Casa Leone in Floriana has been spruced up, with a bright red door and a new nameplate: recruitment company Castille Resources.
Matthew Camilleri and his team have moved there from offices in Old Bakery Street, Valletta, which have been straining at the seams for some time. The iconic 18th century building was purchased this year and totally refurbished, with all telecommunication services and other infrastructure like central air-conditioning installed.
“In our opinion Floriana is among the most accessible locations on the island and visitors to Casa Leone can park relatively easily at no more than one minute walking distance to our offices,” he said.
Although they moved in a few weeks ago and the smell of new furniture and fresh paint still hits you as soon as you enter, there are already plans to add more storeys to create more space.
As with any entrepreneur, Mr Camilleri is already planning his next big thing, which will be technical coaching, where he will source experts to provide this crucial aspect of job-seeking.
The additional storeys will be used as training rooms, complementing the several bright and cheerful meeting rooms he has for candidate interviews.
Castille Resources was set up from scratch just seven years ago.
“I reiterate the word from scratch because Castille was a new brand founded by an industry outsider which is rare, given that most other entities in our industry are off shoots of existing players, subsidiaries or franchises,” Mr Camilleri said.
Its recruitment services cater to three main sectors: financial services, technology and senior talent, with companies ranging from small specialist firms to large international organisations. The company also produces an annual salary survey for these sectors, based on 2,500 positions, which is an important benchmarking tool for both employers and employees.
“While a significant amount of analysis goes into the exercise, Castille chooses not to commercialise the publication, so far preferring to share this with our network and use it for our own better understanding of our markets,” he explained.
In 2009, he set up another arm, Castille Interim, which filled another niche: the provision of temporary staff. There are other divisions, dealing with recruitment consultancy, project staffing, and on-campus recruitment, to name but a few areas.
His 11 employees – eight of them recruitment consultants – all have one thing in common: a dedication to their clients – both the companies and the candidates.
“In this field, it is all about understanding who our clients are and about understanding the skills of the candidates – which goes well beyond a job description and a CV,” he said.
“This takes time. But that is how you build up relationships,” he said.
The company has thousands of candidates registered, although not all of them are actively looking for jobs.
“But at this level and in these dynamic sectors, there are many people who are keeping an eye open for opportunities,” he said.
“More than 80 per cent of the companies surveyed for our Salary Benchmark have plans to grow their headcount in the next 12 months.”
“We want to evolve beyond a ‘search and select’ company to a ‘talent and knowledge acquisition’ company, with a strong focus on professional development,” he explained.
What lies ahead? In the coming year, they will open an office in Mauritius.
“Mauritius is widely recognised as the gateway and investment hub within the African Union as well as having been the most popular vehicle for Western investment into India for some time now.
“We believe this will broaden our network of talent and opportunities beyond the type of internationalisation possible from our Malta base,” he said.