By Business & Finance 
Pictured: Gavin Fox, Director, Martinsen Mayer
Gavin Fox is Director at Martinsen Mayer, a technology recruitment consultancy focused on Technology and Digital sectors. Martinsen Mayer has helped numerous tech founders to build their early, as well as later stage teams.
I’ve been working since I remember! At 14, my mam told me that if I earned my own money she would never ask me how I spent it! So I started young; delivering papers, working in retail and working in an off-licence until I finished college. I moved into recruitment for six months and 14 years later, I am still here! The need for people to redevelop themselves. Across all industries, especially tech, people are constantly looking for new challenges, to work with new tools and to develop new skills and perspectives, all while applying the experience they have gained along the way. We help people do that. Connecting great companies with the ideal candidate. Away from being a husband and dad! Passing my probation, winning my first big project and getting involved in Martinsen Mayer as an equity partner. I honestly have had a great career to date but if there’s any advice I could impart it would be to always pick a job based on the culture and the people, not the money. I would have gotten involved as a Director in a startup sooner! I would define success as having people trust your opinion; and trust that you will deliver in what you say. “Inspect what you expect.” As a leader in a business, this is crucial, and something I am still trying to focus on. In my opinion, motivation is very personal. Yes, you can create a culture and vision for your business allowing people to be successful but creating motivation is very different. To motivate myself and others, I really focus on honesty and developing a group focus. Getting people to understand my expectations and listening to what they need to succeed are key. I am sports mad and very competitive; and recruitment is a competitive business so creating a collective goal and focusing on reaching that goal really helps motivation. You can only control the controllables. Family time takes up a lot of the relaxation time available, but when I have a chance I am a sports nut. I play golf when I can, and I love to run and watch sports. I would love to say reading books and all that but it’s sports for me. We are focused on scaling our business at the moment. We know if we stand still we won’t make our 2, 3 and 5 year goals, and we have some ambitious goals! First things first we will be doubling our current headcount by Q1 2022 and by Q4 2022 we want to double again! We have plans to open up our first hub in London in 2022, with aspirations to open up hubs in other established environments like San Francisco and Berlin. Finding the right person to head up our hubs is the number one priority for myself and Rob (Rob Shannon, Managing Director). I think if I look back in five years and say we have grown our bottom line by five that would make me smile and allow me to say – well done!What was your first job?
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In one sentence, how would you define success?
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