This article is part of the special “Employer Branding Best Practices” published in the January 2024 edition of Human Resources, within the Employer Branding Conference 2024, promoted by Talent Portugal.

We intend to have an increasingly clear positioning and be an exemplary company that others can follow, so that we can have an effective and positive impact on our society.
Rita Mingatos – Talent Development & Internal Communication Manager
In 2019, Fnac implemented a social climate questionnaire within the Group and the results were surprising. This questionnaire showed that the strategy for implementing the EVP (Employee Value Proposition) was not being perceived in line with the company's ambition and objectives by employees. This fact, according to Rita Mingatos, responsible for Talent Development & Internal Communication, led the team to "look critically at the way we communicated and organized information and to do an exercise to put ourselves in the employee's perspective". This was the motto that led to a new employee journey mapping and rethink your experience.
Thus, the Brand Architecture project, which proved essential for the company to become work on people management with one employee-centered approach (Employee Centric), “communicating more clearly and in line with what is truly relevant to them – their needs and expectations, rather than an approach focused on processes and departments”. Objective and relevant communication made the brand’s EVP, which had a very strong commitment, more evident. “Although we reflect this vision, both outside and inside the organization, our main focus continues to be on internal aspect. Today, we live in a world of hyper-connectivity and organizations are like glass aquariums, so our employees are our best calling cards", admits Rita Mingatos, adding that "there is only a good strategy for attracting and retaining talent if our employees curate the brand".

The strategy of Employer Branding Fnac's main objective is therefore provide the best employee experience, from the first to the last contact, based on several essential points for the person responsible for Talent Development & Internal Communication: «To achieve this ambition, we need Relevance (thinking and delivering policies, programs, initiatives that meet people’s needs); Proximity, to get the message across to our employees (involve them in the construction, ask for feedback, testimonials and humanize the experience); Simplicity in access, with an unquestionable commitment to digitalization (since 2022, we have been implementing several SAP Success Factors modules, we launched the new External and Internal recruitment website, the new Intranet and the Employee App); finally, Differentiation in approaches and formats, adding a good dose of creativity, as it is something that is part of our DNA and with which people identify a lot (#cultivate the difference). "
Example company
As with any strategy development, there are inherent challenges and, in this case, Rita Mingatos believes that these begin with the theme of Relevance. «In recent years, we have experienced rapid and structural changes in context, with significant impacts and changes in what business expectations and needs are, such as, for example, the normalization of teleworking. We are experiencing the largest multigenerational meeting ever within organizations, with huge contrasts in lifestyle habits, career interests, etc. These are just two examples that challenge our agility and responsiveness as an organization, so that we can continue to have a attractive value proposition, competitive e suitable for different contexts and populations, which has been largely driven by a continuous feedback culture», he adds.
Furthermore, the same person in charge also states that mission of responsible employer contains some conditions, such as the various commitments within the scope of diversity, equity e inclusion. “We intend to have an increasingly clear positioning and be an example company that others can follow, so that we can have an effective and positive impact on our society”, he warns.
Finally, the person responsible for Talent Development & Internal Communication at Fnac draws attention to the challenge of «digital transformation, one of the pillars of our strategy, which implies a huge focus on change management (of skills and behaviors), with a parallel strong commitment to requalification. Here, we have made important progress in diversifying and strengthening our learning offerings, through FNAC Academy, but also raising awareness and promoting a self-learning culture, because today, each employee must be aware of their responsibility in their own development».

The employee journey is designed as a path that encompasses the various moments of the employee's life within the organization. This path includes seven stages: Integration, Learning, Benefits, Economical performance, Growth, Rights e duties and, still, a dimension Collective (company). Through a conceptual and graphic rebranding, each stage has an associated color and was designed according to the Psychology of Colors and what was intended to be conveyed. The dimension Collective represents the aggregating dimension, adopting yellow, the brand's corporate color. «A visual graphic concept was developed, a logo that multiplies across the various dimensions, but always with the same guiding line. Still a brand book and several model pieces, so that it can be adapted over time", shares the person in charge, noting that this process favored "humanization and informality in some graphic elements, to bring youthfulness and dynamism to the image of the journey, as is also characteristic of the brand itself".
The project, launched in June 2023, has allowed for a standardization of this approach across the various channels (newsletter, communications, intranet and app), ensuring a alignment e consistency na perception of the value proposition. At the same time, visual consistency was achieved in the physical spaces, making the environments much more harmonious and homogeneous, so that the employee experience is the same in any work center.
«In general, our value proposition is to be a integrative and inclusive company, who sees diversity and difference as its greatest strength. A brand that, although in a very challenging sector like retail, is making a huge investment in work-family balance and people's well-being, through various programs and measures to this end, and also a brand that believes that continuous learning and the development of its people is an essential path to guarantee the sustainability of the organization itself, channeling its efforts to provide more and more opportunities in this sense (programs, platforms, content, academic scholarships, talent programs, internal mobility, leadership, among many others)”, adds the professional.
In the present and with an eye to the future, and according to Rita Mingatos, the objective is «consolidate the strategy of employer Branding, looking more closely at some of the challenges of the current context: maintaining relevance in our value proposition, serving different audiences and generations; evolving in what our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion practices are and, also, knowing how to integrate and take advantage of new wave that we are seeing in technology, particularly with artificial intelligence».