Client Testimonials - Poolia Group

Poolia helps coffee company find its MD - Nespresso
Mike Hecker, Chairman of the Board at the coffee company Nespresso B2B, was facing a challenge. He needed an MD for the distribution company Premium Coffee, and he wanted someone who not only had experience from big companies with strong brands, but was also an entrepreneur with a strong ability to drive a rapidly-expanding company forwards. He found Maria Eriksson at Poolia Executive Recruitment - and she found Fredric Gustafsson, whose experience from companies such as Coca-Cola meant that he matched the job specification.

 "Our close contacts with Maria Eriksson meant that we always felt involved in the process. The time she invested in getting to know our needs meant that she found exactly the MD we needed," says Mike Hecker.

Fredric Gustafsson is also very satisfied with his contacts with Poolia Executive Recruitment.

"Absolutely, they're extremely professional in everything they do, and I'm using them now as we continue to grow. We need more skilled employees, and Poolia is very familiar with our business at this stage."

Increasing the speed of recruitment - Effekt
Tomas Jakobsson is the MD of Effekt, a small company where the eleven employees work in the field of business systems.
According to Tomas, for a company of this size it is essential to collaborate with a recruitment company. The difficulty is striking a balance between finding the right person with the right expertise, while at the same time acting quickly enough.

"I believe that you should go with that initial gut feeling. Our partnership with Poolia means that the formal side is already taken care of. The recruiter knows exactly what kind of employee we want and has already screened out all applicants who don't have the right competence. So, when we meet candidates it's mainly a question of whether we'll be comfortable working together with the individual. We have to make a quick decision, and not spend too long deliberating," says Tomas.

In a small company like Effekt, personal chemistry is important. Tomas Jakobsson has focused on good, thorough preparatory work together with Poolia's permanent placement consultant in order to generate the ideal candidates.

"Poolia has a good idea of what we're looking for and what we expect. We then meet a few people and see whether they fit in with the team at the workplace. But we have to make a quick decision otherwise it turns into a scramble for the candidates."

"It would take a very long time if I was the one who had to sift through all of the applications," he says.

A clear vision attracts candidates - Breakthrough Breast Cancer
"The money we collect goes to cancer research. When we take on new employees, we're neither able nor willing to compete on the basis of high wages and benefits like some other organisations. As we don't yet have a strong brand as an employer, our strategy has been to attract candidates with different priorities. We're looking for people who want to work in a smaller, less bureaucratic organisation, who have high ambitions and a clear, straightforward vision for the future."

Brett Terry is responsible for HR matters and organisational development at Breakthrough Breast Cancer. Around 140 employees work at the office in High Holborn in central London. Poolia's first job for Breakthrough was the permanent placement of an acting finance manager, and this was followed by IT staff and administrators.

"We're growing quickly, and to manage this we must constantly find just the right people and succeed in retaining them. This is why we need a partner like Poolia, who understands our business and can help us to quickly find the right candidates with both the right competence and attitude, and not least of all the right expectations of the job. The combination of social and professional competence is particularly important, and I've been impressed by Poolia. This is the first time that a consultancy company has first of all looked at our values and visions before moving on to discuss business," says Brett Terry.

Expertise and attitude are the key - STA Travel
"It doesn't matter if I get 100 candidates for a job if they don't have the right attitude and fit in with us. And we're nearly always in a hurry, so the temp we engage must understand how we work and be able to quickly get an idea of what I need."

These are the words of Frances Nichol, Accounting Manager at STA Travel in London, a travel agency that specialises in school and student travel within the UK and abroad.

"Poolia is extremely professional. Our contact person, Nick Tock, has spent a lot of time interviewing us and following up, so that he can put forward candidates that suit us in terms of skills and as individuals," she says.

At their office in Drury Lane, a stone's throw from Covent Garden, there are 110 employees, 25 of whom work in the finance department. Frances Nichol has been working with Poolia for a couple of years and is an important client.

"We were finding it harder and harder to find good staff for temporary staffing assignments, but one of my colleagues recommended Poolia, so I gave them a call. Now Nick's become something of a friend, and he helps us all the time when we need to recruit temporary staff. It's reassuring to know that the candidates who come have been tested and that Poolia also knows them as individuals," says Frances Nichol.

High quality every time -  AutoScout 24
"When we needed to recruit a new manager for our controlling department we tried first of all to find a good candidate ourselves. But it was difficult to find someone who was both familiar with controlling and had managerial experience. When we turned to our contact person at Poolia, Nico Ikonomou, he quickly got back to us with 3-4 people."

Hanne Kreher is HR Director at AutoScout 24, Europe's biggest car portal, with more than four million visitors every month. She is clearly satisfied with the partnership with Poolia.

"Nico keeps in regular contact with us. He always wants to find out more about the company and what we do, and he gives us suggestions about people who might fit in. This is ideal for us, as we're expanding quickly and the candidates we see are always of high quality," she says.

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Personal contacts are all important - B+S Card Service
"It all started when our contact person at the staffing company we used to use changed jobs and started at Poolia instead. As the personal contacts and an understanding of our business are so important to us at B+S Card Service, just over one year ago we decided to transfer to Poolia as well," explains Gabriele Maikranz, from the HR Department in the head office at B+S Card Service in Frankfurt.

B+S Card Service deals with payment solutions, primarily for credit and charge cards, as well as e-commerce systems. The company has around 450 employees, and in addition to the one in Frankfurt also has offices in Bochum, Hamburg, Berlin and Stuttgart.

"The big staffing companies often think that we're too small a client to be of interest, which is why it's nice to work with Poolia, who always provide us with a good service. Our Poolia consultant knows how we work and contacts us regularly to find out if we need help in any area, or just to make sure everything's OK," says Gabriele Maikranz. "The temps we hire must have experience from the world of banking, and Poolia has really helped us with this."