Peter Neal, founder The Experience Bank Group, is well known for his expertise in leadership and board level recruitment, as well as for his support for SME's ready for that next stage of growth who need advice from an experienced panel of experts.
Here for Northern Insight readers, in his first article of 2023, Peter talks about the importance of making your brand stand out to make your high-level recruitment a success.
“Recruitment, particularly at a higher level for organisations, is in an all-time competitive situation. Recent events, skills and staff shortages, and the combination of unprecedented challenges and opportunities has led to a job seekers market.
“Better wages and benefits are on offer at all levels, but in higher-level recruitment for leaders and board members, there are specific things attracting talent to organisations.
“When put together these individual elements equal a strong brand presence. And at the end of the day, we all want to be proud of where we work and have pride in our job. For leaders it seems that is currently even more important. Employers in a winning position, attracting talent, are using brand as the initial draw and as the closing gambit of the deal.
“So, what are the elements that make a brand not only known but attractive?
“Noticeably, any established brand’s aim is to be recognised as doing a job well, breeding a positive experience for employees and customers. A culture fostering positivity is far more attractive to work for than one accepting negativity and mediocrity into the workplace.
“A brand that is transparent, open and honest, steeped in its local community is attractive to potential employees. If your company talks up the local area, supports community activity, and is spoken well about by all in return, then people will want to work there. If what you see is what you get, there are more likely only good things to be said, and believe me, any potential employee of higher level will be doing their own research about you.
“Flexibility is also attractive, not just in terms of benefits – in terms of delivery, service and product. This shows a sustainability to the organisation, being forward thinking and able to pivot to survive and thrive, is reassuring to those leaving a stable high-level job to join you.
“Now for your marketing, the place where a brand is born and should be nurtured. Your company should be visible, with strong PR, social media and promotional activity.
“Your website should be well thought through, with inclusive language, clear values (not just listed but demonstrated), good, robust policies and of course, it should have good SEO so it easy to find.
“Finally, reviews online are imperative to demonstrate performance. A potential highlevel candidate will look to these to gauge the strength of your brand and performance.
“Don’t worry if you don’t tick all the boxes, lots of execs look for challenges, places where they can bring their own improvements from things they’ve learnt in their careers. As long as some of these attractive brand qualities are achieved or being worked towards, your brand will be appealing, and ultimately, it is also about synergy and of course, having the right recruitment expert on board working with your team to find you the right candidates!”
Experience Bank Group incorporates The Experience Bank philanthropic, social enterprise company along with a commercial venture providing three symbiotic services – EB Board Level Recruitment, EB High Performing Boards and EB Continuous Personal Development.
With this combination of specialist expertise, the Experience Bank Group is uniquely positioned to help organisations ensure they have not only the right skills in the leadership team and boardroom but also optimum board performance with higher value creation.
5% of all revenue from Experience Bank Group is gifted to The Experience Bank social enterprise to enable more start-ups, early-stage businesses, charities and social enterprises access to high quality, advisory and nonexecutive talent.