Looking for a job? Yeah, I hear you. It is the WORST! But you can take a bunch of lessons from employer branding to create a resume that isn't just "good," but helps you stand out and get the job you want. Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. My free newsletter on employer brand headlines hit 1,250 subscribers, so I decided to revamp it on a better platform. Same great content, easier to read!

The future of employer branding (or maybe the maturation of it) lays in how well it is integrated into the corporate brand. The more your brand looks like a single idea seen through multiple lenses, the more each aspect can support the others. And there are few better examples of that than at Delta, where Holland McCue has pushed to create a seamless sense of brand, even when things are deeply chaotic and the future is uncertain. Here's my interview with Holland. Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. My free newsletter on employer brand headlines hit 1,250 subscribers, so I decided to revamp it on a better platform. Same great content, easier to read!

This week we have a lovely long conversation with Charu Malhotra. Charu's worked on a number of employer brands that you've probably hear of, like Unilever, BP, and Ferrero (just to name a few). Enjoy! Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. My free newsletter on employer brand headlines hit 1,250 subscribers, so I decided to revamp it on a better platform. Same great content, easier to read! At ATAP, I'm talking with Todd Raphael about budget-constrained recruiting and branding, August 18th I'm going to talk about data-driven talent branding over at The Goodhire Summit, August 20th

We all make decisions based on mental shortcuts and pattern recognition. It's just what humans do. But if you're building a brand, these same shortcuts can keep you from seeing the brand that's right in front of you. And the more you learn about these biases, perhaps there are ways you can use them in increase talent attraction and engagement. Thanks to Jason Kent Crowell for the question! Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. My free newsletter on employer brand headlines hit 1,250 subscribers, so I decided to revamp it on a better platform. Same great content, easier to read! At ATAP, I'm talking with Todd Raphael about budget-constrained recruiting and branding, August 18th I'm going to talk about data-driven talent branding over at The Goodhire Summit, August 20th

We are seeing the end of "monolithic employer brands," concepts that focused more on consistency that connecting to a person. But if you start thinking about your brand and how it can leverage its pillars better to various micro-cultures, suddenly your brand has more meaning. Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. My free newsletter on employer brand headlines hit 1,250 subscribers, so I decided to revamp it on a better platform. Same great content, easier to read! At ATAP, I'm talking with Todd Raphael about budget-constrained recruiting and branding, August 18th I'm going to talk about data-driven talent branding over at The Goodhire Summit, August 20th

In the last four months, everything has changed, including our candidates. They want different things, they behave differently, and the act differently. Have we changed our own processes the same way? Or are we still tweaking and optimizing? If the world is 100% different, why aren't we? Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. My free newsletter on employer brand headlines hit 1,250 subscribers, so I decided to revamp it on a better platform. Same great content, easier to read! HRTX Virtual, July 30. Be there! It's free!

I'm seeing a lot of comments/chatter around businesses jettisoning their interest in employer brand as the pandemic/recession takes hold. And it makes sense: if you've built all your metrics and value around filling the top of the funnel, not having much of a recruiting funnel makes employer brand redundant. We all know employer brand is much much more than filling the funnel, but somewhere along the way, we got pigeon-holed into this limited value. So maybe it's time for employer branding as a function/concept to break free and own more of its destiny.  Maybe it's time for us to start the People Brand revolution. Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines D&I and Data webinar with Torin Ellis and Gabriel Hitt. (TUESDAY!) HRTX Virtual, July 30

Last year, employer brand was the buzz word, but where is the buzz now? Given a year or three to consider and implement employer branding strategies, where has employer brand landed as a corporate function?  Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Have a questions you would like two employer brand experts to answer on the show? There's a way to record your question on the homepage (look for the big orange button) D&I and Data webinar with Torin Ellis and Gabriel Hitt. EBNow Survey Results

The age old question: where should employer branding live? TA? Marketing? Comms? Like the "chicken or the egg" question, the answer involves a lot of evolution... Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Have a questions you would like two employer brand experts to answer on the show? There's a way to record your question on the homepage (look for the big orange button) D&I and Data webinar with Torin Ellis and Gabriel Hitt. EBNow Survey Results

Who's in charge of the company? Leadership, right? Well, recently it sure seems like the employees are making their voices heard in the strategic direction of a company. How does having staff more "in charge" of a company impact your ability to manage the employer brand? Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Have a questions you would like two employer brand experts to answer on the show? There's a way to record your question on the homepage (look for the big orange button)

Yes, it is absolutely time for your employer brand to quit playing it safe. You and your brand need to take a stand for something. And while that sounds terrifying (trust me, I know), the opportunity it presents is absolutely amazing. Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available on Amazon right now! Get yours on Kindle or paperback. Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines I mentioned Overthrow II (the book) Have a questions you would like two employer brand experts to answer on the show? There's a way to record your question on the homepage (look for the big orange button)

It may seem like a simple question, but how you answer it determines the scope of your work. If you want to keep the employer brand function from being a funnel-filler or the "swag maven," you need to answer the question right. Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available for pre-order on Amazon with a June 15, 2020 delivery. Get yours on Kindle or paperback. Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot. https://bit.ly/talentchoosesyou

Some stories are so engaging and attractive that other people extend them, telling stories you never envisioned.  Which, to be fair, is what you should want from your employer brand. Show notes: Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available for pre-order on Amazon with a June 15, 2020 delivery. Get yours on Kindle or paperback. Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot. Learn more at http://bit.ly/talentchoosesyou

For those of you old enough to remember, there was a time when music came on vinyl (sit down old man!). There was a thing (mostly in the punk world) called a "split single," where two bands who were friends would each take a side of the single. In a similar punk spirit, Rob Stevenson of Talk Talent To Me and I decided to have a nice rambling conversation about Covid, the industry, and what was (and wasn't) working for companies. This is part one of the conversation, but part two lives on Talk Talent To Me (so follow the link and listen to it!). Enjoy! Show notes: Yes, the books are starting to roll out!!! The Employer Brand Handbook Vol 1: Working with Recruiters is now live on Amazon Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available for pre-order on Amazon with a June 15, 2020 delivery The Employer Brand Handbook Vol 2: Metrics and KPIs is available for pre-order will go live Sept 7, 2020. All books are being discounted at launch, so order your copies today! Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot. Learn more at http://talentchoosesyou.com

Call it "employer blanding" or even "the sea of sameness," but there's a valid reason to think all employer brands look and feel the same. But that's not a rule or anything. The trick is learning how to push beyond the obvious to understand your talent targets and offer them something far more meaningful than what's obvious. Show notes: Yes, the books are starting to roll out!!! The Employer Brand Handbook Vol 1: Working with Recruiters is now live on Amazon Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available for pre-order on Amazon with a June 15, 2020 delivery The Employer Brand Handbook Vol 2: Metrics and KPIs is available for pre-order will go live Sept 7, 2020. All books are being discounted at launch, so order your copies today! Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot. Learn more at http://talentchoosesyou.com

We all strive to build brand messages that stand out, that stick in people's minds long after they have been seen. So, how do you make that happen? Your instinct might be to ratchet up the creativity, to focus on making something unusual or with exceptional amounts of polish. But I'd suggest that better brand messages start with positioning, and in fact, can beat out more "creative" messages. Let's explore! Show Notes:  Yes, the books are starting to roll out!!! The Employer Brand Handbook Vol 1: Working with Recruiters is now live on Amazon Talent Chooses You: Hire Better with Employer Branding is available for pre-order on Amazon with a June 15, 2020 delivery The Employer Brand Handbook Vol 2: Metrics and KPIs is available for pre-order will go live Sept 7, 2020. All books are being discounted at launch, so order your copies today! Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

Most recruiting functions work (and treat candidates) as if there's always more fish in the sea. They act as if there are an unlimited supply of candidates, so their job is to just find more. But what about in circumstances where there is a fixed number of potential candidates? Aerospace engineers with security clearance, clinical researchers with MDs, veterinarians, etc? In this episode, we break down how employer brand strategy changes when you have a finite talent pool. Show Notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

In the last two months, we've seen changes to almost every aspect of our lives, both professionally and personally. So it might stand to reason that our employer brands should change, too. But is that true? Perhaps the answer to that question may determine how successful our employer brands and EVPs ultimately are. Show Notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

By now, you've been thinking about how your employer brand needs to react in light of...[looks around]... well, everything. Whether you inherited your brand or defined it yourself, things have changes and your brand needs to reflect it. But if you just slap a new brand on, how useful will that be? You need to re-think things. Which means you need to understand how your employer brand was formed in the first place.  In this episode, we break down the four things that create your brand. If you understand them, you can figure out how to influence them. If you don't understand them, you might as well try to change the tides.

What is culture? And why is it I can still ask that question? You'd think after countless books, articles, podcasts, lectures and TED talks, we'd all know what we mean by culture. And yet, that doesn't seem to be the case. If you define your culture by your perks, this month has been quite the wake up call, hasn't it? If you think you can dictate culture, or that it remains static in the face of changing staff, leadership and... well, everything, you're going to be in trouble. In this episode, we get serious about how to think about and leverage culture in our employer brands. Show Notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Hung Lee's 24-hour Recruiting Brainfood Marathon Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

It feels to me that we often talk about the connection between diversity and employer brand as if its obvious, but is it really? In this conversation with my friend Madison Butler, VP of People at Sourced Craft Cocktails, we try to explore about the connection between the two ideas. Show notes: Madison Butler's LinkedIn Webinar with Elena Valentine: How Do You Build an Employer Brand When No One Is In The Same Room? Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

It really is a rare day when someone says, "go ahead and build our employer brand. We'll stand still for a few weeks or months while you figure it out..." More often, we are building a brand on top of existing ideas, collateral and content, trying to disparate ideas together that were never designed to go together.   So in this episode, we examine the process of developing a strategy, brand and even EVP after you've already built a bunch of "stuff."   Show notes: Webinar with Elena Valentine: How Do You Build an Employer Brand When No One Is In The Same Room? Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

This episode is a kind of natural second chapter to last week's Employer Brand In The Time of COVID. In that episode, we talked about how you need to start thinking about how to manage your brand when physical proximity can't be an assumption.   In this episode, we go beyond that. Not to what happens beyond the crisis, but how do you think beyond the standard limitations of how we see employer branding as a function, as a player within the business. If you think your employer brand is just there to attract talent, that's all it can do. But if you see it as a great deal more, your impact can go far beyond recruiting.   Show notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

Well, it seems like we're all working remotely all of a sudden, huh?  While there are plenty of resources on how to manage employees and manage yourself in a remote-office situation, no one has asked how we're going to manage our employer brand remotely.   Why does it matter? Because the context of work has dramatically changed. No more posters. no more water-cooler talk, no more information communications channels with which to socialize the brand.   Thus, we take a deep dive into how you can manage your own employer brand when no one shares much physical space anymore.   Show notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

If you take the definition of employer branding literally, you might be inclined to make employer brands for all the various teams, offices and roles within your company. I mean, that's how you're going to explain "what it's like to work here" with any kind of granularity and specificity.   But what if you let go of the guide rail of "specificity" and focused on creating emotions in the prospects to attract them? And then, what if instead of telling specific stories, you talked about what it feels like to work there instead?   Show notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot. This episode was sparked by a comment on this post asking what the next topics should be. Feel free to add your own ideas!

We all know our first job is (or expected to be) one of attraction. And we all know that if we build a strong brand, it will impact retention. But how many of us are intentionally involving ourselves in the thorny retention issues of the company? In this episode, we talk about how you can get involved and how you can play a role in one of the most complex and important issues of any company.

We all "know" that the employer brander's mantra is to create an authentic brand. What does that even mean? Is that even achievable? Is that even really a thing? Sadly, we've all brainwashed each other and ourselves into aspiring to something that crumbles with any scrutiny.  But don't fret. Behind that fuzzy-bunny facade is something far more useful. 

While your employer brand is really owned by everyone in your company, your recruiters do a great deal of heavy lifting to communicate, frame and amplify your branding message. So why do so many push back on your work? Don't they know that you're trying to help them??? In this episode, we get nitty gritty on building great relationships with recruiters to be the best possible advocates for you and your employer branding.

The mistake in employer branding is to treat the brand as monolithic, as a single tagline repeated until you are blue in the face.   In reality, a strong brand is modular, allowing you to pick and choose how to present it to various audiences while still maintaining a core (and very much aligned) sense of the company.   But you can't do that on the fly. You need to build your brand to be modular from the ground up.   Show notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

In the beginning, many of us saw (and our bosses saw) employer branding as "stuff that needed to get done and solved." But as we solved issues, we started asking, "is this the right problem to solve?" and "how can we solve this issue so it never happens again?"  But even this isn't enough. Having mastered tactics and strategy, there's still another mind you need to embrace in order to maximize your employer brand impact at work. Show notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

Most employer brand professionals and practitioners or driven (and often pushed) to solve immediate problems, the kind that have immediate impacts, the kind others can see. But solving those kind of "urgent, but not always important" problems is now you you'll succeed in this role. Success comes from seeing the fast, urgent and immediate problems, but also looking to resolve the slow, important, and unobvious ones, too. Show notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

In this long conversation with the one and only Elena Valentine, we get into what employer branding means, branding fan fiction, telling better stories and all sorts of other goodies. Don't miss this one!   Show notes: What?! You don't know Elena Valentine?! Twitter, Skill Scout, LinkedIn Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

To quote the one and only David Byrne (of Talking Heads, duh): "Facts are simple and facts are straight Facts are lazy and facts are late Facts all come with points of view Facts don't do what I want them to" Go to any career site and you'll see facts. Oodles and oodles of facts that mostly tell us nothing. And yet we keep stuffing facts into our work, despite the fact that they don't differentiate our brands or do much to support our narrative.

If you want to attract candidates, promise them the moon. But if you want them to engage and even stick around, you are going to have to learn how to set, manage (and occasionally exceed) candidate expectations. Employer branding is very much about excelling at the expectations game.

Romeo and Juliet is the same story as West Side Story. Star Wars is a samurai fable. Mad Men is the same story as Breaking Bad. As you think about developing and managing your employer brand, you might wonder how your brand is supposed to stand out and be unique and authentic in a world where there are millions of brands, all vying for the same territory as you. Is it really possible? In this episode we think about story structure as a metaphor for how you can build your own brand. 

There are six common, but rarely-discussed, reasons why a company's employer brand initiative (or project or function) will fail. In this, the final in a three-part series, we'll break them down two at a time so you can avoid costly pitfalls and public failure. In this episode, we cover "No care and feeding plan" and "integration and activation."

There are six common, but rarely-discussed, reasons why a company's employer brand initiative (or project or function) will fail. In this three-part series, we'll break them down two at a time so you can avoid costly pitfalls and public failure. In this episode, we cover "reflects politics rather than reality " and "poorly defined ownership."

There are six common, but rarely-discussed, reasons why a company's employer brand initiative (or project or function) will fail. In this three-part series, we'll break them down two at a time so you can avoid costly pitfalls and public failure. In this episode, we cover "poorly defined goals and intentions" and "built on the wrong stuff."

The Hatfields and McCoys. The Capulets and Montagues. Cats and Dogs. Me and Decaf. Employer brand and marketing. These are the feuds that never seem to die. What might be missing from your employer brand is to end the madness and make better friends with the marketing team, not just to access their tools (and budgets), but to move your organization towards one where employer brand and marketing aren't just civil, but integrated. Welcome to the future of the integrated brand.

There are lots of articles (and a few books) that talk about the various work of employer branding within a company, but here is the the 101, the "here's what it means to be an employer brand practitioner" you can hand your new staff or someone interested in switching roles to help them see beyond the tactics and really make a difference.   Show notes: Sign up for my free newsletter on employer brand headlines Want to ask me anything? I have open office hours. Grab your free spot.

Get your pen and paper out, folks! This is a deep dive into a tried and true process you can use to build a content creation machine that will help you build a steady stream of authentic, sharable content. And the best part? It's effectively free. Yes, free. In this episode I reveal a process for building 300+ long-form content pieces that are social-ready in less than a year and for almost no money. Sign up for my weekly employer brand headlines newsletter.  

We've all been convinced that we need to talk about how joining our company will help you make an impact, make a mark, or generally have some purpose. But why? Is it a legacy of milliennial-attraction panic or something else? In this episode, we get serious about whether or not you should be listing "making an impact" as part of your employer brand. Find me: Recruitcon - NashvilleEmployer Brand Headlines Stay up to date on the podcast and the employer brand industry 99 Employer Brand Activation Hacks

When was the last time you asked yourself, "how are candidates making a choice?" Or "if I am asking people to choose my brand, what are they basing that choice on?" It seems funny that it almost never comes up. Because the means by which human beings make choices, be they about food, mates and even jobs, should be front and center of our own thinking. So in this week's episode, we go deep into how people choose to change their lives, and some surprising ideas on how to leverage that process to get people to pay attention to your open roles.

Your employer brand isn’t your EVP. It isn’t your media plan. It isn’t your video, social media or advocacy strategies. It’s about what the staff says about what it’s like to work there. In this episode, we breakdown the three phases of every good employer brand strategy and how to make it really stick. Find me: Recruitcon – NashvilleEmployer Brand Headlines Stay up to date on the podcast and the employer brand industry 99 Employer Brand Activation Hacks

We did it a year and a half ago and as we approach the end of year three, its time to clear out the notes and half-baked ideas to create a clean desk to begin year four. From attribution, metrics, behavior change and all things in between, thank you for listening. Show Notes: Andrew Gadomski’s article on measuring employer brand How Brands Grow by Byron Sharp Find me: HireConf – NYC Recruitcon – Nashville Employer Brand Headlines Stay up to date on the podcast and the employer brand industry

All the data suggests that salary is still the (or of the) primary drivers for job choices. But in a world where salary is be coming more transparent (and therefore similar), does a few bucks one way or the other really matter? The answer may surprise you. Find me: HireConf - NYC Recruitcon - Nashville Employer Brand Headlines Stay up to date on the podcast and the employer brand industry

Okay, okay. You know employer brand is important as a means of attracting and hiring the great talent your business needs to grow. You've invested time and energy (and money!) establishing and promoting that brand, but... But... How do you know it's really working? That's what we'll talk about in this week's episode! Find me: Hired - Chicago (This week!!!) HireConf - NYC Recruitcon - Nashville Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

Have we made a huge mistake, putting recruiting at the front and center of our employer branding strategy? Hat tip to Ted Meulenkamp Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

A strong employer brand starts by revealing what exists. Your job is to uncover who the company is and what it's really like to work there. But that's only half the job. You can't stop there. Because there are few people in the position you're in, one that can see so much of the company, the different locations, teams, roles, styles, purposes, and desires. And with that position comes the responsibility for you to make the company better, to make the company more like the company it wants to be. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

If you make your living as an employer brand professional, what is your job? Is it to write better job posts? Raise your Glassdoor score a little? Suggest better outreach messaging? Manage a CRM? Make hashtags? Obviously, you'll likely a lot of those jobs, but those jobs are in service of a single idea, one we often lose sight of as things get busy (and they are always busy). So here's your reminder of how you should see your job, and what you are being paid to really do. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

How do you attract attention to your brand? Interestingly, its a lot like how you're going to build internal buy-in. You're going to make the familiar strange (and the strange familiar). Show notes: Communicating the New by Kim Erwin (great book!) Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

Every company and every brand has that thing they don't talk about. That thing that everyone knows but bends over backwards to avoid referencing. They have an elephant in the room. And if you're in charge of your employer brand, you can choose to ignore the elephant, but your candidates (who can see it clear as day) will think you're being disingenuous. Or, you could take into account that elephant and find a way to work it into your messaging. Because if you aren't managing your elephant, it's managing you. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

The race to "easiest possible application" has not been a race worth winning. Our ATS's are clogged with applicants we wouldn't hire in a million years simply because we've made it so easy. So what's past "peak easy application?" A world in which we actively and intentionally make it harder for people to apply, to leverage the process itself and insert messages that filter great candidates from the rest. It's time to expect candidates to put some skin in the game. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

Influencing ratings, encouraging talking points, framing values and establishing a shared north star for every one in our company may sound like our job, but it isn't. Our job as employer brand professionals is far deeper, far more difficult and interesting. Our job is to create meaning in the minds of our candidates and employees. Did no one tell you? Oops. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

You know your employer brand is important. I know your employer brand is important. And there are probably a few other people in your company who would agree. But a lot of people see investment in employer brand as a vanity project, as a fluffy-bunny nice-to-have project and not the crucial element in hiring success we know it is. You might be inclined to try and fly under the radar to get your work done, but a better strategy might be to show everyone how crucial employer brand really is. You could elevate the problem in order to drive interest and attention to the project. It's a tightrope to walk, but doing it right opens the door to resources, influence and a better seat at the table. So it's time to raise the stakes. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

It's not a magic trick. A strong employer brand doesn't just attract a better class of talent, it actually helps shape perceptions of everyone in the business. Done well, you can help people inside and outside your company see the business as more valuable than before. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

Hold up! It's not an arcane or crazy question or abstract zen koan. It's a legit question: what exactly is a job. Turns out that how we see it, how we answer that question has huge repercussions on how we find and develop talent in our organization. Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Employer Brand Headlines (weekly digest of the EB world so you always look smart)

Building consistency is easy: take what you already did and do it again. Take what someone learned and use it without learning. Follow the leader and paint by numbers someone else laid. And if that's all branding was, robots would take all our jobs. But it isn't. In fact, great brands are about consistency, but about understanding the core elements within the brand experience and think of ways to re-apply them to other arts of the business. They don't try to copy, they create patterns. Which is what you need to be doing with your employer brand. Show notes: Brands As Patterns by Marc Shillum Find me: Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Yes! you can have my ebook!

Thinking about employer branding can get complicated in a hurry. There are so many ways to describe, measure and understand your brand, it makes it hard to compare one brand to another. When I audited brands, one tool I developed was the "reach and clarity" model, a way to see how you stack up against another brand simply and see where you should be applying your energy. Want to hear it? I thought you might. Find me: MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Yes! you can have my ebook!

There seem to be two schools of thought on employer branding: reveal the brand and be authentic as possible, or manufacture what you think your audience wants to hear. These two positions seem mutually exclusive, but employer branding success happens when you find that middle path. What path is that? You'll just have to listen in to find out (though the title kinda gives it away). Find me: RecFest - London MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Yes! you can have my ebook!

There are ways to spend a lot of money on your employer brand (and a lot of reasons to do so), but how on earth do you pay for it? In this episode, we walk through one scenario to show you how even you can pay for an impactful employer brand. Find me: RecFest - London MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville HireConf - NYC Yes! you can have my ebook!

You can't find better solutions until you ask better questions. But too often we couch, hedge and soften our questions because deep down, we don't REALLY want to know the answers. Rather than build questions to make ourselves look and feel better, if we build the most painful questions possible, we rip the blinders from our eyes and discover see the world for what it really is. Only then can we make real impact. Find me: Transform - Boston RecFest - London MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville Yes! you can have my ebook!

Ever been to an amazing career site? Me neither. Regardless of the platform, this thing you rely on to help candidates fall in love with your brand is a lot closer to stale bread than pastry. So we examine the question of how to build a great career site. Places I'm speaking: Transform - Boston RecFest - London SRSC - Philly MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville

When we talk about brands, we usually talk about brand leaders, the people in the market with the leverage and power to do amazing things because they are the market leaders. No one talks about the power of the Zune brand, they only talk about iPhones. And that's great if you're one of those handful of leaders. But what about everyone else? It turns out, if you aren't a leader, you're one of two brands: a follower or a challenger: those willing to stay safely out of the lead, and those willing to take risks and do what it takes to try and become the leader. There are abundant lessons employer brand pros can take from challenger brands, because every employer brand is a challenger brand. Show Notes: Shane Grey: Twitter Yes, I can speak to your team! Yes! you can have my ebook!

If you're sure bots are evil... this conversation will not sway you. But since so many discussion about AI and bots are vendor-driven, I wanted to talk about the concept of bots with someone who actually uses them everyday. So I pinged Chris Murdock, co-founder and Chief Sourcing Officer (yes, that's really his title), and we had another meandering chat about bots today and bots tomorrow. Show Notes: Chris Murdock: Twitter, IQTalent Partners Yes, I can speak to your team! Yes! you can have my ebook!

When it's time to reveal your employer brand to leadership, what's your plan? Were you just going to take a page from that episode of Mad Men and make a big creative reveal? Wow, that would be a mistake. Here is my surprisingly nuts-and-bolts approach to presenting your new employer brand to leadership to increase your odds of buy-in, acceptance, and even use it as a means to clearing out obstacles in front of you. Show Notes: Yes, I can speak to your team! Yes! you can have my ebook! Places I'm speaking: MRA Bettendorf Transform - Boston RecFest - London SRSC - Philly MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville

A great brand position, brand promise or even strategy that sits in a deck without being used is 100% worthless. So while thinking strategically is a great start, you need to activate the brand in order to see your employer brand's value. While we've talked about specific channels and media before, we've never thought through activation as a concept. In this episode, we'll reveal the secret to activating your employer brand across any channel in any company. Enjoy! Show Notes: Yes, I can speak to your team! Yes! you can have my ebook! Places I'm speaking: MRA Bettendorf Transform - Boston RecFest - London SRSC - Philly MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville MidwestTechRecruit - Chicago

While I'm a big believer and proponent of opening the doors to let everyone find frustration and satisfaction at work, as a middle-ages white guy, I always feel out of my depth. Luckily, I know a guy who lives and breathes diversity. We have yet another rambling conversation on what its going to take to change minds and the world. I'm a huge fan of Torin Ellis, but I'm also his friend, so I'm tickled purple to bring him onto the podcast. And for real: if you get the chance to hear him speak, do it. The man's got the mojo. SHOW NOTES Torin Ellis: torinellis.com, @TorinEllis Places I'm speaking: MRA Bettendorf Transform - Boston RecFest - London SRSC - Philly MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville MidwestTechRecruit - Chicago

Haven't we been doing this recruiting thing for a LONG time already? Does it feel like we're not really getting any better at it, that we're all throwing up our hands and giving up that things can be better. And if we look at recruiters and sourcers and HRBPs and hiring managers as independent actors instead of an integrated system, that might be true. But pilots and surgeons face similar problems with far higher stakes and have found ways to achieving much better outcomes. What can they teach us about improving hiring systems? SHOW NOTES Since I mentioned his book, here's all of Atul Gawande's (amazing) writing MRA Bettendorf Transform - Boston RecFest - London SRSC - Philly MRA Minneapolis Recruitcon - Nashville MidwestTechRecruit - Chicago

Today, we try a little experiment and talk to my friend and recruitment marketing genius Tracey Parsons. Topics covered along the way: why doesn't the business work well with recruiting, creating surprise and delight in candidates and just how low the bar is t0 making most candidates thrilled to apply. If you enjoyed this "experiment," let me know! I've got a few more on deck and want to make sure its delivering value to you! Show Notes: Tracey Parsons: @TParsons, Parsons Strategic Consulting Strive Conference (Chicago!) MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

How do you define "strategy?" Go ahead. I'll wait. It's a lot harder than you might expect. Now take the definition and see how it fits as your employer brand strategy. A little awkward? Here's the deal: it's very rare that any of us are taught "strategy" as a concept, and yet our jobs depend on our ability to develop and execute one. In this episode we go hard into what a strategy is and how you should go about developing one. Show Notes: ERE San Diego Strive Conference (Chicago!) MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

It's so much easier to work on and with the things we control. But... that's pretty limiting, isn't it? Especially in our jobs where we control almost nothing at all. If you want to succeed as an employer brand or recruitment marketing pro, the smart move is to ignore the things we control and focus on what we don't. Show notes: ERE San Diego Strive Conference (Chicago!) MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

If your employer brand is the perception someone has about what it must be like to work there. where does that perception come from? More to the point, what can we do to influence and shape that perception? The answer isn't a campaign or a project, tool or seminar. The answer is in building great habits. Show Notes: Katrina Kibben of Three Ears Media ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference (Chicago!) MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

Freshly back from Talent Brand Summit an 100+ employer brand pros, I was struck by how much we talk of tactics, strategies, optimizations, tools and metrics, but very very very little about emotions. But people won't do anything until they feel something. So let's start talking about eliciting and sparking emotions in candidates. Show Notes: Katrina Kibben of Three Ears Media MRA Waukesha ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

How much time do you think you spend on the tools you and your team use to source and recruit? Add in vendor demos and evaluation trials and internal conversations (not to mention budget conversations) and it adds up. But how often have those tools worked out? How often have they delivered the promised results? When it's all over, was spending that time and money worth it? What if there was a way to ensure that your new tools work out? In this podcast, you'll get ten questions to ask before you buy anything to eliminate buying regrets. Show notes: MRA Waukesha ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

Your custom-designed and unique-to-you recruiting process that you developed is 99.995% the same as everyone else's. When you do everything the same, you attract people who know how to pretend to be the same. Not only does that make it near impossible to understand what makes a candidate different, it also tells the world that you're not different. And if no one can tell the difference between recruiting and companies, you make yourself interchangeable, which might explain why you are losing so much talent so fast. Show notes: Webinar: How Recruiters Can Use Employer Branding (March 21) Talent Brand Summit MRA Waukesha ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

I've been interviewing people and a theme is emerging: even when the company has something unique to offer, even if it has a lot of positives to talk about, candidates simply don't believe it until they are hired and see it for themselves. There are a couple of reasons for this, but a core one has to do with understanding content marketing strategy. Webinar: How Recruiters Can Use Employer Branding (March 21) Talent Brand Summit MRA Waukesha ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

In your haste and zeal to find and hire that amazing candidate, how many people are you burning in the process? In a world where talent isn't a never-ending resource, recruiters need to be very aware of how many negative brand impressions they are making, and how many people they are ensuring will never apply for another job while they find that perfect candidate. They need to stop being so short-sighted and see the long game. Show notes Webinar: How Recruiters Can Use Employer Branding (March 21) Talent Brand Summit MRA Waukesha ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

Maybe it's easy to talk about making an amazing employer brand when your consumer brand is famous, is infamous, is touched and known by its millions of customers. So how can you build an effective, differentiated employer brand when there's nothing obviously different about you? In this episode, we talk trucking, regulated and commoditized trucking. Can you make one brand stand above the rest when they are all all-but-makes-no-difference the same? Yes. Yes, you can. Let's talk about how. Show Notes: Webinar: How Recruiters Can Use Employer Branding (March 21) Talent Brand Summit MRA Waukesha ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis

If you think your jobs is to put butts in seats, your job ends the second that your hire shows up for work. But that's old world thinking. We live in a world in which we are perpetually recruiting, not to join a company, but to be engaged at work, to join a project, to not dig ones heels in to slow progress and change. So maybe your abilities are recruiters have impacts far outside the limitations of "putting butts in seats." Because if recruiting never stops, a recruiter may be the new power in any company. Show notes: Chicago Employer Brand Mini-Conference Talent Brand Summit MRA Waukesha ERE San Diego SHRM Talent Strive Conference MRA Bettendorf Transform RecFest SRSC Philly MRA Minneapolis Oh! Don't forget to grab my free ebook

You'd think offering candidates lots of choices would attract and close more offers. But that's not how it works. People think they want choice, but what they really want is certainty. Which means a recruiter should be focused on lowering uncertainty, not adding more choices. Show notes: Go get my free ebook! Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) :: ERE (April) :: SHRM Talent (April) :: Yello User Conference (May) :: Transform (June) :: RecFest (July) :: Employer Brand Manifesto :: I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking :: Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing :: Ask Me Anything!

In the spirit of the patron saint of filling resale shops, we ask what Marie Kondo can tell us about approaching our recruitment marketing and employer brand tactics. Show notes: Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) :: ERE (April) :: SHRM Talent (April) :: Yello User Conference (May) :: Transform (June) :: RecFest (July) :: Employer Brand Manifesto :: I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking :: Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing :: Ask Me Anything!

For all the work you put into your employer brand, the most important part isn't leadership buy-in, creative tagline or campaigns. It has nothing to do with what you say, but everything with what you do. And that's the hardest lesson to learn. Show notes: Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) :: Employer Brand Manifesto :: Comprehensive Employer Brand Architecture :: I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking :: Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing :: Ask Me Anything!

I'm certain that when I say the word "woke" I sound like an ass, but the new Gillette commercial has really forced us all to ask ourselves, "how woke should and can my employer brand be?" And that's what we'll talk about today. Show notes: Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) :: Employer Brand Manifesto :: Comprehensive Employer Brand Architecture :: I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking :: Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing :: Ask Me Anything!

When it comes to employer branding, the last holdouts who refuse who play along with you are the ones who most benefit from it. Aren't we a crazy species? So how do you get recruiter's to embrace these new ways of thinking? How do you get them to change their habits and do things differently? How do you get them to see the benefits of employer brand? We get into the nitty gritty today! Show notes: Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta (Jan) Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

It's easy to get confused when we don' take the time to define our terms, but you can't swap out your employer brand for your culture. Why? Aside from the fact that they are different things, come from different places and are changed in different ways? Well, you'll have to just listen to find out. Show notes: Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta (Jan) Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

Welcome to the new year! Resolutions suck, but that doesn't mean this isn't a great time to make change happen. The trick isn't focus on a big hairy audacious goal, but to build better habits that lead you to doing amazing things! Show notes: Thank you (in no order) to Elena Valentine and Abby Cheeseman, Lindsay Parks, Katrina Kibben, Ben Gledhill, Iain Hamilton, Charu Malhotra, Audra Knight, Andrea Hurtado, Angie Verros, Hing Lee, Tiffany Lee, Will Staney and Bryan Chaney, Torin Ellis, Tracey Parsons, Shane Grey, Chad Sowash and Joel Cheeseman, Alison Krause, Jeff Hyman, the Talent Brand Alliance Board, Brad Farris and Jill Salzman. Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta (Jan) Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

If you're focused on being seen as a great place to work, as being an attractive employer, as having a string employer brand, you are asking yourself the wrong question to win the fight for talent. What's the right question? Tune in and find out. Show notes: Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta (Jan) Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

What does the future hold? In this episode I pretend I know! Also, if you want that $200 discount code to the Talent Brand Summit in Austin in March (and the TTC sticker and the donation), just let me know (twitter, email, whatever works for you)! Show notes: Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta (Jan) Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

On this, our one hundredth episode, I try to explain the entirety of employer branding in sixty seconds. No special effects or auditory/podcast tricks. No visual aids or speed talking. I just get to the never-stated core of employer branding. Oh, and I swear a lot. This is not the podcast to play at your next holiday party while you're tucking into that meal. Well, none of these are probably good for that. Unless you're into that. You do you. I got your back. (no one ever reads these, so... there you go.) Show notes: Webinar: Hiring Is Holistic. Recruiting Isn't Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta (Jan) Talent Brand Summit in Austin (Mar) Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

It's been a rough week for Facebook, and all of the advertising market. This wouldn't be so much of an issue if so many recruitment and talent leaders weren't confusing advertising and marketing. They aren't the same. So here's my chance to scare you away from over-indexing and over-investing on ads and focus more on the bigger picture. Show notes: Webinar: Hiring Is Holistic. Recruiting Isn't Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta Talent Brand Summit in Austin Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

This is an epic opportunity! Between Thanksgiving and New Years, things get much slower. The pace of new requisitions dries up and it's time to think about the holiday party or next year's planning and budgeting. This is when you need to identify and launch that one program you never have time to get to, even though you know it will make your life easier in 2019. So get to it! Show notes: Webinar: Employer Brand Is For Business (Event Yours) Webinar: Hiring Is Holistic. Recruiting Isn't Future Work in Chicago, Nov 29 Social Recruiting Summit in Atlanta Talent Brand Summit in Austin Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything!

I know that the consumer marketing team gets all the money and attention. But should they? Can a case be made to say that your employer brand is more important than consumer marketing? Or at least that the employer brand is the beating heart of all other marketing efforts? I think so. So take a listen and see if you agree that your employer brand really is your company's brand. Show notes: Employer Brand Manifesto I can help your solve your messiest recruiting problems with employer brand thinking Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything! Talent Brand Alliance

Getting better is great. Sometimes, as we explore and experiment with recruiting and employer branding ideas, focusing on getting a little better might be all we can shoot for. But an over-reliance on optimization, the 2%, 3%, 5% increases year of year of our channels and tactics, leads to stagnation. The best way to ensure you eventually become irrelevant is to focus exclusively on optimization. Want to really get better? Ignore optimization and seek revolution every single day. Show notes: Fairygodboss EmployerBrand.Consulting Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Read the Employer Brand Manifesto on LinkedIn Ask Me Anything! Talent Brand Alliance

How many people think you are competing with Google/Facebook for dev talent? You're nuts, but you're not alone. So many companies consider Google/Facebook/Amazon/et al as competition for talent, but miss their real competition. In this episode, we think through the question of who your real competition is so you can evaluate your own employer brand better. Show notes: EmployerBrand.Consulting Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Read the Employer Brand Manifesto on LinkedIn Ask Me Anything! Talent Brand Alliance

If Maya Angelou was right, and people don't remember what you say as much as how you made them feel, why aren't we striving to make truly emotional employer brand messages? Why aren't we trying to make candidates feel something? Show notes: Read the Employer Brand Manifesto on LinkedIn Proactive Talent Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything! Talent Brand Alliance My latest article at Proactive Talent: Employer Brand Is About the Business (Not Just Recruiting)

There's a reason employer brand people feel like a person without a country, not quite fitting into recruiting or marketing, but needing to influence both. In this episode, I try to plant a flag, defining the EB pro's value (to ourselves and our employers), and start to see how employer brand might just be the way we re-invent this whole recruiting thing from the ground up. Show Notes: The Employer Brand Manifesto The Cluetrain Manifesto Proactive Talent Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything! Talent Brand Alliance My latest article at Proactive Talent: Employer Brand Is About the Business (Not Just Recruiting)

Managing an employer brand usually means feeling more like a plumber than an architect. But here's the twist: plumbers are more important and have a bigger impact than architects. Show notes: Proactive Talent Book me for speaking engagements on employer brand and recruitment marketing Ask Me Anything! Talent Brand Alliance My latest article at Proactive Talent: Employer Brand Is About the Business (Not Just Recruiting)

99% of all employer brand conversations are about recruiters, candidates and hiring managers. Um... how did we forget employees!? Not only are they the backbone and living embodiment of the brand, they are directly impacted by it. James Ellis: http://jamesellis.us Ask me Anything! https://proactivetalent.com/advisory/ Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-c5

Every day, you are collecting resumes from hundreds or thousands of people thinking this is their dream job, even though most won't get so much as a phone call. If I ran a business where I annoyed and disappointed so many potential customers, I'd find that concerning.

How often should you email or reach out to your talent pool? I don't know, how often do you call your best friend? Its such a crazy question, but we hear it more and more. In this episode, I try and flip over the apple-cart of content cadences and communication planning.

The root of most recruiting problems is that we forget that candidates are riddled with uncertainty. Want more people to apply? Want more people to accept your offers? Remove uncertainty throughout the entire process!

How do you measure something that only exists in other people's minds? And how do you set your metrics up so that your boss actually understands what you do and what your value is? Show Notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-bJ

The hardest and most satisfying games to play are those without a clear way of keeping score, without start and stop times. You play to get better, not to win. This sure sounds like an employer brand to me.

In this really long episode, I clear out my notes and cover more than a dozen employer brand topics before we head out for summer break. Everything from social recruiting, deep branding, the invisible employer brand, and recruitment marketing's race to the bottom, this episode is chock full of big ideas. - Is employee advocacy a social strategy or EB strategy? - The slow EB: a big launch invites criticism and rejection. A slow play allows people to feel like the EB has always been there - Assessment solutions are about hiring in bulk, in finding a hire based on specs rather than finding weirdos and artists. The assessment is a decision to optimize around what is today rather than building something that is more future-proof - Follow the leader: "what every career site needs" thinking will ensure no one knows the difference between you and other companies (a sure sign that you don't have confidence in your company/brand). Its driven by what's "supposed to work" without understanding your particular context. Its a way to play safe and not really think about your needs and situation. - Race to the bottom - What would happen if you asked every employee if they would choose to work here if they knew then what they know now? - Branding yields a premium, allowing you to "punch above your weight" in the hiring world. It allows you to contend for talent you might wouldn't have been able to before - A great EB directs the prospect to consider something more. To think about opportunities outside the obvious. It can direct the prospect to re-evaluate how they are evaluating companies. - The invisible employer brand. Does your eB need to be stated? Obvious? - How long does your EB live? - The smaller the company, the more important your EB is - Your job is to make people care first. The sales comes second - What happens when everyone is an exception? Too much of hr is about applying a solution to everyone as if everyone is the same. This isn’t about cultural fit. This is about embracing the mess instead of trying to kill your junk drawer - Who is your competition on Instagram/Twitter? Who are you taking followers from? Its a game of attention: getting it and holding it - Employer branding is "deep branding" - Talent is a moving target: How quickly do things change? The job description you got approved last month is already out of date by the time you hire. So imagine what things look like a year from now? Or three? So stop hiring for skill sets. Stop running the job description checklists. - Employee experience is a lie, except when it isn't. Why do people work? to get a paycheck? Ugh. If that's true, employee experience is crucial. It becomes the differentiator. If the purpose is to succeed, to grow, to make an impact (see: every study on millennial motivations), employee experience is worthless. What matters is your purpose, your why. Defining and communicating that becomes the experience. People are willing to give up perks and comfort for the possibility of success if they see a clear path to it. - Employees want to love their jobs. Why doesn't that happen? Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-ba

Everything about our industry is geared towards the middle: don't do anything too different or clever with your job descriptions because you'll alienate someone, maximize audience and reach (even if you'll never hire that person), focus on the widest possible net, etc. Which is why you you can't compete. Turns out that a strong employer brand is a function of being different. And your goal in managing that brand is about cultivating that difference in the face of a million factors driving you to the middle. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-b2

Your employer brand isn't just about attracting people at the top of the funnel, or getting them to accept your InMail request. It permeates every level of the talent funnel. So if you don't know how to engage with your employer brand properly, it doesn't matter how hot your brand is, you will be wondering why so many people are rejecting your offers. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-aQ

We are awash in recruiting metrics being spewed out from out ATS, our media tools, our social tools, our magic metrics tools, etc. But that are almost all worthless. There is only one single metric that you need to care about because its the only metric the business cares about. If you understand it, there's nothing you can't do. But without it, you'll be forever on the outside looking in. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-aL

Everything in your recruiting ecosystem (tech stack, processes, people... EVERYTHING) is predicated on getting the application: the thing EVERY CANDIDATE HATES. Sorry... I got wound up. Anyway, its time to kill the very idea of the application since you don't really even need it. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-aG

Just because everyone knows job postings suck doesn't mean that's an excuse to keep sucking. A good or great job posting can radically change the type of people applying for jobs. But what should you change? Don't worry: we break it down for you. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-aA

Why are we still taking an adversarial approach to recruiting in a world where the talent has all the power? Why are we boxing when we should be dancing? Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-at

The most important difference between a 20th century recruiting organization and becoming a 21st century recruiting org? Your level of commitment to building and cultivating your network. Show Notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-al

Working on your employer brand? Where? How? Unless you have a map of all the ways someone learns about your employer brand, you're just messing around. So here's the map. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-ah

If everyone *knows* that storytelling is an effective means to get your recruiting message to stick, why do so many companies get it wrong? Because they think storytelling happens in a video or an article or a profile. Wrong! Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-a9

After some great conversations at ERE last week, I realized I was working under some assumptions that are rarely discussed. So here are the things employer brand people think about when they don't realize they are thinking about employer brand. Show Notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-a3

After two days in San Diego for the ERE Recruiting Conference #ERERC, I was left with a single clear trend: Your ATS will become less and less visible to the candidate as we build completely new entrances into the application process. What does that mean? You'll have to listen to find out! Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-9W

Everyone would love to sell you a better way to manage your employer brand, but we don't usually talk about what "managing an employer brand" really means. In this episode, we try to get specific on a very vague and fluid idea. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-9R

One of the most common questions about creating and implementing an employer brand completely misses the point. When someone asks how to make their employer brand fun/diverse/inclusive/collaborative/employee-focused, there's an unstated part of the question. How do you make an employer brand diverse (or whatever) when the company it is representing is NOT. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-9K

We're always talking about who or what is the sexy employer brand of the moment, or how to make your employer brand sexy. But chances are, your brand is deeply unsexy. That's okay. There are ways for your employer brand to succeed without trying to be something you're not.

Recruiters can be so focused on getting any kind of positive feedback (the "yes") that they don't realize that they are being lied to. The goal of recruiting isn't to get people to say yes, but to get them to want to say yes. Stop selling!

Look, this isn't about diversity. This isn't about "doing good." This is about straight up business and destroying the competition. How? By building a women-first recruiting and hiring model.

A helpful way of seeing recruiting issues and evaluating solutions for years, the recruiting funnel is completely broken. It forces your thinking into a transactional mode, which is not going to lead you to talent greatness. In this episode, published in conjunction with ERE Media, you'll discover how your recruiting funnel has been lying to you and how seeing your Talent Funnel is a far better option. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-98

Stop and think of everything you ask from a candidate in return for a chance at a job. Now think of how desperate you are for talent and ask yourself: if you were a true professional, would you EVER give up so much without getting anything in return? Of course you wouldn't!!! Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-94

My mantra for 2018 is simple, but that didn't stop one of my friends from arguing with me about it. Anyway, if you're serious about better recruiting, start with this mindset.

All those lovely reports you get after your ad spend happens sure make it seem like "stuff happened." But unless you understand attribution and connect it your the intent of your ad spend, they mean nothing. Don't let that happen to you! Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-8V

Expecting kids straight out of college to know what jobs they can do or should do is insane. But that's what's happening, leading to a glut of unqualified applicants spamming our ATS's and trouble identifying great candidates. But that's something we can fix.

If job descriptions are the heart of the entire recruiting and hiring process, why are they so bad? In this episode, we start with the "why" and figure out how to use some cool tech to make job descriptions suck less. Then we reach for the stars and find ways to make them actually work Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-8F

I know how much fun it is t pick new toys and tools to help you fix your talent issues. But too many companies start with the tech rather than a strategy and burn through piles of cash. Don't do that. Show Notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-7a

If your going to invest in your employer brand, the first thing your boss is going to ask is how you'll measure it. In this episode, we look at ways to measure and evaluate your employer brand without having to invest in anything extra. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-70

Do you love your ATS? Do your candidates? Of course not. But until now, they have been a necessary evil. No longer! The world is shifting to one in which a candidate should never even see the ATS, so how will you compete for talent then. It isn't science fiction or the latest HBO series: a world without ATSs is here. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-6R

The best way to hire talent isn't to make videos or ebooks or super-funny job postings. It isn't about social media or LinkedIn or Glassdoor. The most important element is being clear and destroying uncertainty. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-6L

You might be inclined to set some big goals and launch some big projects to impact your employer brand, but a smarter strategy might be to think small. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-6B

As we wind down the year, let us celebrate that most amazing of holidays: Festivus! In this episode, we skip the feats of strength and gather around the aluminum pole to air our grievances. I'm guessing you will hear things you are annoyed by, too. And I also list a whole load of things I love, just to balance things out. Complete show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-6q

What's the one thing you want professionally more than anything else? Is it to get a seat at the decision-making table? It's not impossible... Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-6g

It's true: content is probably the most effective way to activate your employer brand. But do you know how to build a proper content strategy? I'm not talking about deciding how many tweets you need a day, but a true strategy. Don't spend huge chunks of cash to have an agency tell you what your content strategy should be, because in this episode we get serious about helping you build your own. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-6b

You want to hire the best, I know that. But the concept of "quality" is both impossible to measure and impossible to define. So that leaves us with a simple question: what exactly is talent quality? Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-64

If someone asked you to invest in your employer brand, it always seems to come with a steep price tag. But it doesn't have to be that way. Most companies can get a huge lift with very little budget. Don't believe me? Listen in! Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-5X

Setting up your 2018 budgets? Chances are, you're trying to figure out how to the stuff as last year with a budget plus or minus three percent of 2017. That's a trap.

According to Glassdoor, your rating says you are a good or bad company to work for, but they've got it wrong. And understanding the cause of that misunderstanding is what can allow you to win the talent game, even if you aren't a "top" employer. Full show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-5J

AI, bots and software can't take all our jobs, just the entry-level ones. It's like saying "we don't need seeds because we've got all this food!" Where will new talent come from when we can't hire entry-level people and make them great? The answer might surprise you. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-5E

A successful employer brand needs to have a strong point of view, but can you take it too far? We find an example where that's true, explain where it created problems and suggest some fixes. Show notes: http://wp.me/p806sS-5y

Are you measuring what matters or just what's easy to measure? Too many people are measuring things that have zero impact on their hiring (Likes! Bounce Rate! Traffic!). In this episode we break down the things that get reported on that have nothing to do with effective hiring and suggest metrics that really do. Show notes found at http://thetalentcast.com

You don't have to create or invest (or invest in) your employer brand, because it already exists. This may be good, or (more likely) it may be bad. And join the Employer Brand webinar series this fall: http://bit.ly/employerbrandwebinar

You want a candidate you say "hell, yeah!" about. And you want that candidate to say "hell, yeah!" about you. That's the goal of recruiting. So why are we talking to so many people indifferent to the job and the employer brand?

Recruiting has become a game of optimization, swapping one tool or tactic for another to see a 5% increase in something. But we're about as optimized as we're going to get. And if we want to truly have a seat at the business strategy table, we need to forgo optimization and embrace a big (scary) leap forward.

You want to hire talent, but did you remember to ask talent what they wanted? And did you figure out if their motivations aligned with yours?

Let's get tactical and specific about Glassdoor: how to use it to measure your employer brand, how to effectively respond to reviews (even the evil ones) and how to increase your overall rating without breaking the rules.

Are you getting the feeling that the value of your ads is diminishing day by day? You're not imagining it. In this episode, we examine why the recruiting ad space is in decline, and how you can still find value in ads.

Recruiters have a brutal job, filled with unending rejection and disappointment. And those are the good days. So we wonder, is it possible for a recruiter to find happiness?

The news this week has been ugly (Charlottesville, Uber, GitHub, Google), and they stem from a core problem: we talk about being committed to diversity and inclusion, but we don't talk about why. That lack of "why" leads to manifestos and firings insider Google (as well as many other problems). It's like telling your kids not to do drugs or have sex: it's far easier to set rules than to discuss the reasons why. So in this episode, we get serious about having That Conversation.

Here comes the goon squad and we're coming to town! Is recruiting and recruiting tech really just fashion? It certainly feels like it. In this podcast, aside from quoting David Bowie and Adam Ant, we talk about the fashion trends in recruiting and talent acquisition.

Did you think we had past the SEO era for jobs? Well, we had until a few weeks ago when Google unveiled its new job search tool. In this episode, we talk about Google, its history and that likely course of Google for Jobs (and what that means for you).

Do you think you're in charge of your recruiting strategy? No, you're not. Not by a long shot.

Regardless of what you hear, the future of talent isn't AI or bots or more more more tech. But those things are real and when they come and we are able to offload so much of the rote chores of our day-to-day, what's left for us to do? A lot, it turns out.

Everyone in talent acquisition says they are focused on "helping people find jobs" but that's not what's really happening. Not by a long shot.

When you play "follow the leader" you never catch up. Why best practices are the least effective means of growing or strengthening your employer brand.

Everyone is customer-focused. Everyone wants to hire a self-starter. Everyone thinks they have a "do what it takes" mentality. But in reality, these ideas do not define us or the issue. What defines us is the edge, what we're not willing to do. That means your corporate mission, employer brand and recruitment marketing is as much defined by who you aren't as who you are.

Why does one job board succeed where another fails? It's not a random question, because it might indicate why Google is launching it's own. Is it a shot at Indeed, or someone else?

Should you have a lot of content, or get out of candidates' way? We answer a listener's question and eventually I make the case that job descriptions sound like advertisements for indentured servitude. Really.

You have thirty seconds to establish and plant the seed of your employer brand in someone's mind. After that you can reinforce the brand pattern. It's easy, right? Then why does everyone get this wrong?

Too many tools, too many companies and too many brands are spinning their wheels, worrying about the wrong things and solving the wrong problems. Are you one of them?

Okay, so if you buy that employer brand is important and that it differentiates you from others, how do you communicate that employer brand? Content strategy. But "telling stories" about your brand isn't enough. In this episode, we dive deep into how your employer brand is perceived and the "Third date rule" of recruiting strategy.

The "war for talent" starts with the "war for attention." But the way you get attention is fundamentally from the way successful HR thinks. In this episode, we examine the friction between HR and Recruitment Marketing, friction that is killing your talent acquisition efforts.

For a long time, Instagram was resigned to the "nice to have" category for recruiting. A lack of clear CTA or linking to any other channel made it a place to show pretty pictures and little else. But changes in the last four months position Instagram to be the next big recruiting social channel. In this episode, we'll break down the world's largest visual social channel, its competition, and how to use it effectively.

Everyone needs geeks, but few people know how to really recruit them. The game isn't about salary and perks, but in about giving them something they really value. And investing in this kind of recruiting will let you compete against the mega-geek companies without spending a fortune. Learn more!

So, you've decided to let your employees activate your employer brand (good choice, I know it wasn't easy). But how? In this episode, we get down and dirty with the details of how to build an ongoing content-creation machine and all the ways to make use of it.

How do you get your staff and employees to embrace a central employer brand and actually share it with their own networks? It's not easy.

When we talk about an employer brand, we talk about something that is true for each person and team within the company. Is that possible? Teams and individuals are motivated by different things, so can you really have a single employer brand for all of them? We find out.

You spend a lot of time and energy getting people to your career site. Is that really the right strategy? In this episode, we unpack how people really look for work and how to change your strategy to meet the evolution in job hunting.

Has your social recruiting initiatives paid off... at all? It seems like an idea that should work, but just hasn't connected for some reason. In this episode, we break down the issues that lead to lackluster results and find a surprising solution.

Can you learn some lessons from Uber's no good, horrible, very bad month? If you care about your employer brand, and about how the million little decisions made at every level impact it, there's a lot to learn.

No one loves their ATS. No one thinks their career site feels modern. No one is raving about the tech behind their talent ecosystems and there's two major reasons why.

I know everyone's talking about the potential power of an employer brand, but does it seem like everyone's talking... around each other? Here it is, a 101 and 102 Employer Brand class to get you up to speed in a hurry.

The process of hiring talent takes two partners: recruiters to bring talent in and hiring managers to make decisions. But who's in charge of the process and outcomes in your business? The answer might surprise you.

Hiring managers hate job descriptions. Recruiters hate job descriptions. Candidates hate job descriptions. And they're right. These horrible legal documents can be turned into compelling and effective marketing tools, but not through some silly trick. If you're ready to get serious about talent, you need to get serious about job descriptions.

In this episode, we bust two myths in #socialrecruiting: hashtags and posting times. If you haven't evaluated your tactics in these ares in the last year, you are missing out.

It's been a VERY long time since just "being on social" was enough. With everyone on social, the "easy tricks" are all used up. So what's left? Here's your no-B.S. guide to doing social recruiting right.

Everyone is saying that they are using or about to use Snapchat for recruiting. At least, that's what they tell you. In fact, the fastest growing social channel is a unique channel for marketing and a tough nut to crack. In this episode, we'll get into the ins and out of how to use Snapchat.

When's the last time you thought about your talent community (or talent pool, or people you email with jobs)? For a small fraction of the time you might spend on Snapchat and FB Live, you can grow an audience you own.

What would you have to do if you had to build a recruitment marketing ecosystem from scratch? Or launch a channel from the ground up? Whether it's a new job or a re-launch of a failed program, at some point, you will have to learn how to start from zero.

It's a new year, so that means resolutions. But instead of thinking about the five tactics you should add in 2017, maybe your resolution should be to keep things simple.

What content to prospects need to make a decision when applying or considering an offer? We reveal the secrets to recruiting content.

In a TTC first, we answer a listener's question: Why can't we be funny in recruiting or job searching?

Facebook launches a Jobs tool to its 1.6 billion active users, but is it a LinkedIn killer or yet another company who thinks they know recruiting? We talk it out!

We talk to Sarah Yang, Talent Content Marketing Manager at Workday about how you can introduce more storytelling to your recruitment marketing.

What will the talent world look like when everyone knows everyone else's salary? In this episode of The Talent Cast, we talk to Kirsten Davidson, Head of Employer Brand at Glassdoor. (Apologies for my audio and weird gaps: I was getting some weird audio issues, but Kirsten sounds great)

In this episode of The Talent Cast, we try to sell a $100 bill for $20 to demonstrate that no matter how powerful your message is, the context dictates its success. TTC is dedicated to the new world of attracting and engaging talent. If you have a question we can answer on the show, or have a suggestion of who to interview, reach out on Twitter @TheWarForTalent.

Now 12 years old, Facebook remains a complicated channel for recruitment marketing, primarily because everyone sees a single piece and thinks they understand the whole thing. In this episode, we look at how people actually use Facebook (the Fence-sitters, the Sourpusses and so many others) and how you can leverage this social media channel.

If I had a dollar for every person who asked me, "How do we attract millennials?" I'd be podcasting from a very exclusive beach. In this episode, how to think about and reach the Google Generation