Creating an Employer Brand Index

A robust employer brand is important if an enterprise wants a talent pool of well-qualified and creative applicants and a competitive advantage in a challenging marketplace. Good employees are hard to find and hard to keep; we know there is a correlation between the employment brand are and how attractive an organization is as an employer to current and potential staff.

Competition for the best employees is on par with competition for customers so it is crucial to develop strategies that enable the creation of distinctive identity and perception in the target population.

Conference Board in their report “Engaging Employees Through Your Brand” offers this definition: “The employer brand establishes the identity of the firm as an employer. It encompasses the firm’s values, systems, policies, and behaviors towards the objectives of attracting, motivating, and retaining the firm’s current and potential employees.”

The smart organization needs to know if the time and resources invested in talent attraction initiatives provide a significant return. The metrics used in evaluating employer brand allow the organization to establish a baseline for working towards becoming the best employer in the marketplace.

Calculating what counts

The Link Humans Employer Brand Index categorizes findings into 16 key employer branding attributes:

• Autonomy
• Benefits and perks
• Brand recognition
• Career advancement
• Culture and values
• CSR
• Environment
• Flexibility
• Job stability
• Learning and development
• Management
• Mission and purpose
• People
• Quality of work
• Salary
• Work/life balance

This methodology for measuring both quantitative and qualitative data points which influence and affect organizational employer brand. The index comprises actionable indicators that constitute a plan for improving the employer brand, recommending what is likely to have the most positive impact on the employer brand.

Understanding how the employer brand is perceived is an obvious starting point. Using an index enables the team to assess whether from an employer brand point perspective the organization is well-positioned in terms of influence and the level of engagement.

Share and adapt

Attractive employers do more than set out the basic responsibilities of a role, they show candidates how what they do fits into the overall strategy and the contribution their work makes in terms of the bigger picture. Good employees want meaningful work that empowers and energizes while facilitating personal and professional development. Bersin by Deloitte research in conjunction with Glassdoor found that for millennials, the “ability to learn and progress” is the principal driver of the employment brand of an organization.

Using stories from engaged employees as part of the brand messages means effectively turning employees into brand advocates, telling candidates what’s great about working for the organization. The employer brand is harnessed to showcase the enterprise and demonstrate an environment and culture that attractive to employees and other stakeholders.

While brand authenticity and differentiation are important the modern working environment is dynamic and volatile, and social and technological change make employer branding an ongoing project rather than a one-stop-shop. Success depends on proactively adapting to new data and applications, constant horizon-scanning and willingness to address challenges and opportunities.

We believe that employing relevant metrics and regularly reviewing brand positioning against an index enables the creation and maintenance of a pipeline of talent against future needs and builds an employee-centered focus on motivation and engagement.

Ready to learn more about your company’s reputation as an employer? Check out The Employer Brand Index today.