With only 2 months left until TalentEgg’s Campus Recruitment Excellence Awards and Conference, we wanted to give everyone a sneak peak of what they can expect at the conference!

The first annual Campus Recruitment Excellence Awards and Conference event on May 14 in Toronto brings together industry best practices and real feedback from top Canadian students to provide a 360-degree view of how to achieve outstanding results in campus recruitment in Canada.

Each week, we’ll publish a “conference preview” featuring more information about each of our talented speakers and their presentations.

Evan Birtch Team Lead, Campus Programs, Research In MotionEvan Birtch
Team Lead, Campus Programs
Research In Motion

With over 5 years experience in the area of student hiring, Evan leads an innovative team of campus recruiters who recruit the best and brightest students to join multinational telecommunications giant Research In Motion. (Follow Evan on Twitter)

Seminar:
How RIM Retains More Students By Creating A Better Experience From Start To Finish

 

What will you be sharing in your seminar?

I will be talking about some of the unique – and some of the common sense – ways that RIM retains students. A big part of this is the student experience starting from the application process, to programs during their work term, to their departure at the end of their time with us.

 

Do you think employers have to do “do it all” when it comes to recruitment?

I think that a lot of employers want to do it all, but there is so much to consider that doing it all, and doing it really well, is the challenge. With so many employers vying for students these days, I think that an organization’s best bet is to determine what it does really well, focus on that, and sell it to their applicants.

There is still room for doing things that you aren’t as good at which you’re looking to improve upon, but you need to find a differentiator from the competition. I don’t think that doing it “all” at a potentially mediocre level resonates with students as much as doing a few thing really, really well.

 

What strategy or initiative from the past year are you most proud of?

We have been constantly trying to evolve our job listing process over the years using a pipeline strategy, which I think is now at it’s optimum level.

Our descriptions balance key details of an overarching skill set while maintaining some information that is relevant to the overall type of role. We do this so candidates can get a feel for the kind of job they are applying to without feeling that the description was too generic to understand yet provides enough specifics to be comfortable with their application to the job.

This has helped us focus on finding the candidate a potential role based on their skill set instead of hoping that they apply to the role that they would be best suited for. This is a shift from the “post and pray” method that is easy to do when you are hiring in large volumes.

 

What is the biggest game changer in campus recruitment right now?

My initial thoughts go to social media, but I actually think that the biggest game changer might actually be moving away from non-personal, semi-anonymous communication and going back to the roots of being on campus more frequently and meeting face-to-face with students.

It is easy for both employers and students to communicate over email, Facebook, Twitter, etc., but the value of having the opportunity to speak directly with a candidate to see and feel what their passions are is undervalued. Returning to the roots of “campus” recruitment might be the biggest departure from the current course that would change the game if done well.

 

Register for the Campus Recruitment Excellence Awards and Conference now to reserve your spot for Evan’s presentation!

More conference previews:

 

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