Work passion in recruiting messages

Purpose: To facilitate a goal of hiring more employees with work passion, this research investigates the content job seekers include in recruiting messages to determine if this content changes with job seekers’ work passion. Design/methodology/approach: Study participants were full-time professionals who wrote recruiting messages for their current jobs and answered questions about their work passion and work histories. These recruiting messages were content analyzed for themes. The percentages of recruiting message content for each theme were entered as endogenous variables in a structural equation model with harmonious and obsessive work passion are exogenous variables. Findings: A significantly positive relationship was found between participants’ harmonious work passion and the amount of passion-related content in their recruiting messages. Practical implications: Findings suggest that organizations may consider including more passion-related content in recruiting messages, if their recruiting strategy aims to attract more high-work-passion job applicants. Originality/value: This is one of the first studies on the role of work passion in recruiting messages. This study also uses a unique combination of qualitative and quantitative analyses.