Customers hiring your employees

In today's episode, Mattias talks about how he thinks about customers hiring away his own employees and shares that he just recently bought his first piece of art that has a deeper meaning for him.

A deeper meaning & connection

Mattias starts the episode by telling Svea about the first piece of art he has ever bought. Just recently he went to a vernissage where he fell in love with a painting called "Cloud Painter". The artist of that painting collaborates with Project Playground, a foundation based in Sweden and South Africa that Mattias' company supports. That's why he caught his attention. The painting shows a child painting clouds on some kind of surface. At first, it reminded Mattias of how we all have been fascinated by clouds as children but it also has a deeper meaning for him. When he sees that painting he gets reminded of wherever you are on this planet, we all see the same sky with the same clouds - and that connects us, even though a whole world might separate us.

A customer hiring your employee

Later on, he starts talking about how he has been in a situation where a customer would hire away one of his own customers. He says that he doesn't take it personally and that he also doesn't have any emotions attached to it. "It's business", he says. However, when an employee leaves iGoMoon, it always has an impact and it can be hard to invest a lot of energy and knowledge to train someone in the best way possible, just for someone else to see their potential and make them an offer.
For that reason, Mattias added a paragraph to his employee's working contracts where it's stated that a customer that might want to hire them away from iGoMoon, needs to pay a certain fee to iGoMoon. This however is only enforced when that customer actually had a monthly retainer with iGoMoon and decided to hire someone who has actively worked in the team that took care of that customer.

Avoiding conflict by communicating

Svea wants to know if the relationship with one of those customers might suffer after they have recruited a person from iGoMoon's team. Mattias explains that in these situations (as in all relationships) it is really important to communicate and talk openly about it. It certainly doesn't make it easier if one of the parties is hiding the obvious under the carpet. He even sees something positive in these situations: the person who is leaving iGoMoon and starting at the customer's company will most likely be a great ambassador for iGoMoon and can help to make the collaboration become even smoother.

💡 EPISODE TAKE AWAY
Customer's hiring away might happen - that's business. It is important to see the bigger picture and communicate with everyone involved.

How do you deal with customers hiring your employees?