Shortage Solutions 7: Recruitment

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So today we’re going to put into words one of the philosophies we go by. We have been over lots of ways for professionals and companies to beat the shortage or perceived shortage. Today we’re going to dive into the numbers.

Hopefully, we can all agree that stenography is somewhat easy to learn but incredibly difficult to do fast. Even if we can’t agree on that, we can agree there’s a high dropout rate because of the amount of focus and practice that goes into doing what we do. There is a certain percentage of people that hear about stenography, a certain percentage of people that try it, a certain percentage that like it, and a certain percentage that love it and want it to be their career. Empirically, it is difficult, and perhaps impossible, to make the education easier without sacrificing performance. So the amount of people that make it to the end will pretty much always be lower.

So let’s fake some numbers. Let’s say for every 1000 people that hear about steno, 100 try it. Let’s say 10 of those 100 are good. Let’s say 1 of those 10 loves this field and wants it to be their career. Can we, as professionals, impact those bottom numbers, and get it to be, you know, 5 people who love it and want to make it a career? A 500 percent increase? Debatable. I say let’s try.

But what do we have very direct control over? That first number. The number of people who hear about stenography. The number of people who know it’s a thing. How many people have you met that don’t believe we exist anymore? How many people have you met that don’t believe we are typing or taking down every word?

Indeed, these are likely the same principles on which A to Z, Project Steno, or Open Steno Project were founded. It’s about lowering barriers like tuition or general steno knowledge. It’s about understanding that every impression has a chance at getting someone to start the path, and that every person that starts the path has a shot at finishing it, however low or high you think that shot is.

There are different ways to perform this outreach, via social media, physical appearance at job fairs, or use of other avenues. There are already many people who have taken up recruitment efforts, and if it’s something you’re into, you can either join an existing movement or jumpstart your own thing. 10 years ago, a lot of the programs we’ve just mentioned were in their infancy or didn’t exist at all. Who is to say that your own idea won’t take off the same way?