How Turner Mining Hires Through Social Media

March 28, 2019

Turner Mining Group has hired nearly 200 employees using social media platforms, without scanning a single resume. So said its founder, Keaton Turner, during a presentation at AEMP’s 2019 Management Conference in Orlando, Florida. Keaton Turner, president, and Thomas Haun, COO, detailed how they use social media to hire and retain the newer generation of working young adults.

“We don’t even look at resumes,” Turner said. “We want to have a conversation first.” He said all the company’s employees were hired through social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

In order to gain traction via social media, the company posts on all platforms every day, sometimes more than once. Each post provides insight into what the company is working on, while keeping specifics about each job site confidential. Employees are also allowed to post about the job sites as they wish (while still maintaining confidentiality). This not only provides the company with much more reach, but offers an organic display of Turner’s company culture. According to Turner, using this strategy resulted in receiving nearly 20 applications a day this past January.

Turner and Haun explained that they aimed to invest in the people they’d hire in a different way than most companies, preventing any employees from feeling like “just a number” in the crowd. Through cultural incentives such as rewards programs, hands-on training, and fair wages, Tuner Mining has seen exponential growth in its first year. The company’s motto, “love people, move dirt,” is heavily abided by, as Turner’s “people first” approach centers around the way he wants his business to run.

Turner outlined three steps for hiring and retaining employees:

  • Recruit- Each employee hired via social media is able to communicate with recruiters via Instagram DMs (direct messaging), Facebook messaging, LinkedIn, and more. According to Turner and Haun, recruiters will also occasionally take an applicant's information via DM and plug it into the Turner Mining database, or conduct a brief interview screening over the internet.

  • Develop- Newcomers are sometimes paired with a veteran worker. New employees often ask questions about why things are done, or why certain methods are the most productive, or “safest” way to work on-site. They suggested employers in the audience try their best to answer questions employees may have, even if it means following up with an answer at a later time.

  • Retain- Turner Mining retains its employees by continuing to value the work they do, and providing recognition for a job well done. They allow their employees to contribute to these incentives by urging them to take part in activities, like voting for employee of the month.