What’s it like on TMP Island, you wonder? Well, it’s no all-inclusive Caribbean resort, but it could prove to be a recruiter’s paradise.
Here, recruiters can virtually replicate their current offices in order to host “real-time” events and conduct employee presentations.
From this virtual island, recruiters can showcase their company’s capabilities, get a better understanding of a candidate’s creativity, and network across various locations.
Fortune magazine recently hailed this as the “most radical dotcom 2.0 recruitment wave” happening in virtual reality.
TMP Worldwide, the company behind TMP Island in the popular Second Life virtual world, calls this an opportunity for unprecedented interaction with job seekers and the future of employment recruiting.
“Initiatives like TMP Island showcase our dedication to innovation, our ability to bring imaginative, next-generation practices to employment marketing, and our commitment to finding leading-edge solutions for our customers,” said Michelle Abbey, president and CEO of TMP Worldwide, in a release.
The company says this offers specific opportunities for “brand immersion,” and in fact, T-Mobile is sizing up the potential benefits of this entertaining way to network.
Charles Handler has suggested that this employment brand reinforcement “will provide a key link that will open the floodgates to all kinds of potential ways that a virtual world can be used as a portal and means of information exchange related to the hiring process.”
Digital services provider Hyro has already bought an island and created a virtual four-level headquarters complete with recruitment center. From there, the company says it plans to seek potential employees for its real-world offices in Australia, New Zealand, and Thailand.
Interested candidates can learn about new openings, submit an application, and learn more about Hyro.
Hyro has also created a digital blimp to float around in Second Life and find people “with skills in creativity, innovation, and applying digital channels technology,” according to chief operating officer Richard Lord.
According to consultant Dave Lefkow, early Second Life adopters will see the highest returns, noting on his new blog that “online job boards in 1997 were much cheaper than it is now and you didn’t have such a crowded playing field…so I would encourage you to explore this promising recruiting environment soon with your agency or on your own before more companies jump in with both feet.”
Privately held TMP, until last year a division of Monster Worldwide, has said it will pre-screen candidates to confirm their actual identities before scheduling any interviews.
The 3-D online virtual world currently has 3.4 million “residents” who have the ability to engage in various forms of personal interaction and commerce. Company officials say they are just beginning to scratch the surface of what’s possible for the business community.