CCAJob.com: The New Online Welcome Wagon for Potential Employees

"I think it's human nature to want to be on a winning team," says Warden Lane Blair of Diamondback Correctional Facility. "CCA is the founder and leader of partnership corrections. We are the biggest and most established. Those are some of the main reasons I chose CCA. And I'm glad I did."

Choosing and creating a winning team is also the intent behind CCA's newest Web site, CCAJob.com. With a distinct tone, inviting personality and welcoming theme – "Expect the Best – from yourself, your career and CCA" – the new site was developed to attract the best and brightest to CCA.

The site's theme is derived from two ideologies across the company – from Steve Kaiser, managing director, Staff and Organization Development, and Warden Blair.

"CCA's vision is to be the best adult corrections system in the United States," explains Kaiser. "To achieve that goal, we the need the best people; we need to hire the best. So everything we are doing now in Human Resources is built around that theme."

Diamondback staff are already familiar with the slogan, "Expect the Best". Blair openly shares his philosophy of expecting the best among his staff and facility inmates from their first day at the facility.

"In our personal and professional lives, we meet our own expectations," he explains. "If you think it's going to be a good day, it will be. During employee pre-service training and throughout the facility, we talk about working to create a better tomorrow than we had today. And I always tell all staff to expect the best – of me, your co-workers and even the inmates."

Engaging Generation Y

But there's more to CCA's new recruitment site than the slogan. The site is also designed to connect with the Millennial generation (Generation Y), typically born in the 1980s and 1990s and known for their tech-savvy background.

A January 2009 Pew Research Center study, Generational Differences in Online Activities, found that 47 percent of all online adults use the Internet to get information about a job, while 64 percent of Millennials (usually in their late teens to late 20s) use the Internet to seek job information.

"Workforce projections indicate that by 2014, Millennials will comprise nearly one out of every three workers in the workforce," explains Ben Elrod, CCA managing director, Compensation & Employee Benefits. "By 2020, Millennials will represent nearly half of the workforce. (See related story on InsideCCA.com)

"Online communication is what they know best. Rather than wait for someone to tell them how or what to do, they would rather go online and search for the answer themselves. It also fits with their social perspective, since online communications links them with like-minded people or subject matter experts across the world."

CCA is also actively working to accommodate the Millennial population with other online initiatives such as CCA's online news site, InsideCCA, and the company's Twitter, YouTube and Facebook pages.

First Impressions Count

"We know that online job seekers constitute the majority of traffic to the www.correctionscorp.com Web site," explains Jenna Slocum, CCA director, Communications. "So it only makes sense to give this large and targeted audience a Web site that is designed to meet their specific needs, serving as an introduction to CCA, company culture and the benefits of a career with our company."

Special CCAJob.com features include extensive photos of employees, videos of employee career testimonials and links to CCA's social media outlets.

"For many prospective employees, their first encounter with our company may very well be a visit to our Web site," says Kaiser. "It's important that in their first impression we begin to get the message across that you're joining the best. 'Expect the Best' is such a cool way to put it because we are expecting the best from the new employee, but, in turn, they can expect the best from CCA."

"We've got to get it right, to get new employees in the door and keep them here," says Blair.

Making a Connection

"Research shows companies that are able to connect with a candidate are more likely to succeed in hiring them," says Wendy Gardner, CCA senior director, Staffing. "In addition, most candidates are attracted to a company with a positive reputation, and CCAJob.com accurately portrays our culture, The CCA Way and growth and development opportunities."

Real employee photos, authentic first-person testimonials and videos featuring current employees aim to help future CCA employees connect with their prospective colleagues, facilities and the company as a whole.

"We get to hear why CCA employees like to come to work every day, why they chose corrections, how they feel about CCA training and promotional opportunities and how they describe CCA culture," Slocum says.

"I really like the videos of different staff talking about their experiences," explains Blair. "Those new to corrections are looking to overcome the perceptions of what television and the movies have portrayed. Seeing and hearing employees gives them sense of who our employees really are."

Visit the new site at www.ccajob.com. Know someone looking for a job with CCA? Tell them about www.ccajob.com.

By Jenna Slocum
Correct Perspectives, May 2010