At first glance, each of these departments does something completely different. Sales provides clients with solutions and cares for proper relations, marketing uses appropriate tools to promote the brand and convince clients to it, and HR employs, manages human resources and payroll, and does everything to make people want to work effectively. Three different areas, three completely different areas of responsibility, what can you get inspired by and what good practices to implement in the field of HR?
Well, I'll surprise you - HR has more to do with marketing and sales than you think. After all, each of you professionally deals with ... selling the company's image! In the case of marketing and sales, the customer pays for it, in the case of HR, the candidate. But isn't it so, we are basically talking about one and the same person, because every client is your potential candidate? Looking from this perspective, it turns out that it is worth getting to know good practices used by marketing and sales and then implement them in your daily work. You will gain a double benefit: you will equip yourself with practical tools that you can easily parameterize and start measuring the effectiveness of your activities, and in addition you will start to speak the same language as sales and marketing - and this is the first step to success on the way to effective cooperation with them.
Cooperation between the HR and Marketing Department - is it possible?
Most people, even not fully interested in the issue, at least know what the HR and Marketing departments are for. If we asked them about it, we would probably hear that the first one focuses on recruiting, finding candidates and introducing them to work, conducting training or motivating. On the other hand, the Marketing Department, to put it simply, is building such an image of the brand, its products and services that the client will want to use them.
Some employees of the HR and Marketing Department also have similar doubts. If they do not answer this question, cooperation will either be impossible at all or at least not very fruitful. Therefore, HR representatives should first consider in which areas they are able to help marketing specialists so that the entire company can benefit from it, and vice versa, people employed in the Marketing Department should find a field of activity in which they will support HR specialists. Both departments must establish common priorities as well as identify the factors that have so far prevented close cooperation. Overcoming them is the first step to working together.
Searching for areas of cooperation
In fact, there are not only many areas in which HR can and should work with the Marketing Department, but also both departments can support each other in such important issues as creating innovative marketing campaigns or building employer branding. The key to cooperation, however, is what we mentioned earlier - finding priorities. They will determine the direction of activities, which in turn will be selected with appropriate methods and human resources.
An example of such close cooperation may be participation in various types of fairs. Usually, the Marketing Department has extensive experience in this type of event and can share this knowledge with HR. For the latter, the fair is also a great opportunity to find and acquire candidates for work in the company. On the other hand, HR often has detailed feedback from employees regarding their job satisfaction in a given company. Such knowledge is helpful not only in internal communication, but can also be used in a marketing message. Both departments can use each other's knowledge and experience. For example, when HR is going to take part in a fair, marketing specialists can suggest who to cooperate with in organizing the entire project.
Another area of cooperation may be social media and the joint use of their potential. Thanks to coordinated activities, the company's profile can become an important place not only for publishing recruitment advertisements or for informing about new products and services, but above all for establishing a dialogue with both candidates and potential clients, it can become an important tool for building a brand image on the market. many different planes. On the one hand, HR brings its understanding and openness to the needs of people and business, on the other - the Marketing Department helps reach potential candidates for work through various channels, supports HR in building relationships and commitment with people already employed, etc.
These are of course just a few examples, but they are about showing the potential of cooperation. Both departments can function more efficiently and perform their tasks, using a common knowledge base, they can exchange information, reports and data. Not only that, the ideal would be mutual inspiration. Of course, all this is not easy, because often there is also the ambition of individual departments, sometimes even some animosity among their employees. However, when all this is overcome, cooperation between HR and the Marketing Department can only bring benefits.