Reviewing the 2007 Creative Excellence Awards winners was an interesting exercise, not unlike looking at the ERE REA winners. At the conclusion of this program, I get to make my personal awards for the best of the best. This award is the MBA (Modified Bettinger Awards) Best Corporate Careers Website. Had I been able to make it to New Orleans on 23 April, this would have been my presenter’s speech:

Full disclosure – I was one of the many judges for the 2007 CEA program. I did not judge the Online Media “E2-Corporate Employment Web Site” category.

“In the Creative Excellence Awards (CEA) program, four web sites have been recognized as finalists for MBA Best Corporate Careers Web Site. Each of the sites is good, but only one site can be the best. And the best of this year’s entries is:

FedEx!”

Here are my ranking (the link goes to my site review):
1st: FedEx, Agency: Bernard Hodes Group (CEA rank 1st)
2nd: CSC Consulting, Agency: Computer Sciences Corporation (CEA rank HM)
3rd: Verizon Business, Agency: NAS Recruitment Communications (CEA rank 3rd)
4th: Intrawest, Agency: Bayard Advertising (CEA rank #2)

The tiny, fixed-size window killed Intrawest’s score. Verizon got nailed for the cheesy stock photos. The Hodes IQ engine really helped FedEx. None of the CEA participants used Taleo.

Go take a look at these sites for yourself. Then let me know your thoughts.

Last week’s Creative Excellence Awards (CEA) recognized four web sites as finalists for Best Corporate Careers Website:

1st: FedEx, Agency: Bernard Hodes Group
2nd: Intrawest, Agency: Bayard Advertising
3rd: Verizon Business, Agency: NAS Recruitment Communications
HM: CSC Consulting, Agency: Computer Sciences Corporation

Because I visited and reviewed the REA sites, I’m working on visiting and critiquing each of the CEA sites. Like before, I’ll look at some standard areas, and then point out the good, the bad and the ugly. I encourage you to visit and share your thoughts in the comments.

The CEA choice for best web site, Fedex was also my personal choice for the best REA web site. I stand by my previous opinion, which can be found here.

An interesting note from this week’s review of the Recruiting Excellence Awards (for corporate recruiting) and the Creative Excellence Awards (for advertising/branding agencies) is the lack of crossover. I expected to see some of the same names of the top REA winners on the top CEA client lists. It didn’t happen.

It looks like only five companies show up on both lists:

Fair Isaac (NAS)
FedEx (Hodes)
Microsoft (JWT)
Sodexho (TMP)
Starbucks (NAS)

Granted, the CEA listed 60 companies, and REA only listed 18. Also, the military recruiters in the CEA list are not in the same class as the corporate warriors in the REA. However, it is interesting to note the differences between the two lists.

Reviewing the Recruiting Excellence Awards winners was an interesting exercise. The corporate culture of all four organizations comes through strongly, (sometimes intentionally, and sometimes not!) These web sites show what can be done with will, time and vision.

So, if Dr. John Sullivan asked me to serve as judge, and present the statue to the winner, here’s what I would say.

Best Corporate Careers Website, MBA (Modified Bettinger Awards):

This award is for the best Corporate Careers website of the four highlighted at REA. Using the Bo Derek scale (rating from 1 to 10 with 10 high), I’ll rank the contestants thus (link goes to my review):

* FedEx 10
* Rackspace Managed Hosting 9
* Starbucks 8
* Citigroup: 6

And the MBA Winner is: FedEx!

Maybe more companies need to enter the contest next year.

PS: John – I’ll hold the banquet weekend open for you. Give a ring and I’ll be there!

Rackspace Managed Hosting

The smallest company on the list, Rackspace was nominated for “Best Corporate Careers Website” in this year’s REA. They didn’t win, losing out to Starbucks. They did a great job. Rackspace runs a separate careers site which is branded differently from their business page. They had the best branding.

SITE DETAILS
+ Direct Link on Front Page? Yes
+ Using www.rackspace.jobs domain? Yes
+ Present benefits information? Yes, “The Super, Duper, Uber-tastic Benefits Package” (TM pending)
+ Present Company Culture Information? Yes – multiple links, including a big button at the top
+ Present Job Preview Information? Yes and no
+ Response sent to applicant? Don’t know. Nothing in the area, couldn’t apply.

JOB POSTINGS:
+ ATS Engine: HRsmart
+ Postings Dated? No
+ Show Specific Work Site? No. City locations only
+ Show Explicit Travel Amount? No
+ Show Salary Information? No
+ Consistent posting formats? No – widely variable
+ Steps to apply: everything is on one screen

IMPRESSIONS, THOUGHTS AND WHINING:
+ OVERALL: My People! These are my people! Very well done! Provides a consistent message, great visuals, and real people.
+ GOOD: Strong branding, theme carries over all pages.
+ GOOD: Great navigation, well organized.
+ BAD: The monospaced Courier font is a bit hard to read at times.
+ BAD: Job postings are vague, don’t show travel, salary or location.

FedEx

FedEx was nominated for “Best Corporate Careers Website” in this year’s REA. They didn’t win, losing out to Starbucks. After visiting their site today, I wondered why they fell short. I give them high marks – better than Starbucks.

SITE DETAILS
+ Direct Link on Front Page? Yes
+ Using www.fedex.jobs domain? No
+ Present benefits information? Yes
+ Present Company Culture Information? Yes
+ Present Job Preview Information? Yes
+ Response sent to applicant? Yes – And I got an automatic “thanks but no match” right away.

JOB POSTINGS:
+ ATS Engine: Hodes IQ
+ Postings Dated? No
+ Show Specific Work Site? No. City locations only
+ Show Explicit Travel Amount? Yes – sort of. Shows a vague “Some Travel” on some, others list a percentage
+ Show Salary Information? No
+ Consistent posting formats? No – obviously not a priority
+ Steps to apply: 7

IMPRESSIONS, THOUGHTS AND WHINING:
+ OVERALL: I like the FedEx site. They have a complicated requirement to support 10 different companies, and they carry it off. The images on the site are of real people – they might be models, but they’re wearing, carrying or standing in front of the corporate logo.
+ GOOD: Nice video of a real person at start.
+ GOOD: They make a big deal of the Courier job in their Areas of Talent section. FedEx knows that these are the guys that most people interact with. FedEx doesn’t appear to treat this as a second class job.
+ BAD: Job posting information quality extremely uneven.

Citigroup

Citigroup was nominated for “Best Corporate Careers Website” in this year’s REA. They didn’t win, losing out to Starbucks. A visit to their site today made clear why they didn’t get the glass award.

SITE DETAILS
+ Direct Link on Front Page? Yes
+ Using www.citigroup.jobs domain? No
+ Present benefits information? No
+ Present Company Culture Information? Yes
+ Present Job Preview Information? Not really.
+ Response sent to applicant? Yes
+ Steps to apply: 7

JOB POSTINGS:
+ ATS Engine: Taleo
+ Postings Dated? Yes
+ Show Specific Work Site? Sometimes. Retail sites are shown, professional sites are not.
+ Show Explicit Travel Amount? Yes
+ Show Salary Information? No
+ Consistent posting formats? No – obviously not a priority

IMPRESSIONS, THOUGHTS AND WHINING:
+ OVERALL: Not as good a site as Starbucks. Main impression is of a huge bureaucracy that demands very careful wording on everything. They have just the right number of stock photos of diverse models who don’t work at Citigroup.
+ BAD: Navigation through cultural section is only through the tiny drop-down menu. Why not have arrows to move through all screens?
+ BAD: Navigation tools overall suck. The arrows for the rest of the job lists are tiny. They must assume that I’m surfing this page on my cell phone.
+ BAD: No back arrow to return to the job list. They buried a link at the bottom.
+ BAD: Job search screen is split, and can’t be resized in a full window. (“Go ahead, waste one half of my screen!”)
+ BAD: List of sources doesn’t have the Internet.
+ UGLY: I have to complete a stupid profiler in order to apply.

Last week’s Recruiting Excellence Awards (REA) recognized four web sites as finalists for Best Corporate Careers Website:
* Citigroup
* FedEx
* Rackspace Managed Hosting
* Starbucks WINNER

I hope to visit and critique each site nominated. I’ll look at some standard areas, and then point out the good, the bad and the ugly. I encourage you to visit and share your thoughts in the comments.

Update 03-MAY-07: Welcome to all who linked in from Jason Whitman’s site. The Starbucks review is below. You can check out my REA rankings here, a comparison to the CEA winners here, and a my CEA award rankings here.

Starbucks

Starbucks Coffee was awarded the “Best Corporate Careers Website” this year. A visit to their site left me with some distinct impressions about what “Best” might be. Here are my impressions (standard disclaimers apply).

SITE DETAILS
+ Direct Link on Front Page? No
+ Career Entry Point: About Us
+ Using www.starbucks.jobs domain? No – but splash page is available on HotJobs
+ Present benefits information? Yes
+ Present Company Culture Information? Yes
+ Present Job Preview Information? Yes
+ Response sent to applicant? Yes

JOB POSTINGS:
+ ATS Engine: Taleo
+ Postings Dated? Yes
+ Show Specific Work Site? No
+ Show Explicit Travel Amount? No
+ Show Salary Information? No
+ Consistent posting formats? Mostly
+ Steps to apply: 6

IMPRESSIONS, THOUGHTS AND WHINING:
+ OVERALL IMPRESSION: Hip, cool and eco-conscious with a focus on giving back to the community. Navigation is a problem on the site.
+ GOOD: They have tons of jobs, and have organized them well.
+ BAD: Asks if you want to search US jobs, then makes you complete a second step of choosing what country to search.
+ BAD: Their location engine requires way too many clicks to get where I want. This is awkward and requires extra clicks. Most of their hiring looks to tied to local retail outlets. Can’t they grab my IP address and ask if I want to look nearby?
+ BAD: First job splash screen shows lots of jobs in Washington State. I’m nowhere near Washington State.
+ BAD: Have sliced up Colorado to make it hard to look in neighboring locales.
+ BAD: They don’t have a category for Retail.

Not to be confused with the Creative Excellence Awards, the Recruiting Excellence Awards were handed out last week at the ERE Spring 2007 Expo in San Diego. This program is run by ERE.NET, and specifically targets recruiting and related talent acquisition successes. Only corporations can apply – no agencies are allowed. The judging panel is a mix of high-profile Staffing gurus – Sullivan and Adler – and winners from last year.

So – Congratulations to the 2007 Recruiting Excellence Award Winners:

Best Diversity Program: Compuware Corporation
Best Corporate Careers Website: Starbucks
Most Innovative Employee Referral Program: Tenet Healthcare
Best Employer Brand: Intuit
Most Effective Use of Staffing Metrics: AIMCO
Most Innovative Recruiting Process or Departmental Structure: Whirlpool
Best Employee Retention Program/Practices: AIMCO
Best College Recruiting Program: Ernst & Young
Most Strategic Use of Recruitment Technology: Electronic Arts
Recruiter of the Year: Achuthan Nair, Wipro Technologies

After a bit of web work, I’ll post some further reflections on the different web and branding entries. It will be interesting to see if any of the REA winners are CEA winners too!