There are industries where the war for talent has long been declared.

This is the case in the very particular world of consulting where certain profiles are in extremely high demand. For PwC, Deloitte, Accenture or KPMG, the stakes are high: the talents they recruit constitute almost all of their future wealth !

All or almost all tricks are allowed, between these different industry players to attract the best. And only the most innovative and creative HR strategies manage to attract the precious passive candidates.

In this highly competitive world, Accenture has been able to stand out with an original and sustained approach, particularly on social networks.

An innovative Employer Brand Ambassador program

For one week, Accenture is giving an employee carte blanche on Twitter and Facebook to talk about their daily life and reveal images of their work life. With the hashtag #CMdelasemaine, the lucky one speaks on a regular basis. 

On Twitter, followers can ask live questions to the Community Managers of the day on the Accenture Recrute account. These hand-picked employees then become employer brand ambassadors.

Anne-Sophie, on the other hand, introduces us to some former colleagues:

Roundly run Twitter recruitment campaigns 

Social networks are regularly fueled with events that bring together dozens of internet users using media like Periscope.

A dual strategy of brand ambassador and social recruiting

With this approach, Accenture aims to pique the interest of potential candidates by embellishing its Brand Content with a fresh touch. Through the testimonials of the "CM of the Week," future Accenture employees can see what their daily lives might be like at the company.

We're almost seeing a storytelling with enough authenticity (but still professionally) that the people who follow the brand's recruiting accounts  on social networks believe in the storytelling

Objectively, this is some very good Social Media Management work applied to Recruitment 2.0

The limit in approaching passive candidates

Could Accenture's digital efforts be called an inbound approach? Not really.

The use of social networks and the production of interesting content by employees are indeed tools of the Inbound Recruiting, but the consulting giant's strategy doesn't really reach passive, candidates, i.e., the ones who didn't take the first step of going to the Facebook page to click on the page or subscribe to the Twitter account.

Even though Accenture has substantial communities on its social media recruitment platforms (8,800 followers on Twitter, more than 21,000 likes on the Facebook page), the interactions generated by the posts will not reach anyone other than the  active candidates, who already want to specifically join this company.

On average, the number of retweets or likes on content does not exceed about ten per posted content, which is too few to radiate beyond the circle of "fans".

This would require relaying business-oriented information, with keywords that are radically outside the recruitment universe. While the French version lacks this depth, it is not the case with the parent company.

Accenture US is currently one of the few companies in the world that has truly embraced Inbound Recruiting. Their site has a blogging space called "Accenture Careers Blog" where you can find content related to the group's business and expertise to attract talent. This is the very definition of Inbound Recruiting!

Accenture France is therefore a very good example of a company that knows how to exploit social networks to improve its recruitment. Let's see if it will be able to evolve towards the most successful form of this strategy.