Sorina Donisa, CEO APT Resources & Services
- Tell us a few words about your company, services provided and type of roles you accommodate.
APT is a company with a constant growth in its over 25 years’ experience in human resources industry and has gained visibility across many regions in Romania through our territorial expansion. We are specialized in temporary staffing, recruitment, payroll and staff administration and HR outsourcing services. Four years ago, we became part of Prohuman Group, one of the largest players in the human resources market in the Balkans. We provide recruitment and temporary staffing services mainly for positions in BPO, SSC, Banking and Finance, Telecom, IT and Technical Support, Front and Back Office, Customer and Sales Support, Secretarial and Personal Assistant, Sales, Logistics, Automotive, Retail and Production. The roles we accommodate range from specialist positions to blue collar jobs.
- What makes your company a great place to work for?
People are making our company a great place to work for. We are attentive to the needs of our colleagues and we try to adapt both at individual and team level according to them and at the same time to keep the focus on our partners business needs. I think the words that best define us are team spirit, adaptability, out of the box thinking, empathy. Appreciation and recognition of merits, constant feedback are other motivating factors, along with the benefits offered. We also have a slogan that suits both our employees and partners: when people choose wisely.
- Give us more details about the company’s culture and working vibe/atmosphere.
We take this opportunity to apologize to our neighbors who must hear every day the joy that fills the terraces at the morning coffee. Everyday events, jokes found on the internet, holiday plans are ingredients that help us get to know each other better and unite us.
We encourage freedom of expression and are open to adapting processes when colleagues want to leave their mark and come up with personal suggestions on the projects in which they are involved. We encourage the involvement of colleagues in various actions of the company such as participating in career fairs, keeping workshops for students and graduates, creating content for social media.
Transparency is the essential condition in gaining and maintaining people’s trust in the organization, as a result their opinion is important and is part of the final decision.
Although we have grown a lot in the last 2 years and usually the scaling of the business involves bigger, diverse teams, with new colleagues, we manage to keep the family culture that we created in APT, even if we are divided into 5 branches and we will open the 6th. The common projects that bring a mix of members both from the perspective of roles and location are those that help us get to know each other better, keep the team together, encourage creativity, bringing diversity of local solutions along with the scent of linguistic emphasis.
- Do you ensure career paths to your employees?
APT is a great place to learn and grow if you like HR. APT offers career opportunities not only for young graduates or people who would like to start a career in HR, but also to senior recruiters or HR specialists. APT is shaping careers starting with those at the beginning of their career path who want to evolve by gaining experience in the field of recruitment, temp staffing, payroll and admin.
If you like challenges, you will never get bored working in APT. The diversity of partners, from various business, of job types, complexity of projects, offers a recruiter or an HR specialist a broad perspective of many industries, although they are working in one company. You can recruit in the same time a financial controller for a retail company and have a similar position in banking industry which requires a very different set of skills. Every project is unique and you have the possibility to learn something new by seeing the culture of different companies, internal processes, leadership styles, employer brands, candidates behavior and expectation, thus giving you the opportunity to grow your knowledge and experience through the projects you are part of.
Working in HR industry is like you are directing a movie with undiscovered talents, which are becoming great actors wining the Oscar and having the satisfaction that you were the first one seeing their sparkle.
- What trainings do you offer?
In 2021 we continued the process of development and training of APT employees; the purpose being not only developing the technical competencies but also soft skills which nowadays are so needed, not only for the job but also in the personal life. We opted for trainings dedicated to all employees in order to refresh the importance of communication, regardless of the work model and courses dedicated to each type of role that would improve job performance such as: Mindfulness, Parenting, Nutrition, Tips & Tricks for Work from Home, Customer Centric Communication, Leadership, Excel, Digital Competences, Motivation & Charming through Feedback, Business Presentation.
- You know how dynamic our industry is – so what is your strategy to keep your employees engaged, motivated and boost their creativity so they can innovate?
We value their feedback, involve them in the decision process, giving them the freedom to implement new ideas, new ways of working, every member of the team is sharing their experience, thus leading to the opportunity to grow as individuals along with the team, partners and company.
It is very important for our team to feel a sense of belonging to the APT community and culture, because the motivation and engagement of our people was and still is one of the main business drivers for our expansion which was already highlighted by our business growth of more than 60% in the last year.
- Tell us more about your diversity and inclusion strategy.
Currently we have over 4000 employees in temp staffing or involved in outsourcing projects. One of the fundamental principles of APT is to ensure a constructive and dynamic work environment that supports the heterogeneity of skills, talents, opinions and beliefs, guaranteeing equal opportunities for all employees. APT grants equal access to career opportunities to all genders and races, 53% of employees being female compared to 47% male.
In the core team of consultants, ladies are representing more than 70% from the total and the leadership team has equal balance between the two genders.
We had developed an internal Disability project “Eu pot” through which we managed to integrate people with special needs in the labor market and the pandemic context contributed positively to this by providing the opportunity for the to work from home.
- What did your employees appreciated in your offices and how do you think the working (from the office) environment will change post pandemic? What are the new top features?
During the pandemic we had the chance to come to the office by rotation even starting with June 2020 and we were close to each other all while still staying safe. We will not return too soon to the working model applicable before 2020, but our team already adapted even more, both collectively and individually to the preference of each team member.
- Some of the employees appreciate WFH and also the flexibility it comes when choosing their location and program. Besides that, it’s a huge opportunity for companies to access new talent pools. Did your company consider working from anywhere? This includes anywhere in Romania or also abroad?
We apply WFA as an exceptional situation in order to adapt to our colleagues needs and we have a small number of people working from other locations in Romania other than the ones where we have offices, but on the long run we consider this model a great chance to access new talent pools.
- Is there a channel/web page where people can learn more about your company and career opportunities?
Being a company working in HR field, attracting candidates is one of the main concerns of APT therefore we are present on many online channels such as: LinkedIn, five Facebook pages for our branches: Bucharest, Brasov, Timisoara, Iasi and Sibiu, Instagram, all recruitment platforms available in Romania (eJobs.ro, bestjobs.eu, olx.ro, etc.). For a full image of our company and our team it is available the website www.apt.ro.