Storytelling is the most powerful and effective communication strategy – and this is particularly true for employer branding! Candidates are far more likely to engage with (and trust) true stories from real people than any other form of content. In a Recruitment Marketing Magazine exclusive, we interviewed Tracy Gawthorne, Accenture’s Managing Director of Marketing and Communications in Australia and New Zealand, to learn about how storytelling forms the basis of their employer branding strategy.
Accenture is a global management consulting and professional services firm that provides strategy, consulting, digital, technology and operations services. We spoke with their Managing Director of Marketing and Communications, Tracy Gawthorne who has more than 20 years’ experience building brands, creating unique customer experiences, and driving growth in markets across the globe.
“As the head of marketing and communications for Accenture across Australia and New Zealand, I’m responsible for shaping our brand in market and demonstrating how Accenture is helping Australia and New Zealand live, work, play, protect, and grow. This encompasses every marketing and communications channel through which people interact with our brand, from employer branding, to client and media relationships!”
This unique structuring decision by Accenture aligns with their conscious effort to include employer branding in their overall brand strategy.
“In a professional services environment, our people really are our brand. So, the opportunity to sit across our overall brand offers a whole new degree of consistency. There’s a lot of power in sharing our story and purpose. I have a fantastic team of specialists and together we can gain insights into what people relate to and why they choose us.”
Worldwide, Accenture has more than five hundred thousand people who offer their services, skills, talents, and insights, which is why they pride themselves on attracting the right people and enabling them to build a flourishing career.
Accenture’s employer brand and overall brand strategy communicates their purpose and message through storytelling in a number of ways.
Global to local
Accenture has the challenge of activating their global purpose locally.
“Our global purpose is to bring innovation to improve the way the world lives and works. We bring an Australian flavour to that by understanding what is unique to us here. So, our purpose is, ‘To bring innovation to improve the way Australia lives works, plays, protects and grows.”
Accenture has a strong commitment to the social environment, safety, and security, and understands how these things resonate with people locally.
Making it personal
Accenture also tries to ensure their purpose resonates with their people by encouraging them to align their work with their personal goals, skills, and interests. (For example, this video showcases how their Digital Marketing Analyst aligns his passion for photography with his role.)
“People want to understand how their personal purpose links to the organisation they are working for. We know we’re succeeding and fulfilling our purpose when we’re: creating jobs, helping Australian and New Zealand organisations to grow domestically and internationally, helping build services that make a difference to people, and contributing to the communities in which we live and work.”
“In the last eighteen months, we’ve asked our people how they believe they contribute to that. We work to understand what’s important to them and give them a voice. We’ve created a wonderful catalogue of ideas, experiences, and stories with diverse voices.”
Story Hunters: employee engagement and empowerment
In giving their people a voice, Accenture has stopped looking at recruitment marketing in isolation and are instead looking at their talent brand holistically. This includes employee experience and internal communications.
“It’s no longer possible to have one brand and one face to attract people. We don’t want to have one brand for candidates, one brand internally, and another for clients. In today’s world of social media and fast content, that doesn’t work. Instead, we work to build consistent experiences and interactions, from when people join as graduates or experienced professionals, to how they come onboard, and even after they become part of our alumni. We aim to make their journey consistently interesting across the different stages of their career and life.”
Accenture values the stories of their people and works to unleash them.
“We created a program called ‘Story Hunters’ with the purpose of empowering our people and giving them permissions to share their stories and the stories of others. Everybody in Accenture has the opportunity to pitch a story to our Marketing and Communications team. We offer them professional support with writers who can conduct interviews and bring their stories to life.”
“In the beginning, people were excited, but shy. But now, we’ve published 130 stories internally and externally. We have a pipeline now and it’s hard to keep up! We have so much more content and it’s created so much engagement on social.”
So much content that, in fact, just this year Accenture published a hardcover book of stories called Our People, Our Stories, which can be found in all of their offices.
“From the beginning, we were conscious about opening this channel. We really needed to allow people to be authentic about what they want to share, so we had to have an open mindset about what content was appropriate. We don’t edit heavily, we don’t restrict, and we have very good writers who are coached and trained in our tone of voice and the types of angles we are looking for.
“We ask people to talk about what they’re passionate about, and their challenges. By being open and realistic, it’s added a lot to the program and has built a level of trust in the organisation. Our people know we care about them, and trust that we’ll produce something that they can be proud of.”
These stories cover a wide range of topics including returning from parental leave, work-life balance, diverse lifestyles, sexuality, faith, disability, and more. Some of these stories can even be emotional or confronting. All these stories help Accenture’s people, clients, and candidates understand the power and diversity in their organisation.
Storytelling through social media
Accenture has programs for graduates and experienced professionals. Their graduate program sees them working closely with universities in a traditional sense, maintaining a presence on campuses through speaking engagements and careers fairs. However, they are doing increasingly more on their social channels to target this demographic.
“We experiment across all of our social channels using different formats and forms. In our latest online program, we’re doing a Facebook Live series called “On the Couch”. It’s an interview series where people in the organisation can talk about their passions and stories. People can engage in real time. For graduates, our investment in social is anchored in storytelling.”
Accenture may choose people and stories depending on the type of talent and skill sets they are looking to attract.
“There really is a war for talent, particularly around STEM skills. We offer a lot of training in-house for people with the aptitude and interest to do cross-training. We continue to use social and work with the industry groups that those type of people are attracted to. We anchor this in the same messaging and storytelling so people have a consistent experience with the Accenture brand.”
Accenture also tries to maintain contact with strong candidates who made a different choice, and most of this is through social.
Diversity and inclusion
Tracy is also the executive sponsor for Accenture’s gender equality programs.
“One of our big focuses is gender equality. It’s an area I’m passionate about so I quickly put my hand up for the position! Globally, we have an ambitious goal to have a 50-50 workforce by 2025 and we’re serious about it. It’s an exciting time and we’re doubling down on programs that help us collectively understand the value of diversity in all its forms.”
It is in this way that Accenture makes their commitments transparent and also gives them the ability to share takeaway lessons with other organisations.
A strong employer brand encompasses storytelling, and Accenture does just that. Through employee engagement and internal communications, they empower and trust their people by giving them a voice and platform to share their stories. Their social strategy is also deeply rooted in social story, and their strategy utilises a range of formats and forms including video, imagery and written content, providing them with various touch points to engage with their current and future talent. Through aligning their client and employer brand, and activating their global purpose locally, Accenture’s powerful employer brand and storytelling strategy is one to replicate.
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