The live music industry and Novus: measuring and developing an employer brand
Svensk Live works to support and develop live music in Sweden and brings together more than 300 promoters across the country. In spring 2024, in collaboration with Novus and a number of member promoters, Svensk Live took the temperature of the Swedish live music industry. The survey targeted people currently working in the industry, with the aim of mapping views on the live music industry and its players as employers.
“The idea for the survey came from the CEO of one of the larger companies. We checked whether other companies were interested in taking part, and it quickly became an email thread full of YES!” says Joppe Pihlgren, Managing Director of Svensk Live, who has acted as a coordinating force throughout the survey.
The survey grew out of a need for a knowledge base that can drive the live music industry forward. With Novus’ help, the aim was to listen to the active voices in the industry to understand what already works well today, and what needs further work to continue to be seen as attractive employers. The idea is for this to be the first in a series of surveys, so that progress for both Svensk Live and the individual participating promoters can be tracked through repeated measurements over time.
Novus’ approach
The set-up was that a number of promoters jointly funded the survey with equal contributions, with Svensk Live as the coordinating party. The questionnaire was written by Novus in collaboration with Svensk Live, was the same for everyone and covered areas such as awareness, willingness to apply for a job, likelihood to recommend and image.
Novus adviser Lina Karlsson has also been a driving force in the project together with Joppe Pihlgren. She explains that, through close dialogue and tailored analysis frameworks, the parties arrived at a set-up that takes into account both the industry context and the individual players, and that will stand the test of time.
“This project has been very rewarding and instructive for us at Novus too,” says Lina Karlsson. “Carrying out a survey where several parties need to be involved and satisfied, without seeing each other’s results, requires collaboration, sensitivity and thinking outside the box.”
Insights to build on
Once the interviews had been completed, each party received its own report containing only its own results and a tailored analysis. All parties could also see how their own employer brand compared with an aggregated industry average on a selected number of KPIs. This gave them a sense of their own relative strengths and areas for development. Svensk Live also received a report consisting only of industry averages, summarising views on the industry as a whole.
Asked whether the survey led to any eye-openers, Joppe Pihlgren replies that there were things that really were not eye-openers at all, but became so when they saw them in black and white. For example, how important work-life balance is for people working in the live music industry.
“Something else that was nice to see was that we are an attractive industry, along with some other good results that feel like a pat on the back,” says Joppe Pihlgren.
The survey and the follow-up measurements will serve as a basis for work within each organisation, and according to Joppe Pihlgren they are already being put to use:
“Each company has used it in its own work, and as an industry organisation we now have tools to see which issues we can work on at a general level for all our members.”
