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14 ways to grow your employer connections
Editorial by Christian Saint Cyr
National Director / Canadian Job Development Network
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Coordinating employer engagement on the community level is the best approach to increasing employment outcomes.
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I believe in the expression, ‘a rising tide raises all boats’, which is an aphorism associated with the idea that an improved economy will benefit all participants.
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I’d like to extend this metaphor to job development. The idea is that if employers are better educated about job development, government supports and inclusive employment, they will be more open to inclusive hiring overall, making the work of employer engagement more fruitful.
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Can you imagine what it is like for a small employer? They are getting calls from teachers in high schools; college and university co-op education departments; provincial and federal employment programs; disability organizations; Indigenous groups; youth groups; settlement organizations; and traditional recruitment, placement and search firms. Everyone is pitching something different; they’re from a different organization; they have different funding; and they all have different messaging. Some want you to hire their clients and some need placements. Some are paid and others aren’t. It’s a loud cacophony of job development messaging, which by definition is “a harsh discordant mixture of sounds.”
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Meanwhile, the employer is just trying to finish their payroll; or approve some marketing; or serve a customer. They don’t have the time, interest or patience to stop and listen.
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I’ve been working in this industry for 25 years, know thousands of career professionals and work with hundreds of career development organizations and I would have a tough time articulating the complete spectrum of benefits available to an employer in any one community.
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Is it any wonder, the entire sector has such a small percentage of employers utilizing job development services in any specific community?
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It’s free money and professional support and 9 times out of 10, an employer would rather pay thousands of dollars to hire a search firm, recruiter or temp agency. That $25 billion sector is more than 10 times as big as all funded employment programming in Canada.
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So, have I got you on-side? That if we work together, get on messaging, educate employers and collaborate, instead of placing two or three hundred clients or students in our community, we could help create employment for 500, 600, 800 or a thousand people?
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Let me relate a story to you. Several years ago, I was working with a group of employment organizations to host annual employer recognition breakfast for organizations that hire people with disabilities. While not all organizations worked exclusively with individuals with disabilities, it was at least part of the work of all organizations.
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In one of our meetings, each organization agreed to reach out to the employers they regularly work with to invite them to this event.
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At this point, I suggested, “hey, you know what would really help people? What if we gather together a master list of employers that have demonstrated an interest in hiring people with disabilities and we post it online. You can share it on each of your websites.”
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What immediately followed was deafening silence, with people awkwardly avoiding eye contact. Some people said something like, “uh, yeah, uh – I guess we could look at that. Something to think about in the future.” People were the relieved to have the conversation move forward.
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Why are people so reluctant to do this -- to share their employer contact information? Because employer relationships are highly coveted by job developers and the organizations they work with.
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I worked for an organization where I supervised a group of job developers and for an entire year, I tried to get them to coordinate their efforts in a central database and they resisted at every opportunity, because they believe they own their employer relationships.
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It's their currency, it’s what makes them a much more attractive candidate if they go and work somewhere else.
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Do you want to know what I learned from working on this employer appreciation breakfast? They’re all working with the same employers and the same contacts at those employers.
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Employers treat job developers like they treat an online job search website. Let’s post the job on as many as possible to get the best we can.
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In this way, employers who are already open to job development supports, have demonstrated they are willing to learn more and utilize the services. Our goal is to try to grow this group and being proprietary about it, limits our success.
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I believe with effective communication and coordination, we can broadly expand this group of interested employers.
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With my background in labour market information, I’ve been privileged to speak at conferences gathering together high school career guidance staff; college and university co-op educators; federally- and provincially-funded employment organizations; disability organizations; settlement organizations; and Indigenous skills development organizations.
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What has struck me about each of these groups, is they don’t spend a lot of time thinking about the others, unless of course they receive provincial or federal funds. And yet, they are walking into the very same employers in their communities, portfolio in hand, talking about a unique set of job development supports.
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So, how do we better communicate and organize our activities? What can we do better as a group and what is absolutely essential we do on our own?
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We’re currently organizing the National Networking Day for Job Developers to take place on September 19th and in many ways this is the first step.
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If you look at the Agenda, we have a one-hour segment called ‘Coordinating Community Employer Engagement’ and this is exactly what we want to talk about.
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The following is a list of 14 specific activities you can work on with other employer engagement professionals in your community which will either bring clarity to the work employment support organizations are doing or raise the profile of inclusive hiring in the community.
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Job Development Mastermind Groups: My hope is that every community that meets on National Networking Day for Job Developers on September 15th forms their own Mastermind Group for Job Development. This opens the door to communication which allows everyone in the community to learn more about what everyone else is doing and create strategies to work together to promote inclusive hiring across the board.
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Employment Service Resource Guide: It would be helpful to have a one- or two-page guide to all of the employer supports in the community and which organizations are providing them. This would be valuable to share at business meetings and job fairs, where multiple organizations are participating.
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Joint Social Media Sharing: Help create awareness of employer supports by liking and tagging what everyone else in the community is doing. Algorithms reinforce messages that are viewed and shared by multiple users and so it would be valuable to both tag other organizations in the career development sector but also like and share what they are doing whenever possible.
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Monthly Press Releases: If you form a Job Development Mastermind Group or some sort of committee for community employer supports, prepare a monthly press release acknowledging all of the organizations but sharing some of the challenges which local employers are facing and how the employer services community is supporting them. By having multiple agencies supporting these press releases, you’ll get better uptake in mainstream media as well as in the community.
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Monthly Labour Market Reports: Work with your local chambers of commerce or boards of trade to produce monthly labour market reports utilizing monthly employment statistics but also sharing insights from local employers. This can be added to the monthly chamber newsletter, to possible speaking engagements and as a tool that garners the interest of leaders in the community from major employers to elected city counsellors.
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Coordinate Client/Student Service: While you may not be aware of all of the job development supports in your community, there may be training, wage subsidies and collaborative skills training funds that can benefit every organizations’ client group. As you learn these things you may be able to work together to better support clients and students in your community.
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Organize Cross-Agency Training: Each employment service organization in your community has special subject matter knowledge. Perhaps your college or university has expertise on student loans while your local disability organization has expertise in assistive technology. You can organize events where you invite clients or students to learn more about this expertise.
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Business Organization Presentations: If there is an organization luncheon or gala coming up, you may want to present as a group, highlighting what makes each organization different. This would be a classic example of how you can share your Employment Service Resource Guide, with contact information for all of the organizations and members. When employers see you are well organized, they may be more open to what you are sharing.
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Employer Sharing Sessions: It may be helpful to host a once-a-month information session for employers on what each organization does and how they can support them. This will go far to addressing the mixed messaging employers often experience when they are hearing it from multiple stakeholders at different times.
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Inclusive Hiring Acknowledgement Months: We suggested this in our branding session a couple of weeks ago, but the idea is to select specific months to acknowledge employers in different areas. For instance, we acknowledge disability employers in October, but why not great youth employers in April, newcomer employers in July and great employers of Indigenous workers in September?
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Create Multi-Agency Job Fairs: Many organizations are trying to host multiple job fairs throughout the year. Why not organize a few big job fairs throughout the year instead, where all of the organizations collaborate on planning, marketing and cost-sharing. The event will get better attendance, more exposure and greater employer buy-in.
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Cross-Promote Job Postings: Many times, employers are looking for someone for a specific job and job developers can only bring them a small handful of candidates. If none of them meet the employer’s expectations, why not share the postings with everyone in your group? At least the job will first go to individuals who have challenges with obtaining employment, rather than the employer simply going out to post the job on Indeed.
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Create an Employer Watch List: We’ve all experienced bad employers. Organizations that took advantage of vulnerable workers, failed to pay what they agreed to and treated people poorly. I don’t think we should publicly shame them, but I would certainly say they should be reported to the provincial employment standards branch and/or to the Better Business Bureau. Beyond this, it might be helpful to create an employer watch-list which is entirely for internal use, but cautions job developers about specific experiences past clients have had, particularly ones which were set up by job developers.
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Citywide Database of Employer Engagement: Creating a cross-community employer database is the most controversial suggestion I have, but if you hear me out, I’m sure I can share some of the benefits. If you work with two or three other job developers, or 10 or 12, you keep an internal database to ensure you’re not contacting the same ones or cross communicating. Doing this on a community basis would allow you to do the same thing. I’m not saying you should replace your own database, only create a frame work for community information as well. If it only held names and contact information, at the very least, it would save others time. As the database grows, it will save you time as well.
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I genuinely believe that if you work with other career development organizations in town to create more communication and better collaboration, you’ll raise the profile of job development in your community and thereby improve your outcomes across the board.
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This said, before we wrap up, I think I need to draw a clear line of distinction. According to Montgomery Burns, from the Simpsons, “teamwork will only take you so far. Then the truly evolved person makes that extra grab for personal glory.”
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I’m sharing this for humour. It’s truly cynical and runs contrary to everything I’ve just said, but there is a hint of truth in it.
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When you are communicating with employers, that is your time to shine. You’re not there to market other employment programs, clients or supports. You’re there to put your organization and your clients or students first.
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Yes, you’ll be sharing information about other employment supports at public events where other organizations are present. This demonstrates you are resourceful and improves the opportunities for your clients to obtain employment. But, when you are actively engaged in one-on-one employer discussions, you need to prioritize what you do and your clients or students.
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Collaboration and communication isn’t about everyone getting an equal share of the employment pie. It’s about raising the playing field for all employer engagement professionals so that when you contact an employer your work is seen as more legitimate, your clients as more capable and your supports as more valuable.
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We’ll be discussing the value of discovery in learning about the challenges of employers at our #MotivatingMondays meeting of the Canadian Job Development Network, Monday July 28th at 8:30am Pacific; 9:30am Mountain; 10:30am Central; 11:30am Eastern; 12:30pm Atlantic and at 1pm in Newfoundland.
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On the morning of Monday July 28th 'Click this Link' to join the session LIVE.
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'Developing a Comprehensive Approach to Effective Job Development'
WORKSHOP
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We’ve had terrific registration all month for, ‘Developing a Comprehensive Approach to Job Development’, with one session for each time zone, September 8th to 12th and THIS THURSDAY, JULY 31ST, is the FINAL DAY to register and get the 35% EARLY-BIRD registration rate. If you would like to know more, just visit: www.jobdevelopment.org/pro-d
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'National Networking Day for Job Developers'
NETWORKING IN LOCAL COMMUNITIES
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We’re still taking on organizations to host the National Networking Day for Job Developers, on September 19th and if there isn’t one in your community, we’d love to help you host one. To learn more, just visit: www.jobdevelopment.org/sponsors
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