VMA GROUP Supports Bidfood in Appointing Internal Communications Manager
VMA GROUP Supports Bidfood in Appointing Internal Communications Manager for Southwest Region.
Bidfood is one of the UK’s leading foodservice distributors supplying food, drink and catering supply products to over 40,000 customers around the UK, from a network of over 25 depots spanning the country.
As part of a restructuring of the Internal Communications team - which included promotions and realignment of team resource to better match business needs – a new role of Internal Communications Manager, Corporate, was created; specifically, this role would focus on supporting non-operational departments and would work closely with the People & Culture team. Given the existing team operated flexibly from a site on the English/Welsh border, some distance from public transport, the location would pose challenges to the hiring process. The client was also keen to ensure that the new hire had a very strong background within internal communications to add relevant expertise and skills to the growing team.
Our Southwest Regional Account Director, Mark Muscroft,has recruited communications folk in the area since 2007, and was asked to support based on his deep network and market knowledge of the region. Through personal networking, referral, knowing who might be open to such a move etc., Mark adopted a Search approach to present the opportunity to people he knew would be interested and would have the requisite skills and experience. A tight timeline of search, assessment and interview was agreed, with the client interviewing on site following initial Teams meetings. By agreeing a very clear process and with interview dates booked ahead, the client could leave things in safe hands following an initial briefing call. Mark could then focus on engaging the best talent for the role, at pace.
The client was happy to offer their preferred candidate immediately, and pleasingly all candidates in the process commented that the process was smooth, comprehensive, well-organised… and actually enjoyable!
“I’ve known Mark and VMA GROUP for some time, and when I needed to find someone new for my team I felt using a local, specialist recruiter was the right thing to do. Mark knows the market well, and was able to find good people for us in super quick time without us – or him – needing to rely on online adverts or weeks of searching. He understood what I was looking for in a candidate and I could trust him to just get on with taking the role to market and presenting us with the right people. Mark essentially helped to short-cut my process by doing the first sift for me, so I only spent time speaking to great people, who I knew could do the job.”
Clare Joslin-Smith, Head of Internal Communications, Bidfood
