In our 2023 Top Ten Talent Acquisition Trends series, we previously looked at Focusing on the Candidate Experience. This week’s trend is Emphasizing Employer Branding and Company Values.

You might think that an employer brand and talent brand are what you create. In part, that’s correct. A good reminder is that if you’re not creating them, you still have a brand and it might not be the one you intend.

When thinking about your employer brand, some of the things to consider:

• Company Values – What are the things you stay true to and communicate within and outside of the organization about what you stand for? These are oftentimes identified when a company is formed. They should be reviewed periodically and if needed, updated to fit the company’s evolution.
• Expand your Reach – What channels can you use to showcase your company’s culture, values and benefits? Consider your current set of social media platforms and research new platforms and tools to expand your reach.
• Employee Experience – Does your employee experience set you apart? Companies are focusing on creating a positive employee experience by offering expanded benefits, perks, and training and growth opportunities.
• Employee Advocacy – Are your current employees positive brand ambassadors? If you’re not confident that they are, you may need to do some internal culture work. Encourage employees to share their experiences and promote the company’s culture and values on social media platforms and incorporate into your website.
• Diversity and Inclusion – Do you have diversity and inclusion initiatives in place? These might include training programs, employee resource groups and inclusive hiring practices.

Expand your brand to include your talent brand by identifying and building on the reasons why desired candidates should choose to interview with and join your company vs. other opportunities they have. Get in touch to discuss ideas on maximizing your talent brand. JESSI Search, Inc. has expertise in all phases of the talent acquisition process.

Your personal brand is a promise to your clients…a promise of quality, consistency, competency and reliability. 

Jason Harman, CEO and Investing & Business Keynote Speaker

I saw this in a post this morning. It got me thinking about the difference in a candidate’s mind between taking a job and furthering their career. We’ve gone through the offer process with 1,000’s of candidates. Before we even get to the offer stage, we like to have a conversation with our client about how they can position themselves to attract the best candidates for the job.

When we ask our candidates what would incent them to make a career move to a new employer, here’s what we hear:

• An investment in their growth. Does the company offer training and/or pay for their employees to learn and grow in other ways?
• A career path. This doesn’t necessarily mean a career ladder. Instead, it may mean the opportunity to take on additional responsibility and broaden their role and have that reflected in their pay.
• An onboarding process. Our candidates want to be able to bring value as quickly as possible just as much as our hiring managers want them to be able to contribute.
• Compensation also comes into play. Having a comp plan that is defined is important. Although, once the comp plan is defined and the candidate views it as reasonable, comp is no longer the most important decision factor.

We’ve also seen these actions have a positive impact on how quickly our candidates engage in their position and how satisfied they are with it:

• Receiving an Onboarding plan that outlines what to expect and what they need to do in their first days and weeks.
• Being setup before/on their first day with any equipment and systems they need to perform their job.
• Given a tour that helps them engage in the office, if that’s where they work, with teammates and others in the organization and with the systems they will use to find information and perform their job.

Navigating your professional life isn’t just a game of numbers and resumes, but emotions. 

Evan Thomas, Author

Don’t miss that great candidate, here is the key to hiring your target talent.

You’re ready to hire. What’s one of the first things you should do? Dust off the job description? Get the word out? Those are necessary steps, however, companies with the most success acquiring the best talent matches for their candidate profile know there’s another area of focus that sets them apart. That is, defining their unique candidate value proposition.

You should know the responsibilities for the role and the competencies that successful employees in the role embody. Understanding what’s important to your talent segment and clearly defining and communicating what you can offer them, is your key to successfully hiring those candidates!

Your candidate value proposition is unique to your culture, values, mission, along with benefits and perks your employees receive. Spend time developing it. Ask your employees why they joined your company and why they stay. Think about current and future initiatives and how they will influence your culture and value proposition.

Beginning with this in mind will guide your approach to the different steps in your recruiting process and the candidate market. Accessing candidates who are a fit for you and who have been looking for a company like yours, benefits both and leads to retaining thriving talent!

If you want assistance or guidance defining your company’s unique candidate value proposition, contact us!

“Staying true to [yourself] is the only sustainable value proposition” ~ Tim Leberecht, Entrepreneur, Author and TED Speaker

We’ve found that the best fit for our candidates are positions they have carefully considered and weighed against criteria that stays true to their goals and values.

The best way to do this is to put thought into what you want out of your work today and in the future. Think in terms of what would be present in a dream job for you and what are things that should be present to meet your unique needs.

Wise leaders know that the best teams are diverse teams. This doesn’t mean that there isn’t commonality with values. When everyone’s core values are aligned and moving towards a common goal, it drives productivity and inspiration!

We once hired a contractor from a trusted resource as a Sales Development Rep. He seemed to be struggling, so our CEO invited him to lunch. When she asked him what his dream job would be, he said, “I don’t really like sales. I want to be an English as a Second Language teacher.” The conversation immediately shifted from him continuing to support us in sales, to what he could do to land that dream job!

Staying true to yourself and your values will help you make decisions that serve your professional and personal goals alike. Now might be a good time to ask yourself a few questions to crystallize your thoughts and have your prioritized list ready when you’re in job search mode. A surprising number of candidates find that they’ve settled for the wrong job. Avoiding a mismatch and short tenure is best for all.

“Let yourself be drawn by the stronger pull of that which you truly love.” – Rumi, recognized as a best-selling poet in the U.S.

According to the 2021 Bureau of Labor Statics report, the annual total separations rate or turnover rate in 2020 was 57.3 percent. Some forecast that number to be higher in 2021. Jump starting new employees and improving retention is clearly important to gain a greater return on your hiring investment.

The key is planning and implementing a clearly defined onboarding process. In the September 21, 2021 edition of Human Resource Executive, Nick Otto shared that what’s important to employees now has moved from culture and meaning to flexibility, increased pay, and job security. Having an effective ‘Onboarding Success Map’ is one valuable way to demonstrate a path to greater pay, flexibility and job security to your newly hired employees. Your reward is a faster and enhanced return on your hiring investment.

Your onboarding process should:

1. Have clear outcomes the employee is to achieve at specific time benchmarks
2. Have regular feedback built in, even weekly in the beginning and,
3. Be progressive with realistic steps that advance each week, month, quarter etc.

If your company does not have an onboarding map and process that you believe makes you a destination employer, let’s start a conversation about how to build or improve on what you have in place.