Media Center – 2022

News

Companies are losing women leaders at high rates : Women in the Workplace Report

19 October | This article was first published on the Axios website here and is based on the new Women in the Workplace report by LeanIn.Org and McKinsey & Company. Read the full report here They’re calling...

Activate Board Announces CEO Search

14 September | Press Release This press release published via Globe Newswire. Read the original post here Today, 12 September 2022, the board of directors of Activate Global, Inc. (“Activate”) launched its search...

Starbucks appoints Indian-origin CEO; trend points to “Super-Choice” by multinationals for future leadership

06 September | This article was first published on the Money Control website and features expert commentary from Sonal Agrawal, global AltoPartners Chair and Accord India managing partner. Read the full, original...

In conversation with Ralf Nejedl

23 August | This interview with Ralf Nejedl was first published on the AltoPartners Deutschland website. To read the original article in German, click here You were a successful manager in the...

Press Release: A change of generations at MPB Recruitment Group AG

01 July | After 35 years, the company founder and Managing Partner Helmut Zimmerli-Menzi is passing the company on to its two long-term Partners Regina Graf and Thomas Markwirth. The MPB Recruitment Group...

Overcoming stigma and misperceptions, one placement at a time

20 June | This World Refugee Day, the team behind Talents For The Netherlands tells us how they started a social enterprise during COVID – and great things happened In search of new talent for the...

Ralf Nejedl Joins AltoPartners Deutschland

13 June | AltoPartners Deutschland is proud to announce that Ralf Nejedl, former leader of B2B business for Deutsche Telekom AG Europe, is joining its team in the Darmstadt office as a partner from July 1,...

Lauren Smith (Diversified Search Group) Recognised as NACD Directorship 100™ Honoree

21 April | The 16th Annual NACD Directorship 100 List Recognizes the Most Influential Corporate Directors and Governance Experts The National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD) announced the 2022 NACD...

International Women’s Day 2022 : Breaking The Bias – one placement at a time

08 March | This year’s International Women’s Day Theme is #BreakTheBias. AltoPartners, a leading international partnership of retained executive search and leadership consulting firms, knows the effects of...

Diversified Search Group Acquires Alta Associates, The Pioneer and Premier Search Firm in Cybersecurity

04 March | The firm continues rapid growth with the addition of industry-recognized experts on cybersecurity, data privacy, and IT risk management talent. Diversified Search Group, the largest woman-led and...

There is No Free Lunch!

25 January | Julia Zdrahal-Urbanek, Managing Partner AltoPartners Austria, was interviewed by the leading daily newspaper Kurier on the topic of politicians moving into top management positions. There Is No...

H.M. The King : Audience with His Majesty Felipe VI of Spain & Representatives from Seeliger y Conde on the 30th Anniversary of Seeliger y Conde

10 January | Palacio de la Zarzuela. Madrid, 07.01.2022 His Majesty the King had an audience with representatives of the consulting firm Seeliger y Conde, on the occasion of its 30th anniversary. The original...

Judee von Seldeneck Establishes JVS Philadelphia Fund for Women

05 January | Fund to Provide New Capital for Women Entrepreneurs in Philadelphia Judee von Seldeneck, Founder and Chair of Diversified Search Group and AltoPartners global board member, the largest...

Insights

AltoPartners Guide to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Religion in the workplace: making the festive season – and the year – comfortable for all

15 December | Religion in the workplace comes into sharp focus in December when a number of days have special significance. From the Buddhist Bodhi Day on December 8 to Kwanzaa, the weeklong secular holiday...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Estelle Kumm

12 December | Meet Estelle Kumm, financial manager, extreme mountain biker, mother of twin girls, and a former off-road super biker with a genius for creating order out of chaos. As her colleagues at Search...

Ask Alto: What is presenteeism and how can I prevent it?

08 December | “In many countries, job cuts have left fewer people in work. Those who remain are having to cope with almost unmanageable workloads, increased job insecurity, and longer hours. Their managers are...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Verena Acerbi

05 December | Ten years ago, partner Verena Acerbi took the bold step to join a small start-up founded by a former colleague, Julia Zdrahal-Urbanek. Today AltoPartners Austria is one of central Europe’s premier...

Lessons in Leadership : Dan Reddiex Headmaster of Dilworth School – Auckland, New Zealand

02 December | Sheffield’s Lessons in Leadership series interviews high profile executives about their leadership style and journey. In this episode, Sheffield North Island / AltoPartners New Zealand Managing...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion : Combatting ageism in the workplace: why and how we need to do it better

01 December | For the first time in the history of the species, people aged 60 years and older outnumber children under the age of 5, making 60-plus the fastest-growing demographic in the world. By 2030, one in...

The Director’s Dilemma – December 2022 Edition

01 December | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Albert Froom, Managing Partner...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Elsa Maria Solis

28 November | Ever since Elsa María Solis can remember, she has wanted to be a manager. Today she has a lucrative and successful career finding managers for her clients in Latin America as a partner at...

Lessons in Leadership : Steve Tucker, Board Chair Gallagher Holdings

25 November | Sheffield’s Lessons in Leadership series interviews high profile executives about their leadership style and journey. In this interview, Sheffield North Island / AltoPartners New Zealand Managing...

Ask Alto: What is code-switching?

24 November | “As a young, curly-haired Hispanic woman, I was often perceived as uneducated and nothing more than a pretty face in corporate America. I learned to ‘talk the talk’ and embody the version of me...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Marion Sözcü

21 November | Today we wish Marion Sözcü, the glue at Jack Russell Consulting our Munich-based partner, a very happy birthday! Twenty years ago, Marion made the brave decision to leave a safe job with a nice...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : A practical guide to creating a trans-inclusive workplace

17 November | “One of the biggest hurdles for co-workers and leaders is a general ignorance of how to interact with a transgender co-worker. This is a significant gap in many companies’ diversity awareness and...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Andrea Brand

14 November | Bold and brave; polished and poised, but with a wicked sense of humour. Meet Munich-based Andrea Brand, equity partner and esteemed colleague at Jack Russell Consulting/ AltoPartners Germany. What...

The Great Debate – Should in-office employees be paid more?

10 November | Despite the benefits of working from home, employers confess to having mixed feelings. Faced with underutilised office space, the added demands of managing remotely and the nagging worry that...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Patrycja Lachowska

07 November | This week we feature Patrycja Lachowska, partner at Accord Group Polska and head of AltoPartners’ financial services practice for Poland and the Baltics. A secret introvert and would-be hotelier,...

Ask Alto : Is it time for a DE&I Manager?

04 November | According to LinkedIn data in 2020, the number of people globally with the corporate title Head of Diversity more than doubled (107% growth) in the previous five years. The number with the title...

The Director’s Dilemma – November 2022 Edition

01 November | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Scott Eversman, Managing...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Jana Martinová

31 October | This week we feature Jana Martinová, Managing Partner, owner of Accord Group in the Czech and Slovak Republic, and a founding member of AltoPartners. A talented linguist with a razor-sharp...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : Conscious inclusion – a guide to reducing unconscious bias in the workplace

28 October | Whether we admit it or not, we all have biases. They arise from our life experiences, from our mental models, and from how we were raised. If that’s the case, what can leaders do to ensure that...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Mpho Nkeli

24 October | She once summited Mount Kilimanjaro with her 64-year-old mum, but these days Mpho Nkeli, executive chair and director of Search Partners International (SPi)/ AltoPartners South Africa, is more...

Ask Alto : What are collaborative negotiation tactics, and why do women need to know about them?

24 October | When Kathryn Valentine was an MBA intern at a Fortune 500 company, she tried negotiating her way into a job. Twelve minutes into the interview she was told that she wasn’t a good fit for the...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : Safe Spaces – Could these be the missing ingredient in your DE&I programme?

20 October | It’s hard to think of a less safe space than polar ice. Yet Dr Ed Coats, polar explorer and adventurer, managed to create one on polar expeditions. He and his team would gather in their tent,...

Ask Alto : What should workplaces’ policies be on tattoos?

18 October | Did you know that Sir Winston Churchill had a tattoo – along with his mother Lady Randolph Churchill? Except that they probably didn’t. The famous wartime Prime Minister’s arm anchor, and his...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Corinne Klajda

17 October | This week we feature the multi-lingual Corinne Klajda, managing partner of Accord Group Poland and one of the founding members of the AltoPartners Executive Search & Leadership Consulting...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : What are white privilege and white fragility? And how can people and companies change things?

13 October | “White privilege to a white person is like water to a fish.” – White social worker Brittany Alfarano The term white privilege, which originated in the United States in the 1980s, refers to both...

Ask Alto : What is menstrual leave and should your HR policies consider it?

11 October | In May 2022, the Spanish cabinet approved a menstrual leave law – the first of its kind in Europe. The bill still needs to go through parliament but if it passes muster, people suffering from...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Beata Preis-Hryniewicz

10 October | Veterinary science’s loss was HR’s gain: Meet Beata Preis-Hryniewicz, animal lover and HR specialist at Accord Poland/ AltoPartners East and Central Europe. What was your childhood career dream? I...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : Microaggressions in the workplace: How to identify them and how to overcome them

06 October | Oprah Winfrey was once told, “You’re not really black”, by one of her wealthy neighbours, who was trying to make her feel better about being in a minority in her neighbourhood. The story may be...

Our ESG specialists unpick the link between leadership and sustainability

05 October | The recent news that the Chouinard family, the founders of Patagonia, had given away their $3-billion company to fight climate change produced the sort of headlines that the organisers of COP27...

Ask Alto : What are the laws and regulations HR professionals should know?

04 October | Did you know that it is illegal in South Africa to force an employee to work unpaid overtime, no matter what their contract says? That’s because the country’s labour laws are based on a...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Claudia Allwißer

03 October | Cool and calm, with an enviable grace-under-fire disposition, Claudia Allwißer is one of Jack Russell Consulting/ AltoPartners Germany’s most versatile team members, with over 20 years in the...

The Director’s Dilemma – October 2022 Edition

03 October | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Jaco Kriek, Managing Director of...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : When diversity is neural

29 September | Autism. Asperger’s syndrome. Dyslexia. Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Tourette syndrome. These are not the first things that spring to mind when thinking about diversity in the...

Ask Alto: What is BANI and should people care?

27 September | “For so many around the world, things are too strange, too out of control, too immense, and too fragile to even begin to imagine appropriate responses.” Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Valentina Flores

26 September | Meet Valentina Flores, an industrial and organisational psychologist from Vienna and our talent manager and senior consultant for AltoPartners Austria with a knack for forecasting HR trends. What...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : What your LGBTQIA+ employees wish you knew

21 September | Practical advice on delivering on your DE&I commitments This week we spoke to peers who identify as part of the LGBTQIA+ community. This is what they told us about their experience of feeling...

Preparing and Positioning Yourself for a Corporate Board Role: Top Ten Tips

21 September | This article was first published on the Diversified Search Group website. To access the full article, click here by Sonya Olds Som As an executive search consultant, I am regularly asked for advice...

Ask Alto: What is a Chief Happiness Officer, and does my company need one?

20 September | One of the first Chief Happiness Officers appears to have been clown character Ronald McDonald who was jokingly “promoted” to the post of McDonald’s’ Chief Happiness Officer in 2003. In 2021,...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Toral Patel

19 September | Born into the first family of executive search in India, following in her illustrious father’s footsteps might have seemed like a given for Toral Patel, managing partner of Accord India. But it...

The AltoPartners Guide to Diversity and Inclusion : My Name Is…

15 September | Say my name “Many new arrivals (we don’t like the term refugee) have names that are unfamiliar to Western Europeans. Just seeing a name that you can’t pronounce on a CV can cause hesitation and...

Ask Alto : What is quiet quitting?

13 September | “I think it’s quite clear my spark has gone, and I just get by doing the minimum. I used to be online hours before I started work; now, I don’t log on until after 0900. I used to work so late that...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Birgitte Olrik

12 September | CEOs describe her as their wingman and clients love her straight-talking ability to cut to the chase. Meet Birgitte Olrik, managing partner of Peoplement, our exclusive and dynamic partner in...

Ask Alto : Should air conditioning be part of workers’ rights?

07 September | Offices are notoriously either too hot or too cold – there’s never any way to set the air conditioning temperature in a way that suits everyone. When people were working from home during the...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Susanne Frey

05 September | This week we talk to Munich-based Susanne Frey, a partner at Jack Russell Consulting / AltoPartners Germany, about why she swopped a career in industrial engineering for executive search. What was...

The Director’s Dilemma – September 2022 Edition

01 September | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Santiago Solis Arias, General...

Ask Alto: What is an Employee Resource Group and does my company need one?

31 August | In a nutshell, employee resource groups (ERGs) support under-represented employees in the workplace. They are organised based on common identities, interests or backgrounds, which can include...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Julia Zdrahal-Urbanek

30 August | Meet Dr Julia Zdrahal-Urbanek, the dynamic founder and managing partner of AltoPartners Austria and the AltoPartners 2020 Cross-Border Consultant of the Year. For the past twenty years, she has...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Julie Garland-McLellan

22 August | She’s been a bouncer and once dreamed of being a bricklayer, but these days Julie Garland-McLellan is most at home in the boardroom. The Sydney-based board specialist has served on a range of...

The Director’s Dilemma – August 2022 Edition

02 August | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Keith Labbett, Managing Partner...

2022 Executive Remuneration Guide for ASX Mining, Tech and Energy Companies

26 July | AltoPartners Australia have just released the 2022 Executive Remuneration Guide for ASX Mining, Tech and Energy Companies. It has been an eventful start to 2022 with sudden reversal of monetary...

The Director’s Dilemma – July 2022 Edition

04 July | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Dr Julia Zdrahal-Urbanek, is...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Emmy Raaff

14 June | AltoPartners celebrates the researchers — the backbone of the executive search industry who work quietly in the background, combing through industry, analyst, and media reports to uncover hidden...

The Director’s Dilemma – June 2022 Edition

06 June | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Harry Friend, is Partner of the...

The metaverse – what kind of new jobs might it create?

24 May | Modern corporate life is so intertwined with mobile technology that it is almost impossible to imagine that business was ever conducted without a cellphone close to hand. And yet it was only in...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Sandra Olive Bäcker

23 May | This week we talk to Sandra Olive Bäcker – entrepreneur, fabulous cook, hostess extraordinaire, and coffee connoisseur, as well as being managing partner of Executive Search at Bäcker &...

Virtual reality in workplace education

19 May | The metaverse is here – or at least parts of it are. The term, first coined by Neal Stephenson in his novel Snow Crash, describes a virtual world in which people can live, work and play without...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Anne Borgen

16 May | This week the AltoPartners spotlight is on Anne Borgen, a partner at Peoplement, executive search specialists based in Copenhagen. Armed with a Master’s degree in Human Resources Management and...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Veronika Kaštovská

10 May | Armed with a master’s degree in adult education from Jan Amos Komensky University in Prague, Veronika Kaštovská, a partner and senior consultant for the Accord Group, AltoPartners East and Central...

The Metaverse 101 – how it might affect the world of work

05 May | Mark Zuckerberg’s October 2021 announcement that Facebook would be changing its name to Meta as a way to “bring the metaverse to life and help people connect, find communities and grow businesses”...

The Director’s Dilemma – May 2022 Edition

04 May | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Kevin Hall, is an AltoPartners...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Lauren Smith

03 May | This week Lauren E. Smith, Managing Director in the Miami office of the Diversified Search Group/ AltoPartners USA and an expert on executive and board recruiting, tells us what inspired her to...

Boost your career and join a board

21 April | Serving on a board of directors can be a career boost. Whether it’s for a non-profit organisation or a corporate entity, being a director is an opportunity for professional growth and growing a...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Maria Isabel Ventura

19 April | What better way to celebrate Diversity, Equity and Inclusion than by showcasing AltoPartners’ women in leadership? We asked María Isabel Ventura a partner at Executive Connection S.A.S in Colombia...

Read this before you accept that board post

13 April | With the focus on DE&I candidates at board level, companies globally are under pressure to diversify their board to satisfy shareholder and investor demands. As flattering as it is to be asked...

The Director’s Dilemma – April 2022 Edition

12 April | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. Contribution by Hansjörg Meine, is the Managing...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Nathalie Deroche

11 April | Meet Nathalie Deroche, Partner at Leaders Trust, one of the founding firms of the AltoPartners alliance. Based in Paris, Nathalie used her STEM training to launch a successful career in executive...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Claudia Hardy

28 March | This week AltoPartners talks to one of our Latam experts in Mexico City, Claudia Hardy, a partner in the Ezentia Group. Armed with a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from the University of...

Diversity on company boards – from tokenism to genuine change

23 March | The composition of company boards is changing. One survey found that directors from underrepresented groups increased their share of board seats at companies on the Russell 3000 index (which...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Annemarie Trouwborst

22 March | Her nickname is Sherlock Holmes because of her curious nature and impressive online investigative skills, a talent that – combined with a fluency in Dutch and French and a working knowledge of a...

Phenomenal Women of AltoPartners – Judith von Seldeneck

14 March | Kicking off our series showcasing AltoPartners’ women in leadership series, we are proud to feature one of the grande dames of executive search, Judith M. von Seldeneck, founder and chairperson of...

The Director’s Dilemma – March 2022 Edition

03 March | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. *Contribution by Ian Taylor, is Executive...

For love or money: directorships and board fees

03 March | Companies everywhere are under scrutiny – whether it’s about how diverse they are, how sustainable they are or how well they have managed the Covid-19 pandemic. At least one consequence of these...

Wanted: Resilient innovators to change the world

25 February | Leaders Trust /AltoPartners the Netherlands has been helping NGOs source visionary leaders for the past two and a half decades. Managing partner Albert Froom has a particular interest in NGOs and...

Salary negotiations: It’s a (white) man’s game …or is it?

22 February | Each year, a day is set aside to remind everyone that women still earn less than men despite legislation prohibiting discrimination in the workplace. International Equal Pay Day was launched based...

The Kaizen approach to innovation – moving beyond trendy buzzwords to strategic business imperatives

16 February | In an interview with Jean Paul Hokke, Partner at Leaders Trust International / AltoPartners the Netherlands, Alexander Eerdmans, Vice President at Capgemini Invent in the Netherlands draws on...

Big Oil on the Precipice of Change – Can Gen Z help?

15 February | As of 2020, the global workforce amounted to approximately 3.3 billion people, with six million of those found in the oil and gas sector. Many oil and gas (O&G) companies are looking to...

How Executive Search is Adapting to Serve Post-COVID Organizations

11 February | Executive search is not immune to change, and the industry has adapted, but at what cost? How did an industry that is personal and face-to-face focused transform during COVID? Hear Nicolás Mora...

THE WORLD HAS CHANGED – DO WE NEED NEW BUSINESS LEADERS?

09 February | By Jean-Philippe Saint-Geours, Partner at Leaders Trust International / AltoPartners Paris This piece was first published in French in the Ecole Nationale d’Administration Alumni Review. The...

Could You Earn More? The Art of Salary Negotiation

03 February | Negotiating a salary increase is a career ritual that no one cares for. But it seems to be an inevitable part of career progression and it’s certainly important for wealth-building. As...

The Director’s Dilemma – February 2022 Edition

01 February | Produced by Julie Garland-McLellan, Consultant at AltoPartners Australia and non-executive director and board consultant based in Sydney, Australia. *Contribution by Mpho Nkeli, Executive Chairman...

What Leaders Can Expect in 2022

11 January | By Ian Taylor, Executive Director Sheffield, North Island, / AltoPartners New Zealand Preparing for 2022 does not require too much of a crystal ball– the certainty of ongoing change is now embedded...