KB Europe is currently advising on an opening for a GUI Designer/Visual Designer. Our client is one of the leading global consumer electronics companies and one of the largest worldwide brands. The position is based at my client’s European Design headquarters in London.

Purpose of job

- Hands on design development of Graphical User Interfaces, visual design, style guide and production of Graphic assets for Domestic appliance products for line up design (production) and future conceptual design.
- Definition of the European Graphic design language to create the design identity.
- Research, analysis and reporting on European Graphic User Interface trends and visual design trends.
- Establishment of the strategic direction of screen graphics and the digital content visualisation.
- Contribute to the strategic direction for positioning the visual design identity of our clients GUI to enhance their brand image of Domestic appliance design.
- Contribute to the establishment of an interactive design language through Graphic User interface solutions.
- Generate graphic design solutions such as screen layouts, fonts, widgets, icons, animations, and visual entities to complement and support interaction style.
- Analyse GUI trends and trends in digital content visualisation in Europe.
- Develop GUI concepts for presentation and for User testing.
- Translate research findings into input to design language and visual design solutions.

Main responsibilities

- Develop visual design language and visual design solutions as a hands-on designer with relevant skills
- Ensure the end results of screen graphic design meet the market (consumer) demands, technical specifications and requirements.
- Communicate and cooperate with UI design development with other internal disciplines (Product Design, Design Intelligence and Research, Engineering, & Marketing), other business functions and external partners (Network operators and external consultants).
- Contribute to the definition of our clients and European local GUI design strategy and language.
- Develop & illustrate usage scenarios, animations, transitions, icons and widgets.
- Research, identify, analyse and communicate visual design and market information in Europe, ensuring that HQ receives regular reports on current GUI design issues and future trends.
- To develop a network of external consultancies and individuals to support the work of the UX design team.
- Understand the aims of visual design and design interaction widgets to support those aims.

Performance Standards

- Deliver projects on time and within budget.
- Ensure the project results satisfy the given briefs in aspects of aesthetics, physical and psychological interfaces between users and products.
- Create the documentation necessary to convey the visual design concepts and solutions through whole design development process
-Ensure the ‘look and feel’ of the visual design solutions satisfy our clients identity guidelines as well as our clients design language
-Provide input where appropriate to enhance overall quality of Domestic appliance UX projects
-Build trust with team members and other groups through appropriate and persuasive design presentation at each phase of the design process
-Resolve project-related issues in a professional, timely and logical manner.

Essential skills required

- BA or MA in Multimedia Design, Graphic/ Visual Design or related degree
- At least 3 years hands-on experiences in Graphic User Interface/ Visual design, ideally working with a multi-national company or design consultancy.
- Ideally, experience of designing for small screens.
- Must demonstrate a creative and innovative approach to design
- Must show personal creative GUI/ visual design (portfolio required)
- Must have a deep understanding of brand identity and how this is expressed though graphic design.
- Must demonstrate understanding of how interaction design, graphics and technology work together to produce an integrated user experience.
- Ability to plan and manage projects the whole design and research projects process.
- Ability to work and communicate with other design and business functions.
- Ability to work and communicate with outside count partner such as e.g. design agencies.
- Enjoy working in a team
- Proficiency in relevant design software and techniques (e.g., Flash, Photoshop, Illustrator, In design CS etc.)
- Interest/Experience in Human Factors, human behavior, field observations & ethnographic research.
- Interest/Experience in design trends.

If you are looking for a new challenge and this position is of interest please do send through a copy of your CV immediately.

• Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com

KB Europe is currently advising on an opening for a Senior Software Engineer. Our client is one of Europe’s most progressive companies specializing in Social and Business networking. The position is based at my client’s headquarters in Hamburg, Germany.

Summary of Key Responsibilities:

• Agile software development in a cross-functional, international team of Engineers (Environment: Solr/Lucene, Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl, Java, Scala).
• Close conceptual cooperation with the respective product owner, tech leads and software architects.

Required Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Several years of experience and in-depth knowledge of search technologies based on Lucene/Solr is a must.
• Additionally, experience in near-real-time-indexing, performance optimization and scalability of search infrastructures in a high-traffic web-environment is required.
• Very good knowledge of Perl and Java or Scala in a web or platform environment.
• Optional know-how in Data Mining, Big Data Analytics, Hadoop, recommender engines and recommendation algorithms is welcome.
• Excellent analytical skills.
• An enthusiasm for creating customer value and an appetite for creatively solving programming problems iteratively and efficiently in an agile software development environment.
• Good communication skills in English and German.

What we offer:

• Working on a high availability, high performance, high traffic, high attention website with more than 11 million users.
• Working on large, distributed, asynchronous architectures.
• Team centric software development (code reviews, mentoring).
• We use Open Source software wherever possible and we contribute back.
• Central location, near the beautiful Alster.

Applying

• Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com

KB Europe is currently advising on an opening for a Software Architect. Our client is one of Europe’s most progressive companies specializing in Social and Business networking. The position is based at my client’s headquarters in Hamburg, Germany.

Summary of Key Responsibilities:

• Review and improve existing architecture/infrastructure.
• Evaluate and recommend new technology/products to improve the existing ecosystem.
• Provide architecture consulting for development projects.
• Assume responsibility for scalability/availability and performance.
• Implement robust, highly scalable, highly optimized infrastructure components.
• Maintenance and improvement of the existing code base.

Required Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• You have experience in web application architecture (scalability, availability, APIs).
• You have experience designing and implementing distributed systems.
• You have programmed in several languages (Ruby, Perl, Java, C, C++, Javascript).
• You have strong experience with Ruby on Rails and Perl.
• You are passionate about and excel in solving challenging problems.
• You like to stay on the cutting edge of web application design and implementation.
• You are into pair programming and agile methodologies in general.
• You are a team player and enjoy sharing knowledge.
• You are fluent in English.

Plus:

• Contribution in open source projects
• Experience with messaging systems
• Experience with mobile applications

What we offer:

• Working on a high availability, high performance, high traffic website with more than 12 million users
• Working on large, distributed, asynchronous architectures
• Team centric software development (pair programming)
• We use Open Source software wherever possible and we contribute back
• Central location in Hamburg, near the beautiful Alster
• Free fruits and beverages

Applying

• Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com

KB Europe is currently advising on an opening for an experienced SW Developer for one of the world’s leading independent research broker’s working with global portfolio managers and traders throughout the investment process, from investment decision through to settlement.

Responsibilities

• Developing and maintaining algorithmic trading products in Europe
• Developing in C# (.Net 3.5/4.0) on windows.
• Working in an integrated environment – interfacing with other systems.
• Working both independently and with collaboration with other team members.
• Close interaction with the client (Product management and Production Services – located in UK)

Skills & Experience Job Competencies Company Competencies

Must haves:
• Computer science B.Sc (or equivalent)
• C# experience
• Object Oriented programming – 2 years or more
• Strong analytical skills
• “Run to completion” quality
• Team player
• Fluent English (written & spoken)
• Good communication skills
• Ability to effectively solve complicated development problems
• Experience working under time pressure and delivering on-time
• Quick learner
• Thorough and organized

Advantage:

• Acquaintanceship with automated trading systems
• Acquaintanceship with Agile methodology
• Python experience
• Integrated systems experience

• Excellent Analytical skills.
• Self-disciplined and motivated
• Excellent communication skill.
• Strong team player.
• Responsiveness to Change.
• Commitment to excellence.
• Meet project deadlines
• Troubleshooting skills

Accountability

Takes initiative, assumes responsibility and appropriately manages expectations with transparency to meet deadlines and deliver quality results

Business Direction

Clearly understands our client’s business and vision and is determined to achieve objectives and exceed expectations while focusing on the utility of the firm

Commitment to Excellence and Service
Sets high standards, commits to service and demands excellence while consistently adding value to build an environment of continuous performance improvement

Creativity and Innovation
Open to new ideas, thinks laterally and creates new paradigms to set the pace for the industry and differentiate our client from it’s competitors

Intellectual Capital
Maintains knowledge and displays intellectual curiosity while facilitating the exchange of ideas to strategically position our client in the marketplace

If you have the desire and drive to work for a genuine global leader in Research Brokerage and want to be an integral part of the companies continued unrivalled growth then please send through your CV immediately.

Apply:
Please send your CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com

My client, a global leader in online business and social networking, currently experiencing incredible growth is looking for an experienced User Experience Director.

Summary of Key Responsibilities:

• Manages a team of interaction & visual designers, user research, copywriters
• Owns the user experience in close collaboration with product management and engineering
• Is responsible for the entire UX design process (user research, interaction design, visual design & copywriting)
• Reports directly into the VP Product

Required Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Should be able to recognize long term trends, knows user experience standards and is able to inspire to design team with those
• Understanding of a product vision, innovation and a product strategy and how those can be aligned with user experience
• Should be able to translate theory into tangible artefacts
• Passionate about user experience, is a team player, has strong communication skills, is able to “think big”
• Focuses on quality in design, makes his/her points in discussions to increase the importance of design within a larger organization (“we are ONE product and we want it to be ONE quality”)
• Understands processes to drive creativity and is able to nourish them within a larger organization
• Proven experience and competence in mobile, tablet and desktop platforms and their technology constraints
• Has experience in innovative and agile product development and the role of user experience in this environment
• Has at least three years of leadership experience with a similar team
• Has at least ten year experience in user experience design (preferably in interaction design)
• Having experience in working for larger organizations is a plus

If you are looking for a new challenge, and your skills, experiences and motivations are as above then please apply immediately.

Applying

• Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com
• Call Kevin on: +44 (0) 207 729 6284

My client, a global leader in online business and social networking, currently experiencing incredible growth is looking for an experienced UX Visual Designer.

Summary of Key Responsibilities:

• Create and establish a consistent look and feel for the entire website and mobile solutions of our client
• Create page designs for new features and enhancements based on concepts, designs and specifications
• Create production-quality graphics and artwork
• Help expand and maintain our clients brand style guide and UI pattern library
• Work closely with interdisciplinary project teams full of highly qualified UX designers in a fast-paced, agile environment
• Participate in design, branding and online marketing initiatives

Required Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent in interaction/interface/graphic design, human interaction or related fields
• 2-3 years of screen design experience with consumer-facing websites
• Experience with the entire product design cycle, from wireframes, to mockups, to prototypes, through to the final design and implementation
• An online portfolio or samples of work demonstrating relevant experience
• Expert in Adobe Creative Suite
• Experience in HTML, JavaScript and CSS
• Ability to effectively communicate and persuasively convey design solutions
• Fluency in English and knowledge of German not required but advantageous

If the above is of interest and matches your skills and experience please apply immediately.

Applying

• Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com
• Call Kevin on: +44 (0) 207 729 6284

KB Europe is currently advising on an opening for an Agile Project manager (Scrum / Kanban). Our client is one of Europe’s most progressive companies specializing in Social and Business networking. The position is based at my client’s European Headquarters in Hamburg, Germany.

Summary of Key Responsibilities:

1. Act as an agile Project Manager (Scrum/Kanban) for 2 teams with a focus on guiding the teams towards improving the way they work and deliver results.
1. Facilitate the agile framework enhancements
2. Assist product owner and other stakeholder in doing the things right
3. Ensure cross-team coordination
4. Reach out to the larger network for impediment removal
5. Maintain relevant metrics and reporting that help the team and others see how they are doing
2. Liaise between the different roles and foster better communication and efficient ways of working between the disciplines.
3. Act as a project manager when necessary. Take responsibility for managing issues and dependencies between teams or third parties.

Who are you?

• You have proven knowledge and at least 2 years of experience in agile project management, preferably in a variety of situations. Additional knowledge and experience of non-agile project management approaches is helpful as well.
• You have an academic or comparable qualification.
• You love to bring out the best in people and build high performing teams.
• You have a strong sense of responsibility and you love to lead by example.
• You like challenges and you’re not afraid to deal with conflicts.
• You know when it’s good to say “no” and when to push for more/better results.
• You have very good communication and negotiation skills in English (written and spoken).
• You laugh at work. Daily. Multiple times.

What we offer:

• A position at one of Europe’s most successful social networks with more than 12 million members
• A wide range of demanding tasks with excellent scope for personal development
• A corporate culture that sets great store on professionalism, teamwork and initiative
• Offices in the beautiful Alster region of Hamburg , flexible working hours, open and friendly colleagues

If you are looking for a new challenge and this position is of interest please do send through a copy of your CV immediately. Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com

The phone interview

Phone interviews are becoming an increasingly popular choice among recruiters. This interview method is often used as a screening process after sifting through CVs, and it gives the employer an initial insight into an applicant’s potential suitability for the role. As well as saving both time and expense, recruiters can subsequently decide which candidates are worth inviting to the next round of the application process.

Not everyone will inform you in advance of a phone interview. However, if you do receive warning you should prepare for the interview as much as if you were attending a face-to-face meeting. The employer will use the phone interview to form a first impression of you and to decide whether to take you on any further in the application process. Below are some of the things you can do to ensure you’re well prepared for a phone interview when it arises.

Find out how long

Make sure to ask how long the phone interview will last if the recruiter does not specify. You will then know how much time to put aside on the day, and this also gives you an insight into the types of questions they may be asking. If it’s a short interview they may simply be asking you basic questions to get the initial formalities out of the way before inviting you to a face-to-face interview. If the interview is longer then it’s a sign that they will be asking you more important and proficiency-based questions.

Find the right location

Find somewhere quiet and tidy which you will be able to easily access for the phone interview and make sure there are limited distractions. Turn off anything that may cause noise during the interview e.g. alarms, televisions, mobile phones. You should, if possible, use a landline to avoid unexpected cutting off, signal failure or battery problems. If you have children, try to arrange phone interviews during a time when they are not going to be needing your attention.

Make sure you have paper and pens in this location ready in case you need to jot down any important information during the interview.

Have access to your application

When applying for jobs keep always keep hold of your application. If you’re then contacted regarding a position you will be able to look up and familiarise yourself with your application before the phone interview. The employer will base many of their questions on this, so knowing what you have written is essential in order to answer their questions well.

Print out your CV and all other relevant documents and have them all ready in front of you. You should know your CV well and not have to rely on having it in front of you, but having the documents close by is handy in case you’re caught off guard by a question. You don’t want to be in the position of having to admit that you can’t remember what you included in your application.

Prepare

As with a face-to-face interview, always make sure you prepare well. Take note of some of the questions they may ask and consider some of the main strengths in your CV to use in your answers. Remember, you will often need to refer to specific examples in your past experience to back up your answers.

Do your research on the organisation.

Find some key points which you can refer to during the interview which will show the employer that you’ve made the effort to look at their website. Find out who their competitors are, what services they offer and what their unique selling point is within the market.

Also prepare some constructive questions of your own that you can ask the employer at the end of your conversation to convey your interest and enthusiasm for the role.

Practice

Again, as with face-to-face interviews, make sure you practice for the interview. Use the people around you to listen to your answers and give you feedback on how you can improve. Do a sound check on the phone to confirm that people can hear you properly and that you’re speaking clearly and concisely. Practice will make you more confident and less likely to slip up and make mistakes during the phone interview.

My client, a global leader in consumer goods, currently experiencing incredible growth is looking for an experienced SAP Analyst HR Systems to join their SAP HR professionals at their European HQ in Krakow, Poland

Job Description

Are you keen to develop your experience within one of the most advanced HR systems portfolios available? Come and join our team! We are looking for talented experienced SAP HR professionals with strong analytical capabilities, creative approach to problem solving & well developed communication skills.

THE OPPORTUNITY:

As SAP Analyst you will be responsible for designing and supporting solutions in Global SAP HR System, considering integration with other applications. You will be part of the central team that is maintaining and harmonizing Template in Global SAP HR system to achieve long term solution sustainability.

Specifically, you will:

• Understand business requirements & design IS solutions for strategic enhancements based on business needs, in SAP HCM Global System
• Ensure that newly implemented solutions are in line with the Global HR Template and are not conflicting with existing functionalities
• Prepare specifications, manage implementations & conduct testing of changes & enhancements
• Proactively identify technical improvements in Global HR Portfolio, improving long term systems stability & sustainability
• Ensure system readiness for the respective Global business cycles
• Build and maintain strong working relationship with internal customers and with the external service providers
• Maintain the knowledge & documentations of the existing solutions
• Analyze functional incidents, propose fixes & solutions, communicate with the developers in order to implement the changes on timely basis

Desired Skills & Experience
QUALIFICATIONS:

• Experience in support & configuration in SAP HCM Personnel Administration or Organizational Management or Payroll & Time
• Knowledge of SAP Talent Management, Learning Solutions, SAP HR Security, SAP Workflows, SAP HR Benefits, SAP ECM will be an asset
• Experience in SAP implementation project or experience in the support organization
• Good understanding of key processes in delivering IS/IT services
• Ability to work independently on complex issues
• Ability of analyzing existing or proposed solutions & identifying the best alternatives
• Very good command of English

If you are looking for a new challenge and genuinely want to be part of one of Europe’s leading SAP HR Departments then please apply immediately.

Applying

• Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com
• Call Kevin on: +44 (0) 207 729 6284

My client, a global leader in online business and social networking, currently experiencing incredible growth is looking for an experienced Principal Product Owner to work from their European HQ in Hamburg.

Summary of Key Responsibilities:

• Lead the cross-functional discovery team consisting of User Experience Lead, Project Management, Monetization Management, and Technology Lead.
• Assume responsibility for the concretization of the XING Product Strategy, and at the same time define and prioritize the company backlog of top-level projects together with the other Product Owners and the Management
• Support the development of the product and business strategy at XING
• Understand top-level user needs and turn them into top-level product concepts, designs, etc. in order to implement the strategy; validate concepts and designs through prototyping and check them against user feedback. Identify dependencies between the multiple agile teams.
• Implement the product strategy together with the peer Product Owners, drive implementation of product concepts, and coordinate with other departments
• Report to the Vice President Product Management

Required Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• At least 5 years of professional online product experience with a sound technical background and understanding
• Leadership role: “Make people listen to you who don’t have to”
• Very good analytical skills and proven visionary power
• Ideally with experience in working within agile development teams
• Sound communication skills coupled with an excellent command of English

If this profile matches your expertise, experience and aspirations, please send through your CV immediately.

Applying

• Email you CV to kevin.oreilly@kbeurope.com
• Call Kevin on: +44 (0) 207 729 6284