The ultimate guide for attracting and retaining seasonal workers

Whether it’s planning for the Christmas rush, tax time, volunteers or peak holiday seasons, hiring seasonal talent can be challenging at the best of times. In the current climate, the challenges facing businesses are even greater, as seasonal demand clashes with the additional challenges of worker shortages, low immigration and rising labour costs. 

However, there are several strategies businesses can put into action that can help overcome current obstacles and provide a blueprint for future seasonal cycles. 

Plan ahead to get an early start 

Planning may seem like a no brainer. Yet some businesses still leave recruitment until a month or so before the season, by which time the best of the talent pool has already been snapped-up by the early birds. It’s never too early to begin a seasonal recruitment plan that will set-up your organisation to be staffed and ready to go when the season hits. 

There are several key factors that can maximise your ability to get the right talent when and where you need them. 

• Review data from previous seasonal hires to help you create a realistic model for this year’s goals. Use it to plan how many people you need, and the number of applications and interviews needed to achieve this. 
• Review your application process. Is it easy to use, streamlined and does it cover the key touch points to help sort promising candidates? If you haven’t already, consider software that can help manage the flow of applicants and alert you when an application mentions skills you’re specifically looking for. 
• Create an effective recruitment advertising strategy based on what’s been successful in the past, combined with updated data on the current market. Review your job advertisements and descriptions and ensure they’re up-to-date, precise and reflect your brand. 
• Ensure you have a proven onboarding process ready to go that gets candidates up and running successfully. The more confident seasonal hires feel in doing their job ensures fewer problems at peak times and happier staff who may be ready to sign-up for next season. 
• Offer remote or hybrid work options where feasible to attract candidates looking for this popular perk.  

Considering how long the interview process usually takes, key seasonal dates you will require staff for and how long the onboarding process takes, start advertising and interviewing as early as you can. 

Keep in touch with your previous seasonal workers 

It’s well worth staying in touch with seasonal workers you’ve employed before. It shows that they’re valued by your business, despite not being permanent. It also ensures you have an up-to-date database to support ongoing hiring goals and help reduce the cost of attracting new candidates. 

Staying in touch does not have to be elaborate: periodic updates about how the organisation is faring thanks to their efforts and making them feel included in your organisation’s journey is often enough. 

Consider an employee referral program to find quality candidates quickly. Employee-referred hires tend to perform better and stay with organisations longer. They can also usually be relied upon to be quality candidates, as it isn’t in the employee’s interest to recommend someone who won’t be an asset to the business. 

Incentives or rewards should be offered for successful referrals, as the cost of these far outweighs the time, money and effort spent in looking for new hires from scratch.  

You should also keep details of unsuccessful candidates who impressed but weren’t right for the position at the time, as they may be just what you’re looking for in the future.  

Create a recruitment advertising campaign that works 

Many people have businesses in mind that they think they’d like to work for, which has a lot to do with how your advertising shapes their perception of you. As job seekers are increasingly engaging across a variety of channels, including social media, your recruitment campaign needs to build on your brand and increase your company’s reach.  

• Think of your candidates as you would customers. Know your audience - who you are trying to attract, and which platforms do they use?  
• Tailor your content to match both your audience and the channels they use. Your content should be designed to capture both active job seekers and passive talent. Where are workers most likely to look for work? How do you position yourself in front of talent not actively looking right now? Consider ramping up paid social, display advertising, paid search, native advertising and job media well before you need to hire. 
• Make sure your job advertisements and descriptions are upfront about your employee values and benefits, such as bonuses or staff discounts.  

Think outside the conventional candidate box 

Have you been wading in too shallow a talent pool? Is it time to expand beyond the traditional age group or practices you usually turn to for your seasonal hires? From high school students through to retirees and everything in between, you may be missing out on great candidates, ready and willing to work, and the experience and enthusiasm they could bring. Not to mention the positive impact a more diverse workforce can bring to an organisation and its brand. Hire for skills and coachability, and non-traditional candidates may turn out to be some of your greatest hires. 

Don’t forget the ‘follow up’ 

In this competitive market, you should never let a candidate wait more than a week for a response, especially if they’re someone you want to hire. Someone with a more efficient follow-up process will be sure to have snapped them up in the meantime. 

Just as important as following-up successful candidates is your follow-up with unsuccessful candidates. As we mentioned earlier, this can be a talent pool worth tapping into in the future.  

Firstly, it gives the candidate a good impression of your organisation and the way it treats its employees. But, more importantly, when a role that does match their skill set comes up, your professionalism in following-up will make them more likely to consider accepting the job, despite missing out on the earlier opportunity.  

As job seekers tend to network, good follow-up also builds strong positive word-of-mouth, and a good reputation spreads just as quickly as a bad one.  

How you end the season with your seasonal staff is also critical for future seasonal hiring. It’s worth taking the time to do exit interviews, even for short-term workers. After all, they bring a fresh perspective to your business, and their feedback on what works and what doesn’t can help you plan more effectively next season. 

And the first question to ask in that exit interview? “Are you free next year?”. If you’ve been happy with their work and they’ve been happy working with you, it may be the simplest hiring strategy you need. Especially if they too are regularly looking for seasonal work.