The recent global crisis and following recession started to affect Russia in the fall of 2008 for most companies, with Russia’s largest companies feeling the pressure a few months earlier. Many of us, myself included, estimated that we had about a year of tough times ahead before things would start to pick up again, and then likely at a slow to moderate pace. Staffwell started to see a real change for the better starting in July 2009.

PR from America was claiming that things were getting better; Russia avoided a forecasted second mini-crisis in August or September, and companies started preparing for positive change and growth again, which meant budgets opening up a bit to hire in fresh new talented executives, management and staff.

Reasons for Recruitment Growth
Staffwell’s growth in the second half of 2009 is attributed to loyal long term clients replacing executives, management and staff who had left the company for other positions and/or who were dismissed due to average to below average performances, and to new department growth in these client companies and at newly developed Staffwell clients expanding onto the market, coming into the market with new investment, or needing to replace employees.

Top Performing Industry Sectors
Staffwell’s strongest industry sectors for 2009 (up to October 12) in terms of revenues from placements (from top down) were Banking & Investment, Real Estate & Construction, Pharma, FMCG, Legal, Leasing, Industrial, B2B, Retail, Energy, Finance, Insurance, Manufacturing, Leisure, HoReCa, Logistics, and Consulting. We are forecasting that by the end of the year, Banking & Investment and Legal will both be in our top 2.

Top Performing Occupational Areas
Staffwell’s strongest occupational areas for 2009 (up to October 12) in terms of revenues from placements (from top down) were from vacancies in finance & accounting, banking, sales, legal, project management, marketing, , HR, engineering, technical, insurance, general management, other, operations, logistics, PR, and administration.

Market Salaries
In comparing overall salaries from Staffwell’s 2008 and 2009 placements (over the same 9 months), for finance positions they increased 5%, banking positions increased 44%, legal decreased 30%, and sales decreased 39%. For other occupational areas, project management salaries increased, logistics stayed the same, and marketing, accounting, office management, engineering, technical, insurance, general management, operations, PR, HR, and administration all decreased.

It is very likely that some of these percentages will change by the end of this year due to an increase in our client recruitment activity and a more positive market outlook by many. Also for better reference, ‘our market’ consists largely of top rate Multinational and Russian companies recruiting ‘highly skilled’ executives, management and professionals.

Outplacement Results
We created our new Staffwell Outplacement services at the beginning of 2009 which was ideal timing as during the slowest two quarters of the year (for recruitment work) it gave our team something new to focus on and gave our clients something new to learn and meet about and consider.

From our corporate clients who put teams of their people through the service, and the many private individuals who put themselves through the service, it was definitely some of the most rewarding experiences we had this year. To see, hear, and feel the stress, anguish and fear of people who had lost their jobs, and in a market with very few quality job opportunities, was truly heartbreaking. We gave more than double what we promised in terms of our time and effort, to our clients going through these services and felt great seeing the confidence, strength and sense of purpose and new knowledge, they had all graduated with.

For me personally to hear from many of the client participants how it was ‘fantastic’ and ‘amazing’ and ‘so professional’ and ‘so useful and helpful’ and that ‘we have a truly top-rate highly professional team’, was just wonderful. We always help companies when we recruit great people for them and help individuals when we place them into new positions and companies, which is always extremely gratifying for us, but with outplacement, to really help people that are in true despair, and depressed and scared, is just extremely emotionally rewarding.

Reflections and Closing Thoughts
Oddly enough, this has been one of my favorite years at Staffwell. Even though revenues were way down, we did the right things, which feel great. We forecasted and planned correctly, we kept our best people, we focused on our core specialization (recruitment & executive search), and added a complimentary new service line (outplacement). We also received an official letter from a division of the Russian Government stating that we were one of the best taxpaying companies in Moscow!

I am so proud that the Staffwell team worked so hard to bring the company successfully through this challenging year. They were positive toward the market, focused in their work, caring and sensitive to those down and/or out of work, and extremely hardworking; some starting very early and others working consistently very late. Most importantly, the team together became stronger and tighter and the quality of our work and the service and attention to our clients was maintained at the highest level, which is always our biggest priority.

Great thanks go to our clients for entrusting us to find them great people to hire, to our candidates in the market for entrusting us in our job recommendations to them, and to the Staffwell team who work hard to keep us one of the best recruitment/search companies on the market.

Kindest regards,

Teri Lindeberg
Staffwell CEO

Filed under HR/Recruitment, Studies/Surveys