Invested in Netflix fairly recently, not without some entirely unsubtle cajoling from my two sons. Very happy we are too with it. Suits is a particular favourite – I have to admit to something of a man crush on Harvey Spector, senior legal partner, marvellous hair and wearer of ludicrously elegant suits. Not sure he is a TK Maxx man. As well as the charms of Mr Spector, it’s impossible to rid your head of the rather engaging theme music – Greenback Boogie by Ima Robot, since you ask. I’ve been getting in touch with my inner geek right now with music sites which allow you to track down songs from films and TV programmes. Helpfully, I am also enlightened as to the definition of the term, ‘Greenback boogie’ – the work we put in to gain the remuneration or greenbacks we require to live our lives. Or from an employer branding perspective, the commitment you make for the financial investment your employer makes in you.
Investment is the name of the game today. We saw a fair amount of it – some well directed, some less so – during the recent Ryder Cup. Golf, it has to be said, I can take or leave, but it is not without its fascinations, watching generally lone practitioners rallying around together for the common good. Except the US were uncommonly bad. The response to the drubbing was insightful. In a press interview sat next to the rest of the US team, stellar golfer Phil Mickelson put the blame squarely at the feet of the captain, the well meaning, sincere but ever-so slightly out of touch, Tom Watson. Mickelson didn’t hold back, ‘Azinger (a previous captain) got everybody invested in the process. He got everyone invested in who they were going to play with, who was in their group. We were invested in the process’. Some contrast then with Watson.
The European side saw the role of their particular captain through a more positive lens. Paul McGinley went out of his way to engage with his players – he spoke with every player, every day, regardless of whether they were on show that day. He crossed continents to get to know certain players better. He visited the course on which the competition was played regularly to make sure it was set up as he wanted. According to one player, ‘He’s dealt with the players in such an amazing way and made everyone feel special’. McGinley certainly invested himself in the team and it seems clear his team were invested in the process.
And the last couple of weeks have seen a number of examples of organisations making tangible investments in their people. And with UK unemployment now down to a six year low at 6% and the number of unfilled vacancies in the economy, 674,000, just off the highest ever recorded, the need to make the engagement case has not been more clear and more pressing for half a decade. In late September, Sir Richard Branson suggested that his personal staff – all 170 of them – could take unlimited holiday from their employer, ‘It is left to the employee alone to decide if and when he or she feels like taking a few hours, a day, a week or a month off’. Apparently, Branson was influenced in this initiative by his daughter who had seen the concept practiced, fittingly, by Netflix. Starbucks raised the stakes further with the announcement that the coffee retailer would provide financial assistance to employees for online courses at Arizona State University. With US firms in this sector investing $10bn annually in training and employee turnover between 80% and 100%, Howard Schulz, Starbucks’ CEO, is investing shrewdly in his people.
However, the investment both Virgin and Starbucks are committing to their people was topped by both Apple and Facebook this week. Both organisations went public in offering to freeze eggs for female employees. As Apple put it, ‘We continue to expand our benefits for women with cryopreservation and egg storage as part of our extensive support for infertility treatments’. Clearly not for everyone (obviously) and a remarkable response from an industry receiving criticism for its lack of female executives.
If we have described talent previously as dozing in Comfortable Disengagement, with many would-be recruiting organisations apparently not working hard enough to lure them away from their current employer, then firms such as Virgin, Facebook, Apple and Starbucks are demonstrating the lengths they are prepared to go to invest in their people in ways entirely consistent with their employer brand.
For such investments to be seen as authentic and credible, the need to maintain integrity with the employer brand is paramount. This is about a commitment to invest – the engagement commitment which sits behind your Employee Value Proposition. And though the likes of Apple, Facebook and Starbucks have succeeded in standing out with their people investment initiatives, they are by no means alone. According to Brett Minchington’s EBI, 65% of employers globally plan to increase or maintain investment in employer branding initiatives over the next 12 months.
If your people are performing the ‘Greenback boogie’, do they continue to feel that the investment they are making in your organisation is reflected in the investment you are making in them? Better hurry too, according to a survey today commissioned by Budget, UK workers start winding down for their weekend at precisely 10.19am on a Friday morning.
Getting to the heart of your employee mindset 