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Click here for the free report "61 Questions To Transform Your Workforce" |
David
Lee
Consultant
Speaker
Author
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AR
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How
to Build A Magnetic Employer Brand™ - Part
I |
| By
David Lee |
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| Originally
published on ERExchange.com |
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In The
True Power of a Magnetic Employer Brand, we explored the importance
of building a Magnetic Employer Brand™ .
When you make the effort to create a Magnetic
Employer Brand™ , you save yourself
the work of trying to convince employees
of choice that you are an employer of choice.
With a Magnetic Employer Brand™ , your
reputation acts like a huge talent magnet,
drawing the best, most talented people to
your organization. To enjoy the benefits
of a Magnetic Employer Brand™ , you
need to deliver a unique and attractive work
experience – i.e. a branded work experience – that
sets you apart in the labor market.
In the previous article,
we discussed the “Why” of employer
branding. In this three part series, we’ll
discuss the “How” – how
to build a Magnetic Employer Brand™ .
This part will focus on the foundation and
assessment phase of an effective employer
branding process. The next two articles in
the series will focus on the process of building
a Magnetic Employer Brand™ .
Put Together a Team That Understands,
Influences, and Experiences All Facets
of Employer Branding and Your Employer
Brand
Developing a powerful employer brand requires that you involve all constituencies
who influence your employer brand in the branding process. This cannot
be overemphasized. Creating a Magnetic Employer Brand™ isn’t
about your Human Resources Department getting together with an ad agency
and coming up with the ultimate ad campaign. It isn’t simply making
sure all your collateral material has a consistent image.
Creating a Magnetic Employer Brand™ requires rigorously examining
all facets of the work experience your organization delivers and making
sure you create an experience that leads to an employer of choice reputation.
To address all the various facets and factors that impact your employer
brand, you need to involve people who represent these varied perspectives.
You want to include one or more individuals representing human resources,
management from all levels, public relations, sales and marketing, customer
service, and frontline workers.
Group size permitting, you would ideally have someone from each of the
major divisions or departments represented. Because a strong brand is one
that gives consistent messages and provides consistent experiences, you
can’t afford to have pockets of discontent and areas of poor work
experience that contradict – and therefore weaken – your employer
brand.
Effective employer branding also involves expertise from a wide range of
disciplines and perspectives. You will want your team to possess expertise
in the areas of advertising and marketing, market research, customer service,
public relations, human resources management, psychology, organizational
development, and management.
Involve Employees In Every Facet
of the Process
Because employees directly experience whether or not you deliver on your
employer brand promise – whether you walk your talk – they
play an essential role in the employer branding process. Without their
input on how to make your organization a better place to work and their
ongoing feedback about how well you’re delivering the work experience
you promise, you are likely to do what many organizations do. You are likely
to end up “advertising your fantasy,” in the words of Alan
Brewer, VP of Creative Services with Burgess Advertising Associates, Inc.
To paraphrase advertising legend David Ogilvy, nothing will kill your reputation
in the labor market faster than doing a great job advertising a work experience
you don’t deliver. Organizations that promote themselves as an Employer
of Choice when they’re anything but; end up with an angry, cynical
workforce that is only too happy to counteract their employer’s paid
advertising with more credible word of mouth advertising.
Frontline workers possess critical workplace quality intelligence that
senior managers huddled around a conference table would never be able to
provide. If you truly want to develop a Magnetic Employer Brand™ ,
employee involvement is nonnegotiable. How do you involve your employees?
First, make sure frontline workers are represented on your employer branding
team. Second, conduct employee focus groups and surveys both in the beginning
and on an annual or biannual basis, to find out organizational and managerial
practices that are weakening your employer brand. These focus groups and
surveys can also provide you with internal best practices that you will
want to spread throughout your organization. Third, create an Employee
Advisory Council that will give you critical “voice of the (internal)
customer” feedback in all phases of the employer branding process.
If your management team has a reputation for soliciting employee input
that only ends up in the La Brea Tar Pits of inaction, it will take time
to build enough credibility and trust for employees to care enough to give
their input. To restore damaged credibility, honestly acknowledge your
less than stellar performance in this area and then demonstrate as quickly
as possible what you are doing with their input. For input that can’t
or won’t be implemented, explain why. Share information on best practices
regarding employee input and involvement with your employer branding team,
and all of management. There are numerous books, articles, and white papers
on this topic. You might want to start with the Society for Human Resource
Management’s website. |
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Become an Expert on Your Target
Market
As any marketing expert will tell you, the most successful brands
are built upon an intimate knowledge of their customers. The stronger
the brand, the more the brand manager understands the hearts and
minds of their ideal customer. In employer branding, this means understanding
what: |
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today’s employees
want |
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the most talented employees want |
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employees in your particular industry
want |
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employees from the demographics you
hire want |
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employees from the various fields
and job positions you hire want |
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Although this may seem obvious,
we have plenty of evidence that many, if
not most, organizations don’t understand
or don’t know how to deliver the kind
of work experience that employees want. Knowing
what employees value most highly not only
allows you to build an employer brand that
is relevant and compelling, it also provides
a framework for ongoing monitoring of whether
you are delivering the kind of work experience
you think you are. Where do you find out
what your target market(s) want? For today’s “typical” employee,
you’ll want to draw on the plethora
of research identifying what matters most
to employees and what impacts both satisfaction
and productivity. Good places to start include
Gallup ’s research, published in First
Break All the Rules, David Maister’s
work, published in Practice What You
Preach,
and Watson Wyatt’s research, published
in their report WorkUSA 2002.
To discover what workers in your specific industry value, contact your
industry association. For information on what the most talented employees
are looking for, interview your star performers to find out what is most
important to them. Interview star performers who’ve left. Find out
what important factors they found elsewhere.
Regardless of what industry you’re in, you hire people that represent
a variety of professions. You’ll want to understand their unique
need and value hierarchies. This amount of precision allows you to create
not only a Magnetic Employer Brand™ to the general labor market,
but also to fine tune your message and the work experience you deliver
to your various sub-markets. For instance, your accountants’ value
hierarchy will likely be very different from that of your sales force or
your customer service representatives. You might be delivering the kind
of work experience that accountants want, but not what sales or customer
service professionals want. Thus, your employer brand would not be consistently
strong across the board. To learn more about the value hierarchies of the
various professions and demographics you hire, contact the various trade
associations that represent the profession in questions or The Society
for Human Resource Management (www.SHRM.org).
If you draw heavily from a particular demographic, become an expert on
that demographic. For instance, when Deb Franklin, HR Manager at Designer
Blinds of Omaha, Nebraska wanted to hire from two different ethnic groups,
she brought in experts and studied the cultures of these ethnic groups
so Designer Blinds could more accurately address their needs. The result?
They have a waiting list for their second shift and a turnover rate of
7.5% – one tenth the average rate for manufacturers in their region.
You will also want to understand the different work experience value hierarchies
of the different generations. To learn about these generational differences,
start with the classic Generations At Work by Ron Zemke et al. |
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| The
values and needs that are unique to
today’s employees and to the
various demographics lie upon a bedrock
of timeless, fundamental human needs.
Regardless of one’s profession
or age group, or changes in societal
norms, human beings have fundamental,
hard-wired needs and drives that impact
employee satisfaction. These include
the need: |
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for meaning and purpose
(i.e. to matter and to be part of something
that matters) |
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for community and connection |
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to learn and grow |
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to feel a sense of control and autonomy |
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to experience mastery and self-efficacy
(e.g. to feel the “thrill of
victory” rather than “the
agony of defeat” at work each
day) |
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When your work experience
taps into these fundamental human needs,
you unleash a gusher of enthusiasm, pride,
and appreciation – and an impassioned
word of mouth PR campaign that positions
you credibly as an Employer of Choice. To
make sure you do tap into this powerful source
of employee satisfaction and inspiration,
make sure you have someone on your team with
a strong psychological background who understands
what fundamental human needs drive employee
motivation and satisfaction.
Find Out If You Deliver What Employees Want
Once you know what your target market wants, the next step is to find out
how well you’re delivering that. Conduct individual interviews, focus
groups, and employee surveys to find out whether or not you are delivering
the kind of work experience the most desirable employees are seeking. For
this to work, you will need to make it clear what you plan to do with this
information – and that in fact you will do something with it. As
mentioned previously, if your management team has a history of not doing
anything with employee input, credibility building will be an important
first step.
Think "Experience"
To provide your employer branding team with precise, actionable intelligence
from employees, break down employees’ total work experience into
process experiences or moments of truth. For instance, what is the new
hire experience like in your organization? Does this critical moment of
truth feel like sink or swim or “We’re glad you’re here.
You’ve joined the best… and here’s why”?
How would they describe their “interaction with senior management” moment
of truth? What about their “the organization is going through change” experience?
Asking employees how they experience each moment of truth will provide
you with valuable information about how to create an exceptional overall
work experience.
Companies known for providing unique, stand-out customer service – companies
such as Ritz Carlton or Southwest Airlines – do this with their customers.
They pay close attention to each facet of their customers’ experience
to make sure it reflects and strengthens their brand. By carefully managing
each customer service moment of truth, they differentiate themselves in
the marketplace with what the Forum Corporation calls a “Branded
Customer Experience”. You can use this same principle to create a
Branded Work Experience. By using this same attention to detail in making
sure each facet of your employees’ work experience reflects and strengthens
your employer brand, you create a branded work experience that establishes
you as an employer of choice. The first step in this process is to identify
and analyze these moments of truth and how well you are doing in each. |
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Get
Ready For the Next Step
At this
point in the process, you have: |
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An employer branding
team in place |
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Active employee involvement |
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A clear understanding of what your
employees of choice want in an employer. |
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A clear, honest, ongoing feedback
loop with employees that enable you
to continuously gather information
about organizational strengths and
weaknesses |
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A clear understanding of what needs
you address well, and what ones you
don’t |
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A list of organizational practices
and policies that weaken your employer
brand and those that strengthen it |
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A list of moment of truth experiences
that help shape employees’ overall
work experience, and a clear picture
of how well you do in each area. |
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| In the next two articles in
this series, we’ll look at identifying
your Default Employer Brand and then move
into using the information your employer
branding team has gathered to create your
own unique and Magnetic Employer Brand™ . |
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About the Author: David Lee is an internationally recognized authority on organizational and managerial practices that optimize employee performance. He is the author of Managing Employee Stress and Safety, as well as dozens of articles on employee and organizational performance that have been published in trade journals and books in North America, Asia, Europe, and Australia. For information on his programs and service, click here.
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