Happy humpday, I mean that in the nicest possible way!

The HR superstars over at Blogging4Jobs have been running a pretty cool theme week, over on their site, dedicated to candidate experience.

Hopefully you already follow Blogging4Jobs, but just in case you don't, here's the lowdown. During Candidate Experience Week, Blogging4Jobs is publishing original daily content geared towards changing the way candidate experience is perceived. Their goal is to get recruiters and employers thinking about how the way they treat candidates affects their company's bottom line, and really focus on creating a positive experience that benefits both the company and the potential hire.

At Jobcast, we love themes, be it pirate themed water parks, theme rides, or theme parties (especially the waters parks though!) So, we thought we would compile some excellent articles that deal with candidate experience.

Links!

A candidate's experience begins with your company brand, weird huh? Apparently even the look and feel of your job post plays a huge part in a potential hire’s impression of your company. This article over at TLNT, goes so far as to say that your employer brand can make or break a candidate's’ experience.

Next up, the application process! Mobile friction during job applications = very very bad candidate experience. This is something we've already touched on quite a bit in our own blog posts, but it bears repeating because so many Career Sites are not mobile friendly, and so many job applicants abandon the application process because of mobile friction. Just check out this article on Talent HQ for more stats about the importance of a mobile-friendly job application process.

On to the interview, my favorite part of the job hunt! Unfortunately, most candidates don’t enjoy this process very much, many even find being interviewed pretty darn scary. In this lovely article, Jocelyn Aucoin shares 3 things employers can give candidates to improve their interview experience.

We saved the best for last, and by best, I mean silliest! That HR Chick, Stephanie Krieg reminds us all that no candidate wants to work for a stick in the mud, and that fun is an all to oft forgotten aspect of candidate experience. She also shares some of the funniest pictures of HR pros I have ever seen. PS I love her.

Oh, actually, the very last link is a teeny tiny bit of self promotion, but it also has to do with candidate experience and fun, so it's okay right? Here's a link to an article about improving candidate engagement through gamification that I wrote for HR Insights Magazine, it even got a gold badge on the front page! End brag fest.

After you check out all of these links, head over to Twitter and follow the candidate experience conversation with #thecandidate, and more cool articles on Blogging4Jobs.

Happy linking everyone!