Employer branding
Encyclopedia
The term employer brand was first used in the early 1990s to denote an organisation’s reputation as an employer. Since then, it has become widely adopted by the global management community. Minchington (2005) defines your employer brand as “the image of your organisation as a ‘great place to work’ in the mind of current employees and key stakeholders in the external market (active and passive candidates, clients, customers and other key stakeholders). The art and science of employer branding is therefore concerned with the attraction, engagement and retention of initiatives targeted at enhancing your company's employer brand.".
Just as a customer brand proposition is used to define a product or service offer, an employer brand proposition (otherwise referred to as an employer value proposition
, employee value proposition
or EVP) is used to define an organisation’s employment offer. Likewise the marketing disciplines associated with branding and brand management
have been increasingly applied by the human resources
and talent management
community to attract, engage and retain talented candidates and employees, in the same way that marketing
applies such tools to attracting and retaining clients, customers and consumers.
, in the Journal of Brand Management in December 1996. This academic paper was the first published attempt to ‘test the application of brand management techniques to human resource management’. Within this paper, Simon Barrow and Tim Ambler defined the employer brand as: the package of functional, economic and psychological benefits provided by employment, and identified with the employing company. By 2001, of 138 leading companies surveyed by the Conference Board
in North America, 40% claimed to be actively engaged in some form of employer branding activity. In 2003, an employer brand survey conducted by the Economist
among a global panel of readers revealed a 61% level of awareness of the term ‘employer brand’ among HR professionals and 41% among non-HR professionals. The first book on the subject was published in 2005, and the second in 2006. In 2008, Jackie Orme, the Director General of the UK Chartered Institute of Personnel Directors confirmed the growing status of the discipline in her opening address to the CIPD annual conference, with the observation that: “When I started out in the profession, nobody talked about employer branding. Now it's absolutely integral to business strategy - resonating well beyond the doors of the HR department”. Similar recognition of the growing importance of employer brand thinking and practice has also been recently in evidence in the USA, Australasia, Asia, and Europe, with the publication of numerous books on the subject.
of the right kind of talent sought by an organisation to achieve its goals, and the subsequent desire for effective employee engagement
and employee retention
.
or Employee value proposition
(EVP). This serves to: define what the organisation would most like to be associated with as an employer; highlight the attributes that differentiate the organisation from other employers; and clarify the ‘give and get’ of the employment deal (balancing the value that employees are expected to contribute with the value from employment that they can expect in return). This latter aspect of the employer brand proposition is often referred to in the HR literature as the ‘psychological contract’.
focuses on communicating the customer brand promise, and the attitudes and behaviours expected from employees to deliver on that promise. While it is clearly beneficial to the organisation for employees to understand their role in delivering the customer brand promise, the effectiveness of internal marketing activities can often be short-lived if the brand values on which the service experience is founded are not experienced by the employees in their interactions with the organisation. This is the gap that employer brand thinking and practice seeks to address with a more mutually beneficial employment deal / Psychological contract
.
, internal branding / brand engagement takes a more ‘inside-out’, value-based approach to shaping employee perceptions and behaviours, following the lead of the highly influential ‘Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies
’ study published in the mid-90’s. This sought to demonstrate that companies with consistent, distinctive and deeply held values tended to outperform those companies with a less clear and articulated ethos. While brand-led culture change is often the stated desire of these programmes their focus on communication-led, marketing methods (however, involving or experiential) has been prone to the same failings of conventional internal marketing. As Amazon’s founder, Jeff Bezos
, asserts: “One of things you find in companies is that once a culture is formed it takes nuclear weaponry to change it”. You cannot simply assert your way to a new culture, no more can you assert your way to a strong brand, it needs to be consistently and continuously shaped and managed, which is one of the primary reasons many organisations have turned from the short term engagement focus of internal branding initiatives to more long term focus of employer brand management.
Just as a customer brand proposition is used to define a product or service offer, an employer brand proposition (otherwise referred to as an employer value proposition
Employer value proposition
Minchington defines an Employer Value Proposition as a set of associations and offerings provided by an organisation in return for the skills, capabilities and experiences an employee brings to the organisation...
, employee value proposition
Employee value proposition
Employee Value Proposition is a term used to denote the balance of the rewards and benefits that are received by employees in return for their performance at the workplace....
or EVP) is used to define an organisation’s employment offer. Likewise the marketing disciplines associated with branding and brand management
Brand management
Brand management is the application of marketing techniques to a specific product, product line, or brand.The discipline of brand management was started at Procter & Gamble as a result of a famous memo by Neil H...
have been increasingly applied by the human resources
Human resources
Human resources is a term used to describe the individuals who make up the workforce of an organization, although it is also applied in labor economics to, for example, business sectors or even whole nations...
and talent management
Talent management
Talent management refers to the skills of attracting highly skilled workers, of integrating new workers, and developing and retaining current workers to meet current and future business objectives. Talent management in this context does not refer to the management of entertainers...
community to attract, engage and retain talented candidates and employees, in the same way that marketing
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...
applies such tools to attracting and retaining clients, customers and consumers.
Origin and adoption of the employer brand concept
The term ‘employer brand’ was first publicly introduced to a management audience in 1990, and defined by Simon Barrow, chairman of People in Business, and Tim Ambler, Senior Fellow of London Business SchoolLondon Business School
London Business School is an international business school and a constituent college of the federal University of London, located in central London, beside Regent's Park...
, in the Journal of Brand Management in December 1996. This academic paper was the first published attempt to ‘test the application of brand management techniques to human resource management’. Within this paper, Simon Barrow and Tim Ambler defined the employer brand as: the package of functional, economic and psychological benefits provided by employment, and identified with the employing company. By 2001, of 138 leading companies surveyed by the Conference Board
The Conference Board
The Conference Board, Inc. is a non-profit, non-partisan business membership and research group. It has approximately 12,000 executives in its network, from 1200 corporations in 60 countries. It holds conferences, convenes executives, conducts economic and business management research, and is seen...
in North America, 40% claimed to be actively engaged in some form of employer branding activity. In 2003, an employer brand survey conducted by the Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
among a global panel of readers revealed a 61% level of awareness of the term ‘employer brand’ among HR professionals and 41% among non-HR professionals. The first book on the subject was published in 2005, and the second in 2006. In 2008, Jackie Orme, the Director General of the UK Chartered Institute of Personnel Directors confirmed the growing status of the discipline in her opening address to the CIPD annual conference, with the observation that: “When I started out in the profession, nobody talked about employer branding. Now it's absolutely integral to business strategy - resonating well beyond the doors of the HR department”. Similar recognition of the growing importance of employer brand thinking and practice has also been recently in evidence in the USA, Australasia, Asia, and Europe, with the publication of numerous books on the subject.
Employer branding
While the term ‘employer brand’ denotes what people currently associate with an organisation, employer branding has been defined as the sum of a company’s efforts to communicate to existing and prospective staff what makes it a desirable place to work, and the active management of a company’s image as seen through the eyes of its associates and potential hires.Employer brand management
Employer brand management expands the scope of this brand intervention beyond communication to incorporate every aspect of the employment experience, and the people management processes and practices (often referred to as ‘touch-points’) that shape the perceptions of existing and prospective employees. In other words, employer brand management addresses the reality of the employment experience and not simply its presentation. By doing so it supports both external recruitmentRecruitment
Recruitment refers to the process of attracting, screening, and selecting qualified people for a job. For some components of the recruitment process, mid- and large-size organizations often retain professional recruiters or outsource some of the process to recruitment agencies.The recruitment...
of the right kind of talent sought by an organisation to achieve its goals, and the subsequent desire for effective employee engagement
Employee engagement
Employee engagement, also called worker engagement, is a business management concept. An "engaged employee" is one who is fully involved in, and enthusiastic about their work, and thus will act in a way that furthers their organization's interests...
and employee retention
Employee retention
Employee retention refers to the ability of an organization to retain its employees. Employee retention can be represented by a simple statistic...
.
Employer brand proposition
As for consumer brands, most employer brand practitioners and authors argue that effective employer branding and brand management requires a clear Employer Brand proposition, also regularly referred to as an Employer value propositionEmployer value proposition
Minchington defines an Employer Value Proposition as a set of associations and offerings provided by an organisation in return for the skills, capabilities and experiences an employee brings to the organisation...
or Employee value proposition
Employee value proposition
Employee Value Proposition is a term used to denote the balance of the rewards and benefits that are received by employees in return for their performance at the workplace....
(EVP). This serves to: define what the organisation would most like to be associated with as an employer; highlight the attributes that differentiate the organisation from other employers; and clarify the ‘give and get’ of the employment deal (balancing the value that employees are expected to contribute with the value from employment that they can expect in return). This latter aspect of the employer brand proposition is often referred to in the HR literature as the ‘psychological contract’.
Relationship between employer branding and internal marketing
Internal marketingInternal marketing
Internal marketing is a process that occurs within a company or organization whereby the functional process aligns, motivates and empowers employees at all management levels to deliver a satisfying customer experience...
focuses on communicating the customer brand promise, and the attitudes and behaviours expected from employees to deliver on that promise. While it is clearly beneficial to the organisation for employees to understand their role in delivering the customer brand promise, the effectiveness of internal marketing activities can often be short-lived if the brand values on which the service experience is founded are not experienced by the employees in their interactions with the organisation. This is the gap that employer brand thinking and practice seeks to address with a more mutually beneficial employment deal / Psychological contract
Psychological contract
A psychological contract represents the mutual beliefs, perceptions, and informal obligations between an employer and an employee. It sets the dynamics for the relationship and defines the detailed practicality of the work to be done...
.
Role of employer brand management in brand-led culture change
Compared with the more typically customer centric focus of Internal marketingInternal marketing
Internal marketing is a process that occurs within a company or organization whereby the functional process aligns, motivates and empowers employees at all management levels to deliver a satisfying customer experience...
, internal branding / brand engagement takes a more ‘inside-out’, value-based approach to shaping employee perceptions and behaviours, following the lead of the highly influential ‘Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies
Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies
Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies is a book written by Jim Collins and Jerry I. Porras on October 26, 1994. The book outlines the results of a six-year research project into what makes enduring great companies...
’ study published in the mid-90’s. This sought to demonstrate that companies with consistent, distinctive and deeply held values tended to outperform those companies with a less clear and articulated ethos. While brand-led culture change is often the stated desire of these programmes their focus on communication-led, marketing methods (however, involving or experiential) has been prone to the same failings of conventional internal marketing. As Amazon’s founder, Jeff Bezos
Jeff Bezos
Jeffrey Preston "Jeff" Bezos is the founder, president, chief executive officer , and chairman of the board of Amazon.com.-Early life and background:...
, asserts: “One of things you find in companies is that once a culture is formed it takes nuclear weaponry to change it”. You cannot simply assert your way to a new culture, no more can you assert your way to a strong brand, it needs to be consistently and continuously shaped and managed, which is one of the primary reasons many organisations have turned from the short term engagement focus of internal branding initiatives to more long term focus of employer brand management.
External links
- Link to useful reference site on employer brand management thinking http://www.employerbrandingonline.com/
- Link to blog about employer branding http://www.employerbrandingtoday.com/