Elevating Mindsets: The Brand is Female's Eva Hartling on Harnessing Personal Power and Follow Through for Change
By Julia Gamolina
Eva Hartling founded The Brand is Female in 2018. She is a Brand Development, Marketing and Communications Strategist who is passionate about gender equity and female leadership. She is also a podcaster who believes in amplifying women’s stories. Through her 20 years of experience helping brands achieve their objectives locally and internationally, Eva has built an expertise in understanding and successfully targeting women consumers while never succumbing to pinkwashing. In the course of her experience in the corporate world, she also realized she was starved for a different type of leadership model. Eva is also the founder and host of The Brand is Female which has become Canada’s leading female leadership podcast. The Brand is Female is now a podcast production and distribution network specializing in working with women changemakers as well as a consulting agency focused on purpose-driven organizations.
Before deciding to become her own boss, Eva held the position of Chief Marketing Officer and Vice President, Brand at Birks Group where she worked for almost a decade. Prior to joining Birks, Eva held positions in Marketing, Communications and Public Affairs at Telefilm Canada, RONA, BDC and IBM. In her interview with Julia Gamolina, Eva talks about her own experiences that inspired her to do this work, and common themes women in different industries come across.
JG: Tell me about your early years - where and how did you grow up, and what were some foundational experiences for you?
EH: I grew up in Montreal, and I come from a family of artists. My mom is a painter, my dad is a photographer, and they were both teachers as well. I was raised in a very creative environment, and what that instilled in me early is an interest in challenging people’s mindsets and preconceived notions. For me, this happens through reflection, creativity, looking at art, reading - I read a lot as a kid as well, which also opened my mind to a lot of ideas, and the world beyond my city of Montreal.
That was foundational for me because my dad introduced me to Bell Hooks, which got me interested in the feminist movement at an early age, and the intersectionality of feminism with other elements of human rights and social justice. The convergence of all of this was very interesting to me.
The Brand is Female Podcast on Spotify.
What did you go to school for?
I always had interests in both artistic pursuits, and communications. When the time came to make a decision, I almost went into filmmaking, with communications as a back-up potential major. I ended up getting a communications degree with a minor in marketing and in management. However, the creative spirit was always present for me throughout this time.
How did you get your start in your career?
My first positions were in corporate environments. My area of focus was always public affairs and communications, but in the worlds of finance and technology, which are completely different than what I focus on now. That was a great school for me though, as I learned a lot from those structures. The experiences instilled in me a discipline and rigor in how I approach my work. I was also lucky to have positions that had me traveling around Canada and the United States, so I could see different realities first hand, and also find a common language among all of these places. The interest in having multiple communities being connected started then.
“Emotional intelligence, intuition, and compassion are also present and very important. We’ve been taught to leave a lot of those qualities behind if we want to be successful in a workplace context, and I very much disagree with that - all of those traits are very powerful traits and only helpful.”
Out of this time, how did The Brand Is Female come about?
After working in this corporate context for almost twenty years, the last decade of that being in the jewelry industry, in luxury, I realized that a lot of corporate environments are generally speaking quite challenging for women. Of course there are exceptions, but I’ve noticed that these environments can be toxic and harmful. When you’re young and naïve, its not something you notice right away, but you certainly do over time.
I also noticed that a lot of projects that I was leading had to do with female empowerment, a term I disagree with because I think women are quite powerful from the start. Anyway, the projects had to do with women at the forefront and leading various initiatives, and recognizing women’s contributions and talent. These were the projects that I cherished the most, and it became clear that I wanted to start my own business and be my own boss. At the same time, I also wanted to focus on that type of work - to celebrate the women around me, especially those that were starting and leading interesting brands and start ups. I wanted to be able to support what they were doing.
I left my executive position, took the plunge so-to-speak, and launched The Brand Is Female first as a boutique consulting agency focused on female founders and women-led brands, and then I decided to launch the podcast around the same time. A friend suggested it to me, I remember her saying, “You love podcasts, just do your own!” And I thought, “Why not?” I was going to do the podcast as a fun, light, side project but it really took off.
That means there was really a gap for it! I remember being so pleasantly surprised at the wonderful reaction and momentum that the Madame Architect interview series had gotten when I first launched them, and I realized that this was because nothing quite like it existed before.
Right, exactly. There was clearly an audience, and we had partners that came on and helped us sponsor the show, which helped us grow. And then a lot of the women that we were working with for the consultancy had come from different backgrounds and were interested in launching podcasts, and this is how we became a podcast studio, producing and distributing podcasts by women. We call them our Women Changemakers.
The Brand is Female billboard.
The Brand is Female podcast cover.
I get asked this a lot, so I’m curious to ask you - what have you learned from all of the varied conversations that you’ve had?
There are very clear themes that come up. Things like imposter syndrome, self doubt - for women everywhere, we’ve grown up and learned that somehow we shouldn’t be putting ourselves first, and that our voices aren’t quite enough. In some cases its very subtle, but there is this layer of doubt and anxiety that is always there that prevents women from fully stepping into their power and self-actualization. I’ve spoken to successful entrepreneurs and celebrated authors, and this layer is everywhere!
On a positive note, I’ve noticed that women embody very powerful leadership traits. No matter if the person I’ve spoken with is a general surgeon or a scientist, there is a lot of creativity that women possess. Emotional intelligence, intuition, and compassion are also present and very important. We’ve been taught to leave a lot of those qualities behind if we want to be successful in a workplace context, and I very much disagree with that - all of those traits are very powerful traits and only helpful. A lot of women now are harnessing these powers, and realizing that these characteristics and gifts and advantages that they can be implementing in their everyday lives.
Finally, there is a lot of stigma about being in the minority as a woman, and that can come in different forms and shapes, like not getting due credibility or compensation when a woman starts a new role. These are all common stories.
Since many of our readers are architects and designers, have you noticed any common themes that are specific to women that you interview in creative fields?
I would say that I hear of the same challenges across all disciplines and industries. I will also say though, that we’ve made progress. When women, especially creative leaders, are able to step into their power, that is when their voices get expressed. When a creative person is owning up to their vision and presents who they are, that really speaks to and inspires other women. When you’re doing something creative, you essentially make people feel - that’s why design and the arts are important, and that’s a theme where I see women in creative fields come together. It’s about elevating our mindsets, and as a society too.
“When women, especially creative leaders, are able to step into their power, that is when their voices get expressed. When a creative person is owning up to their vision and presents who they are, that really speaks to and inspires other women.”
What do you get from these amazing conversations that you’ve had? What has this work done for you personally? And from that, where are you in your career today?
The conversations are truly so inspiring - this is my favorite part of what I do, I feel like every week, at least once a week, I’m speaking to a creative woman with an amazing story to tell. We have that in common [laughs]. I get to hear their thoughts and experiences, and it is a lot like mentorship.
I was just about to say that.
The conversations also fuel me to keep going with what we’re doing with The Brand is Female as a consultancy, because I’m seeing what these women are facing. First of all, their stories that need to be heard, because then they inspire more and more people.
We are so aligned with what we are doing, it’s wonderful to hear.
When you hear about a woman who has been able to overcome all these obstacles, and is still able to thrive, I’m especially inspired in that case. That can be done no matter what a person’s position or job is, as long as they are enabling change and speaking for those left behind, they are still elevating the collective mindset. That is incredibly inspiring to me.
It’s also one thing to increase representation, but there is more to the story. What is the impact of that? You need to follow through with what increasing representation will do, so that true change can happen.
Looking back in your own career, what have been some of the challenges you yourself have faced and how have you managed through them?
At the start of my career, I didn’t consider that I had any challenges. I only realized later that this was because I was bending to the preconceived roles of what I should be in the professional world. That worked until the point where I realized that what I was bending to no longer felt right to me, and by that I mean that certain attitude of being a female executive in a corporate industry. It’s all the things that we know - if I was sitting at a large table, the men at the table would be spoken to and asked questions first. There was the classic anecdote that was, and is, shared by so many women, which is that you say something, and then a male colleague says it five minutes later but more loudly, and everybody thinks it’s a great idea.
Eva!
We’ve all been there.
Those are the types of microaggressions that are so constant, that you become oblivious to them, but once you realize what is happening, it’s very hard to go back. I had a lot of that. I also saw a lot of women in the workplace be really disrespected around me. That became very clear that I had a lot of employees under my care, and I was asked to manage in a certain way. That way didn’t feel right to me - it wasn’t about cultivating team spirit, it wasn’t about helping them cultivate themselves professionally, it all came down to a top-down management approach where only the bottom line mattered and purpose and values were pushed aside. There was a lot of that, so that fueled my desire to be able to both work in a different environment myself as well as demonstrate to other women that there is a different way of doing business.
Who are you admiring right now?
There are a lot of women doing amazing work. I’m very inspired by the younger generation of women who are using their platforms, no matter what their focus is, for their activism. Young indigenous activists and creators, young voices in media - social justice seems to be completely innate for them, and they bring these values to their work. A lot of social media platforms have become vehicles for social justice, which has been amazing to see.
Finally, what advice do you have for those just starting their careers?
Be true to who you are. It’s very easy to get swept into what other people expect of you and what the world expects of you, but it’s important to stay grounded and listen to your intuition about what’s right and what’s authentic for you. That will go a long way.