The perception of an organization as an employer is crucial to attract and retain top talent and build a strong employer brand that sets them apart from their competitors. Insights-driven storytelling uses data to create a convincing narrative about the organization’s employer brand. When candid feedback from employees, candidates, and other stakeholders about their experiences with the organization is weaved into the narrative, organisations can be exclusively positioned with a unique advantage of communicating their strengths and values to create a lasting impact amidst their audience

Although organisations realised the importance of having a strong employer brand, they did not know how to go about it. In fact, an interesting study by a global market research company, Forrester, revealed that it is much more difficult to retain talent in the current scenario than it was 3 years back. Almost 86% of candidates considered employer brand as being important and over 98% of job seekers read reviews on job portals. We explore more on how organisations can make the employer brand work for them in this note.

The recruitment process under spotlight amidst changing candidate and employee expectations.

The current employees are looking for autonomy more than flexibility across age groups. Their focus is in finding meaningful work while sustaining on an acceptable salary and benefits package. Benefits override hygiene level salary which was not the case until a few years back. Job seekers are also attracted to the Learning opportunities if they are confident to pick skill sets that can impact their career in the long term.

These trends have completely changed old ways of recruitment from mere connects to impactful touchpoints of data collection. The insights from these data points can translate into planning the talent strategy, talent expenditure and the ROI!

While it seems like a candidate driven market for the immediate future, organizations value candidates that have displayed stability in their job roles. The job-hopping trend is likely to continue in sectors like data, cyber security etc where the demand is higher than supply. However, once this demand and supply settles, this trend should settle soon too.

Upholding the Employer Brand is joint responsibility of every employee

The common belief is that the CEO office should hold the responsibility ably supported by cross disciplinary functions. We see the rise of unique roles like recruitment marketing that brings the best of Marketing and HR to the candidates. The accountability should be driven by every employee from campus ambassador to the CEO.

Employee engagement should create enough buzz to pull towards Employer branding. leveraging social media through small videos ,byte sized branding strategies is picking up.

Branding must be a continuous process. The engagement should be sustained through learning opportunities to create long term impact. Managerial feedback, clarity on career path etc will help them envision a long career in organisation. Engaging people from offer to joining through technology can be cost effective and impactful

Using data insights effectively to match aspirations and showcase the world of possibilities while being transparent will be the key to earn the trust of the current and future employees.

Strategies to navigate a candidate driven market

An impactful strategy to navigate this candidate driven market is where organisations try to create an impression with every touch point. For Instance, create a career advisory page to share inputs on how to apply for a role, advisory on clearing the interview etc. Some organisations even allow candidates to speak to internal employees to build transparency. This helps build network and goodwill among a pool of potential candidates!

Candidates and employees want to relate to a larger purpose than settling for mere hygiene factors of salary and benefits. Here is where the organisations can score brownie points by being authentic, respecting the candidates’ choices and being non-judgemental.

Creating psychologically safe spaces to voice out and encouraging active listening can make workplaces not only attractive but also highly engaging and productive.

In conclusion, as employees seek flexibility diversity and a strong purpose in their jobs it is important for organisations to be authentic, listen to candidates’ feedback and consistently strive to implement changes for a lasting impact. A sustainable Employer branding strategy should thus revolve around being consistent, open to feedback , leverage insights to influence.