Company culture can help your firm recruit and retain top employees. Just as any group has shared values, beliefs, rules and practices, so does a company. Company culture or the “company vibe” spans the voice, values and practices of members of a company. It’s about the employer brand and “how things get done around here”.
When it comes to recruiting employees, you can use your corporate culture to attract people who’ll “fit”. If you take time to market your culture, you’ll appeal to like-minded people and, in many cases, turn away those who would be better suited elsewhere. Moreover, although job roles change frequently, company culture tends to be less dynamic. So, if you hire people for fit with your organizational culture, you’re more likely to retain them when job duties change.
To market your culture to potential employees:
• Identify and explain your corporate culture. You may need to do an employee survey, hold a focus group or review your mission statement, vision and marketing materials to get a good overview.
• Develop a set of attributes common to your employees – then define them.
• Design your recruitment advertising and careers website with your company culture in mind.
• Look for ways to use employee branding to bring your company’s voice alive. Blogs, testimonials, recruiting parties and even information interviews can help potential hires connect with people in your organization.
• In interviews, ask people to define some of your company’s attributes. Check to see whether their answers reflect your corporate culture.
• Use behavioural interviews to understand the ideas and actions of job candidates, as opposed to simply their skills.
Remember, you want to be honest and forthright about your company culture. Be sure to market the way things are, as opposed to the way you wish they were. Otherwise, you may find new hires leave shortly after you’ve finished training them.
Related to company culture as a recruiting technique:
• Employer branding the Web 2.0 way
• Behavioural interviews
• Interviewing potential employees
