EP26: Hubspot - Keeping the Employer Brand Relevant (with Ashlee Gerow)

All-In Recruitment is a podcast by Manatal focusing on all things related to the recruitment industry’s missions and trends. Join us in our weekly conversations with leaders in the recruitment space and learn their best practices to transform the way you hire.

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Transcript 

The transcript has been edited for clarity.

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Lydia: Welcome to the All-In Recruitment podcast by Manatal, where we explore best practices, learnings, and trends with leaders in the recruitment space. If you've liked our content so far, please subscribe to our channels on YouTube and Spotify. And do stay tuned for our weekly episodes. 

My name is Lydia and with us this week is Ashlee Gerow, Senior Manager for Employer Brand at HubSpot. 

Hello, Ashlee. Thank you for joining us on this podcast.

Ashlee: Hi, Lydia. It’s so good to see you. Thank you for having me.

Taking The Leap To Try Something New

Lydia: So, Ashlee, you've come from a communications and marketing background, and over the past several years, you've been managing employer branding for large organizations. 

Walk us through that journey. What were some of the pivotal points for you in the employer branding space?

Ashlee: That's a great question. It's interesting when you talk to anybody in the employer brand how everyone got here is different. You have some people who come from recruiting into employer brand, and some people like me who come from marketing. 

I began my career in the agency space. So, I started in public relations, actually. I came out of school and thought that was what I wanted to do. However, I learned pretty quickly that it wasn't what I wanted to do. So, I moved on to larger B2C agency work and worked on advertising campaigns, larger brands, strategy, and marketing. And I spent about 10 plus years in the agency space and ended my agency career working with B2B agencies in brand strategy. 

And I transitioned to the employer brand for a couple of reasons. Number one, I was ready to get out of the agency grind. Quite frankly, I wanted to go in-house somewhere and focus on one brand. An employer brand is something that just came across my desk. I had never heard of it before. This was six years ago. Employer brand now have a little bit of a come-up, and people understand the value of it. We're seeing a lot more of it, given what's happening in the market. 

I had a friend who flagged the opportunity to me at a company called Red Hat, which is now owned by IBM. And it sounded like an interesting challenge for me to focus on people rather than products. The bulk of my work in the B2B space was around product and product marketing.

And this was all people that were telling them the human story. That was a really interesting challenge for me, and so I just took the leap and decided to try something new, and I loved it. I was at Red Hat for about four and a half years, and I've been at HubSpot for a year and a few months.

The Hierarchy of Needs For A Specific Role

Lydia: HubSpot is a clear leader in the employer branding space. So, what are some initiatives that you've managed at HubSpot personally since taking on this role last year?

Ashlee: I think one of the things that really attracted me to HubSpot is the employer brand team. All credit goes to my predecessors. The team that was before me has done a really great job at top-of-the-funnel and that larger employer brand awareness story, “What does it mean to work at HubSpot,” around things like our culture, our commitment to hybrid work, and our commitment to diversity, inclusion, and belonging. So, all of those messages are really solidified. 

And the year 2022, like everyone else, was the year of adaptability. I think for our team, we spent a lot of time certainly supporting a larger volume of hiring at the beginning of the year. And then, things really slowed down in the tech world in terms of hiring. So, we really had to pivot away from what I would call large volume, top-of-funnel campaigns into things that were more targeted to make sure we were targeting the right talent for the right roles and the right teams at the right time. 

That is a different initiative. It requires us to position ourselves differently. For example, a huge audience for us, as most tech companies, is its product engineering audience, and what they care about and what they want, what their hierarchy of needs are, is so different than when you're talking about a salesperson or me in marketing, and even down to where somebody's at in their career. For somebody who's just starting out, their cares and needs are much different than somebody who's in a mid to senior role. 

So a lot of what we did this year was trying to take a step back and say, “Okay, what are the real talent profiles that we need to focus on?” And “How can we create content that's really specific to them?” 

One of the things that we have is the HubSpot product blog. It's a blog dedicated solely to a product engineering audience. But historically, that blog has been very culture-based. So, a lot of stories about a day in the life and what it's like to work at HubSpot, which are great. We tell those stories across all of our channels. But we weren't making it technical enough for engineers to really understand that HubSpot is a place you can come and do really cool technical work, you can solve hard problems, and it's a place to grow your technical career. 

And so this year, we really want to make sure that we made a real effort to turn the content mix upside down and really become a more technical outlet. We were able to do that in partnership with our product engineering organization and through some partnerships that we had to build there for collaboration. We've seen a huge response in terms of our numbers, and we know that that's an area we need to go even further in 2023. 

So that's just one example of how a lot of what we're doing is leaning out of what I would call ‘top-of-funnel broad messaging.’ Although we still have to tell that story into, “What does that mean at a row level, at a team level? What does that experience feel like?” And “How do we make that a little more technical?”

Lydia: You mentioned the hierarchy of needs for a specific role. How would you describe the hierarchy of needs for an employer branding professional, for instance?

Ashlee: That's a great question. I think a lot of it is specific to the role that we're talking about and where that person is in their career. I'll speak for myself. When I came in, I came into a more senior role having more of a marketing background. And I think there are the things that you need from a professional development perspective that I was looking for. So, “Is there an opportunity? Is there support? Are there resources? Is it a collaborative, supportive, and inclusive environment?” 

And then there are the things that I just need personally, “Is there support for my family and me?” Compensation is table stakes at this point. “Do the benefits match what I need?” And those are all in the mix. But I think, overall, HubSpot does a really great job. And what I was so impressed by is this idea of total rewards or benefits; however you want to talk about it, can be really flexible to the individual. And that's something that we talk a lot about in the employer brand space is, “What I need and what's rewarding for me.” And, “How do we make sure that we highlight that there's flexibility there?” 

Lydia: An employer brand permeates through networks and circles of friends and even fellow job seekers. We often look to them for validation and sometimes say, “What do you think of this company? Have you applied here before?” 

So, what might be the three biggest hurdles you've seen for employer branding today, especially in the disruptive environments that we’ve seen recently?

Ashlee: I think 2022, as I said, was the year of adaptability. It's been a year of challenges for anybody working in the recruiting and employer brand space. Sometimes, we sit as part of our recruiting organization, and we're very close to that organization. 

So, I think number one is the volatility of the talent market has been a huge challenge for the organization and for recruiters, certainly, but also from an employer brand standpoint. It changes our priorities. It changes our focus. It changes our budgets. It changes our projects. It changes everything when our hiring projections change with it. 

So we've really had to, again, move away from the broader top-of-funnel messaging into things that are more targeted, which is new for us. And it's a new approach which we really had to figure out how to adapt to that. And quickly, as a result of that, I think the second thing is we see across a lot of different companies' portfolios and the definition of employer brand is changing a little bit.

“A lot of times, employer brand teams are meant to tell the larger story to everybody, where we want to share messaging and share stories that can apply no matter where you come in and work in the company. And I think that's true. And we still have to do that.” 

But 2022 was a year in which we saw ourselves being pulled further down the recruiting funnel and being asked to really support the business objectives, which were very specific to certain teams and certain groups. And that changes our tools, our content, and our budget.

I think seeing a shift a little bit in the portfolio into what I would call ‘recruitment marketing’ has been a challenge and has been something we've had to really adjust to. And then I think the third one is, I think, our employer brand team, like many, we're a content marketing team at the end of the day, and our content is only as good as how authentic it is to the experience because we don't want to bait and switch anyone. 

So, maintaining that authenticity and a time that's challenging for the industry, company, and for everyone's company is hard. You want to make sure that it's a little aspirational. You want to make sure that we're still sharing stories that make people want to come and be a part of HubSpot. But we also have to be honest about what's going on behind the scenes and what that feels like in different roles and what that means for changes in product, what that means for changes in our sales teams.

So maintaining that authenticity has been a real hurdle in 2022, and it will continue to be, and it requires us to take a step back and re-assess things like our EVP.

Redefining Who You Are As An Employer

Lydia: So, how often do you re-assess your EVP?

Ashlee: I've only been here for about a year and a half. And so I would think the existing EVP had been there for two or three years. It's really focused on things like our hybrid work approach and consistency, their diversity, inclusion, and belonging, our commitment to that, and things like sustainability and ESG, as well as our culture.

And so we've kind of lived in those three pillars, and I think those pillars are still right. But once we're on the other side of how the whole working world changed for COVID, we realized that we need to take a step back and make sure we're still that employer who says, “Are we still offering the same things? Are people expecting the same thing?”

Because they experienced the same? The answer is no. I don't think the experience is the same anywhere after what we all went through in the past two to three years. And so really making sure that we are using this opportunity as a way to learn. We're talking to tons of employees and our customers. Our mission is to help millions of customers grow better, and we feel strongly and deeply about that partnership. 

We want to understand what they think of us as an employer and what their interactions are like with our employees. And does that hold true to the values that we've shared with them? We talk to alumni, people who have left the company, good, bad, and different. What was their experience? What is their experience at their new employer? And how does that compare? And so we're doing all that work. 

Now we're about halfway through that partnership, or that process of deep partnership with our culture team to really understand “How we have changed? What are we offering now?” And “How do we need to continue to evolve and improve our messaging and external promotion perspective?” 

Then, how do we package that in a way that is not only exciting and not only in something that really shines a bright light on the great reasons to join HubSpot, but it's also authentic? 

It's not only are you a good fit for HubSpot. It's just HubSpot is a good fit for you. And I think the answer to that question is probably different than it was three years ago. And it's our job as an employer brand and our partnership with culture DEIB and our other HR partners to make sure that we're telling that story in the right way.

Lydia: And on that note, how would you describe a good place to work?

Ashlee: That's a really interesting question. 

“I think one of the most interesting things about employer brand is that it's a little bit of a moving target. Because depending on who you're talking to, the answer is different.” 

And again, that goes back to the hierarchy of needs. 

How we qualify ourselves as a good place to work and what we think is great about us as an employer may not be how you describe a great place to work. Also, it may not be how an engineer describes a great place to work. And so a lot of that is figuring out down to the talent persona, or the candidate persona, or the talent profile level. For instance, what is their care about? What are the things that they would use to define a good place to work? And then, can we do those things? First of all, is that real? Is that something we provide? And number two, how do we get that message and that content to them? 

So, I don't think there's a silver bullet there. I don't think there's a single answer to that. And I think that's an exciting challenge. Then from an employer brand perspective, it changes depending on who you're talking to, and it means that our content has to be even more targeted.

Developing A Strong EVP That Aligns With Talent Strategies

Lydia: As your content evolves, basically, depending on what you find out and all the different insights that you get from all the points that you mentioned earlier, you then roll out your employer branding campaigns, right? 

So how do you go about measuring the success of your campaign strategy and the overall outreach?

Ashlee: It's a great question that I get asked a lot. Because I think how we measure the impacts of employer brands is a hard question to answer. I think there are two separate sets of data that we're talking about. 

I think there are traditional marketing data, which are likes, engagements, click-throughs, and all of those things that are channel-based. That helps us understand how effective our content is and whether their content works with the right people and in the right way or not. Are they engaged? Are they clicking through on all the places we want them to? Are they landing on our career site? Are they going into the application process? What does that look like? 

So that's one set of data. And that's the easy data we can pull, gather some learnings, and apply them pretty quickly. 

The second set of data is how that informs us. How does that inform us that we are moving our hiring numbers? How does that inform us that we've hired enough senior engineers into this team within this timeframe? And I think the answer is that it's correlated, not causal. 

So we can't say that “If you go onto our HubSpot Life and you engage the Instagram takeover from one of our engineers, then you go and apply, and then you get into the process. And six months later, you are onboarded.” 

Those data points don't connect right now. And so we're having to make a lot of honestly organic connection of that stuff and work backward and work in deep partnership with our people analytics team. But I think the first part that asks, “How’s our content performing to the right audience?” is the stuff that we're good at. And that's the stuff that we can use to learn. 

The other piece, as how that connects directly to hiring, is what our stakeholders and our business leaders want us to get to faster, and I don't think we figured it out yet, but we're getting closer.

Lydia: Building a strong employer brand is for the long haul. And as you said, it takes time. But for some companies, especially those without a mature employer brand, there is the challenge of connecting that employer brand with the corporate brand and also the pillars of its business. 

So, how do you develop a strong EVP in order to ensure that your talent strategies for business and culture are both aligned?

Ashlee: That's a great question and a very timely one. Because we are in the middle of this process, and we're probably halfway through re-evaluating our EVP, I think HubSpot, as an organization, we're deeply collaborative. We don't believe in silos, we don't believe in pillars, and we don't believe in titles, for the most part, when it comes to what I would call ‘cross-functional projects.’  

So, when we were mapping out the different phases of the project - the research phase, the brainstorming phase, the messaging phase, the launch phase, the creative phase - all the different phases that you would put into a standard large-scale campaign, we had to make sure we had checks and balances at each of those phases. 

To make sure we were integrating the feedback from the right stakeholders all the way up to our leadership team to the C suite, who looked at the research and aligned our recommendation before we moved on to the brainstorming phase. Aligned on that before we moved on to the messaging phase. 
One of the questions they would always ask is, “Well, who did you talk to?” Did you talk to the HubSpot brand team? Did you talk to our customers? Did you talk to our engineers to make sure that those perspectives were included?" That's very important, and making sure that we have time to do that. 

If we have got negative feedback, we’re willing to go back to the drawing board and re-assess to make sure that it all feels good. Now, you're not going to create an EVP that feels 100% to everybody. That is impossible. We wanted to make sure that we understood the different perspectives and brought that in again. 

We made sure that it was authentic to where we were. It should be a little aspirational. It should be a little bit looking forward, and where we think we are going to be and where we want to go, we want you to come along with us on that journey. 

But we also have to be authentic to where we are now. And that is sometimes the bulk of the discussion. But I think it's making sure that you plan ahead of time for a highly collaborative experience and a lot of feedback. This is the type of thing that you're going to get a ton of feedback on. And if you're not open to that, it won't work.

Working Across Departments For Employer Branding

Lydia: We are in a bit of an economic pinch right now, and we've seen major layoffs in large companies. So how do you approach employer branding at a time when companies are downsizing or going through a difficult period?

Ashlee: I think that's a great question, and I think one of the most interesting and maybe honestly, one of the most challenging parts of the employer brand is, no matter what's happening in the market, no matter what's happening in terms of things like downsizing or changing of hiring plans, our mission stays the same. And that is to talk authentically and tell authentic people-driven stories about what it's like to work at HubSpot. 

“Whether you have 10,000 open requisitions, 1,000 open requisitions, or 10 open requisitions, the story is still the story. And it's our job to make sure that we tell that in a way that's specific to the type of talent that you're looking for and specifically the type of talent that you're bringing on.” 

For example, if I'm not hiring senior engineers, I shouldn't be putting out content that features senior engineers. Because when they see that, there's really nowhere to put them, and you've lost that opportunity, and sometimes, you only get one shot. 

If there's nowhere to send them to try to really capture those leads, if you will, then you've wasted that effort. And so a lot of that is trying to figure out, “Okay, how do we tell the story in a way that matches where we are as an organization?” And, “What are we looking for?” But in a way, that also helps us keep telling the broader story of what it's like to work at HubSpot, which remains true no matter where we are as a company.

Lydia: And in times like this, collaboration with internal communications, for instance, in HR, becomes very critical, especially when you have different departments and it's not a single department handling these things. 

So, what are some steps that employer branding professionals should take when they work together with HR and maybe Corporate Communications even, to ensure that the messages, however difficult they may be, are conveyed smoothly and also with empathy?

Ashlee: That's a great question, especially right now. I think the biggest piece of advice I can give is to be unafraid to have tough conversations with other stakeholder groups. And to really make sure that the employer brand perspective is included. 

Now at HubSpot, I will say we're part of HR as corporate communication. It's a unique structure, and we're able to work really closely together. And at one point, the employer brand and internal communication were the same teams when I came into the organization. Which is again unique and really helped with that collaboration and that partnership between myself and my counterpart of the internal comms team. But that's a partnership that has to stay deep. So, I can go to her and say, “Hey, I heard this is happening. Let's talk about it.” And she can do the same. 

I think a lot of that happens through stakeholder engagement and relationship building. But part of it, too, is being unafraid, as an employer brand team, to make sure that people understand that you have a perspective that's unique. Because it's not. Employer brand or internal comms is typically focused on the internal audience - your employees and your leadership teams.

External communication is primarily focused on the customer - what the customer thinks and how we can make sure that we're supporting growth. Employer brand has a foot in both external audiences, which is your candidate audience that we need to come into the organization to fuel that growth, and also our employees. 

Our channels, particularly our Instagram channel, for instance, a big bulk of our followers are our employees, and certainly, our content is driven by them. And so, in order to do our job in a way that's effective, we have to have deep partnerships with both of those organizations. And that requires weekly one on ones, raising your hand if you feel like you're not at the table that you need to be at, and leadership that understands the value of an employer brand. 

And if you don't have that, you have to make sure that you're making the case to leadership to share that value, and at HubSpot, our Chief People Officer, VP of Recruiting, or leaders across the company understand the value of employer brand, and they understand what it can do. So, we're able to be at those tables, but I've worked at organizations where that's not the case. And it is a constant kind of raising your hand, proving the value until you get a seat at that table.

Lydia: How do you ensure that the employer brand continues to be reflected throughout the transition process? For example, if it's downsizing or it's a period of layoffs.

Ashlee: That goes back to what we were talking about earlier, and I think it's taking a step back and looking at the entire candidate journey and the employee journey as well and understanding I've talked about this before. 

To me, it's an infinite loop. Employer brand is typically how someone enters your organization and how you attract the talent, then they typically go into the recruiting process, everything works out, they are onboarded, and eventually, they're going to become alumni. Whether they leave on their own or they're asked to leave, whatever the situation is, they become alumni. And we want them to look back on their time here as a time where they grew, whether they were supported, it was an inclusive environment. So maybe one day, they'll boomerang and come back. 

And I think that remains true no matter what the situation is, and as an employer brand team, we really focus on how we can make sure that the stories we're telling at the beginning of that infinity loop are authentic and true to what they're going to experience. So when they do leave, for whatever reason, it feels like the experience matches their expectations.

Elevating EVP With Technology

Lydia: Let's talk about technology a little bit. Actually, there are plenty of tools that automate hiring, such as Manatal’s ATS. How does technology help with elevating the EVP?

Ashlee: That's a great question. I think there's a lot of technology that is becoming more and more available that can really help in the employer brand space. A lot of those are traditional marketing tools. 

How can we automate gathering content? And how can we make that content authentic? Not everything has to be super polished all the time. How do we make it easy for our stakeholders to give us that content? And how do we automate getting it out onto things like our career site and through our social media channels? 

So we have some tools that really help us do that where it's a very simple input on our end. Our employees can help us create that content on their own time, and then it goes where it needs to when that's finished with some QA on our side. 

Also, a lot of automation going on in the social media space, as you would anticipate from any content marketing team. We are just making sure that as much as we can create solutions that are hands-off, the more time we're freed up to do these more deep-thinking projects, like our EDP. 

Because when we're talking about content creation and distribution, we're always looking for different tools. And we have a good tech stack right now, and I think we may be adding to that in the future to help us generate content faster, and we'll be able to react more in real-time as the market continues to change.

Lydia: And as you've mentioned earlier, you have an interesting transitory experience in the space. What advice would you give someone starting out today in the employer branding space?

Ashlee: As I said, I've not met one person who came into the employer brand the same way. And I think that's really exciting because that says that it's an industry, it's a function that there are so many transferable skills that you can bring into it. 

I have members of my team who started in recruiting and content marketing. They both bring a ton of skills to our team and different perspectives, which I think is important. So, I would say don't be afraid of imposter syndrome. Don't feel like you've never done this before, so you don't have a shot. I think there are a lot of companies who would disagree, and HubSpot is one of those companies. We know impostor syndrome is a thing. I feel it. We all feel it. We don't want that to stop people. 

We really believe in transferable skills, especially if you have a marketing or communications background. I think that's a really easy segue, a recruiting background, certainly. So, don't limit yourself by what the experience is. Employer brand is growing as a function, but we're still a pretty small community. And I would not hesitate to reach out.  Reach out to me, reach out to anybody that you know working in the space and have a conversation about what they're looking for and what you're looking for and see if it makes sense because it's a little different everywhere. 

And then if we're talking about somebody who is already in an organization, and maybe you're a one-man show, or you’re a recruiter who, given the hiring slowdown, has been asked to do some employer brand stuff, and you're like, “Where do I even start?” I think the best advice I can give is to keep it really simple. 

Create some authentic content, and that can be with an iPhone. Get somebody to record a video for 30 seconds talking about what they love about working at your company, put it on social, put it on YouTube, and push it out over LinkedIn. LinkedIn is your friend, by all means. And so I think the more that you can simplify what you're trying to do, and gain some traction, and then worry about what it costs and how to amplify it from there, you can at least get started.

Lydia: Thank you so much, Ashlee, for your time and your insights today. I think they were great, especially for anyone who wants to re-assess the EVP and look into how to refine it moving into a more challenging time. I'm sure the audience, especially those listening and watching, would want to know where to connect with you. So, where can they find you?

Ashlee: Please connect with me on LinkedIn, and send me a message. We'd love to hear from you. We'd love to chat. And then HubSpot as a brand, check out our HubSpot life channels. We are on Instagram and Facebook, and, obviously, our career site and YouTube. You can find us anywhere. So, please engage with our content and please reach out.

‍Lydia: Thank you so much, Ashlee. And we have been in conversation with Ashlee Gerow, Senior Manager for Employer Brand at HubSpot. If you like our content, please subscribe to our channels and stay tuned next week for more episodes of All-In recruitment. Thank you.