Speed is a big part of Sogeti's culture, as well as entrepreneurship. Nathalie Kalmér is the National Head of Talent Acquisition at Sogeti, in her spare time she runs an alpaca farm on Visingsö with her husband. She is used to working towards high, ambitious goals and thinking outside the box.
- I’m after results, regardless of whether that means developing our alpaca farm or to make a leader happy with a great candidate. We’re not afraid to go out on a limb first and then evaluate, this means that we can quickly receive feedback from employees and act on it immediately. This eventually contributes to us becoming an attractive workplace since we meet our employees' desires.
Sogeti is part of the Capgemini Group and has operations in over 100 locations around the world. In Sweden, there are 21 offices with a total of 1,200 employees. Nathalie Kalmér is often on the road visiting the local offices to support her TA partners when she is not developing integrations and tools. Sogeti has high growth, which puts high pressure on the pace of recruitment, in March they reached the Q3 target of 300 new employees.
- My passion lies in coaching my TA partners. We normally do many walks and talks. That's how creativity is born, in the conversations. It's all about building relationships.
My TA partners must have all the tools and support they need to successively deliver to their hiring managers for increased growth of the company. The IT industry is hot right now, and many companies are pulling in our people, therefore my role naturally focuses on recruitment so that the closest team managers can focus on retention, says Nathalie.
One of Jobylon's first customers
Jobylon and Sogeti have collaborated for over seven years and are one of Jobylon's first customers. Sogeti has played a big part in the development of the ATS, as Jobylon has continuously adapted to their specific needs. Since Sogeti requested new functions, other customers of Jobylon ended up benefiting from it as well.
- I feel that we get great service, they customize our ATS daily. For us, it is a hygiene factor to have an ATS partner where we have the opportunity to tailor the experience. We have a close dialogue so that we can constantly improve the tool, and every quarter we initiate a workshop with the TA team to receive their input on the development of Jobylon. We like that it's user-friendly, playful, and simple, we've stripped away features that didn't suit us. It simply rhymes well with our culture, says Nathalie.
Jobylon as a one-stop shop
Today, we're focusing on making Jobylon a one-stop shop, which means getting all integrations into the ATS. All information about the candidate has to be available here, Cubik's recruitment tests for example are already integrated. Refapp has just been integrated, before this, Sogeti had a manual process of taking references.
Now when you’re able to identify yourself with Mobile BankID, the lead time has been shortened from weeks to one and a half days. The integration with Jobylon means that everything will also be correct in terms of GDPR. Time can definitely be saved here if the hiring manager has all the information about a candidate gathered in one place, everything from reference checks to tests.
Fierce competition in the IT industry
Like many other companies in the IT industry, there is a lot of competition, and on top of that, it's also the candidates' market. Sogeti does everything to be an attractive workplace. The first initial contact is important, but also the candidate experience and that our candidates receive quick feedback throughout the process.
- Our recruitment approach is "hire for ambition, train for skill", which means we want to bring in people with a can-do attitude. We have a lot of in-house training and great opportunities to grow, here you get to create and we see the individual, this is important in our employer value proposition. We have a first-contact strategy and are constantly trying to find new ways to connect with candidates, not everyone knows who we are. We need to tell them who we are and hope that our culture and offer match the candidate.
Time-to-hire must be shortened
Competition for candidates also means that time to hire must be reduced. Nathalie works operationally in Jobylon by pulling out reports for each office to keep track of and take action on this.
- 40 days is our target for the recruitment process, and we're almost there. Hiring quickly is good, but it's important not to compromise on quality. Our pace, as well as the quality, is good right now. The challenges will be the salary situation and the fact that everyone is pulling in our people. Developers are by far the hardest to recruit now and in the future. Our role is to relieve team leaders so they can focus on retaining their great people.
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