You have been at PageGroup for over 10 years, how did the recruitment market evolve since you started your career with us?

The market was not as mature as today. Back then, there were only a few multinational players and a couple of local recruitment partners. It was tough to attract candidates and we used our local CV provider partner and our own database to find talent. Today the technology is much more mature. Also, with a growing network of specialized recruitment consultants with years of experience, our candidates’ database gets increasingly stronger and richer. This allows us to make faster paced business decisions and we keep improving the quality of the services we provide to our customers.

And how has the company changing and evolving since then?

Our official name was Michael Page International in the first 4 years in our Turkish operations and then we re-branded. We became one Group – PageGroup – with different brands, focused on specific types of recruitment. The company has evolved a lot in the past 10 years. In 2010, Michael Page Türkiye was composed of 10 people, within 2 recruitment divisions – Finance and Sales & Marketing.

Three years later, at the beginning of 2013, we had grown to be a company with more than 40 employees within different specialized fields.

In over 12 years, Page has matched a lot of great talent to the most prestigious company in Türkiye. Michael Page Istanbul Office has always been a school for the Turkish recruitment market.

How would you describe the daily work and career progression of an Associate Director at Page?

I have intense days of work and I call myself a Problem Solver. When a client needs help with a recruitment process, I am a direct contact to assess them and I am always reachable, within the natural work/life balance. I believe this is a key factor for my success.

Self-motivation is another key point for this role. You are the main responsible for lifting your motivation up! Negative things happen; you should never think about it for too long, as you must continue to drive because the road is long.

Finally, passion is definitely the key indicator to be successful in this role.

And how do you perceive yourself in your future with us?

I am still ambitious about my job; the future is not written yet. You never know what will happen next in your career at Page. One of my dreams is to work for an international role as a next step. We will wait and see.

There is a quote from Kobe Bryant, which I constantly use as self-motivation: “Those times when you get up early and you work hard; those times when you stay up late and you work hard; those times when you don’t feel like working, you’re too tired, you don’t want to push yourself, but you do it anyway; that is actually the dream. That’s the dream. It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.”