When employees write job offers: the Lidl example

In a world of work where the candidate is king, it is up to the company to highlight itself. To write explicit and realistic job offers, a well-known brand has chosen an original approach: entrusting this task to its own employees.

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A successful job offer should capture the attention of candidates by stimulating their curiosity while providing enough information about the position to make them want to apply. However, this exercise can quickly become complex for recruiters, especially in a job market where talent is scarce and competition is tough.

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Between excessively pomposous titles, overly appealing descriptions or skills mentioned vaguely, many offers fail to meet the expectations of candidates. By directly involving its employees, the brand hopes to develop more authentic ads, adapted to the real needs of positions, while effectively distinguishing itself in order to attract the best talent.

Irritated and frustrated candidates

Nearly three out of five Luxembourgers (62%) say they have already noticed a gap between the promises of a job offer and the reality of the position. This is revealed by an HR survey conducted by iVox among 1,000 Luxembourgers, at the request of Lidl.

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According to this survey, two out of five Luxembourgers (42%) even say they have changed jobs because the real content of their function did not correspond to the description of the advertisement. Vague descriptions, such as “versatile” or “roughly 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.”, particularly irritate 41% of respondents.

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In addition, eight out of ten people believe that job offers are often too demanding of candidates while neglecting to highlight the company's strengths. In addition, 83% of Luxembourgers questioned blame employers for a lack of clarity in describing a typical day for the position offered.

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These results highlight the importance for companies to write more accurate and transparent job offers, both to attract talent and to avoid post-recruitment disappointments.

Give priority to an explicit and realistic announcement

To avoid the pitfalls of inaccurate job offers, the supermarket chain Lidl has adopted an innovative approach: leaving it up to its employees to write the advertisements for vacancies themselves. This method aims to reduce disappointments, especially in a sector such as mass distribution, where the lack of personnel is particularly worrying. Currently, Lidl is looking for a dozen employees for its stores in Luxembourg, as well as more than 300 in Belgium.

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” In these times of labor shortage, it is essential to question how it works and to analyze it ” explains Wouter Jan Wegman, HR Director at Lidl Belgium & Luxembourg. The objective of this pilot project is to ensure that the expectations of candidates correspond to the reality of the position.

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The retail sector has long suffered from difficulties in recruiting and retaining its staff. ” It is not pleasant for anyone to hear or to have to say later: “This is not what I expected.” By giving our employees the floor, we hope that the offers will better reflect our corporate culture, the daily tasks and the development opportunities we offer ” adds Wouter Jan Wegman.

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This approach highlights the importance for companies to offer transparent and realistic descriptions, in order to attract candidates in line with their expectations and to promote better integration into the company.

Information compiled using AI

The supermarket chain Lidl has therefore chosen to rely on the experiences and stories of its own employees to write its job ads. Over the past few months, over a hundred employees and store assistant managers participated in an anonymous survey. There, they shared their vision and experiences of working at Lidl.

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The information collected was then compiled with the help of artificial intelligence to create job offers that were both explicit and realistic. The result? Authentic texts, written by people directly from the field, thus offering a true image of the positions to be filled.

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What if, in turn, you asked your own employees to contribute to the writing of your job offers? Involving your teams could well be the key to attracting better informed candidates, in line with the reality of the position, and making your ads all the more effective.

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