Schneider Electric
An approved supplier relationship with Schneider Electric — filling sales manager roles across multiple UK business units before the business transitioned to an in-house talent function.
Client Overview
Schneider Electric is a global leader in energy management and industrial automation, with a substantial UK operation spanning multiple divisions including electrical distribution, building management systems, industrial automation and data centre infrastructure. In the UK, Schneider sells through a combination of electrical wholesale distribution, direct specification channels and systems integrator partnerships. The business employs large field sales and technical sales teams across its divisions, with consistent demand for sales management talent across a wide range of specialist product and channel areas.
The Brief
Sales Recruit UK was placed on Schneider Electric's approved supplier list and worked with various HR team members and hiring managers across the UK business to recruit Sales Managers at all levels and across multiple divisions. The briefs covered a wide range of roles — from electrical wholesale-facing sales managers to technical sales leads within the building management systems and industrial automation divisions. Each search was handled as a standalone brief, with the candidate profile defined in partnership with the relevant business unit hiring manager.
The Challenge
Schneider Electric's size and the breadth of its UK operation meant that each brief was effectively a specialist search in its own right. Candidates needed not just sales management capability but the specific technical and market knowledge relevant to the Schneider division they were joining — a candidate suitable for an electrical wholesale-facing role was rarely transferable to an industrial automation or data centre position. Managing multiple concurrent searches across different divisions, each with distinct requirements and candidate pools, required careful organisation and a strong understanding of the nuances between Schneider's different commercial models.
What Sales Recruit UK Did
Sales Recruit UK maintained active relationships with multiple hiring managers and HR contacts across Schneider's UK divisions, building a working knowledge of each business unit's commercial model, culture and candidate requirements. This enabled briefs to be scoped accurately and quickly, and searches to be targeted to the right candidate pool for each division. The SRUK Fit Score process was applied consistently across all searches, providing Schneider's hiring managers with a structured, comparable shortlist for every role regardless of the division or seniority level involved.
The Outcome
Sales Recruit UK filled roles consistently across multiple Schneider Electric business units throughout the period of the relationship. The relationship came to a natural close when Schneider acquired another business that had a large in-house talent acquisition function, at which point the consolidated group moved away from agency support across its UK operations.