Festive season hiring is crucial for retailers and can be stressful and unpredictable. Some studies suggest that retail sales during the festive season can account for close to 30% of the annual turnover for retailers. This makes it crucial for retailers to recruit staff handling the holiday rush.
Here are some tips to help festive season hiring:
1. Hiring strategy: Festive season hiring needs to have both breadth and depth. Broaden the horizons to surf through pools of workers such as students, freelancers, semi-retired, etc. Deepen the search through employee referral programs for internal employees.
2. Pay well and offer benefits: The recruitment market during festivals is busy and competitive. One way for your job ad to stand out is by offering more attractive pay. Additionally, offering and advertising the job’s perks, such as healthcare benefits, bonus holiday discounts, and bus passes for employees travelling to work via buses, is essential. It is no secret that schedule flexibility is significant to employees. Let your offer contain this perk if you give your staff the autonomy to swap shifts with one another.
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3. Picking the right job advertising channels: Evaluate where your festive season hires are coming from, where they spend their free time, and what would attract them to apply to your opening. You can focus on high schools, other educational institutions, and high-traffic areas such as bus stops, malls, and metro stations. With a small recruiting budget, you can think of advertising on social media sites such as LinkedIn and Instagram, as well as some non-traditional media. If budget permits, think of playing a short radio ad during peak traffic hours.
4. Getting job seekers to apply: Make the job application process simple and quick. Many retailers use QR codes in their store locations or give a text-to-apply option to quicken the mobile application process. Think of having a chatbot on the careers page of your company’s website to enable festive hires to find the right job and answer queries.
5. Easy and seamless onboarding: Step up your onboarding process, as proactive candidates can quickly get snapped by competitors if there is a lag in the recruitment process. Speed up mentoring and training by pairing new joiners with veterans and document all processes and systems in written or video tutorials. Communicate all the good-to-know information to the new hires well, such as where to clock in, break times, etc.
6. Post festival strategies: To avoid the same seasonal crunch the following year, develop a recruitment strategy post a successful festive season hiring. These can include:
- Sending out ‘Thank You’ letters to seasonal hires after the festive season is over
- Design an automated drip campaign sent out to the ‘eligible rehires’ community monthly. This can include content such as company success stories, employee testimonials, or information on new product releases
- Send kickers like a 10% discount on merchandise to seasonal workers every quarter.
By keeping the festive season hires warm through the year, holiday recruitment will become simpler the following year. With these simple tips, HR and Talent Acquisition managers can attract quality festive season hires while saving enormous amounts of time.
References:
- How to recruit for the festive season | Frontline Recruitment | Sept 19, 2022
- Seasonal Hiring Tips For The Holidays & Beyond | Smart Recruiters | October 26, 2021
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