What We Learned About Company Culture After Researching Over 1000 Employers

At the end of last year, GoodSeeker created a Top 20 Story-Rich Employers of Nashville List (see here). It's part of our mission to find and promote companies that walk the talk on company culture and values, regularly celebrate employee success, and work hard to connect talent to their brands in a positive way.

We learned a lot after spending hundreds of hours meticulously scanning for spotlight posts, employee blogs, and culture/values pages. Our research included analysis of data from review sites and a unique formula for assessing employee "voices on values." Learn more about the research here. We learned that although many companies are trying to spotlight their culture, the best are embracing new ways to use employee stories and voices to prove that they are an employer of choice.

Highlights:

• 21% promote company values from their homepage.
• 17% spotlight real employee stories on their website.
• 13% spotlight real employees on social media at least monthly.
• Companies who spotlight values and employees had an average Culture Rating of 3.8. 
• The average overall rating for all companies is 3.5 on Glassdoor.

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Is your company looking to shine a light on culture, values and what you stand for as a top employer? We are offer a free assessment and benchmarking based on our research and data. To see where your company stands visit here. We will share recommendations based on what we saw from similar size companies and within your industry.

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4  things Story Rich Employers are doing to stand out:

1. Highlight your employees on social media - shows authenticity matters

Maybe your company has an active Instagram account with photos of your products and customers. Maybe you schedule posts often about new services or an upcoming sales event, but what about your employees? Taking time to feature them is just as important as they are part of your employer brand. Your employees are what makes the wheels turn. Having a dedicated day once a week, bi-weekly, or monthly to highlight a particular employee demonstrates that you care. And make it personal to them. Have them answer questions such as “In what ways has our company supported you?” or “What’s your favorite part of working here?” Feel free to ask fun facts as well!Don’t make the post simply, “Welcome to the team!” Add more so your customers can get to know who is behind the face of the company.

Looking for companies that do a great job at this? Check out Freeman Webb Company, Williamson Medical Center, and Vaco Nashville - congrats to them for making our Nashville list.

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2. Create a dedicated Instagram account for employees (and a hashtag)

If you want to take it a step further, as some companies are doing, consider creating a dedicated employee or careers Instagram account. Many companies are on the hunt for content. You can use this page for recruiting purposes, employee success, and most importantly - easily generating more employee content to re-share and re-purpose. Employers should share this page with potential candidates in order for candidates to gain a better understanding of your company culture and the other employees on the team. Creating a company hashtag is fun too as it makes your company content easily searchable and simpler to find. 

Looking for companies that have a dedicated Instagram account? Check out Asurion, Gallup, and Change.org. 
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3. Create an employee success focused blog

This is a great opportunity to stand out and is easy to implement if your company already has a blog. Similarly, instead of posting solely about your product or news about your market, post a feature or success story on an employee. 

Only 24% of the companies we researched had a blog that included employee success stories. We saw a direct correlation between companies who spotlight employee success on the likelihood of having above average ratings on review sites like Glassdoor and Indeed.  

Here are two of our favorite employee blogs for you: Gallup: Meet Our People and ManTech: Employee Spotlights. 

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4. Create a culture and values page that people can actual find - and believe!

Do you have a mission and vision statement on your website? You might think that’s enough but we’d encourage you to think again. Including your company values on your website is critical to showing what you’re all about to potential candidates and even your customers. Having a company culture page is yet another way for job seekers to gain a sense of the company and what you value. 

One issue we see often at GoodSeeker is companies hide their culture and values page in different sections of their website. If possible, include these sections at the top of your website - just make sure they’re in plain site.

We found examples of great culture pages include: Booz Allen Hamilton, ECS, and Hilton. 

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Conclusion

After looking at so many company’s websites, social media pages, review sites, we gained a lot of insights. A relatively small group of companies are leading the pack in celebrating the employee experience and making teams feel more connected to values. They truly stand out.

Others have a tremendous opportunity to put employees at the center of their culture and brand story. It's the right thing to do, and it's good for business. And for good reason.

According to HubSpot, 69% of employees say they’d work harder if they were better appreciated. True stories are proof that you care! Research also shows that people are / have lost faith in ads. One study showed that 75% of respondents don’t consider advertisements to be the truth. They trust peers. True employee stories give candidates and customers confidence in your claims and proof that you walk the talk.

In addition, studies show that engagement improves quality of work and health. Especially in the midst of the pandemic, it’s never been a better time for companies to take the time to share success stories about their employees. Stories are a great way to boost remote worker engagement.

Please let us know what you think of these tips. We’d love to hear from you! We’re excited to continue sharing Top Story-Rich Employer lists in new cities across the U.S - stay tuned! 

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GoodSeeker is a storytelling and talent spotlight platform that makes it easy and rewarding for employees and ambassadors to spotlight success stories at work. This tool lets employers show what they stand for and inspire others to do the same. It’s not a social network or a review site. It’s a brand new, unique way to collect, write, and share stakeholder generated stories that are too often missed.

Companies like Evans Consulting, Helios HR, and LION know the power of employee stories. If you are ready to spotlight success in a new way Create your FREE account today and sign up for a demo here. We look forward to showing you how GoodSeeker can help you attract and keep the best talent. 

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