EMEA Recruitment were excited to host an Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (ED&I) Roundtable in partnership with Syngenta.

On Wednesday 19th October 2022, we hosted senior Human Resources and ED&I leaders in Zurich for a face-to-face Roundtable event.

We were pleased to be joined by Syngenta’s Group Head Diversity and Inclusion, Rubén Alejandro Ramirez, who was a recent guest on the EMEA Recruitment podcast: https://www.emearecruitment.com/podcasts/a-champion-of-dandi-ruben-alejandro-ramirez/204

In order to provide a safe space for attendees to discuss their ED&I journeys and to enable us to support leaders in their roles, we invited a select group from our network in Switzerland. We were proud to be bring together a vibrant group of professionals from a broad range of sectors, including financial services, chemicals, hospitality and pharmaceuticals.

Keely Straw, who leads our HR recruitment team in Switzerland, was the host for the Roundtable. She was joined by our Switzerland Country Director, John Byrne, and Senior Consultant, Charlotte Cruise, who has led a number of Women in Procurement initiatives in the past.

We explored the following topics:

• Identifying your momentum and stage in your ED&I journey – identify different stages
• How to design an ED&I global strategy – identify needs for each population and engaging that population
• How to engage leaders and the employee community
• How to identify and measure progress

We have received feedback from our network that there is a lack of this type of event taking place in Switzerland. We are proud to be leading the way in providing an opportunity for HR and ED&I leaders to discuss their journeys and network across different industries.

We enjoyed sharing the topics and ideas discussed at the event!

If you’re interested in attending similar events in the future, please get in touch with Keely, who will ensure you stay up to date: [email protected]

On Thursday 29th September 2022, EMEA Recruitment attended the Recruiter Awards in London.

The Recruiter Awards was established in 2002. It has become the UK’s largest event for the entire recruitment community, recognising outstanding achievements by agencies and in-house recruiters.

We were delighted to be shortlisted in the Best Professional Services Recruitment Agency category, recognising outstanding service through recruitment solutions to sectors such as Accountancy, Human Resources and Procurement.

Paul Toms, our Founder, took a group of our Administration and Marketing team to the event, to acknowledge the hard work that goes into our operations behind the scenes.

Attending was Sarah James, our Office Manager, Victoria Minns, Accounts & Payroll Executive, Laura Henderson, Attraction & Development Consultant, and Rose Jinks, Marketing Manager.

We’d also like to extend our appreciation to all of our clients and candidates that provided testimonials and case studies for our application – we couldn’t have done it without you!

Following a fantastic evening, Paul said: “A great night, even though we didn’t scoop an award. Thanks so much for all the hard work behind the scenes to get us nominated – next time!”

Sarah added: “What a great night out and an honour to be nominated. Well done to everyone in the company that worked so hard towards our nomination.”

The Recruiter Awards was held at JW Marriott Grosvenor House on Park Lane, London. The evening kicked off with a drinks reception, followed by a three-course meal, entertainment by comedian Angela Barnes, and the awards ceremony.

Now in its 20th year, the Recruiter Awards has presented over 500 prizes to agencies and in-house recruiters, as well as marketing and technology excellence.

The Great Room at Grosvenor House is a perfect setting to celebrate with colleagues and network across the industry.

We would like to offer our congratulations to all the winners and fellow shortlisted attendees on the night, as well as congratulating the Recruiter Awards on its 20th anniversary!

On 16th June, we hosted our second in-person event of the year with CIPS Switzerland.

It was great to see so many familiar faces and meet some new people sharing our passion for Procurement & Supply Chain.

We had three wonderful speakers commenting on the topic of Perma-Crisis - Michelle Wang, Head of SCM Contracting & Partnerships at Hitachi Energy, Valentina Coco, CEO and Team Culture & Engagement Consultant & Coach, and Corina Cioranu, VP Global Packaging and Personal Care at Unilever. Plus, a very engaging panel discussion led by Pauline King, Head of Group Procurement at SwissRe.

We received some fantastic feedback from attendees, with 70% saying the content was relevant and interesting, 100% of attendees confirming that the evening benefitted their understanding of the topic, and 100% agreeing that they made useful connections at the event. Equally, over 90% of respondents said the event was inclusive and representative across P&SC.

“I think it’s very good having events like this and I’d like to do it more often.”
- Attendee

We expected, with the battle of conflicting priorities - supply issues, sustainability, diversity, inflation, etc. - that Procurement would be entering an operational/firefight mode.

What we heard from our speakers, however, was that they were really driving strategy further and with greater success during these times of increased pressure, and that long-term strategic, solution-led, business impact/value stream approaches that centred around partnerships and engaging wider business initiatives have been crucial to survive and thrive in this environment.

It was interesting to hear from Corina Cioranu and Valentina Coco on the importance of developing the relationship with peers in Finance and how gaining cross-functional internal sponsors is key to executing successful strategies and the Procurement function to effectuate real business impact.

A lovely terminology we will be adding to our vocabulary is “cris(is)-unity”, which really describes how Procurement has been acting as the glue to bring organisations together over the last couple of years. Thanks, Michelle Wang!

It also led to some very exciting conversations/realisations that we are in the midst of a big culture change in the wider Procurement & Supply Chain space. In attendance was a truly representative group of inspiring leaders from a range of different sectors and backgrounds. We enjoyed some healthy discussions showing a much welcomed diversity of thought and innovation, and we would like to thank everyone in attendance for creating such a fantastic evening with honest, authentic and insightful exchanges.

We would also like to offer a huge congratulations to Varsha Asporata for her first successful event as Chairperson for CIPS Switzerland.

If you’re interested in attending similar, future events, please get in touch with Charlotte Cruise, our Senior Consultant: [email protected]

On Tuesday 14th June, we hosted CFOs, Heads of Finance and Finance Directors in Geneva for a drinks and networking event, before joining those in the Deutschschweiz region on Wednesday 15th June. 

As we enter the second half of 2022, the one thing that we can be sure of is that we are going to see continued change and challenges, which the Finance profession is used to dealing with after COVID-19.

Whether it is rising inflation (3.4% in Switzerland in June, but still well below the Eurozone rate of 8.6%), supply chain challenges, rising fuel costs or other impacts from the ongoing situation in Ukraine, the ability to quickly adapt to market conditions and deliver real time financial information and accurate forecasts will be of paramount importance.

The Finance recruitment market remained resilient in Q2, with high volumes of vacancies available and, after many discussions about the need for data visualisation skills, we are finally seeing increased requests for skills in Power BI, Tableau or other similar products.

What are clients and candidates saying?

One of the main topics of conversation at these networking events was how quickly Finance recruitment has changed, moving from vacancy-led during COVID to candidate-led in the current climate, and how attracting the desired candidates is proving increasingly difficult.

From our discussions with candidates, an increasing number who are currently in permanent jobs have confirmed that they prefer to secure their career moves through a recruitment partner. Reasons include:

• A more informative process, with a better likelihood of the right fit in terms of role, company culture and career development
• Greater clarity about salaries, ensuring roles are within the desired range - the lack of salary information on direct advertisements is the biggest source of frustration amongst candidates
• Structured job searching is time-consuming alongside a current role - these individuals want to ensure their time is well spent on relevant opportunities
• Greater chance of success – “Why would I apply for a role that I can see has had 150 applications on LinkedIn?”

These are just some of the reasons why companies relying on advertising roles are unlikely to draw interest from their target audience.

If you're interested in joining us at future events in either Geneva or Zurich, please reach out to John Bower, in our Finance & Accountancy recruitment team in Switzerland: [email protected] 

On Thursday 12th May 2022, the EMEA Recruitment team attended the Zug 2022: Competitive Advantage conference in Switzerland.

The CIPS Switzerland Conference is hosted annually by CIPS Switzerland, CSCMP Roundtable Switzerland and Kanton Zug.

EMEA Recruitment was proud to sponsor the event for the seventh consecutive year, with John Byrne, CH Country Director, Neil Cope, Manager of Procurement & Supply Chain, Charlotte Cruise, Senior Consultant, Sienna Grey, Senior Consultant, and Sasha Gill, Consultant, of our Procurement & Supply Chain recruitment team in attendance.

This year, the conference explored how to secure competitive advantage by linking Procurement and Supply to corporate direction, top-level strategy and executive decisions.

We were pleased to hear from a range of brilliant panellists, who shared their career experiences and challenged attendees with their personal opinions:

• Arnd Franz, CEO at LKQ Europe
• Alexandra Tarmo, Head of Partnerships & Social Procurement at Unilever
• Werner Lieberherr, CEO at Landis+Gyr
• Barbara Stolle-Amedick, Head of Supply Chain, BU Transformers at Hitachi Energy

The hybrid event was fully booked for in-person tickets, but guests could also join virtually.

CIPS and CSCMP conferences are typically attended by more than 200 Procurement & Supply Chain professionals in Zug.

Last year’s conference focused on Carbon + Circularity, exploring the consequences of business activity on others.

We are proud to continue our partnership with CIPS Switzerland and CSCMP Roundtable Switzerland, and look forward to joining future events.

In June, we co-hosted Procurement Perma-Crisis – Leading the Way? in Zurich with CIPS Switzerland, which explored how long-term strategic, solution-led, business impact/value stream approaches that centre around partnerships and wider business initiatives are crucial to survive and thrive in the current environment.

If you are interested in attending future Procurement & Supply Chain events in Switzerland, please reach out to Neil Cope, Associate Director, who will ensure you receive any upcoming information: [email protected]

On Thursday 10th February 2022, EMEA Recruitment was proud to host a CFO & CPO virtual Roundtable, in partnership with Philips and Accenture.

This exclusive event, Finance & Procurement Join Forces – Digital Transformation to Unlock Value, explored how Philips and Accenture are strategically combining Finance and Procurement to capture the next value unlock for the C suite.

We were delighted to host the following leaders in this area, who also took audience questions during the roundtable:

Alexander Visser - Global Head of Indirect Procurement at Philips

Alexander is the Head of Indirect Procurement and Head of Spend Management at Philips. He explored the opportunities that bringing Finance and Procurement together can create.

Alwin Tulner - Spend Management Strategy and Performance Director - Digitization Lead Indirect Procurement at Philips

As the Digitization Lead Indirect Procurement at Philips, Alwin is overseeing the company’s digital transformation to merge Finance and Procurement.

René Van Heijningen - Lead of the CFO & Enterprise Value practice for Accenture Netherlands

René is the Lead of the CFO & Enterprise Value practice for Accenture Netherlands. He spoke about how to optimize the Source-to-Pay process through digital enabled transformation.

Martijn Van Den Nieuwenhof - Lead of Sourcing & Procurement Transformation at Accenture

Martijn Van Den Nieuwenhof is the Lead of Sourcing & Procuremenr Transformation. He talked about how digital enabled Procurement can support in achieving quartile zero performance.

To register your interest in similar future events, please email Hannah Mallia, our Director – Finance in the Netherlands: [email protected]

Thank you to those who attended the CFO & CPO Roundtable on 10th February.