Do You Have The Best Job In The World?

This blog will be brief. Also look for ‘What you need to know about job seeker’s search engine habits. Part II.’

It’s likely that you have already heard about the ingenious ‘Win the Best Job in the World’ campaign created by Tourism Queensland to help promote travel and, well, tourism to Queensland and Australia. In case you haven’t heard about the campaign, it began in 2008 and offered the following glamorous job: feeding fish, cleaning the pool and posting weekly blogs about the experience. 34,000 people applied for the job. Did I mention that the job pays around $150,000 and provides housing in a $5m villa on Hamilton Island in the Great Barrier Reef? Did I mention the daily oppportunities for snorkeling, sailing and island-hopping? Yes, it seems likely that the position of ‘Island Caretaker’ could indeed be ‘The Best Job in the World.’

So how do you attract 34,000 job applicants? First of all, aside from the attractive compensation and housing, Tourism Queensland provided their target audience a clear idea of the traits they were looking for and the skills needed for success. According to the organization, in addition to feeding the fish and other such chores, “The successful applicant will be required to report back on their adventures to Tourism Queensland headquarters in Brisbane (and the rest of the world) via weekly blogs, photo diary, video updates and ongoing media interviews.” They were looking for someone adventurous, passionate about the outdoors, willing to try new things, have strong communication skills in English (both as a speaker and in writing) and, of course, the ideal applicant would be a good swimmer who enjoys snorkeling/diving.

So, what about you? Do you have the best job in the world at your organization? Are you hiring for the best job in the world? Wouldn’t it be great if you could reach out to job seekers and say: “Here’s a job you’re going to love. Let me tell you why.” I can already hear you saying “Are you kidding? We don’t have an exotic locale, our job description doesn’t include snorkeling in crystal clear water. Real jobs are not like that.” I disagree. Let’s set our sights just a little lower than the lofty goal of ‘Best Job in the World’, lets focus on matching job seekers with the Best Job Ever…for them. You can find the tell-tale signs of people who have the Best Job Ever (BJE) by asking three simple questions of your organization’s employees: 1) Why did you take this position?, 2) Why do you stay with this organization? and 3) What do you enjoy most about your work experience? Sure you could ask more, but at this point you don’t need a full-fledged survey to track down BJEs — you need to find signs of engagement, passion and fulfillment among your employees. You need to find the stories that highlight what makes you unique.

My job is the Best Job Ever because it allows me to: 1) work with topics which fascinate me, 2) continually challenge myself, acquire new skills and develop those I already have , 3) travel and meet new people, 4) provide comprehensive solutions to specific problems and 5) work with a close-knit team of professionals i respect.

There are BJEs in every organization, what makes your job a BJE or what BJE opportunities exist in your company?

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