Roles of Employer Brand Trust and Brand Value on Employer Attractiveness and Job Selection of the Prospective Job Applicants

Abstract

To compete in nowadays business environment, one focus that an organization should not overlook is the quality of the employees since it undoubtedly influences the organizational performance and leads to organizational success. The effectiveness of the Job employment process has been issued in the human resource field for decades. "Employer branding" is a human resource strategic tool that the organization can use to obtain the talented and skillful employees who fit well with the organization and its requirements while "employer attractiveness" extended from the employer branding has been also emphasized. Brand trust, brand image, brand sincerity, brand competence, and brand affects are emphasized in this study since they would lead to the perceived value of the brand of the employer firm. The job seekers would perceive a firm as attractive if they receive positive information from the firm and perceive the firm as high fit with them. Consequently, applying a job at that particular firm could be expected. The question, "How does the employer branding affect the employer's brand value, employer attractiveness, and job selection of the prospective job applicants?" was proposed in this research. The methodology used in this research can be categorized into two parts, development of employer attractiveness scale and examining the relationship between employer branding, employer brand value and intention of the job seekers to apply for the job at the attractive firm. The 30-item measurement scale for employer attractiveness was obtained from the first part. The questionnaire survey was conducted with 1,128 job seekers who were the last year students of three universities. Five industries of the firms that the job seekers would like to work with were focused. Structural equation modeling with multiple group analysis together with one way ANOV A and independent sample t-test were adopted to test the research framework and related hypotheses. The results indicated the significant relationship between all employer branding constructs and employer brand value except brand competence. The significant relationship between brand competence, brand affect, and brand trust and employer attractiveness were also found. Employer brand value was significantly related to employer attractiveness and but not significantly related to intention to apply for the job. Significant relationship between employer attractiveness and intention to apply for the job at their favorite firms was shown. Significant differences of some constructs between gender and among job applicants who had different GP A and different favorite firms were found. Moreover, the difference of the SEM models of the job applicants who would like to work in different industries was found.