Lack of brand awareness

Gowling WLG competes for talent with the world’s top legal brands. To do so, it needs a distinct brand identity of its own, whilst retaining the unique strengths of the founding firms.

Over-dependence on agencies

Agencies had been the first port of call for recruiting lawyers in the past, and the business needed a step change in its approach. Despite having a licence for LinkedIn Recruiter, Gowling WLG was making limited use of the platform.

Minimal internal engagement

To build an employer brand and talent pipeline, Jo and Chris first needed to engage their internal audience in direct talent sourcing and sharing content.

The starting point for building Gowling WLG’s employer brand was an analysis of other major law firms’ activity on LinkedIn – and here Jo and Chris quickly spotted an opportunity. Other firms’ tended to share content relating to their successes with clients or thought-leadership on legal issues – but they rarely mentioned their own employees.
 

“We made a conscious decision to make our people the focus of our content wherever we could. This helped us to be consistent across all candidate touchpoints and align all the different aspects of our LinkedIn activity with our careers pages. It is also an opportunity to differentiate ourselves as a brand and stand out on the platform. We don’t just want to talk about the work we do – but also the environment in which we do it.”

 

– Jo Franklin, Head of Resourcing,
Gowling WLG

Work with marketing and digital communications teams to align your employee proposition with your external-facing brand. Doing so increases internal buy-in and will multiply the benefits that you drive for the business

Develop a digital footprint: a careers site and LinkedIn careers page that embody the brand proposition and can act as a content hub to inspire candidates

Ultimately the best way to showcase the experience of working for your company is through your own employees – and they are also your best external brand ambassadors

It helps to build a talent audience of people who will have a natural affinity and cultural fit with your business

Show stakeholders how sharing content to build your employer brand delivers wider business benefits – track new business leads and opportunities as well as your talent pipeline