Coupa

Background

Coupa Software has positioned itself as the only purpose-built-for-the-cloud spend management platform that unifies business processes across all the ways employees spend money.

It has:

• Coupa Named a Leader in the Gartner 2019 Magic Quadrant for Procure-to-Pay Suites for Fourth Consecutive Time

• Coupa named to Deloitte’s 2018 Technology Fast 500

• Coupa wins ‘Innovative Sourcing Technology of the Year’ 2018

• 42% year-over-year subscription revenue growth

• Customer retention of 95% globally and 100% in EMEA.

Coupa’s Open Business Network has connected more than two million suppliers across the world.

Requirements

Initially, Coupa was struggling to source new sales executives of sufficient calibre for its European operations.

The company had been working with nine different recruitment providers simultaneously in an attempt to attract the right people.

But this multiplicity of recruiters resulted in these providers concentrating on the ‘low hanging fruit’ then giving up – instead of persevering to source the best executives.

Oakstone’s Solution

Oakstone’s sourcing of high-quality executives swiftly convinced Coupa that the fastest and best route to quality hires was to use only one executive search company (instead of nine).

Oakstone is Coupa’s sole supplier of executives across EMEA:

• Coupa’s most successful sales people globally in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017  (Gustaf Tanate, Will Goodall and Daphne Ruerslag)

• Successfully filled 95% of all roles we've taken on

• 100% retention of all managers hired (this is across both sales and professional services)

• 94% retention of all presales hired

• 100% retention of all prof services hires

• 76% of all our hires are with Coupa today

• Placed people that now run EMEA and the US (Rob Glenn and Gustaf Tanate)

Oakstone senior consultant Alice Willmott works solely on assisting Coupa with its executive search requirements.

This seamless Recruitment Process Outsourcing solution sees Alice spending three days a week at Coupa’s EMEA HQ in Dublin. She is part of the team there with her own Coupa email address and procurement account.

Benefits

Coupa is driving growth with a higher calibre of new hires sourced across EMEA.

The company also benefits from greater efficiencies by outsourcing its executive search to just one provider:

• Enhanced reputation – candidates are receiving discreet approaches from one company (rather than being at the centre of a nine-agency bun fight). Read here why executive search should always be a positive experience for all candidates (whether or not they are successful in securing the role).

• No duplication – Coupa no longer receives the same CVs from nine different agencies.

“Over the past four years, Oakstone has sourced many key hires for us in EMEA, across all departments – key managers, sales executives, pre-sales and professional services team members.

Their focus on delivery, cultural fit, background checks, transparency and overall professionalism fits well with our own company ethos.

This has reflected in the high retention of people we’ve hired through Oakstone,”

- Rob Bernshteyn, Coupa CEO