SELECTED WORK / DIGITAL STRATEGY + DEVELOPMENT
The proposal
was rejected.
The problem wasn’t.
How I turned a stalled healthcare recruitment project into a custom careers platform—and opened the door to an entirely new kind of collaboration between Marketing and HR.
We had jobs
to fill.
Candidates couldn’t
find them.
Columbus Regional Health relied on an out-of-the-box careers experience provided by its applicant tracking system. It handled applications, but it wasn’t giving our recruitment efforts the visibility or flexibility they needed.
The way the existing job pages were built severely limited their visibility in organic search. Candidates were more likely to encounter our openings through third-party job aggregators than through a search that led them directly to CRH.
Meanwhile, HR still had positions to fill, and recruiting agencies were becoming increasingly expensive. We needed a better way to make jobs discoverable, present CRH as an employer and connect interested candidates to the existing application process.
The answer wasn’t to replace the ATS. It was to build a better experience around it.
02 / THE PROPOSED SOLUTION
A six-figure
answer.
Marketing and HR explored agency-built careers sites that would use our existing ATS data to power a more visible, more useful recruitment experience.
The selected agency proposal called for a dedicated careers site with ATS feed integration, search-friendly job pages, structured data and recruitment content.
THE DECISION
The proposal was
not funded.
The agency project stopped there. The recruitment problem didn’t.
03 / THE TURNING POINT
So I learned
how to build
it myself.
I knew what the site needed to do. What I didn’t yet know was how to connect a careers website to an applicant tracking system.
When the capital request was denied, the recruitment problem remained. I didn’t want the project to end simply because I lacked the technical skills to execute it myself.
So I enrolled in web application development classes at Ivy Tech, paid my own tuition and earned a certificate. I learned the programming and integration skills I needed, then put them to work building the platform.
What began as a response to a specific business problem became a lasting expansion of what I could contribute to CRH.
Keep the ATS.
Rebuild the
experience.
I developed a WordPress-based careers platform that takes job data from the ATS feed and presents openings as searchable, search-engine-friendly pages under the CRH brand.
HR manages openings in its existing recruiting system.
WordPress imports and publishes the jobs with custom search and structured data.
Candidates discover jobs on CRH Careers and continue to the ATS to apply.
Discoverable job pages
Individual job URLs, search-friendly content and structured job data give openings a way to appear in organic search.
Useful job search
Candidates can search and filter opportunities within a dedicated, CRH-branded experience.
Automated job updates
A scheduled import keeps the careers site aligned with the openings maintained in the ATS.
A flexible publishing platform
Marketing can create landing pages, campaign content and contact forms without asking the ATS vendor to build them.
THE RESULT / CRH CAREERS
Built to work.
Built to last.
The platform has been running for approximately six years, with annual platform operating costs below $700, excluding staff time.
VISIT CRH CAREERS05 / BEYOND JOB LISTINGS
Then it became
something bigger.
Once we controlled the careers experience, Marketing and HR could do more than publish openings. We could build recruitment campaigns around the people and positions CRH needed.
More than
a job posting.
The nursing recruitment campaign gives prospective nurses a dedicated place to learn about working at CRH, explore opportunities and connect with the nursing recruitment team.
It brings together campaign photography, employer messaging, recruitment content and clear calls to action—capabilities that go well beyond a standard ATS-generated job listing.
EXPLORE THE CAREERS SITE
06 / THE RESULT
One platform.
Years of possibility.
Years in operation
A custom careers platform that has continued serving CRH’s recruitment needs since its original launch.
Annual platform cost
Annual operating cost of the site, excluding staff time and recruitment advertising.
Shared recruitment platform
Job listings, employer information and campaign experiences in one CRH-branded destination.
The original proposal would have required a substantial capital investment. Building the platform internally eliminated the need for that proposed vendor project while giving CRH an adaptable foundation for ongoing recruitment marketing.
07 / THE NEXT CHAPTER