Human Resources Articles

Article / Updated 09-29-2022

Employer branding is the process of promoting an organization as a great place to work to the kind of talent required by the organization to meet its business goals and objectives. Employer branding focuses on three key areas: Recruitment: Attracting the talent the company needs to achieve its business objectives Engagement: Ensuring that employees become dedicated brand advocates and highly motivated performers Retention: Encouraging talented individuals to continue working at the company and discouraging them from working for the competition Employer branding operates on two interrelated fronts: Reality: First and foremost, employer branding strives to make the company a great place to work. Achieving this goal requires more than competitive salaries and great benefits. Leading employers create a strong sense of purpose, promote diversity and collaboration, empower people, encourage their creativity, and provide opportunities for learning and career development. The strongest employer brands are built on a consistently positive employment experience. Reputation: An exceptional workplace attracts the top talent only if those talented individuals know about it. Marketing is essential to increase awareness, consideration, and preference for your employer brand. Advertising remains important in driving applications, but social media marketing has also become essential in ensuring people engage with and understand what you stand for and offer as an employer.

Article / Updated 09-16-2022

Building an engaged network on Twitter can have a huge positive impact on your employer brand’s recruiting efforts, particularly if you’re recruiting in fields such as knowledge workers, who tend to flock to Twitter. It’s an open platform, meaning anyone can see any content without necessarily following the account, so tweets have the potential of reaching a wider audience. If you don’t know the difference between a hashtag and a price tag, you may want to check out Twitter For Dummies, 3rd Edition, by Laura Fitton, Anum Hussain, and Brittany Leaning (Wiley). Picking up strategies by observing others Before you venture into any unfamiliar social gathering, whether online or not, hang out for a while and observe how others in the community interact. When you’re setting out to establish an employer brand presence on Twitter, observe other Twitter accounts that have strong positive employer brands and take note of the content they tweet, the tone or voice, and how they interact with potential candidates. You can find plenty of role models on Twitter; here are examples of a few good corporate accounts you may want to follow: @NPRjobs, @JoinTheFlock, @PepsiCoJobs, @MicrosoftJobs, @ViacomCareers, @InsideZappo, and @HootsuiteLife. Try following your peers and competitors on Twitter to find out what they’re doing to compete for talent. Check out the collection of more than 250 brand recruiting handles on Twitter. Using hashtags to source candidates for your employer brand Most employer branding efforts are designed around pull marketing (attracting prospects), but sourcing is a push marketing technique that involves proactively recruiting individuals with high-value skills and expertise. The focus here is on building a strong employer brand, but Twitter is also a good platform for recruiters and organizations to identify and engage with prospects who may not even be in the market for a new job. When posting job notices on Twitter, include function- or job-specific hashtags in your tweets (for example, #digitalmarketing, #PR, #webdesign, or #accounting). You can find function- or skill-specific hashtags by searching the web for “job seeker hashtags.” Tread carefully when using hashtags. If you’re oversharing jobs with event hashtags, you’ll likely face blowback for spamming. You can also use Twitter to source candidates by keeping an eye on hashtags relevant to positions you’re trying to fill. For example, if you’re recruiting Drupal developers, keep an eye on the hashtags: #Drupal, #DrupalCon, #Drupal8, and so on to see what these communities are talking about and to identify influential developers. If you’re recruiting marketing managers, keep an eye on #marketing, #digitalmarketing, #marketingresearch, #mktg, and so on. Plenty of tools are available to help you identify influencers within various hashtag communities. Here are a few to check out: Google Trends Audiense Hashtags Sourcing local talent? These tools and others enable you to search for people talking about relevant topics within a certain mile radius of your company. Engaging prospects for your employer brand When you’re posting tweets, which are essentially very brief, overlooking the necessity of offering followers something of real value is far too easy. Keep the focus on delivering valuable content. Share behind-the-scenes photos or videos to help prospects get a sense of what it’s like to work for your company. Share articles and resources about your industry. Join Twitter chats and share your insights and expertise. Interact with your followers. Try to respond to every @mention and question. Engagement and interaction are vital for building community. Getting your employees involved with your employer brand To fully harness the power of Twitter, get employees involved. Candidates don’t want to hear only from employer brand managers; they want to hear from peers doing the work they (prospects) may be doing for your company in the near future. They want to talk shop with the people who may someday be their colleagues. Great talent can recognize similar talent. Consider developing internal programs that encourage employees to share their knowledge and expertise in online communities where you recruit. By increasing their visibility in certain professional circles and establishing themselves as experts in those communities, your employees can expand their own professional networks while helping you identify and attract talented prospects. Prospects want to hear from your employees. That product manager you’ve been wooing wants to see tweets from your product team that will help them get a feel for the work, team atmosphere, culture, and so on. You may share supremely clever and compelling content on Twitter, but you’re still an HR guy or gal. You have an agenda to bring talent into your organization, so of course your posts are biased. Gauging your employer brand’s Twitter impact You can use any of several available tools to measure the reach, retweets, impressions, and so on related to your tweeting activity. You should also be measuring applications and hires coming from Twitter through your applicant tracking software (ATS). Use these tools to adjust your campaigns regularly. You may be tempted to obsess over your number of followers. Don’t let that be your primary indicator as to whether your account is successful. If you focus on providing valuable content and engaging your community, followers will come. Focus on this and you’ll have something better than followers; you’ll have brand advocates who bring you the best talent available.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 09-01-2022

Training and development can be incredibly rewarding, but it is also filled with challenges. This Cheat Sheet aims to cut to the chase in several key areas that trainers deal with all the time. You'll find succinct tips on avoiding pitfalls, designing great visuals, and loads of quick ideas to improve your sessions.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 04-11-2022

These days, strong leadership is more important than ever. Companies with great leaders significantly outperform their peers. At the same time, globalization, attrition, and changing demographics have led to a scarcity of executive talent. As a result, the competition for top leadership talent is fierce. If you want to ensure your company's survival by hiring great leaders, you'll need some effective way to find them, hire them, and ensure they stick around.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 04-05-2022

Performance management is a continuous process of identifying, measuring, and developing the performance of individuals and teams and aligning their performance with the strategic goals of an organization. A performance management system is a key tool to transform people’s talent and motivation into a strategic business advantage.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-25-2022

Let’s face it. Although the term diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) may be common knowledge, it’s not commonly understood. Moreover, as the workforce continues to be redefined by demographic shifts, this adds additional layers of complexities and responsibilities for leaders. You already have a lot on your plate, and with DEI becoming a greater focus for many companies, it can be daunting to be expected to know all that you should in demonstrating new behaviors and practices and making decisions. The following sections provide a quick reference to give you food for thought, best practices, and strategies on some key DEI considerations, as well as guidance on how to perform an aspect of DEI effectively.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-22-2022

When you're a business coach or mentor, you have a lot to manage, and you may be a one-man or one-woman show. How do you keep all aspects of your practice moving forward? Use the at-a-glance tips in this Cheat Sheet to help you navigate the world of business coaching and mentoring.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-02-2022

To complete any project of lasting importance in people analytics, you have to master concepts and activities that live in many different domains. This cheat sheet provides some information about these domains, concepts, and activities.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 02-22-2022

Becoming a so-called expert in human resources (HR) can be a complex endeavor because, well, people are complex. But for someone starting out in an HR role, hiring qualified employees and managing them effectively can be boiled down to a few basics: evaluating résumés, interviewing candidates, and creating an employee-friendly work environment. In addition, you need to be aware of key federal laws affecting HR. Keep the following in mind, and you’ll be off to a good start. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons. Inc. Copyright © 2013 Robert Half International, Inc., as to Author-Created Materials

Cheat Sheet / Updated 02-22-2022

Conflict at work can be physically and emotionally exhausting, regardless of how directly you’re involved. Discover how to mediate a conflict in your workplace by following a set process and asking the right questions. And be prepared to use internal and external resources to help you resolve the conflict.