Managing Consultant
"Before starting my career with MRINetwork, I was a professional footballer for four years, playing with two well-known London clubs. Unfortunately I sustained a bad knee injury whilst playing against Southampton, so my football career ended when I was 20. I went travelling for a while and when I returned I joined a computer monitor manufacturer as a Sales Executive. After working there for three years, I then joined an IT reseller as a Business Development Manager but after one year there I decided to go travelling around Australia and Thailand.
Upon my return in 2000, I joined MRINetwork. If I am honest I had not heard of MRI when I originally joined, but I was attracted by the uncapped earnings, the possibility of European travel and the team. In May 2005 I left MRINetwork again for almost one year, during which time I worked with a leading recruitment company based in Sydney, Australia. I returned to England and went back to MRINetwork in March 2006.
My current role with MRINetwork is as a Managing Consultant. I manage a team of six people. My responsibilities include running my own desk, as well as making sure the team are doing well. We focus mainly on a niche area within the IT arena in relation to our recruitment activity. We are a dual desk so we focus on Contract as well as Permanent Recruitment.
As a team, we monitor success on a daily basis. We have a white board that monitors everyone's activity. Blue chips are for a new job, green chips are for first interviews and yellow chips are for second and subsequent interviews. Red chips indicate a deal. The highlight of the day for me is hearing the bell ring to indicate that someone has just closed a deal.
We have regular team nights out and team-building exercises, which help to create a good team spirit. We also have a marketing day where we offer a bottle of champagne for the individual who brings in the most new jobs. We also provide incentives for each consultant so that they are encouraged to achieve their individual targets. For example, whoever achieves the highest percentage of their target will win a weekend away somewhere in Europe. We also have a quarterly team target: if we hit this then we try to do something special.
In terms of training, we have regular visits from one of the MRINetwork Business Development Managers, who conducts various training exercises with the team as well as individual training. This ranges from advice on picking up a job through to tips on closing a deal. I will also sit down with my team and offer support and guidance where I can. With the new starters, I set them objectives at the beginning of the day and we sit down at the end of the day to see if they achieved what they set out to achieve; if not, we discuss the reasons why.
My manager (the Managing Director) offers me support with the legal side of things and gives me a free rein to run the team. He is quite flexible and is always open to hearing new ideas. My own management style is very supportive and I always give examples from experience. I am a very proactive individual, I am a real hunter! I always try to make this rub off onto the team as I think you need to be very proactive to survive in the IT recruitment industry.
The office is very much a "work hard, play hard" environment. We have a mixture of experience on the team, ranging from one month to an excess of eight years in recruitment exposure. It is always good to mix experienced recruiters with the juniors as it brings a good balance to the team. It's a fun and vibrant atmosphere here. The balance of the team is great and we have some real characters on the team that make working here enjoyable. We all have a hunger for success and are all motivated by money. Why else would you work in recruitment?!
My goal for the next one to two years is to grow the team to ten and then look to split it into two teams. I will then have two team leaders who will report directly to me. My five-year plan is to become a Partner within MRINetwork.
MRI offers a fantastic career because of its diversity in relation to the markets we recruit in, but also because we span the globe and are the largest Executive Search firm in the world. The career development offered is exceptional and the training is the best I have ever experienced!" (Anthony Cook, MRINetwork Euro Search & Selection)
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