Employee value proposition (EVP): The key elements

Organizations are starting to realize the importance of employee value proposition (EVP) to attract and retain talent.

Therefore, enterprises must focus on EVP, including better packages, culture, and rewards, to compensate for the value employees deliver.

The employee value proposition is an employer’s promise to employees. It is the perceived value that employees gain through their employment, including the following:

1. Compensation package
2. Workplace culture
3. Benefits, perks, and rewards
4. Work environment
5. Learning and development opportunities

Most potential candidates evaluate a company’s EVP to determine whether they want to join the organization. Existing employees also decide their stay with the company based on its EVP.
Hence, companies with appealing EVPs attract frontline talent, increasing their access to a larger talent pool.

EVP and employer brand are different concepts. EVP is internal, focusing on motivating employees, increasing engagement, and improving retention. Employer brand is an external factor that potential employees evaluate. EVP is a promise, while employer brand is the organization’s reputation in the job market.

Globally, enterprises are dealing with the Great Attrition.

Employers need to hire replacements and look for ways to retain existing employees. Employee-centric culture is critical for businesses to reinforce deeper connections, enable radical flexibility, and offer personal growth opportunities.

Companies must create unique, compelling, and relevant EVPs based on the needs and expectations of their existing and potential employees. Leaders must continuously ask what makes their company an attractive workplace.

According to Gartner research, radical flexibility boosts employee performance by 18% when the work conditions support employee productivity. Hence, organizations must include flexibility choices in their employee value proposition, as discussed:

1. Clear and factual statements about the company culture, including its purpose, culture, and values
2. An inclusive and diverse work environment that encourages communication, collaboration, and transparency between peers and supervisors
3. Financial rewards such as salary, bonus, stock options, etc.
4. Work benefits like remote working, paid time off, comprehensive health insurance (including family health insurance), mental wellness programs, fitness programs, retirement funds, parental leaves, sponsored vacations, etc.
5. Learning, development, and career growth opportunities with a purpose, such as technical and leadership training, promotions, mentorship programs, paid educational courses, etc.
6. Additional office perks such as free coffee, gym memberships, company-sponsored lunches, team-building workshops, etc.
7. A supportive workplace culture that promotes holistic well-being and good work-life balance.

When the EVP resonates with employee expectations, it drives business success. Many successful enterprises have designed the ideal EVP to motivate their employees. Below are some of the employee value proposition examples that have helped top brands succeed:

NVIDIA

NVIDIA attracts purpose-driven candidates with its EVP. The company encourages innovation in gaming, AI, and quantum computing, inspiring candidates to work in a highly technical environment and sharing and connecting with peers in creating cutting-edge solutions.

NVIDIA EVP

Unilever

Unilever emphasizes employees working together to make a difference. The company encourages its employees to create a better world.

Unilever EVP

Delta Air Lines

Delta Air Lines shifts the focus to flexibility and work benefits. They offer updated high-priority offerings, especially after Covid-19.

Delta Air Lines EVP

Designing a robust EVP that aligns with evolving business priorities is crucial to continued success. The EVP must differentiate the company and align with the enterprise-wide strategy. It must be authentic and appeal to the labor market and existing workforce. Employees look beyond paychecks to determine whether they want to work for a company. Thus, leaders must choose employee value proposition elements that work best for the organization based on its purpose, objectives, and employee expectations.

Developing a great employee value proposition begins with research, analysis, implementation, and optimization.

Employers must first understand the audience and their expectations before drafting EVP. Getting feedback from existing and past employees about what they love about the company will help design a good EVP.

Surveys, one-on-one meetings, focus groups, and exit interviews are some ways feedback can be collected with simple questionnaires. Transparent communication, including all the stakeholders, such as current, former, and prospective employees, is also essential.

Information collected in the previous stage will give detailed insight into employee expectations. Employers must utilize quantitative and qualitative analysis to determine metrics and analytics that help identify key elements in the EVP. This will help develop benefits and perks programs that the employees value.

The employee value proposition must be presented crisply and attractively, detailing the company offerings for a potential employee. These frameworks and templates are useful to structure the EVP to drive recruitment messages. They can be posted on the careers page to assist the hiring team. However, organizations should draft EVP to reflect employee and candidate expectations rather than considering it as a tagline.

Implementing EVP with an action plan is much more important than drafting EVP to attract talent. The EVP should be actionable with a human-first approach. Use multiple channels to deliver EVP meaning and gather feedback. The first draft can be improved based on the feedback obtained by testing the message with a small group.

Leaders should continuously optimize their employee value proposition to maximize return on investment (ROI). Employee expectations and business objectives change as the business grows and expands to new markets. Creating EVP tracking KPIs will help enterprises optimize the EVP based on the impact and expectations in the future.

Employers’ first step in attracting and retaining talent is designing the perfect employee value proposition. Leaders must monitor and track EVP to continuously optimize it. It is a key communication tool highlighting that the company values employees’ contributions and cares for their needs. Developing and monitoring key EVP metrics helps leaders align the company EVP with the latest trends in the labor market.

Using Mercer | Mettl’s suite of assessments helps build an employee value proposition. Our reskilling tests like Skills Gap Analysis, Learning Agility & Proximity, and Training Effectiveness allow for understanding the learning and development needs of the workforce. Similarly, pre-employment assessments help improve candidate experience during recruitment by enhancing candidate selection and ensuring hiring accuracy and transparency.