Need to hire a virtual assistant? I’ve hired 5 in my career and thought I’d share the virtual assistant job description template I use for these hires. I like to think I get better each time I write a new JD to hire a VA. And special thanks to my friend Ramit Sethi of I Will… Read more »
Posts by Rob Kelly
A Secret & Easy Way to Recruit Veterans from Your Career Site
Want to recruit veterans or enlisted members of the military? I’m guessing yes. There are 1 million+ people in the U.S. Armed Forces and 250,000 per year transition out of the U.S. military. If you want to recruit veterans better, first you have to speak their language…their job lingo in particular. Veterans and enlisted members… Read more »
5 Examples of Affirmative Action Plan Statements
Some of you need to have affirmative action plans, according to the Executive Order 11246 Title 41 Affirmative Action Requirements. As part of this, you publish what’s called an affirmative action statement (or “affirmative action policy statement”) Below are 5 samples of affirmative action statements. You might also check out SHRM’s “Affirmative Action: Statement of Affirmative… Read more »
7 Examples of the Questions Top Brands Use to Start Their Job Postings
Starting your job posting with a question is smart and effective. Just like it’s proven in sales that asking questions can convert customers at 10X the rate than average (see the SPIN Selling book), so too does asking questions in your job ads. The reason? Yep, I just asked YOU the reader a question. 🙂… Read more »
10+ Examples of Awesome Inclusion Statements
Inclusion Statements appear on web pages, in job postings and, sometimes, in bigger reports (see PepsiCo below). They have become vital copy to attract the best talent. After all, the best talent values inclusivity. Below are 10+ examples of Inclusion Statements I hope you draw inspiration from. Note: If you like this article, you might… Read more »
15 Examples of an Awesome “About Us” Statement
An About Us statement is a critical piece job posting or web site. Like any content on your job pages, it’s an opportunity to sell the candidate! After reviewing thousands of About Us statements through our Text Analyzer job description software, I want to share a few things in this article: What content to consider… Read more »
Here’s What Happened When I Appeared on Recruiting Brainfood (Boom!)
Do you know about the email newsletter by Hung Lee called Recruiting Brainfood? If you’re into recruiting, you should. Here’s an example of its influence. On 2 recent Recruiting Brainfood newsletters (August 25th and Sept. 1st), Hung Lee linked to Ongig articles I wrote. The traffic and # of leads from Brainfood ranked right up… Read more »
How and Why to Attract Former Felons in Your Job Postings
With unemployment in the U.S. at the lowest rate (3.9%) in 19 years, companies like Apple, Boeing, McDonalds and Delta Airlines are hiring former felons. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo describes this massive talent pool: “70 million Americans have a criminal record—that’s 1 in 3 adults. There are currently 2.3 million people behind bars in this… Read more »
Top Applicant Tracking Systems Leading Employers Migrate To (2019)
An applicant tracking system migration is one of the biggest HR projects you’ll face in talent acquisition. Are you curious which ATS systems leading employers are moving to? As part of our research into ATS market share (see Top ATS Systems Used by the Fortune 500 in 2019 (Workday Beats Taleo) and The Top Applicant Tracking Systems… Read more »
5 Easy Ways to Remove LGBTQ Bias from Your Job Descriptions
Do the words in your job descriptions contain LGBTQ bias? If you’re hiring 100+ people per year, it’s more likely than not that your job descriptions contain LGBTQ bias, according to Ongig’s Text Analyzer job description software. I’ll give you some tips to remove LGBTQ bias below. First off, what is LGBTQ? The acronym stands… Read more »
How Does Jeff Bezos Score Writing His First Amazon Job Ad?
Early Amazon employee Glenn Fleishman told Internet History Podcast that Amazon had a hard time hiring developers in its early days. We decided to run Amazon’s first known job posting (from August 22, 1994) through Ongig’s Text Analyzer software to see how his job description text scores using today’s best technology. Ongig’s Text Analyzer is… Read more »
7 Tips on Job Posting Wording
Job posting wording has a direct impact on your quality applications. Here are 7 tips that should help you nail your wording. Job Posting Wording Tip #1: Keep Your Job Title Simple The most important first words of your job posting are those in its job title. The job title affects whether a candidate opens up the… Read more »
Caution: Avoid These 3 “Exclusionary” Personal Pronoun Mistakes in Job Descriptions
Using the wrong personal pronoun (he, she, his, her, etc.) can turn off groups of candidates. Here are 3 examples of personal pronouns NOT to use along with synonyms I recommend. Personal Pronoun/Job Description Tip #1: Don’t Refer to Candidate as “He” Check out this first job ad below. In the second paragraph it reads:… Read more »
The 50 Most Used Adverbs in Job Descriptions (and which ones you should delete)
A talent leader asked me when she should use adverbs in writing job descriptions. It turns out using too many adverbs in your job descriptions reduces your apply rate (more on that below). Reminder on the definition of adverbs: adverbs are intensifier words that give greater definition to an adjective, verb or other adverb. Most… Read more »
Top ATS Systems Used by the Fortune 500 in 2019 (Workday Beats Taleo)
2020 Editor’s NOTE — We have the updated version for 2020 here: Top Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS Software) in 2020 Enjoy! — Rob ——————- Workday is the #1 ATS system used by Fortune 500 companies, narrowly beating Taleo. That’s what we found after a review of the 476 Fortune 500 companies that show their applicant tracking… Read more »