LinkedIn Talent Solutions–People Matters Talent Branding Week

About 56 per cent of global talent leaders say employer brand is a top priority for their company, according to LinkedIn Talent Solutions’ 4th annual report on ‘2015 Global Recruiting Trends’. The social media giant conducted the survey among 4,125 talent recruiting decision-makers in 31 countries. With more companies shifting where they source their quality hires from, companies are increasingly nervous if their competitors have a better employer branding than they do. The survey revels that employer branding and employee retention (29 per cent) are two top competitive threats globally.

So, what is a talent brand and why is it important? A talent brand is what talent thinks, feels and shares about your company as a place to work. A strong talent brand reduces cost per hire by over 50 per cent and lowers turnover rates by 28 per cent. About 75 per cent of global Talent Acquisition leaders say talent brand has a significant impact on their ability to hire great talent. While companies have embraced the idea of a talent brand, many questions still abound for the recruiting managers. How can the organization increase its attractiveness to the talent? How does a talent brand affect the hiring and retention metrics of an organization?

These and more questions were answered during the ‘Talent Branding Week conducted in the last week of April 2015. For the second time in a row, People Matters joined hands with LinkedIn Talent Solutions to bring this initiative to the HR community. The Week was marked by a series of activities like 3 roundtables on the theme of ‘Talent Branding’, 1 twangout, 1 tweetchat and content focused newsletters.

At least 100 HR professionals made their way to the three cities—Mumbai, Bengaluru and Gurgaon—where the roundtables on the theme of “BuildIN Talent Brand Experiences’ were held. The webinar on ‘Recruiting as a marketeer—A paradigm shift’, which was conducted by Namrata Gill Tyagi, Vice President-HR, Dr Reddy’s, drew parallels between the roles of a marketeer and a recruiter. Tyagi said that while a marketer focuses on the customer value proposition, a recruiter’s focus would be on the employer value proposition.

Today, employees are not just concerned about money in a job. However, experienced hands differ from freshers in what they seek in a job. when applying for jobs experienced candidates look at career progression, mentoring and training opportunities, while freshers eye travel opportunities and total rewards. A recruiter needs to keep in mind these different needs while developing the company’s employer brand, Tyagi said. More than 170 participants took part in the webinar.

While working on the employer brand, it is important to identify the elements of EVP such as company’s policy on financial rewards, emotional elements that can be crucial for employees, future growth opportunities, support system within the organization etc. Further, organizations should also collect data on employee engagement drivers, strengths and weaknesses of the company, voice of employer culture and draft and create EVP themes based on the analysis. It is important to stay authentic and true to the voice of the organization, says Gill.

Most often, in the whole ambit of hiring, the one thing that is given the least importance is the journey of the candidate. The Twangout on ‘Talent Brand Way of Enhancing Candidate Journey’ by Prashant Bhatnagar, Vice President, Sapient, attempted to address issues like what comes in the way of an effective candidate experience, what can one learn from strong talent brands, the common pitfalls to avoid and the tools and technology that enables candidate journeys.

The Twangout saw the attendance of more than 100 participants. New industry models are emerging and in some cases they are completely dissipating the existing industry models and new industry models are being build upon. As a consequence of that, the expectations from individuals are on an increasing scale as companies look for individuals who can work in dynamic, high-paced environment and deal with the change that comes along.

“We are moving from a labor-arbitraged model to an intellectual-arbitraged model, where the intellect of the idea is what differentiates us. Today, candidates are being chased by multiple opportunities. That is where the talent brand of an organization comes into focus as it will help the company to distinguish itself from the rest,” said Bhatnagar.