I recently worked with a company who were a JD Edwards Partner in Germany. They had a valued employee of theirs retire and they needed someone with comparable experience to fill the big gap.
I spoke with the company to understand exactly what skills the candidate needed to have as well as the soft skills that were important to them. We spoke about the market, what expectations I believe can be met and our processes moving forward. Knowing how urgent this was for them, as they could not complete projects with the person leaving, we had to find someone as soon as possible.
Because of my good market knowledge, I already knew of 3 people who would be suitable for the position. Location was not an issue as it would be a home office contract which meant they could look at people in the whole of Germany for the best skills.
I scheduled the first and second stage interviews for each candidate and after 2 weeks, the company had decided who they wanted to hire. Luckily, the chosen candidate only had a 1-month notice period and therefore were able to start with very short notice.
The candidate has now started working for the company and all projects that were on hold due to the individual leaving have started and are on track to meet all deadlines. I believe this success was down to our efficient process and market knowledge.