4 Reasons to Rethink Your Employee Value Proposition

Your employee value proposition (EVP) is felt every single day. It’s built from that unique set of offerings as an employer—the culture, experience, rewards, and more—for the employee who brings their best self to work. On paper, your EVP should help you clearly convey that dynamic and by doing so differentiate you from your competition. In action, it should also help you accurately answer the question: Why would a person want to work for your company?

A great answer will connect with the people you hope to attract and retain and will leave others questioning if your company is the right fit (because it is not) and move on.

Your EVP acts as a North Star to your employer brand messaging both internally and externally and across every channel. And like any solid brand strategy, it needs to be validated and reevaluated on a regular basis to ensure its authenticity.

Is it time to rethink your EVP? Here are four reasons that point to a resounding “yes.”

1. Your EVP is a blast from the past.

If your EVP is from the pre-COVID era or even a couple of years old, things have most definitely changed. That doesn’t necessarily mean that your employee value proposition is wildly off base. It just means there’s a strong chance that the intel gathered to shape your current EVP and its supporting pillars isn’t necessarily a reflection of today.

2. There’s no back-up.

Knowledge is power and a powerful EVP is backed by research. Employee surveys, leadership 1:1’s, persona workshops, competitor reviews, external focus groups—insights from research along these lines is invaluable. Without them, how can you be so sure that what you’re saying is really and truly true? You can’t.

And put aside worries that you might be opening a can of worms once research findings start rolling in and get distilled to key stakeholders. Embrace the tensions. What you may believe or even aspire to be as an organization could conflict with reality. This level of knowledge will give focus to real opportunities for positive change and impact.

Inevitability, it will ground you and help craft stronger and more genuine messaging with your key audiences. Speaking of key audiences, another bonus is that nine times out of ten persona-based research also uncovers a treasure trove of great employee stories just waiting to be told.

3. The purpose is missing from the promise.

There’s emotional value in where we work. And that often stems from a shared purpose. Having a shared purpose feels right. It brings meaning to our work and a personal reason to be invested. When developing your EVP, challenge the language. Push harder and ask, “Does this clearly convey a connection between our company’s purpose and the employee experience?”

4. It’s generic.

If you give your EVP a read and your gut check is that it could easily be applicable to pretty much any company out there, don’t settle. What makes your company different is at the heart of what attracts and retains people who will thrive and drive outcomes for the business and themselves. That’s who you want to connect with and that’s not going to be everybody. It will be people who can confidently say, “I belong here.”

I hope your wheels are turning. I encourage you to engage in an ongoing investment in evaluating your EVP. Keep thinking, iterating, testing, and validating. Your efforts will pay off in many, many ways, especially when it comes to standing out from the crowd for all the right reasons.