Building the team that builds the brand

Challengers are disadvantaged on many fronts: budgets run tighter, fame is still to be made, and strong candidates often have safer options. Established names promise prestige, regional roles and predictable trajectories, so the game can feel rigged. Yet challengers need not copy incumbents, because pretending, posturing and keeping up appearances only deepen imposter syndrome.

Brands that break through this conundrum work from within. Rather than cobbling together personas to form an attractive exterior, they simply draw people from their actual core. Such brands extend from a clear internal foundation around a magnetic tenet and show up as their truest self, warts and all, trusting that the right people value substance over presentation. That is what levels the field for them.

Belief does not just matter in the marketplace; it also matters inside the workplace. People want their work to count, and large-scale research repeatedly shows that work is central to how meaning is formed. McKinsey reports that about 70 percent of people say their sense of purpose is largely defined by work. Yet that desire is not always met, so candidates look for places where conviction is visible, not merely written on a lobby wall but plainly felt.

That desire is not always met, so candidates look for places where conviction is visible, not only written on a lobby wall. A virtuous cycle begins when a brand’s belief isn’t spelt out yet plain to see.

Attracting and retaining employees is much like winning customers: it relies on a differentiated proposition upfront, a brand with beliefs people can connect to, and conduct that stays consistent from voice to action. Challenger brands should remember that the strongest hires are often already close as users, customers or fans, because they recognise the effort, identify with the integrity, and build trust long before any recruitment drive could.

An employer value proposition does not need embellishment. It needs a reason that feels true in the everyday. Who the brand is for and the standards a brand upholds speak louder than a long list of job perks. Trust in a brand grows when a brand shows up as it is, because authenticity and honest are respected yet scarce, and even a work in progress is better than a polished pretender.

Candidates pick up on this before they ever meet a recruiter: they notice whether the outward persona matches the inside, and whether the employees live up to the standards the brand claims. These quiet cues show them whether the work will add up to something they can stand behind—and with that comes the willingness to help build..

That is the underdog’s advantage: not spectacle, but belief and conviction people want to participate in. Carried into the centre of a business, belief becomes magnetic. It galvanises people, gives sense to the work, instils pride and draws others in to build together. It shapes internal culture, and that culture self-polices, upholding standards because employees become advocates themselves.

Internal culture is inseparable from customer strategy. The standards kept inside become the experience felt outside, and hiring and training internal advocates shape what customers feel more than any clever campaign. When a brand acts consistently across its touchpoints, the right people see their future here, stay longer, and even bring others with them.