Proper treatment of employees is the best form of ‘employer branding’ during COVID-19
How a company treats its employees during the pandemic will be a deciding factor in how successful it is in attracting top talent.
“When you start hiring again or when you’re looking to retain your best employees, they are going to ask you, ‘How did you respond during COVID-19?’” said Andrew Tan, country manager of job-matching platform Wantedly Singapore, during a virtual workshop on human resources.
This may also extend to the availability of flexible work options, as many employees have become accustomed to the convenience of a remote work setup. “If we’re moving into another role and that flexibility is no longer there, it’s almost like a gap,” said Angel Kilian, founder of Career inFocus, a professional training and coaching firm.
A company that addresses these needs must indicate so on their hiring platforms, along with their product or service, mission, and values.
Once a company reaches out to a job seeker for an interview, the common goal must be to discover if there is a right fit based on shared values and purpose. Communication must be open and two-way.
When onboarding, the employer must introduce team members and discuss work culture and the work environment as early as possible in order to manage the new employee’s expectations. “You hear too many examples of new employees getting a culture shock in their first week, being thrown to the deep end so that they can try and learn how to swim on their own, or thinking about job-hopping less than a few months into this new role,” said Mr. Tan.
If a company is able to fulfill its promises in valuing employees, then the employees themselves will be the best advocates of employer branding.
“They will then be your best talents and they will, in turn, refer lookalikes to your talent pool… A boss, he or she is likely to say, ‘My company is the best.’ But when the employee says it, it adds that much more weight, that much more validation,” said Mr. Tan.
“HR of Tomorrow: Thriving Amidst Change,” a virtual workshop on human resources, was organized by coworking space WeWork. — Mariel Alison L. Aguinaldo
