Finders Seekers

What does it take to make Finland THE destination for international tech talent? 🇫🇮💡

We recently hosted an incredible panel with leaders from Nokia Ventures, Wolt, and Supercell, where they shared insights on how Finland can stand out in the global talent race.

Here’s what we learned:

🌍 "There are no borders in tech. You have to hire international from the get-go." – Niilo Säämänen, CTO at Wolt

👨‍👩‍👦 "We need more English-speaking school spots for older kids and better support for spouses." – Melanie Dower, International Employee & Family Support at Supercell

💼 "Finland has a high-tech culture, we have top-notch education, and a society that actually knows what work-life balance is. Let's use it in our communication." – Tarun Sharma, Partner & COO at Nokia Ventures

Key takeaways:

✅ Cast your net wide from the start – the best talent isn’t limited by borders

✅ Showcase Finland’s unique strengths: quality of life, work-life balance, and innovation

✅ Invest in relocation support, especially for families

✅ Invite your international colleagues to enjoy Finnish activities – sauna, mushroom picking, celebrating Vappu. These actions can make a world of difference!

Want to dive deeper? Check out our full blog for more insights from the event: https://buff.ly/3NczQba

Have you got international colleagues? What’s your best tip for making Finland feel like home? ❤️ Tell us in the comments! 👇

How to attract and integrate international tech talent to Finland - Learnings from Nokia, Wolt, Supercell — Finders Seekers Discover expert insights on attracting and integrating international tech talent to Finland. Learn best practices from industry leaders at Nokia, Wolt, and Supercell on creating inclusive workplaces, supporting families, and showcasing Finland's unique strengths to global talent.

We brought back one of our favourite bi-weekly traditions.

Breakfast ☕️🥐🍓

While we enjoy each other's company and would come to the office anyways, we thought we'd sweeten the deal.

So far, bribing works 😏 This group just loves free food!

The first breakfast session after the summer vacation was hosted by our resident Half-Canadians Vivi and Saku.

The theme: Canada - Pancakes and maple syrup 🥞🍁

Everything was super delicious and it was so much fun to kick-start the day with everyone ❤️

P.S. This has officially become a recruitment + employer branding + employee experience + FOOD account. So follow us for more foodie content 😋

Last week we organised an international tech talent panel discussion for CTOs, Business and HR/TA leaders in Finland at Nordea HQ. Thank you for hosting us! ☺️🙏

On the panel we had leaders from the top employers in Finland for international tech talent (according to our International Tech Talent in Finland 2024 report), moderated by our very own Sofia Pohls.

The discussion with Wolt’s CTO Niilo Säämänen, Nokia Ventures COO & Partner Tarun Sharma, and Supercell’s International Employee and Family Support Melanie Dower was insightful and showcased concrete best practices from these top companies to help attract, integrate and retain international (tech) talent in Finland to ensure Finland’s future innovation and competitive edge.

💡Keep an eye out for our recap blog sharing concrete tips coming soon! ☺️

Tech talent report: https://buff.ly/3VpFVGl

Meet the speakers! 👋🎤

We’re excited to introduce leaders from Wolt, Nokia, Supercell, and Nordea who will be joining our International Tech Talent panel. They’ll be sharing their experiences and best practices for creating inclusive and attractive workplaces 💡

Niilo Säämänen, CTO at Wolt, has scaled the company’s product and engineering teams from 10 to 700+ people. As a culture-focused leader, he’s passionate about fostering autonomy within his teams to drive success.

Tarun Sharma, Partner & COO at Nokia Ventures, has built global tech teams and brings expert insights into navigating the international talent market.

Melanie Dower, International Employee & Family Support at Supercell, sheds light on the importance of expat family support. She will share practical tips on how to ensure family members also find their own sense of purpose in Finland.

John van Uden, CTO at Nordea, recently relocated from the UK to lead key technology initiatives at Nordea. He offers valuable perspectives on leadership in a new country and creating environments where diverse teams can thrive.

💬 What would you love to hear from our speakers? Share your thoughts!

👀 Don’t forget to follow us on instagram for live updates this Thursday and stay tuned for a blog post with key learnings afterward.

Conversations around international talents in Finland have been heating up. And rightly so! 🔥

We need skilled talents, diverse voices, and more of them.

Over the summer, articles like this one from Yle pointed out the challenges international talents are facing in Finland: https://buff.ly/3N044yp

Finland's growth, innovations, and global competitiveness depend on our ability to attract, integrate, and retain these talents ⚠️

So what are the top leading tech employers in Finland doing?

Next Thursday, we are bringing together a panel of leaders from the top tech companies, Wolt, Nokia, Nordea, and Supercell - to share their experiences and best practices for fostering inclusive and attractive workplaces.

Our panelists include:
✔️ Niilo Säämänen, CTO, at Wolt.
He has hired a lot of international talents to Wolt and has been able to foster an active and engaged tech talent community.

✔️ Tarun Sharma, Partner & CCO, at Nokia Ventures
He has built several international tech teams, and offers practical insights into the international talent market.

✔️ John van Uden, CTO, at Nordea.
He is an international tech leader who recently moved to Finland, sharing first-hand experience.

✔️ Melanie Dower, International Employees & Family Support Lead, at Supercell.
She is an expat from New Zealand who can shed light on the importance of and how to best provide family support for international employees.

Join us on the 19th of September between 8.30 - 11AM.

Seats are very limited, so be sure to sign up now to secure your spot! https://buff.ly/4efJ8Pb

Introducing our partner Adafy - a growing Microsoft concultancy and innovative digital solution provider.

In just 2 months, we've helped strengthen their employer brand and talent pipeline, achieving fantastic results together 🎯

With a 34% growth in LinkedIn followers and over 100+ applications received, we're excited to continue supporting Adafy's growth!

💬 "Their experience has been invaluable in helping us; providing new ideas for developing our recruitment process and employer branding." - Satu Kuusinen

Check out career opportunities at Adafy: https://buff.ly/4dFMonf

If you're looking for help with your employer branding and recruitment. Give us a holla! 🤙

Hire someone famous they said, it'll boost your sales they said.

Well, meet Koda 🐶

Chief Happiness Officer.

He often gets recognised on the streets by his human fans 📸

This boy has just been chilling rent free at our office. 6 years in, he has yet to bring in sales, but we're sure it'll happen any day now! 😆💰

Recruitment insights from a seasoned recruiter who has helped fill hundreds of positions in Finland and across Europe! - Sofia Pohls

5 reasons why your top candidate is not accepting your offer 🤷‍♀️

❌ Your recruitment process is too long or too short and the momentum was either lost or didn't have enough time to build up.

❌ You did not meet the candidate's expectations towards the offer.

❌ The candidate doesn't have enough information to make a decision.

❌ Your employer brand is not strong and engaging enough.

❌ Other reasons like personal life changes etc.

Luckily, 4 of those you can (and should) influence. Managing the candidate's expectations and following up on their hesitations throughout the process is the key to success.

Sometimes there's nothing you can do, and that's life. But often enough there's a common nominator behind rejected offers. And you can and should figure it out.

Got questions for our recruiters? Leave a comment! 💬

We have been using Miro since 2019 for employer branding work and here's why we love it 💛❤️💜

If you haven't yet heard of Miro, it is an online interactive whiteboard. Think OG Microsoft Paint, but the younger way too cool sister that you wish were related to you.

So what makes Miro cool? 🧊

1️⃣ You can collaborate on the board in real time. Any additions you make is updated right away and auto saved. Makes working on a project together a whole lot easier.

2️⃣ It's visual. It fosters creativity. A canvas without edges or limitations. We love our google docs, but being able to easily visualise concepts and ideas are critical to our work. Plus, you'll have access to the Miroverse 🌌 an expansive template gallery created by the Miro community to spark inspiration!

3️⃣ It's the most engaging tool to run an online workshop. Want all your participants to join in on the ideation? Want them to enjoy the process? Check and check. ✅ ✅

As lovers of the product, needless to say, when we got the opportunity to partner up with Miro on their employer branding in 2023, we were ecstatic 🤩

We worked together on Miro's EB strategy, EVP, career website, campaigns, events, content, and lots more! If you're interested in reading about our collab, check out our case study:
https://buff.ly/3LMrAye

Have you used Miro before? What are your favourite tools for employer branding? 💭

Go Linda! You're a star ⭐️🚀

Our Senior Talent Advisor Linda received amazing feedback from a candidate she interviewed for our client 💛

💡 A reminder to focus on your talent experience. Because happy candidates lead to improved perceptions of your employer brand!

Show me the moneyyyy 💸

That's how you build a case for employer branding with your senior leadership 🏆

✅ Leadership is interested in either making money or saving money.

So translate your EB actions and initiatives into cost savings or improvements in some other areas.

They want to know the return on investment - ROI 💰

For example, only presenting your organic EB post impressions, or how many people came to your meetups to your leadership will most likely not sell them EB.

And it will not grow your EB budget ❌

What you should do, is tell them what these results mean.

💡 How much would it have cost to get these impressions through paid campaigns? How have your actions impacted e.g. your time to hire and hiring costs?

Our CEO Sofia shared some insights on how to use long-term EB data and communicate ROI to get internal buy-in (with step by step guide) at the Embrace Festival a couple of weeks ago.

Comment ✋ if you'd like Sofia to host an online session on this topic!

When should you use a headhunter? 🎯

Let's be honest, headhunting services can be expensive. But also, recruitment IS expensive. A single position can sometimes take hundreds of hours to fill, especially when you're looking for those senior niche experts or have tons of applications to sieve through for entry roles.

Here is when we would recommend you outsource the recruitment to an external headhunter:

🆘 When you do not have the resources internally.
With a small team, think about your opportunity cost. Can your team's resources be better spent on another project?

🆘 When you're looking for talents to those hard-to-fill roles. Expert roles often require a different more targeted approach. And if you urgently need to fill these positions, time is of the essence.

🆘 If you've been struggling with your recruitments and are not receiving applications from the right talents. Tap into the wide network and talent pools of your external partner. It's also time to focus on your employer branding!

If you need help hiring any roles this Autumn, give us a shout! 📣
Agree on the recruitment with us in June and get €1000 OFF from the final fee.

https://buff.ly/4aRWyPB

Happy midsummer ☀️☀️☀️
from the land that never sleeps
and a team that has equal difficulty sleeping
mainly on our team day
due to impromptu 2AM Irish dance parties.

😏

What does an embedded recruiter do?

As the name suggest, we embed ourselves into your team and do anything and everything a recruiter would do.

Need to hire 10 people in the next 6 months?
✅ We can help with that. Create job ads, contact and screen candidates, train hiring managers, create offers, handle communication, help with onboarding - all while ensuring stellar talent experience.

Need help building your talent strategy?
✅ We'll help you craft a sustainable talent strategy that aligns to your business growth needs. Define data points in your recruitment process to enable systematic data analysis. Together, we can create an actionable TA roadmap for the coming year!

Need help optimizing your recruitment process?
✅ We take time to understand your current processes and needs, provide recommendations to enhance the efficiency and make hiring smoother, create documentation, and start implementing.

If you think your team could benefit from having an external recruiter (bringing with them years of talent market insights across different industries), let's have a chat! 😊

And if you choose to sign with us in June, you'll get 10% off your first 3 months' invoice.

https://buff.ly/3VO36ug

Why should your company do employer branding? 🤷

Well, it's simple. Why does your company do branding?

🔎 To make yourself known to your customers.

It does not matter how great your product or service is, if no one knows about it.

But 'corporate - product' branding can only take you so far when you're looking to attract talented experts to your team to build those great products and services.

These highly sought after talents want to know what it's like to work at your company, what will they be doing, what mission are they contributing to. Essentially, what is the value for them ⭐️

A good employer branding strategy can help you attract better talent, cut down on hiring costs, and improve employee retention.

💡 When you have a clear direction of where you want to go, build a strong foundation, and have the support systems in place, your employees will naturally champion your cause. They will become your brand ambassadors, enthusiastically sharing how great it is to work there.

To help you get started on your employer branding journey, we have created an EB Strategy & Roadmap Starter Pack 🎒

This includes 5 x 1.5h sessions where we will work on,
- Assessing your EB Maturity level
- EB Strategy and focus areas + value vs. effort analysis
- EB KPIs
- EB Roadmap 1.0
- Tailored EB budget

The outcome:
Actionable EB roadmap with KPIs and budget for 2025! 🚀

This will help you build the business case for continuing your employer branding work.

A recent feedback we received: "Already this first session was worth the €3900!" 🤩

Sign up before end of June to secure the discount! (the work can start in the fall)
https://buff.ly/4aRWyPB

Props to our employer branding team for receiving this great feedback from the CEO of a Tech Consulting company we partnered with this Spring 🙌

"You are super professional, and your knowledge shows everywhere. A really great partner."
➕
"Hemmetin hyvää duunii ja oikeilla jäljillä." (Meaning: Damn good work and on the right track.)

During our collaboration, we worked on defining their talent personas and key selling points as an employer, conducted an audit to assess the status quo and help them understand the current perceptions of their employer brand, as well as developed their EB strategy and roadmap 💡

We're really proud of the meaningful impact we've been able to make for our clients 💛

If you're looking for a dedicated partner to elevate your employer brand, we're here to help.

https://buff.ly/4aRWyPB

Last Thursday we organized the first Posti Technology Meetup together with Posti & Haltian!

What we helped with:
✔️ Communication
✔️ Venue
✔️ Refreshments
✔️ Meetup practicalities

This allowed Posti & Haltian to focus on planning the topic and technical content for the Meetup 💡

The Meetup was a great success! A house full of people discussing the technologies behind Posti's parcel lockers that many of us use in our daily lives.

Thank you Posti, Haltian and everyone who came to the event! 🧡

The Posti Technology Meetup Group is growing fast and if you’re not yet part of it, join now to hear about the upcoming meetup events!
https://buff.ly/4aRNZnC

Meetups are also one of the best ways to meet and interact with your potential future employees and teammates! Full of passionate and driven people willing to spend their free time networking and learning.

If you need help organizing Meetups, don't hesitate to send us a message 😊https://buff.ly/4aRWyPB

Why do International Tech Talents choose Finland? And what can we do better to attract and retain them? 🚀

Finland attracts tech professionals from around the world, but do they see a future here? Our research explores the experiences of 226 international tech talents living in Finland. The findings are eye-opening: while Finland offers a desirable balanced lifestyle and robust tech scene, challenges like discrimination and non-competitive salaries persist 💡

🚨 Over 55% of respondents reported facing discrimination, and more than 60% feel their salaries are either not or only maybe on par with the local market. These insights highlight the need for better integration and fairer practices.

Curious about how we can improve? Check out our full report for detailed findings and practical recommendations for recruiters, hiring managers, employer branding and HR professionals.

International Tech Talent in Finland Research Report 2024 — Finders Seekers In order to attract and retain tech professionals in Finland, we must understand their motivations, expectations, and experiences of living and working in Finland. This research report provides a comprehensive overview of what work-life is like for international tech talents in Finland.

"First of all, kudos to you! Candidate X mentioned several times that the reason why he wanted to chat with us was the perfect message you sent to him. It attracted his attention and showed that our company understands what we want and need 😊 Nice job!"

How can we grab the attention of talents who regularly receive tens of headhunting messages?

(Besides sharing dog pics)

Here's what we focus on:
✔️ Understanding the role and the company - How will this role contribute to driving business goals? What are the company priorities in the coming years? What are the company values?
✔️ Quality sourcing. Finding talents with the right skillsets, experience, and background to fit the role and company.
✔️ Personalized and targeted outreach. Every person is different. We highlight the points that really matter to the individual.
✔️ Matchmaking. Recruitments are a two-way street. We care as much about helping talents find the best next step for their career as we do in building your winning team.

This guides how we communicate with talents and our overall approach to recruitment.

It also results in ➡️
⭐️ High response rates (50-70%) and interest from candidates!
⭐️ 97% success rate in recruitments

Who are the most preferred employers of international tech talents in Finland? 💡

Last week we revealed the TOP 3 in the list
🏆 Wolt, Nokia, Nordea 🏆

Can you guess which other companies have captured the attention of these tech professionals? Here's the complete Top 10 ⭐️

1. Wolt
2. Nokia
3. Nordea
4. Supercell
5. Microsoft
6. OP
7. Kone
8. Google
9. Zalando
10. Reaktor, Rovio, Smartly

Great job on building employer brands that stand out! 👏

🤿 Let's dive deeper into the results of this research! Join us at our office next Wednesday for the TA Café where we'll share the latest findings 🔎

See which companies have remained consistent on both 2023 and 2024's top preferred employers list, 👀 the main factors these talents consider when selecting their workplace, how competitive they find their salaries, if they have experienced discrimination, and how to better integrate them into work and life in Finland!

📅 Date and time: Wed May 29th at 16:00
📍 Place: Finders Seekers office, Kasarmikatu 44

Only a few spots left. So make sure to secure your seat now! 🚨 Looking forward to a great event and insightful discussions!

https://buff.ly/3yGaL4p

And big thanks to Elizabeth Boykova for helping us gather the data for this research 🙏💛

"Don't you just hire software developers?"

Nope. We do more 🤓

This is a question we sometimes get. And that's on us if the perception is that we only recruit developers.

It's correct that we work on a lot of tech recruitments and understand this audience very well. But, what you may not know is that our unique approach for finding and attracting these hard-to-hire talent groups translate to hiring all kinds of specialist niche roles 💡

Here are some specialist roles we regularly hire:
✅ Leadership positions including CTOs, CIOs, Country Managers, Head of Product / Data / Legal / Business Solutions etc.
✅ Customer success managers, Key account managers, Sales people
✅ Lawyers
✅ HR managers..and of course all kinds of Tech roles!

We have been doing these recruitments across Europe; in Finland, Sweden, Germany, Netherlands, Spain.

And for our employer branding team, we’re working across the globe. From the Americas - US, Brazil, Columbia all the way to APAC regions - China, Kazakhstan, India, to Australia, and back up to Europe.

🍬 Our sweet spot is finding and attracting niche talents in different industries across Europe and beyond 🍬

If you need some help with recruitment or employer branding this year, make sure to reach out to Saku, Sofia, and Ahti ASAP to get our summer discounts! 📞🚨

Revealing the top preferred employers in Finland of international tech talents! 🇫🇮🌟 These companies have made waves in attracting top talent from around the globe.

Here's a sneak peek at the top 3 in the list* 👀
1. Wolt
2. Nokia
3. Nordea
*Results from 226 survey respondents.

But what's the secret behind their allure? Stay tuned for the full report where we dive deeper into what makes these companies stand out and why they're the top choices among international tech talents💡

We'll also be dropping the complete top 10 list next week! ⭐️ Can you guess who made the cut? 🤔