Case study

Global professional services firm

Building a new in-house recruitment solution for a recently acquired business.

The problem

Our client is a leading professional services organisation. When it recently acquired a Swiss business, it uncovered a whole host of problems with the firm’s recruitment services.

Everything from high agency usage and poor governance of the preferred supplier list to wildly inconsistent candidate experiences and low awareness of their employer brand.

The brief

It was simple.

Fix the issues and create a world-class recruitment solution that leverages African-based talent and attracts the best candidates in the market.

The solution

We embedded a team into the business to implement a rapid change programme.

The goal? Implement processes that build a robust recruitment service and instil a culture that delivers excellence across the service offering.

The solution

So how did we do it?

We defined six workstreams that would allow us to build the right solution for our client.

Get the right people doing the right things. This meant deploying a team rapidly from one of our African hubs to deliver the talent solution.
Implement robust processes to create consistency and quality throughout the recruitment function.
Implement appropriate technology to create a superior service.
Provide better, more timely insights to aid strategic decision-making.
Build an exceptional candidate journey and change the way the team communicates with hiring managers and other stakeholders. This meant ensuring the team was fully immersed in the client's EVP and employer brand to ensuring that every candidate received great communications from the very first touchpoint.
Optimise the team structure and ensure team is provided with the right tools for the job.

Our approach

We needed to create a step change in the way the team did things.

This was more than just making a few tweaks.

This was a full scale revolution.

And we needed a plan to match our ambitions.

The plan

Develop a new EVP that showcases the unique reasons why people choose to work at the firm.

Outsource specific activity to our African hubs to allow the team to focus on higher-value, strategic work.

Centralise administration and work permit management to create quicker turnaround times.

Redefine roles and responsibilities for each team member to ensure the right people were doing the right jobs.

Roll-out a new ATS to improve experience across the full candidate journey.

Implement a new supplier management model to provide better governance of agencies.

Redefine the communication strategy with hiring managers to provide a higher-touch, more agile solution.

Rebuild the entire approach to MI and reporting to create more timely, detailed insights that improve decision making.

The results

Our innovative solution allowed our client to build an industry leading-recruitment practice that delivered against its strategic priorities, immediately after the acquisition.

Highlights include:

Cost saving of 250,000 CHF through improved governance of supplier terms and conditions
Standardised recruitment processes resulting in improved service delivery and experience
Delivered greater external brand awareness, through development of a new EVP
New performance management practices and upskilling of new recruitment team
Improved knowledge and skills within team through better knowledge-sharing processes
Flexible and scalable recruitment solution that can react more quickly to business requirements