Simon Kelly not only made the bold move from Ireland to Australia, but also saw new responsibilities and development opportunities when he travelled across the globe.
I started working with Indeed as a Client Success Specialist in Dublin on the UK and Ireland team in November 2013. After a couple of years, I then moved on to manage our Job Boards and Staffing team before also taking on the role of managing our Direct Employer team.
In late 2017, while still based in Dublin, I had spotted a role advertised for a Client Success (CS) Manager at Indeed Singapore, and decided to apply for it.
After further conversations with Indeed’s management team, I was made aware of a role opening up for temporary maternity leave cover in Sydney and I jumped at the opportunity to apply.
Three years later, I am still in Australia! Moving here has allowed me to grow professionally, and given me more opportunities to work on my development.
Having started out at Indeed as a CS Specialist in 2013 and now as the Director of Client Success, my guiding principles throughout any of the roles I’ve had in my career have always been to provide the best service to whoever my client may be, whether it is someone external, internal or management that may be asking.
Our mission is to help people get jobs, and that for me also applies internally within the business.
I want to always provide an answer or resolution that I myself would want to receive, which would resolve my issue as quickly and as accurately as possible.
I’ve always loved data and using it to help inform decisions. I rely on it to help me guide how I view different situations and my advice would be to always double check the data to help backup your proposals or ideas.
In Sydney, we have people in the CS organisation who come from such varied backgrounds, and that is the best thing about CS – we all bring our own unique skill set to the role. For example, I have a degree in History and Psychology before studying for a Masters in Business and adding on additional courses like a Prince 2 Project Management certification… and yet here I am!
As a leader, I really want to ensure that I am reliable – if I say I’ll do something then I make sure I do it and follow up on it.
Being open minded to other ways of thinking and being honest is a key part of any role. It’s ok to be wrong or make a mistake but you need to be honest about it and learn from it. Being a manager, I’ve always tried to make sure I can improve things whether it has been with a product or a bug or a process. Always striving to be more efficient not only helps you in your day to day, but also our clients and the business.
Simon’s secret to success
I have found it personally valuable to seek out someone who will be honest with you and give you both types of feedback, positive and negative. For me, one of the most rewarding parts of my job is when I see someone on the team learning, and watching that person develop.
The skills that usually standout in our best Client Success people (CS reps) are that they are empathetic, have great listening skills, inquisitive, problem solvers and are consistently motivated to help others.
One really key area is that the CS rep masters our company products, they know them inside out, and are able to provide accurate information.
On the flip side, there are times that can be tough; like when someone on the team is struggling, maybe it can be because of a tricky client or sometimes it might be a personal issue outside the office.
I’ve found that the best way to help can be to just talk about these situations, and while sometimes we might not always have the perfect solution, it can help the person to know that we care and that we are listening. Being open and honest can relieve the stress the person might be feeling about an issue. Take the time to check-in to see how things are going with each other’s general daily life.
Another thing I’ve found to help is to maintain a work life balance. These days it can be tricky with our current work environments being entirely home based.
What I do to manage this is to try to stick to core working hours, say 8am to 5pm. I make sure to take breaks throughout the day from the laptop, even just for a quick walk around the apartment or a lunch-time stroll outside to clear my mind really helps me refocus for the afternoon.
What’s great about Indeed is that we usually form some great friendships with our colleagues, so it doesn’t always have to be work, work, work!
Best part of being in Australia
On top of all that, being in Sydney has had other out-of-office rewards, like the sunny warm weather and beaches, the food, and kangaroos! The weather is amazing especially when you compare the almost constant sunshine here versus the rain at home in Ireland. Sydney also has a huge selection of different cuisines to try out and being a bit of a foodie, I love having so many options to try great food.
I’m a HUGE rugby fan, I’ve loved it since I was a kid. What I’ve found is that it has really stood to me in my career as it was a great way to help me build up my communication skills, work within a team environment towards a common goal, and create a pathway that showed me I loved to help lead as I was the team captain in both school and at club level.
Once you are passionate about what you do and enjoy it, it just comes naturally to you. Any hobby can play a role in helping your working day if you sit down and think about how you could apply those skills to your work. And the great thing about living in Sydney was that I got to see Ireland win the series against Australia on the 2018 Tour!
Thinking of a move?
One piece of advice I’d give anyone looking to relocate is to organise your visa early. I did it with the help of Indeed, but it can be a bit tiresome as the Australian Government requires a lot of information, so starting to compile everything you need (our migration agency will guide you) and set up a folder in the cloud for you to easily access your information would be a good tip.
For anyone looking to relocate to Sydney, one of the hardest things was making the decision on where to live! Sydney is huge and depending on your budget for rent and whether you like the beach or not are some of the biggest factors to consider. I live in Erskineville, which is right beside the buzzy Enmore/Newtown area which is full of cafes, restaurants, bars and things to do.
If there was anyone that was looking to join the CS team in Sydney, my advice would be to keep an eye on open roles, speak to your manager about how you would like to move overseas at some point if this is of interest to you, and don’t be afraid to apply to a role if it is something that really interests you.
To learn more about the benefits offered in our Sydney office, click here.
