Attracting Talent With Your Employer Brand A Roadmap to Success

Whether we are aware of it or not, our organization has an employer brand. According to the Employer Branding Institute (2011), an employer brand is defined as the way your company is perceived as a great place to work by all stakeholders such as employees, customers and applicants. Strengthening your employer brand while directing your efforts to the people you need to attract is the key to establishing a true competitive advantage against other players in your industry.

The Shifts that Led to Employer BrandingAs far as recruitment is concerned, the concept of employer branding is brought about by three significant shifts in the talent acquisition space. With the dot-com boom in the 1990s, a technological shift occurred—where once candidates used to print several copies of their CVs and go door to door to apply for jobs, they now are able to apply for hundreds of jobs at the comfort of their own home. What used to be a tedious and long application process has now turned into a rapid firing squad of applicants increasing the need for organizations to design more filters. Due to these changes, a marketing shift also occurred. Because applicants can apply to so many jobs in such a short span of time and organizations seem to be hiring perpetually, the need for applicants to “market” themselves decreased while the need for organizations to set themselves apart from other employers increased. One effect we are seeing in the BPO space is that organizations are now competing on the level of a signing bonus just to bring in

people and meet their headcount requirements. Lastly, coupled with these changes is also a demographic shift with a projection of millennials comprising 43% of the working population in the US by 2016 (Center for American Progress 2009). This shift impacts everything we do in HR as the profile for millennials is described very differently from the workforce we’ve been used to.

If the links between talent acquisition and employer branding are so obvious, why don’t we think about it more? And what does it really mean? When, where, and how do we start building our employer brand? Like most things, it must begin with a purposeful plan.

5 Steps to Build Your Talent Acquisition Plan

1Know your Talent

When we speak about attracting the people who truly contribute to our organization, whether through their skills, knowledge, attitude or unique

abilities, it all comes down to the candidate experience. At every encounter of a potential applicant with our employer brand; and to create the “right experience” for the talent you want to draw in, your organization must

Millennials will comprise 43% of the US working population by 2016

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harness the power of data. By conducting an audit of our existing employee profile and potential talent profile, we gain an understanding of who we call “talent.” We also get to see what draws them to a company—Is it work life balance? A challenging work envi-ronment? Or a family culture? Gathering data is not an optional step, rather, it is a crucial factor in the success of your employer brand in the hiring market.

2Communicate a Simple Yet Relatable Brand Promise

What are you offering to a potential applicant in exchange

for their knowledge, skills and unique abilities? What is the value to them of committing their time and best work to your organization? The answer to these questions is referred to as your Employee Value Proposition (EVP). It’s a two-way street. Your EVP should create a clear picture to the potential applicant of why they should consider a career in your company and further, give it primary preference. A simple and true message, based on data, and that an applicant can relate to, drives your brand forward and engages a specific profile.

3Share Your Promise Consistently Across Identified Channels

Consider that you will be moving through various stages

of building a brand, starting with basic awareness (knowing the brand), which is the most fundamental, to sustaining a mature brand. However, the real challenge comes in keeping the momentum of your employer brand and the way to do this is to consistently communicate your message across various channels where your talent is. By understanding who we consider as our talent,

we are also able to select the appropriate channels that make our message accessible to them. Do we find them online? If yes, in what websites? Do they go to malls? On what days? For what purpose? Getting this data at the start of brand building ensures a more streamlined and intentional way to get talent than the traditional post and pray method.

4Empower Your Recruiters to Deliver Your Brand Promise

When we ponder on what makes a brand great, we often describe it through our own experiences. And while we may encounter brands through a logo, websites or other forms of advertising, the most critical touch points are people. It is vital for you to spend time with recruiters and other front liners to equip them with the skills and tools to consistently embody your employer brand to applicants. Policies and practices in recruitment must also be revisited so that we can clearly define behavioral expectations of our front liners. This step is often overlooked and leads to inconsistency of what the employer brand represents versus the actual candidate experience.

Alignment, not just advertising, is the key to a successful employer brand.

Anj VeraAnj is TalentView’s CEO and a talent management advocate. She has consulted on competency- based HR systems, HR strat-egy and communicating people initiatives through a strong employer brand with all kinds of organizations— multinational companies, lo-cal conglomerates, schools and government institutions. Her dynamic, creative and strategic approach to human capital brings TalentView solutions to life, enabling organizations to reach their goals. She is also a sought after speaker on human capital trends and technol-ogies; her next speaking engagement is at the HR Leadership Conference to be held at the Philippine Stock Exchange Center, February 26, 2015.

talentview.com.phanj.vera@talentview.com.phph.linkedin.com/in/anjvera@AnjVera

5Evaluate Your Success Through Global Recruitment Metrics

It’s not simply how much we measure that matters but how aligned our metrics are to achieve business results. In talent acquisition, successful organizations first cover the basics such as turnaround time from application to job offer and cost per hire. They then move on to more strategic measures such as retention and quality of hire to see the impact recruitment has made to the bottom line. In this way, HR will not be viewed simply as a cost center and can assume a more strategic role in the organization. Results matter so put a process in place to measure, reward, and recognize the right actions and behaviors—because what gets measured gets done.

Sustaining the BrandTo evolve your employer brand and reap the rewards in a fast-moving talent landscape, the key word is alignment. Many organizations think in terms of advertising when we talk of the word ‘brand.’ While this is a relative-ly important aspect, the main focus should be alignment of what is being promised to applicants and what is being experienced from their entry to exit. Just as brands become alive through our experiences, applicants that become part of the organization must experience and live out your employer brand. This creates consistency, a key element of good branding, and a cycle of positive stories

which in turn lead to a higher likelihood of referrals of individuals that also fit your organization.

Whether you’re repositioning your employer brand or seeking to sustain a more mature brand, organizations that put effort into defining their value as an employer and aligning this value at each and every touch point increase employee productivity, satisfaction, and loyalty. Not only do they have a happier workforce, but they also deliver a better customer experience and see stronger financial results.

About TalentViewTalentView is the first employer branding company in the Philippines. We are passionate about getting employers noticed and loved.

Our mission is to develop research-based frameworks and integrate them into your people strategies to attract, retain and engage talent.

TalentView is an Alliance Partner of LinkedIn and Employer Brand International.

For more information about TalentView, visit its website at TalentView.com.ph.

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