Cindy Zhang, Director-Greater Asia Talent Acquisition, Intel, in conversation with People Matters about the impact of employer brand on attracting and retaining talent

How does employer brand contribute towards attracting and retaining talent?

In order for us to hire the best and the brightest, it’s important that we are able to articulate a clear and cogent value proposition. That value proposition emerges from our brand identity. Crafting an employer brand, which maintains the ethos of the company but creates a distinguished market position, has become the need of the hour.

At Intel, we prioritise focus on employer brand as an integral part of our overall talent strategy. Broadly, our initiatives are aimed at creating awareness about Intel as an employer, how a career at Intel can intersect with individual needs and how the company can help optimise your strengths and capabilities.

What led to the decision to create targeted online communities to build Intel’s brand as a preferred employer?

We have used both traditional and new media channels as part of our employer branding and sourcing efforts. Blogs and online communities have always been a part of our strategy. We wanted to build a talent community to help enhance our employer brand perception in the market with the objective to create awareness about the cutting-edge work at Intel and to establish relationships with the community members.

We decided to invest in targeted communities for two reasons. Firstly, we realized that all of us are looking to learn more and are seeking to be a part of platforms that are interactive, engaging and which meets our needs for information. We hope this investment will reinforce our focus on taking a longer term view to talent and secondly to create an exclusive platform to communicate our employer brand story.

How has the Intel India Software Talent Community contributed towards Intel’s brand? Do you have data to measure the impact?

This community has been a key contributor to change our perception among candidates in the market. It has helped in creating a new talent market, which was previously untapped and unaware of software opportunities at Intel India. A good number of professionals from the community have proactively shown interest in opportunities at Intel. We have been able to build a pool of talent that can now be leveraged for our talent acquisition efforts.
We have metrics to measure success on both quantitative and qualitative basis. For e.g., we measure the number of professionals engaged in the community, we measure interest and activity in the talent community, we measure match to our need, to name a few metrics.
 
How does social media influence the HR space, specifically hiring? What are the three things that an employer should take care of while using social media?

Potential candidates have the information at their fingertips. It is important for companies to be realistic about the fact that internet and social media means that people are communicating about the company in more than the “official speak”. They are building an opinion about the company and they are also sharing this freely! Hence, it is important for organisations to understand and leverage this effectively.

At Intel, we acknowledge that social media is a very real-time, dynamic platform. Hence, we ensure that we are communicating information accurately, consistently, comprehensively and in a timely way. It is important to be present and communicate our key messages effectively across multiple platforms. It is important to have a plan. If you intend to engage anyone in a conversation – it is important that you can sustain that conversation over a period of time!