At one of Australia’s largest healthcare organisations, employer brand isn’t just about attraction, it’s about shaping the entire employee experience. Meagan Michaels, Head of Employer Brand and Experience at Bupa Australia, shares how her team is navigating complexity, influencing stakeholders, and making employer brand indispensable to the business.
For Bupa, one of the first challenges is perception. Many people know Bupa as a health insurer, but the company is also a major healthcare employer.
“You’ve probably walked past a Bupa dental or optical and not really thought about it because you think of us as health insurance. But actually, we employ loads of clinicians.”
That means repositioning the brand in new markets and building awareness through consistent top-of-funnel messaging.
With such a diverse workforce — from aged care homes to software developers — consistency is the biggest challenge.
“The candidate and the employee experience you’ll have in an aged care home is totally different to what you’d have as a developer in head office. So for us, it’s about consistency wherever we can bring it.”
Meagan sees employer brand as much more than campaigns.
“We almost have to be internal PR for ourselves, reminding people that employer brand is really important and we’re an important part of the employee experience.”
That often means showing up in team meetings, building relationships, and explaining why EB matters to every part of the business.
Meagan has led EB at Bupa both within the Employee Experience function and within Talent Acquisition, and she sees pros and cons to both.
“In Employee Experience, it was easy to be in those conversations around culture, learning, and development. In Talent Acquisition, the focus is much narrower — it’s harder to access those conversations organically.”
She also warns of the risks:
“When things are going well, every other team is seen as successful. When things are going poorly, it’s Talent Acquisition that aren’t doing their job. That splashback makes EB riskier when it sits too close to TA.”
As Bupa shifts from being seen as an insurer to a broader healthcare company, employer brand is front and centre.
“One of our ambitions is to be the most customer-centric healthcare company in the world. And when your product is people — nurses, clinicians, carers — EB is vital because you need the right people to create the right product.”
With a large unwired workforce, internal communications present a unique challenge.
“If you’re working in an aged care home, you don’t have access to a laptop or phone. So much of our comms is leader-led, and that’s a really delicate system.”
This directly impacts internal mobility, an employee in a care home can sometimes find it easier to apply externally than navigate internal systems. Fixing this is one of the team’s biggest focus areas.
Meagan’s advice for anyone starting in a new role is simple but powerful:
“Without joking, about a third of my role was just rocking up in people’s team meetings and saying: here’s what we’re doing, here’s why it matters. Even if there’s nothing for you to do, just know this is what’s happening.”
At Bupa, employer brand is deeply connected to employee experience and that’s what gives it weight and longevity. From repositioning the brand in healthcare markets to tackling internal mobility and embedding EVP, Meagan’s work shows that EB is most effective when it:
Partners across functions
Acts like internal PR
Focuses on consistency while staying authentic
As Meagan reflects:
“The link between employer brand and employee experience is what gives us longevity in our roles.”