Real recruitment outcomes

    Client cases in tech recruitment

    Five assignments showing the breadth of my work — from a CTO and an IT organisation built from the ground up to hard-to-find technology specialists. Here I explain what made the assignments difficult, how I worked with the client and what made the right people enter the conversation.

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    Client cases

    When a job advert is not enough

    Five different assignments — from a CTO and an IT organisation built from the ground up to some of the market's narrowest specialist roles. Here I explain what made each search difficult, the choices I made with the client and how we arrived at the right match.

    Good search starts with the team — not a LinkedIn filter

    I want to know what the person is actually walking into: which problems the team is trying to solve, where things are difficult today, which dependencies exist and what needs to work six months from now. Only then does the role profile become useful. LinkedIn can be one channel, but it is rarely the whole answer. I have met many of the candidates I later placed through my own networks, events, meetups, GitHub, Stack Overflow, specialist forums and referrals — sometimes long before a particular role even existed.

    Alleima

    CTO and building the IT organisation

    Starting point
    As Alleima prepared to stand on its own following the separation from Sandvik, the IT department had to be built from the ground up. The first hire was therefore much more than filling a vacant leadership position. The CTO would help set direction, create structure, prioritise competing needs and build trust in an organisation undergoing major change. The person needed both strategic perspective and the ability to turn decisions into a functioning IT organisation, while laying the foundations for the hires that would follow.
    What I did
    I worked with the business to clarify the mandate before the search began: which decisions the CTO would need to make first, how the role would connect business and technology, and what kind of leadership was needed while so much was still being established. From there, I mapped senior technology leaders and opened personal, trust-based conversations in which the transformation mattered more than the title itself. The assessment focused as much on the ability to build an organisation, teams and ways of working as on previous technical responsibility. Once the CTO was in place, I continued supporting Alleima with further hires shaped by the needs of the new organisation.
    Result
    The CTO became the first key hire, giving the wider organisation build clear leadership and direction. I then recruited roles including Head of Infrastructure, developers, data scientists and cybersecurity specialists. Every candidate met the technical requirements in their respective field. Just as importantly, they could collaborate, take ownership and contribute within an IT organisation that was still taking shape. It is an assignment I am particularly proud of: one search became the starting point for an entire IT function at a defining moment for the company.

    Handelsbanken

    Infrastructure Specialist in OpenShift/Kubernetes

    Starting point
    This was not a broad operations role. The team needed a senior infrastructure specialist who could work close to an OpenShift/Kubernetes platform where stability, security and change all had to coexist. The rare combination was deep platform expertise and the ability to collaborate with development teams and explain technical choices. The most relevant specialists were already settled in good roles and rarely looking.
    What I did
    I did not start by stacking tools into a requirements list. Together with the client, I worked through what the person would actually own, which situations were hardest in everyday work and how the team made decisions. That let us separate genuine must-haves from things that could be learned on the job. I then mapped platform and infrastructure specialists and reached out through previous candidate relationships, my own networks, referrals, events and cloud-native communities. The conversations were about the assignment and environment, not a standardised pitch.
    Result
    The search opened conversations with specialists who would not have responded to a normal job advert. Before anyone was presented, the candidate had an honest picture of the responsibility, team and technical challenge. The client also understood what had motivated that person to listen. Handelsbanken could move forward with a small number of relevant profiles and hired someone who met the demanding technical requirements for OpenShift/Kubernetes. At the same time, the person matched the team's way of working and could collaborate closely with the development organisation.

    Burde Publishing

    Full-stack developer focused on AI

    Starting point
    Burde had already been searching for some time when we began working together. The role was broader than a traditional full-stack profile: the person needed to move between frontend, backend and product questions, while understanding how AI could be built into the structure of the solution in a way that created real value. This was not about adding AI for its own sake, but judging the right use cases, the data required and how to keep the solution stable, understandable and maintainable. That combination was difficult to identify from a conventional CV.
    What I did
    I asked the client to describe what the developer would actually need to solve during their first six months. We discussed which product problems AI should address, where it belonged in the architecture, when human oversight was needed and how to avoid creating an isolated AI feature that would be difficult to maintain. That made the role profile much sharper. I then returned to developers I had met through networks, events and meetups. This included people who were not actively job hunting. The conversations became concrete, covering architecture, technical trade-offs, product understanding and ownership.
    Result
    A candidate reached through the targeted network search was hired as a full-stack developer focused on AI. Technically, the candidate met the requirements for breadth across frontend, backend and AI. Product understanding, sound judgement and the ability to give AI a considered place in the architecture made the match complete. Both Burde and the candidate understood early on what the role involved and which problems needed to be solved. After the previous lengthy search, the recruitment was completed without having to start over yet again.

    Getinge

    Cybersecurity specialist

    Starting point
    Getinge was looking for a cybersecurity specialist with an unusually narrow combination of experience. Once the market had been mapped, only 30 people across the entire Nordic region matched the requirements. There was no reserve list to fall back on and little value in broad advertising. For any of those people to listen, I needed to understand the security assignment, the technical environment and why the role mattered to the business.
    What I did
    With a target group of 30 people, you cannot send everyone the same message and hope for replies. I reviewed each profile individually: their background, likely motivation, previous points of contact and whether there was a natural introduction through my network or a referral. The outreach was tailored to the person and left room for genuine questions, including the difficult ones. Specialist networks, events and personal introductions mattered more than LinkedIn. Feedback from the conversations was used to sharpen the client's story about the role as the search progressed.
    Result
    The work led to the right conversation and Getinge hired a cybersecurity specialist despite the extremely limited market. The candidate had the specific cybersecurity expertise required by the full role profile. At the same time, the person could move between security, technology and the business. The candidate entered the process with a realistic picture of the assignment. The client gained both the technical depth and the business understanding the role required.

    Mpya Digital

    Recruitment function

    Starting point
    When the initiative started, there was no finished recruitment function to take over. Process, systems, responsibilities and candidate communication had to be built while the business wanted to hire its first tech professionals. These were also consultants who needed to fit the company's culture and work well across different client teams. The challenge was to create structure without making the candidate experience rigid or administrative.
    What I did
    I started close to the business and technical teams: who thrived here, why would an experienced developer choose the company, and where might the process lose momentum? From there I selected and implemented Teamtailor and built a shared way of working across search, interviews, assessments and references. But the tool was never allowed to become the recruitment itself. I kept showing up at events and meetups, maintained candidate relationships over time and introduced people when the timing was right — not only when someone happened to reply to an advert or LinkedIn message.
    Result
    The result was a recruitment function that worked in everyday practice, not just a process document. Teams gained shared language, clearer responsibilities and better visibility in Teamtailor. The candidates hired met the technical competency requirements for their roles while also being able to work as consultants within Mpya Digital's culture and across different client teams. Relationships built well before a specific vacancy led to hires, so each new search did not have to start from zero.
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