The Virtual CEO: Week 2 with The Adecco Group US
Week two of my #CEOforOneMonth experience in the books! I spent his week David Herranz, President of Adecco Staffing, and his amazing executive team. One of Adecco’s largest brands, I was able to see the inner workings of a Fortune 500 business from the executive perspective. Here’s a recap of what I was up to:
Monday
I jump started the week with my first global challenge - a multi-country debate. Around 8:30am ET, I hopped online to join the CEO for One Month winners of Brazil (Camila Kellen Paz de Carvalho) and Argentina and Uruguay (Paula Andrea Ramos) for a debate on replacing welfare with a universal basic income. Camila, Paula, and I were against the motion and faced the CEO’s of Canada (Danny Elnatour), Mexico (Paola Reynoso), and Columbia (Kevin Alexander Pe?a Arevalo). After a fierce round of debate, some tough questions and delivering the closing speech, my team was able to emerge victorious in front of an audience of nearly 100 people worldwide. It was a great start to the week!
Later in the day, I joined the executive team to discuss a pipeline review covering some of the most immediate threats to Adecco Staffing, in terms of delays of purchasing orders and operational inefficiencies. The leaders were all so focused and execution-oriented, which I directly saw the value of.
Tuesday
Today, I joined a long sales leadership team meeting which brought together nearly 50 people across the organization. David Herranz was able to talk about the year thus far, provide some motivational words, introduce new leaders across the organization, and welcome different stakeholders to present. I was impressed by the positivity despite the tough times currently facing the industry.
I spent the afternoon continuing work on my final global project - an innovation presentation focused on building a workforce that truly works for all, especially currently underserved and underrepresented populations. Each country CEO is tasked with submitting this final project at the end of their month, proposing how they can make a change within the organization. The project will be scored and can help me earn a spot at the global bootcamp and a chance to compete to become the Adecco Group Global CEO for One Month!
Wednesday
I spent the morning working with Professional Recruitment & Solutions (PR&S) to author a blog post for Ajilon, on the topic of making a strong virtual impression. This is something I feel passionate about considering I had to find a way to make myself stand out when the CEO for One Month bootcamp turned virtual. Remote interactions and digitization have been accelerated by COVID-19 and many of these changes are likely here to stay. There are some key differences between interviewing and interacting in-person vs. online - stay tuned for the methods I used to earn the internship of a lifetime.
I also received an exciting invitation to lead Laurie Chamberlin's hour-long town hall to all of PR&S while she is out of town. I'll work closely with Laurie and her team over the weekend and early next week to prepare a deck and presentation for the group. I’m so excited for these incredible opportunities to contribute across the organization!
Thursday
Thursday kicked off with a fun, hands-on experience: client calls with several Adecco Staffing clients. This started with Kevin Miles, Executive Director of Educational Testing Services (ETS). We discussed the importance of robotic process automation in driving efficiency in the era of COVID. Given the nature of ETS’s traditional in-person testing options, there has been quite the organizational shift as Advanced Placement (AP) Tests and American College Tests (ACT) have moved to virtual. Later in the afternoon, I hopped on a call with Nancy Suddreth, Senior Director of HR at Shutterfly. One of Adecco’s largest clients, she shared with me some of her takeaways after over 13 years with Shutterfly. Most of our conversation revolved around employee training and education. Notably, she commented that “for the jobs that we need . . . going to a 4 year school isn’t going to teach you how to run the equipment.” Manufacturing and mechanical engineering roles are in high demand, yet the skill sets seem to be lagging as attending trade schools is increasingly stigmatized nationwide. While systemic change is necessary, Shutterfly is working with the Adecco Academy, a program run by the Adecco Group US Foundation and powered by Penn Foster to provide employees with free training programs related to advancing in their career path. What an awesome initiative!
Friday
Happy Friday! Today I returned to the Professional Recruitment and Solutions team, one of the most innovative branches of Adecco’s operations. With a particularly tech-heavy mindset, the team works with clients from attorneys to US Representatives on data solutions, information processing, and advanced technical applications. While chatting with both Chris Gallagher and Aaron Davis, we discussed the evolution of technology and strategies to implementing lasting change in large corporations. Having come from more of a startup space, it was so interesting to see how different applying technology changes is in a Fortune 500 setting.
In the afternoon, I sat in on a June operations review call with the executive team, reviewing the pipeline, criticizing forecasting, and taking a deep dive into P&L. One particular uncertainty that came up was the effect on families and companies nationwide if students do not return to school in the fall. A situation involving virtual school quickly equates to extra time requirements for childcare and caring for household needs. Regardless, there was still a sense of optimism and push to stay motivated.
This busy week ended with a review call with David Herranz , where we debriefed my week and biggest learnings. As David pointed out, picking up the underlying message about what was not happening in the call, but is still happening is an extremely important skill. “Problem identification is soft skill related – it’s all about listening,” he explained.
Takeaways
After week two – and lots of learning, phone calls, and conversation – here are my takeaways:
- Innovation and tech integration are a must - if today’s big businesses want to see continued success, they must find ways to incorporate technology to drive efficiency across their organization.
- How you treat others is fundamental to your team’s success - as one interviewee told me, “you’ll never get anywhere by telling somebody their baby is ugly.”
- Learning how to work with people is extremely important - teams multiply individual talents when utilized correctly.
I can’t wait for what’s in store this upcoming week… stay tuned!