markhavard | Friday, January 15, 2010 at 1:46PM In October I commented on government agencies’ growing use of Facebook and Twitter. My focus then, based on a pair of September articles in Federal Computing Week, was on these social media tools as aids to recruitment. I’ve since taken a closer look at this trend.
The takeaway from my informal scan of federal social media: this trend is growing like a swath of mushrooms after a spring rain. I counted more than thirty major agencies or departments with Facebook pages and innumerable others on Twitter (contact me for a full list, if you’re interested).
None of the government Facebook pages that I found appears to be mounted with much conscious attention to recruiting. Most are devoted to agency programs and activities, and most are (first) linked from their sponsor’s home page, rather than their Careers sections.
What does this tell us? I’d venture that in most of these instances the creative impetus to enter the social media realm originated with agency public affairs professionals rather than HR staff. This doesn’t diminish their effectiveness as collateral recruiting tools. After all, they do reinforce their sponsoring agencies’ brands, and that’s a bonus for recruiting…although a bit more focus on the agency culture--and its employees—would be nice. The same goes for Twitter.
All this is good news for human capital professionals and recruiters, even if your agency’s Facebook and Twitter outreach is administered by your public affairs department. In the first place, an agency social media presence is a powerful branding “hook” for engaging potential recruits. Just because HR doesn’t own your agency’s social media resources doesn’t disqualify you from at least promoting it in your recruiting outreach, both online and off.
What’s more, these tools can provide a recruiting engagement platform that’s accessible to HR at virtually no cost other than the exercise of your team’s intra-agency persuasive powers. If you can sell the team that administers these resources on letting HR contribute content, that’s a big win indeed for your recruiting program.
Communication, Employer Brand, Gov 2.0, Government, Strategies, Web 2.0, social media | in Government, Social Media markhavard | Thursday, October 1, 2009 at 10:50AM Given the government’s reputation in some quarters as a stodgy, slow-to-adopt monolith in matters of online communication, some might expect Web 2.0 social media tools, spreading so infectiously in the private sector, to have little appeal among the feds (at least during this decade).
Federal Computer Week gives the lie to this cliché in two articles published earlier last month. FCW ranks the federal agencies most successful in using Twitter and Facebook, respectively, to engage the public. The reach and social media savvy of these early adopters might surprise you.
The agencies on either or both lists are not—primarily—reaching out with a human capital and recruiting agenda top-of-mind. Even so, if you’re inclined to regard these social media programs merely as plain old information dissemination, you’re understating their influence on their audiences. That’s like calling a popular music concert just an exercise in listening enjoyment. Yes, the description may be accurate at its core, but—especially if it’s a rock, R&B, or hip-hop event—it doesn’t quite capture the full experience of being in the auditorium.
For many in these agencies’ social media audiences, that “experience” is charged with high value, and often as much as the information content itself. The truly committed among them gain what brand adherents thrive on—the felt sense that they are insiders and sharers. To me this seems like a pretty cost-effective way to tap the collective enthusiasm and energy of appreciative individuals, in effect, kick starting the social motor of brand contagion. In their efforts to cultivate attentive communities for the agency and the medium—not merely to distribute information—these leading agencies are showing that they “get” social marketing and Web 2.0.
Will the sponsoring agencies also reap recruiting benefits from these Gov 2.0 initiatives? Do you really need me to state this obvious benefit outright? As you build a compelling brand and a community of admirers, you will attract more and more qualified and enthusiastic individuals to your workforce. It's as simple as that.
Text in graphic on right:
Government Twitter leaders (FCW, September 10)
Government Facebook leaders (FCW, September 14)