Retail Appointment January 2019 TRAP_Jan 2019_Digital Edition | Page 7

top ten for 2018
t is important to distinguish between an
employment brand and a product
brand. This survey identifies not what
people think about the product being
sold, or even how it is sold. It measures
the perception of the organisations as em-
ployers.
I
Very little has changed since last year’s
survey, with Waitrose nudging ahead of
Next for 4th place and Asda moving into
the top ten, displacing ASOS into 11th.
John Lewis retains is crown at the top.
The gap has widened still further from the
rest, with M&S a close and very strong
second to John Lewis. These two em-
ployers have dominated the elite of retail
organisations for generations and, whilst
M&S has had its problems commercially,
it is still seen as head and shoulders
above the rest when it comes to how it
treats its employees.
In many ways John Lewis and Waitrose
have a head start as they are, in effect,
owned by their staff, with profits being
distributed amongst them.
Next, under the leadership of Lord
Wolfson, always maintains a strong
showing. Lord Wolfson has for a long time
been a leading voice in improving life in
Britain generally and is one of the few in-
dustry leaders who really could make a
difference.
Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Asda all do well,
and it is easy to see why. The culture in
these organisations, whilst quite properly
entirely focused on the customer, recog-
nises that a content workforce is more
likely to make a happy customer.
Bad press
Retail employers who have performed
less well have often been the subject of
bad press. Without wishing to name
names, there are many fine employers out
there whose employment brand has been
damaged by some savage attacks on
their leadership in the press. This may or
may not be unfair to the leaders, but it is
most definitely grotesquely unfair on the
businesses that they run. Sadly, in this
retailappointment.co.uk
country the press loves to destroy the
reputations of those who are successful,
with little regard for the truth.
Can an employer improve its employment
brand? Most certainly. Of course, the fun-
damentals must be in place for them to
be a genuinely good place to work. How-
ever, all too often opportunities are
missed to promote the employer brand;
particularly in this digital age.
Employers must have a coherent mes-
sage about what it is that they have to
offer and they need this image to be de-
livered. All too often employers look only
at the number of applications or the
number of hires from a particular recruit-
ment campaign and nothing else. Adver-
tising only on job boards makes an
employer invisible to the vast majority of
the workforce who are not actively
looking.
There needs to be a mixture of high and
low tech in any campaign. Job board, al-
though valuable, are mid tech. Employers
ignore social media at their peril and
searching for candidates on Linkedin is
not a “push” campaign. Facebook,
whether we like it or not, is a way of
reaching the workforce that is not job
seeking. However, having the office junior
post pictures of themselves getting drunk
at the Christmas party will not do. The
message must be coherent, consistent
and interesting. Most of all, it should be
succinct.
At the other end of the spectrum, print
should not be ignored. Whilst national and
local newspapers have all but withdrawn
from the recruitment market, trade press
is still a strong way of getting your mes-
sage to the passive market. Everyone
picks up a trade journal and looks at the
job ads.
2018
If you’ve got a strong message to deliver,
it is relatively easy to move up the search
engine rankings, but it requires a coordi-
nated approach that has the employment
brand as a whole in mind, and not just the
short term need to fill one vacancy.
All about the numbers
In addition to asking which brands were
the most attractive from an employer per-
spective, the respondents were also
asked what they look for in a prospective
employer. They were provided with a list
of options, which they had to rate in order
of importance.
1. I look at reviews from ex-employees.
2. I consider their commercial success.
3. I look at whether I like the product they
sell.
4. I mostly go on word of mouth.
5. I look up press reports online.
6. I consider what the service was like the
last time I was in their store.
Last year’s survey reported that a brand’s
commercial success was the biggest
factor considered by over half of the re-
spondents. This was closely followed by
whether or not they liked the products the
employer sold.
The 2018 survey shows only 28% of re-
spondents considering commercial suc-
cess as their most important attribute,
followed closely by 22% basing their
choice on store service levels. Press re-
ports limped in at a lowly 5%.
53% of those surveyed are currently
working in retail management positions;
20% are in a retail head office or regional
office position; and 8% work on the retail
shop floor. The remaining 19% either did
not comment or are not currently working
in retail.
If you would like to find out what position your firm came on this survey
or if you’d like any information on improving your employer brand,
please contact Russell Pidgeon on 020 7432 8866.
Together Communications is a specialist in recruitment advertising,
social media recruitment campaigns, recruitment PR and employee research.
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