Employer Branding and Internal Communication Glossary

Accessible internal communication presents internal information in forms that employees with different access needs can perceive, understand and use.

The application abandonment rate shows the share of people who start a job application form but do not complete and submit it within a set period.

Application conversion rate shows what share of people who view the career page or a job ad complete an application: an indicator of career page and ad quality.

Asynchronous communication is information exchange that does not require the sender and the receiver to be online or in the same place at the same time.

Campus communication is the communication an employer builds with university students and recent graduates around career opportunities, working life and company culture.

Candidate communication is the written and spoken communication an employer has with candidates, from before they apply until the hiring decision.

Candidate experience is the sum of every interaction a candidate has with a company, from seeing the job ad to the offer or rejection.

A candidate journey map shows the touchpoints a person meets from first getting to know an employer to the end of the recruitment process, and what they experience at each one.

The candidate net promoter score is an indicator that measures how likely candidates who have been through the recruitment process are to recommend applying to the same organisation.

A candidate persona is a fictional but data-based profile of a target talent segment: motivations, information sources, decision criteria and concerns.

The career page is the section of a company website that presents the employer brand, culture, open roles and application process to candidates: the digital shopfront of the employer brand.

Career accounts are the company's LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok channels dedicated to the employer brand, telling candidates about culture, teams and opportunities.

Cascade communication passes an important message step by step from senior leadership through managers to all employees.

Change champions are employees who try out the new way of working during a specific transformation, guide their colleagues and pass implementation challenges on to the project team.

Change communication is planned communication that helps employees understand, accept and adopt change during mergers, new systems, restructuring or culture transformation.

A channel map defines which internal and external channels are used for which audience, purpose and content type.

Communication fatigue is when employees, exposed to too many channels and messages, stop reading, mute notifications and miss important messages.

Company culture is the shared values, beliefs, habits and behaviour patterns that determine "how things really get done" in an organisation.

A company culture assessment is a study of the values employees share, established habits and how decisions are really made in the organisation.

Company culture rituals are regularly repeated practices in a team or organisation that make shared values visible through behaviour.

The consumer brand promises products and services to customers; the employer brand promises a working experience to employees and candidates. They share one corporate identity but differ in audience, message and channel.

A corporate narrative is the shared story that connects where an organisation comes from, which need it answers and where it wants to go.

Cost per hire is total internal and external hiring cost divided by the number of hires: a core metric for the return on employer brand investment.

Internal crisis communication is the pre-prepared plan that ensures fast, consistent and reassuring information for employees during restructuring, downsizing, reputation issues or unexpected events.

DEI is the work of representing people of different identities and backgrounds (diversity), giving them fair opportunities (equity) and making them feel they belong (inclusion).

Employee advocacy is employees voluntarily sharing the company's employer brand in their own networks: the most credible employer brand channel.

An employee app delivers news, announcements, HR transactions and interaction on mobile devices, especially for deskless employees.

Employee benefits are the non-salary elements offered to employees — health insurance, meals, transport, leave, flexibility, development — forming the "rewards" pillar of the EVP.

Employee engagement is the emotional connection an employee feels to their work and organisation and their willingness to give discretionary effort; unlike satisfaction, it shows in behaviour.

An employee engagement survey is a comprehensive, usually annual study measuring the drivers of engagement: leadership, development, recognition, communication, wellbeing.

Employee experience (EX) is the sum of every interaction, environment and emotion a person has with an organisation from candidacy to exit.

An employee journey map visualises the stages, touchpoints, emotions and communication needs of an employee from candidacy to exit.

An employee referral programme is a recruitment practice in which employees can recommend candidates from their network for open positions and referrals are assessed under set rules.

Employee resource groups are voluntary, employee-led communities supported by the organisation and formed around shared identities or life experiences.

Employee satisfaction expresses how content employees are with their role, their working conditions and the opportunities the organisation provides.

Employee segmentation is grouping employees by characteristics such as role, working pattern, seniority or channel access in order to plan communication around different needs.

An employee story is content that tells a real employee's experience, career journey or a day at work: concrete proof of the employer brand promise.

Turnover is the share of employees who leave in a period relative to average headcount; retention measures the opposite: those who stay.

Employee voice is employees’ ability to express their views, suggestions and concerns about work and to contribute to the decisions that affect them.

Employee volunteering is employees giving their time or professional skills to a social need of their own free will, with the organisation’s support.

Employee wellbeing is the support of physical, mental, social and financial health at work: the foundation of engagement and sustainable performance.

Employee-generated content is writing, photos, audio or video that an organisation’s employees create about their own work, teams or experience of working there.

An employer brand audit systematically reviews every candidate and employee touchpoint, content and data set to reveal strengths and weaknesses.

Employer brand awareness is how far a target candidate audience recalls an organisation as a place to work unprompted, or recognises it when its name is given.

Employer brand benchmarking is an employer comparing the experience or communication it offers candidates and employees with that of other employers against set criteria.

Employer brand identity is the set of visual and verbal elements an organisation uses to show what kind of employer it is.

An employer brand KPI set is a group of indicators across awareness, attraction, conversion, experience and retention that reports the result of employer brand investment to leadership.

An employer brand maturity model places a company's employer brand management on a scale from "reactive" to "strategic and measured".

Employer brand perception research measures how employees and candidates see the company as an employer through surveys, interviews and focus groups.

An employer brand strategy is the plan that brings target audiences, positioning, EVP, key messages, channels and KPIs together in one roadmap.

An employer brand’s tone of voice defines the words an organisation uses with candidates and employees, how it addresses them and the tone it adopts in each situation.

Employer branding is how a company is perceived as a place to work by current and potential employees: the sum of the experience, values and promises it offers.

An employer branding agency is a specialist agency that manages how a company is perceived by employees and candidates through research, strategy, creative and digital channel management.

Employer review platforms are sites where current and former employees rate and review companies anonymously (Glassdoor, Kununu, Indeed, LinkedIn reviews); candidates research there.

eNPS is an engagement indicator calculated from 0-10 answers to "Would you recommend our company as a place to work to a friend?".

The EVP is the essence of what a company offers its people — pay and benefits, career, culture, work and purpose — the organisation's answer to "why should I work here?".

EVP activation is how an organisation makes the value it offers employees tangible in recruitment, development, recognition and the everyday experience of work.

An exit interview is a conversation that aims to understand, from the departing employee’s point of view, their experience of the organisation and the factors behind their decision to leave.

A focus group is a moderated qualitative research session with 6-10 employees or candidates exploring a topic in depth: a core tool in EVP and internal communication work.

Health and safety communication is the regular exchange of information with employees about workplace risks, protective practices and reporting channels.

Horizontal communication is direct communication between employees or teams at similar levels of responsibility, set up for coordination and information sharing.

HR consulting is external expertise that supports companies with strategy and delivery in areas such as hiring, engagement, culture, communication and talent management.

HR policy communication is the communication work that tells employees who can use an HR policy or programme, when and how.

Hybrid work is the model in which employees split the week between office and remote work: an arrangement that needs new rules for internal communication and culture.

Internal branding is the work that helps employees understand the promise a brand makes to its customers and act in line with it in their own roles.

Internal communication is the planned, continuous flow of information, meaning and connection between an organisation and its employees; it carries strategy, values and change into everyday work.

An internal communication agency is a specialist partner that supports employee communication with strategy, content, design and channel management.

Internal communication ambassadors are employees who support a regular flow of information and feedback between their teams and the communication function.

An internal communication audit is an assessment of how well an organisation’s internal messages, channels and communication processes meet employees’ needs.

An internal communication calendar shows which message goes out on which channel, when and under whose ownership throughout the year.

Read rate is the share of the target audience that opened or read an internal communication item; participation rate measures likes, comments, survey responses and event attendance.

An internal communication strategy is the annual plan that defines goals, employee segments, key messages, channels, frequency, ownership and measurement.

Internal strategy communication explains a company’s goals, and the choices it makes to reach them, in a way employees can relate to their own work.

An intranet is an internal platform for news, information, documents and collaboration accessible only to employees: the central digital channel of internal communication.

Leadership communication is the planned practice of making senior leaders and managers speak to employees regularly, visibly and sincerely.

A manager communication toolkit is the set of talking points, examples and supporting materials prepared so that managers can pass a topic on to their teams and answer questions.

Message recall shows how far the target audience remembers the key message of an announcement or campaign after a set period.

Offboarding communication is the planned, respectful and clear communication that lets a leaving employee complete the process while keeping a good relationship; leavers are employer brand ambassadors too.

Offer acceptance rate is the percentage of job offers accepted; it measures the credibility of the candidate experience and employer brand at the final step.

An onboarding buddy system pairs a new employee with a colleague who accompanies them in their early weeks, helping them learn how things work day to day and build connections with teams.

Onboarding communication is the whole flow of welcoming, informing and connecting a new hire, from offer acceptance to the first 90 days.

Organisational trust is an employee’s belief that the organisation will keep its word, act fairly in its decisions and share reliable information.

Pay transparency is openly sharing salary ranges, pay criteria and increase logic with employees and candidates: the new trust test for employer brands.

The psychological contract is the unwritten expectations that employees and employers draw from words, behaviour and experience about their obligations to each other.

Psychological safety is a team climate in which people can speak up, ask questions, admit mistakes or disagree without fear of punishment.

A pulse survey is a short 3-10 question survey run frequently (monthly or quarterly) to track employee sentiment and the impact of communication in near real time.

Quiet quitting is when an employee stays but does only the minimum and withdraws discretionary effort: the visible form of low engagement.

A realistic job preview is a method that shows candidates a role’s daily tasks, working conditions, opportunities and challenges before they start.

The recruitment funnel is a model that shows, with numbers and conversion rates, how candidates progress through stages such as application, assessment, interview, offer and hire.

Recruitment marketing applies marketing methods — targeting, content, campaigns, funnel analysis — to attract candidates and convert them into applicants.

Shift handover communication is how the outgoing team passes on the current status, open tasks and changes that need attention to the team taking over.

Source of hire analysis shows which channel (referral, career page, social media, job board, agency) hires come from, with the cost and quality of each.

Special-day communication is the practice of marking calendar moments — holidays, celebrations, awareness days, company anniversaries — in a planned, consistent way aligned with the employer brand.

A stay interview is a conversation held during employment to understand why an employee stays with the organisation and which conditions could affect their wish to stay.

Talent management is the set of processes for attracting, developing, retaining and deploying the talent an organisation needs.

A talent pool is a community of qualified candidates a company builds relationships with and keeps in touch with for future roles.

The first 90 days is the critical period in which a new hire adapts and largely decides whether to stay: the main time frame of onboarding communication.

Time to hire is the number of days from a role opening (or a candidate applying) to offer acceptance: the speed indicator of the hiring funnel.

A town hall is a regular meeting where senior leadership meets all employees to share results, priorities and take questions openly.

Values communication takes company values off the poster and makes them visible in employees' daily decisions and behaviour.