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ENGAGE TREND REPORT 07.27.09
Former Employees: Gone But Not Forgotten
Companies are urging former employees to maintain ties as members of the broader corporate team, almost like grads of the same alma mater, even if they end up moving to competing companies.
The idea is to keep in touch with those who might end up as business partners or even return as employees. For this, companies are steering them to alumni social networks. Much like Facebook or LinkedIn, they offer former employees and retirees a place to establish profiles and friend lists, share news and ideas with ex-colleagues, and participate on blogs and message boards. Unlike the big public social networks, the company sites feature industry news and job leads. They guide alums to reunions and company events - some even offer deals on health insurance.
"We're interested in building lifelong relationships," says Caren Scoropanos, who heads two-year-old KPMG Connect, where some 17,000 alumni can connect online with 22,000 employees.
In the best cases, former employees might have nice things to say about the company, becoming, in HR parlance, "brand ambassadors." And when the economy recovers, companies will be in touch with qualified workers who can be recruited to come back. In the meantime, managers can use alumni networks as a laboratory for learning. Software can be used to analyze the dynamics of each person's connections to determine who has the skill sets and interests to warrant being invited back into the elite active 'corporate student body'.
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