Is your employer brand charismatic? This article is really focused on how to build one's own charisma, but the notes sound like I'd want to see in a strong employer brand. Example: "use of metaphors to simplify messages, stir emotions, invoke symbolic meanings, and aid recall" and "The articulation of moral convictions and shared sentiments to demonstrate alignment with the followers." Sounds like a great brand to me.

Want more evidence that ignoring your employer brand's impact on corporate sentiment is costing your business sales? I thought you might. It's good stuff to keep in your back pocket when someone forces you to justify your existence.

Emily Firth puts this idea front and center, claiming that now is the time for EB to show the value it can bring to the company beyond pipeline-filling (and she's 101% right).

This might make you feel good (or at least a slight twinge of schadenfreude) to see that marketing likes to complain about how it isn't take seriously in the board room, much like how many of us feel disrespected by marketing. Strangely, the solution to both problems is to stop relying on internal metrics and focus on real business metrics.

I know you want to make BFFs with your marketing team, but a lot of you are having trouble making making it work. The culprit? It's that marketing doesn't understand you. They still see your team as a funnel-filler or Glassdoor review watcher. They treat your team as untested and untrained dilettantes "playing at marketing." Which is why I wrote this for you (to give to them): The CMO's Guide to Employer Branding. It's a long read, I'll grant you, but it should speak their language about your value.

I've pointed out that employer brand is the new go-to crisis PR move, but how do you manage your employer brand in a crisis? This article really conflates employer branding with employee engagement a bit, but the notes are still useful.

With the events of 2020 having redefined all aspects of work, how you position your employer brand has never been more critical than it is today.

I admit that when I read this article on “brand collaboration,” I couldn’t conceive of two employer brands collaborating and sharing ideas and identities. But then it hit me: Many of us have staff who have their own brands. Call them thought leaders or influencers, they are resources that you can use and support to drive your own brand. Like Michael Jordan and Nike, how are you going to collaborate your brands to mutual success?

Trying to grow your brand without emotion (I mean, we are in the people business, right?) is a mistake. But leveraging emotion isn’t necessarily obvious or simple. It helps to understand your talent targets’ needs and desires.

Bookmark this: Gallup, the research company, makes a pretty compelling case to your leadership on the power of employer brand. The overall focus is on how the employer brand makes a clear impact on your corporate brand (remember, businesses only speak three languages: make money, save money, extend the brand), which would be something you might want to slide under the virtual door of leadership.

Thinking that it may be time for a bit of a re-brand? Here are some questions you should ask before you do (because this is what your leadership will be asking you).