RecFest USA: Exploring AI, Employer Branding, and Candidate Experience with Insights from Brandon Jeffs

It’s that time of year again. We’ve found ourselves once more in the throws of conference season. When I reflect on my participation in the recruiting community in recent years, it has evolved tremendously. From a scrappy recruiter and employer brand builder, to having the opportunity to speak on stages and webinars, to hosting conversions on my podcast with the People and Talent leaders I admire and learn from. Each day is a challenge, and a familiar motion to attract candidates for the roles I’m working to help organizations grow. The rewards are the relationships formed along the way. 

That’s why it’s critical for the recruiting community to build unity, through shared spirit, passion, and commitment to delivering excellence in the field. For the companies we serve, the hiring managers we support, and the candidates we place. 

We live in an evolving world. And whether you identify as an introvert or extrovert in recruiting, it’s the spirit of collective gathering that inspires me and motivates me to keep showing up. 

This year I had the privilege to travel to a few recruiting conferences, and as of writing this we’re not done yet. Plus I’m already getting invites and planning early 2025 events. So that’s why I wanted to sit down and reflect on one conference that stood out for me: RecFest USA

I had the opportunity to ask some of the best practitioners, consultants, advisors, analysts, investors, founders this very question. Over the course of two days I asked dozens of folks, “What makes RecFest different from all the other conferences out there?”

The overwhelming response was the vibe. And let me tell you, RecFest brings the vibes like no other.

RecFest is put on by Jaime Leonard and the Recruiting Events Company. A fantastic group of people that you should absolutely get to know. I had the privilege of being invited to speak at RecFest USA in 2023 for their first US event and was thrilled when they asked me to come back out again.

Now the first thing you should know about RecFest is, "yeah, it’s not really a conference." It has all the things that might have you thinking it is though: incredible thought leadership, vendor sponsors, happy hours and dinners, swag, and team bonding. But through and through it’s a festival that takes place outdoors in the Bicentennial Park in Nashville, Tennessee under circus tents, with live music, concessions, attractions to make it feel like a true festival.

When it comes to planning my calendar for recruiting events, I accept that I can’t hit them all. But RecFest USA hits right as the fall conference season is taking off, when folks are energized to come together and learn, discover new tools, share stories, and of course, share in some laughter. That’s the beauty of the recruiting community –we created a space to be ourselves, let our guard down, lean on one another, and build each other back up. 

When I boarded the plane to get to Nashville, I was legit hyped as all get out. I had prepped a talk “The New ABCs of Recruiting: AI, Branding and Community” and had some friends and former co-workers I was looking to see. 

One of the things I have learned to not take for granted in my outlook on work is when I hit it off with a team. Right away I knew Antonio, Jay, and Hilary were my people. I had always been a fan of Teamtailor and knew they were an ATS and employer brand force to be reckoned with in Europe. When I heard they were expanding in the US and had a team stateside, I was onboard to meet them and see what they’re all about. 

I’m a big proponent that people make companies great, not the other way around.

You see, in HR tech (especially when selling to recruiters) relationships matter. A ton. It’s a very integrated group, and we’re super friendly. But we’re also discerning, asking tough questions of vendors building in the space, and are diligent on maintaining a high standard of product excellence for emerging brands in the space. 

RecFest has a noticeable energy. The consultants, advisors, practitioners, analysts, vendors are all within eyesight, and I think the first person I spotted this year was Gerry Crispin - cool!

The team at RecFest asked if I would emcee some man-on-the-street interviews with their camera crew so my agenda for the three days in Nashville was extremely tight. The good news: I was so busy that I didn’t have time to get nervous for both of my talks. Plus the conversations with friends, and getting to meet some industry leaders I hadn’t met before was a confidence boost. 

A highlight for me was being able to sit down with Hilary Wagner, Chief Talent Officer, and Teamtailor super user. She’s been implementing Teamtailor into tech startups time and time again for it’s ease of use and set up, beautiful UI, hiring manager collaboration, third party integrations, and most of all, how responsive the product team is to her feedback. This is few and far between these days in the crowded ATS space. So when we spoke specifically about some of the use cases and data for streamlining and optimizing her recruitment workflows. In the conversation we had on the Disrupt Stage, it became clear Teamtailor isn't just a piece of software. It's a way of working. She cited frictionless, seamless hiring experience for teams and candidates through storytelling some of the crucible placements she made. 

When it comes to choosing software for recruiting, again it really comes down to two things:

1. The relationship with vendors.

2. The right tool for the job. 

Hilary spoke about Teamtailor having everything she needs in one place: analytics, an AI assistant, customizable workflows, and powerful integrations. It’s built with candidates in mind, which is why we’re here in the first place. And the employer branding focus is a strong tool, empowering recruiters to craft and showcase their employer brand narrative independently of their marketing teams.

The tent was packed and Hilary crushed it. She was hit up by a ton of recruiters after the talk, and I genuinely left feeling a sense of excitement for something as simple as an ATS. Nerd alert. 

The cool part about RecFest is that even the vendor sponsored content and presence isn’t what you typically find at an industry conference – it’s more thoughtfully integrated, with value in mind.The longer you spend time in the recruiting community, the more you see the patterns and stories of the practitioner<>vendor relationship. Many recruiters have gone on to work with vendors, launch their own products, become analysts. It’s very connected. RecFest connects those dots for a lot of people, just by being immersed in the same space. 

After two days of events there were three key themes for 2024:

1. AI
2. Employer Branding
3. DEI 

I was inspired to see RecFest’s commitment to DEI by having a dedicated stage for this important topic that has seen a major shift in our climate and org charts. There’s no doubt about it, DEI isn’t going anywhere as long as the practitioners that spoke at RecFest are around. They’re some of the brightest, most inspiring folks I’ve learned from and proud to call friends. Will it evolve? Yes. Is empathy at the center of the DEI initiative? Yes. 

Despite the fears of AI replacing recruiters (a hot debate and possible future) there was a ton of enthusiasm for how practitioners have deployed LLMs in their workflows. I won’t go into my talk here, but if you’re looking for specifics I’m happy to link you up to my deck and talk about how I’ve used AI. Teamtailor has been on the bleeding edge of implementing LLM technology into their product with Co-Pilot, and I’m excited to see more features shipped from them and emerging tools. 

Especially around what they’re doing with employer branding. The employer brand community runs deep and there are some folks who go deep on this part of the recruiting journey. As someone who has built brands, run marketing campaigns, and had to create messaging from scratch, employer branding is such a fun topic of our profession. There are emerging tools equipping recruiting teams to be effective in owning their employer brand, independently of marketing departments, which is very much a good thing. Especially in smaller orgs where the business critical work of crafting an employee value proposition, candidate journey, and employee experience fall second to other priorities. All of these tie into the recruitment process, and recruiters who are able to flex into brand and marketing will have transferable skills that make them more employable in the future of work. At the end of the day the employer brand is all about how candidates feel about the role and the company. A great privilege that shouldn’t be taken lightly. Which is why tooling at recruiter fingertips from ATS vendors like Teamtailor can supercharge the effectiveness of recruiting teams tasked with doing more with less.

Our workflows as recruiters are evolving, stemming from how we interact with candidates and the needs of the business we serve, and the widespread application of artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLMs). I’m motivated by the future of recruiting, whatever that may be. The recruiting community is resilient, optimistic, and friendly. Three critical skills for any recruiter working reqs these days, regardless of industry.  And it’s events like RecFest that remind us of the good fortune we share to be able to contribute to one of the most important decisions humans make, where they go to work.