AMARA celebrates the work of recruitment industry professionals. The awards strive to recognise outstanding service and achievement in the South African recruitment industry, across both the public and private sectors.

The AMARA panel of judges include:
  • Ross Mengel (director of DMA Group)
  • Dr Kgomotso Kasonkola (senior director of human resources at the University of the Witwatersrand)
  • Muguette Crozier (digital art director of The Riverbed Agency)
  • Zandile Nzalo (CEO of Zanenza Holdings)
The panel shortlisted print advertisements to five finalists for the Best Creative Recruitment advert in the private, public and education sectors respectively.

Ross Mengel, who has contributed as an adjudicator in previous years, reported a marked improvement in this years' shortlist of recruitment adverts, particularly in the public and education sectors. "Catchy headers, clever use of colour combinations that reinforced employer branding and breaking the mould of traditional templates were some of the features of those shortlisted," Mengel says.

Mengel also says that hashtags and details of where further information could be found online, and on social media, were more common now than in the past. These features, according to Mengel, appear to be a growing trend — particularly in the public sector.

"This demonstrates a healthy cross-pollination between print and other channels, playing to the strengths of each," Mengel says. "For some of the adverts, application processes were tweaked and simplified, meeting the needs of the target market." 

"This enabled suitable candidates to apply and be considered, using the channels [that] they are generally most comfortable with, as simply and conveniently as possible," he adds.

Eben Gewers, head of advertising at Tiso Blackstar group (which owns the AMARA Recruitment Awards), says that it's especially important to recognise creativity in recruitment advertising in order to attract the attention and interest of the strongest candidates.

"In an economy that's being hit by a brain-drain, the value in delivering impactful recruitment advertising has never been more necessary — particularly when high-level skills are in demand," says Gewers.

The public is invited to vote on the ads and visit www.research.net/r/AMARA2019. Voting for the AMARA Awards closes on Wednesday, 4 September. Winners of the print advertising categories will be announced along with the Best Recruitment Advertising Agency, the Publisher’s Award and the Rising Star Award. The awards will be announced at a gala dinner on Friday, 8 November in Parktown.

For more information, visit www.tisoblackstar.com.