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Over the last few years, employer brand has been one of the key emerging topics when it comes to the workplace. Organizations all around the world are realizing that it takes more than a seductive pay package to lure top talent towards their teams and are starting to undertake initiatives that showcase how great a place it is to work.

The problem starts to present itself when companies who do this aren’t actually great places to work. While companies are now becoming more adept in spreading their message, often using social media to great effect, the basics of having a great employer brand are sometimes being forgotten, which undermines the whole ethos behind it.

The only thing worse than not having a clear employer brand strategy, is having one that doesn’t accurately reflect your organisation. If you’re overdoing it in terms of the way you present your organisation, versus the way it actually is on the inside, then you run the risk of not being able to attract top talent, nor retain the people already in your team.

Figure Out Who Owns It, Have a Strategy in Place

One of the key struggles that many organizations have when it comes to employer brand, is knowing who is in charge of driving it. Not every organization has the resources of a Google or an Amazon. With the breadth of disciplines that employer brand relies upon, there are good arguments for the function being owned by a variety of teams; HR, Talent, and Marketing can all put good cases forward. While all of these can do a great job, it’s worth saying that in my experience, companies who do employer branding well have an internal marketing or communications professional, in addition to tight coordination between marketing and talent teams. Ensuring a balance between having enough people involved to where the message accurately represents your organization, and not too many people so as to convolute it, is crucial here.

Once it’s clear who is actually in charge of your employer branding, it’s important to have a strategy in place. Who are you trying to appeal to? What do they value in their workplace and how do you provide that? What channels do they use? How can you share your message with them? Once these questions are answered, you’ll have a far better idea on the specific ways in which you should connect with potential talent.

However, maintaining self-awareness is key here. If you don’t approach your employer brand in the right way, then you can invite skepticism. For example, if you’re an innovative, leading edge company, you’d be right to portray yourself as such. However, leaning too heavily on that message can be detrimental. Just think about it; if someone kept telling you how good they were at something would you believe them? Or would the message wear off every time they say it? Often, in these situations, it can come off as conceited, and sound like they are trying to convince themselves more than anybody else. This is another one of the delicate balances you need to keep in mind when taking employer branding seriously, and one that can be the difference between attracting great talent or driving them away.

Live and Breathe It

Your employer brand has the potential to be a powerful tool for talent attraction. However, it’s absolutely vital to remember that your employer brand is only as good at attracting as your internal culture is at retaining. Put simply, the proof is in the pudding. If a candidate is wowed by an exciting employer branding activity that doesn’t accurately reflect what it’s like to work there, then you’re going to encounter problems sooner or later.

As mentioned earlier, I’ve encountered more than a few companies who have seriously overcooked their employer branding. All too often, there is so much focus put on crafting tweets and picking out conferences to attend, that the basic element is left by the wayside: making your organization a great place to work.

Style doesn’t count for much if there’s no substance behind your employer branding. if your expectations of what it should be don’t match up with the outcomes of what it is, then you may have a bigger problem internally that needs addressing. Keep an open dialogue with your employees about what they like best about working within your organization, and celebrate these things. Often, you’ll find that bells and whistles like beanbag breakout zones or masseuse visits on a Tuesday (while great!) aren’t the key things that your employees want.

Once you know what this is, embody it. This will inform what your employer brand looks like when you market it externally and help you to attract the kinds of people that would be good cultural fits. Recruitment is a reactive industry by nature, so making sure that your culture is a priority over the branding aspect helps you to get ahead of potential issues, such as a candidate being surprised and disappointed by their new role.

Summary

Although some organizations are doing a great job of both being a great place to work and doing exciting, innovative work, I’m often seeing companies who focus more on what their brand looks like over what their brand is. For those companies, I have one piece of advice: Employer brand isn’t just a series of activities, it’s a constant, moving, changing thing. It’s not something you do, it’s something you are.

If you’re looking to talk more about this, or you’re looking for great talent in the HR space, feel free to get in touch with me today.