The Employee Value Proposition: Where to Next?

Real Use Cases For EVP Components

The EVP was already shifting pre-pandemic; however, it had to make significant adjustments during Covid and will, of course, need to continue to evolve. The potential direction of travel can be seen from recent reports on EVP with recommendations.

Gartner, in its CHRO Guide: Reinvent your EVP for a Post-pandemic Workforce, reports that employers must focus on a whole-person approach to EVP and orient themselves towards employees as people rather than workers.

The term radical flexibility is being used. McKinsey describes an approach where, for example, tasks could be broken down into modularized work. These tasks could therefore be independent of traditional five-day work weeks with set working hours. Similarly, CapGemini recommends that employers develop an “employer promise” that links job roles to outcomes and expresses career growth potential.

Increased customization and personalization of the EVP are also expected, where employers will highlight different aspects depending on the region, cohort or life stage of existing and prospective talent.

Intrinsic benefits will continue to develop and be embedded into working life. For example, in a recent survey by Remote, the top two benefits were “healthy food in the office, home deliveries, or meal stipends” and “hours off every month specifically for mental health improvement” across all five countries surveyed; France, Germany, Netherlands, UK and USA.

EVP Evolution

There are many ways to future-proof your EVP. These will vary depending on the company size, and many companies will, of course, already be doing some of these:

Keep talking to current employees about their experience and needs

Use focus groups made up of different cohorts, - new hires, different functions, multiple generations or people from under- represented groups. Top-down management- led policies are no longer enough. More informal methods can work well too. In a recent Talent Mapping & Insight Project, an example of the CEO who has lunch regularly with different small groups of new recruits from all levels was reported very positively.

Company Culture

Explore ways to make your company culture more real or tangible for new colleagues as soon as they join, whether in a hybrid, office- based or remote role. At Hilti, for example, a company well known for investing in its culture since the late ’80s, all new hires are trained on the Hilti culture, and so is everyone responsible for distilling culture to others, e.g. newly promoted team leaders. Embedding culture for younger hires, especially those with little or no experience of pre-pandemic office life, is even more critical. The opinion article in the Boston Globe in March 2022, My Generation isn’t Looking to Make Friends at Work, about GenZ knowledge workers captures this succinctly and the article was widely read.

Partnering with HR

EVP will have to shift from being the sole responsibility of HR and Senior Leadership to the whole company. HR and senior leaders will have to be more open to feedback from TA and hiring managers struggling to attract talent in competition with more flexible competitors.

Use Internal or External Talent Intelligence

Talent Intelligence can help you gather perceptions of your EVP (from former, current and prospective talent) to compete effectively for talent with current and potential new competitors, industries, regions and additional talent pools. It can identify key drivers, motivators and barriers for specific talent pools, enabling you to position your employer brand to make the biggest impact.

Focus on Management Development

The EVP trends reported above highlight the massive need for strong team leadership and good management practices. Armstrong Craven’s Insight & Talent Analytics team has already come across examples of companies that emphasize upskilling their functional managers to help lower attrition and attract talent. Managers must be empathetic and skilled to get the best out of their teams and retain them.

McKinsey’s latest American Opportunity Survey shows high levels of those surveyed who have either been diagnosed with or have received treatment for mental health issues:

• 55% of 18 to 24-year-olds
• 47% of 25 to 34-year-olds
• 40% of 35 to 54-year-olds

The survey also shows that almost half of respondents have actively sought new work in the past 12 months, are currently looking for a new job, or plan to start looking in the next year.

Highlight different aspects of the EVP to different talent cohorts or regions

Focus on different aspects for various groups, and consider establishing employee ‘personas’ within the workforce to help with this.

Promote the EVP

A strong and enhanced EVP needs to have visibility externally; encourage employees to use social media to promote the organization.

These are challenging times for companies to attract and retain talent due to many factors, and both known and unknown challenges are ahead. Companies will have to continue to adapt and, in some cases, radically change policies and accepted wisdom, for example, the necessity of office face-time to develop culture. To address these challenges, managers will need support from their companies to develop a clear understanding of the personal and professional drivers of talent to be able to retain and get the best from them. Also, a larger group of stakeholders within companies are now key to developing and maintaining a company’s EVP to help it attract its share of new talent.

Working with a Talent Intelligence partner, such as Armstrong Craven’s Insight & Talent Analytics team, that has experience in providing current, tailored EVP talent insight can provide a distinct advantage.