The Halo Effect
I know you think you’re strategic. Or that strategy is something only done in the board room. But that’s not the case at all.
Strategy is ALL about achieving more with what you already have. And you want that, right?
In one hour, you’ll learn what strategy really is (and not some BS academic version of it), and how to build your own, and around talent acquisition leadership and employer branding. Why? Because it is how YOU LEVEL UP!
And yes, it’s free. Go sign up. Tell a friend!
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There are three kinds of hiring companies:
🤩 Companies we like (because of the halo effect from the consumer brand)
🤢 Companies we've heard horrible things about
🤐 Companies we've never heard of
They each have different strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and resources.
But when we think "how do we hire better?" we look to the famous companies (though our brand isn't well known) and copy what they do. You can’t learn to pole vault by watching Mondo Duplantis' videos, can you?
And when leadership or HR gets nervous about new ways to hire, they look at the companies many of us hate and think, "ugh, I don't want to be like that!" despite the fact that their brand hasn't committed any heinous fraud or felonies. It's like saying "I don't like swimming" because you watched Jaws.
Most companies (and it isn't even close) are in that third category: Invisible. They have a few thousand LI followers (mostly because LI all but forces you to follow the company if you easy apply), but next-to-no brand recognition.
So why are they (and I mean YOU) trying to build better hiring through employer branding in the same way mega-famous companies like Facebook, OpenAI, Netflix, SpaceX, Spotify and Disney do it??? Do you have a billion-dollar consumer brand halo you can use?
I didn’t think so.
(By the way, many of those amazing employer brands are ALL halo effect. They don’t have an employer brand team or an employer brand strategy. They reply exclusively on the fact that everyone knows and likes the company name.)
Whether its a kid’s game or a recruiting process, playing "follow the leader" is a game ONLY the leader can win. When you follow, you'll always come up wanting.
So play a different game.
A game where you can actually win!
Build your own strategy, one which takes ADVANTAGE of what you have instead of making you feel bad for not having what Goldman Sachs and Apple have.
Build your own strategy, one only YOUR company can execute, that gives you a way to maximize your success instead of playing "also ran" to other companies.
Build your strategy and your leadership will be excited to talk to you about your seat at the table.
If you're interested in building your own strategy, check out the free course in two weeks where I can teach you how to build your very own custom strategy (MBAs not necessary).
📈 How to help your business change »
📈 Brands (of any sort) exist to help people make choices »
📈 What to do when you know more about your work than your boss »
📖 Look. We all want more power. But most of us labor without ever understanding what power is and how to get it. And one of the greatest books on the subject is a 1,300 page (not kidding) time about Robert Moses, a man you’ve never heard of before despite the fact that over the course of almost fifty years, Moses built NYC as a poorly-paid civil servant. Seriously. It’s well-written and insanely interesting and not even remotely for the faint of heart. So I have spend the last two weeks catching up on 99% invisible’s book club about The Power Broker and cannot recommend the book club episodes highly enough. »
📺 The connection between employer branding and candidate experience »
📺 You don’t need your social media team’s permission to do amazing work on LinkedIn »
🏛️ All 2,500+ (five years worth!) articles from this newsletter are in a searchable archive. Go get ‘em!
Problem: Hiring manager won’t work with you
The secret to long term success is to make allies within the business. Your best avenue is to show your value in action, like by helping them hire better.
But many HMs are too busy/distracted to understand how helpful you can be and rebuff your invitations.
So send them this:
HM,
We all know how critical the XYZ role that open will be to the companies success, and I want to do what I can to give you the best possible options when selecting the new hire.
Rather than stick to “the usual” way we hire, a business-critical role like this will benefit from a custom marketing approach, one that takes advantage of your network, your name recognition within the industry to reach great people who aren’t on job boards.
Can we get 30 minutes of time? I’d like to ask you a few questions on camera so I can make some short little video clips that will attract interest from people who probably aren’t responding to a recruiter’s cold outreach.
Yes, I promise to make you look good, and yes, I promise to make this as painless on you as possible.
I’ve peeked at your calendar. Can we grab Tuesday at 11am? I would expect that you’ll see some results in as little as a week.
Thanks,
name
Hey! What’s a problem YOU have? Just reply to this email and I’ll do my best to answer it in future newsletter (no, I won’t tell anyone it was YOU).
People will want to tell you that an employer brand has to be expensive or that it has to tale months and months in order for it to be good.
That’s not true. Work that your Director of TA might call “inspiring” (and one recently did), only takes a few weeks and is roughly the same cost as a LI recruiter seat.
If you ask other people about every decision you make,
you're going to end up doing exactly what everyone else does
and getting the same results that everyone else gets.
- Shane Parrish
Four books and one audiobook
An employer brand buyers guide and agency listing
Five courses
150 videos
240 episodes of podcasts
Conversations on 23 podcasts
Seven “deep dive” resources
18 articles
All in one place: EmployerBrand.ing
I believe in giving knowledge away for free. But doing so isn’t free. So if you’d like to support the various costs for building all this content, please buy a book or hire me.
***This Newsletter Contains No ChatGPT***