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Social Media and Recruitment CEO of Major Boston Hospital takes to Social Media

February 15

Paul Levy, President and CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, authors a blog entitled, "Running A Hospital," which serves, in part, as a major communication platform with past, present and future employees. Levy posts content regarding industry news, proving to his readers that the hospital staff is aware of current medical trends and breakthroughs. His posts regarding the hospital's implementation of programs and work practices convey thought leadership within the healthcare industry. Levy also publishes a post about every employee awarded the "Caller-Outer of the Month" recognition, given to a staff member who calls out a problem in the workplace, noting their contribution to safety, quality, efficiency and a better work environment. Publicly announcing the award combined with posting pictures of employees' aids in employee recognition efforts, team building and boosting morale. To ensure nurses and other employees enjoy reading the blog, Levy also posts humorous pictures and even poetry about healthcare, making "Running A Hospital" an interesting read.

Not all healthcare providers invite this openness and it's highly dependent on your corporate culture as to how your company will utilize social media so it's pertinent for you to have all of the facts before engaging in a program geared specifically toward employment and employee communications.

Just as you may search for a potential candidate on social networks and sift through their online activity before extending an employment offer, rest assured, potential candidates are reading up on your organization and searching for any skeletons in your organization's closet as well. Current and former employees are able to sound off about what they love and hate about working for your organization on their social network profiles and on sites like JobVent. This site allows current and former employees to rate their company on pay, benefits, work/life balance, career potential and other variables. It also contains a comment field for the employee to specifically share what they love/hate about their employer. The ratings are averaged to give employers an overall score that can be used for comparison against competitors. Negative ratings and comments could be the deciding factor in whether or not a candidate accepts your job offer. Managing your online reputation can be broken down into two phases:

  • Monitoring Your Reputation - First, be aware of the conversation regarding your organization. Find out what real people are actually saying about you as an employer. This knowledge will empower you to combat any negative messages being spread online.
  • Preach Your Brand and Overarching Message - Although you can't control what is being said about your organization online, you can influence it! If search results for your organization only consist of negative content, what are googling job seekers supposed to believe? You can control what's on your own website, blog and social media profiles. Turn them into opportunities to spread your brand's overarching message.

To educate recruiters and decision makers on leveraging social media, TMP Worldwide has developed a Social Networking Workshop. The program is a comprehensive, interactive, in-person workshop that focuses specifically on Social Networking; showing savvy recruiters how to engage with, and actively participate in, Social Networks and credibly build Employer Brand awareness as well as how to intelligently advertise and communicate effectively in this medium. The workshop also teaches how to network with and source top candidates.

TMP Worldwide also offers the "What's My Buzz?" feature within our TMP Pathways product. "What's My Buzz?" is the initial entrance into brand monitoring on the web. The goal of 'What's My Buzz' is to show a dashboard view of the amount of 'buzz' around a company — news articles and blog posts that can be found on the web on a daily basis. The offering provides a constant view of what people are saying about your organization, links to where they're saying it, what job seekers are finding out about your organization when they research via search engines and additional buzz surrounding other keywords and terms relevant to your employer brand. The feature also provides daily trends on the quantity of buzz mentioning your company.

Because job seekers utilize the internet and social media to search for a job and research employers, it is of the utmost importance to manage your reputation online. By engaging in social media, you are able to monitor and influence your organization's presence on the internet which is what Paul Levy does every time he takes to his blog. There is a conversation about your organization taking place on social media sites and online in general - whether you deem it permissible or not. It's best to join the conversation and spread your overarching message rather than letting your brand become vulnerable to disgruntled patients, family members or former employees who may portray your organization in a negative light.

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