How to Create A Great Employee Value Proposition

What is an Employee Value Proposition / EVP?

An Employee Value Proposition or ‘EVP’ is what you offer to employees in return for their work at your company. These include elements such as:

• The compensation offered (such as salary)
• Your benefits package and what makes it competitive
• The potential for career progression
• Opportunity for personal development and growth
• Your corporate culture and environment

An EVP is quite literally the value provided by an employer to their employees.

Why would you need an Employee Value Proposition?

Organisations normally create an EVP for a multitude of reasons. As the recruitment game becomes more competitive, EVPs have become an opportunity to showcase to candidates exactly why they are the best place to work.

Internally, creating a great EVP can provide a manifesto of sorts for employer branding and inform your recruitment marketing strategy, as it’s a resource which clearly lays out what exactly you have to offer, and also reflects what your company’s values and priorities are. For example, a company selling children’s toys might offer brilliant benefits for parental leave and childcare, or an organisation which operates in the women’s health industry could show they truly care by implementing a menopause policy.

With work-life balance becoming a significant topic of conversation and quiet quitting causing employees to re-evaluate what keeps them engaged and happy in a role, top candidates have a clearer idea than ever about what they’re looking for in their ideal role. An EVP can enable candidates to determine if they are the right fit for the role, saving both you and them time and effort if they are not.

How to Create A Great Employee Value Proposition

Know your greatest strengths

What differentiates your organisation from others, particularly in your own industry? This must be considered to create a strong Employee Value Proposition.

This isn’t just about what your practically offer a potential employee, but also what it says about you as an employer. Have you been a champion of flexible working hours years before it became such a mainstream conversation? While the flexi-time model can be a great benefit for an employee, it also communicates that you are a workplace which values work-life balance, and the more you can prove this to be the case, by reflecting this across your culture in the long-term, the more it will come across as a genuine part of your company culture and ethos to your potential new employee, rather than trend following. Being genuine is key to your EVP.

While it’s great to be flashy in your Employer Value Proposition, it should still be realistic about what you are like as an employer for any new employee, from what your core values are, to what your workplace is like. Since your EVP will inform your employer brand, your top priority should be making sure it’s genuine. If you fail to do this you may acquire talented new hires, but they will soon realise they are not where they thought they’d be, effecting their view of the company, productivity, engagement, and ultimately their retention.

Ask current employees for their feedback

Understanding current and internal perceptions of your company is crucial for informing your EVP and employer brand. A newer employee will be able to provide fresh feedback around their experiences with your hiring process, and what impression they had of the company during that process compared to the reality. They’ll be able to help you understand what might attract a potential new employee to your company.

Current employees with a longer tenure will provide insight into what has kept them around for so long. What do they think is unique about your company culture? What stops them from leaving?

Off the back of this, reviewing the reasons given for leaving by past employees is a must. It can be easy to focus on the positives, but some constructive criticism can make the world of difference to creating a strong EVP. No company is perfect, so even an employee who left with fond memories of your organisation will likely have some ideas for what you can improve, whether it’s creating a more competitive benefits package, creating a less competitive culture, or improving opportunities for professional growth.

Display and communicate your Employee Value Proposition effectively

It’s all well and good creating a strong EVP, but a key part of your strategy is getting the EVP out there! Update all company social media and update your careers page and overall website to reflect your EVP. Brief all hiring managers, your HR team, and recruitment team on your EVP so they are able to effectively put it into play when interviewing or engaging candidates. You should make sure the messaging you decided on and clarified in your EVP and employer brand is consistently shown across all company material. Sharing current employee stories can be a great way the achieve this.

Using your EVP as the template for your recruitment and interview discussions is beneficial, but if a candidate visits your careers page and sees that it does not reflect their conversations with you, then you risk coming across as an ingenuine employer.

Be aware of your past and present reputation

Your public reputation is part of your employer brand, whether you like it or not! This may sound scary, but is something you will definitely want to consider to make sure you’re not looking at your organisation’s reputation through rose-tinted glasses. No company is perfect, and while we hope there’s no major scandals, understanding your current reputation and where you want to elevate it is key for your EVP and overall employer branding strategy.

Reputation’s and public image cannot be changed overnight. Therefore, when creating your Employee Value Proposition it’s important you think about long term results, as well as short term ones.

Employee Value Proposition Examples

Take a look at the following Employee Value Proposition Examples to get a better understanding of how you might aim to align you EVP with your brand.

Airbnb

“Create a world where anyone can belong anywhere”.

Airbnb’s Employee Value Proposition reflects their mission, centered around travel, as Airbnb offers multiple travel-friendly benefits, such as annual travel and experiences credit and paid volunteer time.

Shopify

“strong values and purpose, empathetic leadership, and a place where all people feel they belong”

The e-commerce platform centers their employer brand and EVP around being a flexible culture, as employees can work virtually from anywhere. They also focus on core hours rather than commuting hours. They stand by this as an employer by giving employees an internet allowance to enable remote work.

LinkedIn

The Employee Value proposition which has contributed to the company’s success is embodied with the slogan ‘#LinkedInLife’.

This EVP is smart, as the hashtag is used by LinkedIn as an employer to encourage every employee to post about the company culture across their social media channel. The company offers a huge array of benefits divided into categories such as health, family, passion, must-haves, and extras. They also have a “paid shutdown” at the end of the year, in which the company closes for a week to celebrate their successes.

A well done Employee Value Proposition can offer you and your recruitment team a major competitive edge. To learn more about how to hire in a candidate led market, click here.