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Recruitment on the French tube: a new trend?

By Myriam Boussaboua

This is a real moment of editorial emotion...Here is my first post on this blog as a member of Johnson King, a Finn Partners company! 

Today, obtaining a first job both in France and abroad is still not that easy. Many factors do not favour first-time employment – for example, the economic climate that we live in today, or even university education that doesn’t lead to ‘concrete’ jobs (especially in the artistic sector) – which is discouraging more and more young people to get their foot in the door. Fortunately, the vast world of ‘Web 2.0’ offers a range of significant options for the younger generation to find THE job of their dreams, although European statistics on youth employment reveal only a slight increase for the year 2015.

It is clear that social networks are increasingly being used and, in some ways, their new features are altering the ‘original’ purpose of social networks, going beyond the simple ‘keeping-in-touch’ function with our friends and family.

According to a recent survey from the French specialist in outsourced solutions for the acquisition and management of talent, Talentpeople, the number of job vacancies on the internet almost doubled between March 2014 and March 2015 in France, amounting to more than 700,000 jobs online. On the issue of employment, and with the obvious increase of social networks’ new users, the question is whether we are in a position to wonder about the efficiency of online recruitment?

As a reminder, online recruitment is fairly new. It wasn’t until the early 2000s that social networks had dedicated sections for employment. Two websites, where you likely had your first professional exchanges with colleagues and old classmates took place, come to mind: in 2003 the US company, LinkedIn, got the ball rolling, closely followed by the French group, Viadeo, in 2004. For me, these two sites have not been immensely helpful for finding a job. Nevertheless, when I was looking for job opportunities, they were for the most part posted on Twitter and Facebook. I only had to mention a couple of keywords and that was it!

A few weeks ago, an original and innovative idea that positively ‘breaks’ the usual recruitment process made the buzz via a YouTube video*, with nearly 250,000 views. It was the initiative of a well-known and off-the-wall French company (also located in England) that recruited people directly…on the tube!

The human resources director of Michel et Augustin, Anne-Claire Long, traveled on several trains in order to recruit six people as a graphic designer, purchasing manager, community manager, etc. We are yet to see if the company succeeds, but it's very pleasant to see the Parisians smile! 

*Check the video out: [VIDEO]

How tech (or lack thereof) shaped my London Marathon

By Claire Ayles

Last Sunday, I took to the streets of my home town to run the London Marathon, raising money for the brilliant children’s charity Whizz-Kidz.

It was simply awesome. Running alongside 38,000 people – all with very different, yet amazing reasons for taking part and some wearing the most astonishing of costumes – was an incredibly uplifting experience. The noise of the crowd – which was several people deep for nearly the entire 26.2 mile course – was so loud, it’s still ringing in my ears.

In short, I loved it.

However, it was not all plain sailing. Apart from the inevitable pain in my feet and joints, my phone’s usually reliable GPS decided to pack up.  I’ve blogged before about my addiction to fitness apps, so just try to imagine how I felt as I shuffled nervously towards the start line, only to find out that my app couldn’t work out where I was. Frustratingly, it’d been working fine just five minutes earlier.

Metres short of the start, realisation hit that the statistics relating to the longest and most challenging sporting endeavour of my life were not going to be recorded (which, to app-addicts like me, means it might as well never have happened). Even worse, I’d have no voice in my ear telling me my pace.  The dangers of this are considerable – start off too fast and you’re bound to be punished later down the road.

The momentum of the crowd meant there was no way I could stop and sort it out, so I just had to go with the flow – relying on mental arithmetic at each mile marker to work out how fast (ok, slow) I was going.  It was unexpectedly liberating to be tech-free, and the sums were even taxing enough to give me a few moments distraction every mile.

I should have known better than to rely on mobile technology, especially at a mass event where there are thousands of people trying to connect to the same thing at the same time, and there were very many wiser folk than me in attendance. 

The fashion ‘must have’ last Sunday wasn’t a fitness band or a smartwatch, it was a paper wristband like this. 


You can’t beat a piece of paper.