By Stephanie Armour, USA TODAY
5 `! N/ N# t( j. ?! kWith the competition for talented workers increasingly fierce, businesses across the nation are becoming ever more creative in their efforts to impress prospects. 6 t0 S2 R3 h" o# q) q! O$ I
The escalating talent war has led Ernst & Young, the accounting giant, to recruit soon-to-be graduates by taking them rafting down a snow-covered mountain in Utah. In Washington, D.C., technology company Blackboard is wooing job candidates with wine-tastings and baseball games. And Esurance, an online provider of insurance products, is taking on the competition by erecting recruiting billboards right next to rival call-center companies in areas such as Sioux Falls, S.D.
$ {- s- _$ K; U% R% S5 o0 h) o"I remember the '90s hiring boom, and I thought that was the peak. I would say this time hiring is even more aggressive," says Barbara Massa, recruiting services director at EMC, an information management and storage company based in Hopkinton, Mass. "All the companies want the 'A' players. … You're doing things for candidates that, a couple of years ago, you wouldn't have to even budge on."
/ f3 Q1 p" |7 q- d( TThe February unemployment rate was 4.5%, down sharply from 6.3% in June 2003. Back then, employers were so confident they could hire talented workers that they began dropping family-friendly programs such as on-site child care centers, signing bonuses and other perks.
$ ~" U( a$ m6 O2 r3 ^Today, those in high demand include Generation Y workers and those with top experience and sought-after skills.% Q8 J! o/ x! v& H9 L0 u- P/ N
FIND MORE STORIES IN: Utah | Ernst | Recruiters | Blackboard " w- _/ v/ H; _( y; J* H
More than 80% of employers planned to maintain or boost hiring in the second quarter, according to a March survey by employment services company Manpower. Only 7% of employers said they planned to reduce staff levels.
+ f* g  M+ T8 w0 |8 kA similar survey by Harris Interactive for CareerBuilder.com, a Chicago-based online job site partly owned by Gannett, the publisher of USA TODAY, found that 40% of hiring managers and human resource professionals will increase the number of full-time, permanent employees in 2007. Just 8% expected a decrease. # H! @. F) Z6 {4 r* S
"It's a fiercely competitive marketplace," says Bruce Tulgan, a management consultant and author of Winning the Talent Wars. "Employers are really stepping up their recruiting efforts. If they don't, the competition will steamroll them. Employers are getting more and more nervous. Unemployment is lower, so employees have more and more negotiating power."
: `$ D! v) N  {) F; Q: m: ~, RCompanies' rising demand for top talent is a boon to job candidates. Compared with the not-so-distant past, candidates now are likely to get more-generous job offers, more promotions and flexible work hours. : ^8 L" p, f  N% k2 ?
Although overall wages are not rising at a fast clip, those in industries where talent shortages are particularly acute — such as engineering, health care and accounting — are seeing significant pay increases.

A job candidate's market
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All of which means it's tougher on employers, especially those eager to hire top performers or appeal to the job market's newest demographic: workers from Generation Y, generally defined as those born from 1977 to 2002.
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Employers wary of the looming exodus of retiring baby boomers are facing not only stiffer competition for talent, but young prospects who realize they are in a position to make demands.: X# h6 {( y/ g/ V3 E
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"We are starting to see additional competition from Wall Street firms, banks, publicly traded companies. The battle is very, very fierce," says Dan Black, director of campus recruiting for Ernst & Young's Americas division, which includes the USA and Canada.2 V/ l* _4 Y% e' V
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"Students are asking more about what you have to offer," Black says. "Students today, more than in the last 10 years, want it all."! {& L. x- k8 }* d9 D( g

' f/ p4 L) W; p, ^3 yThey are especially interested in the ability to try new things on the job and in avoiding ruts. Accounting firms are notorious for expecting young workers to put in long hours, but Ernst & Young has been trying to reach out to younger job candidates by talking about work-life issues and the ability to build a career at one company.
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In March, Ernst & Young took a group of more than 300 students rafting down a snow-covered mountain in Utah. Ernst & Young Global CEO Jim Turley joined in.' q2 i$ G  r( a6 o) y8 [
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Similar recruiting principles apply to prospects who aren't recent graduates, says Maureen Kelleher, a recruiting director at the company.
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"It's increasingly competitive," she says. "The job market is a candidate's market. They have a lot of different choices." " a  I- K, g1 Z- W2 p. ]- s
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Job candidates of all ages and in all types of industries are seeing the advantage of a tight labor market. That's good news for recent job seekers such as Alison Norris, 31, who landed a job in February as an executive assistant at The Biltmore Co., which owns and operates Biltmore House, a 250-room French Renaissance chateau completed by George W. Vanderbilt in 1895.
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8 l& E* m5 d4 E* T"I had a couple of different offers, and they all had comparable salaries," Norris says. She previously worked as a trainer at a bank.
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The tight labor market is also a boon for Kristine Kuan, 22, of Roseville, Calif., who graduated from UCLA in December and says she had her pick of jobs. / g) M  ^% V* l9 M" _! w, v

3 z4 v. }% a  y( rWith a major in computer science and engineering, she took a position in the networking business unit of Hewlett-Packard in California. She picked them, she says, in part because of the company's flexible work schedule, which includes flexible time-off options and work arrangements, and telecommuting.
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0 \! P, b; X( B0 {  x$ r"I was confident that I should be able to get a job," Kuan says. "I had several other job offers. To me, work-life balance is really important, so I asked (potential employers), 'How is that valued?' " : N3 D3 t# f% ]8 }

0 j/ Z; d- H7 Z9 G$ SEmployers are ramping up their efforts to get such prized job candidates. For example:
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• Ernst & Young is tapping technology to try to boost its appeal to recruits. The company sponsors a recruiting page on Facebook that features career opportunities and interview tips, and fosters interactive discussions about working at the firm. It's replaced standard recruiting brochures with flash drives that plug into computers.$ V8 I6 S5 S) T$ p5 n0 z6 q* T

2 S3 n! ]' E- k7 ^; K5 [7 o* }Recruiters also are text-messaging potential college graduates, inviting them to recruiting events, and the company supported a group of interns who created video blogs, or vlogs, that show what it's like to work at Ernst & Young. The vlogs are posted on the company's website and its Facebook page.* l- }0 }$ D8 m! n7 v

1 L( O. I8 y  M8 T• Microsoft, which hired more than 10,000 new employees in 2006, created a unique recruiting website that includes a jobs blog written by recruiters.  o* K, k; p9 {6 `: S) q
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The company highlights perks such as take-home dinners and free soft drinks for employees. Microsoft has recruiters that focus on specific areas or industries. And when job candidates go to the corporate campus in Redmond, Wash., to interview, they're asked about their personal interests and restaurant preferences. Then they're given a personalized guide to the area that they can use to explore.
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Microsoft has more than 70,000 employees worldwide, with more than 44,000 in the USA.
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"What they want to know is, 'What is it like to work there? What's the pace of work?' " says Scott Pitasky, Microsoft's general manager of talent acquisition.
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"They're looking for a company that values diversity and will treat them like an individual," Pitasky says.
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8 r1 T8 ~) D5 m7 \& E2 |$ Z• In its recruiting, Hewlett-Packard has stepped up its emphasis on benefits such as education assistance, flexible time-off options and flexible work arrangements.
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"Work-life balance and working remotely have become very important," says Jennifer Hedding, HP's global staffing director. "We're trying to make the recruiting process much more personal."! y9 z' J' N/ U/ l: s
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• Want pet insurance and casual dress? Join GetConnected, a Boston-based technology company in search of software engineers.
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+ w& P8 A5 c- Z- T* U4 v; r) M"They may sound like soft values, but they give hard business results," says GetConnected CEO Ali Riaz. 0 @  }8 |" M* u6 c
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• Blackboard, a Washington, D.C-based provider of education software, has upped its recruiting bonuses and has more than 60 positions to fill. Employees who successfully refer a new hire get $3,000, or up to $5,000 for hard-to-fill jobs. Those include jobs where a highly technical skill set is needed in product development, such as architects and engineers.& w1 L* p+ |: E6 y

! v2 [$ @1 \  Q$ }/ L"We have wine-tastings, ballgames, charity auctions," says Mary Good, senior vice president of human resources at Blackboard. "It's a pretty tight market."
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" f6 ~, V% U$ H3 O4 o7 dLike the '90s hiring boom / b5 u$ D+ o% h( f! S3 `+ y5 g

# K5 r% w( a& K6 c3 iSuch energy devoted to recruiting is reminiscent of the dot-com boom during the 1990s. Bidding wars are, in some cases, common again.
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( R; G1 O& H: h1 fJeremy Gottlieb doesn't graduate from college until May, but he's already landed a full-time job — and a hefty signing bonus. And that wasn't his only offer.
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The frenzy over job candidates has gotten so intense that Gottlieb, 22, began hearing from interested recruiters when he was a sophomore at the University of Texas at Austin. "It's a candidate-driven market, and there are so many jobs available," says Gottlieb, who is graduating with a master's degree in accounting and will begin his job in August at Ernst & Young in Houston.
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"It's exciting to have so many opportunities to work at so many companies," he says.

He says he picked Ernst & Young because he wanted a larger company with more training opportunities. Most companies, he says, were willing to offer salaries in the $50,000 range. For younger hires, especially, internship experience helps them stand out.
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7 M8 x  |3 [$ k& t8 [7 n2 zBut certain fields are especially hot — health care, accounting, engineering and technical fields in particular. And employers don't just want to fill positions, they want employees with track records — top grades, top schools on their résumés or valued skills.9 D& F" U# q$ W$ g

% H5 g6 K+ @( }0 S: u8 L9 \4 ~8 HStarting salaries up
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The move by employers to sweeten benefits is particularly evident in states such as Hawaii, Utah, Virginia and Florida, where labor markets are tight.
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' {5 n/ N3 T  r" a9 t% \The average starting-salary offer to marketing graduates rose by 14% to $41,323, according to a February survey by the National Association of Colleges and Employers. Last year at the same time, the average offer dropped 3.4% from the previous year. 9 x  p* L/ b" l- w

5 y9 i. U7 [' p2 k. V/ A! PThat's why employers are struggling not only with how to get new hires in the door, but also with how to keep them. At Deloitte & Touche USA, a professional services firm, principal Stanton Smith is studying young workers' interests and helping to educate partners about career differences in hopes of boosting retention.
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- N6 @4 c/ ], a# E2 n"It's critical," Smith says. "We can no longer expect we'll get a sufficient number of people just by them deciding to pursue this career."
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Are you being showered with job offers? Has your company beefed up recruiting? Tell us your experience.