Where do you go to recruit new employees to work in your interior plantscape business? Would you consider using Facebook?
Perusing social media recently trying to stay abreast of horticultural news, I came upon yet another post lamenting the difficulty in this industry of recruiting workers. Despite reading this ‘complaint’ on Facebook, I wonder whether its author had ever actually considered using social media to advertise their position.
Whilst writing an article for Greenlife Industry Australia on retail disruption recently, I investigated ‘Buy and Sell’ groups on Facebook. A quick search of these groups (based on my location, Tasmania) showed a proliferation of public and private groups selling plants and related greenlife:
- All Plants – Buy – Sell – Trade, Private Group with 150,700+ members
- Aussie Plant Sales & Auctions, Private Group with 10,000+ members
- Indoor Plants by Backyard Sellers Australia, Private group with 7,200 members
- Melbourne Plant Buy Swap and Sell, Public group with 11,600+ members
- Selling Indoor Plants in Tasmania, Private group with 9,200 members
How can our industry tap into this pool of potential employees, especially those keen on indoor plants?
The members of these groups show themselves to be passionate plant people. It is evident that many of them possess the right attitude and more than enough knowledge and experience to make them perfect starters in our industry.
Many of these online plant purveyors have demonstrated that they meet one, if not all, of the performance criteria which vocational education and training (VET) students must meet as part of the ‘AHCNSY208 – Maintain indoor plants’ unit of competency, namely:
1) prepare for work;
2) maintain the growing environment;
3) maintain indoor plants and
4) complete indoor plant maintenance operations.
There is certainly is evidence that there may be some merit in exploring the use of Facebook platform to recruit people into our industry. Employers could consider paid advertising targeting members of these groups and/or other people possessing the required attributes.
These are just some of my thoughts on attracting employees. Where have you had success in recruiting your staff? Share your stories with us on the Interior Plantscape Association’s (yep, you guessed it!) Facebook page!
Further reading
‘Interior plantscaping job opportunities and educators – it’s a two-way street’, about the Skills Impact review of ‘AHCNSY208 – Maintain indoor plants’ in the June 2021 issue of Hort Journal Australia.
Written by:
Gabrielle Stannus / Inwardout Studio
IPA Committee Member