3 Ways to Up the Ante on Your Hiring Events | 2-Minute Video

The competition for talent is real.

More than half of companies plan to continue hiring more permanent full-time positions this year. And almost 60% intend to bring on contract workers, according to Robert Half data.

So hiring good people won’t get easier any time soon. Your hiring events need to be attractive to job candidates.

Benefits of Hiring Events

At hiring events – whether you host one specific for your company or take part in an industry or community job fair — you can count on:

• Access to diverse talent. The events attract a wide range of candidates, from recent graduates to retirees looking to go back to work, with an even wider range of skills and experience.
• Face-to-face connections. You can quickly assess communication skills and enthusiasm.
• Efficient screening. With real-time, real-person interaction, you can often identify good matches for company culture and job requirements. You can skip algorithms that bounce out qualified candidates.
• Brand visibility. You can show you’re interested in and care about the local workforce.
• Networking. You can connect with other businesses and professionals which might lead to valuable collaborations.

Now, we have tips on how to make any hiring event better.

What’s Up in This Episode

In this episode of HRMorning’s 3-Point, United Airlines’ Director of Talent Acquisition Programs Jess Austin explains how they make hiring events better to recruit new hires across dozens of functions.

Click, watch and listen for more details on improving hiring events.

Transcript (edited for clarity):

Hiring is a pain.

How do we know? About three-quarters of employers struggle to fill roles, according to research from Manpower Group.

But the rebirth of more traditional hiring events is helping organizations find the people they need. We’re talking about in-person, lively events geared to fill a variety of roles.

How can you do them well? For one, get the word out. You don’t have to just post jobs on the big recruiting sites. In fact, you want to focus on your communities.

Jess Austin, the Director of Talent Acquisition Programs at United Airlines explains how it works for them.

Jess Austin: “So we can work with our technology team. We say, ‘Hey, we want to do these five events and they publish it on our career site. And it’s basically almost free advertising as well because we do get a lot of traffic to the career site. And having these events out there is a very organic way to publicize and socialize that we’re having these things.“

So you get the word out, and you have job candidates lined up to learn about your company and the open roles. That’s your time to shine. For instance, Austin tells a little about what potential airline attendants can learn.

Austin: “We tell them about the role. We tell them here’s what you can expect. Here’s how long you have to train. Here’s how long … There’s actually a reach test we do where you have to actually reach up and reach the overheads and stuff like that. ” 

Beyond that, current employees attend the hiring events to give job candidates a look at everyday life on the job. Plus …

Austin: “We do have to have usually a moderator that’s giving them details about the role, a snapshot of everything it entails and then they do a quick Q&A afterward.”

To wrap up your hiring event in a neat package:

• Get the word out. Don’t just rely on traditional job boards. Advertise events on your website and in other community forums.
• Give perspective. Have HR pros on hand to explain the company and the role. Have employees on hand to give the real insight on each job.
• Be ready to answer. Give candidates time to ask more questions for your job experts to answer.

To get more qualified candidates in your door – and great employees in your company – now’s the time to amp up hiring events again.