South Africa produces over 2000 accounting graduates every year, and competition from banks for the best talent is fierce.

Our brief was to achieve saliency within the Chartered Accounting (CA) faculties for Investec's graduate program, and to filter the exceptional graduates from the rest before competing banks snapped them up.

We put media behind a targeted social campaign on Instagram to drive participation with the Insterview, while using Facebook and LinkedIn as support channels.

For a bank that distinguishes itself by their Out of the Ordinary approach, it’s important for Investec to find Out of the Ordinary talent.

Students are inundated with companies doing the same thing on campus, so we knew that if we created an Out of the Ordinary interview experience, Out of the Ordinary talent would find us.

So we took our messaging onto Instagram and away from the campus completely, making sure we had the conversation before any other banks, and in a space where none of them were competing.

Using Instagram’s native hashtag system, we turned the photo-sharing app into an interactive Myers-Briggs psychometric interview, profiling candidates against 32 personality types.

The Insterview fast-tracked the interview process ahead of competing banks, and allowed us to filter the exceptional few from the rest in a way that reinforced Investec's Out of the Ordinary approach.

We put media behind a targeted social campaign on Instagram to drive participation with the Insterview, while using Facebook and LinkedIn as support channels.

This was targeted by interest and geographical proximity to campuses.

Completion of the Insterview took candidates to Investec's website where they completed an online application form, before follow-up interviews were arranged with suitable candidates.

To achieve a working Myers-Briggs interview inside Instagram, we built a 5-tier decision tree made up of 64 social posts, 128 unique hashtags and 32 unique personality badges.

We then took the platform’s most recognisable feature – the hashtag – and turned it into an input mechanism for answers.

The interview questions were accompanied by interpretive designs that signaled our scientific intent and conveyed their psychometric meaning at a glance.

Abstract concepts such as extraversion vs. introversion, thinking vs. feeling, flexible vs. structured were conveyed through simple shapes and symbols that could be universally understood.

With every tap of a hashtag, candidates were led down a unique path through the decision tree, allowing us to personalise their Insterview experience.

This filtered them into into one of 32 personality buckets - each with a distinct personality badge that represented the individual aspects of their personality in a single design.

We then to took the online experience into the real-world, allowing hiring managers to easily distinguish candidates post the Insterview.

The unique nature of the Insterview positioned Investec as an Out of the Ordinary alternative to other banks, attracting like-minded talent to its CA programme.

It also facilitated richer follow-up interviews with hiring managers and in some instances determined how teams were assigned.

The Insterview took an Out of the Ordinary approach to finding Out of the Ordinary talent, and filled every available position with the cream of South African graduates.