What Is Human Resource Branding?
Human resource branding is about how the company’s current or future or potential employees think about the company as an employer
Like a brand has an image in the customer’s eye, similarly, people also create an image of the company in terms of the employer. An organization needs to build a strong branding HR department to attract potential and strong or top candidates. While organizations with poor or no Human resource branding have to lose top candidates.
Branding HR department is a way for an organization to disclose the packages, benefits, and facilities which are provided to the employees. So, that employees can analyze the benefit of taking a job in an organization.
What is Employee Branding In HR?
Employee branding in HR is an indirect branding of human resource branding. Employee branding in HR is referred to the process when employees project there and the organization’s values and culture.
It is an indirect way of branding which affects the employer and the organization. Process of employee branding in HR takes place from mouth marketing, social media, social advocacy.
Note: Employees receiving great packages, benefits, facilities, etc are likely to share their opinions about the company in their social circle.
What Is Employer Branding?
Employer branding is a process in which organizations have to manage and influence their brand image as an employer among employees, job seekers, shareholders. In simple terms, it is referred to the reputation of a company among employees and job seekers.
For example, the world’s most famous and biggest companies are the best branding HR department examples like Google, Apple, Microsoft, etc have worked employer branding and created strong brand image.
On the other hand employer branding is not something created or owned by an organization. Since human resource branding depends upon the mindset, actions of their employees.
HR Branding Ideas
Human Resource branding is not a one-day job it takes years for an employer to create their organization as a brand for good employment. So, it is important for an organization to build some ideas and to work regularly on those ideas to create an employer. Here are the different ideas for HR branding ideas
Conveying Mission And Vision
A company does not have to wait until an interview or face-to-face interaction to convey the organization’s mission, vision, values. It will help the applicants to understand what are the required skills, and values.
Plus it depicts the organization’s culture and working environment, which not only creates employee branding but also adds value to customers, shareholders, etc. As a result, it creates stronger brand value.
Use Employee Branding
An organization can create human resource branding by using its employees as assets. By providing good packages, working environments to employees. If employees are getting good facilities or a great working environment they will tend to share this opinion in their social circles.
For example: many companies show their employees interview about the company environment in videos showing organizational culture and environment.
Host Industry Events
Another important idea which a company can opt for is hosting industry events. These events help the employees to expand their knowledge horizons. Plus these events are great social gatherings to meet people of similar industries and looking for jobs. So, the organization can hire the top talent in the industry.
Make Work Rewarding
Current employees are the biggest source for creating a human resource brand. So, rewarding the current employees makes them feel safe and secure at their workplace, such events are used to portray the image of an organization as an employer.
For instance, many companies announce the bonus which they distribute at Diwali or New Year. To get applications from talented candidates while recruiting.
Encourage Employee Feedback
Organizations can focus on their employees’ need to understand the things which require changes. As for market research, it is important to analyze the feedback of recruiters. Because there can be valuable ideas or opinions which can change the culture.
Factors Influencing Human Resource Branding
Many different factors influence the reason for human resource branding in an organization. Here are the different factors which influence human resource branding.
- Salary of the employee paid by the employer and human resource.
- Employer provides benefits to employees.
- Job security.
- Pleasant working atmosphere.
- Work-life balance. (Definite or fixed working hours in the job, but not irregular working hours)
- Career progression opportunities. (Simply means growth in the job by way of promotion linked with an increase in remuneration).
HR Branding Strategy Process
A human resource branding strategy is a simple process which a company follows to create an employer as a brand. Plus the simple process divided the steps and made it easy to analyze the progress and the results. So, to understand the human resource branding strategy process, here are the steps which are followed:
Define Goals
The very first step is to define a goal, which states the purpose of establishing HR branding. Like, a company wants to increase more applicants, more talented applicants, high engagement, increase human resource database, employer brand awareness, increase referral rate, more candidates from websites or social media etc.
Use Nesseasery KPIs
Afterwards, it is important to set key performance indicators (KPIs). Suppose a company wants to increase the candidate application by 5%, they have to set particular KPIs to evaluate performance and to understand the path.
All the KPIS are separated into three section which are:
- Consider objectives. Like our example above, the KPIs you select must relate to your stated objectives.
- Attainable and accurate. If KPI data can’t be readily obtained or isn’t 100% accurate, the information will do you no good.
- Actionable. When selecting your KPIs, ask yourself one question: “Can the business influence these metrics, or are they out of our control?” If you can’t influence the KPI, tracking the metric will be futile.
Employee Value Proposition
One of the most important things which any company sounds like an employer is- why does its current employee choose them?
So, it’s important to find all the answers to create successful employer branding or human resource branding. So the organization creates these 5 segments to find answers in every aspect.
- Compensation– Salary satisfaction, compensation system, Promotion system, fairness, evaluation etc.
- Benefits– Holidays, health care, insurance, retirement, education, family benefits.
- Career– Ability to change career, training and education, career development, employee retention, evaluation and feedback.
- Work Environment– Recognition, personal achievement, work-life balance etc.
- Culture– Organization goals and working environment, Leaders and managers, support, collaboration and team spirit, CSR.
Channels For Promotion
Afterwards, in the human resource branding process, an organization needs to decide on a channel to promote its image. Here are the different sources- social media, Career sites, current employees, candidate relationship management etc.
Measure Success
Lastly, as a part of every single process, it is important to analyze the performance. Carefully measuring each KPIs with the result. Afterwards, the required measurement should be taken. Like if the actual performance is lower than the expected performance then the approach needs to be altered.
HR Branding Importance
HR branding is becoming very important for an organization it not only creates human resource branding but also it creates financial stability. So here are the different factors for the importance of HR branding:
Attracts Potential Employees And Retains Existing Ones
Firstly, with human resource branding, an organization receives an application from top applicants and it retains the current employees. As a strong employer, they build a proud feeling among their employees. Plus they provide a strong working environment which creates a strong social image.
So, when a candidate looks for social profiles about working culture before applying for a job, they will come across a strong working environment and proud employees.
Low Recruitment Cost
Companies with strong human resource branding have a strong image among job seekers. So when a company publishes information regarding the recruitment, companies do not have to spend a lot of resources to gather top applicants.
For example companies like Google do not spend a lot on recruitment as they already receive the world best applications before even announcing any recruitment.
So, it saves a big bucks for any company who has focused on creating HR branding.
Strong Internal Assets
A company with strong HR branding have satisfied and proud employees. So, organizations can focus on creating such employees into assets and the company advocates.
As we discussed earlier a satisfied employee tends to share their opinion in their circles. As a result, it works as moth marketing for the company, which attracts talented candidates.
Enhances Employee Engagement
When your organization commits to an employee-centric company brand, intentionally engaging employees to become an intrinsic component of your company culture. And the outcome of intentional employee engagement is increased productivity and profits.
The resulting low turnover provides a firm foundation on which your company can attract more potential candidates for new roles (rather than being stuck in a loop of continuously back-filling vacant roles).
Conveys Brand Value
A market is always led by the industry’s most talented company. And most talented professionals choose industry leaders, the company that has presented itself as a brand. In today’s world job seekers not only look for compensation packages but also look for the working environment, values, mission etc.
Convey Unique Culture
Today many job seekers look for companies that have a vibrant culture and a diverse workforce. They desire to work and have fun at the same time. So, organizations carefully present themselves because it can make or break the deal.
Human Resources Branding Examples
Human resources branding examples are referred to those companies which have established their name as a brand. These companies are not only popular for their products but also for their working environment and happy employees. So here the HR branding examples of companies:
Google employer branding is one of the best in the world. The company is known for its excellent approach to employees and building a strong employer value proposition. Every year, the company receives approximately 3 million resumes, of which they pick only 7,000 new employees. It makes great sense, given that a company goes on the extra mile to be the employer of the year.
General Electrics
General Electric is one of the first companies listed on Dow Jones in 1896. After switching to the digital world, the company had to face a new era. They came to this with great distance. Needless to say, it is a clear analogy to the ‘digital company and also an industrial company’.
Salesforce
Salesforce is an American cloud-based software company headquartered in San Francisco, California. The tech leader recently held a live Q&A session focused on what they’re doing to keep everyone—employees, customers, and communities alike—safe during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The live LinkedIn broadcast featured several members of the Salesforce leadership team, including their director of physical safety and executive vice president of the Salesforce platform.
Starbucks
Starbucks has a very strong communication strategy. They use social platforms like Twitter and Instagram to run employer branding profiles.
Starbucks uses mentioned platforms solely to communicate with current and future employees.
Microsoft
Forced to compete with Apple for “cool”, Microsoft has long seemed like the stuffed shirt. But their recent efforts to transform their image, from their beautifully curated Microsoft Careers Instagram feed to an informative, and truly helpful Recruiter Insights pages are quickly changing the conversation.