Impact of Employer Brand Attractiveness on Intention to Apply for a Job: A Survey of Final Year Management Undergraduates

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of employer brand attractiveness on undergraduates’ intention to apply for a job in those particular employer organizations. With the increasing competition in the business world, the organizations face severe challenges related to recruiting talented professionals for organizations. In this backdrop of events the organizations need to ensure that their organization is identified as a sought-after employer by enhancing the level and quality of elements that make them an attractive employer. Accordingly, this study investigated particularly about five dimensions of employer brand attractiveness; value of interest, social value, economic value, development value, and value of cooperation of employer brand attractiveness. The study investigated the perspectives of prospective employees by taking all the final year undergraduates of state universities of management faculties located in the Western Province of Sri Lanka, as the population. The study tested one main hypothesis and five sub hypotheses. The data were collected from a convenience sample using a virtually circulated Google Form. The responses were received for the online survey from 210 final year management undergraduates and the data were analysed using the SPSS software. The results indicated that there is a significant positive impact of employer brand attractiveness on undergraduates’ intention to apply for a job in those particular employer organizations. These findings of the study provide a basis for research on the dimensions of employer brand attractiveness and also provides insights to the organizations and their respective HR Managers on enhancing the companies’ ability to attract talented individuals.