The ROI story of Mission Produce
Over the past few years, we have found a number of new colleagues for Astrid Claasz Coockson, Human Resource Manager of Mission Produce. We’re curious what prompted her to outsource the recruitment and selection process to us.
Mission Produce is a global leader in the production, distribution and marketing of fresh avocados. With the construction of ripening rooms in Europe, it is now also possible to distribute a consistent year-round volume of the world’s best avocados to customers in European markets. To properly meet the demand, the office in the Netherlands continues to expand.
Why outsource?
At first I did the recruitment and selection myself, Astrid explains. We were still a small office and most of the time I came into contact with our candidates through my contacts. For the Sales Manager position, the head office in America determined that we had to hire an agency for this. This is an important position for us. Normally, we have all the time we need to find and hire someone. But with this position, we needed to have someone in place right away who could help us. We didn’t want to waste any time; the position was too important for that.
We expected that an agency with extensive recruitment, could reach the right target group faster. The head office already had an agency in mind for this. I contacted them, but they did not match us at all. They were too focused on corporate companies.
Looking for an alternative
Since I did see the benefits of working with an agency, we started looking for a better alternative ourselves. Our Sales Coordinator, Nikoletta Kiss, recommended Velde. She had met your agency as a candidate in the past and was very positive about it. A glance at your website confirmed this. It explains in a very accessible and clear way why and how you do what you do. That really appealed to me. The first contacts were consistent with that. There was a click and a very personal approach.
– Astrid Claasz Coockson
Much more professional than expected
Meanwhile, I can say that I like the cooperation very much. The structure of the procedure was much more professional than I was used to before. From the head office we worked with huge job descriptions of two A4 sheets with an extensive enumeration of tasks. With your vacancies, the focus is on presenting the most important information to the target group as attractively as possible. The core of the vacancy, easily scannable text, lots of images and a short vacancy film. Although that was a bit of a stretch, having to stand in front of the camera….
The procedure itself went beyond expectations. Every conversation was worthwhile. Nowhere did I feel like we were wasting our time. With the end result that we hired a new sales manager with Dave.
The cost
You are not a cheap agency. And although we were very satisfied with the cooperation in the Sales Manager procedure, we wanted to try again ourselves in a less demanding position. We came back to that. It took a long time before we could interview candidates, they were not the right candidates, and the extra work in terms of administration and follow-up took up a lot of time.
Fortunately, you were able to reach and trigger the right candidates in a short time, so this vacancy was also filled to our satisfaction. We notice that we are getting more and more used to each other. You now know us, what we are looking for and which candidates fit our organization.
And, of course, the cost is very much dependent on what it ultimately brings us. Dave has been with us for a year now and his arrival has brought Mission Produce into a further growth phase, which meant that we also needed expansion in Operations, for example. Since Dave’s arrival, 5 new colleagues have been hired….
At Velde, we believe in Matching Great Ambitions. The better the ambitions of our candidates and clients match, the more benefit and job satisfaction both experience.
Want to know more about recruitment and selection? Then contact Roy van Eijk.
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