Together Abroad had the privilege of speaking with Kirsten Jansen - van den Broek who is currently the Communication Manager at Undutchables Recruitment Agency.

• Hello, Kirsten welcome and thank you for coming. Can you please tell us a bit about yourself and your professional background?
I started my career in Recruitment in 2006. In 2009, I changed jobs to my current company which is Undutchables Recruitment Agency. About two years ago, I was offered the job of Communication Manager for the whole of Undutchables. I find that it is a great match with my personal background as I am Dutch but also the daughter of an Expat and I know how it feels to move to a new country and can relate with the challenges of settling down and finding your feet in a new job market.
I have worked with Undutchables for over 5 and a half years and it has been a wonderful and fulfilling journey for me. I am passionate about Undutchables as an organisation because we are here to support the international employee. We are always happy that we can offer our international candidates good job prospects and access to opportunities in the Netherlands.

• Please talk some more about Undutchables and what your organisation does?
We are the go- between for candidates and employers. We offer a diverse range of jobs profiles and opportunities for the international knowledge worker. For us it is important that the candidate we recruit is highly educated with at least a bachelor degree. It is equally important that our candidates have a good command of English and can communicate in English at a business level. Every other language spoken is a big plus. Our vacancies; from sales, support, finance, administrative up to executive positions, always require the English language as a primary language and then the native language is a plus. In recent times, we have seen an increased request for roles requiring a knowledge of Scandinavian language. But we are always looking for a good mix. German, French and Danish speakers are always welcome and the same goes for Dutch speakers. They are also welcome to sign up with Undutchables and if they have a strong English competency, they make a formidable candidate.
We work best by trying to reach our candidate from the earliest moment possible. We have a strong online presence so even before they arrive in The Netherlands, we try to give them a preview of what it means to move to The Netherlands and how best they can find suitable employment.
With new candidates, we like to have a face to face meeting to have a clearer understanding of the candidates’ skills, competencies and job preferences. After online registration is done via website, we review the CV for a match and we find it interesting, we will invite the candidate for a face to face meeting and keep that candidate in mind for potential openings. We act as mediator between the Hiring manager or the Job Holder and job seeker.
We are available online and offline to have interactions with our current and potential candidates. The Undutchable team is reachable via various social media outlets such as LinkedIn, Google-plus, twitter and Facebook.

Quite regularly, we organize events such as intake interview sessions in all our 4 office branches in The Netherlands. Our offices are located in The Hague, Utrecht, Eindhoven and Amsterdam and each office organizes an intake interview session where, we are open for short interviews and candidates sign up to attend interview sessions lasting about 20 minutes per candidate. The social element of these interviews is that we try to get to know our candidates before sending them to meet with the hiring manager. At the intake interviews we also provide a brief feedback and tips to the candidate afterwards.
Another interesting initiative that the Undutchable team does is that, every two months we organize the Undutchables Society after work drinks. This is a forum for internationals seeking new opportunities to meet and network with other internationals and also get to know the undutchables recruiters. It is not a work related event but we do chat about jobs and share knowledge in a more informal setting.

• How is the Netherlands job market doing (expanding or contracting) and what are the implications for current job seekers?
I believe it is expanding and we hope it will stay that way. However, it differs per function. Production jobs have reduced somewhat and the last couple of years were tough in global business terrain however we do know that this year job mobility has increased and job openings have not decreased.

• There is some excitement building about a future collaboration between Undutchables and Together Abroad. Can you provide some information on that?
Yes there is some collaboration going on between the Undutchables team and Together Abroad and both parties are very happy about this. We offer a lot to our candidates in terms of job search support however, our core business is finding jobs and we noticed that some of our candidates need more coaching and information in order for them to achieve job search success and while we would like to provide them with the required training, our core responsibility is to work with them to find suitable employment.
We know that Together Abroad is a professional organisation that is specialised in coaching and preparation of candidates for the Netherlands job market. We will therefore be calling on the services of Together Abroad to offer trainings to our candidates who need some extra support and preparation in order to maximize their chances of securing suitable employment in The Netherlands. For us at Undutchables, it is a great addition to the services that we offer. We will still continue to handle the intake interview by ourselves but training and workshops for job seekers on CV preparation or how to find a job in the NL will now be handled by Together Abroad at our various office locations.

• What would this collaboration mean for all stake holders: Job seekers, Hiring Managers, Undutchable and Together Abroad?
It is a win-win situation for all Stakeholders. Undutchables will work with job seekers to help them find suitable jobs and Together Abroad will offer the necessary coaching to ensure that candidates present themselves, their skills and competencies in the best light possible. This will increase the candidates’ chances of securing suitable employment in the Netherlands.
We hope to start the first series of workshops in September and these workshops will be run twice a year in each of our branches. We trust that our candidates will benefit for these initiatives

• What words of advice can you leave with our readers who might be seeking for a new job opportunity in The Netherlands?
Be proactive, the job market is tough. Working with an agency can be of added value because they will have a wide variety of vacancies available and can take the time to understand the candidates skills and competencies and can sell the candidate a bit more to the hiring manager.
Be visible. Come and join the Undutchables events and drinks. The more we see you, the more we think of you. We have a strong presence at job fairs and we meet candidates one on one. Come and introduce yourself, we would love to meet you.
Network and interact with your peers. You never know what piece of information can be useful for your job search endeavours. Finally be patient.
Over the last 18 years we have placed thousands of clients in fulfilling roles and we are happy to provide these same service to job seekers. For us finding the right fit to the company culture is important and we are always seeking for new ways to ensure that everyone in the work relationship is fulfilled.

Thank you for your time.
Contributed by Tamkara Adun.