Tuesday, July 20, 2010

It happens so frequently

If your employees are not living the organisation’s brand values internally then it’s going to be next to impossible to build the brand externally.

It’s surprising how much money and effort organisations put into building and promoting external brands when things just aren’t right on the inside. When culture is fragmented across different areas of the business. When employees just don’t have a clear view of the road ahead or who’s driving the organisation. When employee disengagement starts to spread because the organisation forgot how to challenge or reward them. When recruitment campaigns fail to get a result. When sales volumes start to dip because enthusiasm and belief for the organisation’s products and services just aren’t there any more. When change moves employees out of their traditional comfort zones and brings on stress and discomfort. When efforts to communicate with employees fall on deaf ears.

Organisations are switched on these days to identifying the warning signs but tend to experience significant difficulty when it comes to finding solutions.

Most branding consultants are inexperienced when it comes to thinking strategically and creatively to identify employee-related issues and finding ways to prescribe solutions – ones which, in many cases, significantly affect the future wellbeing of the organisation. Consulting firms tend to focus on business processes and the bottom line. Employer branding consultants like Heywood Innovation however, focus on employee-related issues and opportunities and how the organisation is perceived as a competent and attractive employer from both the inside and the outside.

Which one did you go for?

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and London with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, Singapore and Mumbai.