John Graham, Shaker’s VP of Employer Brand Strategy, hit RecFest USA with a mic drop on recruitment marketing and employer branding as we careen into 2025. His talk? A mix of AI hype, DEI drama, and a reality check for those clinging to the idea of "jobs for life" like it's still 1985.
Graham’s big reveal: employer branding is less about forever and more about for now, pivoting to a launchpad for career development instead of a golden handshake into retirement. He also dove into AI, calling it both the hero and potential villain of recruitment. Sure, it’s reshaping strategies faster than you can say "algorithmic bias," but Graham threw some shade on humanity, pointing out that we’re not exactly bias-free either. His advice? Play nice with AI but keep an eye on it—like a toddler with scissors.
DEI got a spotlight too, but not without acknowledging the current rebrand it’s enduring thanks to political tug-of-wars and corporate-level ghosting. He tied it all up with a forecast for 2024 tech trends: automation, AI, and video storytelling are set to dominate, but the focus will still be on keeping things human-centered. (Spoiler: robots are cool, but people still like people.)
And if that wasn’t enough, Graham’s closer was basically a call-to-action to stalk—er, network with—Shaker online. Updated website, LinkedIn, the works. Because nothing says "modern employer branding" like a shameless plug.
PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION (cometh)
Intro: Hide your kids! Lock the doors! You're listening to HR's most dangerous podcast. Chad Sowash and Joel Cheesman are here to punch the recruiting industry right where it hurts! Complete with breaking news, brash opinion, and loads of snark. Buckle up, boys and girls, it's time for the Chad and Cheese podcast.
Joel: Who are you and why are you here?
John Graham: I feel like you've asked everybody that question.
Joel: We've been given some standardized questions.
John Graham: I'm John Graham, vice president of Employer Brand Strategy Humanity and Culture at Shaker and I help our clients think about their employer brand strategy from end to end, not just the pieces and the parts. How does EVP connect to EB connect to RM and everything in between and how do we bring it to life in a way that makes sense for your organization and your culture?
Joel: And you presented earlier today. Talk about that presentation.
John Graham: I did. Yeah. We were talking about the predictions for 2025 as far as recruitment marketing and employer branding. So getting thought leaders from Visa and AutoZone to share their perspectives, things that they're working on now, what did they see as the challenges? Of course, AI was a conversation as it was in every conversation, but also the DEI landscape and how that's shifted significantly and how do you brand in the context of a company that might be rolling commitments back. How do you get leadership, the disconnect between leadership experience and the frontline experience, and how do you bridge that gap with employer branding? And I think we also spoke about not looking at bringing people in for lifetime careers but more so being a launchpad for the career that they need now. And if they go somewhere else, awesome, but take this goodwill of the brand with you and the values and the opportunities that you got to grow.
Joel: You mentioned AI being a hot topic, and yes, it indeed has.
John Graham: Yes.
Joel: Are we as branding organizations, putting too much trust, faith in technology and not enough about the human part of our business, or there are companies bringing both together for two great tastes that taste great together? What's your take on that?
John Graham: Yeah. Oh, I think you nailed it. I think we have to be cognizant of the balance between humanity and technology. You can't depend too much on technology because you're still dealing with real people and you can't give all of your agency away to an AI, Gen AI chatbot, any of that because it might not be right. So I think what we are reconciling now is which bias are we comfortable with. Obviously there's bias in AI because people made it but there's bias in people so we can't trade off one for the other. The question is which one are we gonna be more comfortable with and accept what comes with that. So yeah, I think we need to inject a bit more humanity in and leverage AI as a tool not as a surrogate.
Joel: One of the more fascinating things that I've learned in the last few months particularly here at this show is we went from a period where the black hole is bad, having applicants apply and not hear from us is bad.
John Graham: Sure.
Joel: Now let's automate it where they do have a conversation. That's good. But now it's swinging to okay, that's bad because it's not authentic, it's not human, it's not real. It can be one or the other. Where do we go from here? Do we scale human beings? Does the AI get that much better that we don't know the difference between a human and a rope? You're nodding your head yes.
John Graham: I think that's gonna be the move. Yeah.
Joel: So tell me what does the future look like?
John Graham: It's going to be indistinguishable at some point where you won't know if you're speaking to a human or not and that's good from an efficiency perspective but that's also meaning you're replacing human beings. So there's gonna be a balance of it. I think with every era of technology and technological advancement it's a reduction or an augmentation of the labor force. You saw it with the change, with the advent of automobiles, assembly lines. Every progressive advancement, it removes some of the manual tasks from it but then it creates a whole nother industry that didn't exist before. And I think people forget that. That yes, some things might go away but it's gonna create a whole bunch of opportunities in places that we don't even know yet.
Joel: Give me your take on the current state of DEI. A few years ago it was like yes, that's a good thing, let's do it. It became politicized, weaponized.
John Graham: Sure.
Joel: Companies stepped back, didn't wanna touch it. What's the current state of that issue?
John Graham: Yeah, so I think we're at a point where DEI is now going through its own rebranding and if you're a student of this space, you know that for the past 60 years there's been a series of progressions and regressions. It's just a natural ebb and flow. When you start making progress people will pull it back. But the key is you're incrementally moving forward. I think we're at a point right now where we're being honest about what can change, what people are willing to change, and then what can we do within that construct? What are we doing within the context of employer brand and recruitment marketing? How honest are we gonna be about our culture? What are we going to do as a company as far as what we're donating to them or not anymore? And some companies have made headlines for pulling their commitments back all the way, based on pressures from activist investors, perceived risk for their consumer bases, whatever the case may be. The challenge is that the issues for the people who were most marginalized didn't go away because a company rolled back its commitments so they're gonna have to contend with it in some way.
Joel: Jumping back to technology real quickly, 2024, what were the tech trends that stood out to you? You do a lot of vendors so I'm sure your take on this is pretty interesting. 2024.
John Graham: Yeah so this year it's been a lot of automation. AI has been the buzzword in everybody's tech platform but I think getting two candidates faster whether it be through your recruitment marketing efforts, getting higher quality candidates through automation, storytelling, and video. A lot of video platforms and ambassadorship for existing employees to be amplifiers of the brand. So I think we've seen a lot of that this year and it's really a circle back to maybe like 2016, '17 where that was sort of emerging. Now we're having a Renaissance. Technology's becoming better but interestingly enough I think we're gonna see more of that. We're gonna have to.
Joel: Let's talk about that. We took a step back. Now let's look forward. A year from now what will the tech trends be that we talked about?
John Graham: Well I think AI is going to get smarter. I think that there's going to be... While the advancement of the technology is inevitable I think you're also gonna start to see more of a double down on human-centered experience. So it's not just going to a conference and setting up a booth. It's what experience are you creating for specific demographics, different functions, different roles outside of the vendor floor and in a more intimate space so that people can start really building and establishing relationship.
Joel: Okay. So you say AI will be smarter. I guess it'll be left to find out if humans get dumber in that process.
John Graham: It's possible.
Joel: But thanks for sitting down with us. For those listeners and viewers that wanna connect with you or learn more about Shaker where do you send them?
John Graham: Shaker.com, first and foremost. We have a brand new site. It's gorgeous. A lot of good information and you can always find me on LinkedIn.
Joel: Shaker.com.
John Graham: That's it.
Joel: Easy-Peasy Nacho Cheesy.
John Graham: My god.
Joel: Thanks man. Enjoy the rest of the show.
John Graham: I appreciate it Joel.
Outro: Wow. Look at you. You made it through an entire episode of the Chad and Cheese podcast. Or maybe you cheated and fast forwarded to the end. Either way, there's no doubt you wish you had that time back. Valuable time you could have used to buy a nutritious meal at Taco Bell, enjoy a pour of your favourite whiskey, or just watch big booty Latinas and bug fights on TikTok. No, you hung out with these two chuggle heads instead. Now go take a shower and wash off all the guilt but save some soap because you'll be back. Like an awful train wreck, you can't look away. And like Chad's favorite Western, you can't quit them either. We out.
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