m4l2 - employer branding from a strategic perspective

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EMPLOYER BRANDING FROM A STRATEGIC PERSPECTIVE

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Copyright © AIHR Academy

Employer branding is story telling of the organization

In this lesson, you will learn:

• The impact of a strong employer brand

• Factors contributing to a brand

• The difference between marketing driven and HR driven branding

• How to translate a corporate brand into an employer brand

• How to understand and map what your specific target groups think is important, and

• How you translate these insights into the way you present your organization as an interesting employer to the labor market

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RESEARCH ON EMPLOYER BRANDING


• Ambler and Barrow (1996): ‘The Employer Brand’

• Employer branding is the development of an organization’s image and reputation as a prospective employer, impacting its ability to attract and retain employees (Sivertzen, Nilsen & Olafsen, 2013).

• Gaddam (2018): a strong employer brand is directly associated with both employee attraction and employee satisfaction, and indirectly with employee commitment, customer satisfaction, customer loyalty and profitability.

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RESEARCH ON EMPLOYER BRANDING


• Gartner: organizations that invested in employer branding reported a 54% increase in qualified candidates and a 23% decrease of new hires leaving the company at an early stage

• Gallup: organizations that invest in their employer brand are 130% more likely to increase employee engagement

• LinkedIn: investments in the employer brand establish an average turnover reduction of 28%.

• Our focus is on the external brand

• Internal brand management however, influences the external brand

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INTERNAL BRANDING


• Our focus is on the external brand

• Internal brand management however, has impact on the external brand

• Internal alignment between internal and external branding is key

• Branding pyramid

• Jeff Bezos: ‘branding is what people say about you when you’re not in the room’

• IBM’s Watson in jeopardy

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Identity

Corporate Branding

Product Branding

Employer Branding

Job Branding

InternalBranding

Shareholders Consumers Job Market Job Seekers Staff Members


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CORPORATE BRAND AND IDENTITY


• Every organization has an employer brand

• Current and former employees have an opinion about you as an employer

• This brings us to two conclusions:1. The best way to build your employer brand is to be a

great employer

2. It is hard to change your image in the labor market

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HOW TO BUILD AN EMPLOYER BRAND


• Starting point is the corporate brand

• The organizational strategy, vision, mission, values and personality form the corporate brand and corporate

identity

• Corporate identity is the way an organization presents itself to the inside and outside world

• Also called brand DNA, brand identity, or brand profile

• Who you are and what you stand for

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HOW TO BUILD AN EMPLOYER BRAND


• Corporate identity is often defined by the management team

• Rewrite it to a half-page description of your DNA

• Job seekers place great importance on the image of their potential employer

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HOW TO BUILD YOUR EMPLOYER BRAND


Five steps to create a great employer brand:

1. Assess your current image as an employer

2. Describe what image should you strive for, based on your corporate brand

3. Define why applicants should choose you as an employer

4. Roll out an organization-wide employer brand strategy

5. As always: evaluate and finetune

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1. Assess your current image as an employer• What do current and former employees, and applicants say

about you

• Ask them which elements they like, and what things should change

• Ask them why they choose you and not your competition

• Use your recruitment SWOT analysis

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2. Describe what image should you strive for, based on your corporate brand• Describe what the ideal employer would look like

• Based on your corporate brand and input from the people that are key in your organization

• Make it a future-proof image that can move along with the waves of the economy and the organization

• Draw the gap between this ideal image and your current situation

• Create actions to bridge this gap

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3. Define why applicants should choose you as an employer• List why applicants should choose you as an employer

• This is your value proposition to the employee, your EVP

• How can employees realize their needs within your organization?

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4. Roll out an organization-wide employer brand strategy• Roll out an organization-wide employer brand strategy based

step 2, and your EVP

• This is a long-term approach that concerns your whole organization

• It has to be in line with your corporate brand and fit the standards, values, and mission of your organization

• Involve colleagues from all departments and levels in building and maintaining your employer brand

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5. As always: evaluate and finetune• To have a sustainable advantage in the battle for talent

in the labor market, your employer brand needs to adjust to new situations to be effective

• Evaluate frequently whether your image as an employer still meets the wishes of employees and the candidates you seek to attract

• ‘Work at coke’

• Different roles, different personalities, different needs

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PULL FACTORS


• Aspects that are important to employees to stay with you, and for candidates to finally choose you as an employer, are called ‘pull factors’

• To keep your current employees happy and to attract new talent, you need to understand and offer these elements

• Consult labor market data agencies AND people that already work for you

• Implement the most important pull factors in your career site, in vacancy texts and other labor market communication

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EMPLOYEE VALUE PROPOSITION – EVP


• The offering of rewards and benefits that is received by employees in return for their performance at the workplace

• A developed and communicated EVP is a key element in your recruitment strategy

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EMPLOYEE VALUE PROPOSITION – EVP


EVP is the internal version of your employer brand, and is important because:

• It makes you compete better for talent

• It creates an engaged workforce

• The business will stay honest and reinforce the reputation of the organization and the customer experience

• It helps HR in providing a blueprint on how things are organized in the company and has a positive impact on KPIs, like retention

• Important for recruitment as a driver of the employer brand in attracting the right candidates in a competitive labor market

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FOR WHOM DO YOU DEVELOP YOUR EVP?


• For current and future talent

• It attracts and retains employees

• Should be a short story: flashy, inspiring, and energizing

• Answer why employees should join and stay with the company

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HOW TO DEVELOP THE EVP?


• Internal and external research

• SWOT analysis

• Use workshops to discuss, refine, and prioritize the lists with all stakeholders like:• Recruitment team

• HR

• Leadership team

• Marketing

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HOW TO DEVELOP THE EVP?


• Make EVP easy to understand

• Check the outcome with a possible future employees, colleagues, and a member of the leadership team

• Look for statements like; ‘that’s why I like to work here’, ‘that makes me tick’, ‘that is what I'm looking for’, or ‘those are the values I stand for’.

• Ask whether they can and would use it to recommend the organization to other

• Adoption and promotion are crucial

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HOW TO ACTIVATETHE EVP?


• Share ‘reasons to believe’ and what those pillars mean in different segments of the company or in different markets

• Prove your promises with real life examples that inspire the target group

• Translate it to the context

• The activation (or communication) of the EVP is part of the recruitment strategy

• Inside stories and the reasons to believe

• No one cares what the marketing and HR departments say a company is like

• Candidates listen to their peers inside your company

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SOME EXAMPLES


LEGO: gamification

The toy company converted its selection process into recruitment marketing. Candidates competed for the title of 'Master Model Builder', with a job at a LEGOLAND® Discovery Center as a reward.

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SOME EXAMPLES


British Army: understanding the target group

A boring vacancy text is rarely enough to really appeal to someone's emotion, so they launched a campaign that focused on millennials

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SOME EXAMPLES


Jobsintown.de: Unexpected spots outside of the box

Showing employees like they are working inside the machines you are using

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SOME EXAMPLES


The City of Los Angeles: wake up call for Graphic designers

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SOME EXAMPLES


McKinsey: old school brilliantly reinvented

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SOME EXAMPLES


Google 2004: still famous

People who could solve the enigma to 7427466391.com were invited for a job interview at Google

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m4l2 - employer branding from a strategic perspective

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