In this episode of The Talent Tango, Amir sits down with Caitlin Kamm, Director of People Growth at Envoy, to unpack a real-world employer branding initiative tailored specifically for engineering talent. Caitlin walks through how her team developed a laser-focused EVP to support a return-to-office mandate—balancing culture, candidate persona, and business needs. From strategy to stakeholder alignment to creative execution, it's a playbook for anyone in talent roles grappling with attracting high-caliber candidates in a hybrid world.

💡 Key Takeaways:

1. Start with specificity: Crafting an employer brand around a targeted persona—like engineers—yields clearer messaging and stronger impact.

2. Authenticity over perks: The EVP focused on purpose, innovation, and collaboration, deliberately leaving out compensation and benefits.

3. Match the medium to the message: They pivoted from real employee footage to an animated video to better reflect Envoy's brand and voice.

4. Metrics with context: A 5% increase in offer acceptance was a win—but measuring deeper attribution requires embedding branding assets across the candidate journey.

⏱️ Timestamped Highlights:

• 00:00 – Intro to Caitlin and episode scope

• 01:01 – Defining employer branding at Envoy

• 03:02 – Aligning brand with return-to-office policy

• 07:24 – Why engineers were the initial focus

• 10:07 – Communicating the 'why' of coming to the office

• 12:55 – Making intentional branding choices

• 14:24 – Measuring success: acceptance rates and Q1 plans

• 17:01 – Applying a product mindset to employer branding

• 19:56 – Lessons learned and the power of anchoring to the ideal candidate persona

💬 Quote to Highlight:

"You have to treat the soft stuff like the hard stuff—when you bring rigor to planning and persona targeting, the strategy actually sticks." — Caitlin Kamm