Not so long ago, people living away from urban centers didn’t have the opportunity to work for an employer headquartered in a faraway city. But technology has made remote work not just possible but also often advantageous for both employers and employees. Now, at least for some kinds of workers, employers aren’t so limited geographically. They can branch out and bring in talent from far beyond a manageable commute. By tapping into talent outside the cities, employers don’t just expand their pool of candidates; they also benefit by gaining the perspective of people with a nonurban lifestyle, and they can give existing employees who want to live far from the hustle and bustle of an urban area the flexibility to relocate.
Why Recruit in Rural Areas?
After many years post-pandemic, employers continue the remote versus in-office debate. While remote work was a saving grace during the pandemic, many organizations now want their employees back in the office—at least most of the time.
But other employers see advantages to continuing work-from-home arrangements, feeling the pros outweigh the cons. For example, some employers are eager to reduce costs by downsizing office space.
For employers committed to allowing at least some remote work, recruiting in rural areas can bring many benefits, including new ideas from people who have different life experiences than their urban colleagues.
And it’s not just employees breaking free of their ties to urban areas. Titus Talent Strategies, an HR consulting firm, published a report in late 2023 detailing why recruiting in rural areas is gaining importance. It points out that it’s not just potential employees who choose to live in nonurban areas; some employers also see benefits to moving away from cities.
“Rural communities, once perceived as distant and lacking job opportunities compared to urban areas, are experiencing a resurgence as business hotspots,” the report says. “Organizations worldwide are considering relocating their operations from busy cities to quieter rural areas.”
During the throes of the pandemic, some office workers sought the slower pace and quieter lifestyle rural areas provide, and because they were working remotely anyway, they could move away from congested cities and suburbs and take their jobs with them.
Those workers found the lower crime rates, easy-to-navigate traffic, and proximity to nature-based recreation alluring enough to give up urban amenities.
In 2021, the Center on Rural Innovation partnered with Rural Innovation Strategies Inc. to publish a report noting that some areas not only tout the quality of life in small cities and rural areas but also incentivize people to relocate.
For example, Ascend West Virginia is a relocation initiative trying to lure people to “Almost Heaven” by offering them $12,000, plus a year of free gear rental for outdoor recreation. In Arkansas, the Life Works Here initiative plugs the northwestern part of the state for remote tech talent by offering $10,000 and a mountain or road bike.
The report also says employers enlarge their talent pool when they hire remote workers from rural areas.
How to Recruit Rural Candidates
As changes in where and how people work continue, employers are exploring how to reach out to rural candidates for remote work opportunities. Hiring platform Monster offers some suggestions. Among them:
- Create an introductory video. By including a link to a video explaining the job either in the job posting or in an email to a candidate scheduled for an interview, employers can explain the job and how communication software keeps people connected.
- Be clear about remote obligations. Answer questions like what time zone employees are to be available, how flexible the work hours are, how often the team will meet virtually, and whether some in-office time is expected and who pays for transportation.
- Extend the interview. Without an in-person interview, extra exposure between the interviewer and the candidate may be necessary for them to get to know each other.
- Prepare virtual interview questions. In addition to job-specific questions, interviewers should cover how well candidates work independently, whether they’ve worked remotely before, what they see as the greatest challenges to working remotely, and what project management and communication software they’ve used.