Equifax

We have been working with Star Staff for about four years, mostly to fill positions for our IT department and for the financial product development and analytics department.

Our company, Equifax, is a credit history bureau; the company accumulates data on borrowers under the federal law on credit histories. And we are a huge aggregator of data. Accordingly, as a huge database, it would be strange not to use it to create something, so we develop all kinds of information products, analytical and software, which we sell to financial institutions.

Star Staff came into Equifax's life quite simply: I had been working for the company for about a year, and I received an email, one of many that come in advertising format. The unconventional nature of the letter caught my eye, it was quite frivolous in a good way, not in the classic business style. This letter was in the right place at the right time. At the time, I lost a freshness of vision from working with existing agencies, we had projects with the "monsters" among staffing agencies, but it was obvious that in the case of IT, we needed a different approach. I decided to try [working with Star Staff], and it all worked out.

It all depends on the vacancy. Each vacancy is shaped individually, often with the participation of a recruiter on the agency side. And from our side there is often a customer at the initial stage, the head of the department, who describes the profile of the successful candidate in detail. So in our case every vacancy is unique.

This is a very difficult thing for us.

When we talk to a person and realize that he or she has the potential to get an offer from, say, Avito or Ozon, we just talk about ourselves honestly. We say real things and projects that we have.
We try to select the most appropriate project and team for the selected candidate.

We have a very carefully selected benefits package, which includes everything that is most relevant to our employees.

• Compensation for fitness in the fitness club, located in our Business Center. With the ability to attend, for example, the pool at lunch time.
• Or English lessons, which we have, they are not just for show. We have 4 teachers, all native speakers, two of whom have been with us for more than five years. They know people like family, and the topics they discuss and how they teach are individualized plans.
• Insurance to clinics that are convenient to our colleagues and their families. We co-fund insurance for family members.
• We pay for training where the employee has chosen. We don't impose bought courses.

I would also note that we give our guys more freedom in terms of going to work, choosing tools.

Every "perk" we have is so alive, so tried and tested, that we tell it like it is. And if this puzzle matches both for us and for the candidate, he or she will come to us, and we will gladly accept him or her into our team of like-minded people. And there's no use in re-buying

In my opinion, at the beginning we were incredibly lucky to have our first Star Staff recruiter, Tatiana Akva, who was the first person to get in touch with me. In this respect, this was the point of reference on which the work was built. So with Tatiana and through her further communication was as effective as possible. And then, those who are working with us today, already use and develop the groundwork, experience and understanding of us as a company-customer, as deep as possible.

So yes, Star Staff knows pretty quickly who we need. It is thanks to the professionalism of Star Staff recruiters.

Star Staff has an absolute understanding of the IT market.

I am grateful to Star Staff at least for the dynamism we have in our work and their patience. The combination of these two qualities has allowed us to work efficiently.

We are always long and very detailed in our searches. It is often uncomfortable for a recruiter to sort through, it is right for them to dive into the task as much as possible and find the right candidate quickly.

We communicate a lot, always in touch on messenger and on the phone. If I have some idea, or my fellow recruiters, we call and tell each other. We have a fairly direct format of communication, prompt, which allows me to keep myself up to date, to work together and at the same time.

We switched to telecommuting at the end of March. One day, after the mailing, we packed our bags and went home. We are an international company, so we get information from headquarters one way or another about Equifax's plans.

The transition was smooth. For about two weeks we worked two shifts, we purposely shifted times to balance the load of public transportation. We started at 7:30, and the last one ended at 9:30. This allowed us to get to work comfortably and helped us maintain social distance and load in terms of business.

But we underwent a very serious mental change. Equifax had not worked remotely before.

At first, there was a lot of employee activity in terms of social activities, telegram groups, contests, photos, videos, communications. Later on, this tinsel went away, a clear structure of work of subdivisions on their tasks was lined up. Someone had to decompose the tasks even more, to break them down in more detail. And control, control and control again. Well, and video meetings from morning till night, so the voice sits. I think every executive has had that, because that's what they do all day. There was probably a lot of communication in the office, too, but there the look, tone, hand movements, and other things had more effect than an hour of monotonous conversation in Zoom or MS Teams.

Each team began to live by its own rules, we became such islands. It wasn't good for us, but it worked very well for the time slot.

Today, about 20-30 people work in the office every day. Most of them are those who, due to certain circumstances (in terms of information security), are required to be present at the workplace personally.

Telecommuting is still temporary for us. Living and working, but still temporary.

However, it has advantages, which will now remain. If you have to do something at work from home, you no longer have to fear that it will be impossible. Now we have everything organized in such a way that there are no problems with it.