Creating a good candidate experience

When we think about culture, we think about HR departments who coordinate culture related projects and value determining group activities. However, culture adds more value than it is often credited for, also for the marketing department.

Let’s say you believe that there is some value in culture, but that it is not that important for your company. Let’s even say that you do not care about internal atmosphere or how productive your employees are. Let’s even go so far to say that you believe that, as long as everybody just does their job, there is no need to really worry about culture. Even then, even if you do not care about these internal factors, then there is another reason why you should worry about your culture: it directly affects your branding as a company, and could either be beneficial or detrimental.

Wait, what?

Yes, you’ve read it correctly. Culture, an internal challenge, will determined how you will be perceived externally. Let’s do a thought exercise. Think about a random company you’ve ever been in touch with. How did you perceive your interaction with that company? Positive? Negative? And what shaped that interaction? Was it the designed marketing message on their website? Their advertisements? Or was it the interaction with their customer service-, helpdesk-, or sales representative? More often than not, our opinions of companies are shaped with how we interacted with individual employees. How those respective individuals interacted with us is heavily dependent on how the internal culture and values are set up. For example, a company whose culture is shaped around serving customers will most likely have employees who are more pleasant to interact with, as consumer, as opposed to a company whose culture is shaped around following rules. This is, in a nutshell, why culture also matters for your branding.

But how does this work in practice? How can you set it up and what do you need to do to improve your branding?

The foundation

In core culture is a mixture of individual behaviours and values. These behaviours and values get translated into how people act and the sum of all these actions is what we call culture: how people behave and interact with each other. It seems therefore that culture is pretty much determined and that there is little that you can change. This is partly true; you cannot fully control culture and it sometimes grows organically. However, good behaviours and values can be stimulated and bad behaviours and values can be discouraged. So, you cannot steer culture as much, but you can nudge it in the right direction (Do you want to read more about the power of nudging? Read this article). This means that you can mould your culture towards the desired internal driver which aligns with your external message. For example, the marketing message: “we are service champions” should align with the internal value “being service minded”. Easy right? Wrong. Adjusting culture is hard. It is a time-consuming process and the people involved are often stubborn and hard to convince.

Turning the idea upside down, you can also see how internal culture will affect your marketing message. If you have toxic values within your culture, this will also translate in how your image will be conducted outwards. For example, if rules come first and customers always come second, then your customers will notice this when they interact with the people within your company. So, although culture and marketing seem worlds apart from each other, they are actually closely related and interconnected.

If you still believe that this is all ridiculous, then think back about the thought exercise. Think about how your perception was shaped, who was involved and what they did. You can deduct their actions back to motivations which are shaped by behaviours and values. That is culture.

Getting it right

What happens when your culture is actually aligned with your marketing message? Well when culture and marketing interlock and supplement each other, that is when you utilize culture to its fullest extent. The result is often noticeable in increased customer satisfaction. Depending on your culture, marketing and goals, it can either: drive sales and/or improve service and/or expand operations and much more. Culture can motivate your employees to go above and beyond and to reach goals which seem unachievable. As your employees feel part of something that is bigger than themselves and the message that your brand displays, they can create something bigger than just the sum of their efforts. Does this still sound a bit vague and fuzzy? Forbes has ranked 50 companies with a great culture (read more here). What do we see? In the top 4 there are 3 companies (Microsoft, Zoom & Google) which are extremely successful in their industry. This is, in large respect, thanks to their outstanding culture which motivates their employees in a positive way. Their stimulating culture increases collaboration, customer satisfaction, service, but most importantly: the growth of the company they are working for.  

In conclusion

So where do we stand? Well, firstly it is important to repeat the mantra: culture eats strategy for breakfast. The importance of culture cannot be overstated enough, not only for your internal atmosphere but also for your external brand. HR herein has to play a more central and steering role within a company and not just “that office where they do the administration and stuff”. CEO’s and directors have to be made aware of this as they need to give HR a more central role. You see that this already happened at companies with a thriving culture. Now how to set it up is more difficult to explain, mainly because it is entirely dependent on the situation and environment of your company.

If you want more information on how to unlock the power of culture for your company, then get in touch with us and see what we can do for you!

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Branding and culture are two separated dimensions often run by separated teams. This is problematic because many companies do not realise that branding and culture are part of the same process. So why are branding and culture part of the same process?

In most organisations branding is driven by the marketing department whereas cultural projects are driven by the People (HR) department. Often these two continuous projects (and participants) communicate little or not at all with one another, and that is because they are perceived as separate projects. This goes against our vision of what branding and culture is and how they can reinforce each other. We believe that a brand is determined by culture and that the correct display of a brand will reinforce internal culture. In this blog I will assess the two topics and show you how they intertwine.

Branding

Branding is an integral part of marketing. Branding is a way to steer how the outside world perceives your company and how they interact with your company. Brands can be very personal, very classy, very edgy, very transformative, you name it - and it is out there. The flavours of different brands are endless, which is not surprising as each company is trying to stick out from the crowd by creating their own unique identity. That is why it is not surprising that marketing departments focus on creating an own “brand identity” complete with own colours, values, story lines, slogans, and other components to make an own distinctive brand.

While creating a distinctive brand is important, it is almost similarly important to communicate this brand to the outside world. You can have a beautiful brand identity, but if nobody knows about it, then it is practically useless. In other words, you need to make consumers/potential clients aware of your brand. This part of marketing is, not surprisingly, called “brand awareness” which basically focusses on all the different channels through which you are trying to inform the world out there about your brand identity.

As you can imagine, these are enormous tasks, not only to define a strong brand which really stands out and persuades consumers/potential clients, but also to then get your message out there. It is up to your marketing department to properly formulate and distribute the message that your brand wants to convey.

Culture

Turning now to culture. In its core, culture is the combination of all individual values and behaviours of the people within your company. This is in part influenced by your organisational values, but also by individual beliefs. Culture is therefore not something that you can completely control, you can only partly steer it. With every new person that joins your team, or every person that leaves your team, your culture partly changes. So, in some sense culture is something you cannot control. However, you can stimulate certain behaviours and demotivate others. This way you can move culture in the right direction.

Your culture determines a lot on how your employees communicate and behave internally, but also how they communicate and behave towards the outside world. In part, your culture therefore determines what how the outside world perceives your company and your brand. This hints towards how culture and branding are very intertwined.

The same coin

So how are culture and branding part of the same process? Well, in simple terms branding is a process which determines how you are perceived in the outside world and culture determines how your employees interact with the outside world. In essence they are therefore both part of the same process: interactions with the outside world.

An organisation is its people. I believe that branding should start with assessing your internal culture. You need to know first what your internal culture stands for before you can create a brand accordingly. Why? Simple: consistency. For example: you can create a beautiful brand identity talking about how customer-focussed your organisation is, but let’s assume that your employees are rather more focussed on creating the best products (product-focussed). If your customer interacts with your representatives, which have a different attitude than your brand advertises, this might disappoint or upset them, or even worse; it will make your brand identity questionable, unconvincing, or even unbelievable.

On the flip side, having a brand identity which does not align with the internal culture also causes some problems. You will soon find that your employees do not believe any more about the message you convey to your customers/clients and that they become unhappy about the fact that the company seems to become more and more out of touch with their own employees and the internal culture. This can lead to unhappiness, unproductivity and even with people calling in sick or ultimately leaving the company.

So, what to do?

1. Find out what your culture is.

As with all cultural projects, the first step of assessing your current culture is key. Try to use employee surveys to question your employees what they value in their work, how they feel connected to their colleagues and what motivates them to come to work. Ask them how they communicate towards one-another, if they feel free to speak up during meetings, if they value creativity, how they experience the leadership; and many other questions. Try to find out how they work (together) and what motivates them to work (together).

(optional) 2. Motivate desired behaviours/demotivate undesired behaviours

In case you notice that there are many unwanted behaviours, then you should try and motivate desired behaviours and demotivate undesired behaviours. Use workshops, brainstorming sessions and early adopters to help people see how individual and group behaviour affect the brand in a positive (or negative) way. Bring out their desire to build a strong unique culture and brand. During these sessions you should get a better uniform image of what behaviours everybody wants to motivate. This is also the moment to take the leading role and move people in the right direction to start adopting the desired behaviours.

From these sessions you should also be able to bring organisational values to life. Working bottom-up: individual behaviours can be generalized in a couple of shared attitudes, which in turn can be generalized and highlighted in organizational values.

Don’t forget that organisational values prescribe behaviours. These are things you do. Therefore, your organizational values should be actionable.

3. Create a brand identity that aligns with your culture and promote it.

Now that you have found out what your internal culture stands for, it is time to create a brand identity around it. This is the job of your marketing department, but they need to keep connecting their messaging with the internal culture. If that does not align, then you are saying one thing while doing another. Once your brand identity is established and aligned with your internal culture, feel free to promote it any way you see fit.

4. Celebrate, celebrate, celebrate!

I do not understand why companies keep forgetting this step. Once you have created the right culture, the right brand identity, and you have started promoting it, then celebrate this with everybody involved! Present the results, show of the new polished brand, and how you are promoting it towards the outside world. While you are presenting this to your employees, remind them of how essential their contribution was into the cultural assessment and how they too have created their brand. It is just as much their achievement as it is the achievement of your marketing department. After all, your brand is your company, and your company is your brand. Everyone contributes to that, so every individual is key. Make your employees feel part of this journey and make them feel that they have contributed to this process. This will improve your overall culture, internal atmosphere, and connectivity amongst your employees.

In conclusion

Branding and culture are part of the same process. Culture is an integral part of branding, and you cannot create a solid brand without understanding your culture first. Therefore, I would argue that every brand project should align itself with the internal culture. If your brand does not align with your culture, then it becomes unconvincing and uncredible in the long run. Do you want to change your brand? Or do you want to fine-tune your brand identity? Start looking towards your internal culture and you will find your guidance towards how to change your brand and the overall perception of your company for the better.

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First impressions matter. So being aware of the first impression of a new employee in your company is crucial to his or her future performance. That’s why in this blog I’m taking a closer look at onboarding.

Onboarding somebody into your company is a lot like welcoming somebody into your house. As with all welcomes, it is not just a first coffee and a short introductory chat. It is a continuous demonstration of cooperation and affection. A good onboarding process is paramount for the productivity of your employee and his or her integration with the team. It encompasses everything from the first small introduction over a cup of coffee until the more formal monthly one-to-one meetings. In this blog I will give some practical advice on how you can improve your onboarding process and the integration and engagement of your new employees. If you’re thinking: “well most of this doesn’t apply to us because the COVID-19 crisis is forcing us to work remotely”, think again. Onboarding is now more important than ever to create a well-functioning team, you just need to rethink your structures in a digital matter. More tips on that here.

Handbooks and more

Let’s get the boring stuff out of the way first. As a part of any onboarding process, there are a lot of practical matters and questions that your newly hired employee has. Handbooks are a great way for employees to peacefully read through and find an answer for their questions, in the first turbulent weeks of a new employment. In the same line, make sure that the handbook has a FAQ as well, where the employee can find the most frequently asked questions, just to make it a bit easier for him or her.

It does not all have to be dull practical stuff, however. You can also include more interesting things in your handbook such as:

• A formulated version of your vision, mission, strategy, culture and values.
• An overview of your team members, including pictures, practical information and fun facts.
• An overview of your customers/clients and stakeholders, and a short summary on each and every one of them.  

Meeting the team(s)

If you want to feel at home, you need to know who are living in the house. It is therefore important to have meetings with the different teams. Now this is where things become a bit difficult to define. As companies differ in size, it becomes more difficult for them to involve everybody in the process. Meeting the team is a process that starts off large, with a lot of people involved, and is narrowed down over time.

Normally the process looks like this:

1. A (digital) announcement of the new employee, who he or she is and what he or she will be doing, for the entire company.
2. A short (digital) introduction of the employee to the entire company (or a larger part of the company).
3. A more thorough introduction with colleagues from different departments with whom the employee will work closely with.
4. A meeting with representatives from the HR, Legal, and Facilities/IT departments.
5. A meeting with the closest colleagues of the employee (or the entire department). Hold this meeting off-site, perhaps as a lunch meeting or afternoon coffee so that the team can really spend some quality time to get to know the employee.
6. One-to-one meetings with the manager.
   

Introduction and training

After you’re done with shaking hands, just like at home, it is time to take a coffee and sit down to talk about some more serious stuff. In this sense I am talking about more thorough introductions on what the company does and how they do things, what they stand for and how they communicate this. Employer branding is a big topic in these introductions and trainings. You need to give the newly hired employee a good idea of what your brand represents and how this translates in his or her activities.

This is also the moment when an employee gets their first introduction to the internal systems, ways of working and contact persons, including possible clients. In this sense it is good to have a training set up from a more senior employee or somebody from the IT department to make sure that the new employee can work with the systems you use. Client or stakeholder meetings are also a big part of the process. A senior employee should take the new employee with him to introductory meetings with the potential clients and stakeholders so they get an image of who you are working for/with.

Another part of this process are job-specific trainings which can be ongoing, but which get introduced in the onboarding process.

Feedback

So now that you have bombarded your newly hired employee with as much information as you possibly can, it is time to harvest some information as well. This means: one-to-one meetings with feedback. These are often meetings between the newly hired employee and his or her manager, where both parties can give feedback to one another. These meetings should be held regularly and continuously throughout the career of your employees over at your company. Try to have such a meeting roughly every month with your employees, even their first month. Of course, everything is still fun and games then, so there will not be that much feedback coming from your employee but try to challenge them even then already. Is there really nothing that the company can improve? How was the first impression? Was it well enough? Is there anything that should be improved? Remember, the image that the company gives of to its own employees often also translate into the same image that they give off to clients and stakeholders.

In conclusion

A good onboarding process is everything from the first handbook until formal meetings with clients and stakeholders. It is a large process which, if done correctly, can kickstart the career of your new employee within your company. In this blog we have given a brief overview of all the essentials. If you want to have a more detailed roadmap of what a good onboarding process looks like, click here.

If you need help setting up your onboarding process, just reach out to us and we'll set up a meeting to see what we can do for you!

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