In the past six months, the internship recruiting and hiring process has completely changed. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought about a shift to remote work, and hiring teams must find and evaluate potential hires without in-person networking events and face-to-face interviews.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by all of the sudden changes, don’t worry. Here are a few ways you can effectively recruit and hire interns in a remote working world.

Tools and tactics to improve your intern search process

1. Build a strong brand online so interns come to you 

If you’re hiring remotely, your online presence may be the most prominent way for internship candidates to learn about and form an impression of your company. If you want to attract talented interns, you’ll want them to be excited about applying for the position after viewing your website, social media, and other online resources.

After some quick searching, job seekers should be able to have a clear understanding of your company’s mission and values, work culture, and internship expectations and responsibilities. The more information available to potential hires, the more they’ll be able to assess how much their passions and strengths align with your needs. Ultimately, this saves you time by maximizing the chance that people who apply for your internship are a good fit and genuinely want the position.

2. Use online resources like job boards and social media 

Recruit and hire interns using online channels. While it’s difficult to engage in in-person recruiting and networking for internships at this time, you still have many online resources to support your recruitment efforts. 

One 2019 survey found that 41% of recent hires found their current position through an online job board. Another 14% discovered their job through social media, and an additional 5% through email newsletters. That means that 60% of recent hires connected with their current employers online. It’s definitely possible for you to recruit valuable interns remotely.

Tools and tactics to vet interns and seal the deal

1. Implement low-effort screening

Making your job posting unique will help it stand out from the slew of postings that job seekers search through. One specific way to make your job posting more unique and effective is to include a low effort requirement such as including a fun word in your application subject line.

For example, something as simple as asking potential interns to include “penguin” in their subject line can help you easily weed out applicants who won’t even take the time to completely read through your job posting, or at the very least don’t pay much attention to details. 

2. Conduct virtual interviews

Virtual interviews are a great alternative to in-person interviews to recruit and hire interns. They give you the opportunity to chat with potential hires while adhering to social distancing guidelines. Virtual interviews are also convenient for interviewing interns who may be in a different time zone or completely different country — just remember to specify the time zone when scheduling interviews.

When conducting your virtual interviews, make sure to evaluate applicants on their remote work skills. It’s hard to say how long remote work will be the norm, so it’s important to hire employees who can thrive in a remote working environment.

Tips to ensure your intern has the best possible experience 

1. Continue building community

It can be difficult to build community while everyone’s stuck at home, but it’s important to continue making efforts to do so. Virtual coffee breaks or lunches give employees a chance to chat with their coworkers and let your new intern get to know people. Team hangouts that include interactive activities like games can also be a fun way to build community.

2. Encourage feedback and communication

If you want to know how to deliver the best possible internship experience, consider asking your intern for feedback. Feedback is valuable for determining what they like about the internship and what you can do better to support them. Promoting open communication is great for building trust as well as making your intern feel like a valued member of your team.

While COVID-19 has made it more difficult to recruit and hire interns, there are many online resources you can leverage to search effectively for new interns, make good hiring decisions, and provide an enjoyable internship experience. Work on attracting and retaining capable, enthusiastic interns who will fit perfectly into your company’s culture so that you can continue to run a successful business — even during a global pandemic.

Does your organisation recruit and hire interns? If you love any of these tips or use them already, leave a comment below. 

Gabrielle Gardiner is a Manhattan-based writer who is passionate about sharing her insights to empower recruiters and job seekers to succeed. She specializes in creating content with actionable tips about professional development, most recently for websites like LiveCareer.

The post How to recruit and hire interns in a remote-working world appeared first on Recruitment Marketing.

It’s that time of year where smart recruiters are teeing up to net top student talent at careers fairs. Careers fairs are an excellent opportunity to secure qualified candidates, so it’s important to have an effective strategy in place.

What’s your goal?

Before investing time, money, and energy into planning and assigning resources for a careers fair, determine the best events to suit your hiring requirements and the best candidates that will be worth your investment.

Industry-specific careers fairs are excellent opportunities to boost your employer brand (for example, if you are in the tech or hospitality industries). Offer entry-level, vacation, and internship opportunities to interested potential candidates.

Choose your best brand ambassadors

We’ve stressed the importance of choosing only your most qualified and enthusiastic brand ambassadors to represent you, as they are the ones who will be making an impression on lots of people. In particular, choose people with recruiters and hiring managers who are invested in finding the right people and are aligned with your overall brand.

Recruiters are the best people to converse with candidates, obtain contact details and resumes, and know how to coordinate interviews. In fact, hiring managers can potentially screen candidates onsite, describe the types of roles and responsibilities available, and answer questions.

Also consider bringing employees who are alumni from the same educational institution–a great way to initiate conversation and form an instant connection. Students can also relate to these employees more easily and visualise themselves in the organisation.

Coordinate and book

Contact event organisers, pay relevant fees and provide information about your organisation. (Be prepared with marketing materials, such as your logo for booths, and information about position openings.)

Prepare materials

Don’t come to a careers fair empty handed! Order marketing materials and work with designers to create an attractive booth with:

• banners
• pictures of your company
• brochures
• electronic media to play on screen (if this is available to you)
• memorable, useful, branded promotional giveaways (e.g. USBs, branded goodie bags)
• name tags for your brand ambassador attendees
• business cards.  

Ensure your website and promotional materials are up to date. The last thing you want is to direct great talent to an outdated, hard-to-navigate website!

If you choose to giveaway promotional materials, instead of pens and stickers, think outside the box and make it memorable and useful. What’s something that represents your brand or company culture?

Prepare to engage

It’s important to prepare questions to engage candidates in advance. You only have a short amount of time with each candidate, so ask questions to determine quickly if they have minimum requirements for the roles you are looking to recruit for.

Engage them by asking about their interests and determine if they have experience with or recognise your brand.

Here are some example questions:

• What do you know about [our organisation]?
• Do you have experience with [software]?  
• What’s your area of expertise/interest?
• What would you like to learn more about?

Advertise and promote

In the weeks leading up to your event, promote your current opportunities and your participation in the event on your website and through your social media channels. If you’re participating in a closed event, you might not be able to invite people, but you can still let attendees know where to look for you!

Post pictures while you’re at the event on your social channels to let people know you’re there.

On the day

Arrive early to set up your booth with pictures, materials and any visual multimedia or laptops you will be using.

Engage with as many people as possible using the questions you prepared earlier. (You might find many excellent potential candidates!) Try to keep conversations brief, structured and engaging; exchange important information quickly and effectively. Long queues are great to show you are desirable, but it may make you lose out on connecting with valuable talent.

Take notes and record important information! A great way to do this is by having a well-thought-out expression of interest form (electronic is best if you have the resources). That way you can quickly capture the most important information.

Ask people how they heard about your presence at the fair, or if they came across you by chance. This can help you direct your promotional strategy for future careers fairs.

It can be difficult to remember great potential candidates unless you take notes when speaking with them. In particular, have a way to capture CVs and contact details.

If you have suitable positions advertised on your careers page, encourage desirable candidates to apply. When asked to answer the question “where did you hear about this opportunity?” Prompt them to select “careers fair” from the drop-down menu.

Let interested students know what will happen next and when they can expect to hear back.

You must be able to answer candidates’ questions; so be armed with important and interesting information about your organisation, teams, culture, people, benefits, future plans, and what positions are currently available.

After the event

The work doesn’t stop when the event is over! Get in touch with people you connected with. The sooner the better, as the more likely it will be that they’ll remember you.

Make sure you reply promptly to people who asked questions you couldn’t answer on the day.

Take the next steps. Add interested applicants to your talent pool emailing list. Thank applicants who aren’t suitable for their interest, and let them know you will reach out to them. Or, provide them with a way to stay up to date and keep an eye out with your upcoming opportunities.

Reach out to great candidates if they are suitable for one of your current roles and invite them to start the screening and interview process. Assess their skills and start interviewing.

Have a debrief with your team who attended to gain a general overview, successes, and areas to improve next time.

Lastly, measure your ROI. How many people expressed interest? Out of this number, how many qualified people did you engage with? How many did you bring in for interviews, and hire? Measure your overall time to hire. Compare this with your other recruitment strategies.

Careers fairs are an excellent opportunity to both discover and engage with sought-after talent, and build your brand! While these events are a cost and time investment, with the proper planning, materials, and brand ambassadors, you’ll receive great ROI.

Have you achieved success at a careers fair? What kind of interesting materials did you bring and how did you engage candidates? How did it compare to your other recruiting methods? Let us know in the comments.

The post Participating in this year’s careers fair season? Here’s your strategy for success appeared first on Recruitment Marketing.

Internships are guided work or volunteer experiences where individuals develop their skills with structured work and learning goals. These programs are typically aimed at students, facilitating the transition from study to work through experiences that are aligned with their academic studies.

Organisations are on the hunt for top talent and many are recruiting at universities and colleges, so the competition is fierce. Recruiting from universities and internship programs is such an effective talent strategy because you can integrate new talent more effectively, determine if candidates are a good cultural fit, and onboard them full time after they graduate.

It’s important to keep in mind that when candidates look for internship and employment opportunities, they want to know what employers will provide them.

According to Shaunya Bhayani reporting for Source Con, early-career candidates have many options. Employers must work hard to brand themselves to build brand awareness.

“A study from Glassdoor reveals that 40% of workers are more likely to apply for a job when they are familiar with the company’s brand. The same study found that 60% of employers identify their brand awareness as a significant barrier or challenge in attracting applicants and hiring candidates. Companies with a weak consumer brand will ultimately have a weak talent brand.”

So, with employer branding in mind, how can you successfully recruit top intern talent?

Attend university events

Having a presence at university events is usually a great place to start. If your organisation is running a stall, start building buzz by promoting through your channels a few months in advance. Speak on a topic of interest. Be prepared with branded materials from your organisation, and be able to answer any questions they might have.

Do you have any recent university hires currently in your organisation? Bring them to the event, along with your best brand ambassadors to show students the type of people they could be working with and what they’ve managed to accomplish with your organisation. Demonstrate how a career with you will benefit them.

Connect with the right university clubs and student groups. For example, if you’re wanting to increase your technically-skilled talent pipeline, connect with a computer science group to see if you can introduce your brand and network with prospective candidates.  

Have a strong online presence

University events are great, but according to Sanjeev Agrawal reporting for Harvard Business Review, you need to go where students are: online.

“Students are online all the time. Invest in a visually appealing, content-rich site where students can go to and learn about your company. If you can, [personalise] the site to showcase the right alums, intern experiences, and the basic messages you want to deliver to potential hires. Done right, a good “brand page” can have the same effect as a great conversation at a career fair — it’s the story of your mission, your culture and why they should join you.”

Establish your brand on social media and be authentic. Keep in mind “most online communities don’t like being marketed to, so be authentic, add value to users, and be cautious of blatant self-promotion.”

Include a designated internship or graduate program segment to your careers website with an easy-to-use application portal for interested students to apply.  

Help them connect with your purpose

We’ve shared how young talent are interested in making a meaningful contribution. Showcase your organisation’s values by promoting them on your social media, website, and careers page.

In communicating with potential intern candidates, give their roles context. How is their work going to make a meaningful difference?

Make their internship memorable

Bhayani recommends creating short, mid-length, and long-term goals to keep them engaged throughout the duration of their internship.

“Contrary to popular belief, the days of interns fetching coffee and rolls are gone. From Day 1, interns are put on real teams and work on real-life challenges of the business. Every job includes some mundane tasks, so find ways to sustain the excitement. Inject excitement into the routine.”

What are skills are students interested in learning? Consider getting in touch with local universities and careers centre to gain some insights, and create opportunities for interns to learn these skills.

Create brand ambassadors

Talent attraction doesn’t stop once you get interns in the door. They could potentially become your best brand ambassadors!

“A positive internship experience will build long-term success for a brand by word of mouth. Students innately possess a strong sense of community and mingle with one with another. Students sharing their strong internship experience with each other is one of the most organic, grassroots ways to attract more intern talent.”

For those interns returning to their studies, arm them with recruitment tools to offer perks to their friends and peers. You can even ask your current interns and new hires for referrals.

Design a brand ambassador program and provide rewards for successful referrals.

Offer interns events to socialise

Leveraging events is a great way to engage talent – and this is true for your interns too! Events are a way for your people to connect on a more personal level, and are also a great diversity and inclusion strategy.

“Millennials are socially oriented people. Offer them mentorships and partnerships. Set up social events where they get to meet other interns and employees in the company. Connect them with other individuals that have common goals or interests. This will not only help interns build strong relationships, but foster innovation, efficiency, and problem-solving.”

If your organisation is not large enough for a big event, consider offering casual after-hours activities for fun.

Be mindful of the legalities surrounding internships and unpaid work; the person doing the work should be receiving the main benefit. Your goal should be to create a memorable learning experience and provide the best interns with the motivation to return and join your organisation.

A word of caution. Internship programs are a time commitment: you will need to take time to structure their program thoughtfully, and also get buy-in from your people who will be guiding them through their learning goals. (See Scott Wintrip’s leadership tip #4 for getting buy-in from your people!) If your people have intense workloads, it might not be feasible for them to take on an intern. Also, not all the interns you offer opportunities to will return – or they may not end up being a great fit!

Internships can be game-changing for your talent pipeline. These programs give you first access to new talent entering the workforce before your competitors, each party can determine if they will make a good cultural fit, and interns can learn new skills and bring fresh perspectives to your organisation, and become brand ambassadors and referral sources.

Does your organisation offer internships or graduate training programs? Leave us a comment.

Source

6 ways to grow your intern talent pipeline

Shaunya Bhayani

SourceCon

How companies can attract the best college talent

Sanjeev Agrawal

Harvard Business Review

The post Why you need to build your intern talent pipeline appeared first on Recruitment Marketing.