Novo Nordisk is a Danish multinational that has a reputation for supporting people living with chronic diseases such as diabetes. In a bid to tackle the growing obesity epidemic, it launched a new global Therapy Area, with the help of a new drug. But to support this, it needed to attract talent from regions far and wide. One of the challenges lay in changing misconceptions of obesity itself amongst medical professionals and the general public too – that individuals living with obesity are simply eating too much.

Pink Squid ran 12 workshops and leadership interviews with almost 60 Obesity Therapy stakeholders in the business. It analysed over 11,000 online mentions relating to obesity therapy and Novo Nordisk careers, as well as benchmarking 14 competitor brands. Further research included talent insights, colleague surveys and audience mapping tools across 40 unique job roles. The conclusion was that a huge proportion of hires needed to come from within Novo Nordisk, yet internal discussions related to obesity often focused on the risk of diabetes, rather than obesity being a disease in itself.

It started with a hero video, ‘Change the story’, designed to change these perceptions. The aim was to unite employees, build their empathy and attract them to work for the cause. The first task was to humanise the data around obesity to show the tangible impact on those around us, then introduce the real experiences of Novo Nordisk employees living with obesity themselves, to build powerful employee advocacy. Finally, an attraction campaign introduced Novo Nordisk as an employer, demonstrating how it offers a unique opportunity to change the story for each candidate. Individual videos and materials promoted eight Obesity Therapy functions, with ready-made assets for hiring managers to download. The new employer brand changed conversations around obesity both in the business and further afield, in the pharmaceutical industry and media.