A drive among European firms for greater efficiency is behind business transformation staffing specialist Venquis expansion into Central Europe, according to managing director Steve Garner.

Venquis has announced that it has opened a new division in Central Europe, focusing on Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Garner told Recruiter: “Business transformation specialists are in demand in the UK and that’s no different across the rest of Europe. Financial services institutions are all going through large change. Increasing regulatory change means they are having to continually update and improve the efficiency of the organisations.

“Just as an HR department exists across organisations, a business transformation department will exist and have the same prominence in very large organisations and SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises].

“All organisations have been affected over the past few years. Since then the priority has been for organisations to look at things like credit risk. What was once a department of one person at the back office is now a division of 20 or 30 people that are reviewing change or business strategy. The uncertainty around the Eurozone is driving the need for efficiency to run alongside projects to ensure they are run in the correct way.”

The division will be led by German speakers Mathias Geisselsoeder and Tim Bilski, who are both responsible for recruiting change management professionals and business technologists for the financial sector.

Geisselsoeder was previously managing consultant at Hydrogen Group, specialising in the DACH (Germany, Austria & Switzerland) region, while Tim Bilski joins from eFinancialCareers, where he recruited for financial institutions in Germany and Austria.