EMPLOYEES AS A CULTURAL ASSET
For years the brand spoke and the employee stayed quiet, kept on message, run past comms first. That wall is coming down.
From M&S letting a food developer become an accidental influencer to a challenger studio turning its own hiring process into a viral campaign, brands are discovering that the most credible voice they own was already on the payroll.
Two examples, two very different tactics, one shared insight: people trust people, not departments.
THE FOOD DEVELOPER WHO BECAME AN INFLUENCER
M&S didn't hire an influencer. Marketing consultant Louise Jukes OLY put it plainly after a food developer named Kathryn Turner started racking up millions of views on Instagram just by talking through what's in store: "M&S didn't hire an influencer. They created one." No script, no media training, just "casual, unscripted, clearly loves her job" content that most brands would run through three rounds of legal first.
Jukes has sat on the other side of that decision. Working at a sports rights holder, she describes being told the opposite: "Don't share this. Don't comment on that. Run it past comms first." The M&S difference wasn't luck, it was permission. "Individual store channels. Staff showing up regularly.
The organisation clearly backing them. That takes a decision. Someone had to say yes to this." What she's describing isn't a content strategy, it's a trust exercise the brand chose to run in public. And it paid off in the currency competitors can't buy: "when your people post, something happens that no campaign budget gets you - Actual human trust!"
THE HIRING PROCESS THAT BECAME A CAMPAIGN
Sult went further and skipped the CV entirely. When the studio needed a new Social Media Manager, co-founder Henry Porpora didn't ask for a resume, he asked for proof. As recruiter Emily Moffat reported it: Henry Porpora, said and I quote 'we've actively decided to not look at any CV's'.
The brief was blunt: brands say they want someone who "knows what will go viral," "understands internet culture," and can "build a community, not just an audience", then ask them to prove all of it on a one-page PDF. Moffat's line lands hard: "Make that makes sense."
Sult let applicants pitch themselves however they wanted, and the applicants turned it into content of their own. The result, per Moffat: "socials have been FLOODED ever since, videos across every platform", and "in the process has managed to turn a hiring campaign into a brand awareness campaign." The job post didn't just fill a seat. It became the most efficient piece of earned media the studio ran all year, for the cost of not writing a job description.
SO WHAT? STOP MANAGING THE MESSAGE, START ARMING THE MESSENGER
Both stories point at the same shift. The brands winning attention right now aren't the ones with the biggest content budgets, they're the ones willing to hand the mic to someone without a media training certificate. That's uncomfortable for anyone used to running everything past comms first, and it should be. Control and credibility trade off against each other, and right now credibility is winning.
For a brand sitting on real people, real expertise and real behind-the-scenes texture, the opportunity isn't to build another polished campaign. It's to identify who on the team already has a point of view, back them properly, and get out of the way. Not every employee needs to become a face. But every brand has at least one Kathryn Turner already inside it, just waiting for someone to say yes.
The best brand asset in the building might not be on the org chart as talent. It's whoever already loves the job enough to talk about it.
Published 8 October 2026 · Mariana Gates, LOVE
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