Latest / Women Disrupting Tech / The ROI of Relocation: Scaling Global Teams Without Attrition with Judith Roetgering | Ep. 137

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The ROI of Relocation: Scaling Global Teams Without Attrition with Judith Roetgering | Ep. 137 · Women Disrupting Tech

• 0:00
  Because Can you imagine, I'm going to ask you to move to
• 0:04
  China and you arrive there and they have arranged a hotel for
• 0:09
  you and you have your registration, but then you need
• 0:13
  to find a place to live. Then you need to bank account,
• 0:17
  you need to have your health insurances, your insurance,
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  yeah, but your focus is not at work because there are so many
• 0:26
  things at the back end that you still need to arrange and you
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  have no idea where to start. What if your next growth risk is
• 0:54
  not finding international talent, but helping them land in
• 0:58
  a new country and actually stay? I'm the Archelinopus, the host
• 1:02
  of Women Disrupting Tech to podcast about how power, money,
• 1:06
  and voice actually work for women in the tech ecosystem.
• 1:10
  My guest today is Judith Root Ring.
• 1:13
  Judith Root Ring is the Managing Director of Rehive People, and
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  she has helped companies relocate and onboard
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  international talent for years. In this episode, we talk about
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  why international hiring fails without proper relocation, what
• 1:28
  a real soft landing looks like, and how language, culture, and
• 1:32
  even AI play a role in where people stick around.
• 1:35
  If you are a hiring manager, founder, or investor who wants
• 1:39
  to understand what it takes to build global teams that
• 1:41
  performance day, this episode is for you.
• 1:44
  It will give you a very practical look at what needs to
• 1:47
  be in place before your new international hire gets on the
• 1:51
  plane. So when you're ready to listen
• 1:53
  and learn, here's my conversation with Eudit Kutrin.
• 1:58
  Hey Udit Ruthen, welcome to Women Disrupting Tech.
• 2:02
  Good to have you. A question I always ask at the
• 2:05
  start is how you got into your current position.
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  In your case, how you got to founding Rehive?
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  Well, first of all, dear John, thank you for having me onto
• 2:13
  your podcast. It's a great honor for me.
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  Good question. I met the official founders of
• 2:20
  the of the company when I was still in my old company and we
• 2:25
  had a great clique and they were already in in the talent domain.
• 2:30
  They have built an HR platform, an ER platform and we came
• 2:35
  across each other and they were really focusing on growing their
• 2:39
  businesses. They really wanted to add a
• 2:43
  relocation agency to their business because it's a part of
• 2:46
  the ER strategy. So they asked me to join.
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  They started the company in late 2023.
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  Back then I was still finishing the bankruptcy of the company I
• 2:59
  had before that. And so when they they asked me
• 3:03
  to join, honestly I said no because it was quite a
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  challenging time back then. And I joined them in April 2024
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  as the managing director and so to say late Co founder because
• 3:18
  the company was already found before.
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  OK, so how was that to join a bit later?
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  Yeah, it, I think it was in the beginning.
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  It was also challenging with the team, of course, because the
• 3:32
  team was already partially there and and they were working
• 3:37
  together already and, but the founders, they really see it as
• 3:43
  an investment. So they were really looking for
• 3:47
  a captain navigating this ship and within the team that they
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  had they there. It was a lot of experience.
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  There is a lot of experience but not in managing a start up and
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  that's exactly why they asked me to start the whole process
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  together with the team, set up the strategy.
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  Of course I have founded a relocation agency before so I
• 4:13
  had my lessons learned which I could take into that and also
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  starting with a team that was already there.
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  Normally when you start up a company you start by yourself,
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  Co founder and then when you start growing you are adding
• 4:29
  people to the team. This was very different in that
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  sense that there was a team already and a quite senior team.
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  So on fees and immigration, one of the guys we are working with,
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  one of my colleagues, Mike, he is, he's already inviting
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  immigration for 15 years. So he knows exactly what he's
• 4:53
  talking about and he's really senior.
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  So in that manner it was really different to step into the
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  company. And on the other hand, it was
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  really good because you have an A different start than starting
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  on your own wedding to have some achievements and then start to
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  grow. Yeah.
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  So the attitude, if I understand correctly, a because they needed
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  a captain on the ship and B because they want to expand into
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  relocation, right? Yeah, exactly.
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  OK, so if I remember correctly from the research, you worked in
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  multiple countries. What challenges did you into run
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  into yourself with relocation? I have relocated once in my life
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  so I haven't lived in a lot of countries.
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  I think the most difficult is, is that you don't know exactly
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  what needs to be done. So for example, if you moved
• 5:56
  home country, of course you need to know that you need to be
• 5:59
  registered there. But how do you select a bank?
• 6:02
  How do you find a house if you don't know the market there?
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  And I had the privilege when I was moving that I have family of
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  I had family and friends there that helped me and that knew
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  exactly, OK, you need to do, you need to take these steps and
• 6:18
  don't forget about these things. But if you, for example, here in
• 6:22
  the Netherlands, we have so many regulations and if you don't
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  know, you just don't know. Because if you know, I think you
• 6:29
  get lost. Oh that, well, that's for sure,
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  that's for sure. I think the Netherlands is one
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  of the one of the countries with so many regulations I
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  experienced. For example, if I try to explain
• 6:43
  to an international how our healthcare system works, it's,
• 6:47
  it's so difficult to, to, in that sense to, to, to explain,
• 6:51
  but also to make them understand.
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  And I think that's, that's the role that we have to take as a
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  relocation agency to really support them.
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  The, the, the main question or even the first questions are
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  raised when I am talking to potential new clients is like,
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  OK, what would you need If I tell you that you need to move
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  in six to eight weeks from now from the Netherlands to for
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  example, Singapore or China or India?
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  There are a lot of cultural differences there.
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  But also it's a different system.
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  So especially when when it's your first relocation or when
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  you are relocating with a partner or a whole family, there
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  are so many things to to be arranged and people feel really
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  vulnerable. So if as an employer you can
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  support them with the whole relocation services and
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  everything to be to settle in quickly, that creates less
• 7:51
  stress to them and they can thrive within the company as
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  soon as they can. Yeah, yeah.
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  Before we dive into to that part, you mentioned that you've
• 8:04
  had other companies before. I just want to to double click
• 8:07
  on that. What lessons from there do you
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  take into your current role? I think there are a few lessons.
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  When I look at my former companies, it, it was different
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  than what we're doing right now because we were both
• 8:24
  international recruitment and international relocation and we
• 8:31
  grew insanely fast. And I think especially The funny
• 8:38
  thing is that it was in COVID time.
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  So 20/20/21 we grew from from zero to 1,000,000 in, in, in the
• 8:48
  second year that we were there. Growth is amazing, but
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  especially when you start hiring people, I think it's really
• 9:00
  important to stand still. Like OK, what is the direction?
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  Where do we want to go? Look at the former company we
• 9:07
  were, we were constantly under construction with the store
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  open. And sometimes it's really good
• 9:14
  to just stand still, like where are we and what is the direction
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  that we want to go towards too? And what kind of people do we
• 9:23
  need and what do our people need from us?
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  And I think that's really important for me as an
• 9:30
  entrepreneur that when you start hiring people, most of the 9 out
• 9:34
  of 10 times there are young people like started.
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  And if I look back at that, I'm really happy with the fact that
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  I have a much more senior team around me growing this business
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  because different way. And and I sometimes I don't
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  think it's absolutely fair to have like a someone just
• 9:55
  starting in the business taking them alongside in your start up
• 9:59
  because they don't know what to expect.
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  Is it a good thing to be somewhat older when you found a
• 10:06
  company in that sense that you're also a bit more, you have
• 10:11
  a bit more experience, I hear you say and but also you're a
• 10:15
  bit more like you've seen. Many things already.
• 10:21
  Yeah, it's more seasoned. Absolutely.
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  If I look back at my career, I started in fashion, so something
• 10:28
  totally different than what I'm doing right now.
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  And I've been travelling to so many countries and I think
• 10:34
  that's also where my motivation started to start helping
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  internationals in their, in their transition to the
• 10:41
  Netherlands. Within fashion, I have been
• 10:44
  travelling. I'm much more aware of cultures
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  right now than I was when I started.
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  The first time I was travelling to India, I went to New Delhi
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  and we arrived on a Sunday evening around 11:00 at night.
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  And the moment the door opened of the airplane, I've it
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  absolutely felt I stepped into an upside down world.
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  And I was so naive because everything that we that we do as
• 11:12
  a person is based on our own values and our own beliefs and
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  our own culture because beliefs and values are embedded in our
• 11:21
  culture. So if you're confronted with
• 11:24
  someone from a different culture, which is totally a
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  181st is yours, which I felt like that when I when I first
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  travelled to India, it was to me really challenging because I
• 11:38
  came there with AI, was there with a mission.
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  I had to finalise the production of the brand of the clothing.
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  I had to renegotiate on all the prices.
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  But if you need to do business and you don't know the culture
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  on the other side of the table, it's really difficult to to, to,
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  to, to bridge that gap. Whilst you understand the
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  culture and you do see the differences, but you also know
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  how to bridge them, then it's working for both.
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  And I think that I realized that quite fast when I was travelling
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  because I was also travelling, travelling a lot for work.
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  And and that made me also more curious to other cultures and
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  more curious to OK, how can we help?
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  Yeah, how can we help the process for being successful
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  from both sides? So you lent in just to pick up
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  on the story. Yeah.
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  So you lent in New Delhi, which is indeed, if the airplane door
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  opens, you end up in a different world, and not only in terms of
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  the people you see and the culture, but also in terms of
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  the smell, in terms of the heat, in terms of.
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  Absolutely. It's, it's, it's triggering all
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  the senses that you have. So your smell, the the, the
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  chaos. We are so used to everything is
• 13:03
  aligned and everything. We have rules for everything.
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  I know when we, we, we were waiting for our luggage and I
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  was looking around and they were like, it was in the middle of
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  the night by then. And, but there were many people
• 13:17
  on the airport as on midday. It's like it's going on for 24
• 13:23
  hours a day there. It's, it's, it's if you land
• 13:27
  around midnight at the Amsterdam airport, it's quiet.
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  But there it's not the same level of noise, same level of
• 13:35
  chaos and everything. And I, I, I turned around and
• 13:39
  there were like papers in the corner of the airport and I was
• 13:42
  like, Oh my God, is that their archive?
• 13:46
  There was like piling up up to the ceiling and like, I think 20
• 13:51
  of these balls. And I was like, Oh my God, but
• 13:53
  what is that? So it's a total different.
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  All your senses are triggered. And, and that's with India, but
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  it's also when I travelled to first time to China, when I
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  travelled to first time to, to Turkey.
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  It doesn't have to be on the other side of the globe, of
• 14:09
  course, but it's, it's being aware of the fact that you're
• 14:13
  stepping into a different, different roles and really aware
• 14:19
  of your role in that and your, your, your presence towards
• 14:24
  others with a different, different background.
• 14:28
  I think that's really helpful to become successful together.
• 14:34
  Yeah. And I think it also takes
• 14:35
  experience, so also a bit of let's say age at least.
• 14:41
  So out of curiosity, how did that journey end because you
• 14:45
  were there send there with you to renew, negotiate prices and
• 14:49
  contracts and all? I was really happy I was because
• 14:56
  I was absolutely junior. I just graduated.
• 14:59
  It was my first position as a product manager, junior product
• 15:03
  manager, and I was really happy. I was there with the team, my
• 15:07
  manager and one of the other product managers and a designer.
• 15:11
  And so I learned a lot from them as well.
• 15:14
  Like, OK, how do you approach the other side of the table, so
• 15:21
  to say? And so I think I I was really
• 15:25
  lucky. I don't know if I would have
• 15:27
  stand my crown if I was travelling all by myself.
• 15:32
  When I was older, I did travel by myself to China and to India
• 15:36
  as well. But then you're more seasoned.
• 15:39
  And to get back to your question like, hey, how is it that
• 15:43
  because you're, you started your company when you were older and
• 15:48
  with more experience in a different markets?
• 15:51
  Yes. But I think that with the
• 15:53
  experience that I had in fashion, both on the desk side
• 15:58
  and the and and being outside, I think that I absolutely brought
• 16:03
  my experience to to grow the business, both my former
• 16:07
  business and this business. Absolutely.
• 16:09
  So let's shift to relocation as it as topic before we start
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  rehive you do relocation outbound and inbound or only
• 16:26
  into the Netherlands? Yeah, only inbound.
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  So we are like a destination service provider.
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  OK. So what are the biggest pitfalls
• 16:36
  for international talent arriving and how do they hurt a
• 16:42
  company that they were are working on?
• 16:44
  I think that the pitfalls for internationals is that they are
• 16:50
  not aware of the fact that we have so many rules here in the
• 16:55
  Netherlands. Secondly, and I think that's the
• 16:58
  most or the biggest burden that we see right now is housing.
• 17:06
  Of course, the when you move to the Netherlands, I think that
• 17:10
  99% starts to rent a place. And then after a certain times
• 17:16
  they decide to buy or to move on or, or whatever.
• 17:22
  And of course they have their, their experience from their
• 17:26
  country of origin or the country that they're living in right
• 17:29
  now. And that's different from from
• 17:33
  the Netherlands. So what we normally do is the
• 17:37
  moment that we get a new international relocation
• 17:42
  initiative through our platform, we set up a first school and we
• 17:47
  go over certain topics like cost of living allocation.
• 17:51
  We need to manage expectations in in in every kind of way, and
• 17:57
  it's all about informing. Not being informed I think is
• 18:01
  the biggest pitfall in relocation management.
• 18:05
  OK, so so talk to me about how people can then inform
• 18:10
  themselves because I let me just do this as a bit naive young
• 18:18
  person. I go to GPT and I ask, what is
• 18:23
  it like to live in the Netherlands?
• 18:26
  What is going wrong then if you do that?
• 18:29
  And what is the problem that you're actually solving for with
• 18:34
  Rehive? Well, I think that that of
• 18:37
  course, for sure you can use AI. And I think that if you have the
• 18:41
  right front, you can come quite far.
• 18:44
  But I think it's still quite generic using AI.
• 18:49
  I think that using a relocation company that is familiar with
• 18:54
  guiding internationals into the Netherlands will bring you much
• 18:59
  more knowledge. For example, we use a platform
• 19:03
  and we have like our full relocation guide on that
• 19:06
  platform telling you all about the different cities, the
• 19:10
  different rent prices, the entire visa process that you are
• 19:14
  going through, what are the steps, what is the timeline.
• 19:17
  I think that and that's different to everyone.
• 19:21
  For example, if you are moving from Spain or Italy to the
• 19:25
  Netherlands or any other European country and you're by
• 19:28
  yourself and it's your first, first position abroad and the
• 19:35
  process is much more lean than moving with a family from, for
• 19:40
  example, South Africa or Brazil. So it really depends on the
• 19:44
  personal situation that a person is in.
• 19:48
  It also the really depends on the company that you're working
• 19:51
  for or going to be working for here in the Netherlands, because
• 19:54
  I truly believe that if you as a company really focus.
• 20:00
  On what I see happening, just I would like to take one step back
• 20:03
  here. What I see happening is that
• 20:06
  when it comes to recruitment and especially these days when we
• 20:10
  are lacking talent in, in, in, in all layers of our society
• 20:15
  these days, unfortunately, we are willing to spend a lot of
• 20:22
  money and time and effort in hiring in the whole recruitment
• 20:28
  process. And if you look at the cost,
• 20:31
  they're relatively high and the candidate is involved, the
• 20:35
  hiring manager is involved, the hiring team is involved.
• 20:39
  So a lot of people are involved in that process and I think that
• 20:44
  for us it's really important to understand like, OK, what is the
• 20:48
  hiring process and what is your onboarding process?
• 20:51
  Because to be honest, we are in the, we are the midsection when
• 20:54
  it comes to international hiring because we are the peace,
• 20:57
  immigration and the relocation part.
• 21:00
  And to understand the entire process on the forefront.
• 21:06
  And when someone is, is is about to land in the company for us,
• 21:11
  that's really important. Secondly to that is that if
• 21:15
  you're willing to to pay that amount of money and to put that
• 21:21
  amount of time and effort in hiring someone, a relocation
• 21:27
  should be part of the cost and compared to the recruitment
• 21:30
  fees, it's it's really less so the return on investment is on,
• 21:35
  on, on, on on a relocation is quite big.
• 21:38
  For example, if you are looking for a certain profile and you're
• 21:42
  only looking in the Netherlands to find the 5,00,000 cheap so to
• 21:47
  say and it's. Yeah, we both have to smile
• 21:52
  because we recognise how this lists with requirements are set
• 21:58
  up. But you're looking for a certain
• 22:02
  profile and there are not enough people here in the Netherlands
• 22:06
  with that profile. You have to, you have to make a
• 22:09
  decision there. You have to choose, are you
• 22:11
  offering someone a really high salary to join your business or
• 22:18
  are you willing to let go on certain requirements which will
• 22:25
  maybe slow down the growth of your business that you're aiming
• 22:28
  for? When looking abroad, the pool of
• 22:32
  talent is much bigger than only with in the Netherlands.
• 22:36
  So that also means that most probably your time to hire when
• 22:42
  looking abroad is much shorter. So taking all these these things
• 22:50
  in account, I think you should take all these things in account
• 22:54
  before deciding to only focus on the Netherlands.
• 22:57
  But it's also the other way around.
• 22:59
  If you are willing to to source and hire from abroad, both
• 23:05
  yourself and your company must be ready for this.
• 23:09
  Especially when when you you have never hired an
• 23:12
  international before. Your company is most probably
• 23:16
  really Dutch focused. So everything.
• 23:19
  Is your angle. There's absolutely a cultural
• 23:23
  angle, but also a operational angle because most probably
• 23:27
  everything is in Dutch. Everything is written in Dutch.
• 23:30
  How do you create a an, an an an an inclusive surrounding for an
• 23:36
  international? Because if you hire an
• 23:39
  international, you want to be successful with that.
• 23:44
  And I think that's really important.
• 23:45
  And that that's, that's absolutely that the best moments
• 23:49
  to step into the conversation with, with a founder or a
• 23:54
  founding team like, hey, but if you want to do this, you need to
• 23:58
  embed that also with the team that's already there.
• 24:01
  Yeah. So actually what I'm hearing you
• 24:04
  say is that currently you're usually let's say only when a
• 24:08
  candidate is hired and is well for lack of a better word has
• 24:13
  already landed on Hippo Airport. Then you pick him up and and
• 24:19
  take that person to find your home etcetera.
• 24:24
  And here you say is actually start considering the relocation
• 24:30
  part before you start hiring that person.
• 24:35
  Yeah, I think I love to put things in numbers at the moment
• 24:41
  that you know that you're hiring a certain profile and that's
• 24:45
  difficult to be found in the Netherlands, especially when you
• 24:48
  are like a start up or scale up and you have like a certain
• 24:55
  profile that you're looking for. It's quite hard to to to compete
• 25:01
  with other companies. And so why would that person
• 25:06
  work for you and not for, for example, booking.com or Google,
• 25:10
  which is like much more like a name on the forefront of for
• 25:14
  most of technology rules. So I think that you as a
• 25:19
  employer, you can add up to the benefits of people by offering
• 25:25
  them, for example, relocation and ask them to to move to the
• 25:30
  Netherlands. OK.
• 25:32
  So, so going back to, to the investment, just as as to, to
• 25:38
  compare, so if I hire someone from abroad, I spent recruitment
• 25:44
  fees that are let's say one year salary that I have to pay to the
• 25:52
  recruiter 6, it's usually six months to a year, I think that
• 25:56
  you pay. How much is it for the
• 25:59
  relocation? I think that it it really
• 26:03
  depends. If I look at our pricing
• 26:05
  structure, we have different prices for people coming from
• 26:09
  the European zone versus people who are coming from outside
• 26:12
  European, the European zone. That all has to do with visa and
• 26:17
  visa application. And we made a difference because
• 26:22
  a single has different needs than a family.
• 26:24
  It's quite simple. So if I look at our services
• 26:30
  that we have divided it into like we have a package and with
• 26:35
  this package we know that we are covering everything from A-Z.
• 26:41
  It's for both the the company and the employee.
• 26:45
  So we cover everything and we make sure that everything is
• 26:49
  done like a month after arriving.
• 26:53
  So the moment that a person starts or just signed the
• 26:58
  employment agreement, we get initiation, initiation from from
• 27:04
  the company, for example, HR, the hiring manager.
• 27:09
  And from that moment we start instantly.
• 27:11
  So if we with a visa, like I said before with the managing
• 27:17
  the expectations define the house search, define if we need
• 27:21
  schooling for kids whatsoever. So the entire, so in the 1st and
• 27:25
  the second call, we create the entire timeline and to make sure
• 27:32
  that we know when to book the flights, that we know when we
• 27:35
  need, for example, temporary rehousing.
• 27:37
  Are we going to book temporary rehousing, yes or no?
• 27:41
  And when will we start the search and housing?
• 27:45
  When do we need to get the BSN done?
• 27:47
  All these kind of things are put in that timeline.
• 27:50
  And so for example, a single coming from the European zone is
• 27:58
  less than 5K and a. Family maybe a month by one
• 28:02
  month, Salary two months. Yeah.
• 28:04
  Well, if you, yeah, Well, if you, if you look at the total
• 28:10
  employer cost of one month of salary, you're already below
• 28:13
  that. So you return an investment, you
• 28:16
  can determine it on 20 to 25 days.
• 28:19
  So if you compare that with a search in the Netherlands for
• 28:25
  six months and you can't find that person, but you can get
• 28:30
  someone from outside the Netherlands within four months,
• 28:36
  you already have your return on investment on relocation within
• 28:39
  the first month of them working here in the Netherlands.
• 28:43
  So and I think that's really that's, that's absolutely a
• 28:46
  benefit for the company of course.
• 28:48
  But at the other hand, you as a company, you also have with that
• 28:54
  a certain rule and responsibility towards the
• 28:58
  international hire. Yeah.
• 29:01
  And let's let's talk, yeah, let's talk about that because
• 29:04
  there there's two layers to it. A that person has to be on
• 29:08
  boarded of course. Do you do you play a role with
• 29:12
  free Hive in that part on any on boarding or is that the company
• 29:16
  and have fun? Well, I find it a really good
• 29:20
  question. It's, it's, it's, it's not
• 29:22
  really black and white in that sense.
• 29:25
  The thing is that when we start talking to a company about visa
• 29:29
  immigration and relocation, we always ask like, OK, how does
• 29:33
  your onboarding program looks like?
• 29:35
  Some companies have a really extensive onboarding.
• 29:38
  Startups are like, they do have an onboarding, but that's really
• 29:41
  more focused on, OK, how can we get you up and running ASAP?
• 29:46
  So based on that and based on the budget that that is
• 29:49
  available, we try to make a program that fits.
• 29:54
  Once the onboarding started, we are still aligned of course,
• 29:57
  because the, for example, someone starts on the 1st of
• 30:00
  December and arrives the last week of November and during the
• 30:08
  whole month of December, we are still part of the process.
• 30:12
  Everything needs to be arranged upon arrival.
• 30:15
  So we try to make that as dense as possible to make sure that
• 30:20
  the international is able to start working and, and focused
• 30:24
  on his new or her new position as soon as possible.
• 30:29
  And that's, that's I think that's absolutely where we bring
• 30:35
  added value. Because Can you imagine I'm
• 30:38
  going to ask you to move to China and you arrive there and
• 30:44
  they have arranged a hotel for you and you have your
• 30:47
  registration, but then you need to find a place to live.
• 30:51
  Then you need to bank account. You need to have your health
• 30:54
  insurances. Yeah, but your focus is not at
• 31:01
  work because there are so many things at the back end that you
• 31:03
  still need to arrange and you have no idea where to start.
• 31:06
  So if you have a relocation manager supporting you in that
• 31:11
  and giving you the opportunity to focus at work and takes away
• 31:15
  that amount of stress, making sure that within a month from
• 31:18
  upon arrival, everything is done, that that that relieves
• 31:24
  you from a lot of stress, enabling you to focus on your
• 31:28
  new position. And that's for also what the
• 31:30
  international wants. Yeah, yeah.
• 31:33
  So it works both ways in terms of benefits, less stress for the
• 31:38
  for the inbound international talent, but also for the company
• 31:43
  you're up and running earlier, so productive earlier.
• 31:47
  Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
• 31:50
  OK, so I just wanted to circle back to culture.
• 31:55
  What are things companies can do to make the culture more
• 31:59
  hospitable? And I don't mean to say that the
• 32:03
  international talent is not welcome, but it's more like I
• 32:06
  remembered a conversation I had with Mathias Vela and he started
• 32:13
  working for Muse in Czech Republic.
• 32:18
  And he said that he had to put his foot down on the fact that
• 32:21
  all office communication was to be in English because he didn't
• 32:25
  speak Czech. And I can imagine that for, for
• 32:30
  let's say, if you have Dutch conversations on the, on the, at
• 32:34
  the lunch table, and I've been there that this happened quite
• 32:40
  quite a few times that you need to ask your, the rest of your
• 32:48
  team to switch. OK, we need to, once Jim or Udet
• 32:54
  is on board, we need to start talking or speaking English at
• 32:59
  lunch because it's simply and, and there's that, that's one
• 33:04
  element of culture. So what can employers, what can
• 33:09
  startup founders do to make the culture more welcoming and more
• 33:15
  inclusive before the talent arrives?
• 33:20
  Two points. I think that when you are a
• 33:24
  startup, especially in technology, I think that most of
• 33:28
  the technology companies are sooner or later depending on
• 33:33
  international talent because certain skills cannot be found
• 33:37
  in the Midlands or they're already internationals living
• 33:41
  here who might be willing to change to change positions and
• 33:46
  jobs. So the sooner you start with
• 33:50
  internationalising your internal organization, the easier it will
• 33:54
  be. But that's the easy and assured
• 33:57
  answer. I think that the moment we start
• 34:02
  looking for international talent, involve your team and
• 34:06
  not only the management team or the hiring manager, but the
• 34:10
  entire team. Have that open conversation,
• 34:14
  what you think about it. And I think a lot of people are
• 34:18
  open to it, but there might also be people that they're like, OK,
• 34:22
  but my English is not that well. So I'm really scared to come
• 34:26
  across with an international. And that's not only at the lunch
• 34:29
  table, but especially in meetings.
• 34:32
  If you ask people to change from Dutch to English for the very
• 34:37
  first time, we are not really happy when we need to change to
• 34:42
  English. I think with the younger
• 34:45
  generations, it's getting better.
• 34:47
  We, we see a lot, a lot of startups and scale UPS already
• 34:50
  internationalizing from a very early moment in time, making it
• 34:54
  easier to grow with an international talent base.
• 34:58
  But if you want a company with like, for example, 50 people,
• 35:01
  only Dutch people, and you add 1 international, that it's really
• 35:07
  difficult to change your internal culture on that.
• 35:11
  And I have an example, to be honest with you, we had a client
• 35:15
  in the eastern part of the country and they were looking
• 35:18
  for quite some new developers to add to their team.
• 35:23
  And eventually that leads to a team of 6 developers from
• 35:28
  abroad. Entire company was Dutch and
• 35:36
  they were only willing to hire people from South Africa because
• 35:39
  of the the countries are quite alike Dutch and South African.
• 35:43
  South African language has Dutch influences in it, of course.
• 35:49
  So they felt like, OK, these, these, this is a culture that
• 35:53
  that fits within our company culture.
• 35:55
  So they thought about it. So, but unfortunately they
• 35:59
  lacked the following step like, OK, how do we get our interval
• 36:03
  internal organization along to speak English?
• 36:08
  And within 12 months they all left.
• 36:11
  So I think that you really need to challenge your team.
• 36:15
  You need to in that play by example.
• 36:19
  So always take the lead role in that.
• 36:24
  So speak English as simple as processes that are put on paper,
• 36:32
  rewrite them in English. So to be to get it more common,
• 36:36
  for example, with rehash people, we started with only Dutch
• 36:41
  speaking. And I know that the first time I
• 36:44
  had to report into the shareholders, I did my
• 36:47
  presentation in English. They were Dutch.
• 36:50
  They were like, why are you doing this in English?
• 36:52
  And I was like, but this is, this is the tone, this is the
• 36:55
  base that I want to set because that fact that I don't have an
• 36:59
  international on board yet doesn't mean I don't want to.
• 37:04
  And that's what I learned from my former company to really
• 37:08
  start doing that from the beginning.
• 37:12
  It really sets the tone and it really helps you to get everyone
• 37:17
  involved alongside with you. I started hiring internationally
• 37:22
  and I'm really happy that our our daily speaking language is
• 37:27
  is English whilst we are it's 4 Dutchies and one not native
• 37:31
  Dutch. Yeah, it makes it makes life a
• 37:34
  lot easier indeed if you have all the processes already in
• 37:37
  English and if you make it about or are able to, to have also the
• 37:43
  communication, the office communication in English.
• 37:47
  Because going back to your your example of the company in the
• 37:51
  east of the Netherlands that's they made a huge investment in
• 37:56
  hiring these people and getting them over and then to see them
• 38:00
  go within 12 months. Yeah, but that's that's and
• 38:04
  that's that, that's difficult because that's like outside my
• 38:08
  circle of influence when people start and we have finished the
• 38:12
  relocation and everything is settled.
• 38:15
  Of course we stay in touch with the international high, but it's
• 38:18
  mainly on like, OK, how are you coping with living in the
• 38:22
  Netherlands, the changing weather?
• 38:24
  How are the the kids doing at school?
• 38:25
  So that's really on a personal side, but I cannot influence the
• 38:32
  internal organization. I can advise them, but it's up
• 38:35
  to them to decide how they want to get along with that.
• 38:39
  If you're not willing to change your internal language from
• 38:43
  Dutch to English, if you're not open to internationalize your
• 38:47
  internal organization, then I would not recommend to hire
• 38:51
  internationally. How do you find out if your
• 38:54
  culture is ready for this? By having the conversations and
• 38:57
  not only with with yourself or with a partner, because I love
• 39:03
  to be that partner. What we see happening, for
• 39:06
  example, is that a lot of companies, especially if you
• 39:10
  read like empty sprouts and and leads in like, yeah, we have
• 39:13
  another investment, but that investment is to grow.
• 39:17
  So, and part of the grow growth still despite AI is still we
• 39:24
  grow with people, our business grows and thrives with people.
• 39:29
  So if you are not able to make the following step in in in
• 39:34
  growing your team, for example, like only sourcing in the
• 39:37
  Netherlands, then you cannot hit the growth that you are aiming
• 39:41
  for together with your investors because you have made a
• 39:45
  forecast. If I have this money, I can grow
• 39:47
  into this direction. That's for me and the right
• 39:51
  moment to step in because the moment that they are asking for
• 39:55
  money and asking for an investment, it's really that's
• 39:59
  the right moment to drill down. OK.
• 40:01
  How are you growing your talent? What are you exactly going to
• 40:05
  do? Because if you have the money
• 40:07
  and you come to the conclusion like, hey, I can't find the
• 40:10
  people here, I need to get them from abroad, but I don't have
• 40:13
  budget set aside for that, then it's going to be a whole
• 40:18
  different question and you have to go back to your investors.
• 40:22
  Yeah. So what I'm hearing you say is
• 40:25
  that if you think about this and if you're thinking about raising
• 40:28
  funds, you also have to factor in, let's say cost of
• 40:32
  relocation. Cost of that is of course if
• 40:36
  you're planning to hire international talent, also
• 40:40
  factor in all these cultural changes that you have to go
• 40:46
  through, which will maybe slow down growth by themselves.
• 40:52
  What we did in the past was that we had a amazing business coach.
• 40:59
  She was really good in process mapping, but she was also really
• 41:04
  good in looking at people and, and see their role within the
• 41:10
  team. And she used the rocking genius.
• 41:17
  And I'm really a big fan of that because it shows six types of
• 41:23
  yeah, six types of character, so to say.
• 41:26
  And everyone has these 6 character, these types in
• 41:29
  themselves. And in one you are a genius and
• 41:33
  in one or in two you are a genius.
• 41:37
  In two you thrive. It's giving you energy, but it's
• 41:42
  not it's not really lacking energy.
• 41:45
  And in two, you are really lacking energy.
• 41:47
  If if, if they ask you to do a certain thing within that, that
• 41:51
  section of your type, then you're like, Oh my God, here we
• 41:54
  go again. I don't want to do this.
• 41:58
  Yeah, it's like an energy drain. Well, for you, it's admin.
• 42:01
  For me, it's it's something different.
• 42:05
  But by by going through that entire process with your team,
• 42:10
  imagine we were with, I think about 25 or 28 people.
• 42:16
  I think about 18 or 19 different country of origins.
• 42:20
  Out of total, there were only four people from the Netherlands
• 42:23
  and the rest were from all different cultures, different
• 42:25
  background. And to go through that process
• 42:30
  together is really helping to, to see, OK, you're good at this.
• 42:37
  And that's my for me that, that that's my drainer.
• 42:42
  But I see you're really good at this.
• 42:44
  So then you can position people and create that whole team.
• 42:49
  And by doing that together with specifically this, this coach
• 42:54
  for Jessica, we really got the teams together and we really got
• 43:00
  everyone to understand, OK, this is my position within the team.
• 43:05
  And to make people more thriving in their in their specific role,
• 43:10
  maybe even changing their job spec based on what we have
• 43:15
  learnt from the working genius assessment and also looking
• 43:21
  like, OK, these are the type of people we have in the team now.
• 43:25
  What are we lacking? What do we put in the team to
• 43:28
  get a complete perspective within one team?
• 43:33
  Yeah, that's usually as as a gap analysis these type of tools is
• 43:37
  like really good because you indeed to your point get a sense
• 43:41
  of our people playing to work to their strengths and do we miss
• 43:47
  any capabilities. Which makes.
• 43:51
  The focus of hiring then also and subsequently maybe
• 43:55
  relocation and also more, let's say, quote UN quote easy because
• 43:59
  you know what person, what type of person you're looking for.
• 44:03
  Not necessarily the the capabilities that person needs
• 44:06
  to have, but more like you always need a bit of a in, in
• 44:13
  founder teams. You need to hacker the hustler
• 44:15
  and the hipster. Yeah, but you you need to have
• 44:20
  more. You need to have the
• 44:22
  combination. If you have like hipsters or
• 44:25
  three hackers, then it, it's not working.
• 44:28
  You need to have that combination.
• 44:30
  And I think that's really important to, when I joined, we
• 44:34
  have people. The first thing I did with the
• 44:36
  team was the, the working genius assessment.
• 44:40
  And to have that conversation about that, like, OK, who is
• 44:44
  within, within the entire spectrum, who is where?
• 44:47
  Because it's giving you so much insight and it's, it's, it's,
• 44:51
  it's going over cultural differences.
• 44:56
  I want to shift a bit before we do that, just touchback on
• 45:00
  housing because you mentioned housing is a big issue in the
• 45:03
  Netherlands. So is there any realistic advice
• 45:08
  that you can give companies or talent when it comes to setting
• 45:13
  expectation on on housing in particular?
• 45:17
  The search is much more intense versus two or three years ago
• 45:22
  running off. Yesterday I had a conversation
• 45:24
  with one of my colleagues and I was like, back in the days, we
• 45:27
  got called by Realtors like, hey, I have a really nice
• 45:30
  apartment. Do you have someone who can see
• 45:33
  this? Well, you can't imagine that
• 45:34
  anymore in this time of this time that we are in.
• 45:37
  So since July 2024, a whole legislation around renting out
• 45:43
  apartments has been changed dramatically, I can say.
• 45:49
  So we start as soon as we can with a housing search to have
• 45:53
  enough time. We use AI for our search because
• 46:00
  it's it's so intense to do everything by hand and head on a
• 46:07
  search. So we have different AI tooling,
• 46:11
  scraping websites of Realtors, scraping websites like Kunda
• 46:16
  area to really have like the first option to apply, make sure
• 46:25
  you have all your information ready because Realtors already
• 46:29
  ask on the forefront a lot of information from you to judge if
• 46:35
  you are capable of renting the place.
• 46:38
  If I look for employers, be aware that if you have like a
• 46:42
  really entry level position with corresponding salary, it might
• 46:50
  be very difficult for the international to find housing.
• 46:55
  If you look at the at the price brackets within, within the
• 46:59
  rentals between €1200 and €2000, it's really difficult.
• 47:07
  I find it really hard to say because I know it's a lot of
• 47:10
  money and you need to earn 3 times the rent based on your
• 47:14
  gross salary. So for example, if you rent a
• 47:17
  place of 2K, you need to earn gross 6K.
• 47:23
  That's a lot of money. But that's what we are facing.
• 47:27
  So I'm really happy with with our clients if they have the
• 47:31
  intention to offer a a job to an international, they check in
• 47:36
  with us. OK, this is what we want to
• 47:39
  offer. This is the this, this is the
• 47:42
  position. What do you think if you are an
• 47:46
  international and you're moving with your family and you are
• 47:52
  earning the minimum thresholds for this year above 30, that's
• 47:58
  6588 year rounds, but you're moving with a wife and three
• 48:03
  kids and, and and or with a husband and three kids and your
• 48:08
  spouse will be will stay at home for the kids at least for the
• 48:13
  first year, then it's really challenging to to find a rental
• 48:21
  with for example, 3 or 4 bedrooms within.
• 48:24
  In that price range that good luck that these Milton Amsterdam
• 48:28
  were Rotterdam in the city centre anywhere.
• 48:32
  Not even in the South of the country.
• 48:36
  Price prices are going up rapidly nationwide.
• 48:41
  So of course the, I think the onset is the most difficult
• 48:44
  part, but it's, it's, it's also spreading towards the other
• 48:47
  parts of the country. Also to to let's say Eindhoven
• 48:50
  that area and ends today. Wow, that that I didn't know.
• 48:57
  I have to say so far we managed. But if I being honest about that
• 49:04
  as well, the amount of time spent foreign housing search,
• 49:08
  doing viewings, the amount of viewings, we spent much more
• 49:11
  time and we have to do much more to, yeah, to really conduct a
• 49:18
  house for an international. Sometimes we even have like
• 49:23
  applied, we had one case we applied I think for 300
• 49:26
  properties, we did 4 viewings. So also the ratio between the
• 49:33
  application and the amount of viewings you have is, is it's
• 49:36
  totally different versus a few years ago.
• 49:40
  So you have to put much more effort into it.
• 49:42
  OK. So we talked about a negative
• 49:47
  case, the company in the east of the Netherlands that hired a
• 49:51
  bunch of South African developers that left within a
• 49:54
  year. Can you share a success story
• 49:57
  where actually you got to effectively relocate people and
• 50:04
  they both quote UN quote lived happily ever after?
• 50:09
  Yeah, luckily, absolutely. But luckily we have more
• 50:13
  positive stories than the negative ones.
• 50:16
  I think last year it was a really, it was a relocation that
• 50:21
  I did personally because I got approached by a friend of mine
• 50:29
  and he was like, yeah, I'm working for a company.
• 50:31
  They are moving the headquarters from Italy to the Netherlands
• 50:35
  and we have a CHRO that needs to move.
• 50:40
  So I got in touch with him and his wife.
• 50:42
  There were in their mid late 50s already have been living in Rome
• 50:48
  their entire life and they were not really keen on moving to the
• 50:53
  Netherlands, so to say. Not because of the work and not
• 50:58
  because of the Dutch culture, but they were like we, we have,
• 51:01
  we have set our roots in, in, in, in, in Italy.
• 51:05
  So the first time I got in touch with them, they were still quite
• 51:08
  positive and they came over for a few days to the Netherlands to
• 51:13
  do some viewings and get to know the area.
• 51:18
  Because they when they arrived for that four day trip, they
• 51:23
  were convinced that they really wanted to live in the city
• 51:25
  centre of Amsterdam. That's not where they ended up.
• 51:30
  They ended up in in the suburb area of Harlem.
• 51:35
  And we were meeting the first time and I felt instantly like,
• 51:41
  OK, these people, this is not really, I won't, I won't say it
• 51:46
  wasn't their choice, but they were really hesitant about
• 51:50
  moving to the Netherlands. And so that means that with this
• 51:56
  couple, I really took them by the hand.
• 51:59
  That's not always necessary, but in this case it was.
• 52:03
  I really took them by the hand, which means that on viewings, on
• 52:08
  registration, booking their flights, finding houses, I
• 52:12
  joined all the viewings together with them.
• 52:15
  We always join all the viewings by the way, but this was really
• 52:19
  like, I picked them up from where they were staying and,
• 52:22
  and, and, and took them to the houses really every step of the
• 52:26
  way from opening a bank account to settle the utilities,
• 52:33
  everything we did together, because that was, that was what
• 52:36
  they needed. So with that, it was really
• 52:39
  important for them to, to feel safe and, and, and understood by
• 52:46
  me. Like, OK, we, there are so many
• 52:49
  things we need. We don't know, we need help with
• 52:54
  that. Whilst on the other side we also
• 52:56
  have relocations of people like OK, but I really want to do this
• 52:59
  part myself. So we constantly balance like
• 53:03
  OK, what is needed and what can we help with first is what do
• 53:09
  they want to do themselves? And to come back to the to this
• 53:13
  couple, they're really happy with the move now.
• 53:17
  So at first they were hesitant and they rather not, but we have
• 53:25
  to move because the headquarter is moving.
• 53:27
  So we have to move along so that that they fully understood that
• 53:31
  that had to happen. But yeah, now to hear.
• 53:34
  Understanding that cognitively and then also emotionally being
• 53:38
  able to execute on it. Aside from the coffee aspects,
• 53:43
  which I will not talk about now, quality of the coffee in the
• 53:47
  Netherlands compared to Italy, yeah, that's quite a big step.
• 53:51
  So I can understand that they were like, really, OK, do we
• 53:55
  really have to do this? Yeah, absolutely.
• 53:57
  And then knowing that they, they, they love living in the
• 54:03
  Netherlands now and that they're really happy that they moved.
• 54:07
  And they go back and forth, of course, to, to visit their
• 54:10
  family because within that culture, family is like the,
• 54:13
  that's, that's, that's the biggest base that you have
• 54:16
  there. So that's really important to
• 54:20
  them. But the fact that they, they can
• 54:23
  actually say now like, we're really happy that we took this
• 54:26
  step and we love living in the Netherlands and we learn a lot
• 54:30
  by living abroad and that this is like a big adventure to us.
• 54:35
  So to create that positive flip together with them.
• 54:39
  Yeah, that's that's that's really, that's absolutely the
• 54:41
  reason why I start doing this. Yeah, that's beautiful.
• 54:46
  That is absolutely beautiful. So I want to move to a bit of
• 54:50
  the the practical tips and tricks that come with
• 54:55
  relocating. So we we already talk talked
• 54:59
  about start-ups that want to hire their first international
• 55:04
  employees. So can you share free steps that
• 55:08
  they have to take maybe even before they draft up a job pad?
• 55:14
  So I'm a founder, I need to grow thinking about international
• 55:19
  talents, probably developer. That's the most, let's say
• 55:23
  common example we we can imagine.
• 55:25
  I think it all starts with research.
• 55:28
  What does it mean to hire from abroad in a in a practical
• 55:33
  sense? So am I hiring from the EU or do
• 55:38
  I want to hire also from outside the EU?
• 55:40
  Where's the talent located? For example, if that means that
• 55:43
  you need to hire from South America, you need to be a
• 55:46
  recognized sponsor with the Ind. And to become a recognized
• 55:50
  sponsor you you need to fulfill certain requirements.
• 55:54
  So we also support companies with becoming a recognized
• 55:58
  sponsor. Sometimes that means that it can
• 56:00
  take up to six to nine months to become a recognized sponsor, for
• 56:04
  example. Before that sort of precedes,
• 56:07
  before you can hire, start hiring people.
• 56:10
  Yeah, exactly. So normally a becoming a
• 56:15
  recognized sponsor takes up to 90 days and sometimes the I&D
• 56:21
  decides that they need another 90 days to come to a conclusion.
• 56:25
  And especially when it comes to technology, technology startups
• 56:31
  and even scale UPS, they need to have a lot of investment before
• 56:35
  they even have their proof of concept of proof products.
• 56:41
  And then they have to start earning the money and they have
• 56:45
  to start earning more money to even become profitable.
• 56:50
  And the Ind, the reason why the Ind wants you to become a
• 56:54
  recognized sponsor is to make sure that you are able to
• 56:58
  provide your international hire with for long term with their
• 57:01
  salary. And the moment that they,
• 57:07
  they're not sure that you are able to do so or give you a
• 57:12
  negative advice. But 9 out of 10 times,
• 57:15
  especially when it comes to younger companies, they involve
• 57:20
  the RVO. That means that the RVO needs to
• 57:23
  do an additional investigation. That means that you have to come
• 57:27
  with a business plan with a forecast for a few years from
• 57:30
  now. How are you going to grow?
• 57:32
  Are you going to get another investment round?
• 57:34
  How does that look like? Just they just want to make sure
• 57:38
  that you're capable of paying the salary to your people, to
• 57:43
  your entire talent pool, but mainly for your international
• 57:47
  hires. So if you want to start hiring
• 57:51
  internationally, the first question that I would ask you
• 57:54
  like, OK, are you capable of finding these people within the
• 57:58
  EU, so with an EU passport? Or do we need to go further than
• 58:04
  that? If you need to go further than
• 58:07
  that and you are not a recognized sponsor yet, of
• 58:09
  course, you can also use an employer of record who is a
• 58:13
  recognized sponsor. That's also a way.
• 58:15
  But that's in the end quite costly.
• 58:18
  It's like, it could be like an in between, in between solution
• 58:22
  while you're waiting to become a record sponsor to join, join an
• 58:26
  ER solution to bridge that period of time.
• 58:31
  So that's the first. I would not wait until you have
• 58:35
  a candidate you like to hire and then, oh, we're not a recognised
• 58:38
  sponsor. As soon as you are able to, to,
• 58:42
  to apply for that sponsorship, I would definitely do that.
• 58:47
  The second question is, is like, OK, what does it mean?
• 58:50
  Because we have talked about the language barrier, but it's also,
• 58:55
  and I think that's even more more complicated, the cultural
• 58:58
  barrier. What kind of type of culture
• 59:02
  fits your organization? Are you willing as a
• 59:04
  organization to, to pivot your organization for certain
• 59:09
  cultures? Like I said before, someone from
• 59:14
  from the European zone, from the Nordics is different than from
• 59:17
  the South of the European zone already.
• 59:19
  So that's already something you have to keep in mind.
• 59:22
  You have to assess it with yourself.
• 59:23
  Like, OK, do I have the time, the room and the availability
• 59:27
  within my team to onboard an international to grow our
• 59:34
  business? I think that's that that's a
• 59:37
  really important question to raise to yourself.
• 59:39
  Yeah. So do you recommend that
• 59:42
  organizations maybe not hire one international talent, the 2, so
• 59:48
  they're sort of a buddy to to talk to each other and also to
• 59:53
  have have more more, let's say more ability to influence the
• 59:58
  culture because 1 is only one and then it can be me.
• 1:00:02
  Whereas if it's two, they can at least talk to each other and
• 1:00:05
  maybe share and voice also better.
• 1:00:09
  I think yes, of course, I think that that's that's better.
• 1:00:13
  On the other, on the flip side of that is that if you hire two
• 1:00:18
  people from from abroad, for example, you'll hire two people
• 1:00:23
  from abroad and you already have a team of 10, you create a
• 1:00:26
  group. So you need to get them, you
• 1:00:29
  need to get them integrated. So it's really, it's great for
• 1:00:33
  them that they have a person beside them that has the same
• 1:00:37
  experience. Absolutely on that.
• 1:00:40
  But the next step is how do you integrate that?
• 1:00:44
  For example, it can be really give them a Dutch buddy that
• 1:00:47
  shows them around, tells about Dutch culture, Dutch habits, the
• 1:00:52
  company itself, their specific role within that company.
• 1:00:56
  Because you need to, because otherwise you're creating
• 1:00:59
  groups. You need to blend them to be.
• 1:01:01
  Able to? Ultimately yes, but the first
• 1:01:03
  step is to to at least have to give an international hire
• 1:01:08
  someone to talk to who also can empathise.
• 1:01:12
  I agree on that up to a certain level.
• 1:01:14
  I think that you're for example, we are with five and one of them
• 1:01:19
  is international, not from, from, from the Netherlands.
• 1:01:26
  So it's up to the other four to make, make him land in and blend
• 1:01:32
  in and support him. That's that, that's a certain
• 1:01:35
  awareness that you need to create.
• 1:01:38
  And I, I'm very lucky with the fact that I have a team that's
• 1:01:44
  already aware of that. If you have a team who's not
• 1:01:48
  aware of that, you need to create that awareness and you
• 1:01:51
  have a pinpoint to each other. If we are, for example, we are
• 1:01:54
  at the Lynch table with the five of us, of which four are
• 1:01:58
  speaking Dutch, it might happen it it also happens to me that I
• 1:02:03
  start the conversation in Dutch and then one of my colleagues
• 1:02:07
  would say like, hey, let's. Keep it to English, yeah?
• 1:02:11
  Keep that inclusiveness with each other.
• 1:02:13
  So you need to hold each other to account.
• 1:02:17
  Absolutely, Absolutely. OK.
• 1:02:20
  So you talked about the status you need to have if with the
• 1:02:23
  Ind, so the immigration service in the Netherlands before you
• 1:02:29
  can actually hire people from outside the EU.
• 1:02:34
  That comes at a cost, of course. So what can investors then do to
• 1:02:40
  support founders and maybe also a talent in?
• 1:02:43
  I think that, I think that an investor who is experienced with
• 1:02:48
  investing in companies with an international talent pool, they
• 1:02:53
  are aware of the fact like, hey, if you want to grow with
• 1:02:55
  international talent, there are certain steps to be taken.
• 1:03:01
  So the moment you start talking about as a funding team, like
• 1:03:05
  OK, we want to do or we need to have another ground to have our
• 1:03:09
  growth dive into that whole talent aspect.
• 1:03:14
  So you have your forecast, so you have your revenue, you have
• 1:03:17
  the cost of revenue. That's all to be predicted.
• 1:03:20
  But also your talent part and your people part within your PNL
• 1:03:25
  can be predicted. And if you grow, if you need to
• 1:03:30
  grow with 10 profiles within the technology domain of which you
• 1:03:34
  know that there are, we are lacking those people already in
• 1:03:38
  the Netherlands. Take an account that you need to
• 1:03:41
  hire from abroad because then your your, your investment ask
• 1:03:49
  might be higher, but you're able to start looking for these
• 1:03:54
  people from abroad and bring them in and grow your business.
• 1:03:58
  Because if you're lacking these specific profiles in your
• 1:04:01
  company, you can't get to that role.
• 1:04:05
  You can't get to that role. So, and then last question on
• 1:04:09
  this is what can, what is one question, let's say that
• 1:04:15
  international candidates should research before they accept the
• 1:04:20
  job in the Netherlands. So of course they look at the
• 1:04:24
  job requirements and they do a little search on on on Google
• 1:04:29
  where where an AI agent of sorts.
• 1:04:34
  What is prompt? The prompt?
• 1:04:37
  OK, good one. I'm going to try to make it as
• 1:04:41
  dense as possible. I think of course, it really
• 1:04:45
  depends on where you're coming from.
• 1:04:49
  The best is to travel to the Netherlands and we have one
• 1:04:54
  client and they invite every international to the Netherlands
• 1:04:59
  for at least five days for the final interview round, their
• 1:05:01
  final assessment, but also to take them around in the
• 1:05:04
  Netherlands. So they have a little bit of an
• 1:05:07
  idea where they're going and if they want to go there, yes or
• 1:05:11
  no. Because of course it's always a
• 1:05:12
  two way St. in that sense. And I think the prompts should
• 1:05:16
  be like make a comparison about the cultural background I have
• 1:05:21
  coming from land X. ABC.
• 1:05:25
  Yeah, ABC moving towards the Netherlands, how does the cost
• 1:05:30
  of living allocation look like that's different for every
• 1:05:33
  country? What may I expect in terms of
• 1:05:39
  norms and values? What may I expect of cultural
• 1:05:42
  differences and what I see happening with a lot of
• 1:05:48
  internationals? They have their, I think 9 out
• 1:05:53
  of 10 times they have like a little or not so little set back
• 1:05:57
  after six to nine months because they have a certain purpose to
• 1:06:02
  move to the Netherlands. They have a certain expectation
• 1:06:06
  from the Netherlands, from their position, from the company that
• 1:06:09
  they're working in. And at some point they come to
• 1:06:12
  the to the realization like is it still matching up to the
• 1:06:16
  expectations that I had? And I think that's a really
• 1:06:20
  important moment in time for both the international and the
• 1:06:25
  employer to see, OK, what do we need still need to bridge here
• 1:06:30
  to maintain you within the company in the Netherlands and
• 1:06:34
  for you to actually be actually be happy and to thrive.
• 1:06:37
  I think that if you talk to other internationals for if you
• 1:06:42
  are in your interview phase and there are more internationals
• 1:06:47
  working for that company, ask if you may speak to them like, OK,
• 1:06:50
  what is your experience? What, what were the pitfalls
• 1:06:56
  that you didn't think of and that you almost or that you
• 1:07:01
  stepped into? There are.
• 1:07:02
  And yeah, now it's a bit like when he tells, but on, for
• 1:07:07
  example, Facebook, there are a lot of expat groups for every
• 1:07:12
  major or minor city, there are expat groups.
• 1:07:15
  Try to connect with people not even or not specifically from
• 1:07:20
  your own cultural background, but try to connect with people
• 1:07:23
  from different cultural backgrounds.
• 1:07:25
  There are even living in the Netherlands or in a certain
• 1:07:28
  area, what are the expectations? For example, if you move with a
• 1:07:33
  family, how are their schools like?
• 1:07:35
  Are you selecting an International School or a
• 1:07:38
  regular school? What are your intentions?
• 1:07:41
  Are you going to stay for the long run or only for a year?
• 1:07:44
  So there are a lot of questions to be answered and I think one
• 1:07:49
  of the benefits is when working with a relocation partner re
• 1:07:53
  raise those questions. What are your expectations?
• 1:07:57
  Can we manage them? Can we, can we, can we match
• 1:08:02
  them? And if not, how should we manage
• 1:08:04
  to match them as much as possible?
• 1:08:07
  Because in the infra, our main goal is that we have a happy
• 1:08:12
  company because they hired an international and it's going
• 1:08:15
  well, and that we have a happy international who has landed
• 1:08:19
  softly into the Netherlands with our help.
• 1:08:22
  So we have two parties to to support.
• 1:08:26
  And yeah, we take that very seriously, but it's also the
• 1:08:29
  greatest thing to do. It absolutely is.
• 1:08:31
  And if you can make two people happy or two, yeah, two people
• 1:08:35
  happy, that's the fun. Exactly.
• 1:08:39
  Exactly. So looking forward because we we
• 1:08:44
  talked about past a bit about what people can do when they are
• 1:08:47
  relocating both from an investor point of view, from a company
• 1:08:52
  point of view and an international talent point of
• 1:08:55
  view. How do you see Talent, mobility
• 1:08:58
  and rehive go moving forward in the next 5 to 10 years?
• 1:09:04
  Well, I wish I had liked the club team.
• 1:09:07
  Yeah, the crystal ball to, to, to look in and to to answer this
• 1:09:10
  question. I think if I look at the past
• 1:09:14
  five years, relocation management really took a really
• 1:09:18
  high leap in, in, in in the Netherlands, but also the remote
• 1:09:25
  working took a really big leap. So I think there will be that
• 1:09:30
  will be balanced out. On one hand you see that a lot
• 1:09:33
  of companies are aiming to get people back into the offices as
• 1:09:37
  much as possible. Opposite of that we see people
• 1:09:43
  that just want to be more free in that sense and and work
• 1:09:46
  remote from wherever they want to be and live.
• 1:09:50
  So I think there will be absolutely a balance to come.
• 1:09:55
  Now what I see happening for example with companies who are
• 1:09:58
  considering relocation but already have like talent abroad.
• 1:10:02
  They might choose for a local EOR to work with for example.
• 1:10:07
  And what? What does EOR choose?
• 1:10:09
  Employer of records, Employer of records.
• 1:10:12
  So for example, remote and deal that are global Eors that have
• 1:10:19
  certain entities in certain companies or a certain
• 1:10:22
  countries, I have to say then they take those people onto
• 1:10:27
  their payroll and and invoice that to their clients globally.
• 1:10:31
  The story, what really what I find quite exciting is that AI
• 1:10:39
  is here to stay and I absolutely do believe in AI.
• 1:10:44
  There are a few things that that we need to absolutely improve in
• 1:10:47
  AI. The thing is that we started
• 1:10:51
  working with AI at the beginning of of the the start of we have
• 1:10:55
  people, we used it for the housing search, but also for our
• 1:11:00
  platform. The thing is that by using AI,
• 1:11:04
  we can create very lean and agile processes, giving us the
• 1:11:09
  opportunity to spend more time with the people.
• 1:11:13
  Because relocating to a country is like it's, it's, it's an
• 1:11:17
  adventure, but it can also be very daunting for people.
• 1:11:21
  If you have never left your own country and you have to move
• 1:11:25
  across the world alone or your partner and, and, and, and maybe
• 1:11:31
  even a family, you need to have that personal touch.
• 1:11:35
  I absolutely believe in that, that every reload and for me in
• 1:11:39
  that sense, every relocation is different because the need is
• 1:11:44
  different. Their, their personal status of
• 1:11:46
  mind is different. So we need to support them in a
• 1:11:50
  personal manner. You cannot do that 100% with AI.
• 1:11:54
  I don't believe in that. That's not that's not the reason
• 1:11:58
  why I started working in relocation management.
• 1:12:01
  I absolutely believe in a personal sense in that sense.
• 1:12:05
  But you can take it a step further, if I hear you
• 1:12:08
  correctly, like AI is taking away of a lot of let's say the
• 1:12:14
  menial jobs or the administration type of tasks.
• 1:12:20
  And that frees up time for managers and for for people to
• 1:12:25
  have more conversations and more connection with each other and
• 1:12:30
  by extension also with the international talents coming in.
• 1:12:34
  Yeah, exactly. So to me, I think that's really
• 1:12:37
  the upside of using AI for us. Yeah.
• 1:12:41
  Creating time. Yeah.
• 1:12:45
  OK. So on AI, I'm building an AI
• 1:12:49
  tool with women disrupting tech. It's a tool that connects female
• 1:12:53
  founders and investors to bridge the funding gap and it uses AI.
• 1:12:58
  From your perspective, what's the most important ingredient
• 1:13:01
  that we that I need to have to a support female founders but not
• 1:13:08
  replicate the biases that we have currently?
• 1:13:11
  Thought about that when preparing for this podcast and I
• 1:13:16
  think that if you look at a global perspective, but also in
• 1:13:22
  in in within the Netherlands itself, there are a few things
• 1:13:26
  going on. For example, the gender pay gap
• 1:13:29
  is it's, it's growing and there are a few things that are
• 1:13:34
  moving, to be honest with you, for me back in time, and I think
• 1:13:39
  that beginning of this decade, we saw a great moving forward in
• 1:13:47
  diversity, equity and inclusion. And that somehow it's going
• 1:13:52
  because of the, the, the, the changes that we have nationwide,
• 1:13:56
  but also worldwide on a political level, but also within
• 1:13:59
  the company level. And I think in that sense that
• 1:14:03
  the, the situation is hardening on, on, on, on women.
• 1:14:07
  I think it's so important what you're doing.
• 1:14:09
  You're an ally and to give them their voice and to have them
• 1:14:17
  being able to share their stories and put it out there.
• 1:14:23
  If you look at it in in investments these days, less
• 1:14:26
  investments are going to women instead of more investments.
• 1:14:30
  But that doesn't mean that women's women are not worth the
• 1:14:34
  investment. And I think by showing, showing
• 1:14:42
  that part of the specific part of the ecosystem, showing that
• 1:14:48
  there are so many talented women out there that need that
• 1:14:53
  investment and to create a stage for them, I think that's,
• 1:14:58
  that's, that's please keep doing that.
• 1:15:01
  But because we because we need it.
• 1:15:04
  But I think in the coming, in the coming years and maybe even
• 1:15:07
  in the coming decades, we need that even more.
• 1:15:09
  So we need those male allies to to support and I think also
• 1:15:17
  between women, we must create more and more allyship together
• 1:15:21
  to grow. Is that not enough?
• 1:15:23
  Not happening enough? You think that women support
• 1:15:26
  women? Yes and no.
• 1:15:28
  I think that if you compare it with like 10 to 15 years ago,
• 1:15:33
  it's it's already much better. But I think it should be even
• 1:15:36
  better. Like for example, if I look at
• 1:15:39
  my children that somehow they still have the bias that their
• 1:15:46
  their, their, their first response to something that they
• 1:15:49
  want to do is like, but yeah, I don't think I can, I can do this
• 1:15:53
  because I never did it. And that's there, there's a bias
• 1:15:58
  between already with young children, between a boy and a
• 1:16:04
  girl. And I think that we absolutely
• 1:16:08
  need to change that. And I would love to change that.
• 1:16:13
  The moment that I started my first, my first business, I have
• 1:16:19
  three young girls and they, they saw me thriving at the business
• 1:16:26
  and they, they had no idea what, what I was doing, but they were
• 1:16:30
  really proud because they were like, OK, mom is doing very well
• 1:16:33
  and, and so you can do whatever you want.
• 1:16:38
  I changed from fashion to relocation management.
• 1:16:42
  I did that doing during my third pregnancy, I decided to make
• 1:16:46
  that change and I started to, to teach myself, but also learn
• 1:16:51
  from others within the domain. What does that mean and what is
• 1:16:55
  my place in that? And I think that's really
• 1:16:58
  important to start on a small level, but also take all the
• 1:17:01
  steps that are in between. And I think, yes, I think women
• 1:17:07
  are more an ally to each other than 10 years ago.
• 1:17:11
  But I think we can do it better. OK, sounds like a great place to
• 1:17:16
  close. Thank you so much.
• 1:17:19
  You did thank you very much for this interview, really
• 1:17:23
  appreciate it. If people want to connect with
• 1:17:25
  you, learn more about Rehive and services you're offering, where
• 1:17:30
  would you like to send them? Of course, LinkedIn, check my
• 1:17:34
  profile on LinkedIn, also the company profiles.
• 1:17:37
  Of course at linkedinand@realpeople.com.
• 1:17:41
  You'll find the website with more information and also a
• 1:17:45
  connect form to get in touch with me or the rest of the team
• 1:17:49
  because I'm not doing it all by myself.
• 1:17:51
  We have a great team with us. And yeah, feel free to reach out
• 1:17:56
  to me. I love to have a conversation
• 1:17:59
  and increasing my network and learn from others.
• 1:18:03
  Cool, and we'll include those links in the show notes.
• 1:18:06
  So you did a good thing. Thank you very much for the
• 1:18:09
  interview, listeners. Thank you very much for
• 1:18:12
  listening. And as always, until the next
• 1:18:15
  episode, keep being awesome. Well, that's it.
• 1:18:22
  Thank you for listening to episode 137 of Women Disrupting
• 1:18:26
  Tech titled The ROI. Of.
• 1:18:29
  Relocation scaling global teams without attrition with you did.
• 1:18:35
  If you want to connect with you DID or learn more about your
• 1:18:38
  work at Rehive People, please use the links in the show notes.
• 1:18:42
  As usual, you can find the show notes at Women Disrupting Tech
• 1:18:45
  Talk blog. Find a link in the caption.
• 1:18:49
  If you found this episode useful, please take a moment to
• 1:18:52
  rate and review the show on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or
• 1:18:56
  YouTube. And if you haven't already,
• 1:18:58
  please hit the subscribe button so you never miss a future
• 1:19:01
  episode. Once again, thank you for
• 1:19:04
  listening. I hope to see you in the next
• 1:19:06
  episode. And until then, as always, keep
• 1:19:09
  being awesome.