Companies today need to present themselves as desirable workplaces that attract talented employees, and corporate events are a great tool to improve employer branding.
The dramatic increase in turnover over the past years, as seen through the so-called Great Resignation, goes hand in hand with the reputation that companies manage to build for their employees.
Just like companies define their Unique Sales Proposition (the added value that they are able to offer to a client), today, companies define their Employer Value Proposition (the added value that they can offer to their employees).
In practice, a company with strong employer branding has more opportunities to attract and retain talent. On the other hand, a company that has a reputation of giving little attention to its own workers will struggle to find new employees.
According to Forbes, in the United States there has been an increase of 18% of the time needed to substitute a departing employee. This is because candidates today often have more options to choose from with more attractive pay.
Corporate events have always been an opportunity to strengthen the employee relationship by making the most of a shared environment for several days.
A business can therefore use employee events to improve employer branding and reaffirm their own company culture, where the employees themselves become Ambassadors.
We will look at how corporate events can support a business through four main points on which employer branding is based.
Table of Contents
1. Corporate culture
Corporate culture is the set of values that characterises a business, what it believes in, what is stands for, and its behaviour. It is an essential part of employer branding. For an employee it is important to work in a business that has the same shared values, because this contributes to harmony, motivation, and satisfaction.
Through events it is possible to highlight these values, such as commitment to sustainability and social responsibility.
For a few years now, event organisers like us have been able to provide programmes and activities that highlight corporate values such as respect for the environment, solidarity, transparency, and inclusiveness.
Even supporting initiatives such as, for example, the Italian project Food for Good which deals with recovering food waste at the end of events and transforming waste into aid for people who need it most.
2. Employee wellbeing
Today a business has to address the issue of employee wellbeing, understood as providing holistic support to employees’ lives. It is naturally easier to find benefits of this kind in multinationals and large companies.
For example, Google is known for taking particular care of its employees, who have gyms and parks to keep active and they can take long parental leave periods to spend time with their families.
Even smaller businesses, however, can provide benefits that consider the needs of their workers. Some, for example, allow their employees to bring their dogs or cats into work with them or, particularly more recently, allowing a certain number of days per week to work from home in order to optimise their free time.
Of course, organising a special event or, better still, incentive trips are obviously a kind of benefit, all the more so when the employees’ families are also invited.
The practice of inviting partners – or in some exceptional circumstances even the children – on incentive trips was actually quite common in the past. Then, during the years of the economic crisis, this was cut back due to budget cuts or images of companies that preferred slimmed-down events.
The results of these events where business and family life were mixed for a change, have always been rewarding. For employees, it is an opportunity to feel appreciated by the company and, at the same time, an opportunity to spend some quality time with their families.
3. Brand Ambassadors and social media
Successful Employer Branding involves Brand Ambassadors, i.e., employees who are so enthusiastic about working for their company that they want to tell people about it by social media posts.
The concept of Brand Ambassadors is so important that LinkedIn’s algorithm, the only social network completely dedicated to the world of work, rewards companies whose employees publish posts that are shared and commented on with increased visibility.
A corporate event is the perfect opportunity to encourage employees to post on social media where they are and what they are doing, posting photos of lunches and dinners and behind-the-scenes images – the most popular among social media users at the moment.
In this case, it is more important than ever to have a good event organiser because the risk is to go from a brand-positive campaign to an opportunity to criticise everything that went wrong.
4. Growth process
One of the topics that is closest to the hearts of the younger generation is personal growth. Today’s employees expect their company to support them with coaching and opportunities to share knowledge and improve their skills.
Through tailor-made corporate events, it is possible to give employees valuable experiences with a view to personal growth.
It is possible to create a themed programme to explore highly requested soft skills such as teamwork, leadership, or communication skills. Or you can design an immersive experience of two or three days dedicated to the improvement of some specific technical skills, also through listening to a keynote speaker known to be an expert in the matter.
Events of all kinds, from incentive trips to conference workshops, can definitely help businesses to build strong employer branding and a well-defined corporate culture.