IMPROVING THE APPLICANT POOL
THROUGH EMPLOYER BRANDING
A case study at CMS Derks Star Busmann, on how to
optimize their applicant pool
Master thesis, MscBA, specialization Human Resource Management, University of
Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business
JITSKE TUINSTRA
Studentnumber: 1668544
Springweg 99
3511 VL Utrecht
Tel.: +31 (0)6-46264588
E-mail: j.tuinstra.3@student.rug.nl
Supervisor/ university
drs. J. van Polen
prof. dr. H.B.M. Molleman
Supervisor/ field of study
E.C. Bolt & M. Lever
ABSTRACT
CMS DSB, a large international service provider, has quantitative as well as qualitative problems with their applicant pool as a result of the shortage at the labour market and more and more demanding law-students (the company’s future recruits).
Based on the theoretical framework, the preferences law-students have regarding their future employer were measured as well as the brand-image of CMS DSB. A benchmark report of the current reputation of CMS DSB among other in size and performance comparable firms was set up in order to find out where the improvement opportunities for CMS DSB lie. The information was obtained making use of two online-surveys (N= 313 and N=30) and several interviews (N=7), with law students as target group.
TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION...4 2. THEORY...6 Employer branding...6 Psychological contracts...7 Organizational identity...8 Personality characteristics...8
Brand identity and brand image...9
Three step process...10
Familiarity...10 Job-attributes...10 3. RESEARCH METHODS ... 11 Procedure... 11 Quantitative research... 11 Qualitative research... 12 Respondents... 13 Measures... 13 Data analysis...15 4. RESULTS... 16
Preferences of third year and master law-students... 16
Reputation of CMS DSB regarding job-attributes and among other firms...19
Brand-image of CMS DSB under law-students... 22
Recruitment activities... 23
5. DISCUSSION... 24
Preferences of law-students
...24
Brand-image and reputation benchmark
... 26
Recommendations for CMS DSB
... 27
Limitations and suggestions for further research
... 29
1. INTRODUCTION
The Dutch population is ‘greying’ and ‘de-greening’ following a report from the European Union (2005). The prognosis is that in 2050 the population aged 65 and over, as a percentage of the population aged 15-64 is over 35% compared to 16.6% in 2003. Because of the aging population, it is unavoidable that the labor-force will age as well. Over the period 2011-2030 the whole baby-boom generation, born in 1955 until 1964, will reach the retirement age (European Union, 2005). These people must be replaced by a much less numerous population born in the 1970’s 1980’s or early 1990’s (Carone, 2005). Already visible are the growing numbers of jobs and unfilled vacancies in the consultancy sector. As can be seen in figure 1.1, the consultancy sector shows the biggest job-growth during the next few years. The growth of the labor productivity in this sector is low which means that for companies the only way to solve the gap between the amount of work and the number of employees is by hiring more people (CWI, labour market prognosis 2008-2013).
The human resource department of the large and international juridical service provider CMS Derks Star Busmann (CMS DSB), which is also part of the consultancy sector, already has to deal with the problems of shortage at the labor-market. CMS DSB has qualitative as well as quantitative problems to find employees who can fill the vacant positions within the company. Hitt, Bierman, Shimizu and Kochhar (2001) found that an important factor of why firms differ in performance is because they differ in their human capital. This shows the importance of recruiting and maintaining only the best employees (Bierman, et all., 2001).
FIGUUR 1.1
Labour market prognosis for the number of jobs (CWI report 2008-2013)
offices have to invest more in becoming popular and standing out in order to be able to recruit the best students (Blauw Research, 2010). CMS DSB doubts if the unique aspects of the company are optimal communicated and known under students. CMS DSB also wonders how popular the firm currently is under law-students compared to other, in size and performance comparable firms. These doubts became clear in the results from two different sources of internal research (graduation report from a student human resource management and a communication report made by an extern company). In these researches employees and partners expressed their concerns relating the reputation of CMS DSB under law-students.
External research from juridical publisher Ars Aequi points in the same direction as the internal researches. Ars Aequi conducted independent research concerning the attractiveness of advertisements and brands of law-firms among 402 law-students. The students criticized the advertisements of 44 offices, including the advertisement of CMS DSB. The main result from this research was that students prefer to do an internship or apply for jobs at companies whose advertisement they liked the most and whose brand they thought was the strongest. CMS DSB gathered the 34th place, which indicates that for the respondents, CMS DSB was indeed not attractive as a future place to work in comparison to the other 43 firms (Ars Aequi, 2011). Pol (2010) also conducted research into the brand strategies and the effects of these strategies at big law firms. He showed that law firms underestimate the importance of their image and that there are a lot of improvement possibilities in this sector (Pol, 2010). The question that now arises is whether there is a link between the reputation of CMS DSB and the problem they face with their applicant pool.
In literature the connection between on the one hand a companies brand and reputation and on the other hand the number of applicants seems obvious (Edwards, 2010, Pol, 2010, Turban & Cable 2003, ect.). The applicant pool of a company is one of the most important measures of recruitment success (Turban, & Cable 2003). Research shows that the reputation of a company significantly influences the applicant pool of a firm, which indicates that the reputation of a company is for a part responsible for recruitment success (Turban, & Cable 2003). Following Turban and Cable (2003), companies who want to attract quality employees should benchmark their current reputation among potential applicants relative to that of other comparable companies. If it can be concluded that the reputation is not optimal, steps should be taken to improve the brand among the group of potential employees (Turban, & Cable, 2003). Taking this into account, the main question raises:
In what way should CMS DSB change its brand in order to improve the applicant pool, qualitative as well as quantitative?
In order to answer the research question, a theoretical framework will be presented in the following section. Theories from different fields are used to provide a complete picture of the influence employer reputation can have on the applicant pool of a firm. After the explanation of literature, the methodology of this research will be presented. This methodology section will include the sample and design of the study, and the choices made regarding the data collection and analysis. The methodology section will be followed by the results section which consists of an overview of the gathered information that is relevant to answer the research question. The information from the results section will be interpreted in the discussion section. In the discussion section also the practical lessons that can be learned related to the research questions will be outlined, and recommendations will be provided to the company. To conclude, a critical reflection is given on the research.
2. THEORY
Employer Branding
The first theory that will be discussed broadly is the concept of employer branding. The term employer branding was first defined by Ambler and Barrow in 1996. Over the years, more and more firms started using employer branding in their human resource strategy to attract future employees to their firm (Backhaus, & Tikoo, 2004).
Employer branding can be defined as the differentiation of a firm’s characteristics as an employer, from those of its competitors. The employment brand highlights the unique aspects of the firm’s employment offerings and environment (Backhaus, & Tikoo, 2004). These unique aspects may include, among other, possibilities for promotion, company culture, life work balance, ect. (Tüzüner, & Yüksel, 2009). Employers can successfully manage their company’s image, the way the company is seen through the eyes of potential hires, by applying employer branding (Martin, & Beaumont, 2003). Employer branding differentiates itself from product and corporate branding in that it does not consider how a product or organization is represented to a variety of external audience. However, employer branding has as main goal to show the company as a desirable place to work, with current en future employees as specific branding targets (Edwards, 2010). People differ in what they want and in how they experience things. The central idea behind employer branding however, is to create one shared employment experience by summarizing the different ideas of employees and presenting these in branding campaigns (Edwards, 2010).
2000). The social categories that people belong to influence their self-concepts as well as their social status. The reputation of an organization can therefore influence the self-concept and social status of employees as well as potential employees (Hogg, & Terry, 2001). The signalling theory is also relevant in understanding how a decision of a job-applicant can be influenced by a firm’s brand and reputation (Breaugh, 1992). Following the signalling theory, applicants do not have all information about a firm so they interpret the available information as signals. However, when the brand of a company is strong the available signals will be interpreted as more positive than when the brand is weaker or unknown (Breaugh, 1992)
Although it seems clear that employer branding could be of major importance in the HR sector, still little theoretical and empirical work from the academic HR literature focuses on the concept of employer branding (Edwards, 2010). Therefore some additional theories from other fields can be linked to employer branding to understand the concept better (Edwards, 2010). Edwards (2010) differentiated the theories of psychological contracts, organizational identity and personality characteristics as main theories to describe and explain the concept of employer branding. Based on above research from Edwards (2010) the theories mentioned will be elaborated on in the following sections.
Psychological contracts
The concept of employer branding consists for a great part of selling the unique characteristics of the employment relationship to current and future employees. There are two types of employment contracts. The first type consists of the written contractual terms and conditions that are needed to start an official employment relationship. The second type is the unwritten, so called psychological contract which is formed through the branding process (Rousseau, 1990). The psychological contract consists of expectations from the (future-) employee about what the (future-) employee owes to the employer and what the employer owes in return. Psychological contracts are based on all information future-recruits have about the company through media, current employee’s experiences, job-interviews, ect. (Rousseau, 1990). Although the expectations from the psychological contract are never confirmed on paper, if the perceptions get breached this will cause negative behaviour and attitudes in employees and if the relationships do not change this will eventually result in poor performance and discharge of the employees (Ng, Feldman, & Lam, 2010). The consequences of breached contracts show the importance of a truthful company presentation (Ng, et all., 2010).
and job security. Make-oriented firms, who focus on the long-term contributions potential employees can make to the firm and the developments a person can go through within the company, foster such relational contracts in employees during recruitment (Miles, & Snow, 1984). Martin and Hetrick (2006) also identify a third type of psychological contract, which is the ideological contract. The ideology focus goes beyond things that serve relational or economical purposes. The fulfilment employees get from working towards an ideology goal can also be seen as a reward. The more people value an ideological goal the less important rewards such as money get. Supporting charity is an example of an ideological goal (Martin, & Hetrick, 2006).
A company who provides a unique and attractive psychological contract automatically makes its brand more distinctive, and this can help in attracting employees (Edwards, 2010). However, a company should be careful with presenting itself more attractive than the reality in order to reduce the chance of damaging the psychological contract eventually (Ng, et all., 2010).
Organizational identity
The aspect of a unique identity is an important part of the employer branding definition. This makes the crossover to the organizational identity literature obvious. The term organizational identity is an often-used term in the personnel psychology field. Two types of organizational identities can be differentiated. The first type is the perceived organizational identity which consists of the perception of insiders (employees) about the values and reputation of the company. The second type is the construed external image which focuses on the perception of insiders, about how outsiders perceive the reputation and values of the company (Dutton, Dukerich, & Harquail, 1994). Both are important for the self-concept of employees, following the social identity theory. Furthermore, it is important for a company that the perceived organizational identity and the construed external image are the same among employees (Lievens, Hoye, & Anseel, 2007). The inside identity of a company and the outside attractiveness are strongly related to each other. Organizations want to attract talented applicants by showing their image as an attractive employer. At the same time organizations should ensure that the image they show is consistent with how current employees view the identity of the organization, to be sure the psychological contracts do not get damaged (Lievens et al., 2007). When construed external images of employees are negative within a company, the company should investigate the real image of outsiders and report the findings to their employees (Lievens, Hoye, & Anseel, 2007).
Personality characteristics
receive approval from their social environment (social-identity theory). Effective employer branding should take a pro-active approach by trying to identify the most desirable work-features to promote (Backhaus, & Tikoo, 2004).
Brand identity and brand image
Besides the differentiation made between the perceived organizational identity and the construed external image, which both focus on perceptions of employees, there is also the difference between the brand identity and the brand image. The brand identity is the message that is sent out by a company, it is how the company shows its company identity. However, it is uncertain if people perceive the brand the same way as it was meant, this customer perception is called the brand image. Figure 2.1 presents an overview of the two concepts (Nandan, 2005). In the current market it is very common that the brand identity and the brand image do not match with each other. And while the market is tight and the competition for talent high, it is easy for recruits to move on to other companies when they do not like the brand image they perceive (Nandan, 2005).
Another advantage of a strong brand image is the fact that it influences the quality of applicants. Firms with strong brands will attract more high-quality applicants and less applicants who are average or beneath average (Turban, & Cable, 2003). The Expectancy theory predicts that potential applicants who review a job or a firm as not-attainable automatically find the job and/or the firm less-attractive, this group of potential applicants will often not apply (Vroom, 1964). For firms who want to attract high potential students an inaccessible image can be an advantage, since less average students will apply and therefore the quality of the applicants will increase (Vroom, 1964). Feedback from the side of the recruits about the brand is crucial in order to know whether or not the brand is perceived the way it is supposed to (Nandan, 2005).
When it becomes clear that the perceived brand identity is not how it is supposed to be, the brand identity-message should be adapted. When the identity and the image match with each other it is important for a company to keep all the messages they sent out about the brand consistent. This consistency is needed in order to create a strong, long lasting brand image (Nandan, 2005).
FIGURE 2.1
Three step process
According to Backhaus and Tikoo (2004) employer branding can be seen as a three-step process. The first step focuses on the value proposition of the company, defining the organizations brand identity. The second step focuses on external- and the third step on internal-marketing of the value proposition, how to sell the brands identity and thus how to create the brands image (Backhaus and Tikoo, 2004).
Current research will focus on the first two steps in this model. The audit image should incorporate beliefs about what the characteristics are of an attractive employer (Backhaus and Tikoo, 2004). When the brand image has been mapped properly, this could be linked to the brand identity in order to identify a possible gap between the brand identity and the brand image. Before going further some literature will be provided according to step 2, how to market the brand identity successfully.
FIGURE 2.2 Three step model
Familiarity
It is important for a company to create familiarity of the companies brand (Cable, & Turban, 2003). The higher the familiarity of a company’s brand under potential recruits the better recruitment advertisements are read and memorized (Cable, & Turban, 2003). Furthermore, Cable and Turban (2003) state that advertising how good the company is only during the recruitment period is not trustworthy to future recruits, and this does not enhance the popularity. Instead of promoting the company only during recruitment, communicating information to potential recruits should be a long-term process in order to enhance the familiarity and to alter the external perceptions of potential recruits. Furthermore, it is important to know where potential recruits go search for a job in order to shift the recruitment of a firm to those sources (Cable, & Turban, 2003).
Job-attributes
et all. stated in 1968 that job-attributes are of main importance for the job-choice decision of job seekers investigations in job related attributes have been done (Moy, & Lee, 2001). It is of main importance for an employer to be familiar with the preferences of job seekers regarding job-attributes while these attributes can influence the attractiveness of the job, as well as the attractiveness of the employer (Moy , & Lee, 2001). Moy and Lee (2001) identified and tested nine job-attributes which were after extensive research selected out of an original list of 15 attributes that was developed by Powell in 1991. The highest rated job-attribute was: long-term career prospects followed by: pay, job security, managerial relationships, fringe benefits, working conditions, involvement in decision making, responsibilities given and marketability (Moy, & Lee, 2001). Above attributes are interesting for current research because they can help to identify which job-attributes current law students find most important, and which job-attributes should be promoted in vacancies. Although Moy and Lee (2001) did not control for gender differences in their study, Chow and Hang-yue (2002) did find gender differences in the degree of importance of job-attributes. Therefore it might be useful to control for gender differences in current research.
Research discussed above showed the importance of a strong employer brand and a strong brand identity in order to create a strong brand-image under potential recruits. This will automatically lead to a qualitative as well as quantitative improvement of the applicant pool which is the main aim of current research. The provided psychological contract, familiarity of the firm and provided job-attributes are all factors that influence the brand-image. Therefore, it is necessary to know what preferences law-students have according to these factors. In the following part the research methods of this study will be discussed.
3. RESEARCH METHODS Procedure
Current research is based on the mixed methods approach which combines quantitative with qualitative research (Johnson, &Onwuegbuzie, 2004). The advantage of the mixed methods approach is that it combines the advantage of a large sample from the quantitative part (accuracy, generalization ect.) and the advantage of understanding and description from the qualitative part (Johnson, & Onwuegbuzie, 2004).
The main part of this research is the quantitative part, which consists of two online surveys. The qualitative part of the research consists of several interviews.
Quantitative research
was made because currently CMS DSB does not include first and second year students in their recruitment activities. As was already stated in the theory section, it is important that a company is not only promoted during the recruitment period, but instead the communication of information to potential recruits should already start at an early stage (Cable, & Turban, 2003). For that reason, it seems important to find out ways to enhance the brand awareness of CMS DSB under first and second year law-students. Third year and master law students are already the focus of current recruitment activities of CMS DSB therefore, the expectation is that third year and master students are more familiar with CMS DSB than first and second year law-students. Furthermore, according to Business Courses (2007), third year and master students are more focussed on their future employer than are first and second year students.
Besides the main question: in what way should CMS DSB change its brand in order to improve the applicant pool, qualitative as well as quantitative? four side-questions were formulated based on theory.
The survey distributed to third year and master law-students was mainly indented to answer the first two side-questions:
1. Which preferences have third year and master law-students regarding job-attributes, psychological contracts and ways to search for a job? (Q1)
2. How does CMS DSB score regarding the job-attributes, and how does it score compared to other, in size and performance comparable firms (reputation benchmark)? (Q2)
Both surveys were used to answer the third side-question:
3. What is the image of CMS DSB under law students regarding the attractiveness of CMS DSB, the familiarity with the firm, and the opinion regarding the promotion material?(Q3)
The survey distributed under first and second year law-student was also used to answer the fourth side-question:
4. Which recruitment activities are recommended for third year and master students and which activities are recommended for first and second year students? (Q4)
Respondents for the surveys were recruited through advertisements at websites of law-faculties and other law-student related web-sites. Furthermore, a mailing with an invitation for the surveys was sent to 700 law-students from faculties in Utrecht, Tilburg and Leiden. The respondents were unaware of the fact that CMS DSB was the initiator of the survey, in order to prevent socially desirable answers.
Qualitative research
law-firms, so they have much reference material. Furthermore, the interviews might give an explanation or a better understanding of some of the survey results.
The two questionnaires and the interview questions will be discussed more broadly in the measures section.
Respondents
Survey for third year students and master students. 313 respondents filled out the
online-survey and all of these respondents were law-students. 85% of the respondents have already chosen a field of study, an overview of the different fields of study can be found in appendix 1. 88 respondents (28%) were excluded from the survey because they were not interested in a career in the advocacy, tax or notary. CMS DSB is not a future employer for this group of respondents, and therefore the opinion of these respondents is not important in light of current research. Eventually 225 respondents stayed in the survey. 74% of the respondents were female and over 90% of the respondents were between the age 20 and 26 with an average age of 21.5. 36% of the respondents were studying in Groningen, 20% in Utrecht, 14% in Amsterdam, 12% in Nijmegen and the remaining 18% of the respondents were studying in Leiden, Tilburg, Rotterdam or Maastricht. Not all respondents answered all questions, in the results section the number of respondents per question will be reported.
Survey for first and second year students. 30 respondents filled out the online-survey and all
of these respondents were law-students. 63% of the respondents were female and 90% of the respondents were between the age 19 and 24. The respondents were studying in Amsterdam, Groningen, Nijmegen, Rotterdam and Utrecht.
Interviews with boards of law-student organizations. Seven law-students were interviewed
from five different boards of law-student organizations. Five of the students were male. The interviewed students were located at a board in Groningen, Leiden, Rotterdam Tilburg or Utrecht.
Measures
Survey for third year and master law-student. Third year and master law-students were asked
to fill out a questionnaire which contained twenty-six questions regarding six different subjects: general, job-attributes, psychological contracts, reputation benchmark, orientation on a future employer and CMS DSB.
In order to answer Q1, preferences law students have for particular job-attributes concerning their future job were measured using the nine job-attributes from Moy, & Lee (2002) mentioned in the theory section. These job-attributes were combined and replaced with favored job-attributes under students indentified in the more recent study of Ebbinge Company (2011). To identify whether students prefer symbolic or more instrumental features of a company, properties regarding the symbolic/instrumental framework were added following the theory of Backhaus, & Tikoo (2004). Based on the mentioned three sources, sixteen statements were formulated in total. An example of a statement is: “My choice for a future employer is mainly based on the salary they pay”. In order to facilitate the quantification, respondents had to criticize the statements on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from totally agree to totally disagree (Boer, Bouwman, Frisser, Houben, 2005). To prevent that applicants would answer in patterns, for some attributes similar kind of statements were given with reversed polarity (Brace, 2008). The chance exists that students find all job-attributes equally important, therefore students were additionally asked to make a top three of most favorable job-attributes and these rank scores should be compared with the mean scores.
To identify which kind of psychological contract students prefer, transactional, relational and ideological aspects of the psychological contracts were compared with each other, making use of twelve statements (Rousseau, 1990). Two statements were put against each other and the options were from left to right: (1) totally agree with statement A, (2) partly agree with statement A, (3) not agree with A or B, (4) partly agree with statement B and (5) totally agree with statement B. Parallel-form reliability was used to enhance the reliability of the answers (Salkind, 2006). Using this method the same kind of statement comparisons were offered multiple times, but with different words and formulations.
Two questions were added about if and how students already orientate on their future employer in order to find out where CMS DSB should place its recruitment advertisements, and where they should organize recruitment activities.
In order to answer Q3, the last part of the questionnaire under third year and master students focused especially on the attractiveness and familiarity with CMS DSB. Using three items, the familiarity of respondents with the company CMS DSB was measured. The three familiarity items were based on items used by Turban (2001). Four items were used to measure the attractiveness of CMS DSB under the respondents who were familiar with CMS DSB. The attractiveness items were based on items from the measure of organizational attractiveness by Highhouse, Lievens, & Sinar (2003). Furthermore, questions were posed about how students became familiar with CMS DSB, and what first comes to mind when they think of CMS DSB.
Survey for first and second year law-students. First- and second year law-students were asked
to fill out a questionnaire which contained of fourteen questions. The survey started with some general questions which were all measured with one item. The questions were mainly included to be able to check if the respondents met the requirements for the target-group. In order to answer Q4, questions were included about the willingness of students to engage in activities organized by their study association or law-firms, and which activities they would like. The questionnaire ended with specific questions regarding CMS DSB, to inventories the familiarity with CMS DSB under first and second year law-students (Q3).
Interview questions. The semi-structured interview consisted of twenty questions, and took
approximately 45 minutes to complete. The interview started with questions regarding recruitment activities for third year and master students as well as for first and second year students (Q4). The interview continued with several questions regarding the advertisements and other promotion material of CMS (Q3). These questions were asked in response of the results from ARS AEQUI, where CMS DSB scored real low on attractiveness based on their advertisements (Ars Aequi, 2011). The aim is now to find out why this is the case, and how the other (recruitment-) promotion material is judged. In this line, the board-members were also asked their opinion regarding the attractiveness of the stand for fairs of CMS DSB and the presentation of the company during in-house days. In addition to the questions in the surveys, some questions were asked concerning the reputation of CMS DSB and the preferred job-attributes. These questions were posed to get a better insight and understanding of why law students value some firms and job-attributes over others.
Data analysis
Survey for third year and master law-students. For analyzing the surveys data the statistical
package for social sciences was used (SPSS). Furthermore, excel was used in order to present the data graphically.
preferred job-attributes between good and average students, the non-parametric Mann Whitney U test was conducted. Respondents were placed in the “good student” group when the following criteria were met: an average grade of 7.5 or higher, and at least one relevant extracurricular activity. The Mann-Whitney test was also conducted to be able to control for possible differences between genders, in preferences for job-attributes.
To analyze the preferred psychological contract, mean scores, standard deviations, and test values were used. In order to measure if the preference is significant, the Wilcoxon signed ranks test was conducted. The Mann-Whitney test was performed in order to control for the differences between good and average respondents and differences between genders.
Average percentages, diagrams, and descriptive statistics were used for analyzing the brand images of the ten firms and for the comparison of the brand images. The expectancy theory was researched using correlations and a diagram.
Descriptive statistics and diagrams were used for analyzing the orientation of the respondents regarding a future employer and also to analyze the questions related tot CMS DSB.
Survey for first and second year law-students and the interview questions. Descriptive
statistics were used to analyze the data from the first and second year survey and the interview questions. Due to the small sample size of the first and second year survey, these results will be mentioned concise.
All findings from the surveys and the interviews will be presented in the results section.
4. RESULTS
Preferences of third year and master law-students
This first part of the results section will present the findings regarding the preferences of third year and master law students (Q1). The results are based on the survey under third year and master law students.
Table 4.1 shows the mean scores and standard deviations of the thirteen job-attributes. The higher the score, the higher the job-attribute was valued by the respondents. A score of 3 or below indicates that the job-attribute was appreciated as unimportant. Using the Wilcoxon signed ranks test, the mean scores were compared with the score 3. The job-attributes: international environment and a businesslike environment differed not significantly from 3. For the other job-attributes counts that, at the = 0,05 level of significance, there exists enough evidence to conclude that the scores differ from 3.
job-attribute high status firm scores only average (M=3,22). The mean rank score of the top five most important attributes are shown in the most right column, where the number 1 represents the job-attribute with the highest average rank. The average top 5 based on the ranks correspondents with the average top 5 based on mean scores, with only a slight difference within the top 5.
Table 4.2 shows the mean scores and the standard deviations on the job-attributes, separating male and female. Right of the standard deviation column the test score of the Mann-Whitney U test is shown. A non-significance test score (P>0,05) indicates that there is not a significant difference between the average scores of male and female, and thus that the two groups can be seen as equal. Female law students value the job-attributes friendly working atmosphere and corporate social responsibility significantly higher than their male colleagues (p=0,03 and p= 0,03). In contrast, male law-students valuated autonomy significantly higher than female law-students (p= 0,01). For the other job-attributes count that there is not a significant difference between the genders.
There were no significant differences found between good and average students regarding the average scores on any of the job-attributes. Appendix 2 gives an overview of the mean scores, standard deviations and test scores of the good and average group of respondents. Appendix 3 shows the job-attributes that the respondents added to the list of job-attributes themselves.
TABLE 4.1
Mean scores, standard deviations, test statistics, and mean ranking scores for job-attribute
* Significant test score with P< 0,05 (two-tailed) ** Significant test score with P< 0,001 (two-tailed)
(N=167)
Std. deviation
Wilcoxon signed ranks test score (test value= 3)
Average top 5 (ranking scores) Personal development (training
& courses) 4,43 0,48 z= -11,17 (p<0,001)** 1
Friendly working atmosphere 4,37 0,37 z= -11,19 (p< 0,001)** 2
Good supervision & support 3,99 0,57 z= -10,01 (p< 0,001)** 4
Job security 3,96 0,78 z= - 8,48 (p< 0,001)** 5
Private-work balance 3,67 0,77 z= - 3,63 (p< 0,001)** 3
Flexible hours 3,43 0,79 z= - 5,67 (p< 0,001)**
Corporate social responsibility 3,31 0,82 z= - 4,18 (p< 0,001)**
High status firm 3,22 0,95 z= - 2,84 (p< 0,001)**
International environment 3,04 1,3 z= - 0,58 (p= 0,56)
Businesslike environment 2,93 0,97 z= - 0,95 (p= 0,34)
Autonomy 2,84 0,98 z= - 2,00 (p< 0,05)*
Many jurisdictions 2,68 0,91 z= - 3,72 (p< 0,001)**
TABLE 4.2
Mean scores and test statistics for job-attributes, separating male and female
Job-attributes Male (N=38) Female (N=128)
Mean
Std.
deviation Mean
Std. deviation
Mann Whitney test score
Personal development
(training & courses) 4,51 0,50 4,41 0,47 U= 2162,50 (p= 0,20)
Friendly working atmosphere 4,16 0,64 4,43 0,58 U= 1988,00 (p= 0,03)*
Good supervision & support 4,00 0,66 3,98 0,78 U= 2431,00 (p= 0,78)
Private-work balance 3,43 0,80 3,73 0,75 U= 1979,50 (p= 0,05)
Job security 3,82 1,04 4,01 0,68 U= 2356,50 (p= 0,60)
Flexible hours 3,21 0,84 3,50 0,90 U= 2005,50 (p= 0,05)
Corporate social responsibility 3,05 0,99 3,39 0,87 U= 1925,50 (p= 0,03)*
High status firm 3,32 1,04 3,20 0,93 U= 2289,50 (p= 0,41)
International environment 3,00 1,07 3,06 1,16 U= 2397,00 (p= 0,67)
Businesslike environment 3,03 1,03 2,91 0,98 U= 2293,00 (p= 0,42)
Autonomy 3,16 0,86 2,74 1,00 U= 1827,00 (p< 0,01)**
Many jurisdictions 2,92 1,10 2,61 0,90 U= 2142,00 (p= 0,13)
High salaries and benefits 2,71 0,98 2,52 0,90 U= 2212,50 (p= 0,23)
* Significant test score with P< 0,05 (two-tailed) ** Significant test score with P< 0,01 (two-tailed)
Table 4.3 shows the mean scores, standard deviations, and test values of the preferences for psychological contracts under third year and master law-students. A significant test score indicates that the average score differs significantly from 3 (3= no preference for one of the two contracts). The relational contract was significantly higher valued than the transactional contract as well as the ideological contract. The transactional contract was higher valued than the ideological contract. Figure 4.1 shows the results graphically to make it clearer. The Mann-Whitney U test showed that there were no significant differences between male and female regarding preferences for psychological contracts. There were also no differences found between good and average students. An overview of the test results for the differences between male and female and good and average students can be found in appendix 4 and appendix 5.
TABEL 4.3
Mean scores and test statistics for psychological contracts
* Significant test score with p< 0,05 (two-tailed) ** Significant test score with p< 0,001 (two-tailed)
Psycholoical contracts (N=170)
Mean Std. deviation
Wilcoxon signed ranks test score (test value= 3) Transactional vs Relational 3,45 0,93 z= -5,78 (p< 0,001)**
Transactional vs Ideological 2,83 0,98 z= -2,26 (p= 0,02)*
FIGURE 4.1
Graphical representation of the preferred psychological contracts
Only 20% of the respondents of survey under third year and master law-students state that they do not concern themselves yet with their future job/employer. 34% orientates themselves through their study association. 43% of the respondents does not orientate using any study organization, but uses the internet, their personal network or arranges an internship at a law-firm. Only 3% orientates themselves on a future employer by using their fraternity.
The majority of the respondents (80%) expect to go search on the internet for a job once they graduated. Especially the corporate and recruitment websites of firms were mentioned as the place to search for vacancies online, and also job-banks are seen as a good option to go search for a job. Only 26% of the respondents expect to use a social-network site on their search for a job. The personal network was mentioned frequently as an open answer.
Reputation of CMS DSB regarding job-attributes
This second part of the results section will present the findings regarding the brand-image of CMS DSB based on the job-attributes and furthermore, a reputation benchmark will be presented (Q2). The results are based on the survey under third year and master law-students.
Figure 4.3 shows how CMS DSB scores compared to the other nine firms. The percentages indicate the percentage of respondents that link the job-attributes to the firm. The figure shows the brand image of the firms regarding the job-attributes. For example, CMS DSB scored 41,8% on the job-attribute “many jurisdictions” this indicates that 41,8% of the respondents expect that CMS DSB operates in many jurisdictions, but it does not imply that this is indeed the truth. Remarkable is that the niche firm has the highest score on friendly working atmosphere, private-work balance and job security however, the niche firm captured the lowest score on the job-attributes high status, international environment, businesslike environment, many jurisdictions and high salaries and benefits.
FIGURE 4.2
FIGURE 4.3
Reputation benchmark of the ten firms on the job-attributes
Brand-image of CMS DSB under law-students
This third part of the results section will present the findings regarding the brand-image of CMS DSB (Q3). The results are based on the two surveys and the interviews.
Figure 4.4 shows the relationship between the willingness to work at a firm, and the expected chance to get a job at that same firm, based on the survey under third year and master law-students. The X-axis represents the percentage of respondents (N= 170) that would like to work at the firm. The Y-axis represents the percentage of students that expects that a job at that same firm is not attainable. The correlation between the willingness to work at a firm and the perception of respondents that the job is not attainable is not significant (R= -0,45 with P=0,19). For CMS DSB counts that 41% of the students would like to work at CMS DSB and 13% of the students see a job at CMS DSB as not-attainable.
FIGURE 4.4
Of the respondents from the third year and master survey (N=169), 52% were familiar with the firm CMS DSB. When only looking at the students from Utrecht (N=36), 58% of the respondents were familiar with the firm CMS DSB. The respondents from Amsterdam (N=19) were most familiar with the firm, as many as 63% knew CMS DSB.
Of the respondents who were familiar with the firm (N=87), over 65% is familiar with the establishment in Utrecht as well as the establishment in Amsterdam. Brussels is less familiar, only 35% of the respondents are aware of the fact that CMS DSB has a third establishment located in Brussels. Furthermore, 60% of the respondents who are familiar with CMS DSB say, that they do not have a good enough impression of the firm in order to asses it properly. The most frequent cited comments regarding what first came to mind at the respondents when thinking of CMS DSB, are shown in appendix 7.
Even though, a large percentage of the respondents does not have a clear image of CMS DSB still a positive, significant correlation is found between the familiarity with CMS DSB and the attractiveness of CMS DSB (R=0,30 with P<0,01). This indicates that the more familiar respondents are with CMS DSB, the more attractive CMS DSB becomes to the respondents. Although the positive relation is significant, it is not a really strong connection (R=0,30)
25% of the respondents of the survey under first and second year law-students (N=30), were familiar with CMS DSB. Of the respondents that were familiar with CMS DSB, 75% were positive about the firm. The majority became familiar with CMS DSB trough friends/family.
The majority of the interviewed board members did also not have a clear image of CMD DSB and in their opinion, the same counts for their colleague students. The majority of the board members state that it is most important that firms tell the truth about their firm, both in their advertisements as well as during events. Most firms portray themselves as the best, the biggest, the nicest employer, ect. However, the majority of the board members rather hear the facts. If a firm states that it is the biggest, they should prove this with numbers. The promotion material of CMS DSB is businesslike and a bit dull in comparison to other firms, according to the majority of the board members. In their opinion, the material should be more noticeable for example by using brighter colours and also more promotion material to stand out.
Recruitment activities
This fourth part of the results section will present the findings regarding the recommended and preferred recruitment activities under law-students (Q4). The results are based on the survey under first and second year students and on the interviews.
attractive to the respondents. However, only 1 respondent stated that he/she actually engaged in an activity organized by or at a law-firm already. 50% of the respondents state that they became familiar with firms through advertisements. The other 50% of the respondents became familiar with law-firms through friends/family, or by looking at websites.
According to the interviews, all board members were convinced of the fact that on the moment the first priority for CMS DSB should be to become better known under law-students. Following the board-members opinions, the low familiarity of CMS DSB causes that students will rather go to activities arranged by more familiar firms, and it also causes that the firms with a higher familiarity get more attention at for example a fair. More promotion material and sponsorships should be arranged by CMS DSB. Board members do not think it is necessary to organize activities for first and second year students. However, they do think it is important to increase the familiarity under first and second year students. The advice of the board members is to sponsor agendas and extracts to enhance the familiarity under first and second year law-students.
5. DISCUSSION
The main aim of this study was to investigate how CMS DSB can improve its applicant pool quantitative as well as qualitative, by making use of employer branding strategies. In this part of the study the results will be discussed.
Preferences of law-students
contradiction to earlier research from Moy and Lee (2002) where the job-attribute good salary and benefits captured the second highest place (Moy, & Lee, 2002). However, during the interviews the board members had a clarifying explanation for this finding. According to the board members the general assumption under law-students is that their future salary will be high at almost all firms. When the salary is above average anyway, other attributes become more important and those other job-attributes differentiate the firms. This might explain the differences between the researches, since in the research from Moy and Lee (2002) business undergraduates were the target group.
Similar to the research from Chow and Hang-yue (2002) some gender differences between preferences in attributes were found in current research. Female law-students valuate the job-attributes friendly working atmosphere and corporate social responsibility significantly higher than their male colleagues. However, also male law-students value a friendly working atmosphere with an average of 4,16 out of 5 which makes it the second highest valued job-attribute under male students. Male students value the job-attribute autonomy significantly higher than female law-students. However, the mean score is around three for both genders which makes it a job-attribute that does not deserve too much attention. Current research as well as research from Chow and Hang-yue (2002) did found some gender differences in preferences for job-attributes however, in both researches these differences are rather small. These findings indicate that there is not enough evidence to advice firms to make a distinction between male and female in their recruitment tactic.
Interesting for law-firms to know is that there was no significant distinction found between good and average students regarding their valuation of job-attributes. The same job-attributes will catch the attention of both groups of students. To conclude this job-attributes part, when law-firms promote the employment opportunities within the firm they should provide law-students especially with detailed information about the atmosphere in the firm, the development programs they offer, and the supervision and support lawyer-interns get from the firms.
valued low. However, the link between symbolic aspects of a brand and relational contracts is not all clear yet (Martin, 2008). More research is needed here.
No evidence was found for the fact that there are gender differences in preferences for psychological contracts, the same is the case for the distinction between good and average law-students.
Besides knowing what features and characteristics are important to highlight during promotion, it is also interesting to know where students will read the advertisements. According to current research third year and master law-students mainly orientate themselves using their study-association. This indicates that activities organized by study-associations will receive the most attention. Furthermore, respondents from the third year and master survey expect that they will mainly use the internet as a source to go find a job, especially recruitment websites of a firm are popular. Now we learned that recruitment websites are one of the main sources law-students will use in their job-search, it seems extremely interesting to know how law-firms can use this recruitment tool as effective as possible. Williamson, King Jr, Lepak, & Sarma (2010) found that the best way to make a recruitment web-site attractive, is by optimizing the vividness and content of the web-site. Vividness means how easily recalled and convincing something is thinking of pictures, movies and other things that attract the attention. Content, on the other hand, captures how useful the information is that is presented on the web-site. Research shows that the more useful the information is that people read on a recruitment web-site the more positive their attitude against the company is, the web-sites should minimize ambiguity (Williamson, King Jr, Lepak, & Sarma, 2010). Furthermore, Williamson et al. (2010) found that also vividness is a prospective factor for attitude against the company and the job-offer. Using information and vividness together, the image will be the best (Williamson et al., 2010). However, a gap in the research of Williamson et al. (2010) is that they did not took into account the likelihood that future recruits will visit the website. When future recruits are not familiar with the web-site, the web-site is not of any value. For law-firms it is good to know if prospective applicants know their recruitment web-site and if not, they should make the target-group more aware of its existence.
Brand-image and reputation benchmark
In order to indicate where the improvement opportunities for CMS DSB lie, the brand-image of CMS DSB according to job-attributes and a reputation benchmark were presented in the results section (Q2). CMS DSB should especially pay more attention to the job-attributes friendly working atmosphere, job-security, high-status firm and personal development. These job-attributes were highly valued by the law-students however not highly recognized within CMS DSB. In order to become more popular under law-students, these are the factors to improve. Also in comparison with the other firms it is obvious that CMS DSB has improvement opportunities here.
preferable profile, where only the job-attribute high status firm should be improved. This image was confirmed when the law-students resounding responded that they would like to work at a niche office. With a majority of 70% of the respondents that would like to work at a niche firm it captured the highest score of all ten firms. Furthermore, Allen & Overy captured almost the exact opposite profile to the niche firm, which makes it in theory undesirable for law-students to apply. The results confirm this, only 36% of the students would like to work at Allen & Overy which is the lowest percentage of all firms. Above findings indicate that job-attributes are indeed a good prospect for brand-attractiveness.
The results from Q3 also indicate that there are a lot of improvement possibilities for CMS DSB. Although the results did not provide evidence for the expectancy theory of Vroom (1964), figure 4.4 does indicate that law-students think it is relatively easy to get a job at CMS DSB compared to the other firms. It would be better if this image of CMS DSB would change. According to theory of Nandan (2005) less average students will apply at a firm of which they think the chance on a job is small, automatically the quality of the applicants will increase at such a firm (Nandan, 2005). Therefore, CMS DSB should try to change the image that it is easy to get trough the application process at CMS DSB.
Only 41% of the respondents would like to work at CMS DSB, this number should be improved. The expectation is, based on current research, that when the profile based on job-attributes becomes more attractive, the number of law-students who would like to work at the firm will increase. Another aspect to improve is the familiarity of CMS DSB under third year and master law-students (52% is familiar with CMS DSB) as well as under first and second year law-students (25% is familiar with CMS DSB). According to the interviews with board-members, CMS DSB should make their promotion material more noticeable in order to stand out and achieve more familiarity. Also more promotion material is needed, according to the board-members, in order to make the firm more familiar under third year and master law-students as well as under first and second year law-students. Although 70% of the first and second year respondents reported that they would like to engage in activities organized through or at law firms, the board-members advice just to enhance the familiarity under first and second year students by making use of advertisements (Q4). In their opinion it is not useful to spent time and money in actual recruitment activities for this group of students, the only thing that is important is to become familiar under this target-group in order to attract them to activities more easily once they are third year or master students.
Recommendations for CMS DSB
Friendly working atmosphere, job-security, high-status firm and personal development are the job-attributes that CMS DSB should emphasize on more prominent in promoting their employment opportunities. Furthermore, CMS DSB should try to act like a make-oriented firm in their advertisements. This implies for example that they should focus on their preferred long-term relationship with interns. Although, almost all law-firms claim that they try to hire all lawyer-interns after three years, often this is not really the case. However, this is the real ambition of CMS DSB and therefore they should prove this with numbers. Law-students want to hear the truth confirmed by numbers. In other words, CMS DSB should consider designing new and effective recruitment messages in order to create a better and long lasting brand-image.
CMS DSB should perform research concerning the familiarity of their recruitment web-site. Recruitment web-sites are the main source for law-students to go search for a job, therefore it is of main importance that the recruitment web-site is known under law-students. Furthermore, the web-site should contain movies, pictures and organized and useful information. At the moment, the web-site could use some improvements on these factors.
CMS DSB doubted whether or not to organize activities with student fraternities instead of study association. Current research shows that almost all students use their study association to orientate on a future employer. So the recommendation for CMS DSB is to keep study associations organizing their activities. CMS DSB also doubted whether or not to enlarge their target audience for recruitment activities with first and second year students. Based on the interview results the recommendation is not to do this. However, it is good to try to become more familiar under first and second year law-students by making use of advertisements. Furthermore, also under third and second year law-students there is not enough communication from CMS DSB, students are still to unknown about the company. The company should change this by making use of more promotion activities and try to stand out with the promotion material they use.
Current research shows that law-students expect that it is easy to get hired at CMS DSB. This image is not good for the quality of the applicant pool of CMS DSB. Therefore, the firm should try to change this image for example by exactly outlining their selection procedure. Furthermore, CMS DSB should research whether or not their selection procedure is actually lighter compared to other comparable firms. When this is the case, they should consider changing their methods.
Limitations and suggestions for further research
Respondents of current research were all law-students. For juridical service providers like CMS DSB this is an advantage, because the results are especially accurate for this sector. However, it limits the generalization of current research to other industries, this study already showed differences between the preferences of law-students and business undergraduates regarding job-attributes. A larger N would have been better for the generalization of current research as well.
Current research had an unequal distribution of male and female students, where male students were under represented (26% male against 74% female). Therefore the few gender differences that were found in current research should be better explored in further research.
The number of job-attributes presented in current research was limited, in order to avoid an information overload to the respondents. The respondents were able to add some job-attributes they had missed in the questions (appendix 3). According to these results it seems that law-students also find the location of the company, the relationships with other people within the company, and growth opportunities within the company really important. Further research should prove if these job-attributes are important to the majority of students and whether or not there are other job-job-attributes that students might find really important but that were not included in current study.
Where current research showed that, under law-students, the internet is seen as the main source to find a job, research exclusive for law-students should be done in order to investigate what this specific target-group finds most important on a recruitment website.
6. CONCLUSION
In order to solve the quantitative as well as qualitative problems of CMS DSB regarding their applicant pool, this paper indentified the preferences of law-students regarding job-attributes, psychological contracts and ways to search for a future employer.
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APPENDIX 1 Fields of study (N=250)
APPENDIX 2
Mean scores and test statistics for job-attributes, separating good and average students
Job-attributes Good student (N=71) Average Student (N=93) Mean Std. deviation Mean Std. deviation
Mann Whitney test score(p= two-tailed)
Personal development
(training & courses) 4,42 0,41 4,42 0,53 U= 2162,50 (p=0,20)
Friendly working atmosphere 4,35 0,68 4,39 0,55 U= 3405,00 (p=0,99)
Good supervision & support 3,97 0,80 3,99 0,73 U= 3328,00 (p=0,77)
Private-work balance 3,72 0,90 3,63 0,67 U= 3100,00 (p=0,31)
Job security 3,89 0,82 4,05 0,72 U= 3091,00 (p=0,29)
Flexible hours 3,46 0,84 3,40 0,93 U= 3275,00 (p=0,65)
Corporate social responsibility 3,36 0,96 3,28 0,87 U= 3213,00 (p=0,61)
High status firm 3,32 0,98 3,12 0,92 U= 3016,00 (p=0,18)
International environment 3,08 1,09 3,00 1,17 U= 3270,00 (p=0,65)
Businesslike environment 2,82 0,90 2,99 1,03 U= 3002,00 (p=0,17)
Autonomy 2,73 0,99 2,94 0,98 U= 3070,00 (p=0,25)
Many jurisdictions 2,86 1,11 2,48 0,72 U= 2993,00 (p=0,13)
APPENDIX 3
Other important job-attributes
APPENDIX 4
Mean scores and test statistics for psychological contracts, separating male and female
Psycholoical contracts Male (N=42) Female (N=128) Mean Std. deviation Mean Std. deviation
Mann Whitney test scores(p= two-tailed)
Transactional vs Relational 3,56 0,87 3,41 0,95 U= 2439,50 (p=0,36)
Transactional vs Ideological 2,60 0,82 2,90 1,02 U= 2239,50 (p=0,10)
Relational vs Ideological 2,05 0,71 2,16 0,89 U= 2655,00 (p=0,90)
APPENDIX 5
Mean scores and test statistics for psychological contracts, separating good and average students
Psycholoical contracts Good student (N=71) Average Student (N=99) Mean Std. deviation Mean Std. deviation Mann Whitney
test scores(p= two-tailed)
Transactional vs Relational 3,56 0,85 3,37 0,99 U= 3048,00 (p=0,13)
Transactional vs Ideological 2,88 1,00 2,79 0,97 U= 3381,00 (p=0,67)
APPENDIX 6
An overview of the percentage of respondents who expect a job-attribute at a firm
APPENDIX 7
