By Michelle Boyde

HSBC is relocating its Group CEO to Hong Kong from London before the end of the year. This in a bid to be one of the first Western companies listed in Shanghai.

However, relocation is will not be the solution for most of the workforce. Employers will need to attract talent in the region to avoid expat packages and build long term local talent pipelines. This will be a challenge, even for those companies which have strong global employer brands. The results from the Univesum Chinese Student Survey show seven of the top 10 employers in China are Chinese. The ranking is led by China Mobile and Bank of China, illustrating that national champions still prevail in China.

By Michelle Boyde

Employers are targeting talent younger and younger. I just interviewed an HR representative from the National Institute of Health.  It’s very interesting to hear what they are doing in the US to encourage very young children to take an interest in science. This is definitely long term talent pipeline management.

If UK university courses will cost £9,000 per year, we cannot blame young people for re-considering a university education. How it will affect the graduate recruitment pipeline in specialised subjects is up for speculation. Students who may have chosen a ‘softer’ course may decide to invest in a degree which promises a return – therefore, we may see an increase in graduates choosing degrees in key subjects like the sciences, engineering and IT. Or, will numbers of competent students chose not to enter the university system at all leaving the UK with a shortage of graduates across the board,

Either way, one thing is for sure: employers will need to step-up their industry attraction before students apply to university. Teenagers need to think it’s cool to be an engineer before they summit their UCAS form – otherwise it’s all too late.

You can read the full story in Universum Quarterly 2011 issue four. If you have an initiative for building the brand to pre-university talent email Michelle on michelle.boyde@universumeurope.com.

By Michelle Boyde

Across the UK, 32 per cent of students want a career where they are “dedicated to a cause or feel I am serving a greater good”. This bodes well for General Electric and Siemens. 

David Cameron has said that £60m of spending earmarked for upgrading British ports to make them suitable for handling large offshore turbines will go ahead.  Cameron wants the UK to be a world leader in offshore wind energy.

This will generate 70,000 jobs for these employers. That’s a lot of recruiting and currently only 3.9 per cent of UK students was to work in the energy/power sector. However, if they can leverage the ‘green’ angle correctly and use it to strengthen two already strong employer brands, they have the opportunity to appeal to students, as well as have the jobs available for them.

By Michelle Boyde

With 500 million active users worldwide, Facebook has incredible potential, but is it the right platform for employers to communicate? Only 20 per cent use Facebook for both social and career purposes, 35 per cent of people on Twitter and 16 per cent of people on YouTube. In fact, the majority of members on these social networks disapprove of employers sending them information: 57 per cent of Facebook members, 61 per cent of YouTube members and 50 per cent of Twitter members say “No thank you”.

This data is based on Universum’s “Communicating with Talent Report 2010”, which delves into what and how to communicate to UK career seekers. Universum is hosting its Communicating with Talent Webinar on November 11th and 18th at 4pm GMT. If you would like to attend, please email michelle.boyde@universumeurope.com

By Michelle Boyde

Over the decade Universum has conducted research in the UK, work/life balance has always been our student’s top career goal. In fact, it’s a global career goal with only markets such as Poland, Russia, China and India ducking out of this trend. As much as the phrase is thrown around, most employers would struggle to define precisely what work/life balance entails. For many people, it may be a case of work/life integration. For those that see working at home as a route to achieving this, it continues to be a challenge for many of us in the UK.  The Trades Union Congress (TUC) reports this week that one fifth of UK employers, 4.5 million people, would like to work from home but are not permitted to do so by their employers. How to achieve work/life balance, and of course what it is, will continue to be a point of discussion.

By Michelle Boyde

Tomorrow promises to be a painful day in the capital, not to mention a long one as we try to get around without the tube. If you find yourself feeling a little bitter about tomorrow’s strike, spare a thought for my colleague. He will be caught by our strike tomorrow morning as he heads for St Pancreas and then by the French Metro strike (over retirement age) when he arrives in Paris later that day. Strikes are certainly prevalent right now…

Coca Cola have confirmed their strike over pay for September 8th and the majority of union members at the BBC have called for industrial action over the change in pension scheme. I won’t even mention British Airways.

Strikes are certainly a very visible example of disgruntled employees. Others may not be quite so palpable. However, for loyal employees who have stood by their employer the last couple of years, through the pay freezes and imposed hour cuts, many will be asking what they will get in return. In amongst the job cuts, perhaps they should be happy to have a job. However, the reality is that top talent can always find job elsewhere and they are the ones you need to keep.  New hires are expensive; investing in current employees is better value for money.

Internal engagement continues to be a critical facet of employer branding – brands are built from the inside out and now is one of the worse times to neglect this element.

By Michelle Boyde

Today, The Times reports that the Big Four are recruiting 3,850 graduates in the UK this year. This is an increase of more than 20 per cent on 2009 and surely good news for the UK’s graduates. However, it seems that too much of the UK are lured by the lights of London. PricewaterhouseCoopers reports that 70 per cent of their applicants apply for jobs in the City, making it tougher to fill vacancies in other offices.

This is not only the case with graduates. Some BBC employees have been reported to be unhappy as they are required to relocate to Salford Quays in Manchester, to continue their jobs outside the capital.

However, invention and ideas are rife outside London. In today’s FT, a report from the British Library, home of the national patents collection, reports that north-east generated more patents per person per pound of investment than any other region.

Geographical location will continue to be an important factor when choosing a job. Firms need to build their employer brands to encompass how attractive locations outside of the south-east can really be.

By Michelle Boyde

A-day is fast approaching. On Thursday,  anxious 18 year-olds across the country will collect their A-Level results, discovering if their place at university is secure or not. For many it will not, and students will have to move quickly to find a place through clearing, although this is no longer a guaranteed route to gaining a spot with many universities reporting no places available through clearing.

So what will become of our budding students? A colleague of mine, recently out of university herself, told me she has a friend who achieved three A’s at A-Level and missed a place at university two years in a row – he is trying for a third time this year. If it is not a case of third time lucky, I doubt he will pass through the UCAS system a fourth time. He is an example of potential top talent who may become ‘lost’.

For those students not entering the UK university system, what are the options? Some may forego a tertiary education all together, or others may venture abroad. The US is becoming an increasingly appealing option, especially as the gap in fees between the UK and US narrows. In addition, Australian and the Dutch universities will be undergoing recruitment drives in the UK this week.

UK top talent will inevitably become more dispersed with young people abroad or missing from the education system all together. The question is how will graduate recruitment evolve to prosper from these increasing considerations?

Gen Y has seen university as their right, many going through the motions of UCAS without considering what they wish to achieve and what they want from a career. Increased tuition fees and insufficient places may provoke our youngsters to consider their career path more closely.

The corporate brand and the consumer brand constitute important elements of the employer branding strategy for many companies.  An effective branding strategy for all brands means that the communication will emphasise common messages and values imbedded in the brands. The brands thus strengthen each other.

However, sometimes the company’s employment offer differs from its consumer image. People with values and attitudes similar to the consumer brand are attracted to the company, but discover that the workplace falls short of their expectations— or even worse, the company’s consumer image may convey a boring and uninteresting employer brand.

Some companies are fortunate enough to have overlapping consumer, corporate and employer brands. The consumer brand attracts the right talent, for example the target groups that the company wants to attract and retain. However, the consumer brand might create very high expectations among job seekers that might be difficult to meet.

Re-published: “Integrating your brands”, by By Annika Lagerholm, Universum Quarterly, 2006, Issue 1

It’s often attributed to a one-sided focus—often personal attitudes and behaviours—while neglecting the development of processes and structures. Sometimes, diversity efforts target certain groups, such as women or employees of a particular ethnic background, rousing resistance amongst others who feel like they don’t belong because they don’t recognize the advantages for themselves. As these employees often comprise the majority and hold managerial positions, they feel excluded and may hamper the progress of your diversity efforts and affect the perception of your employer brand. Thus, do not focus exclusively on those that differ from the norm, but give everyone the opportunity to develop.

Republished: “Diversity”, by Annika Lagerholm, Universum Quarterly, 2006, Issue 1