What’s covered in this blog
Ignasi López París, People Generalist with a global focus on Talent Acquisition and Employer Branding at Cellnex Telecom has been transforming how a pan-European organisation approaches employer branding, and the industry is taking notice. Recently named Emerging Employer Brand Leader of the Year at World Employer Branding Day, Ignasi brings a strategic, systems-led mindset to a space often dominated by short-term campaigns.
In this Wiser Expert blog, he shares how to scale employer branding across countries without losing authenticity, why global frameworks matter more than one-off content, and how to link your brand to business outcomes in a way that earns real leadership buy-in.
Tell us about your background and how you found your way into employer branding?
I joined Cellnex Telecom within Global Talent Acquisition, initially working very closely with corporate recruitment operations, early careers and international hiring. Being part of a European infrastructure company operating across ten key countries, I quickly realised that attracting and retaining talent was not just about filling roles. It was about building long-term credibility, clarity and consistency around what Cellnex stands for as an employer.
As the function evolved, my role naturally expanded to include more strategic talent acquisition initiatives, framework design, and global reporting, while also allowing me to focus more on employer branding. This combination of systems, data and brand allowed me to work at the intersection of strategy, experience design and employer branding.
“What truly drew me into employer branding was seeing how deeply it influences recruitment efficiency, engagement and long-term talent pipelines, especially in complex multi-country environments where employer brand consistency becomes a strategic asset rather than a communication exercise.”
Over time, this has allowed me to contribute to shaping a more structured and international approach to how we design, communicate and scale our talent attraction and early-career experience, always in close alignment with the wider talent strategy.
What’s the key to scaling employer branding across countries without losing consistency?
The key is understanding that consistency is not the same as uniformity. A strong international employer brand needs a clear strategic backbone, shared EVP principles, core narratives and cultural anchors, while still allowing space for local HR teams to adapt and activate them in ways that make sense within their markets.
In multinational organisations, employer branding becomes scalable when it moves from isolated campaigns to structured frameworks, including common playbooks, governance models, shared guidelines, clear ownership and defined metrics. These frameworks create alignment while still enabling local authenticity. In my experience, this combination of clarity and flexibility is what allows employer branding to grow sustainably across countries without losing its core message.
What’s one employer brand project you’re especially proud of?
One of the initiatives I have been most involved in is the 'Ignition Project', our international internship programme. Ignition plays an important role in how we approach young talent across multiple countries. It provides a more coherent early-career narrative, supports international visibility and helps us build long-term relationships with future professionals entering technical and corporate functions.
More recently, a particularly strategic step within this ecosystem has been our collaboration with Nova Talent through the Nova 111 List, where Cellnex participates as a sponsor. This partnership allows us to:
Strengthen our employer brand positioning among high-potential young professionals
Increase our visibility in key European markets
Align ourselves with innovation-driven talent communities.
It is a good example of how employer branding can move beyond communication and connect corporate purpose with external talent ecosystems that shape future leadership
How do you link employer branding to wider talent strategy in a way that gets real business buy-in?
By positioning employer branding as a structural part of the talent strategy rather than as an isolated communication layer.
Employer branding directly influences hiring quality, speed, candidate experience, early engagement and long-term employability pipelines. When these elements are linked to recruitment, onboarding, early-career development and internal mobility, employer branding naturally becomes a lever that supports business continuity and growth.
“The conversation with leadership changes when employer branding is framed in terms of workforce sustainability, future skills pipelines and competitive advantage rather than campaigns or visibility alone.”
What’s one misconception about employer branding you’d love to challenge?
That employer branding is mainly about content, social media and campaigns: in reality, your employer brand is your operating system.
It is reflected in your hiring process, onboarding experience, leadership behaviours, development opportunities and everyday employee experience. External communication only becomes powerful when it reflects what is actually lived inside the organisation.
How do you keep employer branding authentic when working across different cultures and markets?
By moving from broadcasting messages to curating real stories. Authenticity comes from local voices and real employee experiences. The role of corporate employer branding is to provide clarity, frameworks and alignment, while empowering local teams and employees to bring the brand to life in their own context. This decentralised but aligned approach helps maintain both credibility and cultural relevance across markets.
Where do you see employer branding going in the next few years?
Employer branding is becoming one of the most strategic levers within HR. As skills become scarcer and professional mobility increases, organisations will compete less on compensation alone and more on meaning, development, flexibility and long-term employability.
Employer branding will move closer to analytics, employee experience design and workforce planning and will become an essential component of sustainable growth. That is where I am excited to keep building and contributing.
