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Employer Branding for Small Business: Learn from the big guys
As jobs become more available and, as a company, you are fighting for your target employee, your employer brand will start to play a massive role in your HR strategy. The biggest factor, perhaps, comes down to your employee engagement and rewards incentive that you can use to entice employees and improve retention. Creating an engaging and rewarding workforce doesn’t have to be expensive, and many lessons can be learnt and scaled down by the kings. Here we take a look at how to develop a work/life integration, instead of the work/life balance that you may be currently be applying.
“Do cool things that matter”
It’s well known that Google values its employees. They focus their employer branding on facilitating their staff and making it comfortable for them to do great work. After the release of “The Internship,possible” they are globally known for their office slides, multicoloured bikes and sleep pods. Aside from making ‘The Campus’ as comfortable as possible, Google matches community hours/donations, has its own schools to develop outside skills and even manage finances. They nurture their employees to become the best that they possibly can, in every area of their lives.
Take-away
Not many of the small local businesses can replicate this on such a scale, but small steps have a massive impact when it comes to employer brand. To apply some “Googleness” to your workplace, facilitate your team as they perform their great work. Some lower cost methods include flexible hours, comfortable work and rest environments, and supporting your team in the development of outside skills.
Key note: Google’s employer brand has gone viral. Build a company people enjoy working for and spread the word online. The power of the internet.
John Lewis Partnership
“The Partnership Spirit”
For over 75 years the John Lewis brands have been leading the UK’s employer brand market. Known for their employee-owned corporate structure and great employee perks, it is no wonder they are an aspiration for many of the nation’s workforce. Being part of the John Lewis team means that you are a “partner” not an “employee” and this reflects directly in the team spirit and combined motivation. Being a partner means that you are part of a team working towards an end goal, and adds extra value to the work that you do. Partners are entitled to strong rates of pay, large annual bonuses (non-related to performance), enticing discount store-round and a strong network of subsidised social and leisure societies. The partner structure is a catalyst for motivation and performance, whilst the benefits keep the staff there.
Take-away
Although as a small business you may not have the funds to build a great benefits package on the same scale as John Lewis, you can still apply the fundamentals. When thinking about how to engage and retain your workforce, and make good talent aspire to work for you, you need to thing about the indirect impact of the programme. Instead of thinking “How can I reward my team in the cheapest way possible”, think “How can I reward my team most effectively so that they feel motivated and increase our revenue willingly”. In other words, think of the increase in revenue as a result of the programme, as opposed to the direct cost associated.
Asos
“The Asos Way”
It may make sense to have our workforce dressed head to toe in your product, but that doesn’t give Asos’ 40% discount any less value and appeal! Being the third most visited website in the world (2014) and having a product catalogue in excess of 65,000 products, Asos has developed a stellar employer brand to support its growth. The difference of Asos’ employer brand’s success is they have thought smart. They have recognised the actual wants and common annoyances of the British workplace and formulated their employee benefits and brand around them. They don’t have a large list of unneeded benefits, just the ones that matter and appeal to the people they are trying to attract.
Asos’ offices include ‘Summer Hours’. In Summer the team all finish at 3pm on Fridays. An act that has relatively minimal impact on the bottom line, but is very appreciated by the staff.
Alongside it’s generous 25-day holiday package, they have recognised that a lot of people dislike working on their birthday, so to overcome this, they have the day off! A simple, personable selling point.
Take-away
Smart perks. By recognising your worker’s biggest annoyances about being at work, creating a small range of perks to overcome these will help establish a work/life integration, instead of a work/life balance. It’s also a way to minimize the direct cost of employee perks, because the large expensive benefits that don’t solve problems on a daily basis, are those that are often the least performing. Think small, think smart and regularly ask for their feedback.
