Rethinking Value Proposition

It is important to first define what an organization’s employee value proposition is. It used to be defined as a set of pecuniary and non-pecuniary benefits provided by an organization for which the organization expects and receives skills, competencies and capabilities that help the organization achieve its strategic objectives.

What Is Employee Value Proposition?

Today, it is much more than that. It encompasses an entire ecosystem of remuneration, support, training, rewards, recognition, and values that an organization provides to its employees to attract, achieve, develop, and retain a highly engaged workforce, which in turn produces great returns on investment translating into the organization’s branding and customer loyalty.

An organization’s employee value proposition thus entails a symbiotic relationship with its workforce in the totality of what the organization offers to its current and prospective employees to get the best out of them. It incorporates all the tools an organization deploys to attract, retain, engage, review, reward and develop competencies in its workforce. It is reflected in pay, engagement, benefits, development, training, growth and growth potential, succession, mentorship, performance management and remediation of employee deficiencies.

What Makes a Good Value Proposition?

An organization’s value proposition becomes even more important in a tight labor market like the one we are in right now. This shines a spotlight on an organization’s culture and puts the onus on the organization to take care of its image and brand reputation, how it is perceived and how it has treated its employees in the past as an indication of how incoming employees might expect to be treated. This is perhaps the most critical and all-encompassing function of the HR department within an organization as a value-added capacity builder.

Recurrent themes emerge in how certain organizations that I have worked with think of their value proposition towards their prospective and existing employees. These value propositions which are both tangible and intangible have the effect of producing certain behaviors like loyalty, productivity and job satisfaction depending on the message conveyed. It is therefore important for an organization to be careful to convey the intended message by meticulously designing a thorough and targeted value system that is unique and relevant to the organization.

The planning, therefore, starts before an employee ever becomes an applicant for a position within the organization. This is achieved by policies, practices, processes, and culture that understand what makes each employee happy at work and highly engaged with work after gathering supporting analytical evidence.

Cooperation and Culture

An organization has an interest in employing people who want to be part of the organization and it makes no sense to go after those that do not really want to be there. Thus, an organization’s value proposition requires the willing cooperation of employees to work. This means that employees and prospective employees must be open and forthcoming with their thoughts, ideas, experiences, desires, and career objectives. Such vulnerability by employees and prospective employees must be rewarded by the organization’s HR department crafting and instituting employee value propositions that are specific, relevant, and constructively calculated to deliver desired results.

The culture of an organization plays one of the most important roles in an employee value proposition. When on organization views its workforce as a strength and its beating heart, that makes all the difference in how the employees are viewed. All necessary inferences are resolved in favor of the employee’s wellbeing and advancement. Such a culture that views people as strength creates the right environment for the crafting and implementation of programs that serve to reward employees, increase engagement, improve motivation and commitment while delivering value to the organization, its shareholders, and customers.