Meet James. He is a 32 year-old Account Director with eight years’ experience in a mid-size advertising agency. Results orientated, and collaborative, James prides himself in leading his team and building relationships with the clients he serves. He has mainly worked on packaged goods accounts, but has a passion (and educational background) in sports and entertainment marketing. He lives in a trendy, up and coming area, is married with no kids just yet, is active on two or three social media channels, drives an imported SUV, and likes to spend weekends at the cottage.
James doesn’t exist—at least, not to our knowledge. Rather, James is a talent persona. He is a fictitious individual who may exist in some way or another in the greater talent pool. Name aside, his traits can apply to a number of people looking for employment, and understanding what he or she looks for in an ideal position is key to attracting the right talent and retaining it for the future.
Talent personas are offshoots of customer personas, which were first developed by web design companies around the time of the dot com boom to test their websites. Functionality, features, and appearance all had to meet in the middle in order to create websites that appealed to everyone, seeing as those on the internet are free to explore it as they please.
Eventually, the concept of customer personas made its way into the world of retail, where companies would strategically determine the two or three ‘types’ of people most likely to shop at their stores. Down to an income level and musical taste, the retailers would tailor sales events and in-store music to suit these individuals, stimulate shopping, and create brand loyalty that hopefully would last for generations. Unlike the web design version of this concept, these personas were meant to capture the exact traits of the likely and/or ideal customer and focused less on appeasing a wide range of people.
Take clothing retailer Zumiez for example. They play punk rock in their stores, employ young people who would wear the clothes they sell, and place an emphasis on hiring individuals with a passion for skateboarding, snowboarding, or other extreme sports. Their talent persona is directly informed by their customer persona, and both work synergistically to create a brand identity that doesn’t quite exist elsewhere in the marketplace.
Talent personas are based on as much real data as possible, along with educated guesses about experience, goals, and motivations. They help you understand your candidates better, and act as a guide as you create content for their consumption.
To build an accurate talent persona, you should know their background, namely their employer requisites: what do they value in an employer? How do they look for work? What do they use social media for? Some people may use it to look for work, read news, or to connect with friends. Regardless of their purpose for using it, what are their top social channels? What social media channels do they use? Using all social media channels to promote your employer brand doesn’t make sense when your ideal talent only uses a few of them. On top of all of this, personal interests play a pivotal role—a graphic designer and a banker have different interests, look for work differently, and prioritize things differently, both vocationally and personally.
Similar to customer personas, talent personas are crucial to your organization’s talent management and employer branding strategy. When in doubt, work with an external vendor to help you conduct the research needed to develop these personas. Understanding your talent segments’ career motivations and the personal priorities that influence their behaviours and decision making process will ensure you are hiring the right talent quickly.
About Blu Ivy Group
Blu Ivy Group is a leading employer branding and employee engagement consultancy that aligns your organization with contemporary workplace paradigms. Our mission is to help client’s build award-winning people practices, inspire extraordinary employee engagement, and cultivate unique and desirable workplaces. We provide integrated solutions in employer brand and engagement research, strategic consulting, employer brand integration, creative and talent communications.
Blu Ivy Group is a trusted partner to many of North America’s most respected employer brands. For more information, visit us online at bluivygroup.com or contact us at info@bluivygroup.com.