The best tool in employer branding? Your peers

I was attending World Employer Branding day this week and was in one of the roundtable sessions when I spotted a familiar face in the room. It was someone I had met just a few days before, when I was in Romania presenting at the Employer Branding Conference there.

You know your industry is niche when you fly to two different countries in 4 days… and still end up seeing the same people at both events. Employer branding: maybe only profession where you can’t ghost anyone. We will bump into you again.

But it’s the very nature of this industry being so well connected that makes it so special. This week at World Employer Branding Day in Amsterdam, you’re surrounded by hundreds of people who just get it. They get the hard slog, the endless stakeholder “alignment sessions,” the requests to “make it pop but still keep it subtle,” the eleventh-hour U-turns, the ‘can you just knock me up a poster or campaign’ because of course we can pull rabbits out of hats.

They know the thrill of finally getting sign-off… followed immediately by someone asking if the logo can be 2% bigger.

They understand that employer branding isn’t just a job - it’s part marketing, part internal politics, part hand holding, part project management, part stakeholder management and sometimes emotional support hotline for recruiters and hiring managers

It’s the only field where you can bond with a stranger purely by saying, “Our Glassdoor review / social media post/ campaign went viral” (for all the wrong reasons) and they’ll respond with, “mate… tell me everything.”

We spend most of our careers convincing candidates to care about companies and stakeholders to see the impact of the work we do. And when so many of us come together, united by that mission, it’s genuinely magic. Because — as always, the real energy isn’t in the keynote speeches or the stage-perfect slides. It’s in the in-between. The coffee chats. The fresh air breaks (or smoke breaks, depending on your vice). The lunches. The drinks.

Employer branding doesn’t advance in hushed boardrooms or polished decks. It advances in:

• Those five-minute coffee chats where someone leans in and says, “We spent £50k on that video and it completely flopped - here’s what we wish we had done instead.”

• The side-eye moment when someone on stage says “authenticity” for the sixth time and you lock eyes with a stranger who clearly feels the same.

• The late-night bar debates about whether EVPs even need pillars — or if the whole thing is just a corporate security blanket.

• The WhatsApp screenshots of job ads and Glassdoor reviews quietly prefaced with “please don’t share this but LOOK…”

• The, “Hey I have this idea — what do you think?” followed by instant validation you secretly need

  
  

That’s where the real learning happens. That’s where trust is built.

Networking gets a bad name because we associate it with awkward small talk and transactional business cards. But in reality, networking is just community. And when community is done right - it evolves into collaboration, accountability, and shared progress.

The most useful conversations in this industry never happen on stage - they happen in group chats, DMs, lobby corners, and quick coffees that turn into therapy sessions. I’ve made more genuine friends from one random event chat than from any formal networking slot - suddenly that person becomes your go-to for advice, a sounding board, a spontaneous wine debrief or the person you send your campaign idea too trusting that the inevitable roasting is coming from a good place.

And it doesn’t stop there. The beautiful thing about this industry is connecting others too.

Networking is not a “nice to have” - it’s a career strategy

If you don’t build your own visibility, you will forever be known as “the person who works at X.” Networking is how you shift from “Oh, she’s from xxx,” to “Oh, she’s the one who did x y and z” We all work for brands of different sizes but you are more than the company you work for.

And here’s the thing often forgotten: networking isn’t just about being seen, it’s also about connecting others. The moment you start introducing people, recommending speakers, or saying, “You two need to meet” is the moment you move from participant to value creator. That’s when people remember you.

You can build the best EVP in the world - but if you don’t build relationships, nobody will ask you to speak about it. Nobody will bring you into the room when the next opportunity lands. Someone else will - not because they’re better, but because they’re visible and useful to others.

Which brings me back to Amsterdam.

For me, World Employer Branding Day isn’t just about listening, it’s about connection. Of course I love hearing what others get up to and seeing their journey. (Shout out to Dan Perkins at Sanofi - this year he won global leader of the year - incredible - and two years ago we were at this very event talking about how he had just started leading the team)

I love connecting and reconnecting with people. Finding people I can message when I’m debating campaign tone. People who will send me frameworks without making me sign up for a demo. People who will tell me “you’re overthinking it - just post the damn thing.”

Slides fade. Insights get lost in notebooks. But relationships? They compound.

So if you’re working in employer brand and still thinking:

• “I’ll network when I’ve achieved something.”

• “I don’t want to bother people.”

• “Everyone else already knows each other.”

…here’s the truth no keynote says aloud:

You don’t network after you feel confident - you network until you do.

And if you’re reading this - consider this your invitation. I am open to a coffee chat, virtual or in person any time. Share the thing you’re stuck on. Trade wins or failures. (I have plenty).

Because this industry doesn’t move forward through polished slogans.

It moves forward through conversations.