Before Caspian One I was working as a Sales Negotiator with a local leading estate agent in the area. I’d left university about two years before and was really enjoying the sales industry, improving my confidence and learning to pitch and prospect for new business. It was okay, for a while... but the financial award for the effort and the hours you put in was becoming frustrating.

I met a friend, Lucy, through my partner, who worked for Caspian One at the time. I was 22, she had an awesome car, and I was still dragging around my 15-year-old Peugeot 106 on viewings at this point (with the paint chipping off the bonnet!). We got talking about her job over a glass of wine and she was so passionate and enthusiastic about what she did, I could genuinely tell she loved her job!

Three job interviews later and I landed a role as a Recruitment Consultant within the North America division. I initially helped them build out a tech centre for a leading global bank in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. That was for the first 4-5 months, and then after that, I settled into the Canadian market where I’ve remained ever since.

I joined around 18 months after that initial pilot, but we were still really saturated by two clients, which was sustainable for our team at the time. We stayed like this for a long time, servicing the contract and permanent market of one huge global bank and another smaller client.

We didn’t have much training back then. I remember being given a job description on my first day, printed from a client's website – and being told to “call this Manager and pick up a job”. I always remember this because it was a BA job (I didn’t even know what a Business Analyst was!) and I had to pick up the vacancy, work the role and, within 48 hours supply my three best candidates. It was like, “wow, this is the environment then!”.

Looking back now, training on the job, learning from my mistakes – was the best way for me to do it. I was very young, VERY money-hungry, and I wasn’t afraid of hard work. I’d put in the effort before with little reward in my old job, and I thought that if I could put in the same amount of effort here, hopefully, the reward would come in time.

Looking back on it, I didn’t love classroom training – I appreciate it, but to sit 9 am - 3 pm in a classroom having someone talk at me, I didn’t find much benefit in that at all. Being thrown in at the deep end in sink or swim mode, learning as we go and making mistakes; I think 3 months in I was on a plane heading to the US for my first set of client meetings – for me, that was the best way to learn.

Looking at where the company was then to how Caspian One is now, we’ve matured and stabilised. There’s better management structure, we have goals (quarterly, monthly, yearly). Teams are involved in budgets and what we need to do to get there. We’re spreading our risk with client diversity and variety and putting people where their strengths lie - previously the only path to the top was to be a Manager, but that’s not always the case. 

There were times in my mid-twenties when it felt like “the only way I’m going to be at the top is if I’m a manager” ... I wasn’t ready to manage people, no way.

I was too immature, too selfish, and I was in it for myself (which was perfect at the time). Now I’m a Delivery Manager, I’m more mature, I’ve got experience, I’ve made mistakes and had great rewards and successes – and I can now see the rollercoaster everyone else is going through. I can see me in them. I’ve been there, done that and learnt along the way. To now coach and mentor a team around me is so rewarding watching them reach their individual milestones and goals is wonderful to see.

In my opinion, our team is the strongest it’s ever been today. We’re way more collaborative and everything in the division is an open book; we know how everyone's doing and can hold each other accountable. It’s very much a case of working as a team rather than as individuals, that’s probably the biggest change I’ve seen and brought us closer together.

How has a career at Caspian One impacted your life outside of work?

Oh, it changed my life! 

Before I joined Caspian One, I was 23 on less than minimum wage. It was hard - I didn’t care about having money to spend materialistically at that point. My goals then were just to earn over £1000/month net. Then, in my first year at Caspian One, I was awarded ‘Best Newcomer’, and the rest is history. I've just bought my second home, it’s my dream home in the dream location and I still find that unbelievable, it’s wild.  

In addition to that, there’s the flexibility. I have a full-time job and was still able to take some time out to have a baby and come back to where I left off; returning to the role feeling comfortable, knowing Caspian One had given me the safety, security, and flexibility to balance family and work life and I'm thankful for that.