There are moments in employee research when you realise the organisation has been asking the wrong questions — not because they were poorly written, but because they were too safe.
This realization doesn’t come from dashboards or benchmarks.
It comes from a pause in the room.
From a sentence that starts carefully, then turns honest.
And almost every time, it’s triggered by one question.
“If your best friend asked if they should interview here, what would you tell them?”
That question has changed the direction of more employer brands than any satisfaction score ever could.
Why this question works when most research doesn’t
Traditional employee research asks people to evaluate their workplace.
How satisfied are you?
Do you feel engaged?
Would you recommend us?
Those questions invite caution. Employees answer as representatives of the organisation, weighing their words, managing tone, and instinctively protecting the place they work.
The “friend test” does something entirely different.
It removes the organisation from the centre of the conversation and replaces it with a human relationship. Employees stop answering as employees and start answering as people who care about someone else’s outcome.
That shift, from evaluation to responsibility, is where honesty appears.
The moment the room changes
In focus groups, this question is rarely answered immediately.
People smile.
They laugh a little.
They think.
And then the stories begin.
Not sweeping declarations, but grounded truths:
- “I’d tell them it’s a great place to grow, if they’re comfortable learning on the fly.”
- “I’d say yes, but only if they’re okay with direct feedback.”
- “I’d warn them the pace is intense, even though the work is meaningful.”
Almost inevitably, someone says “but.”
That “but” is not a weakness.
It’s the most valuable data point in the room.
Because it reveals the conditions under which pride exists.
Ratings give you averages. Stories give you alignment.
Employee ratings tell you how people respond.
Stories tell you how people experience.
When organisations rely solely on scores, they often end up with employer brands that sound polished, but feel generic. Aspirational statements replace lived reality, and candidates sense the gap immediately.
Stories, on the other hand, surface:
- what employees value enough to tolerate trade-offs for
- what they warn others about without bitterness
- what makes the environment energising for some, and wrong for others
This is where employer brands become clearer, not broader.
When one answer quietly changes everything
In one focus group, employees were asked the friend test question after an hour of more traditional discussion.
Up to that point, leadership believed their strongest differentiator was stability and structure. Their messaging reflected predictability, process, and clarity.
But when employees spoke honestly, a different truth emerged.
Again and again, they described an environment that rewarded adaptability, problem-solving, and comfort with ambiguity. People stayed not because everything was defined but because they were trusted to figure things out.
That insight didn’t require a rebrand.
It required a correction.
The EVP shifted from promising certainty to owning complexity and suddenly, the organisation started attracting people who actually thrived there.
Asking better questions isn’t about clever phrasing
There’s a temptation to treat questions like copy to tweak wording until it sounds smarter.
But the most effective employee research doesn’t succeed because it’s articulate. It succeeds because it’s intentional.
The right questions:
- change the role the employee believes they’re playing
- lower the need to perform
- create permission to be specific
This isn’t about extracting truth.
It’s about making it safe enough to surface.
What 20 years of listening has taught us
At Brandemix, we’ve spent more than 20 years sitting in rooms like these, across industries, across workforce sizes, across moments of growth, pressure, and change.
And the pattern is always the same.
When organisations stop asking employees to describe the company and start inviting them to speak for someone else, the conversation changes. The insights deepen. And employer branding stops being performative.
The most successful employer brands we’ve helped shape didn’t begin with positioning statements. They began with uncomfortable clarity, followed by the courage to act on it.
Truth is what makes employer brands believable
Employer brands don’t fail because organisations lack good intentions.
They fail because they mistake polish for trust
Trust is built when people recognise themselves in what you say.
When candidates hear echoes of what employees would actually tell a friend.
That’s why the most powerful employer brands aren’t the loudest or the most ambitious.
They’re the most accurate.
And sometimes, all it takes to find that accuracy is one well-placed question.
Curious what your employees would say in a neutral room?
Get in Touch
FAQs
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What is the “friend test” in employee research?
It’s a focus group question that asks employees what they would tell a close friend about interviewing at their organisation, encouraging honest, story-based responses.
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Why are focus groups more effective than surveys for employer branding?
Focus groups allow nuance, emotion, and context to emerge, insights that are often lost in quantitative ratings.
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How can one focus group insight change an EVP?
A single recurring theme can reveal misalignment between how an organisation presents itself and how it’s experienced internally, prompting a more authentic EVP.
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What role does employee research play in employer branding?
Employee research provides the lived truths that make employer brands credible, specific, and resonant with the right talent.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jody Ordioni is the author of “The Talent Brand.” In her role as Founder and Chief Brand Officer of Brandemix, she leads the firm in creating brand-aligned talent communications that connect employees to cultures, companies, and business goals. She engages with HR professionals and corporate teams on how to build and promote talent brands, and implement best-practice talent acquisition and engagement strategies across all media and platforms. She has been named a "recruitment thought leader to follow" and her mission is to integrate marketing, human resources, internal communications, and social media to foster a seamless brand experience through the employee lifecycle.
