The aim of the thesis is to examine what employer branding entails and how employer branding can be managed and developed. This thesis analyzes how a positive internal employer brand could be communicated externally to attract more talent to the right target group. According to Mosley, the ultimate strength of an employer brand lies in the character of the organization.
The case study examines the current state of Rovio's internal employer brand and how it can be developed to attract more talent. In addition to the survey, there was also a small group discussion with a couple of the new ones, and the focus of this discussion was on the development of the employer brand. The following chapter focuses on employer brand management and discusses who owns and is responsible for the employer brand.
The employer brand varies internally and externally and also between these different stages of the talent lifecycle. It has both advantages and disadvantages if the employer brand is closely related to, for example, the customer brand. On the other hand, a disadvantage of this can be that the consumer brand has too great a negative influence on the employer brand.
3 EMPLOYER BRAND MANAGEMENT
There is evidence of the impact of the psychological contract because the employer's value proposition is an agreement between the employer and the employee. The majority of companies (60%) developed it in-house, while one-third of companies used creative agencies or employer branding specialists to develop their employer value proposition. Especially among the younger generation, cultural fit has become one of the main factors in employee engagement (Hubschmid 2012, 205).
Therefore, it can be useful to vary the communication of the employer brand according to the target audience and also during the process with the same audience. Internal marketing involves keeping promises made and making them part of the company's culture. The first stage is discovery, which helps understand what stakeholders think about the current employer brand.
Then it's time to assess your current employer brand among potential employees and current employees. As a final step, the employer brand strategy and recruitment marketing efforts should be adjusted to improve employer brand results, and then repeat some of the same steps again. Also, one of the challenges with Generation Y is that their life expectancy to stay in the same job is two years or less.
There are no specific metrics that should be used when measuring employer branding activities because it depends on the company what they want to measure. Companies need to understand and define what employer branding actually means to their company, what it consists of, and what the goals are for each part of it before they begin measuring any activity. Rosethorn says the impact of an employer brand can be measured in terms of attraction, engagement, finances and stakeholders.
Most of the data mentioned above should be easily accessible from the applicant tracking system (ATS), also known as the recruiting tool, that the company uses. It's important for companies to understand that some metrics are something they need based on their employer brand goals, while others are nice to have but not critical to their goals. Recording of data related to employer brand metrics should be ongoing and monitoring of this data should be regular.
Only half of the respondents in Universum's (2015c, 12) research measure their activities and effectiveness on social media.
4 CASE ROVIO
Since the survey was anonymous, it would have revealed the identity of the respondents from offices other than Espoo and Stockholm. The survey was open for three weeks, during which time a reminder was sent to the group. As mentioned above, the study covered three areas; employer image, recruitment and onboarding – employer image is the main topic.
Because this thesis contains the suggestions for improvement, a voluntary group discussion was organized two weeks after the questionnaire was closed. The focus of the group discussion was on the improvement to collect ideas from the new connections for the development ideas.
5 RESEARCH RESULTS
69% agreed or strongly agreed with the statement "My image of Rovio has changed from what it was before the application". 88% either agreed or strongly agreed that they were satisfied with the recruitment process and 85% agreed or strongly agreed that they were satisfied with their onboarding. Most employees were proud to tell other people that they work at Rovio.
The next question was a matrix that covered adjectives previously used in many job ads from Rovio. The respondents were asked how well they agreed with the given adjective when they thought of Rovio. Looked like a fun place, although recent financial problems highlighted in the media obviously had a negative impact on the brand.
I was very familiar with the past, but also extremely impressed with the actions taken in early 2016. Next, they were asked that if the image of Rovio had changed during their employment, how it had changed. When asked "what do you think is Rovio's competitive advantage compared to other companies", respondents thought it was a strong brand (38%), Angry Birds (23%), family-like company (15%) and that Rovio ' a fun place to work (12%).
What respondents thought worked well in the recruitment process was fast pace (27 . %), interviews (23 %) and communication (15. There was mention of delays in the follow-ups and setting a certain time frame for a start date in advance) I was told there would be several, but in the end it was only two (which in this case was of course a nice surprise).
In the onboarding process, the team and colleagues (19%) seemed to work well and 15% thought that the basic setup was good. I felt very welcome in the studio and got a good project from day 1 Basically that I could start working on the project straight away once I set everything up.
6 DEVELOPING ROVIO’S EMPLOYER BRAND
According to the participants, Rovio does not “sell” itself enough to potential employees and they should “brag” with the company culture. Respondents would add more information to the company's website, which they believe is currently too obvious and difficult to find. For example, they compared the company's website to the website of King, another game development company, which they described as.
Rovio should present studios, teams, projects and products on the company side, as well as DAU (daily active game users) data and other statistics, for example. The image that the company wants to portray must be consistent, for example, throughout the entire recruitment process. So it's important to keep in mind when creating employer branding content that it's something the company can actually deliver.
The author suggests a strong collaboration with the marketing department and to decide who is responsible for what in the company. Employer branding is two-way communication and therefore it is important that the company not only pushes their message, but also listens and responds. A concrete action could be to develop the company's website in order to provide enough information about Rovio as a company, employer and workplace in an attractive way, in order to attract potential employees.
It is also important that when potential employees see Rovio's job advertisement in various job boards, they get supporting information from the company's website in addition to the job advertisement, which can only contain a limited amount of information. As also mentioned by the new members, the company's website could contain game studio and team presentations, information about projects and products and some statistics for e.g. the games and the employees. As Rovio supports the relocation of employees, this information can therefore be brought up on the company page.
Potential employees can relate more to these brand ambassadors who work at Rovio, rather than the constant message from the company. As we mentioned earlier, the company has to decide which KPIs it wants to measure based on what is useful for it.
7 CONCLUSIONS
The response rate could have been higher if the request to complete the survey came from management or there would have been some form of reward for answering the survey. On the other hand, the reward could have resulted in respondents responding without actually reflecting on their experience. Chapter six offers action and development ideas for Rovio, but as an overall guide, the author recommends starting with planning the EVP to have a strong foundation for communication and actions.
As mentioned in the beginning of this thesis, every company has an employer brand, whether they have defined it themselves or not. Further research could explore the status of Rovio's employer brand at different stages of the talent lifecycle. How do the talent pools, applicants, candidates, rest of the employees and alumni view Rovio as an employer.
As mentioned earlier, the employer brand message can be created for different segments and so it can be useful to research these different audiences to get the right message across to the right audience. The author believes that employer branding is an ongoing process that will remain important as long as there is competition. Particularly in roles where there is no oversupply of talent, the well-planned and communicated employer brand must be there to differentiate the company from others.
Survey form
