A question that seems to be popping up more and more in the minds of recruiters and general HR leadership is, "Why should branding be important to HR manager? I work in HR, not marketing."
In proposing answer to this question, one must admit that just a few short years ago, answer would have been significantly more limited than it is today, in that branding in HR has traditionally been limited to the employment function. But while employment branding has always been a topic of great interest to many leading recruiting professionals, the importance of mastering the concepts and skills behind branding have much greater implications for HR professionals in the "new economy".
A Shared Responsibility is Arising
It is no secret that success in business relies upon excellence in execution. While corporate leaders have historically looked to other functions, such as product development, marketing and sales, to drive corporate success, today more and more eyes are looking to HUMAN RESOURCE for help.
The reason for this new-found reliance on HR stems from a decrease in the effectiveness of the traditional levels marketing organizations used to differentiate a firm and their products. Marketers have traditionally used "the 4 P's" (product, price, position and promotion) to set the products of their firm apart from those of the competitors in the market place. However, in the new economy, product features, pricing and positioning become almost irrelevant as competitors can now mimic and upstage your efforts in very short periods of time.
While this development forces marketing to become more and more branding oriented, it also forces corporate attention on other avenues that can be used to establish and maintain a corporate brand in the marketplace.
Most corporate leaders and professional marketers now admit that one of the few (if not the only) channels left to communicate the corporate brand to customers is the employee, and the customer experience they are capable of providing. Customer service is a factor that is largely influenced by the quality of the workforce, which in turn is largely influenced by the quality of recruiting and workforce management systems developed and maintained by HR.
Workforce Lives Your Brand
Companies opting to distinguish themselves in the market through customer service require a workforce capable of providing a notable positive difference in customer experience versus that which a competitor can provide.
Providing such an experience as a means to communicate and support your corporate brand requires several key factors in place, including: -
• A workforce that understands the customer service distinction you are attempting to provide, and that believes in providing it.
• An environment that actually lets the workforce live the brand which you are trying to build (most firms really screw this one up).
• The presence of tools and products that exemplify or empower the brand values.
Each year, companies spend billions of dollars crafting corporate branding or "identity" strategies. They update their mission and values statements, and then work with marketers and advertisers to fine-tune and communicate the new perspective to customers. In many companies, the value statements are posted publicly at every facility to remind employees and communicate to customers what attributes matter most to the company.
Where most companies routinely fail is in managing the impact employees have on making a brand more than words on paper. In every industry, employees serve as the primary "channel" used to characterize the brand during direct contact with the customer. But in most companies, employees don't understand the corporate brand elements or what is needed from them in order to help customers experience the difference. To make matters worse, many organizations have developed standard operating procedures, policies and reward systems that drive behaviors directly in opposition to the brand values.