One of the things I’ve learned from interviewing people for the podcast is that very often the most effective recruiting innovations come from the recruiting teams at tech start-ups who have successfully scaled. This is normally as a result of the size of the recruiting challenges they tend to face and the speed at which they must overcome them.
My guest this week is Anna Lambert, Director of Talent Acquisition at Shopify. Shopify is a great example of a tech company that has scaled massively and Anna has some great insights on recruiting innovation to share.
In the interview we discus:
• How to maintain quality of hire as you grow
• The life story approach to recruiting
• Interview shadowing
• Effective strategies to overcome human unconscious bias
• The critical importance of employer brand
Anna also talks about the advantages of her non-recruiting background and gives her view on the outlook for the future.
Shopify are currently looking for new recruiters to join their team, more details are available on their careers site
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Transcript:
Matt Alder [00:00:00]:
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Matt Alder [00:01:04]:
Hi everyone, this is Matt Alder. Welcome to episode 84 of the Recruiting Future podcast. One of the things I’ve learned from interviewing people for the podcast is that very often the most effective recruiting innovation comes from the recruiting teams at tech startups who have successfully scaled up. This normally comes down to the size of the recruiting challenges they face and the speed at which they have to overcome them. My guest this week is Anna Lambert, Director of Talent Acquisition at Shopify. Shopify is a great example of a tech company that has scaled massively and Anna has some great innovation insights to share. Hi Anna, and welcome to the podcast.
Anna Lambert [00:01:49]:
Hey Matt, how’s it going?
Matt Alder [00:01:51]:
Very good, very good indeed. Could you introduce yourself, give, give a bit of sort of background to who you are and what you do?
Anna Lambert [00:01:59]:
Sure. So I am the director of talent acquisition at Shopify, a commerce company headquartered out of Ottawa. And I have actually a political science background. So nothing related to HR or recruiting, but wound up kind of finding my way into this field as most folks in recru and for the past five years have helped grow Shopify from about 150 to over 1800 employees. It’s been just an incredible experience to kind of support that kind of growth over such a short period of time. And, you know, really proud of the work that our team, our recruiting team has kind of done in maintaining the kind of quality of hires we’ve grown so rapidly.
Matt Alder [00:02:50]:
So with that amount of growth in.
Matt Alder [00:02:51]:
The organization, what recruiting challenges do you.
Matt Alder [00:02:55]:
Have and how have they evolved over.
Matt Alder [00:02:58]:
The time you’ve been there?
Anna Lambert [00:02:59]:
Yeah, so I think I mentioned it just a couple seconds ago. Quality and kind of balancing, ensuring that you’re maintaining the quality of the team as you grow, along with a need for, you know, lots of new folks to help us solve the problems that we’re solving. And so, you know, back in, say, 2013, you could sit in on 50 or 60 interviews with another recruiter to really understand, you know, what are those predictors of success and what makes, you know, someone successful at Shopify, what to look out for, what types of skills would be kind of interesting. And because we take such a unique approach, you know, there isn’t that checklist of they have five years experience and therefore they’ll be great in this area. So it is, it is, I think challenges are around maintaining that quality and training, you know, a growing recruiting team to look out for those predictors of success while, you know, highlighting and acknowledging that we all are human and we have biases and we need to make sure that we’re building an extremely diverse team that, you know, brings in diversity of thought so we can solve kind of problems with the best answers.
Matt Alder [00:04:19]:
You mentioned there that you’ve got quite a sort of unique recruitment process or way of recruiting. Could you tell us a little bit more about that?
Anna Lambert [00:04:28]:
Yeah. So a lot of companies look at talent as, you know, my least favorite term, bums in seats or resources. And the approach to finding these folks is very much about what is written on the cv. And certainly that is one indicator of potential success. You know, what you’ve done in the past typically is a good predictor of the future. And I think the approach that we take is one, we’re, you know, working with human beings and they bring not only their skill sets, you know, their experiences, but their volunteer work and their families and, you know, their different personality types and what gets them excited outside of work. And so we really take a holistic approach to understanding a person. You know, what they love to do, why, you know, why they come to work every day and how they want to have an impact as well. So I think that’s one of kind of the key things and how we do that is that we genuinely get to know people in the process. So, you know, we do what’s called the life story. And essentially we sit down with a person and we start from a point of time in the past and we talk about their transitions, their, you know, the impact they’ve had, how engaged they were in their work. You know, folks bring up really interesting side projects that we might not, we might not have otherwise learned about had we taken the kind of traditional approach of what’s on the CV and what professional experience only have they had. And so what we find is that we end up learning about so many things that another company might not, and we can place a person in the best role for them to solve the problems that interest them the most.
Matt Alder [00:06:17]:
That’s obviously a really interesting approach. How have you kind of maintained that? As the recruitment team has grown, is there any sort of specific technology that you’re using to make it easier?
Anna Lambert [00:06:32]:
Yeah, so we actually, we’ve increased kind of significantly in the, in the tech that we’ve been using. We actually built our own applicant tracking system about four years ago and we had to sunset that. ATS’s are very complex and it was a really fun experience to be part of that. Doug, the very first recruiter at Shopify, had built that out with our developers and actually every developer who joined at the time, their onboarding was to work on the ATS for about two weeks. It was built in Ruby on Rails and, you know, the team was committed to kind of building out this product in the best way. As the team has scaled, we’ve had to turn to some, let’s say, you know, better tested technology. And so we use Lever as our ats and we’ve been a kind of an early customer of theirs and have helped. They’ve been awesome at listening to the challenges and the needs and what happens at scale. And they’ve been great at including us in their product kind of feedback loop. So Lever’s really great. We also use ntelo and one of the key features of Intello is the diversity filter, which allows us to expand our reach as it relates to our research. We have a number of tools that increase productivity, so reduce the time spent, you know, responding to, you know, scheduling errors back and forth, you know, maintaining a high kind of candidate experience. So anything that can improve, you know, the efficiency and effectiveness of the team. We also allow folks to kind of pick their own. So we like, you know, I use textexpander for myself. We use Calendly for scheduling. And actually this past hack days, which is two days of every quarter, where the entire company stops what they’re doing and works on a project with groups outside of their team. So we actually built a shadowing app where folks can schedule themselves into certain interviews so they can learn from the experts of that particular interview style.
Matt Alder [00:08:54]:
That shadowing app sounds really interesting. Has it been up and running for long? What kind of results have you seen from it?
Anna Lambert [00:09:03]:
We literally built it two weeks ago. So it’s in kind of final development stage. And basically the app allows for us to see who’s been trained, so who’s completed interview training, who’s completed bias training, and then how many interviews with another person somebody has done. And then they can actually go in and say, hey, you know, I’VE done the, you know, the pair programming a couple times. But I’m interested in maybe learning from some other people so I can learn different styles, improve my skills and they can schedule themselves in with another person who might be, you know, well trained or well equipped in that, in that area. So honestly I’m really excited to see how it, how it’s adopted. It’s going to, it’s definitely going to increase the speed at which we can train people up on, on those department specific interviews.
Matt Alder [00:09:53]:
Just picking up on the unconscious bias.
Matt Alder [00:09:55]:
Side of things, which must be, you know, a fairly large issue for you with the way that you’re interviewing people. You mentioned sort of training. How are you overcoming that within the organization?
Anna Lambert [00:10:09]:
Yeah, it’s a great question. And I think something to note is that a lot of companies will indicate that they have a bias free interview process or their grading system has been developed to essentially remove bias. It is quite literally impossible to remove human biases. It is inherent but and so I become a little skeptical when I hear that because to me it indicates that, you know, they haven’t identified how biases might exist in the development of said, you know, tracking mechanisms. And so what I think is super important is to make the education and awareness around bias recognition and decision making, putting that at the forefront of recruiting, of decision making around, you know, promotions or level of impact. And so that’s exactly what we’ve done. You would be absolutely blown away by how self aware the recruiting team is about their particular, you know, backgrounds and experiences that have, you know, resulted in certain biases and then what really, you know, meaningful ways, kind of their meaningful kind of tools they’re using to reduce their biases and be aware of them in how they make decisions. And I think that is absolutely critical no matter what type of interview you have, is identifying the points of time where a human being has made a decision about another human being and that often it’s subconscious, it’s below the surface. And so we do bias training for everybody who will be interviewing. And what that entails is lots of learning in a advance so, you know, links to certain videos and specifically the IAT test, which is an implicit association test. And then we go through a lot of examples when you know, bias has impacted an interviewing process and just how subconscious it can be. And you know, great examples of when products were built with diversity of thought on the team and how much better suited they are for a global market or alternative and kind of the, you know, the downside when there isn’t diversity of Thought is when products have failed or you know, potentially harmed people because diversity of thought didn’t exist on the team. So we do about an hour on, you know, the different interview styles, the different ways to identify your biases up front, how to reduce it, how to be, you know, mindful in every stage. So whether it be screening, interviewing, decision making, even to just how, you know, you would onboard someone and, and based on the particular biases that you know, that you might have, how that might change how you interact with somebody else. And you know, a great example is, you know, someone on the team, you know, they interview a candidate and they come out and they say, you know what? I don’t, I would like somebody else to interview that candidate and kind of confirm what I think to be true. And I think this takes a lot of, a lot of self awareness and a lot of kind of, you know, you have to remove the ego to be able to say, I’m not sure that I’m able to make the best decision here. And what we’ve done is we’ve certainly made that not only okay, but encouraged. So that when you are making a decision about another human being, you know, and it isn’t in a standardized, let’s say, process, everyone goes through the same process. From the life story to say it’s on the developer side, there’s a technical deep dive, there’s a pair program. You know, we have different exercises for different departments but every individual would go through those same four interviews and you know, some companies would then indicate and therefore it is bias free but you’ve got human beings conducting those interviews and so highlighting, you know, all of the complexities of decision making and in particular, you know, bias or sponsorship, that certainly is kind of one of the most important things in ensuring that you’re attracting and hiring the very best.
Matt Alder [00:14:44]:
So we’ve talked about the innovation in.
Matt Alder [00:14:47]:
Your recruitment process with the, with the company growing so quickly. Have you had a similar approach in your sort of actual talent attraction and recruitment marketing strategy?
Anna Lambert [00:15:00]:
Yeah, employer brand is really important. It’s absolutely something that can kind of make or break a company’s ability to attract the best. And so certainly things that we’ve been very intentional about are, you know, depicting the realities of working at a company like Shopify. So and that will attract certain folks and might dissuade others. And so as an example, Shopify is a place where we care a lot about impact over things like, you know, what time you show up in the morning and what time you leave at night. We care A lot about, you know, people being able to thrive in ambiguity. So because we’re growing and changing so quickly, you have to be able to, you know, see the kind of North Star and then kind of balance all of the different variables and different data points that come your way. And so when we’re kind of describing our what it’s like to work here, we’re very, very accurate about the kind of the way that we get work done. We attend lots of conferences that align with our culture. We’re kind of on the ground in many different and unique ways to, like I said, and connect with folks outside of maybe our traditional networks or our particular locations. And this is key. I mean, multi location and like, you know, attracting talent globally is really important when you’re, when you’re hiring, you know, you’re hiring at the rate that we’re hiring at and looking for the, you know, the quality of those candidates and their skill sets. We have a hashtag life at Shopify, where folks can tweet about, about projects they’ve shipped or fun things they’re doing at work. And so we have lots of people who come and take a look at what it might be like to work at Shopify. Through that. We actually won Glassdoor’s Best Place to work in 2016. And that was entirely. It was really incredible because it was as a result of our employee feedback. So this was our employee, you know, without any prompting, going on and saying, here’s what, you know, here’s what’s great about working for this, you know, for Shopify, and here’s what I love and here’s how I can have an impact and here’s why it’s great for my family and, you know, my personal life. And, and so with that, we, you know, we were able to attract lots of people, you know, from very many different backgrounds and with different sets of experience.
Matt Alder [00:17:42]:
You mentioned at the start you came to Shopify without a recruitment background. What have been the advantages of that and what have been the disadvantages of that?
Anna Lambert [00:17:52]:
That’s a great question. And one of the things I value the most about Shopify is the incredible balance between a team where you have somebody with the kind of raw skills or potential to have an impact in an area where. Where maybe they’ve never worked along with folks with some experience to help, mentor and guide. And I was certainly lucky enough to be in that situation where they saw potential in my abilities. And then I learned from the best recruiter and was able to grow in my capacity in this industry. And I Think diversity of thought is a great example of why these different backgrounds matter. My experience, both internationally and within kind of the communications, political science space meant that I was bringing zero baggage about recruiting. So, you know, no existing kind of practices or protocols. I was able to say, why are we doing this this way? Or why aren’t we doing it this way? Because I didn’t have any sort of preconceived notions about what a recruiting process might look like. And so that has allowed for innovation again, for looking at the industry with an incred positive light and, you know, with, you know, seeing huge opportunity in changing the way that we, you know, manage talent and attract people and get to know them and treat them really well. And I think that’s been incredibly beneficial. It’s been hard. It’s been a steep, steep learning curve. This is a craft that is very complex, especially when you’re aiming to do it in a really, you know, high quality way. And so learning how do I source for these skill sets, how do I learn about, you know, these, these different backgrounds that I know nothing about? And so not only was there a steep learning curve around recruiting and how to learn from folks who have, who have come up with really great practices and skills, but also, you know, our recruiting team is deeply embedded in the teams that they work with. And so, you know, what’s Ruby on Rails and you know, what is the, you know, what are the different technologies that we want to attract and you know, what about the folks who don’t have those skill sets? How do we also see, you know, what they’re capable of learning? And so I spent a lot of time sitting in with the different groups that I was working with and learning about the technology they use or their design kind of methodology, or their philosophies around how they’re building out their team, their products. And that’s been again, steep learning curve, but incredibly useful in then looking out to recruit the best for those, those teams.
Matt Alder [00:20:43]:
So final question.
Matt Alder [00:20:45]:
What’s next? Where do you see your recruitment strategy going over the next 12 to 18 months?
Anna Lambert [00:20:51]:
That is an exciting question. So I was actually at a conference last week called the Future of Work. And it was the first, it was, the first conference was put on by a company called Remote Year. And this is something that I find interesting and that I’m looking kind of more into this idea of, you know, the workplace is changing and the future of work is changing. And that is as a result of, you know, AI and bots and remote work and the fact that you can work from anywhere with your mobile device, you know, with your laptop, you can truly be anywhere in the world and work. And so, you know, as we look to the future of work, you know, I’m certainly interested by the best ways for us to recruit the best talent in a world where work is changing so rapidly. If you think about it, you know, six years ago, if you were to walk into a room and say, you know, would you get into a car with a stranger that you connected with on an app? I’m sure everyone in the room would say absolutely not. Or would you let a stranger come and stay in your house? You know, you would say no. And so I think those are both indicators of just how quickly the world the economy is changing and the ways of working and the flexibility around work. And so I am super interested in being ahead of that curve as we look to attract the best talent all over the world.
Matt Alder [00:22:28]:
Anna, thank you very much for talking to me.
Anna Lambert [00:22:30]:
Thank you so much. And I just have to plug my team. We’re growing so you can visit shopify.com careers not only is Shopify growing all over the world, but the recruiting team specifically. So if any of this has been kind of interesting to listeners, which I hope it has, reach out. Our team is growing and we’re doing some really incredible things. Thanks for having me.
Matt Alder [00:22:52]:
My thanks to Anna Lambert. You can subscribe to this podcast on itunes on Stitcher, or via your podcasting app of choice. Just search for recruiting future. You can find all the past episodes@www.rfpodcast.com on that site. You can also subscribe to the mailing list and find out more about working with me. Thanks very much for listening. I’ll be back next week and I hope you’ll join me.
