Case Study: 8 Rivers

Background

8 Rivers is leading the invention and commercialisation of sustainable, infrastructure-scale technologies for the global energy transition and strives towards net-zero. After receiving a $100 million investment from a new international JV Partner with the goal of developing multiple projects across North America, Europe and APAC, 8 Rivers had to aggressively scale their team to meet these engineering, project development, capital management and internal controls goals.

Meg Manlove, Vice President of People & Culture at 8 Rivers says: 

"In March of 2022, the company received a $100 million investment... to scale, grow our business, from tiny startup to let’s actually turn this vision into a reality."

Challenge

8 Rivers operated a lean organisation without the internal resources to research current market compensation structures or applicant tracking systems to support large-scale talent acquisition across multiple technical disciplines. The HR Team was spread thin and unsure of where to find the technical talent needed, and the brand was unknown in the market. Additionally, 8 Rivers' aggressive growth plans needed to be implemented quickly to meet their timelines and turn their vision into a reality.

Solution

A dedicated team was put in place, acting as an extension of the 8 Rivers HR Team. The team assisted in the development of job descriptions, provided compensation and benefits data, sourced experienced personnel, and provided consultancy services. Meg says: 

"You were my right-hand people, which was so great to have a huge team because, for the first six months, it was just me, managing all of HR."

Additionally, a dual-branded marketing campaign leveraged Airswift’s network and helped 8 Rivers build its employment brand.

Image of cobranded graphic for the landing page created by Airswift.

Meg says:

"Airswift did a lot of the heavy lifting for us in that first year. They marketed us to the right people, reaching out to over 5,000 people and helping us hire 26 new employees."

Strategic hires were made across the business, which was necessary to scale up in line with their investor commitments and project milestones. Airswift became, and remains, the trusted recruitment partner with ongoing advisory support.

Results

By leveraging Airswift’s candidate network, 8 Rivers gained access to a new talent network. Keith Albright, Talent Manager at 8 Rivers says:

"One interesting metric: the number of followers on our LinkedIn homepage has doubled... I can attribute a lot of that to Airswift and your campaigns."

Brilliant minds with unique skill sets were hired from larger organisations. Passive candidates were sought out and saw their future careers at a smaller organisation. Candidates from critical key niche markets, such as specialty gas, hydrogen, engineering, and all gas backgrounds, became aware of this smaller, privately funded startup.

Due to the cobranded marketing campaigns, the number of followers on the 8 Rivers LinkedIn page doubled, and they have become a well-known employer in the market. 

Image of cobranded advert for social media channels created by Airswift.

Additionally, 8 River’s employees increased from 18 to 35 within the first year to 66+ people in two years. The partnership with Airswift has allowed 8 Rivers to grow from a developing start-up to an established climate technology company well on its way to helping the global energy industry achieve net zero. Meg says:

"Airswift was an essential part of our success in getting us to where we are now, and we could not have done it without them. We had to have a recruiting engine to scale for growth. I can’t over-emphasize how important Airswift was to our success."