Nishma Aguado | making work meaningful stories.
Nishma Aguado, programme director
I feel lucky to be in a job and industry that I really like. I am truly passionate about all things relating to the most important asset a company possesses: talent. Having the autonomy to be creative about the solutions we can build together with and for our clients is what drives me daily. Managing people and supporting them to realize their true potential is incredibly rewarding.
a workday with Nishma
My typical day is split between team management calls and client meetings. I am responsible for leading strategic transformation and service delivery across a couple of accounts. As the lead of a team of phenomenal account directors and their operational delivery teams, a key part of my role is to make sure we stay firmly focused on our total talent management journey.
The topics vary from the well-being of the team across client accounts to the transformation of talent acquisition strategies for our clients. I also support new client bids and internal Randstad Sourceright initiatives, such as Randstad with Heart and our inclusion strategy.
achieving a healthy work-life balance
Organize, organize, organize! And stay calm. My advice is not to put so much pressure on yourself all the time. There are days when I’m an amazing boss, but feel I’ve not been the best mum, and other days where I have been “mum of the year,” I've felt compromised somewhere else. Every day the balance shifts, and you need to accept that and roll with it. Take moments in the day or week to evaluate the balance you’re achieving.
Randstad Sourceright empowers you to do this as it successfully adopted remote working even before COVID-19. One of the company values at our organization is to trust, and I honestly believe that Randstad Sourceright embraces this and values each employee’s contribution at all levels. At Randstad Sourceright, we work in an environment where people can work flexibly as needed.
ensuring agile leadership
Regular check-ins with people across the whole team are key. There are many different types of challenges that people are facing across the team between work and home. I’ve ensured people know how adaptable we can be to accommodate this.
In addition to making people feel supported in a remote working environment, I believe it’s important to give everyone something to strive for at work. While the team has superbly managed their daily operational tasks, it's important none of us lose sight of the strategic goals and make time to progress our collective priorities.
This has helped make work meaningful and rewarding in a team environment. I have encouraged people in the team to step up, and in doing so, helped them to understand how they have or will make a difference. My approach has been to keep our total talent management journey moving forward, while staying aware of the team’s challenges and needs at the same time. This has meant being realistic about deadlines and managing clients expectations on the commitments we make.
the key to staying well
Organize, organize and organize — did I say that already?! I am a born scheduler and if I don’t schedule time for me, it will be the first thing to fall off the list completely! We need to remember to “make time for me.”
When I am not working at my desk, I am committed to spending time with my family: my husband and two very gorgeous and very cheeky children. Making time to have fun as a family is important to all of us. We love getting messy doing art projects and science experiments, and enjoy nature trail walks and climbing trees.
There are many articles on how to slow down the aging process of your brain and learning a new skill apparently helps this. I’ve recently taken up painting, and now I love it!