2013 Strategic Talent Acquisition Conference Part 3: Rethinking Recruitment : NPR‘s Brand Ambassadors

Everyone in the talent acquisition space knows the importance of social media in an effective recruitment strategy, but many are unsure of what percentage of resources to devote to social media versus traditional avenues.  Lars Schmidt, Senior Director of Talent Acquisition & Innovation at NPR shared his insights with the crowds today at the 2013 Strategic Talent Acquisition Conference.  NPR has chosen to spotlight their social media campaign as the crown jewel.  Schmidt champions empowering his current employees to assist in the outreach as brand ambassadors and utilizes innovative twitter hashtags to drive the brand and posts to an NPR Tumblr page as well. 

Schmidt provided not a blueprint per se but a spark of inspiration for firms to create an open organizational culture sharing views from inside the firm providing a more engaging and transparent environment.  Citing author and HCI webcast presenter Erik Qualman and his book Socialnomics, Schmidt wowed the crowd with a short video of eye opening statistics like over 50% of the world’s population is under 30! 

NPR’s story is a familiar one of blowing up an outdated HR model.  NPR was evolving dramatically into a digital media company and needed to have a nimble, strategic and proactive HR.    Schmidt imparted actionable steps that a firm could use to scale social media to their advantage.  Given the high pave of change in social media, Schmidt explained, “You don’t need to be everywhere.  Figure out what your objectives are.  What platforms are best suited for you?  Start small and scale.” 

With 92% of US companies using social media to find talent and potential employees to hire, social media is a necessary piece of the puzzle for talent acquisition professionals.  We’re looking forward to some great breakout sessions this afternoon at STA 2013 and for members who were unable to attend, feel free to follow us on twitter (@Human_Capital) and watch for tweets with the hashtag #hcievents.