Using Video to Recruit Great Summer Camp Staff

Getting great people to work at your camp is an incredibly important part of a camp director’s job (keeping great staff is a bigger issue that I’ll write more about this winter).

I found this video on the recruiting page of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank (a non-profit doing amazing things for hunger issues in the developing world).   Let’s look at what it does for CFB:

• It gives the organization some personality - “Hey, we’re real people, with cool ideas, who can sort of draw.”
• It shows off the true spirit of the place - you understand from the video that this is a faith-based organization that is focused on bringing food to those who don’t have enough. We now know their values
• It allows the people of CFB to express themselves- by not “enforcing” a company line but allowing the people to write their own answers this video shows off the uniqueness of all of the people who work there
• It shows (not tells) us that this is a national organization - this also adds value to a potential recruit by demonstrating that there are people from across the country involved.
• It’s FUN - good music, personal pictures, people laughing and smiling.

I’d love to work there.

Your Recruiting Task:

1. Ask your staff to send you a photo from their webcams at school, their phones when visiting cool places or their cameras at home answering this question: How does Camp _______  make the world a better place?
2. Take a half an hour and put it together in iMovie.
3. Place it on your website under staff recruiting.

I bet you’ll be surprised at how creative they can be!

How is your summer camp using all of the tools available to recruit the best possible staff?

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