If you are a programmer, you understand the meaning and power that TMTOWTDI (pronounced TIM-TOADY) can give you.  It originates from the world of Perl but also programming practices in general  it means that for every solution to a problem, there is more than one way to do it.  There are different ways write the code in order to achieve the desired results.

Now before I receive an onslaught of emails from programmers, I also agree that the simplest, cleanest solution is usually the best for coding and low overhead in a software program.

But for candidate attraction, we need more than one way to find those candidates and attract them to the company.  

How many ways can this be done?  The answer is as many as you can imagine.  Even if you use the simplest method in the world for finding candidates, that does not necessarily guarantee a hire.  So instead, you picture what the perfect candidate profile looks like, and then devise many different paths to get to that candidate profile.  If you just rely on one method, whether simple or esoteric, you are missing out on candidates and possible hires.

It Starts with the Req

Let's take this Environmental Engineer req in Sydney, Australia:

" Track record in  power/energy and civil infrastructure projects.  Senior Environmental Engineer with heavy civil engineering experience.

Reporting to the Project Manager and responsible for ensuring compliance with contractual environmental specifications, environmental legislation and other relevant stakeholder requirements. Demonstrated experience preparing and administering environmental plans and upgrading existing plans.  Standard duties such as erosion and sediment control plans, conservation of native flora and fauna, maintenance of cultural heritage, air quality protection and waste management as well as asbestos management.

Previous experience in heavy civil infrastructure projects in energy, power, oil and gas civil infrastructure is required. An environmental qualification i.e Degree in Environmental Engineering or Sustainability or Science or related is a must. "

First Things First

You can't find it if you don't know what you are looking for. So figure out what an Environmental Engineer does and what else they might be called.  They have several different names, but the constant seems to be a degree in Civil Engineering, Environmental Engineering, or Geotechnical Engineering.  These engineers should have a background in oil and energy.  They should be concerned with environmental impact/waste/hazards and they should comply with standards and codes.

There's More Than One Way to Do it...but how many? 

Here's how the candidate search breaks down:

• Linkedin Searches
• Linkedin Searches from Google
• Job Boards (regular and specialized)
• Engineering Organizations
• Associations
• Social Profiles (Google+, Facebook, Twitter)
• Open Resume Searches

So here's the first search to take a sample size of the landscape.  This can be done in your company's ATS, Monster, or Linkedin internal search (local search within 50 miles from Sydney):

environment "engineer" ("civil engineering" OR "civil engineer" OR "Environmental Engineering" OR "Environmental Engineer") (petroleum OR gas OR refinery OR oil) (compliance OR quality OR "codes" OR hazop OR waste OR pollution)

But there's more than one way to do it, so we search for Linkedin profiles through Google:

site:au.linkedin.com/in OR site:au.linkedin.com/pub "sydney australia" environment "engineer" ("civil engineering" OR "civil engineer" OR "Environmental Engineering" OR "Environmental Engineer") (petroleum OR gas OR refinery OR oil) (compliance OR quality OR "codes" OR hazop OR waste OR pollution) -inurl:dir

Here (Google link) are the results of that search.  You might notice some random single words that are in quotes.  They are there for a reason.  I'm looking for compliance with environmental, regional, or city codes.  But I don't want Google to word-stem codes into code, coding and who knows what else.  So we use the quotes around a single word.

So Give Us More

Using your super sourcing skills and Sherlock Holms-like powers of detection, you see that there are many groups that these candidates belong to:

You can search for these candidates who belong to the groups that you think are valid.  A simple Google search will give you the group members.

The results (Google link) are pretty targeted for the one group that you search:

site:au.linkedin.com/in OR site:au.linkedin.com/pub "sydney australia" "Environmental Engineers Group" -inurl:dir

Not only that, but you can take an organization like Engineers Australia, and you can target group members from Google or the actual website of the organization:

"engineers australia" (bio OR profile) ("civil engineering" OR "civil engineer" OR "Environmental Engineering" OR "Environmental Engineer") (he OR her OR she OR his)

When searching for candidates that belong to world-wide organizations, it is good to add in some general locations of country, state, region, and city.

Even More 

Social profiles can yield more possible candidates.  Google+ is just one example.  There is not much information available on the profiles; just name, company, degree, and location (if they enter this info).  But you can change-up your string to adjust to this social network:

site:plus.google.com (sydney OR australia OR perth OR melbourne OR brisbane) ("Environmental Engineering" OR "Environmental Engineer") ("have her" OR "have him") -inurl:jobs -intitle:jobs -intitle:job -inurl:job

Conclusion, Sequels, and Where to Find More

Well that's enough for now.  We don't want to do ALL the work for you now, do we?  Join us next week for part 2 of this series.  We will talk about candidate attraction and motivation as it applies to this job we used in our example.

If you are in the Australia, New Zealand, APAC area and want to learn more, please attend one of the upcoming Sourcing Social Talent conferences by ATC Events this November.  You will learn how to develop these searches and so much more:

- Mark Tortorici
Founder & Training Expert
Transform Talent Acquisition