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Building an inclusive employer brand for Historic England

Historic England_Recruitment Social Assets_Inclusive Employer Brand Creative

Historic England helps people care for, enjoy, and celebrate England’s spectacular historic environment.

They asked us to help them articulate their employment proposition in a way that would better position them as the inclusive employer they truly are, so they could attract more people from under-represented groups.

The challenge

It’s really important to Historic England that their employees reflect the diverse perspectives and experiences of the communities they work in – there are opportunities available at HE for people from all backgrounds and all walks of life.

But the reality is that many people don’t perceive conservation organisations like Historic England as a place for someone like them, and hold back from applying.

Our approach

Our first job was to articulate Historic England’s people promise and proposition: Actively seeking new perspectives.

This is a clear statement of intent: Historic England is keen to hear from candidates with open and curious minds, whatever their background or lived experiences.

We used this narrative to build a creative concept ‘A place for everyone’.

We then developed a suite of marketing materials using potential employees – people of different ages and ethnicities – asking questions about their careers, which Historic England would be able to answer.

We also used the creative to highlight the emotional connections we all have to historical places and spaces. This demonstrated that Historic England’s work is relevant to everyone.

We developed a brand positioning film, social media adverts and posts, content for their careers website and event collateral for young audiences – all showing what’s unique about Historic England, and appealing to a wider audience.

Historic England inclusive employer brand linked in post with creative developed by BrandPointZero

At the same time, we completed a comprehensive audit of their careers web pages and candidate journey, making recommendations on how they could improve the user experience.

We then shared expertise on how to reach and engage with a more diverse talent pool – all using the suite of advertising and promotional assets we provided.

phone banner for Historic England inclusive employer brand

The results

The campaign launched with pride of place on the revamped Historic England careers pages and is being used to support recruitment activity for various apprenticeship schemes at the organisation. As a result we have seen:

  • 17% increase in applications from young candidates (18-24)
  • 8% uplift in applications from candidates with Black and Asian heritage
  • 7% increase in applications from other under-represented groups
  • 83% approval rating from Historic England staff who rated the film excellent or very good
  • A big step on the way to realising their diversity ambitions

Got a project? Let’s talk

We’d love to hear more about where your organisation is heading, and chat about how we can bring your culture to life to drive attraction, engagement and inclusion.