Listen to the audio recording of the interview.
Hello again – it’s Steve Warren it’s time for another Spectrum show. Today we’re going to have some guests from a company called FDM. And if you have heard of it, then you know what we’re going to talk about – if you haven’t heard of it, well, in the next couple of minutes, you will have heard about it. But anyway, we have four different guests and we let them all introduce themselves to us. But first of all, our first guest – we’ll let her introduce herself and she can tell you just a little bit about what is FDM.
Hi I’m Nabila Salem, VP of Global Marketing Operations at FDM Group. FDM is a very unique company. We’re an IT services provider with over 200 clients worldwide - renowned household names, household brands that you would have heard of. And what makes us unique is our business model. Our business model consists of training college graduates mainly in IT, numerical science, business, college graduates to become a professional IT consultants. And what makes it so special is that we train graduates and bridge the gap between academia and employment. The catch-22 situation is a big issue, especially in the field of IT where our economy has a severe lack of skills. However, demand far outweighs supply. So FDM trains graduates in order to fill that gap and then places the consultants once they’re trained on client sites and they could be placed worldwide representing FDM. Our APAC (Asia Pacific) opportunities are particularly interesting. So we have an office in Hong Kong, Singapore, and most recently we’re setting one up in China. And we are looking for graduates from those areas to place in companies in APAC after they’ve trained in New York (Wall Street), in London, Manchester or Toronto.
Tell us a little bit about the history of the company, how did it get started, when was the first need realized and who stepped up and decided to put the shingle on the door and go after this market.
That’s a very interesting story actually. The CEO of FDM Group, Rod Flavell is the founder of FDM and he still leads the business today which was founded in 1990 in a city called Brighton in the United Kingdom in the attic of his house. And it went from him founding the business to now leading a multimillion pound company with ten offices worldwide. And the need came about actually because he worked in a company where they provide freelancers to market and he realized actually we could be doing this model with graduates and train them to become sort of freelancers in the making if you like. So, FDM consultants are junior consultants, they’ve got the potential, we train them to have the skills and when they’re placed in these companies for a minimum of two years, our clients really like the fact that they don’t only have someone that they can mold to their business and teach them to become part of their corporate culture if you like, but they can also take them on permanently after two years so that’s a bonus to the client. It’s also a bonus to the consultant because whereas they didn’t have the skills necessary maybe to get into that company in the first place, after the training, after the two years, the sky’s the limit for their career.
They’re really able to focus and know exactly what they can learn and that this is going to be immediately applicable to what the company wants that they’re going to be working with.
Absolutely, the careers are extremely lucrative – so they could become test analysts, they could become Business Analysts, Project Mangers, Java developers, .NET developers, we train in a variety of those skills and more. And they’re all skills that are in demand, very lucrative, and it will make sure that their future is very bright.
Good! Well, we have some other folks here. By the way, I’ve been to Brighton. And maybe that was a guy in the attic that I saw when I was sitting there by the shore – in 1990 – having some seafood. Yeah, definitely. OK, let’s get to some of the other guests that you brought along from FDM. Who would like to be second in command here, second in line? OK, Ahmet, would you like to pull the mic up to yourself a bit there, thank you?
Of course, yes. My name is Ahmet Aydin. I’m the Head of Recruitment at FDM North America. I suppose I can put an additional slant on what Nabila’s giving you today. So we are looking for the Asian market, but we also provide the USA with a good, steady stream of IT Consultants and how we do that is quite interesting as well. We’re almost like a mini university is the way I like to describe it. So, after people have been recruited in, they join our award winning academy which is an intense program but it’s completed in up to sixteen weeks, depending on the stream. And they’re constantly getting their classes and doing their projects. Basically, when they’re finished, the clients are already looking for them; the positions are there and the Account Mangers are ready to place them.
Are you looking for people that are directly out of university or have had some experience in the marketplace as well?
Yes, the majority come as fresh graduates, even after one or two years of their degree time. We’re looking for junior positions – so anyone with perhaps too much experience may find the Academy course a bit easy to do. However, even for the advanced people, we can find them contractual sources positions as well.
Or perhaps, focus what they know into a specific area where there’s a greater need.
Absolutely, our clients need projects done, so that’s usually a combination of junior people and senior people. So we can hook packages together. So they are definitely useful. But the majority of the business is in the junior developer field. So graduates within the last couple of years.
Good, well thank you. Well let’s see who else we have brought along with us. I think it’s your turn now.
Hi, my name is Janet and I’m one of the Account Managers in Asia Pacific. So I actually flew all the way from Hong Kong. I’m based in Hong Kong and also go to Singapore and China as well.
What do you do there and what are you doing while you’re in New York?
My role is slightly different. So as an Account Manager, I basically work very closely with some of the clients that we work with across the globe. So in Asia Pacific, most of our clients are in the financial sector. So my day to day role is basically going to meetings and to find out what their needs are within their business and to see how FDM can support them and help them. So I have a very close relationship with candidates as well to tell them what opportunities that we have, especially the first weeks when they come in training. I try to introduce myself and speak to them about what opportunities we currently have in Asia Pacific. The reason why I’m in New York, as Nabila has mentioned, FDM is actually expanding to China. We have worked with various clients in China and they have provided some of the requirements that we have to fulfill in China, so we’re trying to support that project. So, opportunities in China, actually in Shanghai and Guangzhou. So these two are the cities where we’re currently looking for potential candidates to work there.
Our guests on Spectrum this morning are from FDM and if people would like to know more about the company, let’s pause for a moment and give your web address, so where people can go to immediately check on to exactly what we’re speaking about today.
www.fdmgroup.com
Fourth member is actually in all honesty, someone I already know, who’s Chris Lee. Chris, welcome. And you’ve just recently joined this organization. Tell us a bit about you’re doing there.
Yes, I joined the organization two weeks ago. I’m the Marketing Analyst in the New York office. I focus on marketing and broadening these types of opportunities and finding new prospects from a data-driven perspective. And I’ve also most recently been working on APAC marketing. So, marketing to a Chinese audience, but a global audience as well.
OK, good. It’s nice to have you back in another capacity. We all wear lots of hats here. In a perfect world, what would you hope to accomplish by opening all of these offices and are you looking to expand, to grow, to get into different areas, you know, the world of IT changes almost hourly and I guess there’s new technologies on the horizon. How do you know envision staying fluid enough to keep ahead of the curve on that?
FDM’s mission is always to grow, obviously to become more successful and the way we do this is because of the lack of IT skills that the economy has. And at the moment, what we are trying to do in Asia, is we’re trying to fill that gap and supply the necessary IT Consultants to our clients to help them in the areas, namely Mainland China, Hong Kong and Singapore. These high caliber IT, numerical, or business college graduates would ideally have studied in New York, London, Toronto, and then are eligible to work in Mainland China, Hong Kong or Singapore.
What would be the typical recruitment process that you go through – people find you, you find them? What is your outreach that you identify people that may be interested in your program?
Usually we’re marketing the positions online – we have job advertisements at universities. We’re using social media networking as well. Once a potential candidate has showed some interest, they typically go online at the website that was mentioned before (www.fdmgroup.com), they submit an application to us, and there are various locations at which they can work. Let’s just take the example of China since we are on a Chinese talk show. If you would select the China location from which to work, you will select something like USA to train in and we also have New York office, as well as a new Toronto office as well. So, those are the two North American locations. Once an applicant has applied, we will screen their resumes and decide whether or not the candidates background is suitable for technical training. Once they pass this stage, there’s a telephone interview; it’s only fifteen minutes long, but we normally schedule it in and we give them plenty of time to look up the company and find out more information about us. We’re relatively well-known in Europe, but we’re becoming more, better known around the globe as well, so we give people an opportunity to find out about us. But the main drive is to look for IT people with passion for IT.
Just for my own personal curiosity. Obviously, one thing that is changing in the United States and other parts of the world is immigration. The rules change almost you know, every week. And of course, we’re in the process of, in our country, the United States, examining that issue very, very closely. Do we see that there’s going to be a loosening and perhaps, improving opportunities for international cooperation in these issues as it regards people being better able to go from one country to the other and work from one country to the other?
Having first-hand experience on this, I think that the UK definitely makes things very difficult for people and has taken away visas, especially after studying. The US seem a little bit more flexible, although it’s still quite difficult for a student to remain here, although the opportunities are there. But given the opportunity by allowing to have a separate visa status afterwards after the degrees or their studies. So as long as they can find work that’s related to their degrees, the United States is very happy to keep them. I think it’s the right balance, really. It’s definitely a place to come, on many people’s visions, so I can understand why that there’s scrutiny and restrictions.
Once again, our guests are from FDM. And I guess we’ll just, the time flew by very quickly, but we’re not going to quite go just yet. We’ll go back and get to know each of you a little bit better and then your final words on FDM. Tell us a little bit about your personal backgrounds that people know that FDM is a diverse environment in which people can work. You wanna begin?
Sure, as I said, my name is Janet and I actually come from a very interesting background. I was born in Hong Kong originally, went to Canadian school up to the age of 14, and my parents sent me to a boarding school in the UK; I went to university at Nottingham and I worked for FDM after my graduation. So I started actually in London, and now they transferred me to go work in the Asia Pacific office. So this is the reason why I flew all the way from Hong Kong to London to New York, back to Hong Kong.
And you probably have a lot of other miles to fly, considering the territory you have.
Yeah, I definitely do, yeah.
And so, your background?
Yes, I’m Nabila, and I’ve worked at FDM for seven years. I was born in England, but I’m Spanish. I went to university in the UK, in Brighton, actually, where FDM was founded and I joined FDM as a graduate, seven years ago. When I joined, the company had three hundred employees, including consultants. And now, seven years later, we have 1,300+, so it’s growing very, very fast.
I’m Ahmet and I have a Turkish heritage. My family is from Istanbul and I was born in the UK. You can tell from my accent. I studied in the UK and I did a PhD in electronics, so I actually have a technical training background and I was a lecturer. I taught electronics for seven years and I did a lot of the recruitment side, so helping to get international students, which is how I landed my job here, so I used to meet the CEO after work, I’m friends with him as well, so that’s my background.
OK, and Chris, last but not least, a little of your background, as a new kid on the block.
Sure, I’m the new kid on the block, but I’ve actually been on your program before, I used to work for a consumer video chat company and I was in the product management department. And so my background is I’m a New Yorker, I don’t know if you can tell by my accent because my accent is relatively neutralized – it’s the general Midwestern accent. Was born and raised in New York, my family is from Hong Kong – so ethnically, I’m Chinese. It’s good to back on your program.
Great, well, thanks Chris. We’ll talk again. Alright everybody, thank you so much for coming by. I wish you good luck. Obviously, you have good luck. It’s not really something you need a lot of luck – you’re on the right track, to do the right thing with the right people. Hopefully, the folks listening around the world and around the US and around New York who are our regular listeners on our program will check out your website. Once again, the address of your website is fdmgroup.com. Thank you so much for being on Spectrum and I hope we meet again. 
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