Over the past three years, eBay has been on an aggressive push to grow by focusing on customer needs and creating new shopping and payment experiences to solve their problems. The company’s efforts to revamp the core eBay shopping experience, take a leadership position in mobile commerce and deliver value to sellers and merchants are paying off. EBay has grown to a global business, earning $9 billion in revenue in 2010, with more than 16,000 employees and offices in 35 countries. Currently there are 94.5 million active users on eBay and another 94.4 million active registered accounts on PayPal.

As the company’s brand portfolio expands, its talent management strategy provides just the right amount of process to control but not suffocate employees. Lou Sanchez, vice president of global talent acquisition, management and development at eBay, told Talent Management what it takes to manage such a fast-growing company.

TM: What’s eBay’s approach to talent management?

Sanchez: Our philosophy around talent is tied to the company’s purpose and values. We try to use those to guide the work we do internally just as we use them to guide our work with customers. We have three core areas, things you have to believe as part of eBay, PayPal or any other division of our portfolio. They’re simple, and they date back to the earliest concepts of our company about 15 years ago. One is that we create opportunity for people. Another is we care because people depend on us. Third is that we make a difference in the world. We don’t necessarily talk about talent management for the company; we talk about building strong, capable organizations and a pipeline of leaders who are going to have the ability to influence the incredible growth we have as a company as well as keep us very competitive in the marketplace.

TM: What processes or programs have you established to improve workforce performance?

Sanchez: What we have found [that] works in our environment is the notion of just enough process. When we talk about talent management and talent acquisition processes, we’re constantly looking for the sweet spot between getting consistent and replicable results and enough freedom, creativity and innovation opportunities to play out so that we’re not stifling the way we do things. We try to be simple. Process- and program-wise that means being clear on company goals and how the employee’s work relates to executing those goals, delivering [the] value proposition to customers, and really getting focused and providing context that leads to an employee finding meaning in the work he or she is doing.