Human Capital Store is a recruitment agency established in 2009. Our company has specialised in offering solutions for recruitment and selection of employees from various professional fields. Our agency also owns an affiliate company operating in the U.S. and is working with executive search partners from 55 countries around the world. To develop a successful business and offer the highest quality services, Human Capital Store always follows three essential rules in its work: Time is money – each delay on our part affects our clients’ business; Provide added value to the most important capital – humans; Follow high standards in human and business ethics. Human Capital Store’s goal is not to be the biggest or most successful recruiting company, but to make our clients feel that we care about their business the way we care about our own.
Following is an interview with Miroslava Nikolova, Human Capital Store CEO, for the SEE TOP 100 annual ranking by SeeNews.
There are several factors affecting the performance of a recruitment agency, but what are the ones that you currently must consider when looking for the most suitable specialists?
Let’s start with a very interesting and important factor – values matching. People increasingly often say that they want to work for companies where there is a very strong match in values. We all know that we spend more time with our colleagues than with our family, but have we ever thought that we build our family according to the values we have. Similarly, when our values at work are not shared, there is no way we can feel good, and the most natural thing is to start thinking about parting with the company.
The next key factor is employee well-being. When starting communication with candidates for a given project, it is important for them to know if the company offers an employee well-being programme. These programmes for our clients usually cover food vouchers or public transport and fitness cards, but there is a growing focus on the opportunities for getting specialised advice when needed in areas such as career, psychological state or health. It is extremely important that employers make a conscious effort to motivate employees to work in a truly positive environment, and not just spell out the need for such an environment in company policies. Ideally, an employer should think about improving all the components of well-being – the financial, mental health, social, physical and career ones.
Do other key factors come into play?
Of course, and they are just as important as the ones we mentioned. The people transformation factor for example. Since the beginning of 2020, after work from home was imposed, people have started to change. Their views have changed on work – on what is good performance and how to maintain pre-2020 levels, or whether there is a need to raise their performance levels. Have you thought about how “quiet quitting” could affect your business? What will you do if someone from your team starts to cover only the bare minimum required to keep his or her job? What will be the consequences if the whole team goes for “quiet quitting”? This is also related to another factor – employee experience. Whether you work at home, in the office, or you have the opportunity to work in a forest, a beach or another remote place, this always has an impact on your experience.
What can be expected in the development of the HR sector?
The expectations are for a new employer value proposition. Remote work was imposed on the business, it was not the companies’ own choice, and they are already tempted to reverse things as they were before. Nowadays, the lack of choice and flexibility would make a candidate who previously had a very strong desire to work for a company to prefer another employer. Increasingly often, I hear even the best employers say, “There are no people.” So, I ask my clients, “Have you considered hiring mothers or fathers who want to work part-time to look after their children? What do you think about hiring people over 50? Do you think students would bring benefits to the business? And what do you think about the people who have worked for you for years?” Employers who answer positively to all or some of my questions have a management that really knows that the person is the most important capital in an organisation. There are those who say that they would not allow the hiring of such people to change their business model but are they aware that in these times of shortage of people companies that are not adapting to the new needs of skilled people may cease to exist?
Another thing to take note of is the employee retention option, which has always been important, but more so now than ever before. Among the most important challenges facing an organisation today is precisely the shortage of people and the associated turnover and retention of employees. Therefore, it is important that companies make an effort to create programmes to retain their employees. Knowledge of the emotional intelligence of everyone on the team can be a great benefit in this respect as each of us has a different ability to perceive, evaluate and manage our own emotions. Using this emotional information, people can manage their way of thinking and behavior. Have you thought about how many different reactions there can be to a change in an already established work policy, for example?
Of course, even if all of the above is used in a given company, that doesn’t mean that everything will be rainbows and sunshine because every organisation is unique and has its own needs that may have been ignored so far or if it is pretty difficult to make your business better, have you thought that it could be because your business ego is holding you back.