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Job advertising: how to market jobs and win top talent

There is a lot more to job advertising than simply writing a few paragraphs. My not so favourite tasks – the pasting a whole job description and posting on a job board – also don’t sum up. Many employed in the fields of advertising and marketing can attest that our careers are beyond knowing how to write a job advertisement.

If not done properly, you will then experience a mix of results ranging from too few responses, wrong candidates applying, too many wrong candidates, or no ideal candidates applying. There are 15 key ingredients…

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Job advertisement and marketing tips

job advertisingWhen selling a house, you only need one buyer. However in recruitment, you not only need one buyer, you actually need ‘the ideal buyer’.

Because you want to recruit the right candidate, you must create the most compelling message and offer. Then make sure you target the right candidates.

You must maximise the exposure of your message so that you capture the widest yet most targeted audience. There are many key ingredients that will ensure the success of your job advertisement. However, get any one of these wrong and you risk losing valuable candidates.

My job advertising strategy

In over 18 years of recruiting and job ad copywriting, here are the 15 key areas that have allowed me to get great results for clients:

How to write a job advertisement

  1. Have a well-defined Position Description including salary range & benefits
  2. Have a Person Specification with 3-6 essential and preferable skills  and attributes
  3. The Job Title must be meaningful, descriptive and marketable
  4. Create a compelling 150 character teaser (or “lead-in”) to capture the attention of job seekers. Then give them a reason to “click through” to the main advertisement
  5. Craft up 3 compelling bullet points that best describe the opportunity and benefits of applying
  6. In the body of the advert describe the company, why it exists, what it does and points of difference – what is the culture and why would the reader want to work there?
  7. Describe the job opportunity and summarise why it exists and what it does.

Job advertising in action

  1. Selection Criteria: Describe the key skills and attributes required to successfully undertake this role

    job advertising and marketing

    Reader hit in the face. Shocking assault causes an emotional response.

  2. Provide a closing date and any other information to help candidates apply
  3. Select the job location, job classification and subclassification. Research all the available classifications and sub-classifications
  4. Check to see if there are additional locations, job classifications and sub-classifications relevant to this job and be prepared to use more than one to capture the market
  5. Research comparative jobs to ensure your salary level is competitive
  6. If your remuneration package is competitive, publish it to generate a higher response rate. If it is marginally or less competitive, do not publish it
  7. Enter the engagement method (eg part-time, full time, casual, fixed term contract etc)
  8. Is the job board you are using where your preferred candidates ‘hang out’? Some of the best candidates don’t apply via major job boards. Therefore, posting on multiple job boards will ensure your exposure to the widest applicable candidate markets

For more information on how to craft compelling and effective job advertising, contact Neil at 1300Hired. [/read]

Employee turnover costs and how to avoid them

Employee turnover is disruptive, expensive and has both tangible and intangible effects.

employee turnover cost iceberg staff

The cost of employee turnover is like an iceberg.

Like in an iceberg, the tangible effects are visible above the water. Meanwhile, the intangible effects appear underneath, less visible yet often quite larger than it seems.

Staff turnover is more than filling up a job vacancy due to attrition. In fact, the costs exceed the average cost to hire a new employee.

 

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How expensive can a turnover be?

Aside from measuring how much it costs to hire and train a new employee, other factors to employee turnover also exist. When added up staff turnover can cost as much as 1-2 times an employee’s salary or $50k-$100k on average per hire. Here are some more interesting pointers: 

  • When measuring attrition cost, anticipate that the expense of employee turnover varies within the organisation. The costs of replacing an employee rise from entry-level to more senior management and executive positions.
  • While hiring expenses go up the ladder, employee turnover cost goes up, too. Hence, for the CEO of a major corporation, the price can be in the millions as reflected in the share price and market capitalisation.
  • In the Australian construction industry, turnover costs around twice the profit generated by an employee.

Strategies to reduce employee turnover

Excessive staff turnover distracts management, can eliminate profit and cause business failure.

Hence, how do we minimise the hefty cost of replacing an employee? 

  • Have a strong and supportive culture
  • Have strong leadership and management aligned with your work culture
  • Recruit the right people
  • Implement strategies to engage and retain the right staff
  • Have strategies to engage all disengaged staff
  • Have strategies to reduce actively disengaged staff

Employee retention now becomes a big issue. Let us turn the tide and avoid the iceberg that may soon sink our ships. For more information on how to reduce Staff Turnover costs, contact Neil at 1300Hired. [/read]

5 things that make a bad hire expensive

In another article, I have listed the 6 telltale signs an employee can turn into a bad hire any time during his/her tenure. It is imperative to establish how and HOW MUCH our poor hiring decision becomes a liability more than an asset.

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Bad Hire: The (Not-S0) Secret costs that strip away Profit

The problem in making a poor hiring decision is the overall cost to your business. The expense is not just in the out of pockets costs, but also in:

  • loss of team morale,
  • lost time,
  • downtime,
  • management time,
  • and loss of team productivity in covering the gaps.

bad hire employee sleeping at workThe cost of making a bad hire has been estimated at anywhere from 30% of annual salary and up to $50,000. Here are the 5 big costs:

  1. Impact of the rest of your team. They have to pick up the slack, cover mistakes and tolerate any bad behaviour. Morale suffers and your top performers may leave
  2. Impact on Customers. Not fulfilling job responsibilities, taking shortcuts or upsetting customers generally. Your brand and reputation can suffer, and worse, customers may leave.
  3. Performance management. A bad hire drains management time and focus on what could be spent on coaching and developing your good performers. Dealing with complaints from staff and customers also takes up management time.
  4. Business reputation. If a business has a habit of making bad hires, this will adversely affect the reputation of the business and the manager involved. It also adversely impacts the reputation of your leadership
  5. Cost of replacement. This involves recruiting and training costs, management time, loss of productivity and impact of the team both during and after a bad hire leaves.

For more information on how to make better hires and to minimise the occurrence of a bad hire, please contact Neil at 1300Hired.

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How to avoid bad hires and poor decisions

BAD HIRES: Real horror movie script – shocking audiences in your office

So you’ve brought on a new staff member and things aren’t quite going as expected? If you’re getting that sinking feeling, you are not alone.

The problem we see with bad hires is that they occur more frequently than they should.

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Effects of a poor hiring decision

bad hires zombie

Bad hires are scary.

Bad hires are not only costly but they also negatively impact others in your business.  The cost of loss of productivity can be significant.  The out of pocket costs start to stack up, and this can be debilitating particularly for smaller businesses.

The 6 Red Flags of Bad Hires

Employers realise the true cost of a bad hire once these unqualified employees start bringing disadvantages than profit. If you’ve ever experienced this sinking feeling, then here are the top 6 things to look out for.

  • Failure to produce an acceptable quality of work.
    Employers expect productivity from their staff, even from the recent hires who may take a while before they get up to speed. Regardless of tenure, employees must present a decent amount of quality work. Sadly, bad hires don’t get this and only care about clocking in and out.
  • Failure to work well with other employees.
    We all want harmony in our business most especially in our workplace. Bad hires tend to (although not necessarily) do their things their own way, causing friction with their colleagues and superiors.
  • Having a negative attitude towards work.
    Positivity is imperative to success and so is diligence.  Lacking this feat not only adds to poor performance, but also to a gloomy atmosphere in the workplace. Make sure you correct and end this sooner than later.
  • Immediate problems with attendance.
    Excessive absenteeism and tardiness shatter discipline and efficiency among all things. Consistent attendance infractions may imply a poor hiring decision or a waning employee engagement. Either way, act on it or lose profits.
  • Employee caused customer complaints. Excellent customer service makes any business grow. If your employee causes more problems than positive response, you may have made a bad hire after all.
  • Failure to meet deadlines.
    Completing a project beyond the deadline not only impacts your reputation as a business negatively but can also incur unwanted costs and/or penalties. Avoid having someone on your payroll who deliberately and constantly overlooks targets.

How to avoid hiring the wrong person

There are hefty consequences of hiring the wrong person for the job. Do everything possible to identify indicators of these traits during the recruitment process, rather than have them infiltrate your workplace.

To minimise the chances of making a bad hire, use the best available resources, expertise and technologies when recruiting. To learn how to turn bad hires into assets, please contact Neil at 1300Hired. [/read]

Disruption is the new “Norm”

The world is changing rapidly and the world of business is no exception. What excites me greatly is the pace of change (which is not slowing down). In fact it is growing at an exponential pace with no let up. There is hardly a day that goes by where there are not exciting new developments, breakthroughs, or reports of changes that are only just being understood and hence, reported well after they happen. Some of these changes are positive, some are not so positive, and some – well it depends on which side of the fence you sit on, or what your perspective is.

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