Spring Group will open five international offices in the next year, said its chief executive.

Speaking exclusively to Recruiter, Peter Searle outlined his plans. Spring is primarily an IT recruiter, but is growing its activity in recruitment process outsourcing (RPO), finance and other areas. He is looking to make Spring a "multi-disciplined, multi-brand business". It has no offices outside the UK. Searle mentioned Hong Kong, Singapore, France, Italy and Spain as among the most likely locations for new offices. It now has more than 850 staff, and will grow by at least 80 over the next few months.

Searle said he was looking to fill every job through RPO rather than "spot". However, the company's challenge is clear, he said: "How do we tell a customer that they can go from being a spot customer to being part of a PSL (preferred supplier list)?"

Searle took up the reins in September, having previously been the head of UK & Ireland operations at Adecco. He has lured several staff from there. Searle is aware of the perception that many staff become disaffected with Spring, and are soon looking for an exit. However, staff turnover levels have dropped to 20% since he took over, he said.

He said the number of redundancies since he took over had been "in single figures".

He said that since his appointment, he had refocused the company's priorities. "It's no good looking at key performance indicators," he said. "This a people business. I have never stopped visiting offices."

The company has net cash of £45m and Searle hinted at acquisitions. "It would be common sense to buy into some markets," he said.

Spring will announce its results on 7 March. The company has already said pre-tax profit will be about £5m, compared with a loss of £5.5m in 2005.

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