Northvolt is a fast-growing company that has revolutionized the market of green energy with sustainably produced batteries. The headquarters lies in Sweden, but their aim is international – and the goal is definite: Northvolt will be the next big industry in Europe. But with rapid upscaling comes an intense need for recruitment. Daniela Maniaci, Director of Talent Acquisition, tells about a journey pushing boundaries and how the collaboration with Jobylon has grown with the company.
Daniela Maniaci, Director of Talent Acquisition at Northvolt, has a solid background in recruitment. Before entering Swedish grounds, her most recent responsibility regarded recruitment in a multinational company based in Shanghai. But the assets of Sweden called, and three years ago, Daniela started her career at Northvolt as one of three operational recruiters. Today, she is the team manager of 20 recruiters and has head responsibility for Northvolt’s recruiting strategy as they keep growing bigger.
– What caught me was the purpose and spirit of Northvolt – at that time, the company wasn't much more than a PowerPoint and a vision, but the ambition made me decide I wanted to be a part of this journey. I expected I was going to be a part of something revolutionary. And now I am.
As implied, those ambitions brought Northvolt from 120 employees to 2 000 only since Daniela started. Jobylon has been their recruiting partner since 2017, and with the fast forward expansion and increasing pressure on Northvolt’s recruitment, the collaboration has grown in multiple terms. Daniela believes that attitude and flexibility are the main elements that have made it a successful one.
– Our need for recruitment has been fast-changing, in scope obviously, but there have also been other factors that have required a lot of flexibility from Jobylon. Ever since we started to collaborate, they've had a great attitude towards adapting their offer to our needs, and have continuously been open to expanding their service and challenging their boundaries to solve our problems. During these three years, I feel like we have grown together side by side in a collaboration that keeps improving.
The challenges of an attractive workplace
One of Daniela's main challenges is managing the number of applications – the team receives about 6 000-10 000 monthly. And the biggest challenge in that, in turn, is to secure the candidate's experience. The importance of a good application experience lies close to her heart and is something she thinks is vital to keep striving for while scaling up.
– The candidate funnel is crucial to understand, and since we have so many of them, it has made it a lot easier to manage candidates with Jobylon’s ATS. We've had much use of categorizing candidates and keeping track of where they're at in the recruitment process. Looking forward, the tool will be even more important since we wish to map out where we succeed in attracting candidates and where we might lose them in the process.
Besides this, Daniela and her team do a lot of recruitment through headhunting – both nationally and internationally, to find the very industry-specific type of knowledge and competence required for Northvolt's development. Not only do they need to track them down, but they also need to attract them to Sweden – and consider taking on Northvolt as a mission rather than just a new job. When showing an interest, the team funnel headhunted candidates in Jobylon's tool. Daniela describes the process as guiding both recruits and often family firmly by hand through a relocation across the globe. In other words, Northvolt's trustability as an employer brand is a necessity.
With the aim set on the global market
A lot has happened at Northvolt, but more is yet to come. They plan on growing twice as big in the near future, and Daniela predicts they will recruit about hundreds of new colleagues only in the next year. Going global is a true challenge in recruiting as it requires a broad understanding of country-specific premises and prerequisites. It will involve working with candidate experience on another level and demands even more control over the candidate's recruitment journey to keep the employer brand on top.
– I'm not going to lie – it will be challenging for both my team and Jobylon. But what makes me believe they can keep up with us is their spirit. Their positivity and ability to be agile are undoubtedly their most valuable assets. It truly has been a collaboration in finding what works out, where we've gained a lot of valuable input from Jobylon on recruitment overall. That's how we'll keep working forward – and that's why I believe that they will continue to be the right partner as we face new challenges.
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