Youth Development Specialist
Job Recruitment

The Challenge: Making a difference in the lives of children and giving back to the community is a valuable yet sometimes demanding job. After the success of previous Youth Development Specialist campaigns, there needed to be a refresh of new creative to draw in a larger audience. New approaches were to be tested across various platforms to promote this alluring civil service career to a vast number of possible candidates.

Our Impact: In partnership with the NYC Administration for Children’s Services, DCF created a range of campaigns to promote YDS—pivoting to a new approach of understanding, empathy, and ultimately, engagement. Our key was to change the conversation around the job’s rewards, so that it not only benefited the prospective Youth Development Specialist, but, more crucially, the at-risk youth and neighborhoods they were there to mentor and serve. Multiple digital and radio campaigns in both Spanish and English were developed and ran across the NYC metro area. An open dialogue of compassion and empathy resonated with the intended ACS target audience, and as a result saw a strong increase of qualified applicants and successful hires.