EP 12: Growth-Driven Strategic Workforce Planning

Adriaan: Thomas, welcome to the Leaders in Talent podcast.

Thomas: Thank you for having me.

Adriaan: Thomas, let’s dive right in. You have a fascinating career working at large corporates like Shell, TomTom, Getir, Just Eat Takeaway, and you are currently the Global Head of Talent Acquisition & Contingent Workforce at Action, the fastest-growing discount retailer in Europe.

Adriaan: Arguably, maybe even the world. Growth is imminent in your career. Today I would really like to talk to you about strategic workforce planning and how you deal with tremendous growth, but also the volatility that you’ve experienced across your career. But before we dive in, can you maybe share a little bit more about Action and why Action is so successful for the listeners who have never heard of or been to an Action store?

Thomas: Action is a non-food discounter, which sounds like the most boring thing you could ever do. But what I love about it is that they’ve really made it exciting. We have a thing where our inventory in stores changes very often, so much so that there are fan clubs online that try to figure out when there’s new stuff in a particular new Action store.

Thomas: I think we’ve made discount exciting again—great products, low prices. What made us so successful is that we’ve stayed super true to that. That’s been our formula for 30 years. We treat it like something sacred, and we keep it super simple, right? Most companies, and you’ve named a couple where I’ve worked, when you experience hyper-growth, you tend to make life more difficult for yourself.

Thomas: You start doing acquisitions, you think you can create other product lines—all that type of stuff. Your organization becomes complex and matrixed. Not for us. We keep overhead low, store is king, and we run everything from one place and turn it into a science.

Adriaan: With that rapid growth, opening a store a day, and the expansion and success that Action has, in your role as the Global Head of TA, what does it mean for you in terms of planning and in terms of your own team? What’s your view on strategic workforce planning?

Thomas: I think strategic workforce planning for retail is relatively easy if you grow because you keep growing, and you can be quite aggressive in your lead generation. If you don’t have a job for someone today, you’ll have it again tomorrow. But it’s about timing it for markets, right? So, every time we enter a new market, it takes a while for people to get to know Action and to fall in love with it.

Thomas: I genuinely think that in most markets, people are in love with Action. Once we’ve established a certain amount of stores, then we see lead generation become easier, cost per hire comes down, just because people start understanding that this is a fun place to work.

Adriaan: Hey, and then looking ahead, because you’re also responsible for the stores and HQ, right?

Thomas: Yes.

Adriaan: Tell me a little bit more about how you look at and balance the two.

Thomas: They’re separate worlds, right? The store manager in the store is the CEO of their own little company. So, they do a lot of their own workforce planning themselves, obviously with their manager. We provide services to them to make sure they always have great people to talk to, that they have the means to make them stay, and to make it easy to hire them. But we’re a service to them. They’re in charge. Our managers are in charge.

Thomas: For our headquarters, again, right? We have a beautifully clean org chart, no matrices, no weird stuff. I think a lot of people find that refreshing. It all happens in one place in the north of the Netherlands. Walking around in this busy, buzzy park with everyone talking to each other is really appealing. The focus is on how we can make it so that even if you’re not in Amsterdam or The Hague, you can become an employer of choice just by offering a more exciting career.

Adriaan: How’s this the same or different at companies like Shell, TomTom, or Getir, where you’ve worked in leadership positions? Are they similar, or is it very different?

Thomas: First and foremost, Shell was a long time ago.

Adriaan: Yeah.

Thomas: I wouldn’t want to speak to what Shell looks like today, but at the time, Shell was trending on top employer lists for young graduates. What I’ve always admired about Shell is their commitment to building their own talent.

Thomas: A significant part of their workforce came in as graduates and worked their way up into that organization. It was so smart because they built this workforce that all came from the same place and grew together. There was camaraderie. Even though it’s a huge company, hundreds of thousands of people, they still managed to make it feel like there was a joint experience, which made Shell attractive.

Thomas: And obviously, at the time, Shell was big in the market and able to offer growth. Recruitment becomes so much easier when you’re in a market where you’re offering growth. Some people like growth for the sake of growth, like some of the startups I’ve worked for—just aggressive, throw everything at the wall and see if it sticks type of growth. Long-term, people at the top of their game tend to veer towards companies that can offer a more sustained, profitable growth instead of long nights of panic.

Thomas: That’s the thread with the companies I’ve worked for. I’ve always tried to find that sweet spot between growth for the sake of it and actual sustainable growth.

Adriaan: Was that similar with TomTom and Getir, or different because they were in different phases of their growth cycle?

Thomas: Yeah, absolutely. What’s hard as a recruiter if you switch jobs is changing loyalties. It feels a bit like changing football clubs, and now you have to go somewhere else and say, “No, this is the best job.” But I genuinely loved every company I worked for because they were each in their own phase. I still admire TomTom today. They pivoted from being a consumer electronics company into a monster of an autonomous driving software provider. It’s not easy to pivot a company like that and remain successful.

Thomas: At TomTom, we went from a completely marketing-driven consumer electronics company to, overnight, a software engineering company. We hired 800-900 software engineers in a year.

Adriaan: Wow.

Thomas: Insane.

Adriaan: Coming back to Action and the future, how do you plan internally, with your in-house team, and also with flexible resource allocation? What’s your view there, and is that something you’ve taken from previous companies, or is it very different at Action?

Thomas: Funny, I was thinking about that while driving here. Someone once told me, “You have to ask your business what the driver for growth is.” Workforce planning, especially for recruiting and building your recruitment strategy and structure, is a dark art. You can’t quite get it right, but there are things…

Thomas: Action is a buying-driven company. TomTom became a software-driven company. If I think about my path to growth, I know I’m always going to need to hire the best of the best quickly in buying. You could pick two or three departments that are always going to be strong, and that’s where you start. If you get those right, the rest will follow.

Adriaan: And what is the moment when you bring in an external RPO or embedded agency? What’s your experience there?

Thomas: That’s a question I could spend a week on. Some companies use RPOs because they don’t know what recruitment looks like. Others do it because they have volatility. For example, I know I have to support the core businesses, but I outsource the rest to Matchr. It’s about having a specialist partner to manage volatility while I focus on the core.

Adriaan: In your experience, what are some key factors that make these partnerships successful?

Thomas: Before you talk to partners, articulate your buying reason. Whether you’re looking for brand, specialism, or handling volatility, make sure it’s clear so you can ask the right questions. Often, people think they’re saving costs when they should be improving quality. Getting your requirements right is key.

Adriaan: And when working with a flexible partner, what are the key success factors?

Thomas: Clarity gets you what you want. Be clear on your goals. Don’t bring in an RPO out of stress and then put them in a corner. Integrate them into your structure. A proper integration is crucial because if you’re already behind on vacancies and just bring someone in without a plan, it won’t work. Make sure there’s space for implementation.

Thomas: I told Matchr I want to be their favorite customer. If you buy cheap, you end up cheap. I’m Dutch, so I hope we got a good price, but you have to make money to keep bringing me your best people. There needs to be reciprocity. We work together, I make you better, you make me better.

Adriaan: Absolutely, and that’s been our experience as well. Treating each other as full-on partners leads to mutual success. Even though we recently started working together, we’ve felt that from you and the team.

Adriaan: What are you excited about? What’s next for Action?

Thomas: Lots more growth. We’re a very planned business, and it’s budgeting season. I’ve been with Action less than a year, and maybe it’s the honeymoon phase, but I think this will be the easiest employer brand to sell. People have such a deep connection with Action, and when I tell them it’s 30 years old, in 12 countries, and Dutch, they’re often surprised. It’s exciting to sell.

Adriaan: Everyone I tell about Action has a positive connotation with it. It’s incredible what you’ve built. And the story about the CEO, right?

Thomas: Absolutely. Started in the store, stocking shelves, and worked his way up.

Adriaan: What an incredible story. Thomas, what’s the best way for listeners to connect with you?

Thomas: If I gave you the real answer, I’d have to give my phone number, and we’re not doing that! But LinkedIn is the best way.

Adriaan: Great. Thomas, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast and for trusting us to work together. I’m really excited to see what the future holds for Action and for us.

Thomas: Thank you for having me!