Issues & Trends – May 2011
Use ‘social media managers’ to help win the ‘war for talent’, urges TMS chief
TMS Asia-Pacific chief executive Andrew Chan has called for the appointment of deciated “social media managers” by travel and tourism companies.
He promises those that take his advice will “have a definite advantage as the ‘war for talent’ continues to intensify”.
Social media, he said, is definitely playing an ever-increasing role in the recruitment process and more and more employers have come to realise the benefits it offers above and beyond traditional recruitment channels, particularly with the Gen Y demographic.
“Savvy organisations understand that they need to adopt similar strategies in marketing to potential employees as they would their customers,” Chan claimed.
“Those taking the next step and ensuring they have a ‘Social Media Manager’ on the HR team stand to place themselves well ahead of the game.
“Gen Y candidates are attracted by organisations that empower them to be individuals, are socially responsible and promote work life balance.”
According to Chan the industry is starting to see “a huge increase in the number of job advertisements appearing through the likes of Facebook and Twitter.”
He said the key advantage of using social media as a recruitment channel is that it is instantaneous, extremely cost effective and, importantly, gives employers the opportunity to interact with potential candidates via far richer and more highly targeted media than traditional channels.
“The advantage of Facebook is that the brand becomes far more personal to a candidate – they get to see who they might be potentially working with whereas a corporate website can come across as being far more sterile.
“Judging by the speed with which this ubiquitous social media phenomenon has taken a grip on the recruitment process, I think it’s highly likely – and timely too – that very soon many employers within our sector will be creating dedicated ‘Social Media Manager’ roles in order to ensure they are keeping abreast of their competitors.”
Chan pointed towards his own company’s utilisation of the social media phenomena which recently saw TMS launch a dedicated i-Phone application, subscription for which has now passed the 40,000 mark.