Monroe Consulting Group China, the international executive recruitment company’s latest branch operation, held an internal award ceremony to mark what has been an impressive first quarter for 2016. The event was attended by Joost Kreulen, chief executive officer of parent-company Empresaria Group Plc, who flew into Shanghai to personally thank the team for their achievements in little over a year of operations.
Mr Kreulen, who has more than 25 years management experience in the international specialist staffing industry and has been CEO of the Group since early 2012, said 2015 had been “a year of transition that saw IntelligenceHR rebranded to Monroe Consulting Group and adopt their business model.” The restructure is already paying dividends with an excellent start to 2016.
“Kelly Liu who joined to head Monroe's operations in Shanghai has built an enthusiastic team of young Chinese consultants,” Mr Kreulen said. “March recorded the best results the office had achieved in years, which given the new team, certainly is a very good achievement.”
Monroe China Award winners were Leo Li for Best Review Meeting Host as well as Best Team Contributor, Rowena Zhu for Most Diligent Worker, and Cindy Wu for Best Revenue Results.
Ms Liu said she was proud of what the rapidly expanding company had been achieving in China. “Our Shanghai-based company has grown from two to 10 people in just over a year and hit our major targets ahead of expectation,” she said. “All the numbers on our business side are extremely positive.”
She said it was also particularly motivating to see the recruitment consultants benefit from Monroe’s comprehensive in-house training programme, which featured extensive classroom and online training material on not only the recruitment industry, but also about leadership, team work and personal development.
Ms Liu said Mr Kreulen’s visit was a great boost to the China operation, particularly as he was able to provide more information about recruitment practises globally.
“We have been working very hard and so focused on what we are doing in China that it was great to stop and look at things from a more global perspective,” she said. “Our consultants haven’t had enough time to connect with global thought leaders … so this was an extremely positive occasion and highly motivating.”
Andrew Hairs, group managing director for Monroe, which has operations in the emerging markets of Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Chile and Mexico said the rebranding and appointment of Ms Liu had produced better than expected results and was an exciting prospect for both the Monroe Group and Empresaria in the coming years.
“Despite the recent slowdown in the growth of the Chinese economy, Monroe has been able to make a real impact in the country by successfully transplanting our international award-winning business model to Shanghai,” Mr Hairs said. “Multinational or national clients that work with us in emerging markets in the Asia-Pacific respect our recruitment processes, integrity and customer service and companies in China have the same expectations.”