Employee attraction refers to employers getting new talent to apply to and work for their organizations. Often coupled with retention—the ability to keep an employee working for an organization after being hired—attraction is critical for employers to find top talent.

Many employers struggle to bring new employees in the door. Even when a company is able to fill positions, it is important for an organization’s longevity to employ workers who genuinely want to be there, as employees are more likely to stick with a workplace they like being at. Further, new talent often has different education, skills, experiences and mindsets—all critical to an organization’s growth. With an effective attraction strategy, companies can fill open positions with eager, talented candidates and establish a positive reputation among potential hires. This helps retain skillful employees and foster a motivated and productive workforce, ultimately positively impacting the employer’s bottom line.

Employee Attraction Factors
Many factors affect an employer’s ability to attract workers, and several of these influences exist in some capacity for all employers. Employers should consider the following components when thinking about their organizations’ attraction plan:

• Recruitment marketing — How an employer’s brand and values are presented to potential employees is a crucial factor in a candidate’s decision about whether or not to work there. Recruitment marketing allows employers to show employees why their organization is a great place to work.

• Employer branding — Branding plays a critical role in people’s daily decision-making, such as which products they use and the clothes they wear. This phenomenon extends to job selection, where an employer’s brand represents its reputation as a workplace and the value it offers to employees.

• Recruiting — Not every potential employee is searching for a job, so recruitment can be useful in gaining their attention. The best candidates, whether they are actively looking for work or not, scrutinize more than just job descriptions and consider company values, internal policies and company culture when weighing their employment options.

• Hiring—The hiring process provides employees insight into what life at an organization will be like. Employees may continue their job search elsewhere if the process is difficult and unclear.

Organizations should consider the type of candidates they seek and apply techniques best suited to attracting those individuals. Broadly applying all types of strategies may create confusing messaging for candidates, so employers should strategically plan their approach to effectively convey specific information to potential candidates