EP53: MotorK - Communicating Culture and Values (With Marta Capossele)

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

This 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 like our content, please subscribe to our channels on YouTube and Spotify to stay tuned for our weekly episodes.

My name is Lydia, and joining us today is Marta Capossele of MotorK. Welcome to the show, Marta. Good to have you with us today.

Marta: Hi, Lydia. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you.

The Spark of the Digital Revolution

Lydia: So Martha, tell us a little bit about your background. What really drives your passion for the talent space?

Marta: At the beginning of my career, I was interested in having an impact on organizations by helping them build stronger teams, developing talent management practices, and sharing company culture. As I became more aware of my impact, my interest shifted towards diversity and inclusion. I saw the potential to build a more inclusive and diverse workspace through recruitment practices. By starting with companies, we can expand these practices even outside.

Lydia: You are now the head of talent acquisition and employer branding at MotorK. I noticed that to work at MotorK, one must be a Sparker. What does it mean to be a Sparker, and how do you communicate this cultural identity during the recruitment process?

Marta: Being a Sparker means being part of the digital revolution that we are pursuing at MotorK. It means being an active agent of change and having an impact on our clients by helping them through their digital transformations and achieving their goals with our solutions. It also means being part of an incredible group of talented professionals who are committed to a common goal. This is the core of our culture, and we communicate it to candidates from the very beginning.

We dedicate a lot of time during the first HR interviews to explain what it means to be a Sparker and what it looks like. We have also created a brochure with our brand and marketing team that we send to candidates before the recruitment process, so they can have some insights and be prepared.

Lydia: What does it mean to be a Sparker, then? What is the cultural identity?

Marta: MotorK is a dynamic company that provides digital solutions in the still traditional environment of mobility. Being a Sparker means working towards the digital evolution that we propose to our clients and partners. It involves understanding how the mobility industry works and how it is evolving, as well as how new practices, ideas, and digital solutions can have an impact on it. We talk about the digital revolution in many fields, but mobility is still evolving. Being a Sparker today means looking forward and being part of this evolution.

Social Media: The Portal To Reach Younger Generations

Lydia: I understand that you are passionate about social recruiting. Social media platforms are constantly evolving and introducing new features. Which platforms have you found to be most effective for social recruiting, and why?

Marta: In terms of social recruiting platforms, we work a lot with LinkedIn. Not only do we have access to a large talent pool, but we can also spread powerful messages and connect with people who are interested in us. As a company that is focusing more on employer branding, Instagram is becoming increasingly important. It is part of our 2023 strategy to become more visible by showcasing employee stories, providing immediate content, and building a stronger employer brand.

Lydia: Do you find a difference in audience between LinkedIn and Instagram? Is there a specific goal for using Instagram, or is it currently focused on building your employer brand and culture?

Marta: One challenge that many companies face is reaching younger generations. Instagram is a first step in this direction, and we are also exploring other channels such as TikTok.

The idea is to provide easy-to-access content for young talent that we are targeting to build our internal talent pool. On LinkedIn, we focus on industry-specific content to onboard senior professionals, while on Instagram, we aim for fresher and more immediate communication with younger generations.

Lydia: So, what are some best practices you've used or any new experience that you've seen has worked in terms of social recruiting?

Marta: I am a big fan of referral programs and believe they are important for every company. When I joined MotorK, one of the first things I did was reshape our internal referral program by gamifying it and changing the incentives to increase visibility and engagement. It has been successful, becoming our second source of hiring. We are also working with our brand and communication team to build and leverage an employee advocacy program, incentivizing employees to share job offers, opportunities, and company updates. We engage with industry communities in the digital automotive, mobility, and tech worlds by participating in events, communicating through social media platforms, and hosting dedicated events. For example, we organized activities for the WordPress community last year. Our goal is to get closer to our target communities and become more visible to them.

Lydia: So these events, are they virtual or are they on site?

Marta: We organize both virtual and in-person events. MotorK hosts one of the biggest European events for the digital automotive world, Automotive I/O, which takes place in the spring and is completely virtual with speakers from around the globe. We also love to organize in-person events at our large office in Milan. The next one will be a hackathon for internal employees at the beginning of July. We use a mix of both virtual and in-person events.

Lydia: So, the talent strategy hinges on every kind of business event that you would have out there. It's a form of communicating your cultural identity or your EVP through these events that are taken.

Marta: Indeed, of course. The point is to convey our EVP method through the events to stay with what we want to communicate.

Challenges in Attracting and Retaining Talent

Lydia: What are some challenges you face in attracting talent and retaining them?

Marta: Well, I think we are facing common challenges like many other companies. One of the things that I’ve found very important to focus on to overcome future issues is to communicate our culture and values. It’s never easy to help candidates project themselves inside the organization, but it’s also important to help employees stay connected with the local company culture. So, we are working on enhancing our employer brand, making it visible and accessible externally by showcasing company stories, employee stories, and success stories.

Another important thing will be to offer continuous development and growth plans to people approaching the organization and to employees who have been with us for a long time. We invest a lot in training programs, organize conferences and events, give our employees a budget to participate, and offer language courses.

We try to maintain a high sense of involvement and motivation through many different talent management practices. We have an annual performance evaluation that employees appreciate and candidates ask about when approaching MotorK. So it’s a mix.

Lydia: When speaking about EVP being critical, especially when putting the company’s employer brand on display, what are some steps to take to develop a strong EVP? How can you make sure that your talent strategies for both skill and culture are aligned?

Marta: Good question. I think that it’s something we are working on more and more. The first point when talking about an EVP that has already been developed and launched is to involve the employees.

The EVP is evolving, never static, especially for organizations like MotorK that are constantly and quickly growing. Involving employees helps the organization take the temperature of what is going on and how the EVP is evolving. We do focus groups, have HR corners where they can communicate, and have recurrent annual surveys that we use to extract information and data to adapt our strategy and EVP.

The integration of the EVP along with the talent-related strategy is also very important to have a consistent message from the beginning. When we approach candidates, put them in the recruitment funnel, recruit them concretely, onboard them, or during learning steps, we have a very structured onboarding process. All along their life in the company, the different moments related to people development in your organization should be consistent with the EVP we want to transfer.

Harnessing the Power of Employee Storytelling

Lydia: So, on that note, going back a little bit to something that you alluded to using employee stories. Are there any processes in place where you harness the power of employee storytelling in order to build that brand? Do you have a particular process or structure in place, or is it something that you do through the surveys that go out? Or is it something that happens at the L&D events? How does that work?

Marta: We are working on it. We also encourage employees to share their stories spontaneously. And that’s something that they do a lot through feedback, through posts on different platforms. We are working on how to build a real storytelling culture in the organization. And I think the first important thing is to communicate to employees that they can share, that we are listening, that we care about what they are sharing. And this is something that we’re doing through different calls to action internally, to help them understand that there is a space for them there.

But this is not something that can be built from one day to another. So, I think it’s very important to also give instruments and train employees on how storytelling has to be built, especially because, of course, we have to be coherent with what we want to communicate. We are also thinking about identifying some natural-born storytellers in the organization and helping them coach other employees to get used to it and get closer to this practice. These days, we are talking about a call to action that will help employees become part of an activity that will use our channels and visibility to empower actions and initiatives or causes that they are following externally.

Because our employees embody our values and culture, but at the same time, they have their own passions. So we want to give them the possibility to integrate these two things and become more visible and spread their ideas.

Lydia: So, moving to the EVP and social recruiting. A lot of it is very visible, it’s almost like a brand exercise, right? Going out there and keeping the message consistent, etc. So, within your team, how do you build that consistency in terms of storytelling to candidates? If there’s no structure, how do they do that with candidates?

Marta: Well, of course, we organize activities internally to be coherent. So first, we have built some guidelines, which is the most important thing to follow, to give a structure, especially at the beginning with some new activities. We work on building communication calendars that have a different focus on considering the different channels. So what do we communicate on LinkedIn, what do we communicate on Instagram, and who is communicating what? This is for sure something that is giving a track to the talent acquisition team first, as they are the first agents of this.

Lydia: Absolutely. The first touchpoint, right?

Marta: Exactly. I mean, we have to give an example and be ambassadors of this. Then, for all the other employees who are interested, of course, this is also spontaneous. We train them together with our brand and communication team, which of course has tools for it. If they are very interested, we have different training materials and online platforms. Usually, what we do and what I’ve done in the past is to create an ambassador group where we can have recurrent meetings, and exchange feedback and exchange ideas, so they can be part of it in a very constructive and productive way. So, they can bring their ideas to the table and build together their communication coherent with what we want to communicate about from the job of the organization.

Leveraging Technology to Interact with Employees and Candidates

Lydia: With the growing popularity of remote work and virtual interactions, how has social recruiting been impacted in your experience?

Marta: Well, I think these last three years, it’s COVID. And after COVID has accelerated something that was already going on. For us, remote work is something that is very important because we are growing internationally very quickly. So, it’s a topic that we constantly discuss internally.

I think social recruiting and related platforms are helping organizations a lot to access a larger pool of talent. So we don’t focus anymore on local candidates in the country or in the city or even just in Europe.

We are recruiting talent from Argentina because they are willing to join us in Italy sometimes. So this is, of course, helping organizations a lot to face the very famous talent shortage that sometimes we are experiencing, especially because we are a tech company. So, this is very common. This is one point.

But on the other side, I think it helps organizations to be understood better and deeper. We can share more content, bring candidates into our organization through videos, pictures, and trial events, even before they join.

We’re trailing engagement, which is super important for us. We do it through the recruitment process. The majority of our steps are online, then if possible, we invite them to our offices and try to balance it a little bit. We are participating in virtual events with universities and schools, and this helps us meet young talents who are located abroad. We are building our graduate turnout program. So, this is key for diversification and inclusiveness. This is very important in terms of balancing the remote approach to candidates and then getting to know the company.

Lydia: That’s interesting that you mentioned going into the university side and building the talent pool and pipeline from when they begin their careers. And then projecting that as a great place to work. So, talent leaders such as yourself also need to look into these kinds of strategies so that you can not only fulfill business needs now but also look into something that will fulfill them in the future. So, in addition to that, what might be some other ways to think about future-proofing recruitment?

Marta: On top of what we were saying, for us, it’s very important to have a proactive and adaptive approach to new technologies. Because we are interested in people who are passionate about technology in general. And so our solutions, the projects we propose to them, have to be attractive to them first. Then, of course, all the solutions that technology is bringing us to interact with employees and candidates will probably help to overcome future issues that we might have. And then, again, to explore how to make decisions that are more and more data-driven. When we are approaching talent, it’s not just saying, “Okay, we want to have a team built that way with that type of profile,” but it’s also, “Where is this type of profile? Where are they going? What are they interested in? How are they moving? What could attract them?” And everything is based on data and concrete analysis because otherwise, it’s just pure luck.

Informed Decision Making through Data Analysis

Lydia: Or pure assumptions, which is the last thing you want to do, right? But informed decision-making definitely makes a difference in terms of analyzing historical data and what you can do in the future. So, on that note, on being data-driven and analytical as a talent acquisition function, you’ve got all these AI technologies out there, AI solutions, automation specifically, that are transforming so many aspects of recruitment. So, in your experience, how do these technologies influence social recruiting? How does the data element come into play?

Marta: MotorK is very into AI topics. We are transferring these into recruitment and talent practices. I believe it’s important to find a balance between technology and human interaction, especially when talking about people meeting other people, joining organizations, and making decisions that will impact their lives. This is the first thing I believe.

On top of it, there is no doubt that Artificial Intelligence has been impacting recruitment practices for a long time now. Some steps and areas can be completely modified by AI solutions, such as candidate sourcing, screening candidates, and matching for specific profiles and skills. I believe there are some roles that are more functional and require a different interpretation.

Artificial Intelligence will also help us have a more comprehensive understanding of people when they approach the organization, not just as candidates with their CVs but as human beings in their environments. Our ATS is already integrating the different social networks and platforms candidates are on in the candidate page so we can get to know them 360, not just from a work-related point of view.

Lydia: We know that social interactions, soft skills, and the real personality of a candidate are sometimes seen through social enrichment. The kind of information you get from their social presence is important. We’re seeing many trends in talent acquisition, including a rise in different forms of work and the need to build more connectivity. When virtual interactions are concerned, you’ve got to enhance the experience and make sure it’s memorable enough to be human. When you have a fragmented workforce, the need to build more connectivity comes in tandem with productivity. When looking for top talent, what criteria make a top talent?

Marta: The way of working has changed tremendously, and it will continue to change for sure. We talk a lot about the fact that our jobs in 20 years will be completely different, and some jobs won’t exist anymore. Who knows? So, I think we don’t talk anymore about concrete skills to do the job, but we’re more talking about broad soft skills that are very important to develop and evolve inside the organization.

For us, specifically, going back to the Sparker’s mentality and culture, it’s very important to have people on board who are adaptable and flexible. This means that they are not afraid of embracing changes and are very curious about innovation because this is what we bring outside, and that’s what we work on every day. So this is for sure one important thing: people who are not afraid of taking on new challenges.

Then, going on to the remote way of working and the fact that maybe you have a colleague in another country and another one working in a different time zone, the very first thing that everyone has to have in common is the work ethic and cultural fit with what we are working on. If values are in common, these will evolve with the organization. Probably the way of working will change, but people will stay coherent with their values, and this will bring connection and cohesion inside teams. Then skills can change; people can learn new things. We can help them to evolve in their role.

“This is power: to have the DNA of the organization and then people who will be onboard.”

Onboarding Remote Teams with VR and AR

Lydia: So, looking ahead, what emerging trends do you foresee in social recruiting or even employer branding? With the kind of data-driven recruitment perspective that you have now, what kind of emerging trends do you foresee?

Marta: I am a big fan of the impact that virtual reality and augmented reality can have in these processes. It’s something that has already started to take place in many organizations, but I think there is still a big room for improvement, and organizations can invest a lot in it. This is basically for two main reasons.

First, through these solutions, we can help candidates get to know the organization beforehand. For example, they can have virtual tours or experience on one typical day, or see what their job would look like. I mean, I’m thinking about my organization, but imagine there are people doing jobs that require a physical presence on some plants or sites that can give them a real perception of how their job will look like.

And on the onboarding side, again, with remote teams onboarding colleagues, this can help everyone sit around the same table and experience it in a different way. And this is so important for me because it will reduce attrition on onboarding and accelerate the ramp-up time, but also can have an impact on reducing turnover for all those cases where people join organizations and they don’t know where they are going and make a blind decision. This can really help people be more aware and organizations become more understandable outside. This is something very easy that can be done.

Then, generally speaking, I think the challenge for organizations is to stay up to date with the evolving landscape. This is possible, of course, with open eyes and an open mind, listening to employees and candidates who bring us a lot of ideas, and then fostering a culture of innovation for sure. When someone joins an organization, even if you try to have the best recruitment process and put them in contact with different colleagues, peers, and managers, there is always a risk that the person will join your organization with some misunderstandings or biases. And more so when people are coming from different backgrounds and cultures. We are growing a lot in new countries, so we are onboarding people with different experiences. So, the onboarding process has a natural time of evolution that brings people from being candidates to first-day employees and then Sparkers. These types of solutions can definitely give at least a different experience and accelerate this understanding.

Lydia: That’s great. I think it’s more futuristic than you had imagined it to be. It’s a trend that is foreseeable, at least, and something that can be done. In fact, how do you present it virtually speaking, when you’re big on remote hiring and looking at diversity and DNA? You’ve got so many of these cultures, as you said, coming in with the skills that you need. The whole idea of bringing people with different backgrounds in is to enrich your internal culture and turn it into something that’s very innovative, right?

Thank you very much for your time and your insights. I’m sure the audience listening in will want to know where to connect with you, so drop us your contact details.

Marta: We have our official website, which is www.motork.io. We also have our LinkedIn page, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. And then, of course, I will be more than happy to get in contact with anyone who wants to reach me on LinkedIn. My contacts are there: Marta Capossele at MotorK. We’re happy to connect.

Lydia: Perfect, and we have been in conversation with Marta Capossele of MotorK. Thank you for joining us and stay tuned for more weekly episodes from All-In Recruitment.