No matter where we are in the economic cycle, the competition for the best talent rages on. Much like the war for customers, companies must leverage their brand positioning to attract, recruit, onboard, and retain people with the skills they need in order to remain successful. Companies have long understood this concept, of course, creating a corporate persona that projects stability, industry leadership, and other characteristics that employees value. But today’s productive teams include more than just full-time employees. To obtain the mix of abilities required to meet customer needs and adroitly implement projects, companies seek to tap into all the labor resources available to them. Statement-of-work workflow consultants, freelance writers, independently contracted accountants, seasonal sales representatives, and other contingent workers increasingly are adding their talents to work teams.
With in-demand skills so widely dispersed, companies need to rethink and refocus their brand position to appeal to workers occupying spaces throughout the fragmented talent pool. A strong employer brand persona will escort contingent workers along the engagement funnel from awareness to assignment completion much like a marketing persona is instrumental in converting prospects to loyal customers.
Perhaps your first-party data and other in-house capabilities are sufficient to allow you to self-source your talent needs on your own. Or maybe it makes more sense to work with a managed service provider to direct source recruitment and workforce solutions through direct connections to the labor market. Either way, carefully developing and curating your employer brand will be key to creating competitive advantage through an exclusive, diverse reservoir of talent.
Market Yourself to Contingent Workers
The good news is that part of the work is already done. You can tweak your marketing strategy and traditional worker recruitment plan and use them as starting points for developing and focusing a brand persona that resonates with today’s new workforce dynamic. By using key components of a marketing plan – market segmentation, precise messaging, and strategic placement – you can project an employer brand that external workers want to align themselves with. This approach is designed to capture quality, lifetime-value candidates. As with marketing for customers, the goal is not to find workers for one-time transactions but to establish connections that will pay dividends with multiple engagements throughout the relationships
- Your Market – Data from your marketing, human resources, and agile workforce procurement departments – augmented by third-party data if you work with an MSP – can provide insights into which types of engagements have been successful and which are best abandoned. Analyze these data to form a picture of workers’ motivations, career aspirations, values, employer expectations, etc., and how they mesh with your company’s greater purpose. Where they intersect will tell you what characteristics you will find desirable and profitable for contingent workers to possess. It is likely they will be similar to the traits possessed by your full-time employees and even your best customers. Now you will know how to build both your contingent workforce management structure and your employer brand so the right kind of non-traditional workers will take notice.
- Your Message – Now that you know who you’re talking to, you can set about determining what you want to say. Your employer value proposition gives voice to your corporate purpose and strives to entice talent to embark on the contingent worker journey you have planned for them. Your message should plant the seed that your organization offers contingent workers something of value greater than a paycheck. And the value you provide starts with every message you send them. Focus on their needs and what your company can do for them. The message itself should give them something they can use to further their careers or make their lives easier or more enjoyable. If that tidbit reflects some aspect of your company that resonates with target workers – technical savvy, work-life balance, environmental stewardship, or insurance benefits, for instance – you will have established yourself as a company that warrants their attention when they’re looking for their next gigs.
- Your Media – How and where you distribute your message will ensure your intended audience receives it at a time and through a medium in which they can respond positively. Posting on social media, of course, is a no-brainer for reaching specific segments of your audience: Facebook for mid-career types, Instagram for Millennials, etc. When the message matches the medium, it establishes that your firm “speaks the same language” as the people you’re trying to attract. As we mentioned earlier, the right media for leveraging your employer brand may not be the same as for attracting customers through your consumer brand. You will want to establish a real presence on your media of choice, posting lifestyle, parenting, travel, or other tips – depending on your company’s industry and your target workers’ interests – in addition to announcements of job openings. To ensure you cast your net as widely as possible, make sure to be active on platforms frequented by people of color, and different abilities, orientations, cultures, ages, and demographics. See our previous post for a discussion of the strategic advantages of a diverse workforce.
Metasys’s Branding and the Contingent Workforce Service
Leveraging clients’ employer brand is a major component of the managed services Metasys provides. Our comprehensive program includes collaboration to determine, develop, and leverage your employer brand and value proposition. Often, our “outsider” perspective is just what companies need to view their brand objectively and make adjustments to attract the right types of workers. Our industry experts and technicians can customize a scalable, dynamic plan for leveraging your brand to find and manage workers whose personal values align with yours to create a shared purpose throughout the workforce. We use your proprietary data, enriched with insights we have gained in the marketplace, to match the message to the audience and the medium to procure contingent workers with the talent, diversity, and commitment your organization needs.
Contact Metasys when you’re ready to move your company’s contingent workforce procurement and management program from the transactional to the strategic. We will help you determine, develop, and leverage your employer brand to implement a comprehensive policy that positions you as the workplace of choice and builds your proprietary pool of external workers.
