Kea’s emphasis on Relationship First was what first resonated with me, and is the value I’ve tried above all else to maintain since joining. When you strip away finance and investing, at the heart of our role is interacting with people: understanding them, supporting them and building relationships with them in the long-term. While headhunting can hold a reputation of being mercenary and transactional, I appreciate Kea’s integrity in prioritising their candidates and treating them and people, not means to an end.
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I think headhunting requires a strong level of emotional intelligence.While at face-value, headhunting involves matching talented candidates with relevant opportunities, beneath that is understanding the more subtle aspects of someone’s personality and motivations, aspects which can’t be recorded as objectively.
Day-to-day
Part of the fun of working at Kea is variety; this makes defining a typical day-to-day challenging. Throughout the week, I’m consistently engaging with existing and potential candidates, whether this is introducing new candidates to Kea, helping candidates through processes as they interview with our clients, or just catching up with candidates and seeing how things are going for them. Another aspect, and where the title ‘Researcher’ becomes a little more tangible, is understanding and collating information on the market. It’s important for our business to be at the forefront of understanding the entire spectrum of investment space, and by extension the wide range of businesses and sectors that investors work alongside. It also means understanding the backgrounds of our candidates: what roles they currently have, how they’re finding working with their current employers and what gaps are missing that our clients could potentially fill.
KEA
What does success mean for you at Kea?
JL
For me, success is less a concrete, singular goal than a series of small checkpoints to reach. I want to be able to look back at the start of my journey at Kea, or even look back at the previous month, and see success in the new skills I’ve acquired and honed. Whether this is tied to a heightened understanding of the investment space, or linked to softer interpersonal or communication skills, success for me is continually growing and improving.
KEA
How have your outside passions influenced your day-to-day?
JL
I’m driven by curiosity and creativity. While the kind of storytelling and creative writing I do outside the job tends to be a little too fantastical for the world of investing, the core of my interest is in stories, which also lies at the heart of my role at Kea. Researching isn’t just identifying a potential candidate’s employment history, it’s also engaging with them, hearing the narrative of what lead them to where they are now and what’s driving them towards a future they might imagine.