If you enjoyed the viral 2022 Hip Hop Awards Social Ciphers or the Road To Soul Train Awards’ carpool karaoke-style clips featuring City Girls’ Yung Miami and music legend Babyface, meet Tasha Hilton, the executive dedicating her career to impacting culture through disruptive marketing.
As BET’s Senior Marketing Director, Hilton is responsible for the strategy and end-to-end marketing of multi-platform campaigns, ultimately getting people to engage with the brand but her personal responsibility within marketing and the culture is so much more than that.
“I am quite clear about what I want for my career,” Hilton told ESSENCE. “I know often people have dream companies they want to work for and that’s great because there are a lot of really amazing companies breaking through the clutter within their industries. For me it’s about aligning with my purpose and ultimately I want to drive impact in culture and business goals. I have the luxury to currently work at a company where culture sits as the nucleus of its core values.”
The North Carolina A&T State University alum added “it’s a beautiful experience” getting to wrap her work around amplifying HBCU initiatives, small Black business owners, and ultimately “driving Black excellence to paint a cohesive picture of our collective experience.” Hilton shared with ESSENCE that she is particularly focused on “the importance of unpacking the layers of the Black experience through her work and highlighting the diaspora while laying ground to impact the state of Black mental health along the way.”
Her journey has been an inspiring one.
While studying engineering, Hilton had the unique opportunity to intern in Los Angeles as an assistant to an actress in Black Hollywood which led to a full-time job and the start to her journey in entertainment. This led to her working at a brand agency that helped lay the foundation of the marketing career we see today. Eventually, she landed at publishing powerhouse Simon & Schuster to drive awareness of big-name books distributed out of the company. After three years of launching #1 bestselling authors, Hilton directed her attention to driving impact within media content.
That led her to join BET in 2019, and in just a few years she has already managed to leave an indelible mark.
“Through my journey, I have learned it’s more than the great work you can accomplish, it about the impact you have, the way you lead a team, creating balance in your personal life—again ensuring mental health for all,” Hilton told ESSENCE.
She continued: “My SVP of Marketing, Tiyale Hayes and EVP, Chief Marketing Officer of BET, Kimberly Paige nominated me into the BECA Playbook.”
She explains that BECA (Black Executive CMO Alliance) is an organization that creates opportunity, access, equality for Black marketers. “They launched the BECA Playbook to help invest in Black leaders who have their sights set on the C-Suite by providing meaningful resources, networking opportunities, and pointed tactics to successfully navigate that path.”
Hilton added: “I am extremely aware that access is key and being aware of resources like BECA and even individuals who can guide and lead you is critical. In my early career I had no idea about soft skills or the importance of creating balance to avoid burnout.”
But as important as the grind may be, Hilton also acknowledges that balance is required for success, and is a firm believer in the soft life even as an ambitious millennial. The 34-year-old advised younger generations to pay attention to the hustle, and their bodies.
“Our work culture has warranted a demand of self-care and balance in the workplace,” she said, adding that her work schedule can be “insane” at times but she is now learning the importance of a commitment to self-care.
“While balance and self-care isn’t something I would have ever brought up in a conversation to my employer in my 20s simply because that wasn’t the culture or a topic mentioned, Gen Z does it with assertiveness which is impressive not only for their conviction but also for the long-term adaptation it applied to the work culture,” Hilton said. “At the end of the day kudos to Gen Z for demanding self-care at work, I’m still a work in progress as my work days end late but I see the light and I’m on my way.”