Ask the Recruiter: Ioanna on Blueground Jobs and What It Takes
So you got a callback for the job you’ve been eyeing and this next step feels like a make or break moment. Oh and you only have 48 hours to prepare. We’ve all been there and Blueground’s People Operations team is here to calm those nerves.
In this Ask the Recruiter interview, we get to turn the tables and hear from our Head of People Operations, Ioanna Christodoulopoulou. With more than 51 positions open worldwide at the time of writing, Ioanna’s team of recruiters is working hard to make sure every role finds the perfect talent and every qualified candidate finds a position at Blueground. Three and a half years after joining Blueground, Ioanna has seen the team grow from 10 to 226 — and things are only accelerating from here.
Blueground at a glance
- Founded in 2013 in Athens, Greece
- 9 cities spanning 11 time zones
- Recruitment team of 6 FTEs
- 46% increase in employee count in the last 6 months
About Ioanna
Inside Blueground: Hi Ioanna! Can you briefly let our readers know what your day-to-day at Blueground looks like?
Ioanna: My day-to-day centers on recruiting. With our business now in a hyper-growth phase, it’s my job to set a talent pipeline in place. What that looks like is approaching and sourcing top candidates who match our job requirements and culture fit.
Apart from that, I manage the full spectrum of People Operations activities from payroll to administering benefits. The aim here is to create the necessary HR policies and procedure that will foster our culture of engagement and empowerment.
IB: And do you work on filling openings just in Athens or in all offices?
Ioanna: All of the recruiting is managed centrally here in Athens. Our recruiters and Growth Team are in place to accelerate hiring in the US, as well as Dubai, Istanbul and Athens. We recruit in-house for all positions regardless of level or function, even for the specializations like engineering. This allows us to be more effective in making a match between the candidate and role while strengthening our value proposition as an employer.
We also look to recruit internally to promote, develop and progress our existing people.
Recruitment Process
IB: How do you recruit for new team members? What role do word-of-mouth referrals play in finding the right talent?
Ioanna: When it comes to filling positions in Greece and Turkey, Blueground is already well known so candidates come to us directly to apply. On the other hand in the US, as we are fairly new, we need to approach passive candidates, especially for the most senior positions. Of course, as we earn more brand awareness, we start to receive more inbound applications for executive roles as well.
Referrals are very important to what we do, thus we have launched our Employee Referral Program. It’s prevalent to our culture that we recruit from our own network in order to source the right people. So every employee can be a recruiter and end up working with friends or past colleagues or classmates, sharing their passion for work while having fun.
Our guiding principle is to hire for potential — in terms of knowledge and experience. So that our employees can grow alongside the organization and take on more responsibility.
IB: What is the recruitment process at Blueground like?
Ioanna: After you apply, you have a screening call with the People Operations team in order to read against your CV. This is used to have a first understanding of whether you are a good fit, and mainly in terms of Blueground’s values and the position’s basic required skill set.
Afterwards, we proceed to a second call with the hiring manager or the senior functional head. Next, there could also be a one-on-one in-person meeting, or a talk with the GM of the city to which you applied, as a third meeting.
And since our CEO, Alexandros, is also our Chief Recruiter, you also have the chance to speak with him. If you make it to the last round, we check your references then we get the green light from the CEO.
This is a very quick process. Our target is a 30-day time to hire.
Since we’re receiving so many applications and we strive to minimize the time to hire, we are thinking about implementing an assessment test. This would be to evaluate technical skills while our in-person or phone interviews cover personality questions. Stay tuned for that.
IB: If I want to apply for more than one job at Blueground at once, would you prefer that I submit separate applications?
Ioanna: Candidates can apply for as many openings as they see fit. And it is our responsibility to understand for which position the applicant fits best. In many cases, we’ve invited candidates to apply for another position. When you know the organization, you can easily assess the CV and see which role they fit now and what makes sense for their own career progression within Blueground.
We see it as our job to route the right candidate to the right position.
IB: And I’ve seen this before that individuals move from one area of the company to the next.
It’s very easy in our team — apart from some very specialized positions. There is a huge potential to move from one function to another. And you can even change cities — and go to the other side of the Atlantic!
IB: Does Blueground offer support with visas or work sponsorship for its US positions?
Ioanna: We have started doing this for the US for senior positions, on a case by case basis. We’re willing to do what it takes when we find the right fit.
Blueground as an Employer
IB: What one quality would you say permeates throughout the whole Blueground team?
Ioanna: I would say high energy.
The energy our team brings in the morning and carries throughout the day. I could say a lot of words! But high energy to get the job done through accountability and ownership. However, I don’t believe you can bring high energy without being likable, organized and humble.
IB: How would you describe the company culture and office culture here? I’ve worked at a startup before, will I find the same here?
Ioanna: We have a mix of corporate and startup-prevalent values. We value efficiency while having fun, collaborating, nurturing teamwork and of course sharing. But what you’ll find in a startup, but never in a corporate environment, is initiative taking and this eagerness is very important to us.
At Blueground, we encourage our employees to express an idea and tackle a problem from early on. It’s about the freedom to think and act.
IB: Any final words of advice to prospective applicants?
Ioanna: We need people who are committed to bringing results while demonstrating enthusiasm for teamwork. If a candidate adds their attention to detail and strives for continuous improvement, he or she will succeed at Blueground. We see them advancing their career so long as they leverage their knowledge and tackle the obstacles found at a startup.
Here we are a startup growing fast and, naturally, we keep adding or adjusting our processes along the way. Some people need formal processes and that’s fine. But if you’re the kind of person, who is agile and is open to thinking outside of the box, we’d like to hear from you.
Want to learn more about Blueground directly from one of our recruiters? Have a look at our job openings from Athens to Los Angeles.
