Employer brand revisited

Money's no object

The notion of a war for talent has been around for at least a quarter of a century. As business jargon goes it has stood the test of time. The militaristic language adds drama. Blood may be spilt. One imagines Google and Microsoft in a tug of war competition with the talented AI specialist performing the role of a low tensile rope.

Scarcity fuelled the war for talent. There are not enough skilled management consultants, Java programmers or derivatives traders, so we have no choice but to pander to their remuneration demands. In essence the war for talent was a problem that could be fixed with cash.

Yesterday's problem?

But the world has changed and continues to change. Some leaders are pinning their hopes on AI eventually obviating the need for people. Like generalised AI, this is a fantasy and will be for some time. So people have a value-creating role to play in most organisations, particularly in respect of innovation. As a reader of this newsletter, you will know that innovation is the mechanism by which organisations adapt to an increasingly unknowable world. And as you may have observed most organisations are not organised to distil the creativity of their people in pursuit of innovation. That is an existential table stakes problem.

Similarly the war for talent has changed. Throwing money at the problem will not cut it. Talented people are less willing to do meaningless work even if they are rewarded very generously for what is in effect trading their lifeforce units for money.

Not so easily fooled

Key drivers of this change include:

• Demographic shifts – An aging workforce is more likely to value meaningful work than well paid meaningless work that connotes status and spending power.

• Hybrid work expectations – Some people have decided they like their family more than their employer and are not interested in organisations that would prefer the opposite.

• Global fluidity – Your organisation is no longer the only game in town. Remote work has opened the stage to a global beauty pageant of opportunities for top talent.

• Experiences trump careers – Some people have woken up to the fact that they only have one life, so they want to experience life in a manner that might be considered extreme work-life integration. The key to the c-suite bathroom has lost its allure.

So perhaps for the first time ever, organisations will need to think of talented people as individuals rather than resources / cogs for the machine. HR departments will need to develop a passion for people rather than people processes.

Why your organisation?

So how do you move forward? The first step is to determine how strongly your employer brand contributes to attracting and retaining talent. Here is a simple tool to find out. Ask each employee which level reflects their primary reason for working. 

1. Survival: I have bills to pay.

2. Stability: I like having a predictable income.

3. Comfort: The remuneration enables me to have a comfortable lifestyle.

4. Competence – I like doing a job that conveys social status.

5. Engagement – I enjoy what I do.

6. Mastery – I like getting better at what I do.

7. Craft – I think of work as a form of self-expression.

8. Contribution – I like the idea that my employer is a force for good.

9. Legacy – I like the idea that my outputs will still be of value long after I am gone.

10. Transformation – I like working for a company that has a vision to change the world.

On this scale it should be fairly obvious where Amazon fulfilment driver and SpaceX janitor sit.

There are in essence three levels:

• Hygiene: 1 to 3

• Professionalism: 4 to 7

• Spiritual: 8 to 10.

The scores are in

Hygienic: If your organisation scores in this zone, its chance of survival depends on whether you can automate everything and eliminate people. Organisations do not exist simply to make people comfortable. Today’s organisations need people who can turn cognitive horsepower into value. That requires much more than adhering to the ops manual.

Professional: There is something noble about becoming a craftsman. But organisations, particularly in times of disruption, are not monasteries. They must adapt to the macroenvironmental forces bearing down on them. People who are unwilling to adapt because they have a vision of themselves as an authority on for example agentic AI, or worse still data warehousing, will increasingly become a HR headache.

Spiritual: Such organisations attract people who see beyond their own interests. They will do what it takes to progress the mission. They will even role with a change of mission if the organisation maintains its ‘Don’t be evil’ stance. This is a problem if your organisation is predicated on:

• Giving young children type 2 diabetes.

• Dismantling families by empowering the breadwinner to always be within easy reach of a virtual Las Vegas.

This need to support the greater good is a consequence of us being social animals. Smart employers will exploit this superpower / vulnerability. And the employees will love them for it.

This article also appeared in the Intelligent Organisation newsletter on LinkedIn.