Using Business Psychology to make your organization the ‘place to be’

How do you attract the brightest and the best to work for your company? The latest buzzword on the block, Employer Branding- that’s how!

The term employer branding has been bandied about since the 1990’s where Ambler and Barrow (1996) chose to apply the language and techniques of brand management to HR management. They defined an employer brand as: “the package of functional, economic and psychological benefits provided by employment and identified with the employing company”.

The gold standard of employer branding includes companies such as Google and Facebook. In 2010 whilst Google were recruiting for 6,000 jobs they received a reported 75,000 applicants, which can be mainly attributed to their unique employee brand. So does this fancy phrase actually help organizations?

What’s the big deal?

Employer branding has been taken from the marketing language and is a child of its time. The late 90’s was an era of a buoyant labour market. Employees were fighting for the best places to work and employers were desperately trying to differentiate themselves to attract the best talent. Employee branding was used to communicate a company’s story, ethos and culture to attract the best.

With a clear employee brand organizations can cut the costs of recruitment, increase productivity, motivation and retention of top talent. If an employee perceives they are getting what was promised in the employee brand communication, the psychological contract will be fulfilled and equity is maintained.

With an active and dynamic employer brand an organizations reputation amongst current and potential employ- ees can be increased, leading many to perceive the organization is a great place to work. Employees and investors alike will be queuing up to work with the organization (in theory).

What makes employees stay- psychological contract explains

The psychological contract is defined as “mutual expectations between the employer and the employee” and is strongly linked to employer branding. The psychological contract describes a loyalty to the firm in exchange for job security. Employees will try and fulfil the needs of the organization if the organization fulfils the needs of the employees the psychological contract between the two parties are maintained. Where the psychological contract is the unwritten promise between the employee and employer; employer branding acts as the communication tool in communicating the culture of the organization to potential and current employees. Both concepts need to be adhered to when developing and maintaining an employer branding concept in order to keep motivation high and to attract and retain talent.

How can Employer Branding be used?

A way organizations can use the unique aspects of their brand to attract the best talent is first to establish what that is. Researching what makes you special, talking to current past and potential employees may be a way to do this. Conducting interviews or focus groups can be a way to do this effectively. What is important at this stage is to make sure the research captures something special about your organization. What are the unique offers? What makes employees want to work for you? What makes them want to stay?

The next step is to communicate this message to current and potential employees. This can be done in a variety of ways, internal messages, emails, bill boards, meetings, recruitment events and glossy brand brochures.

A rare breed in Sri Lanka

Many fans are singing the praises of employee branding for retention and selection however there are some disadvantages. Critics have stated that employee branding is a fad, a fashion statement with no substance. Many employee value propositions have very similar wordings or rhetoric and do not differentiate themselves from other companies.

Clambering to be on the front pages of Best Places to Work or The Times 100 is futile if it doesn’t actually mean anything to your employees. What is important is to make sure is that employee branding is not something that can be manipulated. Companies that has made any of the lists of best places to work has followed and implemented a through system of employer branding which is worth researching. Once an employee spots a disconnection in the employee brand proposition and the reality of the nine till five the psychological contract may be broken leading to poor retention levels and bad feeling. Employee branding is not something that can be just implemented, there has to be a skill that has to be learnt and understood. As a business psychologist the skill of employee branding comes naturally, which is the reason most of the companies today look for business psychologist who are a very rare breed to find in Sri Lanka.

Masters in Business Psychology from Heriot Watt University at Oxford College of Business

Heriot Watt University together with Oxford College of Business offer the 1st and only Master in Business Psychology in Sri Lanka. Launched in 2010 this masters program is gaining a large amount of popularity and fame purely because of the uniqueness of this program and because of the manner in which psychology is applied to a business context. Heriot-Watt University is the eighth oldest higher education institution in the UK and has a reputation for innovative education, enterprise and leading edge research in science, business, engineering and design. According to the National Student Survey (NSS) which is Britain most recognized rating system. Heriot Watt University established in 1821 is regarded as “Britain’s best kept secret,” the university has always come within the top 25% of universities in the UK and listed among the top 4% of universities in the world. Furthermore Heriot Watt University is tried and tested on all ranking systems (visit www.ocb-

srilanka.com for more information on rankings).

The importance of employer branding

The importance of employer branding cannot be emphasized enough at any given moment. We tend to slip too easily when it comes to identifying and handling our priorities. In certain instances we are forced to give priority to making profit and forget that keeping employees psychologically happy automatically results in profits increasing. It is also safe to say that any of our company objectives set out in any of our corporate plans can be easily achived if positive employer branding is communicated by our employees, which is exactly what the MSc in Business from HWU hopes to inculcate into its students.

The MSc in Business Psychology can be described as our gateway for a balanced life. It is a process which helps an individual to improve their performance in both personal and professional life by being coached in certain psychological theories linked into business. Though this is quite a new subject area in Sri Lanka, countries like USA, UK and Australia have professionally qualified business leaders and senior managers practicing Business Psychology. At senior levels of management strategy formulation is considered your daily bread, and working under pressure is something you are immune to. For business leaders at this level striking a balance between work and personal life is the secret all business leaders at senior management would like to learn. This is the reason why more and more seasoned managers and business leaders tend to consider the Masters in Business Psychology from HWU at Oxford College of Business. For more information on the MSc in Business Psychology, call 0719996222 or visit www.ocbsrilanka.com and www.hw.ac.uk