Blog Post: Who Owns Your Employer Brand???

If you answered "I do" to this question I would have to ask you to take a few minutes and really, truly think about it a bit more. If you answered "bloggers, social media users, search engine managers, current employees, past employees, or vendors" then you are headed in a more accurate direction based on the fact that a fundamental shift has occurred.

I recently read a blog called Revelation- Your Employer Brand Is No Longer Owned by Your Firm on ERE that spoke specifically to this topic. While there are so many great blogs today on this and other similar ideas this one nailed it in my opinion. It shared how for those who ACTIVELY ENGAGE and PUBLISH THEIR STORY, their PERCEPTION IS REALITY. This of course touched my heart since I work for a company that works so hard to support employers to share their stories.

The blog mentioned how control provides comfort to senior talent management executives. I am sure many can relate to this. While control can be perceived as negative, I believe in this case they truly do not know better.  A fundamental shift has occurred and typically when this happens it takes time for all to "get on the bus" so to speak. Herein lies the biggest challenge of all; this shift is evolving so quickly that those who do not take a leap and engage could truly be left far, far behind. Moreover, since the reality is that we do not own our employer brands anymore if we are not engaged in this shift there is a very real possibility that the perceived perception of our brands could be the total opposite of what we intend them to be.

This shift is enabling how people learn and communicate. PEER PRODUCED CONTENT IS MORE CREDIBLE. The most common objection I hear from employers is that they are afraid to give people a platform to share negative feedback. I believe that if we think they are not finding a way to share it we are only kidding ourselves.

The great news is that with today's social media technology we have the ability to make the content we want to be most visible, BE MOST VISIBLE!

So again I ask, "Who Owns Your Employer Brand?

Please share your thoughts and