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You need look no farther than the popular business press to understand the value of a strong employer brand. Companies known as great places to work are featured in annual surveys and glowing stories that attract even more strong candidates.
Yet a quick review of these top employers reveals amazing diversity in the features and factors that make for an attractive workplace. For example, Griffin Hospital in Derby, Connecticut, regularly appears in the top 10 of Fortune's "100 Best Companies to Work For," although it pays less than other hospitals in the area. According to Fortune, "Griffin received 5,100 applications for a range of 160 open positions in 2005, largely due to its top-notch reputation for patient care."
Meanwhile, at Enterprise Rent-A-Car, number five in BusinessWeek's "50 Best Places to Launch a Career," management trainees wash cars and perform front-line customer service at lower-than-average pay in exchange for the chance to quickly assume significant management responsibilities.
It's All About Authenticity
What's interesting about employment brands is that the employer ultimately does not define them. "A brand is a collection of perceptions in the mind of the consumer," says Hong Kong-based brand strategist Colin Bates of BuildingBrands. In other words, the public defines your brand based on how it sees you as a company, employer and corporate citizen.
Thus, it's essential your self-defined brand rings true in every stage of the recruitment process -- from your Web site and application through interviews and employee interactions. Follow these steps to ensure authenticity:
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Align Employment Web Sites with Company Mission and Culture: Your employer brand is not separate from your corporate brand; rather, it is an extension of company culture to include the hiring process.
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Be Realistic: No matter what you want your brand to be, take a good, hard look at what it is, and make sure your employment messages and processes accurately reflect it. In other words, don't describe your company as family-friendly to attract candidates unless you can prove it through examples, policies and programs.
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Survey Candidates: As part of your recruitment process, include a survey that asks applicants their impressions of your company and its recruiting methods and messages. You might be surprised at candidates' perceptions.
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Look for Discrepancies: From examining survey results as well as self-analysis, look for inconsistencies between your words and actions. Does your brand promise a team environment, but your interview process includes only one-on-one interactions? Do you promote yourself as a great place for careers to grow, yet offer no formal mentoring programs, leadership development or career pathing? Candidates will find and fault insincerity; do your best to make sure they don't find any.
Your Brand Is Visible in Your Employees
Kirsten Dixson, brand strategist with Brandego, always advises job seekers to connect with employees to discover the real company culture. "Your employees, current and former, are living representations of whether you are walking your talk," she says. "They are an extension of your brand." And with the growing use of online networking forums, potential employees can easily compare a company's stated culture and values with the reality as described by its workers.
Here are ways to boost your employment brand in your employees' eyes and beyond:
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Find out what existing employees want. Take regular surveys, and act on the findings to keep improving employee satisfaction.
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Ask departing employees what caused them to leave, and look for trends.
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Learn what's important to your target candidate groups -- different programs and benefits will probably be attractive to new grads, mid-career employees and candidates age 50-plus.
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Develop programs and benefits to keep moving your organizational culture toward your ideal brand attributes. Then publicize these programs both internally and externally.
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Be consistent in how you describe your company and its culture. You'll build familiarity and create an expectation for the brand.
Finally, keep this in mind: Establishing a winning employer brand doesn't necessarily mean raising salaries or adding costly programs. "Especially since 9/11, people don't want to work for just another company," Dixson says. "They want to believe in what they're doing, and as a result, they will connect with the emotional brand attributes of an organization."
