level for the Regional Operations area of a home improvement retailer.  We’ll call him Paul but I’m sure you understand why he needs to remain confidential.

He asked about how effective various recruiting methods are today and I thought my blog readers may find this interesting.  Here it is, unabridged:

Date: 12/05/2010

Subject: recruitment strategies

Hi Brenda, is there anything “out of the box” that is new in recruitment besides social media? I don’t believe recruitment is rocket science, but I’m wondering if I’m missing the boat on something.

I agree it isn’t rocket science!  Social Media is such a larger and now all-encompassing term that lots of new talent acquisition methods fall under the term.  The changeup in recruiting is largely fueled by the candidate population and its requirements and trends.  We don’t work in recruiting anymore, we work in Talent Acquisition. We aren’t filling positions anymore, we are building talent hubs.  It’s a big question, Paul, but if you are asking the questions, and with your background and expertise, I’m sure you aren’t missing the boat.

I recruit for operations services – supervisors and senior managers. We’ve worked on a lot of strategies such as:

- tried traditional – so we placed an ad in the paper – workopolis captures this also –

Unless it is a smaller, regional paper that focuses strictly on a region (and the best potential clients may be living in that region) I don’t advocate newspapers. You are doing the right thing by choosing a job board like workopolis or working.com who have newspaper affiliations so you can economically cover both an online job posting and a print ad but often the size of the print ad included is so small it is even less effective.

- internal referral program + external referral program  -

This remains and always will a superior candidate identification process as long as the program is well crafted and well communicated within the organization.  I’ve always said there should be periodic events in-house that include the referrer and the referees that have been successful.  Congratulating them in front of their peers, while presenting the referral fee cheque increases the value.

- attend job fairs – industry related and universities  -

I’d be willing to say that unless you are targeting university (or any educational institution) level candidates, job fairs themselves are becoming a thing of the past.  You may know I’m extremely pre-online (no kidding, eh?) and online job fairs are becoming fairly common place.  The big knock on job fairs was that working candidates were hesitate to attend for fear of running into the boss and they were expensive to attend and staff.  You still need to ‘attend’ a virtual job fair, but there isn’t the shipping, travel, promotion item expenditures and booth staffing issues AND all candidates can engage without fear of discovery.

- target alumni from universities – always a good plan

- members of operations associations – will attend industry events; have posted on their websites; etc  -

During my whole career, I have played this card.  I thoroughly believe you and your organization need a profile within the industry and the section you are recruiting in.  How did you first meet me? Probably at an industry event.  Whether candidate or client, recruiting is serious, personal business.  If you can build a preliminary trust factor by participating in organizations and groups, it gives you a leg up and the HUGE side bonus is learning and enjoying the organization yourself.

- will target students and develop a co-op program (longer term goal)

It is a long term and expensive goal, but probably essential for a company the size of the one you work for.  Many retailers have a program such as this already in place.  Ask someone at Loblaw Companies Limited how their excellent student coop program is going?

- linked in sites; advertising  -

I’ve often heard that LinkedIn is absolutely, and I mean absolutely, essential to any recruiter.  I agree.  I train the recruiting features of LinkedIn and if LinkedIn had been available when I owned Dumont & Associates Retail Recruitment, I would be on my third Mercedes.  Like using mobile techniques to recruit, with LinkedIn you need to consider whom you want to recruit.  It is the place for management, from store management, planners, supervisors and above.  (far, far above as it turns out).  Its currently not effective for hourly paid individuals.  The features in LinkedIn’s job board are far superior to any I’ve ever seen and, as you know, I owned Canada’s first and largest retail-only job board, canadianretail.com.  At certain levels, buying a posting there is a must.  But, (there are always buts, eh?) For LinkedIn to be really effective for anyone, irrespective of their goal in joining, you need to invest time into building a network, joining groups, participating in group discussions, etc.

- direct sourcing linked in – of course

- job magic – facebook, indeed etc.  –

As I am trying to convince in my current social media recruiting business to many of Canada’s retailers – “Having an effective Facebook Fan Page is an absolute no-brainer, it’s a given.  Fan Pages are wildly effective – particularly for retailers. “ Yet, many retailers either don’t have Facebook Fan Pages or they do but don’t have a recruiting ‘tab’.  I represent a company – Syndicruit – that provides a Facebook app that works like a mini-job board on your Facebook Fan Page.  Free trials are easily available.  I can help you with Fan Page creation and recruiting options on the page.  You can’t ignore Facebook’s 500 million + users.

- in past we have advertised in theatres – banner ads –

A superb idea for hourly paid and customer-facing positions.  Not sure you would receive your return on investment for the area you recruit for.  And, like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Places, Foursquare, etc. you are not only strengthening your Employment Brand, but also your overall brand.

- I understand some co’s have done “virtual online career fair” – but the cost is very expensive to do this –

Is it? See my comments above about virtual online career fairs.

We were going to do in-house career fairs?…..

In the stores? In the warehouses? Head Office? In all cases consider that candidates should be able to get there easily.  Something not easily accomplished in the GTA! And, of course, it can’t be disruptive to the business at hand.  In House Hiring events at stores are often successful for part-timers.

Am I missing the boat on anything – is there any other strategies i’m missing? No.

I would love your feedback. – see above Does Brenda Dumont Consulting have any industry related events in Toronto? I am considering this for 2011, other people have asked………….

Thanks for these questions ‘Paul’.

Filed under:
Restaurants, Retail, Retail Education, hospitality, recruitment by Brenda