Strategic HR Appointment Spearheads Recruitment
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Strategic HR Appointment
Spearheads
Advantage Recruitment Drive
‘Build-your-own-career’
Auckland – 5 July 2000 –
Advantage Group Limited (NZSE: ADV) is readying to introduce
web savvy New Zealanders to flexible, self-determined
careers. New HR Director Philippa Furlong has one line job
description from CEO Greg Cross: identify great people, then
find out how to attract and retain them.
“Part of the
current e-commerce land grab is the race to attract and
secure excellent talent,” says CEO Greg Cross. “Advantage
offers stimulating, challenging, rewarding ways for people
to build up their own intellectual capital. We want to
reward staff that get involved in building their own
company. We don’t offer jobs.”
“Throughout e-commerce
internationally, demand for talent is extremely high, supply
is low and so experienced staff are at a premium. We
recognise this as a critical component to our success.
International research shows that talented web-savvy people
look for three things to capture their interest. Firstly,
they look to participate in the growth of their company
through stock options. Secondly, they seek a flexible and
progressive work environment with limited red tape. Thirdly
they want to work on the best projects using the newest
technologies. Advantage offers all these, including our
Employee Share Options Programme.”
“Advantage has
operations in five countries and employs some of the
smartest, most innovative, most exciting, best-qualified web
people in the world,” says Philippa Furlong. “The biggest
challenge facing e-commerce companies today is attracting
and retaining the best staff. To that end, we’re embarking
on the global recruitment campaign, in particular targeting
kiwis looking to return home after their OE. Significant
numbers of skilled e-commerce people are attracted by the
benefits of the New Zealand lifestyle. We’re also planning
an exchange program where our staff can go on exchange with
staff from overseas companies. This gives our people the
opportunity to travel and work internationally, so they
increase their marketable skills while retaining involvement
in their company.
“Internally, I’ll be heading up
Advantage’s ‘Leaders of Tomorrow’ programme. We’re
constantly identifying the go-getters, those people that
have consistently exceptional performance. Those
individuals will be fast-tracked into an accelerated
programme of high level exposure, career coaching and
motivational packages.”
“We’re moving to succession
planning and career planning,” adds Furlong. “In an
industry that has a critical shortage of highly skilled
people we’ll strive to create a culture and workplace
environment that gives Advantage ‘cut through’ to attract
the people we want.”
Working alongside CFO Stewart
McKenzie, Philippa heads up Advantage’s five-strong HR team,
including a full-time in-house recruitment
specialist.
Since January 1 this year we have recruited
82 people and we still have vacancies for another 95 people.
That’s 177 new jobs in what the government likes to refer to
as the knowledge economy.
Ms Furlong has considerable
experience working to drive innovative HR practises through
technology companies. Prior to joining Advantage, Philippa
held senior positions as Human Resources Manager Asia
Pacific for Motherwell systems and Human Resources Manager
for M2 Technology Limited.
About Advantage
Advantage
Group Limited, an NZSE listed company, is a leading supplier
of e-commerce and transaction processing solutions in New
Zealand, Australia and throughout the southern hemisphere.
The company has three business units: point-of-sale
equipment, retail solutions and business-to-business
e-commerce. Advantage provides hardware, software,
transaction processing and funds transfer capabilities to
enable complete e-commerce
solutions.
ENDS