Employer Branding 101 – Four Fatal Errors When Building Your Employer Brand

As you develop you employer brand to attract and retain talent to deliver your business strategy, how confident are you that you are taking the appropriate measures to guarantee you build a compelling and magnetic employer brand?Here are four fatal errors when evaluating the effectives and strength of your employer brand. How well does your employer brand stack up against them?1. No clear, consistent and differentiating employment experienceHow many businesses are there who are looking to attract the same talent as you are in a 10 mile radius of where you are based?How well do you know who they are and what the employment experience is in their business?If you don’t know who you are competing against for talent and you don’t know how you are different from them, how will you be able to communicate this clearly and concisely in all your communications?2. Not leveraging every communication vehicleEngaging people behind your employer brand is a key to bringing it to life.How well do you communicate about your employer brand and what you stand for in all your communication from your corporate website to your intranet; from your internal newsletters to your external job adverts; from your appointment announcements to your employee handbook; from the minutes of executive meetings to the verbal messages delivered by your line managers?Are you sure that your message is consistent?And if your message is consistent does it also match your behaviours and the decisions you make about key appointments, reward decisions and how you recognise the contribution your people make to the business?3. Paying lip service to your employer brand valuesWhen the going gets tough, are you prepared to stand your ground in the decisions you make on appointments so that the people you hire are going to live your corporate and employer brand values?All too many times, especially in internal appointment decisions, many companies will appoint the person who is able to undertake the role based technical ability, not their ability to live the values of the organisation or their ability to demonstrate the leadership behaviours required in the organisation.Technical capability can be bought or taught. Behaviours and reputation are far more difficult to acquire. Hiring for technical ability above leadership behaviour and demonstrating living the values and culture you aspire may help you in delivering short term profit but does not build equity in your talent for the future.4. Not considering the employment brand through the total employment lifecycleMany organisations consider that the employment brand is only important at the time of recruitment and selection.However those organisations that are able to attract and retain high quality talent in a challenging market place recognise the importance of delivering on the employment brand proposition throughout the total employment life cycle.Understanding where you need to adapt your systems, processes, policies and ways of working will enable you to create a magnetic employment brand where employees are not only proud to work for you but they are also your biggest employer brand ambassadors and can themselves help you attract talent to the business.