Speaking of diversity, here's an article breaking down what women in STEM really want in their next job (and if you clearly offer these things to them, they are more inclined to apply and accept your offers.

Yet another case study of an organization deciding to get serious about their diversity issues and actually moving the needle. How?! Start with data, but then also (and here's the magic part) have the will to make changes based on the data. Crazy, right?

It's a little "let's all hold hands!" for my taste, but this article talks about how you build a sense of team spirit when your team is remote and you only get together once or twice a year. But the points raised remind us that the macro trend of remote work is increasing (and unlikely to change), so you need to re-think what your culture and brand might be when your people don't sit next to each other all day.

I think it's a mistake to say "employer branding is dead" because you're moving to a "one brand" strategy, but it's hard to resist lines like, "Delivering your brand is as much about what you don’t do and say as it is about what you do say and do."

Maybe I'm biased, but I love case studies and articles that show perfectionism actually limits the power of your brand. So embrace your flaws to maximize your brand's influence.

How can you start to spark a stronger brand culture (that you will eventually learn to tap into and take advantage of)? Here are some tips from the brand side.

Though it is written for a CEO, there's a lot of valuable advice in this article about internal comms. There's two ways to read it: get lots of advice on how to run your own employer brand internal comms. But also, you can read it to better understand how your leadership team has to see the world, which helps you can align to their needs and keep influencing them.

This week's long read comes to us courtesy of Tracey Parsons: How to personalize your content journey to increase conversions. One of the big takeaways is that there are a LOT more ways to establish context and triggers than "applied" or "set up interview." And if you can define more context, you can define more personal messaging.

The dirty little secret to successful employer branding is the ability to "sell" the concept and idea up the chain. Without any buy-in, you will be isolated on an island for a long time ("a three hour tour..."). But if you can get leadership excited for the work, your path forward will always be clearer. So here's Phil Strazzulla whiteboarding how to build a strong business case for your TA and EB initiative.

To me, figuring out what employer brand video to make is the litmus test of how strong your brand is. If you don't know what to do, if you're grasping for the latest trend in whatever, you're brand doesn't have a clear sense of itself and thus isn't very strong. But here's an ebook to help you solve this kind of problem: An EVP-driven video strategy.

Why should you think more like an anthropologist? Well, no brand can survive without feeling, sensing, and talking to their people. The anthropologist understands the development of humans in societies or cultures, which is what happens when people come together. That sounds like the sort of thing every employer brand pro should aspire to be.

Myself, I don't get too wrapped up in scripting the brand experience, mostly because I don't know how much you can really script the brand experience. But if you need to get a handle on the idea, here's a nice write-up on how to script your own.

"We have put together this curated collection of the best, most insightful articles of 2019, that focus on mastering branding as a strategic business tool."

As a bonus, here are predictions for social media for the coming year. What’s next for Facebook, TikTok, Slack, and more

Lots of great data points on Vox's wrap up of 2019 tech trends. The most interesting one is how tech talent is continuing to cluster around a handful of cities. This blows my mind. We all know how expensive it is to hire in the obvious cities, so you'd assume companies would look beyond those cities for talent (and a steep discount), but that's not happening. Might be a good chart to show the hiring manager who asks why it's so hard to hire in Boston, SF and Seattle

The assumption is that culture creates the brand, and I think that's true to an extent. Your brand is the intentional and judicious selection of traits and ideas that highlight your culture. But can you go the other way? That is, can you use the brand to change the culture? Great article on the chicken/egg situation and some great ideas on how you can make an impact on the culture.

I think I've mentioned that the concept of "belonging" is far more powerful than "joining" (think about that when you write your 47th "join us!" social media job post...), but the HBR goes deeper, defining the value of having people feel like they belong to the company. (Note the juxtaposition with the white paper above where isolation and loneliness are going to be a real problem).

We're reached peak-recruiting. As anyone with any real skill and a LinkedIn profile will attest, we've entered a world where recruiters can spam and annoy anyone with very little effort. It's time to pivot and reinvent your recruiting away from spamming and messaging and move towards building relationships. It's time to reinvent your recruiting.

Finally, if you're looking for a list of great brand articles to help you think bigger and bolder when you get the year kicked off right, here's a great one.

To encourage consumers to take action, you'll want to use direct response copywriting. Here, we'll dive into tips and examples to inspire your efforts.

Further evidence of companies embracing that the world really has changed? Chevron managed a virtual summer camp for its employees' kids. If your company cares about you, is there anything you care about as much as your kids??? So while this kind of thing will be common in the future, I love seeing companies pivot to embrace stuff like this.

COVID-19’s impact on the world of work is without question. The big question employer brand leaders need to ask themselves is: How will our organization show up in the labor market?

Stronger businesses and brands – that’s our hope for every marketing oriented leader and professional that reads our insights on Branding Strategy

You know that my feeling is that the platonic ideal of employer brand isn't to be a silo, but rather a single perspective through a shared brand for the entire company. Ignoring how surprised I was that a marketing/branding magazine even know what employer brand was, here's a great article geared towards marketers on how to leverage a stronger employer brand.

Last year, I did a whole newsletter based on the various prediction stories people were writing (how'd that turn out?!) and this year it sure feels like no one's willing to put their head in the lion's mouth again. But I did find one brave soul willing to predict the future of EB for 2021. I could quibble about how "HR tech will focus more on candidates than recruiters" is a gimme as it is impossible for them to focus LESS on candidates, but it's a good read.

If you're going to force your candidates through your TSA-like ATS (huh... they share the same letters... weird), you better be taking advantage of it as a shared point of contact (and data) for candidates and recruiters.

It feels reasonable to me that in a time of virtual/remote everything, the thing that will help bring people together and build connection and increase productivity is shared learning. What we learn together is what keeps us together. That holiday zoom class where everyone learned to make gnocchi in their own kitchens was the highlight of your Q4? Keep that in mind and start supporting shared learning experiences at work as a means of developing culture.

When it comes to transforming recruitment marketing, I don't know anyone who knows more (or done more) within tech or large companies than Allyn Bailey. As she is someone who truly knows how to turn the biggest boats around, this series on how to think through your own recruitment marketing situation is going to be epic.

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I love Skill Scout's reverse-brief thing, where they show you how they made teh decision to shoot a particular kind of video