Inside Look Into Glassdoor
Have you heard of Glassdoor? If you answered no, you would be in the majority. I was baffled to find out that in a group of peers when quickly surveyed, more than half had no idea what Glassdoor even was. You NEED to know what this is and I am here to help!
Glassdoor is a website where that was created so employees can post about their experiences with things like compensation, culture, management, etc. and YOUR Company. Go ahead, check it out: https://www.glassdoor.com/index.htm (click on Companies and Reviews to start your search).
As you can see, they can post anonymously and can even provide direct comments regarding your organization (which are viewable to ALL). Let’s just call it the Yelp for offices and instead of customer comments, you have employee/former employee comments/evaluations and “grades” for your company, overall.
To have a website like Glassdoor out there COULD be problematic to some, and beneficial to others. To companies that have culture and employee satisfaction figured out, Glassdoor isn’t a four-letter word to you. To others, poor employee reviews on Glassdoor could be detrimental to your organization for several reasons:
Cautiously advising other candidates not to apply within – thus creating a cycle of hiring “secondary talent” by settling for candidates that aren’t the best match (skill-wise, professionally, etc.) simply because no one else has interest/has applied.
Broadcasting to your competition how to poach your most valued employees – your competition can see why disgruntled employees left your organization and use that as leverage to poach your top talent right out from under your feet.
Advertising to your existing clientele that you may be having “problems internally” – fostering a sense of internal turmoil could prevent your clients to continue to do business with you and/or prevent NEW prospects to go to another organization where the employees are less focused on internal turmoil and more focused on the end product/results.
Alright, so you know there is this site out there, so how do you protect yourself from current and future defamatory posts/comments about your Company? There are several unethical ways of changing your score (much like a business owner would do with a bad Yelp review) but ultimately everyone knows it was out there, and you do too – so why not work on a plan to make the changes necessary to ensure a positive employee experience during their tenure with your Company? Working with HR Professionals that are focused on best practices and company culture are great first steps in “getting to work”. It may seem like you have to make some giant leaps, but if you’re working with the right HR team, they can guide you through some small strides that can make a big difference quickly. You’ve got this!
