Homegrown Talent: Balancing Business Needs and Band Members’ Aspirations

We’re a people-first organisation, dedicated to helping our band members thrive in an equitable way so they can perform at their best. That means investing in homegrown talent is part of our People Strategy, both for the benefit to our business and our bandmates.   

To sustainably optimise for homegrown talent while building a great business, we must balance two perspectives: the strategic needs of our business and the career growth aspirations of our band members. This is what we refer to as the sweet spot.

To balance the two perspectives mentioned (both now and in the future), HR’s role in creating an ecosystem with programs, processes and activities that are designed to find sweet spots between bandmates’ aspirations and business needs, is pivotal. 

Taking a Step Back: Internal Mobility Spotlight

Over the past year, we’ve redefined many parts in that ecosystem, embracing and nurturing our ethos of being a people-first company. And through close collaboration with leadership we’ve made some significant learnings, which have led us to identify the things that work best when it comes to optimising our homegrown talent. Internal mobility plays a significant role in enabling a thriving environment of homegrown talent. And as Spotify has transitioned from hypergrowth to enhancing growth for the talent who are already part of the band, we’ve embraced deeper exploration of what healthy internal mobility truly means for Spotify and for all of our band members.

What Does Healthy Internal Mobility Mean?

While the simplest definition of internal mobility is moving someone from role A to role B through a fair and consistent process, the reality is far more nuanced. For instance, should success be measured by a specific percentage of employees changing roles annually – say 25% or 50%? While appealing in its simplicity, this approach doesn’t reflect the complexities of internal mobility. Instead, we’re looking at a number of indicators, but aren’t using them as targets or goals. This approach helps us to  see broader patterns and therefore allows us to prioritise continuous improvement, which we know will make internal mobility at Spotify even more effective and impactful. This is not a box-ticking exercise! 

The key indicators that are shaping our understanding and helping us assess success are:

Employee satisfaction with career growth – employee feedback on growth opportunities is vital. In our employee survey we see a positive correlation between “having a meaningful dialogue with my manager about performance and development” and scoring higher on “I have good opportunities to grow and learn at Spotify”. It’s clear that the quality of manager and bandmate conversations is key to the perception of growth. 

This is also reinforced by one of our foundational and long-held beliefs about growth: at Spotify employees are in the driver’s seat when it comes to their development. We know that this helps them feel more motivated and engaged, and in turn, ensures that the development is embraced and relevant for them and our business. We also see this reflected in the ways that Spotifiers engage with HR through open-text responses and ongoing feedback, on our People Growth Philosophy. It’s simple –  successful internal mobility is not only about moving from role A to B, but about career growth, which is multidimensional.

Internal vs. external hiring for open roles – with the help of our Talent Intelligence and TA teams, we’re becoming more deliberate about when to source internally versus externally. For roles requiring highly specialised skill sets, external hiring needs to remain a focus. However, the overall shift is evident: in 2022, 1 in 10 roles were filled by internal candidates, and today that number has risen to 1 in 3 – a tangible sign of progress.

Homegrown talent in critical and senior roles – currently, 69% of senior managers and above are homegrown, meaning that they progressed internally at Spotify. Our average tenure for Spotify as a whole is 48 months, and 77 months for our Director and more senior band members.

We see that our strategy of finding senior leaders from within (and who are staying with the band for longer) is working. This strategy creates a ripple effect across the organisation. For example, if a Director leaves, it might, over time, trigger promotions for two or three employees, ultimately leading us to backfill externally with junior talent. This not only fosters internal growth but also brings fresh perspectives into the company.

However, as with any strategic direction, it’s important to remember that getting it right can take time. We have a fantastic bench of talent, some ready for more senior roles, which is a result of our longer-term focus where we encourage and help band members to drive their careers multidimensionally. Now, when a senior role opens, a fair and consistent internal process is even more critical. This is important, as a competitive process can sometimes lead to friction or disappointment for those not selected. To address this, it’s essential that we provide clear feedback and continued support to those who don’t secure the role. We also need to recognise that we are working with people, not machines, and there may be some cases, when we do not have a “ready now” successor and therefore need to look externally. 

The number of times we can fill senior roles with homegrown talent is a key measure of success, and this approach also helps us benchmark our internal talent, ensuring we maintain a competitive edge.

Diversity and equity in internal mobility – ensuring that diverse teams and an equitable process remain incredibly important priorities. As external growth slows, we have fewer opportunities to increase diversity and make progress at all levels of the organisation – something we strive to see. To mitigate this, particularly at more senior level roles, we’re committed to building diverse candidate pipelines, and when these are lacking internally, we need to broaden the pipeline and also consider external candidates. 

Change takes time and when we broaden our reach for talent to build diverse pipelines, the time to hire can be further impacted. However, by introducing more proactive sourcing strategies we can continue to make the hiring decision on merit while at the same time increasing the probability of a more diverse workforce. This approach underscores our commitment to inclusive growth while balancing business needs. And measuring how diverse our teams are at different levels of the organisation gives us an indication of how we’re doing on this.

What’s Next for Spotify’s People Growth Ecosystem?

With all the learnings from the past year, our focus now is clear: it’s not about doing more but about doing what we can do to strengthen the synergies in our people growth ecosystem – better, faster and with greater quality.

Roles and responsibilities within HR will remain intentionally fluid. The boundaries between all disciplines within HR are designed to be collaborative and dynamic. Still, by aligning responsibilities and approaching challenges with curiosity, we can uncover sweet spots faster and execute them with higher quality, ultimately benefiting both the business and our band members.

We’re also just beginning to unlock the full potential of Talent Intelligence. From matchmaking sessions to aligning candidates with open roles and succession planning based on our talent insights, we’re finding more ways to spot and act on sweet spots in real time. This approach is making us increasingly efficient and effective over time.

Finally, one thing is certain: change is the only constant. As always, we know that there will be more learnings along the way  – and we’ll continue to share our progress.Thank you for following along as we grow together!