LHH Recruitment Solutions - Week Three Recap -CEO For 1 Month Switzerland

We have officially passed the halfway mark and during week three I was able to dive into a different part of LHH -  this week's focus was Recruitment Solutions.

Before diving into my impressions of the week I would like to thank James Peck and the entire LHH recruitment solutions team in both Geneva and Zurich! Although brief, the interactions I was able to have with the team were valuable and I appreciate the opportunity to include me in your meetings, and day-to-day tasks to give me the chance to develop a thorough understanding of the business. 

I had the pleasure of accompanying James Peck for Week Three and the week started off in our Geneva office with one of the most stunning views of the famous Jet D'eau. 

We started off with a leadership call to have an overview of the current business situation, what needs attention where we can improve, and just as importantly, what was done well. 

I was able to sit in on the 1:1s  with James and our management consultants in the various sectors. This allowed me to get an overview of our focus divisions; whether they were IT & Tech, Banking, Finance, Marketing, Life Sciences, or HR  and Legal. 

After my first day, it quickly became evident how invaluable trust and support within a team environment are in order to ensure personal and business success. Other than personal competency, it is a huge benefit to feel the support of one's team and to know, if needed, that you have someone to rely on. With your own contribution, you also help toward the team goal, and if you can foster trust within the group and support one another you achieve your goals faster than if you set out on a path alone. 

There is much to learn about working autonomously and there are definitely benefits to this, although there is no I in team there is a me. This should be viewed as your individual contribution, learnings, and success in combination with your input to the team effort and the team's success. They should work together not in competition with one another, and trust and support are vital. 

On my first day, I was able to further my understanding of the LHH ICEO offering and how we support executives through various stages. Thank you Christophe Touton for elaborating on your efforts within this sector and for the workshops I was able to take part in. 

I also got an insight into the challenges of merging two brands under a new name and the unique hurdles and opportunities for success one needs to overcome or create during such a transition. The importance of looking at your team members holistically not just at one aspect but considering their operational, financial, and cultural fit within the organisation must not be underestimated. This also leads to which skills can be taught and what is inherently part of one's personality.

✨Key takeaway: If you have the right attitude and determination for success, where you are actively doing your best to learn and improve, the typical “hard skills” can always be learnt. If your attitude is negative and your efforts are almost non-existent, although you may possess some of the know-how, you can potentially put the overall business culture and success at risk.

This is especially important in a business like LHH RS where human interaction and building on those relationships is crucial to understanding both our clients but also finding the right candidates. 

This has further shown me that one must at times minimise to maximise - concentrate on the essentials and do these well. This can lead to greater success than focusing on too many other things at once.

Tuesday was another early start as James and I were off to Zurich for the day. It was my first chance to literally “Work and Travel”. The train ride provided stunning Swiss views’ although we were on our first calls of the day quite quickly.  Looking at various training options for the team and how best we can support the professional development of those who work within LHH RS was our task at the start of the day.

I was fortunate to take part in the Recruitment Solutions Leadership Team Meeting and was able to meet Nicolas Buisson President of LHH RS and James’s amazing partners of LHH from all around the world.

We discussed ways to grow the business without decreasing productivity, and business updates from various countries and on a global scale. A big lesson I was able to learn from Nicolas Buisson is the importance of identifying points of confusion and friction and working to alleviate these. He also highlighted that recognising the hard work and dedication of the team to the business was crucial and spoke about some of our current initiatives to do so. 

Wednesday morning before we jumped back on the train to head back to Geneva I joined the Tech and IT team in Zurich for their team meeting and got an impression of how we develop business opportunities, and keep track of our own performance to be able to benchmark what we are doing with the results we produce. This involved a better understanding of the day-to-day tasks faced by our consultants to match candidates and clients successfully. The topic of the personal goals you set yourself and what you define as success came up. We defined KPIs for the team and a way to move forward for the coming week. 

Within the week I was also able to take part in candidate interviews with Jasmin Diallo and Lyly Berrut - in different industries and for varying positions. It was great to see how LHH is a partner to our candidates and clients' success assisting both in making their futures work, successfully, effectively, and sustainably. Thank you both for inviting me to these meetings. 

I took part in two meetings that week on Generative AI and its impact on the business and the value of Customer Experience. Both meetings were truly engaging and insightful in understanding the future of the business and what we are working towards - how we can best utilise the tools to ensure we continue providing only the best service. 

✨Key Takeaway: It is important to establish this cycle in any customer interaction - you trust me, I know you, I make it easy for you, I get you, I deliver on my promise, I fix things and you trust me.- Constantly working on improving and offering solutions to our clients, and candidate needs. 

The week ended with technical business reviews and a deep dive into all divisions and what still needed to be done to meet or surpass the set targets - again highlighting the importance of individual contributions to the team effort and finding a balance between identifying and keeping both goals in mind.  Through the technical business reviews, I was able to see that when taking up a position of management and leadership, it is important to understand the power of delegation - it is not possible to do everything alone and you need to delegate allowing your team to gain more responsibility and therefore higher engagement with the tasks at hand. 

On Friday I took part in an initial client introduction session to understand our client needs and to introduce our solutions as well as establish the initial relationship on which our work will be built.  It was great to see the diversity of clients LHH works with and the impact we have in people's lives by finding work opportunities for them where they can excel and in doing so our client does too. 

Within the hustle and bustle of Week 3, a new part of the LHH GBU, two new offices, many new faces, travelling back and forth between Zurich and Geneva, and two global CEO for One Month challenges to submit - during a train back to Zurich James shared his secret in finding the energy to keep focused and moving forward.

Week three has drawn to a close and so has my time with LHH, in Week 4 I get to know the last business unit of The Adecco Group - Stay tuned for my key learnings!