By Abby Breckenridge

Image by Nicole Todd

“Violence against women affects me as a human being—my message shouldn’t be a feminist message. It’s a universal message.” — Bad Bunny

Is it a cheap trick to open with a Bad Bunny quote? Probably. Am I above it? Certainly not.

As a women’s studies minor and lifelong feminist, I have spent a lot of time mulling over feminist issues, and I firmly believe in the concept behind what Bad Bunny is highlighting here. Most things we call women’s issues are just human issues and segmenting them off usually does their cause a disservice.

I feel the same way about parental leave. It’s on all of us to help make sure folks can have and raise kids, and adequate parental leave is part of that.

In the staffing agency world, benefits like parental leave are rare. Most staffing models treat staffing consultants and contract workers as temporary resources: deliver the work, finish the contract, move on. Benefits are minimal, and life events are often treated as inconveniences to the system.

But having children isn’t an inconvenience. It’s how societies continue. If we want thriving communities, people must be able to have and raise children without sacrificing their careers. That responsibility has not been picked up by our government, so for now it belongs to all of us, including companies.

That’s why we provide paid parental leave to our staffing consultants.

Our team is made up of experts who help our clients ship campaigns, launch products, and scale content programs. They’re professionals with careers and lives. Supporting them through major life moments is good policy. And it’s good for business.

People do their best work when they know they’re valued as humans, not just as billable hours. And by respectfully handling our consultants’ parental leave needs, including temporary replacements and overlap time for handoffs, we’re also helping our clients. Win/win.

By Nora Bright, Andrea Swangard

Image by Nicole Todd

For many B2B tech organizations, building a partner program feels like a natural next step as they look to expand their go-to-market strategy. Partnerships, integrations, co-sell motions, and marketplace participation can extend your reach and unlock new revenue without requiring you to expand your core product. For many companies, this becomes a key part of their partner ecosystem strategy.

What’s less obvious at the outset is how quickly the team structure behind a partner program needs to evolve. Early on, partnerships are primarily about building relationships. As the ecosystem grows, the work becomes more operational and programmatic, and the partner program structure often needs to evolve with it.

Early stage: One person, many hats

At the beginning, partner programs are relationship-led. One person, sometimes a founder, builds alliances, negotiates integrations, supports sales conversations, and experiments with light co-marketing.

Processes are informal with loosely-defined incentives, and pipeline influence isn’t always tracked in a rigorous way.

Hiring focus: Hire for versatility and ownership. You need someone comfortable operating without a playbook, who can move between strategy and execution without friction. Over-specializing too early can slow momentum when scaling a partner program.

Growth stage: Complexity starts to surface

As your ecosystem grows to a meaningful portfolio of partners, team needs evolve. Sales wants clearer co-sell guidance and marketing sees repeatable campaign opportunities. Leadership asks for reporting and marketplace programs introduce new requirements.

This is often the point where organizations expect one person to manage relationships, marketing, enablement, and reporting simultaneously, and that structure rarely holds up as the program expands.

Hiring focus: Before adding headcount, define what’s actually breaking. Is it enablement? Campaign execution? Reporting? Hiring without clarifying ownership usually recreates the same bottleneck in a slightly different form as partner ecosystem management becomes more complex.

Mature stage: Partnerships become a growth channel

When partnerships begin influencing a material portion of pipeline, informality stops working. Revenue targets emerge, incentives formalize, and the work that once sat with a single generalist begins to separate into more defined functions:

• Strategic alliances (which partners to prioritize)
• Partner marketing (how to activate demand)
• Enablement (how sellers and partners execute)
• Operations (how performance is tracked and measured)

At this stage of partner program maturity, organizations typically move toward a more clearly defined partnership team structure.

Hiring focus: Define scope and revenue accountability clearly before hiring senior talent. Strong candidates will expect clarity around authority, KPIs, and decision rights before accepting the role, especially when revenue is involved.

Structure enables alignment and scale

As partner programs grow, structure is what allows teams to keep moving quickly instead of getting stuck in ambiguity. The organizations that get the most from their partner ecosystems are usually the ones that redefine roles just ahead of complexity, not in reaction to it. Taking the time to scope those roles clearly helps organizations make the right hires and ensures new team members are set up to succeed.

If you’re evaluating your next partner hire or thinking about how your ecosystem team should evolve, it can help to talk through the structure before opening a search. If you’d like an experienced perspective, reach out!

By Nora Bright, Andrea Swangard

Image by Nicole Todd

Contract roles are foundational to how large tech companies operate: entire teams and initiatives depend on contractors doing high-impact work. Yet despite how mission critical these roles are, many companies rely on vendor management systems (VMS) to find talent, often with subpar outcomes.

On the surface, these contractor hiring portals promise scale and speed. But in practice, they often strip away the context and care that good recruiting depends on. What you get is a system optimized for volume, not for finding the right person for the work.

Where VMS-driven hiring starts to break down

When roles are posted in a portal, staffing firms are competing against dozens, sometimes hundreds, of other agencies. With such low odds of placement, recruiters are naturally incentivized to move fast and submit often. Spending extra time deeply vetting candidates or digging into the nuances of a role rarely pays off.

To make matters harder, recruiters usually have little to no direct access to the hiring team. Without meaningful context about the role or team, even strong recruiters are left guessing. Volume becomes the safest bet, while candidate fit becomes secondary.

Scale over relationships erodes the experience

VMS portals tend to favor the largest staffing firms. Enterprises can’t realistically onboard every specialized agency, so size becomes the deciding factor. Many agencies that appear boutique in a portal are actually owned by large conglomerates and operate like one.

From the client side, agencies become interchangeable. That makes it difficult to understand how one firm might support the hiring manager during the engagement, or how contractors are treated once they’re on the job. Over time, this lack of differentiation removes the incentive to invest in better experiences.

Contractors feel this quickly. Large agencies often offer the bare minimum in benefits and route support through impersonal service desks with slow response times. Talented, experienced contractors notice and choose to work elsewhere. Poor support leads to higher churn, disengaged talent, and teams that are constantly backfilling instead of moving forward.

A more thoughtful way to hire contractors

Boutique agencies, like 2A Recruiting and Staffing, take a different approach. We build long-term partnerships with our clients and our contractors because thoughtful recruiting leads to better results. That starts with strong benefits, like our fully covered health, dental, and vision insurance, 4 weeks+ of PTO annually, and 401(k) with employer match. It also means regular check-ins, personal, responsive support, and staying engaged throughout the entire contract. Because of benefits like these, in 2025 more than 85% of our contractors completed or extended their engagements.

When contract roles are truly mission critical, they deserve more than portal submissions. If you’re ready to go beyond the portal and work with a firm that treats contractor hiring like the strategic function it is, we’d love to talk.

By Nora Bright, Andrea Swangard

Image by Nicole Todd

After years of recruiting for large, matrixed organizations where employees collaborate across functions and regions, we’ve noticed a consistent pattern. While technical skills might land someone the job, they rarely determine whether that person thrives long-term. What truly sets candidates apart is how they operate in complex, fast-changing environments.

That’s why our interview process focuses on core behavioral traits we’ve found to be strong predictors of success. Here’s what we look for, and why it matters.

1. Driving self-directed execution

In complex roles, candidates need the ability to take initiative and keep things moving. We look for people who can work through ambiguity without getting stuck. They’re comfortable getting started even when the details are incomplete, and they know how to break down fuzzy goals into clear, actionable steps.

They also keep stakeholders informed without needing close oversight. And when something stalls, they don’t wait; they know when to keep going and when to raise a flag. This combination of independence and judgment keeps work momentum going, even when guidance is limited.

2. Taking proactive ownership

In fast-moving environments with shifting priorities, success often comes down to mindset. The people who thrive are those who treat problems as theirs to solve, even if they fall outside their job description. Rather than waiting to be asked, they build cross-functional relationships, seek out context, and stay curious. When something needs doing, they step in because they see the broader value in helping the team move forward.

3. Communicating with clarity and context

In cross-functional, global teams, misalignment can create major downstream issues. That’s why clear, contextual communication is essential. We look for people who tailor their communication style based on who they’re talking to and what the situation calls for, whether it’s explaining a project to a non-technical stakeholder or looping in a team across time zones.

They make sure their work connects to broader goals and that they identify conflicting priorities early, which helps prevent misalignment that can slow things down later.

4. Staying adaptable and resilient

Change is a constant in complex organizations, and success depends on being able to roll with it. We look for people who maintain focus and productivity even when priorities shift, plans change, or teams restructure.

Resilient candidates recover quickly from setbacks and keep a constructive mindset under pressure. They don’t rely on certainty and know how to move forward without it.

Looking for candidates with these traits?

We’ve spent over a decade helping enterprise teams hire professionals who have the right skills and the behaviors that lead to long-term success. Our screening process is designed to surface these traits early, so you meet candidates who are ready to thrive in real-world complexity.

Want to see what that looks like? Explore our recruiting and staffing services, or reach out to us. We’d love to help!

By Abby Breckenridge

Image by Rachel Adams

“2A is great, they don’t freak out.”
I overheard a long-time client say this to a colleague while convincing her that our creative agency was the right team to help get an executive keynote presentation across the finish line.

It made us laugh, and it perfectly captured something I’ve come to value in marketers. Whether I’m hiring for our creative agency or helping our recruiting and staffing clients build their own teams, I look for candidates who are flexible. In other words, they don’t freak out.

A lot can change over the course of a tech marketing initiative. Executive priorities shift. Tools and channels gain or lose effectiveness. And we’ve all seen AI reshape workflows that, not long ago, were considered best practice.

Great marketers aren’t overly attached to any single tool or tactic—they stay focused on outcomes. When something stops working, they test, learn, and adjust without panic.

Translating change into opportunity 

Product change adds even more complexity. In tech, features are added, removed, or repositioned frequently as roadmaps evolve in response to customer needs and competitive pressure. Marketers who struggle with change risk misalignment and missed opportunities. The strongest ones stay close to the product, translate updates into customer value, and evolve the story without unnecessary friction.

This doesn’t mean the fundamentals don’t matter. A deep understanding of marketing principles, the ability to tell a compelling story, and a strong grasp of the product and/or industry are still essential. But on top of that, the best marketers quickly absorb new information and evaluate how it changes their course.

When you’re hiring a marketer, look for the ones who can adapt, recalibrate, and move forward confidently. Your team (and your customers!) will thank you.

By Nora Bright, Kimberly Mass

Image by Nicole Todd

When a partner marketer leaves, hiring their replacement can feel like a big lift—it’s a niche role that blends strategy, relationship management, marketing execution, cross-functional coordination, and project management. But it’s also a natural moment to pause, reassess what you need, and shape the role in a way that moves your partner marketing program forward. 

With a little structure—and a little guidance—you can use this transition time to re-scope the role, sharpen expectations, and quickly attract quality candidates who can hit the ground running. 

Let’s get started! 

Step 1. Evaluate the role: What do you want to keep, adjust, or elevate?  

Start by reflecting on the role as it is today and where you see your partner program heading in the future: 

• What’s changed since this role was last open?  
  • Has your partner program matured—more partners, more tiers, higher goals? 
  • Have priorities shifted—different customer focus, new products, new regions, new motions? 
• What worked well? What could work better? 
  • Collaboration: Was there friction between teams when making decisions? Did cross-functional teams slow down or genuinely support the last person? 
  • Capacity: Was there too much (or too little) to do?
  • Support: Was there enough support from a manager or mentor?
• How should your new hire be the same (or different) from your last hire?
  • Were any skills lacking? 
  • What strengths are essential to maintain? 
  • Are there different skills this person might need based on new priorities? 

Step 2. Audit tools and workflows: What systems and processes are in place today—and what needs to be changed or built? 

The seniority and experience you need depends on the current state of your operations. Evaluate your workflows and tools and categorize each as “keep running,” “change,” or “build.” Here is a list to help you get started:

• Intake and prioritization: How work requests come in, get approved, and get scheduled
• Project management cadence: How timelines and stakeholders are managed 
• Partner communications engine: Communication schedule, messaging consistency, and ownership
• Co-marketing workflow: Campaign planning through execution and follow-up 
• Assets and enablement: Where partner-ready materials live and how they’re managed 
• Systems and handoffs: CRM/PRM basics, lead flow, ownership, and data hygiene
• Measurement: What “success” means and how it’s tracked and reported
• Budget and vendors: MDF spend (if any), agencies, tools, and ownership 

Step 3. Decide what level of role you’re hiring for: Operator, strategic lead, or hybrid 

Based on your answers to steps 1 and 2, you should have a clearer picture of the role level you’re hiring for:

• Operator: Ideal when systems are already in place and details just need to be managed. This person is essentially a project manager—driving timelines, managing stakeholders, and keeping work moving. 
• Strategic lead: Best when priorities are unclear and the overall partner marketing program needs rethinking. This person shapes strategy, sets priorities, makes high-level decisions, and drives executive communications. 
• Hybrid: A blend of the two: Best when you only have the ability to hire one person or when your program is in its earlier phases and still evolving. Keep in mind, finding someone who can and wants to do both can be tricky.  

Step 4. Define what success looks like in the first 30, 60, and 90 days 

Now that you’ve outlined the role, the next step is understanding what strong performance looks like in the first few months. A simple 30–60–90 framework can be used to help you set direction and align everyone involved in hiring. For example:   

• 30 days: Get up to speed on the partner program, stakeholders, partners, and current priorities. Clarify goals, success metrics, and “who owns what,” and then create a realistic plan for what will (and won’t) get done. 
• 60 days: Start delivering meaningful work, including 1 or 2 quick wins. 
• 90 days: Turn early wins into repeatable processes. Set a forward-looking roadmap. 

Step 5. Write the job description and interview for what you need 

Once the role is well-defined, writing a clear and compelling job description that attracts the right candidates is much easier. Make sure to include the following: 

• From step 1: Role mission and top priorities 
• From step 2: Build/fix/run expectations 
• From step 3: Role level and required skills (this will also help determine compensation) 
• From step 4: 90-day outcomes  

Having a clear job description also makes it easier to write interview questions. Check out our list of recommended interview questions for partner marketers. 

Ready, set, hire 

When you take the time to define what you really need before you hire, the process becomes smoother, faster, and far more likely to deliver a great outcome. 

2A Recruiting & Staffing has over a decade of experience recruiting for partner marketing roles. We can help scope your open role, calibrate level and compensation, and deliver qualified partner marketing candidates. 

By Nora Bright, Jack Foraker

Image by Nicole Todd

Partner marketing demands strong marketing instincts paired with the ability to align goals across companies. It’s also more niche than traditional B2B marketing, meaning the talent pool for potential hires is smaller. 

Yet partner programs continue to grow and evolve, and tech companies need candidates who can make an impact fast. Ask the right questions during the interview stage to find someone who understands the nuances of partnership work and how to drive results that support broader go-to-market goals. 

Here are the questions that can help you find your next great partner marketer. 

1. How do you decide which partners or campaigns are worth investing in? 

Most partner teams have more potential collaborators than bandwidth. This question helps you understand how candidates prioritize their efforts. You want someone who uses concrete metrics to qualify partner marketing opportunities and tactfully deprioritizes lower-value partnerships toward those that actually move the needle. 

2. Tell me about a time you had to align internal teams and partners around a campaign. What were the points of friction and how did you resolve them? 

Alignment is one of the toughest realities of partner marketing—and absolutely essential to a successful candidate. It’s even more crucial when partners don’t have mature marketing practices of their own. Different companies bring different goals and timelines, so cross-company friction is normal. A strong candidate will show you they can set clear expectations, resolve conflicts, and translate priorities across internal and external teams. 

3. Walk me through your most successful co-marketing campaign? What made it successful? 

Successful partner campaigns require coordination, creativity, and solid project management. A good answer should hit on how they worked across teams and measured success in a tangible way. 

4. How do you structure your partner marketing efforts to support pipeline and sales goals? 

Partner marketers work close to revenue, and the best ones know how their programs influence pipeline. Look for someone who collaborates with sales, tracks performance with clear metrics, and builds campaigns designed to create real opportunities. If they also mention co-selling motions or partner enablement, it’s a strong sign they understand how marketing fits into the broader revenue engine. 

5. How do you keep organized when managing campaigns with multiple stakeholders? 

Partner work multiplies tasks and approval chains, so organization is critical. A strong candidate should have a system that works for them, with clear methods for managing assets, deadlines, and communication, plus a way to keep both internal teams and partners in sync. 

6. How do you stay ahead of trends in the partner world? 

Partner ecosystems evolve quickly. You want someone who keeps up with updates from the major clouds—such as new competencies, incentives, sales plays, and marketplace changes—and stays plugged into co-marketing and co-selling best practices. Look for mentions of industry groups, like Partner Marketing Visionaries or Partnership Leaders. A marketer who brings curiosity to the role will spot opportunities that otherwise might be missed. 

7. How do you use tools, automation, or AI to work efficiently? 

Lean partner teams need people who work smartly. Good candidates will share practical examples of tools or automations that help them manage complexity, save time, and stay focused on the work that drives the entire business forward. 

Finding the right partner marketer doesn’t have to be overwhelming. With the right interview approach, you’ll quickly get a sense for who has the experience and instincts to succeed in your co-marketing ecosystem. 

And if you’d rather skip the resume juggling, 2A Recruiting and Staffing can help introduce you to vetted candidates who will make a difference on day one. 

By Abby Breckenridge

Image by Nicole Todd

I’ve been noticing more friends taking on fractional roles. Maybe it’s because the fractional model is catching on with businesses looking for access to skills and experience they may not be able to afford full-time. Or maybe it’s because a lot of my cohort have hit the point in our careers where we’ve racked up some real experience, and now we get to use it in more flexible ways. Either way, fractional leadership is having a moment, and for growing companies, it’s a game-changer. 

Fractional hires bring leadership without the long-term commitment 

A fractional executive is a seasoned leader who joins your team part-time—usually a few days a week or for a defined project—to bring executive-level strategy and oversight without the full-time commitment or investment. Think of them as your interim CMO, COO, or Chief of Staff who can quickly understand your business, set direction, and build momentum. 

They’re a good fit for growing B2B tech companies 

Fractional executives fill that tricky middle space: you’ve outgrown one-person-does-it-all leadership but aren’t ready for another full-time seat at the table. Or maybe you have budget for one full-time executive, but you need support that spans a few roles.  
Fractional hires can: 

• Bring outside perspective. Because they work across companies and industries, they bring playbooks with proven outcomes and fresh ideas you won’t get from inside your business’s bubble.
  
• Flex with your goals. As your needs change, their involvement can scale up or down. It’s executive leadership on demand.
  
• Bridge the gap during transitions. Whether you’re between full-time hires or expanding into new markets, fractional leaders can provide steady, experienced guidance when continuity matters most. 

We can help   

At 2A, we’ve seen the power of fractional leadership firsthand. Or another way of putting it, we’ve been doing it since before it was cool. We’ve been placing temporary teammates in strategic roles for years, and our network is only getting stronger. We can give you access to marketing and operations professionals who’ve guided companies through change, challenge, and scale. We can help you find the right fractional fit—someone who can start strong, move fast, and make things happen. 

By Abby Breckenridge

Image by Jenni Lydell

“What are you doing right?”  

It’s what my friend and fellow business owner asked me a few weeks back after I explained that our recruiting and staffing practice had taken off over the last year. In simple terms, I realized it’s because we’re kind. As a small player in an industry where scale often overshadows individuals, we’ve backed into a differentiator that I love.  

By kind I mean we know all our team members that are embedded in other companies, and we check in with them regularly. We offer good benefits, paid time off, and morale boosters. We negotiate on their behalf for raises when they’re due, and we research and cover training to boost them along their path.  

Lucky for us, we’re noticing a trend—clients are recognizing the gap left by larger staffing firms, where contract employees feel more like a line item than a human. Our recruiting and staffing clients, the ones that work daily with the skilled (and human) folks that we employ and place in roles with them, want to be sure their team is well taken care of. And they’re not finding that at the global staffing firms where procurement algorithms select talent agencies for their low margins. Increasingly, they are turning to boutique agencies that prioritize well-being and meaningful connection. 

As a human, I’m thrilled that what we’re doing right is treating our team with kindness. As a business owner, I’m also thrilled.  When employees thrive, clients benefit from stability and engagement, and agencies stand out for the right reasons. In a competitive industry, kindness isn’t just good—it’s strategic. 

By Nora Bright, Jack Foraker

Image by Nicole Todd

Finding great talent is tough and getting tougher. Job postings are flooded with unqualified candidates, hiring team resources are stretched thin, and managers have to juggle hiring on top of their day-to-day responsibilities. On the other side of the screen, job seekers are faring no better: They’re often one of thousands of applicants for an open position, which can lead to a hiring process that feels cold and impersonal. 

As a consulting agency that also provides recruiting and staffing services, we see the hiring process from both sides at 2A. We know hiring is always an investment—of time, resources, and money. So it’s no wonder that companies turn to recruiting agencies to help surface stronger candidates faster and make sure they invest in the right people from the start.  

Here’s why working with one is the smartest (and ultimately most cost-effective) move to make: 

Access top talent and industry knowledge  

Recruiting agencies often specialize in a particular industry or function, and if you choose the right firm, they’ll understand the roles you’re hiring for and the skills that matter. Because we specialize in marketing and creative roles in tech, we have a strong pulse on the roles as well as the job market: who’s hiring, who’s moving, and what it takes to compete as an employer. We also have deep networks packed with top marketers, designers, program managers, and more. That includes the kind of passive candidates who aren’t scrolling job boards but are open to the right offer.  

Save serious time 

Hiring is a full-time job in and of itself. (Ask us how we know.) Reviewing resumes, managing outreach, and scheduling and conducting candidate screens adds up fast. A recruiter takes the first and most time-consuming stages of hiring off your plate, which means your team can focus on growing your business instead of chasing candidates. 

Get expert guidance 

The best recruiters stay closely involved throughout the process. We’ll make sure your communication is clear, your candidates stay warm, and your offers are competitive.  

Sell your opportunity 

Top candidates (the candidates you want) have options. A strong recruiter knows how to tell your company’s story in a compelling way, so candidates will be more excited to explore your team—and be more likely to say yes to an offer. 

In the end, that’s what 2A Recruiting & Staffing is about: making it easier to find standout people. We connect you with vetted marketing and creative talent, so you have more time to focus on your goals—not sorting through resumes. 

Ready to find your next great hire? We should chat.