Social Media Job Recruitment Strategy

Date: September 30, 2012

Author: Gerard Cox

Goal

The goal of the Social Media Job Recruitment Strategy is to identify steps required to maximize outreach through social media, identify media outreach channels, and to identify an execution plan for recruiting critical Open Ecology job positions.

Purpose

The purpose of this document is to outline a social media plan for recruiting job positions for the Open Ecology project.

Statement of Problem

The Open Ecology project is recruiting four positions (in priority order): Operations Manager, Master Prototyper, Machine Designer, and Construction Director. Recruiting for Open Ecology is challenging due to the complex nature of work, open methodologies used for development, and remote location of headquarters. The Open Ecology project provides a cutting edge opportunity and an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for any prospective team member. Open Ecology will aggressively fill their open positions to move forward with the current plan. But Open Ecology wants to ensure they recruit the right people. To meet their aggressive recruitment plan Open Ecology must maximize all recruiting channels. The decision has been made to utilize social media to recruit open positions supplementing current recruitment methods.

Why Social Media?

Social Media provides a unique method for recruiting positions for Open Ecology. Recruiting has been challenging up to this point. Social Media provides an opportunity to make an emotional connection with people who have the most interest in the values, practices, and technology promoted by the Open Ecology project. This Social Media Plan provides the following components:

1. Inputs
2. Channels
3. Process
4. Plan

Each of these items is covered in more detail in the Social Media Recruitment Plan section.

Social Media Recruitment Plan

Inputs

The Social Media Plan Recruitment Plan requires several inputs. Inputs are listed below:

• Job Positions with associated priority and timeframe
• Job Position Descriptions
• Social Media Channels and associated functionality

Each of these inputs will feed into the Process section listed below.

Job Positions

Each of the Job Positions must be identified and prioritized based on needs of Open Ecology. Below is the list of job positions in priority order:

1. Operations Manager - Free Marcin campaign
2. Machine Designer x 4 - to design 4 prototypes per month
3. Master Protoyper - on-demanf
4. Construction Director - to test construction machines

Job Position Descriptions

A Job Position must be created for each of the four positions determined as a need. The job descriptions should give a clear narrative as for why a person would want to become involved in the Open Ecology movement and give a clear description of role, requirements, skills, and required experience. The job descriptions are being developed with the help of the SupporTED community.

Social Media Channels

There are eight main social media channels each with their own unique opportunity for promoting and recruiting Open Ecology job positions.

Publish - content management system. Next time I post sth to wiki. For any postings that other potential recruiting people. Building critical path is what this is called - aligning details with greater vision.

Social Media platforms used for publishing can provide daily updates on the progress of the project and critical path for each role as currently being executed within the organization. The posting should be very personal with a real emphasis on how each potential candidate would fill the team and realize the Open Ecology narrative. Consider the - critical path narrative must be there. Want to create an emotional element and social hook. Even manuals and publications - show the big story at all times. Have you review posts.

Share - just post it.

YouTube, Flickr,  etc. Consumables like pix, presentations, videos. People go to digestable media channels for actual searches.

Social Media platforms used for sharing provide prospects a background of the Open Ecology methodology and cutting-edge technology being implement through the project. This should be a simple extension of the current open model used to distribute information to the development community. New messaging should be added to ensure the narrative and respective movement is emphasized.

Discussion  

Social Media platforms provide discussion capability and are great for opening up dialogue with people interested in the project. The discussion can be an extension of the current discussions with ongoing development of the Open Ecology project. As with other social media initiatives, the narrative and movement must be emphasized as part of all future messaging.

Social Networks - heart and hub of social media - most general discussion because of broadest audience. Make sure you link to share sites.

Social Networks are a great mechanism for recruiting interests to the Open Ecology project. Social network applications, like Facebook, should be a hub for all information relevant to Open Ecology. Facebook offers functionality for integrating platforms of other social media channels. This allows social networks to further promote information distributed through other social media channels and reach a much broader audience. The content published in the social network should be broad ranging. You need to provide general project updates along with specific updates of interest to more technical audience on a timely basis. The technical updates will spike interests from potential prospects. It is critical that all postings on social networks (regardless of content) promote the narrative and movement.

Microblog - make it a daily practice. Hit Facebook and YouTube. Creater OpenSourceEcology YouTube channel.

Microblogging platforms, like Twitter, are excellent for keeping content fresh for those interested in the Open Ecology project. The microblog should be integrated with all available channels. The goal is to use the microblog feed to drive people to other content and social media channels. The challenge with microblogging is the timeliness of updates. Microblogs must be updated several times a day. The best strategy is to embed microblogging into the daily operations process of the Open Ecology project. Open Ecology should use the microblogging platform to post job descriptions as needed. The job descriptions can reference other content or social media platforms.

Life Stream

Life Stream social media platforms provide a personal social media content distribution network very similar to a social network. The Life Stream is more specific to the person/role vs. the organization. Life Stream platforms provide a more intimate view into the day-to-day operations of Open Ecology. Live Streams could provide an opportunity for a more emotional connection with potential candidates.

Virtual Worlds/Gaming - Kelly Santiago, Jane McGonigal

Virtual Worlds and Gaming social media platforms offer a very unique and cutting edge opportunity to recruit potential candidates. The technical nature of the Open Ecology project would fit nicely into a Virtual World and Gaming strategy. The only challenge is Virtual World and Gaming strategies may require investment to develop models and workflows.

Below are the leading platforms for each distribution channel:

Process

The Social Media Recruitment process outlined below identifies the steps for implementing, tracking, and adjusting social media strategy. Performance is at the heart of the process. Performance is critical for realizing social media needs and must be monitored on a regular basis. The steps for social media process are: define, prioritize, develop, listen, engage, learn, measure, and control.

Define - we are doing recruiting

Open Ecology must define all the social media initiatives that will meet strategic objectives. For the purpose of this Social Medial Plan we will focus only on job recruitment.

Prioritize - which position goes first - don’t bury the lead

The social media content will be prioritized based on Open Ecology organizational priorities. This Social Media plan assumes recruitment is the top priority. The priority of recruitment will be driven by the priorities of jobs to be filled.

Develop - develop content itself - Job Description - clarify process of how we go about development

Social Medial content should be developed for all critical pieces required for recruitment. Specifically, the content should be job descriptions and any content relevant to narrative, movement, and critical path for the role. Other content should be developed to reinforce the narrative and provide general status on progress of the Open Ecology project.

Listen

It is critical for there to be at least one resource who is actively listening to social media streams. This can be challenging and time consuming but is an absolute must. Listening requires someone to capture responses, catalog feedback, gauge interest, and identify potential recruits/supporters. There should be listening bias to ensure the narrative and movement is being adopted. Listen for people who can help recruit. See who retweets, etc.

Engage - talk to them directly if they talk about you

Engagement may be the most important step in social media. If people take time to engage into your social network model you must respond and further engage. It is likely people engaging through social media are looking for away to get involved with the project and would be a potential job prospect or know of resources/methods to fill positions. The best person to engage is who is assigned to listening. This could be a huge time requirement to do both listening and engaging but both activities are closely associated.

Learn - understand project and needs and learn.

Learning is the task of reviewing social media responses, trends, and adoption within the context of the community, organizational goals, and specifically, for this Social Media Plan, filling job positions.

Measure - define performance metrics? Uploads to Vimeo and Youtube - see which is better, ex.

Social media strategies take time, which equates to money, and effort taken off other critical activities. Measurement is critical to optimization of available resources. Measurement requires a set of metrics and performance indicators based on social media strategies adopted. The product of measurement should be regular lessons learned and actionable steps for moving forward and/or adjusting.

Control - mid-course corrections

Control is the activity of adjusting social media strategies based on learning (context) and measurement (performance). This should be an ongoing activity reviewed at least every week.

Plan

Below is a high-level plan for executing the Social Media strategy for job requirement.

More granular strategy for common posting: HootSuite?, etc. Link accounts.