These challenges have pushed more organisations to reconsider their recruitment strategy, the type of candidates they are looking to recruit, and the tools they use to reach and attract the right individuals.
One solution that ICAEW Authorised Training Employers turn to, when looking to attract future finance talent for their business, is ICAEW Training Vacancies. As an exclusive benefit available to training employers, our platform allows you to advertise training roles to potential students looking to begin or continue ACA training.
Benefits of Training Vacancies
The Training Vacancies platform enables you to reach a pool of engaged students actively looking to begin their finance career. Within the platform you can even access a reporting dashboard, giving you insights into the performance of your adverts in real time.
With easy-to-use features, you can quickly create a branded company profile and upload job adverts. Our dedicated support team is on hand to offer support and guidance, ensuring you attract the right talent to grow your organisation.
And it's all available completely free of charge for Authorised Training Employers!
Best practice top tips
Standing out in a sea of recruiters may seem challenging, but there are some sure-fire ways to ensure you catch a candidate's eye.
Company profile
A well rounded and up-to-date company profile sets the foundation for your Training Vacancies recruitment strategy. This will be the first point-of-call for candidates to understand who you are and what your company stands for.
We recommend including;
- A full company name and logo – these work as initial identifiers for candidates to quickly understand who you are, and potentially recall your brand from other areas, such as your social media, email communications and more.
- A complete company description (with a section dedicated to company culture) – as a generation who highly values authenticity, Gen Z candidates will look for organisations that provide an honest dialogue, with a consistent reflection of company culture.
- A link to your company website – this allows candidates to dive deeper into your organisation, ensuring you are the 'right fit' for them before they apply.
- Preferred location – providing this from the outset allows candidates to weigh up whether they could realistically commute or if hybrid/remote working is available.
- Preferred contact information – with this, candidates can choose to request more information about a role before applying. Posting this information with your 'contacts' name also provides personalisation, making candidates feel like they are connecting with a real person.
Training Vacancies has the functionality to post roles, report on application volumes and hold application information all on-site. Simply add the contact details you prefer to your profile and create a job advert using our application template – this will be the form candidates complete to apply. We recommend keeping this process on-site if possible, as it will be a seamless experience for your candidates and easy to track. If, however, you use a different application or contact recording system, such as Dynamics 365 or HubSpot, you can include a redirect link in your profile and job advert to direct applicants to your own website to complete an application.
Job details
This section needs to take candidates on a journey through awareness, interest, desire and eventually action, in the form of a completed application. And it's pretty simple to achieve!
One very important, but often excluded, piece of information is the salary. According to the 2023/24 'What do graduates want?' survey from Bright Network, found that 80% of students would not apply for a job if the salary isn't listed. This information is particularly relevant when 84% of students think the cost-of-living crisis will impact their career prospects*.
Whether you keep your application process on the Training Vacancies platform, or redirect them to an external form or website, your job description needs to be clear and engaging. Make sure to include your company benefits, whether you have hybrid or flexible working, your application closing date, location, clear candidate expectations and role expectations.
Candidates similarly like to see a snippet of what your company culture is like. Being open and honest about your culture, diversity and employee activities, paints a realistic image for candidates as to why they should consider working for you.
Be clear in your advert about what the recruitment process will involve. Being transparent by including information on how many rounds of interviews there will be and the expected timelines for each stage for example will help candidates feel informed and prepared.
It is also good to include information on what you are looking for from the ideal candidate. Bright Network's 'What do graduates want?' survey found that students believe that the number one thing employers are looking for is existing industry experience, whereas employers ranked this as 12th on list. Including information about what you are looking for from the ideal candidate, like passion, communication and problem solving skills and resilience may help to increase the number of applications you receive.
CV search
Training Vacancies also features a CV search. Allowing you to view a list of partly qualified students looking to continue their training with an Authorised Training Employer. This feature allows you to recruit trainees who have already completed a number of exams and come with more knowledge and experience than those at the start of their training journey. Using filters and a set of criteria, you can customise this search feed to show you candidates with the attributes you are looking for.
Attracting the next generation
It is vital that you understand the motivations of Gen Z, what they are looking for in an employer and what they want from their career. Your recruitment strategy should be aligned to these motivations to ensure you can attract and retain the next generation of chartered accountants. Once you understand what Gen Z look for, and how to attract them, you can tailor your messaging and offers to fit. This short guide aims to help you attract the next generation through Training Vacancies.
Expanding your reach
What can we do?
Our student attraction team can include your vacancy in our 'Job of the Week' social media series. In doing this, your role will be posted to over 350,000 followers, via the ICAEW student social media platforms, every Monday for one month.
You can also become an ICAEW featured 'Employer of the Month' where your company profile will appear in our student facing monthly newsletter and a promotional banner added to the home page of the Training Vacancies platform.
Three selected roles from the 'Employer of the Month' and 'Job of the Week' will also be featured in our student facing monthly newsletter.
What can you do?
A great feature of the Training Vacancies platform that you can take advantage of is the ability to collaborate with us on 'student facing' blogs, such as a 'day in the life of a student'. These will provide additional avenues for candidates to explore why they should work with you. It is also a great way for you to openly promote incentives or important projects you think might be attractive but don't fit right in your vacancy posting.
Optimise your student recruitment with ICAEW Training Vacancies
From the wide candidate pool available to consolidating job adverts, applications and reporting all in one place, completely free of charge – its clear to see why so many Authorised Training Employers are already using Training Vacancies to recruit their next trainees.
If you are already authorised to train with ICAEW, all you need to do is register today to start posting job vacancies. Take a look at this helpful step-by-step guide to find out more.
If you are not yet an ICAEW Authorised Training Employer, start the quick and easy process with these three steps, allowing you to train ACA students and utilise the Training Vacancies platform to recruit your first trainee.
And remember, our dedicated support team is here to help no matter where you are in your recruitment or training journey.
* "What do graduates want?" 2023/24 – Bright Network