THE CHALLENGE
Our client, a ~$1b revenue and 10,000+ person automotive supplier, was partnering with a historically mechanical focused business, who are leaders in thermal products in the automotive space. The partnership was designed to diversify their product offering to market, by entering the world of advanced cockpit electronics. While the business is headquartered in Michigan it was looking to grow its presence in Europe by building its team based in Germany. The business was keen to diversify their internal culture and bring new ideas to the table by hiring leaders in Europe.
The main goal was for the successful candidate to build a large scale (100+ person) team focused on software and systems engineering based in the German location, and subsequently launch new products in the advanced electronics domain to customers globally. The client was also keen to review a diverse shortlist for the role, in keeping with the D&I policy.
THE SOLUTION
Leadership in the automotive electronics domain has little or no knowledge of our client, meaning our first challenge was building brand awareness for a relatively unknown company and educating potential candidates for the role about who the business was and its future goals. We created an attraction pack for the candidates, giving details of the transformation and technology the business is already creating as well as the impact the candidates would have on a global business. The role required specific automotive safety (Autosar and Aspice) knowledge so the target pool was limited to the automotive technology space, which the Miramar team was already very familiar with.
RESULT
We were able to provide the client a shortlist within 3 weeks, providing 5 qualified candidates from the world of automotive electronics and software development. Our shortlist consisted of leaders from the large automotive suppliers (Bosch, Continental, Magna & Visteon) with diverse product backgrounds in ADAS, autonomous driving, connected car and infotainment.
The selected candidate was hired from one of the large Tier 1’s and was convinced by our client’s strategy to diversify their product line as well as building a team from scratch. This offered the candidate far more of an impact than was possible in their previous position. The shortlist was 40% diverse with 2 of the 5 presented candidates being female leaders, one of which was ultimately selected for the position.
