Developing an EVP to attract & retain talent

The concept of a value proposition made up of your accounting services, staff efforts and desired client outcomes is something you are probably most familiar with when thinking about clients. Increasingly though, modern accounting firms are looking at their employee value proposition (EVP) to help them attract and retain staff. Alisdair Barr from Grad Mentor explores how your firm can develop an EVP of your own.

Your EVP encompasses the offerings and benefits provided by your firm to attract and retain employees. The idea of providing a value proposition for employees is not something many accounting firms may have thought about. But with increasing marketing competition and high costs of recruitment, an EVP can help you define your brand (your reason for being), differentiate you from your competitors, and in the long-term, save you money from better managing human resources and employee benefit programs. The primary goals of an EVP are to attract and retain great staff.

What should your EVP include?

Grad Mentor recently undertook a major study to explore what employers and graduates wanted from each other within professional services settings. We found seven key relationship drivers between employers and their employees that when considered, create the perfect marriage between the business and staff member. These factors can be used to create your EVP.

You might expect that employers cared most about time sheets and employees cared most about money. While those factors were present, the modern relationship between the firms and their staff is much more dynamic.