For sheer entertainment, it’s hard to beat the horror-story themed Norwich Union graduate careers site:
- more choice than you can shake a zombie at (discussion of their seven business areas)
- don’t come to a grisly end; avoid a career horror story (an explanation of what is good about joining Norwich Union)
- share the horror (get one of the scary Norwich Union office monsters for your Facebook/Myspace page)
- 10 tips on what not to do in a horror film – yes, we all know that you should never go into the basement alone when the ominous music is playing, but it’s good to be reminded. Not directly careers related, but who cares?
- zombie screensavers, flying bats, scary usb snakes and staplers … and a laptop that eats the careers calendar a page at a time.
Even the text is themed: they refer to the graduate career profiles as ‘escape stories’ from ‘the good guys’, and the various locations that graduates could live in are described in terms of witch burnings, the Black Death, ghosts and murders.
And, best of all, an invitation to film your own horror movie and submit it to a competition via YouTube to win the best 25 horror films of all time. Now that’s a prize I’m sure many students would love to win.
From an apparently staid industry, this is an entertaining site that goes some way towards changing the perception of the industry – and that has to be a good thing.
One question though: it doesn’t seem to be highlighted on the main corporate Aviva site (though there is a link to the Norwich Union Careers section from the Aviva Careers section), and I think that is a missed opportunity.
Lucy is Editor at Corporate Eye
