Could you imagine being part of an organisation that knows how to sells itself?
Attraction can be challenging in a candidate limited industry and easy in others, retention is the norm and you and your colleagues enjoy coming to work. Creating a strong internal and external EVP will send you on your way to seeing benefits such as lower attrition costs, higher employee performance and a more engaged workforce. But… what is an employer value proposition? Employee Value Proposition (EVP) is a set of tools, processes and people strategies you’re implementing to support your workforce. Your EVP combines your internal (existing) employees, along with the external market you wish to attract – when both are working effectively, you can strive to become an employer of choice.
What are the benefits of a strong EVP?
1.) Attraction
As we start to think about how competitive today’s market is, particularly for attracting high-quality candidates – have a think about what you can offer (other than compensation/benefits/reward) to attract new employees. Make sure you have a commercial hat on when thinking about this part. In my opinion, the most important impact a good EVP can have on recruitment is an improved time to hire. several other benefits, through better attraction e.g. reduced dependency on agency fees and lower lag time to hire and a brand people recognise.
2.) Retention
Although, it is important to remember that not all attrition is bad attrition. It is safe to say that the more support and development opportunities, flexibility and an open-door environment are given to employees, the higher the chance you have of retaining them.
3.) Improved performance People who personally identify and engage with their company, deliver better performance, enjoy coming to work and make more referrals and recommendations helping you built your times and recruit quicker.
HOW TO BUILD A STRONG EVP?
Two constructs that strongly correlate with the EVP and company performance include Employee Engagement and Company Culture. We are going to discuss both concepts below.
Employee Engagement!!!
What is it?
Due to the world of employee engagement becoming saturated, it’s harder to define what it is. However, simply put, an engaged workforce can be described as having a present, energised and committed employees.
Employee engagement is intrinsically linked to improved individual and organisational performance. It also ties in with better employee reliability, along with an increase in innovation and motivation.
Many organisations of an older mindset will still see employee engagement and people strategy as a “fluffy HR thing” however, people are at the centre of every business and everyone in an organisation has a role to play, HR may help you identify your EVP however it must be brought to life and lived through your employees and business leaders for it to be a success. Processes. policies and technologies are great, however, without engaged people they are useless and a waste of your time.
How to create an engaged workforce?
FEEDBACK, TRUST, AND COMMUNICATION
Most organisations communicate poorly and therefore, trust between the employees and leaders is low
Although some businesses have good intentions with new their new strategies, the fact that they don’t capture feedback on the needs and wants of their workforce leads to poor adoption
Creating a culture where feedback is frequent, trust is high and you communicate effectively will lead to an engaged workforce
PURPOSE
We’ve all worked for businesses where they have a couple of words on the wall which they call their “values”. However, a purpose or mantra is a modern slant that should communicate to every employee why they come to work and why they do the job that they do
Following on from the previous point, feedback will allow you to shape your purpose or mantra. There are a number of tools that you can use, as well as hands-on approaches.
WELLBEING AND WORKPLACE
We all want good quality talent and therefore, the way in which we support the wellbeing of our employees both physically and mentally is crucial if we wish to retain them
Good working conditions and in some cases SMART working strategies are also important, as we begin to focus on our people being at the centre of our businesses
REWARD AND BENEFITS
The reward is often the thing that people turn to when they have high attrition. However, the reality is that Reward is not a sustainable or cost-effective business strategy in relation to employee engagement
However, it’s certainly an enabler and one of the core pillars to creating an engaged workforce
Benchmarking and understanding personal needs in individual industries/regions and internal teams is very important
Creating a great culture
What is culture?
The most practical way of thinking about culture is to think about the core values of a business. It is the glue that binds everyone together. No matter how diverse your workforce is, if they are motivated by the same values they will be able to put their differences aside to work towards a common goal
How to create a great culture?
The drive to create a great culture needs to come from leadership as they are the ones responsible to its creation. However, its foundations need to be built on engaging with the existing workforce using various tools such as surveys, interviews, and workshops to give each employee a voice and create a high performing culture.
Definition – what does culture mean to me?
Culture may sometimes seem ‘fluffy’ as people don’t fully understand the commercial value that it can bring. It is a complex concept and this is why before doing anything, make sure you define it in a way that’s specific to your organisation.
Creating a great culture may seem to be a time and resource-intense process. However, the long-term benefits of getting it right and getting buy-in from everyone will set your organisation up for success.
Current vs. ideal culture
Before jumping into setting up the ‘ideal’ workplace culture, we first need to determine ‘where we are’ as the organisation – this can be done by completing a “health check” or diagnostic exercise. This creates the foundation for the entire process and helps to focus on relevant areas of culture. The ideal culture should come from leadership but should be supported by the existing workforce. Don’t ignore any answer, reach a holistic understanding.
The best way to define the ideal culture is by focusing on individual and organisational core values. What do you care deeply about and would like to ingrain it in your organisation?
Action Plan – Define employee experiences you need to do more and less of
At this stage, a lot of creativity and brainstorming takes place. An action plan should specify what the changes might and might not indicate.
It is essential to establish an effective communication strategy and get everyone on board. Culture re-definition requires the leadership to demonstrate what the new values mean, reward the expected behaviours, and continuously engage with the workforce.
Measure/Track
The benefits of culture often have a lagging impact on the bottom line. For this reason, it is essential to find metrics that measure the effectiveness of the core values specific to your business.
People have a great capacity to focus on the set metrics. Once, as a leader, you set the metrics – people will most likely deem the other performance indicators irrelevant. – what you measure gets people’s attention!
Conclusion
Creating a strong Employee Value Proposition (EVP) can add significant value to your organisation, improving employee experience internally and attracting talent/clients from the wider environment.Need support in creating your EVP? drop me an email and let's have a chat
#EVP #EmployeeValueProposition #Healthcarecommunications #Healthcareadvertising #MedicalCommunications Daniel Laghaney Healthcare Communications Recruitment Agency
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