Spring Into Your New Career Hiring Event

Target Audience: To fill approximately 200 vacant bus operator roles, this special event was created to target job seekers who were looking to level-up by seeking a career with excellent benefits and pension, paid training, and a $2,000 sign-on bonus. Serious candidates were sought because on-site panel interviews, finger-printing, and conditional offers were promoted as part of the event.

Strategy Objective:The goal was to draw quality candidates to a fun and productive spring event that would expedite the hiring process for qualified bus operator candidates. The recruitment team set a goal of 100 attendees. We wanted to cast a broad net to attract candidates to our event. First, we created an Eventbrite page and incentives to get candidates to pre-register. Then we partnered with a local Bay Area DJ, Shay Diddy of KMEL radio. A paid marketing effort included endorsed content by Shay promoting the hiring event. Shay and the KMEL Street Team would also attend the event providing music, swag, and prizes. Other tactics included bus exterior ads, interior rail hangers, digital billboards, and targeted social media. Once at the event, candidates could walk away with a conditional job offer.

Situation Challenge: As previously stated, AC Transit has a number of vacant bus operator positions that need to be filled to bring bus service back to pre-pandemic levels. To hire candidates that meet AC Transit's high standards, the process can take weeks, even months—from the screening calls, panel interviews, fingerprinting, getting the proper paperwork from the DMV, and finally to background checks—before a new bus operator can enter a training class. Candidates have to be willing to do the groundwork involved, which can often prolong the process even further. This event aimed at bringing several of these steps together in a marathon 1-day event.

Results Impact: The hiring event proved to be extremely successful. The Eventbrite page received more than 5,000 visits and 300 candidates pre-registered before we had to close registration a week before the event due to demand. Our marketing tactics also drew lots of attention, with the Shay Diddy and KMEL social media promotion alone receiving more than 37,000 post engagements and nearly 3,000 total clicks. On the day of the event, 157 candidates were able to move through the entire process, with 127 candidates receiving conditional offers during the event. More candidates were able to initiate the process, creating leads for the Recruitment team to follow up on. The marketing tactics were designed to match the event branding, so the campaign and event had a cohesive, spring-theme.

Why Submit: Like many transit agencies around the country, AC Transit is struggling to keep our bus operator ranks fully staffed. With very high standards for our workforce, the steps to hire one bus operator, let alone hundreds, can create bottlenecks that our recruitment staff can't efficiently handle on their own. By creating an event that rolled many steps into one day and bringing in more than 50 District staff members to assist with interviews, what might have taken all summer was accomplished in one day. Additionally, the partnership between the Marketing and Recruitment teams created a highly produced event that exceeded our goals, as well as reaching a broad audience with a hiring message.