Pictures in my head

branding, EVP, Marketing No Responses »
Jun 272007

Thinker/doer Lou Adler from the Adler group has kicked off a project which aims to produce “The Most Advanced, Innovative Career Website in the World”. It is an open project in as much as he’s asking for everyone’s help in putting together all the elements of such a site, and has also considered the possibility of sharing the authoring of the final product.

The article outlining the project already includes some ideas to consider when thinking through the site’s content sources, function elements, backend, etc. Some of them are:

- Use private virtual communities.
- Take maximum advantage of user-generated content.
- Push proactive employee referral programs.
- Develop respectful, instant application processing.
- Add gadgets and feeds.
- Implement cultural branding.
- Take advantage of the current networking sites.

among others.

I didn’t think that any of those suggestions were bad or wrong. But as I was going down the wishlist, I got a picture in my head. You know those composite faces that get made from the best features of the most beautiful people (Julia’s lips, Scarlett’s eyes, etc.); and you know what happens inevitably, right? The face is at best ugly, sometimes it does not even look human.

If the best career website in the world ended up being like those composites, it would not be that great, would it? Imagine all these rich features vying for the web visitors attention making them feel sufficiently intimidated and lost to just leave the site.

And then I got the other picture in my head, which is the scene in city slickers where Curly (Palance) asks Mitch (Billy) about the ‘One Thing’ that matters most to him.

Maybe when designing a career website it’s worthwhile asking what that One Thing is. What do you want to achieve with this site first and foremost? It does not have to exclude other goals but it may steer the website’s design, development and operations in the right direction.

Hope you had a good humpday. I did!

Posted by jorge at 4:12 am

recruiters that blog

blogging, Companies, Marketing, recruitment No Responses »
Jun 262007

Paul Lyons of ambition and cfoambition (liked the site); he’s started in March; good news.

Any other recruiters that you know are blogging in Oz?

Posted by jorge at 5:05 am

constructing an employer brand

best practice, branding, business, Marketing No Responses »
Jun 212007

how does a unique/single employer value proposition work to attract and retain people with different work ad life values, preferences and styles?

a suggestion: you layer it to appeal to your employee segments; and yes, theoretically at least you have to think about employee segments of one (maybe there’s a long tail post on employer branding coming soon).

So what are these layers?

- Foundation: this is the ‘infrastructure’ of the EB, the set of values, preferences, modus operandi, etc. that are company-wide. These will likely be ageless/long term and not-for-negotiation.

- Design: which attends to the business unit/region/division super-segments. These rest of the infrastructure but are tailored to match the aspirations and preferences of the people that operate within these groups, whilst enabling their strategic role.

- Features: focused on teams or individuals, embodied in sets of practices that enable the company to speak to employees with a personal tone (I cater to you). The features are flexible, interchangeable.

The interconnection between foundation, design and features produces EB execution. Example

foundation: the company is green (and not just for the last couple hours)
design: the finance team is prudent, errs on the safe side; the R&D team is innovative and risk-friendly
features: john works 2 days a week from home
interconnection: john is a part-time telecommuter from the finance team; he has a company laptop with an RSA token / VPN for remote access. He’s not been furnished with a printer.

Can you think of better examples? …. now if this is something I have unconsciously robbed off someone’s model from someone pls let me know.

Posted by jorge at 6:52 am

Twitterlit

Advertising, best practice, Marketing, mobile No Responses »
Jun 202007

What is TwitterLit? A site that serves up literary teasers twice daily. At 5:00 AM and 5:00PM Eastern Time I post the first line of a book, without the author’s name or book title, but with a link to Amazon so readers can see what book the line is from. Why? Because it’s fun! The posts are also available for subscription via RSS, Twitter, and email. Literary teasers in your inbox or RSS reader, on the web, in your Twitter reader, or by mobile phone. Curiously addictive.

If Twitterlit triggers any ideas about using Twitter for jobs, give me a shout jorgeatlatinocean.com

Posted by jorge at 5:06 am

hypothetical question

Advertising, Marketing No Responses »
Jun 202007

If markets are conversations
and brands are relationships
are viral campaigns s*x with strangers??

Posted by jorge at 4:52 am

Attention deficit will produce the disorder

General No Responses »
Jun 192007

The problem is that human attention, unlike technology, has limits. There are only so many digital inputs we can realistically pay quality attention to in our busy, multitasked lives. Demands for our attention have outstripped our finite supply of time. A crash is coming, folks. But this time it’s not financial — it’s personal.

From Steve Rubel’s article, via gapinvoid’s twitter

Posted by jorge at 4:42 am

First Vacancies post at LatinOcean

General No Responses »
Jun 142007

Just running it for a friend of mine at Ross. I am not getting paid referrals or anything of the sort to pass this on. If you happen to read and are interested in any of the jobs going in this project contact michael.queally@juliaross.com, he’ll be happy to hear from ya.

OVER 100 JOBS to start next week!

ADMINISTRATION ASSISTANTS WANTED

$21.00p/h
4 – 6 months (Travellers are welcome to apply)
FREE TRANSPORT FROM CENTRAL STATION
PAID TRAVEL TIME FROM CENTRAL

This respected company, has a number of roles available for good communicators and administrators to start immediately. Transport and training supplied!

This is a temporary role for up to 6 months – there may be opportunities for permanency.

Analytical and reasoning skills
Available for 6 months
Good communication skills are essential
Ability to process complex information
Ideally candidates will have a tertiary qualification
Candidates will need to be available between the hours of 8am and 6pm

We will be holding assessment centres today Friday 15th and Saturday at 10.00am.

Posted by jorge at 5:00 pm

re. seek’s employment index

Job Boards, Job Seekers, Marketing, recruitment, Sourcing, Talent 10 Responses »
Jun 072007

The notes to the latest Seek Employment Index report that on a year-to-year basis job applications are 5.5% higher compared to a corresponding 35.8% increase in news job ads posted to their site. I assume that the numbers for the other two biggest job boards show similar trends (set me straight if I am wrong please)

If I were to stick to the Seek numbers, the stats are saying that a typical/average advertiser is getting @ 22% less applications per ad; which implies less candidate processing work, less job-application-related exchanges, etc; so this is in itself not a bad thing from a processing cost and churn side of the equation.

The problem arises when with the available candidate pool (constantly fed by your applications flow) you cannot fill the role. What this means in turn is that the candidates that make up the 22% that are NOT applying to the roles you advertise happen to be the ones you needs to make a placement or fill a vacancy. So you could be receiving 22% less applications but in fact you may be losing up to 100% of your quality applications (placeable candidates).

What do you do if you are an advertiser?
What advertising advice do you have to give if you are a job board?

If you find flaws in my reasoning, pls give me a shout… and kudos to Seek for their transparency with the trends.

Posted by jorge at 6:11 pm

adding to our services portfolio

aboutus, Advertising, google, linkedin, Marketing, Sourcing, Talent, Tools No Responses »
Jun 062007

I have given the What We Offer section a very small update, as I have now included a LinkedIn master class session and the management of recruitment advertising campaigns on Google (AdWords) in our offerings portfolio.

I have been very suscint in what I have included on the site mainly because every time I have delivered on these services, they vary substantially depending on the client requirements. I might need to expand on the basics perhaps, as newbie clients come on the site and they need a bit more handlholding, which I am more that happy to offer.

Feel free to pass these details around, there will be a referral fee for you. And even better if you want to take our services up.

Posted by jorge at 5:59 pm

A jerk-free workplace

best practice, business, People, recruitment, Talent No Responses »
Jun 042007

It’s a bigger problem than you might think—jerks and bullies in the workplace. Research shows that they not only hinder recruiting and retention but also raise levels of client churn, damage reputations, and diminish the confidence of investors.

Interesting article from McKinsey’s on the costs of jerks and bullies in the office (need to register for free). This is perhaps more timely in the context of candidates shortages and the urge to recruit and place people quickly. Just make sure you don’t drive your TCJ (total cost of jerks) for your organisation.

Posted by jorge at 5:54 pm
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