TalentEgg Trends

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Author: Stephanie Davis (page 1 of 4)

Millennials Are All Grown Up: Connect with Early Career Professionals

May 18, 2020 / / 0 Comments

In 2019, TalentEgg is proud to celebrate its 11th anniversary. For over a decade, TalentEgg has specialized in being the most preferred job board and career resource for students and recent grads in Canada. Something unique about our demographic is that we’re finding students and grads that found their first jobs on TalentEgg are now coming back to us for their second or third jobs in their careers. As a trusted source for all things career, our users are looking for more experienced and intermediate roles, which means we can reach even more candidates to fill your recruitment gaps. To learn more about early career professionals, we eggs-panded our TalentEgg Survey to get their insight about the workplace, what they look for in an employer and what they’re searching for in their careers. We’ve already revealed some of our findings throughout this Guide but wanted to dedicate a little more attention to this cohort. Our once young millennials have grown up, and here’s what they’re searching for.

Out of the early career respondents, 41% have been with 1 employer since graduation and 41% have stayed in the same role since graduation. However, 72% are actively looking for a new position with an employer. The common theme? They’re looking for growth and aren’t necessarily finding it at their current place of work. Career path and growth is consistently the number one factor that both students, grads and early career professionals are looking for in a potential employer. So it’s no surprise that 59% say they want more job opportunities shared with them.

We found that 94% of early career professionals are interested in taking additional training and certificates, including one-on-one career coaching. We also discovered that 61% of early career professionals have already taken additional training/certificate programs beyond their undergraduate degree. This demonstrates that there is a clear desire for additional training. This presents an opportunity to develop a generation of young professionals who are looking to continue on their career path, potentially improving employee engagement and retention. Don’t let your onboarding investments go to waste. If your organization prides itself on developing its people, then make sure you’re highlighting this to not only current employees, but to new candidates as well.

Since early career professionals are the millennial generation, they are digitally savvy and want to receive information in a similar manner to students – via social media. Instagram is the number one preferred platform for early career and, as they get older, they start to rely on social media and online resources for their career information instead of their parents and family members.

With TalentEgg’s paid social media campaigns, targeted email blasts and geo-fenced mobile marketing campaigns, we can target early career professionals looking to make the next step in their career as well as provide you support for your campus recruitment.

With this strategic approach, we can add value to your talent attraction and recruitment efforts and your talent pool will be filled with the top-notch candidates before you know it! We deliver measurable results and promote your employer brand at the same time. Reach out to us to find out which customizable solution will work best for your company.

Doing Good Never Looked So Great: Why Your Employer Brand Needs CSR

March 16, 2020 / / 0 Comments

In recent years the prominence of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has grown to become a core activity of most businesses, but why is it so important for you as an HR professional? CSR initiatives helps build your company image within your community, but it also improves your employer brand and helps to attract and retain top young talent. Showcasing your CSR initiatives as part of your employer brand is more important now than ever, as a growing number of students, new grads and early-career professionals actively seek out a caring culture in potential employers.

In our 2019 TalentEgg Survey, an astounding 90% of post-secondary students ranked social responsibility as important to very important, for a company to be involved in, and that’s 15% more than last year! You may be thinking: “Egg-cellent, my company has several CSR initiatives.” But it’s not just about participating in CSR initiatives. It’s critical that you effectively communicate your involvement to your target demographic and help them connect the dots between your commitment to community and your commitment to employees.

TalentEgg’s blog, “The Incubator”, provides various career-related articles to help students, new grads and early-career professionals navigate their way from school to work. Our range of topics cover everything from the importance of volunteering to different companies’ involvement in their communities.

We also work with employers to write custom editorials and produce videos to showcase their CSR initiatives to help them reach our audience of young and passionate job seekers. In 2018, we worked with Mercedes-Benz Financial Services to create a custom video about their changing corporate culture with a focus on collaboration and community work. The video follows employees spending the afternoon at their local food bank. Cindy Voskuil, an HR Business Partner at Mercedes-Benz says: “It gives you a sense of pride to see that your work actually wants you to go out and take you away from work to spend your time giving back to your community.”

Providing these volunteer opportunities for employees is also a vital part of engaging and retaining your talent. Our survey found that 81% of high school students, 75% of post-secondary students and 64% of early career professionals volunteer. An additional 65% of total survey respondents currently don’t volunteer but want to, they just don’t have the time or don’t know where to start. Providing your employees with these volunteer opportunities as a part of their work shows your commitment to not only your company values, but also your employees’ values and their development. 37% of survey respondents state that having an employer whose values match theirs is an important factor in choosing a potential employer.

“I think it’s awesome to give employees volunteering days (that are also paid). You sometimes forget to volunteer because it’s usually unpaid work and some people can’t afford to do this, but the fact that companies specifically want their employees to volunteer is awesome.”
Mallory Thompson, Western University, 2019

Are you searching for opportunities to get your employees involved but aren’t sure how or where to start? TalentEgg has various partnerships to specifically guide and encourage students, new grads and early-career professionals to volunteer. Our sister company CharityVillage is Canada’s most popular career resource for the nonprofit sector. We work with CharityVillage to curate our volunteer opportunities directly from their site and tailor them for our audience. We also work with our sister company Bmeaningful, that features purposeful jobs in the social good sector and provides helpful resources to help people connect purpose with their paycheque.

This year we partnered with World Wildlife Fund to encourage students to become Living Planet Leaders @ Campus. The certification provides students with an opportunity to make a difference on campus and in their communities while teaching them teamwork and leadership skills.

We have also partnered with Students Offering Support to help students make a real impact while gaining real-world experience. Through this program students are able to gain leadership skills and vital volunteer experience by leading campus workshops and helping their peers excel in their studies.

It’s eggs-treamly clear that CSR is a must for employers to attract, engage, and retain top young talent. With our customized content and partnerships, we’ve made it easier than ever to connect with students, new grads and early career professionals all through one platform. Reach out to us to find the best way to promote your giving back initiatives and amplify your employer brand!

Partner Landing Page: WWF

How Workplace Culture and Recruiting Top Talent Go Hand-in-Hand. An Interview with Gaby Patenaude from Export Development Canada

March 5, 2020 / / 0 Comments

Workplace culture is an important aspect of any happy and productive working environment. There’s something to be said, though, about organizations that go above and beyond to showcase what the culture in their workplace actually looks like. Students, new grads, and early career professionals are digitally savvy and do their research to find the best fit for them. Even if your workplace culture is out-of-this-world-amazing, are you telling your story effectively? Are young candidates seeing it, hearing about it, watching it? If they aren’t, there’s a chance that you’re losing top candidates to other employers who are taking the extra steps to highlight the quality of their teams, culture and why they are the best place to work.

Export Development Canada (EDC) is one of those employers who strongly supports employee culture while also showing it in an authentic and engaging way. We had the chance to speak with Gaby Patenaude from EDC who shares how their organization lives and breathes culture, community, personal growth, professional development and so much more to ensure that candidates know that they are working for one of the best employers in the country. Read the full interview below.

Meet Gaby

Gaby is the Campus Recruitment Program Lead at EDC and has been with the company for three and a half years. Starting as a new grad, Gaby knows first hand what it’s like to make that school-to-work transition. She also understands how important it is for employers to step up and showcase what it’s like to work at a particular organization. Gaby manages the whole student-employee lifecycle – from campus events, partnerships with schools and interviewing candidates, to providing programming, onboarding and support once students are in the door and on the payroll.

‘Go, Grow and Succeed’ at EDC

EDC’s culture is unique with a variety of inclusive employee-led committees, community giving programs, professional development workshops, and a “state-of-the-art gym” to support their employees — both in work and in personal growth. “As someone who was really actively involved in my university community, I really value the giving nature of EDC,” Gaby comments.

“Community involvement is embedded in everything we do, whether…when EDC employees worldwide take a day to do volunteer work with over 40 organizations or to our stellar CSR practices embedded into the business transactions we make every day. I think that kind of purpose is really what younger generations seek in an employer. Somewhere where their values can come to life at work.”

Having initiatives like employee-led committees also allows employees to connect with so many more peers and leaders that they otherwise wouldn’t have access to. “It lets employees feel like they have a wide variety of what I like to call ‘work extracurriculars’ because there are so many ways for people to get involved at work outside of what is listed on their job description.”

“Through these committees and their events, I have met so many new people and flexed new muscles as I took on side projects totally unrelated to my role. That is so rewarding and definitely lends to an inclusive workplace culture. No matter where people are in the hierarchy, they can really make a difference.”

Shouting Out Your Culture To Top Talent

All of these amazing initiatives and activities that are ingrained in the culture at EDC would be lost on new candidates if their team wasn’t active both on-campus and online to spread the word. Gaby cautions employers not to completely limit themselves to one strategy or the other, but to really look for a balance. “It’s a balancing act of that digital side to reach broad audiences, but [also] creating a space for highly specialized, in-person interactions.” EDC has found that dedicating specific and targeted strategies to both digital and in-person experiences has been enormously beneficial in their overall recruitment and employer branding strategy.

“TalentEgg has been instrumental in us reaching broad audiences with country-wide digital campaigns with hot new tools like Instagram takeovers. The nice thing about digital content is that in most cases it is there to stay and you keep referring back to it if candidates want to do any self-led research. I think it’s important to have digital brand awareness about your employer.”

Striking that balance, Gaby found that the most success they’ve had is with smaller scale, highly specialized events.

“For instance, partnering with campus clubs and associations to host case competitions in topics where we want some fresh insight, or hosting career spotlight events where students come and experience what it’s like to work in a certain role or career.”

Tell Your Story Authentically 

While it’s vital to tell your employer story both in-person and online, Gaby stresses that it’s important to have authentic and transparent content.

“I think the more transparent the better! We’ve found the best success in our recruitment campaigns when we really connect with students. For example, during our Instagram takeover with TalentEgg, we let a student a day take over TalentEgg’s account and take us through a day in their life: from their walk to our downtown office, to their 1:1 with their leader, to their gym session at lunch, or lunch on our rooftop patio. This was a way better indication of their impact and life at EDC than any thoughtfully worded job poster.”

Gaby also stresses the importance of showing candidates that you truly care about them as a potential hire, that they aren’t just another number. EDC did this by hosting a TalentEgg Talks Live where students and grads asked Gaby live questions. She was able to give the audience across Canada a deep-dive 30-minute session about EDC instead of a quick 1-minute conversation at a career fair.

“Recruitment is all about allowing the candidate to really be able to picture themselves in a role and envisioning their happiness and success in that role. TalentEgg has been great in shining light on the new and upcoming strategies for things like social media recruitment marketing, mobile marketing, and others. This has also been proven in bringing students into our office and introducing them to employees. It allows them to put a face to a job and see what someone’s career path was to get to where they are.”

Advice for Fellow Employers and Final Thoughts

“It’s important as an employer to show that you are developing people and not just employees. It’s a two-way street – employees will invest more in their jobs if they know their employer is investing in them. The reality is that if you as a company aren’t staying up on trends, or putting in a caring approach to employees, those employees will go to the next employer down the street that is doing a better job. So I think employers really have an obligation to take their employees seriously and give them the best caring culture to support their best work.”

That’s one of the reasons why Gaby started her career with EDC. She emphasizes why it’s so important for young people to know that their employer will be there for them in the best of times to push them forward, but also on those not so great days.

It’s important to not only rely on being present online and on-campus, but also to tell your employer brand story, bringing it to life and helping future candidates see what their future could be like at your organization.

How Employers Can Support Students in Their School-to-Work Transition. An Interview with Jesse Sahota, Career Development and Relationship Manager

March 5, 2020 / / 0 Comments

Career educators and coaches play a vital part in the success of developing future talent. This support doesn’t end once students finish their degrees – career educators continue to assist students in their school-to-work transition, and this benefits not only students but also employers. Though, it’s important for employers to be involved in career planning as well. From employer branding, showcasing workplace culture, holding events, managing campus ambassadors to connecting with students before they even start their first day can have a great impact.  We explored this topic with Jesse Sahota, Career Development Relationship Manager in the Engineering Co-op and Career Services office at McMaster University, who also won Career Educator of the Year at the 2019 TalentEgg Awards. Read on to learn how Jesse supports his students, fosters relationships with employers and his advice on ways employers can connect with students to assist in their school-to-work transition.

Starting His Career with Purpose

When Jesse first envisioned his career, he believed he was going to work in the advertising industry one day, “designing commercials for Audi or working for Kellogg’s redesigning their Fruit Loops cereal boxes,” he says. During his final year at university, he landed a job in a wealth management firm as a recruiter, which eventually led him to his passion for helping others find their careers. And what a long and meaningful career it has been for Jesse so far! With over 15 years of experience in Career Coaching and Education, Jesse’s current role is comprised of three pillars that facilitate student success. He works to pursue new business development leads while maintaining existing partnerships in the engineering and business communities. The second pillar is coaching students using personalized strategies. “Pain points differ depending on where the student is at in their recruitment life cycle,” Jesse says. Whether students come with generic resumes and cover letters, or are looking to get more involved on campus, Jesse helps them on their career journey. Finally, the third pillar to Jesse’s role is collaborating with employers who are looking to create a stronger brand on campus.

“Our department’s “Employer of the Week” series brings employers to campus where I assist in orchestrating events, such as employers in the lobby, resume roasts, bus trips, Instagram takeovers and lunch and learn workshops.”

Supporting Students on their Career Journey

Jesse’s department supports students through a variety of workshops and individual appointments to prep them before the start of their co-op work term. “In Engineering Co-op and Career Services at McMaster University, the transition from the classroom to the shop floor or boardroom is exceptionally smooth,” he comments.

“Having been in this industry and in my current role for so long, I’ve had the opportunity to meet many of our employer partners on-site. These meetings give me the opportunity to provide a unique perspective and “inside scoop” when coaching students on what to expect at their new job.”

One of the most memorable career highlights was taking five students to Silicon Valley in San Francisco for their Big Ideas Contest. Students were given the opportunity to learn from top innovators and develop their professional skills. Five students, management staff and the Dean of Engineering visited Tesla, Apple, Google, Facebook, Corning and several start-ups during their trip. This is a great example of how Career Educators are creating experiences for their students to showcase their innovative engineering solutions, build invaluable networking opportunities and learn about the possibilities. While Jesse and his team created this opportunity for students to learn, he ended up taking away a lot for himself too.

“It was an eye-opening experience for me as it provided the opportunity to connect with McMaster Engineering alumni and further solidified my understanding that our graduates are changing the world.”

What Can Employers Do for Students?

While career educators help to set students up for success in launching their careers, Jesse shares some ways in which employers can make students feel welcome and valued before they even start working. Jesse comments that not only will this showcase the organizations’ culture, but it will also prepare students for the road ahead. Reaching out to students after they’ve accepted their offer, even if it’s well in advance of their start date, can have a positive impact.

“A welcome email with details regarding what to expect on their first day is a great way to get the student excited about their new adventure by winning their heart and mind. Many organizations are taking onboarding seriously by allocating a personal mentor to each new hire – a strategy that I find highly effective.”

Another way Jesse suggests employers get involved in students’ transition is during the offer stage.

“When employers present an offer to a student, I would suggest that they invite the student to their site, provide them with a tour of their facility, introduce the student to a mentor, connect them with the current student(s) that are working there, and take them out for lunch or coffee. This approach is an excellent way to strengthen the student’s commitment to the employer’s brand. It’s a win-win strategy.”

Build Your Brand Recognition – Get on Campus!

Providing the opportunity for students to connect with employers in-person is always a great strategy when it comes to recruiting the right talent and finding the best candidates to fill your talent pipeline.

“Employers are encouraged to come to campus and meet our students, run workshops, attend hackathons, partner with student groups and, ultimately, connect with career offices on campus. Getting in front of students and answering their questions in-person establishes a connection, builds stronger brand recognition, and these students can then become brand ambassadors for employers by telling their friends what they’ve learned.”

Whether you’re an employer looking to connect with and hire students or you’re a fellow Career Educator, you can learn from Jesse’s unique approach. “My career is something that I truly enjoy and I love knowing that I have had a hand in helping someone else find their dream job or career.”

Get in Touch

jsahota@mcmaster.ca

905-525-9140 ext 24432

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jesse-sahota/

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