Men and women look for different things when choosing an employer

Although salary and benefits rank as the biggest draw for both men and women when it comes to choosing an employer, significant gender differences exist when it comes to defining other elements of employer attractiveness, according to a recent employer branding survey conducted by Randstad US.

Randstad recently surveyed 7,000 people nationwide with a variety of backgrounds and occupations to find out the key factors that go into employer attractiveness.

“How a company is perceived as an employer impacts what types of candidates it will attract,” said Lisa Crawford, senior vice president, Randstad U.S. “As our research reveals, companies may need to focus on key elements, such as building culture and adopting more flexible work policies, to appeal to different demographics. Attracting and retaining talent is not a one stop shop—particularly with a diverse workforce and multiple generations sitting side-by-side to one another.”

Key findings:
Women Want a Prime Location: Location is key for women workers, with 44 percent of female respondents choosing that as an important employer attribute compared to 35 percent of men. Men Want Career Progression Opportunities and Financially Healthy Companies: When choosing to work for an employer, 42 percent of men look for opportunities to advance versus 36 percent of women. Additionally, the financial health of a company is very important to male respondents (36% of men versus 28% of women). Work/life Balance Continues to Be a Top Concern for Women Workers: Nearly one-in-four (37%) women respondents chose workplace flexibility as an important employer attribute, compared to just 26 percent of men.

Companies Must Assess What Their Brand Means
“As the job market continues its steady momentum and employee confidence increases, more employees will keep their options open for other opportunities,” Crawford said. “If companies are to retain and attract the best talent, they first need to assess what their brand really means, determine what keeps their talent coming through their doors and how to attract the next wave of workers who may have different expectations than what their company currently offers.

“With women making up half the workforce, they should also consider the unique things that women value when choosing an employer. Investing in building a strong employer brand will pay off in a stable workforce, a better match of talent within your organization and increased engagement and productivity.”

Survey Methodology
Randstad’s Employer Branding survey is based on perceived attractiveness of companies amongst 7,000 students, employed and unemployed workers between the ages of 18 and 65. Samples are based on national demographics with a slight emphasis on respondents aged below 40, as potential jobseekers, or those most likely to be in the job market, are the target audience of the survey. Each sample is representative of age, region, gender and education.

Respondents are invited by means of online interviews to select the companies they know from a random list; each company is set to appear approximately 1,500 times at random during the entire survey.

The margin of error on a sample of 1,500 is plus or minus 1.245 percentage points at the 95 percent level of confidence. This means that there is a 95 percent chance that the responses of the target population as a whole would fall somewhere between 1.245 percent more or 1.245 percent less than the responses of the sample (confidence interval of 2.49 percent on the worst case percentage of 50 percent).