Why HR needs to think like marketing.

Back in the mid-1980s a European car manufacturer decided to re-label its HR function, 'Internal Marketing'. Along with the name change were associated fundamental changes in how HRM was to see its role, moving from a policing and administrative department, to customer service, public relations, advisory and consultation. This company was ahead of its time. To a great extent, although HR has often changed its name (eg., People & Culture), and the titles of the people in HR (from recruitment officer to talent acquisition advisor, etc), this has rarely led to any significant changes in what HR actually does. If the function is not careful it is in danger of being seen as the emperor that has no clothes. In general, HRM needs to fundamentally question its assumptions about the things that it does, for example, - 'talent', 'performance', 'leader development'. This failure to double-loop learn often means that HRM is stuck in the industrial and legacy thinking of the 20th century, perpetuating tired old thinking about how we define 'talent' (which is never defined), manage performance, develop leaders. In fact, tired old thinking about the entire employee lifecycle.

In this article I take aim at a specific triad - job analysis (JA), job description (JD) and job specification (JS) - and show how the way jobs are typically 'sold', by HR professionals, reflects a lack of creativity and effort on the part of HR which has implications for all other elements of the employee lifecycle.

Personas and marketing

This is where marketing comes in. More specifically, the concept of the?customer persona.?In essence, a customer persona is a synopsis?of the attributes, needs, motivations, context and behaviour of typical but differentiated audience types.?The value of identifying these fuller audience types is that products and services can be focused on very clear personas for whom they are intended. This is beyond simply segmentation.

Industrial HRM and the need for ideas from marketing

HRM sells jobs. In order to sell jobs to the best and most appropriate people, it too needs to develop a full understanding of the attributes, needs, motivations, contexts and behaviours of distinct audience types. This is exactly what conventional processes (JA, JD and JS) do not do. These processes are focused on the 'job' and are only interested in the person to the extent that they have the skills and or qualifications to do a job. This is obviously important, but it is not enough. If a JA is undertaken and, often it isn't (because it is assumed jobs don't change - which they didn't in the industrial era), it results in a job description, or worse, a?duty statement (DS).?In turn, this usually leads to a job/person specification. The JD or DS is then used to sell the job through one or a number of channels, to the labour market. This is equivalent to the channels in marketing, the places where the product or service is exposed to the market.

In conventional HR processes, which still proliferate, the JD is generally put together by HR practitioners who replicate previous JDs or, who do some minor tweaking in order to show that they recognize that jobs have changed. This is an overly passive and not very innovative or effective way to sell a job or build an employee value proposition.

Employee personas and 21st century HRM

A much better, more efficient and more creative way of focusing on the recruitment of high performers is to put some effort into creating?employee personas.?The employee persona (EP) is a fictional, multi-dimensional description of an ideal employee for a particular role. The construction of the EP, however, is not based on a simple re-write of a previous JD and JS, which typically produce a list of duties and responsibilities to be performed by a person with a particular skillset and qualifications. It is, rather, based on the collection of a broad range of data, specifically with reference to current high performers in that role.

A well constructed employee persona, built around the characteristics, attributes, needs, motivations, context and behaviours of existing high performers, drives much more effective and efficient recruitment efforts.

1. It attracts potential high performers in a focused way.
2. It enables more creative ways to approach and appeal to potential high performing recruits.
3. It positions the organization and role in a way that highlights the employee value proposition (EVP).
4. It enables much better and holistic evaluation of applicants.
5. It enables the development of more creative selection processes and mechanisms.

Developing employee personas

The starting point for developing employee personas is not?the job or the supposed role.?It is?high performers?who do the job/perform the role. The key to appealing to and attracting the 'right' people to do a job/role is to first understand what current high performers do.

Remember, this is NOT a job specification (JS). A JS merely lists the skills and capabilities required. It does not at all deal with characteristics, behaviours, motivations, needs and so on in any detail. Furthermore, a JS does nothing to enhance your organization brand or to reflect an EVP; it is often simply a list of what HR believes people do.

Developing employee personas requires more than just the input of HR and, perhaps a line manager. Data needs to be collected from a range of stakeholders, starting with high performers, then managers, other staff and any existing knowledge that may be relevant. It is important that the focus is on a current high performer in any given role. So, as an example, here are some of the questions that we might ask of a high performer in order for us to shape an employee persona as an effective recruitment tool.

• What career objectives do they have and why?
• What do they like about the job/role, what do they dislike?
• What do they actually do?
• What makes them good at the job/role?
• What would make them leave?
• What motivates them to be a high performer?
• What commits them?
• What do they feel about the organization's culture?
• What are their pain points as an employee?
• What do they want in an employer?
• What is their overal employee experience?
• What attributes do they have and what is their personality?
• How do they deal with difficulties on the job/in the role?
• What needs do they have?
• What skillsets and capabilities are most important in doing this job/performing this role well?
• What interests do they have beyond work?
• What social networks do they use?

This is not an exhaustive list. But, this is part of painting the multi-dimensional picture of the employee persona which will also include input from managers, peers and HR. The employee persona(s) should drive recruitment. Recruitment becomes more targeted, efficient and proactive. Equally important, we can create more appealing and attractive messages about the role and the organization. We can also humanize jobs/roles =?"Hello, I'm Crystal, I am a manager in a call centre. I am 35 years old and have developed a successful career in contact centre supprt. I am ambitious, focused and like to have control to build close relationships with my staff. I want professional development as part of my career and I also like challenges, but the organization needs to work on workload and stress levels and use data more effectively".

Developing employee personas requires creative HR professionals who do more than list duties and specifications. It requires knowing high performers as holistic human beings. This is something at which marketing has become an expert. HR needs to look outside of itself for inspiration, and marketing can be an excellent muse.