The 20 May 2011 marked a landmark event at the JW Marriott in Hong Kong to celebrate the success of several shining stars in HR. The half-day HR sharing session, organised by Lumesse (formerly StepStone Solutions), looked at the business impact of ‘New Talent’ acquisition. At the event, Erik Schmit, Group Managing Director APAC, Lumesse revealed the findings of HR Magazine’s research into what Gen-Y jobseekers are looking for from employers. Lumesse also took the opportunity to unveil their new brand identity with a candle-lit procession and jazz dancers bopping to the beat of their funky corporate video. Alexandra Richardson, Senior Human Resources Director, PepsiCo, Asia Pacific Region and Jonathan Stewart, Senior Manager, HR Communications, Asia Pacific, BASF and Emille Mac Gillavry, Managing Director, Maximum China also shared advice on the day on employer branding and the use of social media for recruitment. Three companies received awards for their outstanding efforts in building a trusted corporate brand and use of online recruitment tools.
Importance of employer brand
Jonathan Stewart, Internal HR, BASF provided insights as to why employer brand is so important to recruiting. Stewart noted that there are changing conditions in the employment markets—primarily a dwindling pool of qualified talent—and because of this increasing competition to both hire and retain quality talent. In the light of this, he stressed the need for companies to ensure that they create and maintain a good employer brand and noted that this required focus both internally and externally.
Internal integration
The internal focus is the goal to have employee engagement. Stewart noted, “No matter what, the employer brand needs to be consistent and linked to the corporate brand.” He added, “Internally, it is important to engage your employees, as they are the greatest advocates of the brand.” Stewart also stressed the importance that companies look not only at what they offer, but also how employees perceive this. BASF has made great efforts in terms of using social media to help increase employee engagement. This has included the organisation establishing an internal ‘Facebook-style’ blog which allows employees, internationally, to join different interest groups, ask questions and work collaboratively. Stewart cited an example of a recent presentation he had to prepare, where through the internal online network he was able to ask colleagues in Germany for help and input—significantly decreasing preparation time, and allowing more objective input from different stakeholders.
External engagement
The external focus is the goal to become an employer of choice. In order to do this, Stewart highlighted six core missions for HR:
- Get buy in from the board—let them help drive the plans through
- Create guidelines for a global strategy
- Provide internal training
- Look at established media platforms to showcase the company
- Build connections—use these platforms to link people to the media
- Create target group specific pages
Branding bonds
Once companies have created an employer brand, Stewart pointed out that they then need to implement the brand. To ensure proper implementation companies must ensure they have four key elements in place in respect of the employer brand:
- Support from the senior management
- Joint training of management and communications staff—so everyone is on the same page
- Communication and engagement at all levels
- Consolidated, consistent and updated guidelines and recommendations
Stewart stressed that implementation is important, but companies should also be sure to maintain and update the brand to meet changing needs, and no matter what companies do, they should ensure the employer brand and corporate brand are linked.
Brand flexibility
Alexandra Richardson, Senior Human Resources Director, PepsiCo Asia Pacific Region presented on PepsiCo’s experience when launching their new employer brand and the experiences gained from the implementation. Richardson, quoting Jeff Bezos, Founder, Amazon.com, summed up employer branding, “Your brand is what people say about you when you leave the room.” Richardson developed the definition by suggesting that an employer brand is much like a romance between two parties: the company and the consumer/employee, with the objective of both parties being loyalty.
Richardson highlighted seven core attributes, all of which need to be linked to the employer brand, that are critical to attraction and retention of quality talent:
- Compensation
- Organisational stability
- Development opportunities
- Future careers
- Respect
- Quality of managers
- Positive work environment
“It is important to look at each of these aspects, and ensure they are all aligned to the business strategy, and are differentiated from competitors,” Richardson noted. She added that brand should also be consistent across all regions, while remaining relevant to local operations. Using PepsiCo as an example, Richardson demonstrated how, through gaining local knowledge, the organisation had been able to adapt and modify these seven attributes to best meet local needs. Ultimately, this further enhanced the perception of the brand and led to attraction of higher quality candidates, who were more eager to be retained in the organisation.
Segmented approach
On the issue of employee attraction and recruitment Richardson noted that her company still makes use of traditional hiring channels such as campus career fairs, but that they were becoming less popular as the younger, more tech-savvy generations preferred to search for jobs using other channels such as the Internet. She pointed out that methods used to attract, hire and retain employees should be segmented and applied differently between different talent pools. For example, companies could use social media platforms to help attract New Talent. She concluded, “No matter how companies have developed their brand, they should offer a positive experience at all touchpoints, and ensure that the experiences offered are consistent with the overall brand.”
Companies ignoring social media
According to Lumesse candidate survey conducted by HR Magazine, 100% of respondents—all New Talents—used social media, and did so for an average of just under 16 hours per week. In stark contrast, only 10% of companies are currently using social media as part of their recruitment strategy. Erik Schmit, Group Managing Director APAC for Lumesse noted, “Companies are spending an awfully large amount of money on placing jobs on job boards, so there is a huge disconnect between where you are spend your money and where you will find candidates—because they’re on Facebook not job boards.”
Schmit added, “83% of respondees from the companies surveyed are not using LinkedIn, I was astonished by this and goes to show that there is huge under-utilisation of social media as a recruiting channel.” With greater use of social media like Linkedin and Facebook, Schmit recommended companies being in a situation where they are no longer simply putting jobs on job boards and waiting for people to apply, but through social media start pushing those jobs to relevant set of candidates and asking them if they would like to apply.
Passive fishing
Emille Mac Gillavry, Managing Director, Maximum China defined three different types of job seekers: active, passive and non jobseekers, noting that 10% of those on the China job market are considered ‘active’, while 60% are ‘passive’ and would switch jobs if a good opportunity was presented. He noted that companies should be targeting passive jobseekers, as that talent pool is much larger than the active pool, and it has been found that the general quality of applicants and skills tends to be higher among passive jobseekers.
Social swimming
Mac Gillavry highlighted a number of ways, including the use of social media marketing. He noted, “Social media is just as popular in China as the rest of the world, but due to restrictions, platforms like Facebook are blocked, so companies should look for more effective equivalents that have huge penetration in China such as Renren, Kaixin001, Baidu and QQ. Mac Gillavry pointed out, “When comparing China to the rest of the world, companies must take account of the fact that China is different, and cater to the Chinese market and tastes if they want to be successful in recruiting in China.” He added, “While social media is a very useful tool for recruitment, companies should be sure they are ready for using that social media—if they are not, then it is a good time to start. Companies can take their first steps of utilising social media for recruitment, at minimal cost, by advertising with search engines that offer pay-per-click ads.”
Employer brands—the future
Mac Gillavry explained why so few companies use social media for recruiting purposes when compared to usage by HR in the US and UK. He said, “The idea of employer brand is advanced in Europe and the US. In Asia it is still a relatively new concept, however, this is changing fast and will likely leapfrog and soon advance upon the levels of uptake in Europe and the US.” Richardson offered advice on what HR could do to ensure their employer brand was developed.
She said, “Engage the CEO at a local level, keep in mind that all CEOs look at the same drivers—the bottom line and ROI. Therefore you should build a case on how employer brand influences ROI and its overall importance to the company. There should also be cross-functional support that is proactive. In fact, every company already has a brand—but what matters is how people perceive this brand.”
(left to right) HKR International, award accepted by Ms Florence Chung, General Manager, Group Human Resources; Philips Electronics Hong Kong Ltd, award accepted by Ms Coco Fung, Senior Manager, Staffing, Country Human Resources; The Hong Kong Jockey Club, award sccepted by Ms Portia Leung, Human Resources Manager
Paul Arkwright
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