As Spinal Tap memorably put it, “These (amplifiers) go up to 11” – and, fittingly, volume of branding activity has been to the fore over the course of the last week. In a major article, G4S’ much maligned CEO, Nick Buckles, outlined his organisation’s response to the Olympics’ security fiasco. And if the magnificent successes of both the Games and the Paralympics have rightly over-shadowed G4S’ pre Olympics’ woes, then the company itself has not come out of it well – reporting a 60% fall in half year profits as a direct result of losing £50m through its inability to recruit sufficient numbers of security personnel. Interestingly, Buckles saw G4S’ lack of brand as a major factor in the public’s response to his shortcomings. As something of a blank canvas, G4S has little in the way of goodwill and brand equity to fall back upon at a time of reputational challenge. Indeed, their Games’ failure has shaped their brand rather than having an existing brand which was able to influence reaction to their issues and challenges.
And we can see echoes of this in David Cameron’s flurry of activity this week. Criticised recently for a somewhat tame and lacklustre presence over the summer, particularly in comparison to brand Boris, Cameron has turned up the volume this week. His Mail on Sunday article two days ago unveiled an apparent end to economic paralysis, heralding boosts to jobs, infrastructure and schools and an axe to red tape. Significantly, his Government re-shuffle is a telling indication about who’s the boss. Cameron’s needle is clearly hovering around the 11 mark.
However, turning up the branding dial doesn’t suit all purposes. Barclays, over the last week, has made it very clear that a quieter approach to reputation and brand is the bank’s chosen way forward. Antony Jenkins is Barclays’ new CEO and harks tellingly from the organisation’s retail banking arm – a significant distancing from the Barclay’s (hugely successful) investment banking division. In complete contrast to the hubristic Bob Diamond, Jenkins is quietly spoken and thoughtful. As former colleague Justin Urquhart Stewart puts it, “the thing Jenkins personifies is a disciplined business culture – he defines honesty and trustworthiness.” So, Barclays’ response to the massive reputational damage suffered as a result of the Libor scandal, is to reduce the volume around its branding activity. It will be fascinating to see how the bank’s employer brand platform responds to a new leadership and a culture likely to be some way removed from that of Diamond’s tenure.
So for TMP, this provides an interesting challenge. In defining and articulating employer branding in partnership with our clientbase, we have to create messaging platforms which are authentic and aspirational, ownable and bespoke, flexible yet differentiated. However, it is clear that the volume of the message is as important as the message itself. Each brand, employer or otherwise, has its own set of objectives and challenges. For some organisations, their main employer branding concern will relate to a lack of awareness and, then, greater amplification of message is likely to be called for. For other employers, simply turning up the dial in a blind rush to ‘raise awareness’ may be exactly the wrong approach, particularly if candidate audiences have seen more than enough of the organisation and want more in terms of granularity and clarity than simple ear-bleeding volume.
The effective absence of a brand, as G4S found out to its cost when unpleasant things started hitting the fan, can be disastrous. At the same time, there are occasions when an organisation’s brand and messaging can be too much to the fore, when it becomes a detractor rather than an enabler. It will be fascinating to see how both G4S and Barclays respond to two hugely contrasting challenges and how their brands, both employer and corporate, evolve to tackle their own very specific issues.
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