Monstered by their owners: The Randstad and Apollo debacle in Europe | ep109

Episodes of the Inside Job Boards and Recruitment Marketplaces Podcast are typically 15-minutes. Long enough to get a good understanding of the topic, not long enough to bore the socks off of our audience.

Cohosts Steven Rothberg of College Recruiter job search site and Peter M. Zollman of AIM Group (Marketplaces / Classifieds) knew going into today’s episode that the topic needed more time to do it justice, and so we are giving it that time. Our guest is Matteo Nicolo, director of international sales for CareerBuilder + Monster.

Together, we talk a little about the history of Careerbuilder and Monster before they were combined by Randstad and Apollo Global Management, Inc., how they were operated after that combination, the impact of the recent Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and how terribly they’re treating the couple of hundred European employees despite having far more financial resources than necessary in order to treat them humanely.

AI-generated transcript, courtesy of the AIM Group:

Steven Rothberg:
Welcome to episode 109 of the Inside Job Boards and Recruitment Marketplaces podcast. I am one of the two co-hosts, Steven Rothberg with College Recruiter. I’m the founder.  And we believe that every student and recent graduate deserves a great career and that it should be easy and inexpensive for employers to hire them.

We’ve got a special episode today, kind of a breaking news episode, and I won’t spill too many of the beans, but you’re going to want to hang on for probably a bit of an extended episode. This should be really interesting.

Peter, my other co-host. Hello.

Peter Zollman:
Yeah, your other co-host. How many co-hosts? Well, you have three podcasts. I’m looking for a lot more co-hosts.  

Steven Rothberg:
The fewer your contributions, I think, the easier I’ll sleep.

Peter Zollman:
I’m Peter Zollman with the AIM Group. We do consulting, conferences, and content for job boards and recruitment marketplaces. We’ve got a bit of a different podcast today.

The fallout from the CareerBuilder and Monster bankruptcy is continuing, and about 200 employees of Monster in Europe are the latest victims. We’ll fill you in for a minute and then we’ll get to our guest Matteo Nicolo of Monster in Europe.

Randstad, the global staffing company, bought Monster Worldwide in 2016, so almost 10 years ago, for about $429 million. At the time, Monster was doing about $600 million a year in revenue. It was profitable, and Randstad intended to incorporate it into its staffing organization.

Randstad is based in the Netherlands and does more than 24 billion euros a year in revenue. So it’s big. It says its core values are, and let me quote here, “to know, to serve, to trust, striving for perfection, and simultaneous promotion of all interests.”

Pretty good. That’s a pretty lofty statement for a company that’s setting 200 employees adrift. For the record, we invited both Randstad and Apollo Global Management, the other villain in this story, to appear on the podcast. Randstad declined.

Peter Zollman:
They responded saying we should ask Monster. Apollo didn’t even respond.

Steven Rothberg:
Randstad said we should ask Apollo.

Steven Rothberg:
Yeah.

Peter Zollman:
No, Randstad said we should ask Monster to—

Steven Rothberg:
Oh, okay.

Peter Zollman:
Yes. And of course we have somebody from Monster, but that’s not whom they had in mind. Apollo didn’t respond—no surprise there.

Apollo bought CareerBuilder in 2017 for roughly 500 million. It sold off many of the company’s primary assets. From what we at the AIM Group heard from a very knowledgeable source, it made seven times its initial investment, maybe more, in those sales and profits from CareerBuilder until it all went south.

Apollo benefited from its ownership and, as a company with 72 billion dollars of assets under management—or at least that’s what they say—it could afford a 15 million or a 20 million or a 30 million or 50 million dollar payout without blinking an eye.

This is a story of victimization because Randstad, which could easily afford to pay that 15 or 20 or 50 million euros in severance and extended severance, perhaps, to these employees, is stiffing them. Severance pay was cut in the U.S., and now Bold, which is about to buy the CareerBuilder and Monster job boards from out of the bankruptcy, has said it will employ 350 full-time employees. Unfortunately, that does not include the European employees.

Randstad and Apollo are essentially saying tough luck to the European employees. We see Randstad as more culpable here. Why? Because it bought Monster as a going—not necessarily growing—but a going profitable business. It couldn’t figure out what to do with it, and it finally handed it off to Apollo to get it off its books. It said that the handoff to Apollo would not have a material impact on its financials.

So now let’s talk to Matteo Nicolo of Monster in Europe

Peter Zollman:
What’s the latest? What is happening with the European Monsters? When are you going to have to liquidate the companies, or when are they going to be liquidated? Can they make payroll for August? What’s the story here?

Matteo Nicolo:
Yes. Hello and thank you for inviting me to this podcast. Yes, the latest is that, as you mentioned, the next step for all the European subsidiaries—today we have operations in 12 countries, but we don’t have a physical presence of staff in all these markets; we have nine of them—is liquidation. So liquidation will take place within the next few days to within the next few weeks because we do not have the same cash situation in all countries. But basically liquidation is looming forward, and I would say probably 85% to 90% of the European employees will soon be gone.

Why I’m saying not 100%? Because, breaking news, Bold has extended some offers—is planning to extend some offers—to some Czech-based employees. As you know, in the Czech Republic we have a shared service center and it covers globally. So certainly they have some people they would still need for the new business.

Last comment: however, they still clarified that they are not planning to keep any European operations. 

Peter Zollman:The operations are in 12 countries, and they have been operating more or less at break-even. 

Matteo Nicolo:
I have to say that in terms of profitability, profitability has been an issue already for quite a few years, but it’s also been an issue because we have an excessive cost base and every year there is a very high percentage of,  of management fees that is charged to all the different countries, and this can go to 30 to 40% of the annual turnover. So when you have already a business that is not particularly profitable and on top you add this huge , huge cost, that makes things even harsher.

Peter Zollman :Now, you could have tried to do a management buyout—an employee buyout—if you could have held the Monster brand and reputation for what it’s worth. Sometimes good, sometimes not so good.  but the problem with that was that essentially they gave you no opportunity, and that I, again, would fall on Randstad even though they only owned 49% of the company when…

Matteo Nicolo:
This is a… yeah, this is really one of the most serious concerns and critiques I told to our management—that basically we’re not given this option. Because we’re not many in Europe, but most—many of us—are really deeply committed to this company. We’ve been working for the company for 10, 15, 20 years. We love this business. We believe that there would have been a spot for Monster still in Europe.

But, you know, as basically we were informed that everything was going to go through a fire sale when we were already off the cliff, then this made things impossible. Because definitely, had we known it a few months earlier, we would have—I would at least have—definitely tried to lead a group in Europe to work towards a management buyout.

Steven Rothberg:
You know, one of the things that I think we really want to talk about in this episode is sort of to distinguish between what Randstad and Apollo are legally allowed to do versus what I think most people would say they should be doing. And especially, like, in light of what Peter read—and, you know, Randstad’s, like, values—it just seems very contrary to the values that they say they have.

Apollo, a private equity firm, I think, you know, they’re just going to follow the dollars. And if they can make a dollar and 14 people get hurt, they’re going to make a dollar. That’s just—that’s the way the industry works. But I think we all feel like Randstad should be doing more than that.

So, what I’d like to do is just take a second and read—or paraphrase—a little bit from one of the Monster employees in Europe who posted on LinkedIn, her story.

And it’s from employee Lindsay. She talks about being a single mom. And as somebody who grew up in Canada, I appreciated her use of the British spelling “mum” rather than the American “mom.” And she said that she’s been at Monster longer than she’s been married. She’s been there for 17 years.

Her world was turned upside down when, earlier this year, her 12-year-old son was diagnosed with a rare blood condition, which will ultimately mean that he’s going to be getting a bone marrow transplant in mid-September—so roughly a month and a half from now. Juggling this for any working parent would not be easy, she writes. But she had the financial security and personal support that came from her tenure with Monster.

Now, it seems to me that the rug has just been pulled out from underneath her—that she probably has days, maybe a few weeks left as a Monster employee. And she’s a person, her son is a person. And so when corporate executives make decisions based upon dollars and cents and not humanity, these are the people that get hurt.

And Matteo, I think this is the kind of person that you’re fighting for, right? I don’t think you’re fighting for shares in a company—or, you don’t have any shares.

Matteo Nicolo:
We don’t have any shares as employees. The shares—it was a 4.58 million dollar booking that Randstad made. This is in their annual report for the senior management, you know, when the company—when the spin-off, sorry, when the joint venture was created. So they accelerated all the vesting of the shares for the top management. On these things, there’s been no issue of cash for Randstad.

But actually now, when we need to speak of the actual employees—as you’re saying—they’re not just numbers; they are real people. And what really shocks here is the gap between the hypocrisy and the simple view that is taken. Because we are told basically, you know, in Europe, “Basically, you have the government taking care of you.” But this is a simplistic approach.

Because I do not know the legislation in all the markets, but for example in France, the country I’m in, as soon as a liquidation is acted, then we immediately lose the health insurance. When you are fired, you still get the health insurance for some more months. But when there is a liquidation, you lose it immediately. And this is probably the case also in some other European markets.

And then, you know, this is also something we are questioning—we are criticizing Randstad for—that we are putting people into precarity. Because, first of all, you have people that will not have the health insurance. But you have also—even though the government one day might step in—this does not happen overnight.

You first need to declare a liquidation. Then there needs to be the government institution taking care. And this can be faster or slower. In Italy, it can take several months. In France, it will take at least one month and a half. So you still have people—you do not know what are the requirements and the needs of people.

We have people, as I said, many of our employees have been in the company for quite a long time. So we have also quite a lot of senior employees, and some of them, they have some heavy health requirements—needs. So that’s why it’s really, it’s really a tough and inhuman move.

And if I may—sorry, if I may conclude—just, Randstad is saying, , well, you were saying some, some great slogans before, but there’s also “it’s the most equitable company” and their approach is “human forward.” Yeah, they struggle to see this human.

Steven Rothberg:  A follow-up question for you: I just—I want to go back because that was an interesting thing that you talked about—that if the company is liquidated, you lose all your benefits right away.
Yeah, that’s kind of the norm in the U.S. When an employee is terminated—we’re at will—you lose your benefits right away. So, I think a lot of our U.S. listeners are going to be like, “Well, welcome to the club.” But I don’t think we should be saying that just because something shitty happens to American workers, therefore that should happen to European workers.

I think the opposite is true: we should aspire to protect our employees to the extent that we can more. This is also not a situation of a company that’s run out of cash and is going out of business, right? Randstad is big, it’s very profitable—as Peter outlined. So this is a choice of putting money into the employees’ pockets or the shareholders’. The money’s there.

So, in the EU—specifically in France where you sit—would it be the norm in a situation like this for the company to fire the employees so that they continue to have benefits instead of liquidating? Like, when this kind of thing happens with other companies, what’s the norm in the EU?

Matteo Nicolo:
Well, the norm usually—I have to say that this is something that’s particularly shocking also for France because, as we’re saying, in total we’re not so many employees. When you look, we have 200 employees throughout the whole of Europe. In France, we have 30 employees.

What is shocking is that—you said—the amount that this would entail from a financial standpoint for our shareholders to do a clean closure is just peanuts, with the profits they make.

And what I have to say is shocking for France, but also for the other European markets, is that you have two highly profitable companies—two multi-billion companies—that basically want to rely on public money to pay for their shortfalls and for their wrong management decisions.

And there was something very true that you said before: that, you know, what is legal is not necessarily ethical. Now, if you say, “Is this legal?”—obviously, what they do is legal. Because, you know, before setting up the joint venture, they were surrounded by armies of lawyers. They paid—no, but jokes apart—they paid, I don’t know, dozens of millions of dollars in lawyer fees if you add up what was paid before and what’s been paid now. By the way, with this cash accelerating the downfall.

So, when I, for example, spoke with the Randstad legal director, I told her: I know that from a legal standpoint there’s nothing we can object—because you’ve been surrounded by smart lawyers—but what you’re doing is not right, is unethical, and it’s against the principles that you’re claiming to be as the base of your DNA, of the DNA of your company.

Peter Zollman:
You mentioned to me the other day that within the bankruptcy paperwork, there were also some bonuses for some of the senior executives who stayed to see the company through the bankruptcy. That’s pretty common in the States. But in the States also, employees are what’s called first rank creditors. Employees must get paid before anyone else gets paid in a Chapter 11 or a Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

So some of the money from the proceeds of the sale would go to the employees in the States. The bonuses are being paid, from what you understand, but there is no first rank of creditors in Europe if the companies are liquidated. Correct?

Matteo Nicolo:
Yeah. Well, the big issue we have with this is that with a Chapter 11, basically all the cash—well, our company works on a cash pooling approach from a liquidity standpoint. So basically, it means that the cash—there is a central treasurer, and the cash might have flowed before from the U.S. to Czech Republic to Germany to France.

Now, everything—with the Chapter 11—then you have basically a rampart between the U.S. and Europe. So no more money is flowing between the two sides of the Atlantic.

So, what we were told basically is that we had to survive with the money we had on the accounts. And structurally, Europe needed to get some cash from the U.S.—because, don’t forget that in Europe, we have also quite a few headcounts working for global, for example, also like myself.

So if all of a sudden you can’t wire any more money, then you are going to be strangled.

The auctioning itself—it went pretty well, because in total the total proceeds went up from 35 million, which was the stalking-horse bid, to near 65 to 70 million. But the problem is that, despite all this bigger amount of cash in the U.S., the U.S. is saying that they are unable to wire more money to Europe for an orderly closure.

And just one last comment: on the U.S. side, considering that they’re getting much more money, I think it would be the least that they would increase the compensation and—as you said—the money allocated for the employees that will be let go. Because, you know, two weeks—two weeks for 15, 10, or 20 years of tenure—is really not a lot.

But that’s not the topic of our subject today.

Peter Zollman:
Yeah, but Bold—to its credit—as part of the bid, said it would employ 350. Now, these are companies that, when they were in their heyday, probably had several thousands of employees between them. But still, the—you know—winding down, the 350 people who have or will receive—who have received or will receive—offers, that’s something.

From what we can tell from Europe, basically they’ve said, “Good luck, God bless, and we don’t need you.” And that’s okay if, as you say, the company ran out of money. But Randstad—24 billion a year in revenue,  let’s say 15 million for argument’s sake in severance and shutdown costs and that sort of thing. That’s not even a rounding error for a company with the values of—how do they put it?  —
“To know, to serve, to trust, striving for perfection, and simultaneous promotion of all interests.”
Well, it doesn’t sound like they’re living up to that.

Matteo Nicolo:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. As you said, the money that would be required for Europe—you’re not very far—it should be in that range. And , so as you said, it’s really a rounding error.

To the credit of Bold, they are going to keep quite a few of the U.S. employees. As far as I know, the offers are being extended now—since yesterday and over the next few days—and I understand that usually they’re keeping the same T’s and C’s for the employees. So that’s, , so that’s very good for the people that can remain.

But basically, the sad thing of all this story is that in the U.S., the brand will survive. Maybe they will get a better management, some people will remain on board, and there is a future. What is sad is that we didn’t have any chance for Europe—because in Europe we’re losing the brand, we’re losing the employees, and basically we’re losing everything. Because we are also told: “Get out of here. We will liquidate. We will liquidate you without any money. And thank you, thank you, goodbye.”

Peter Zollman:
It’s also worth pointing out that Apollo sold off the operations in India, in Asia, in several other countries. CareerBuilder—rather, that was Apollo. That was Randstad. CareerBuilder/Monster—Apollo sold off the Broadbean. It sold off TextKernel. It sold off a number of the CareerBuilder brands in Europe.

In other words, just selling off TextKernel and Broadbean brought in, from what we have been told, a large portion, if not more, than what they originally paid for the company. And as a result, you know, having sold off all of those assets—even if they gave away some of them or gave them away for a nominal amount—they really kept the core and drove it into the ground.

Now, they faced competition from LinkedIn. They faced competition from Indeed, of course, but they were still viable businesses. A year ago, they had 20 million visitors for CareerBuilder—roughly 20 million for Monster, most of those in the U.S.—and the next thing you know, we put them together and we allow them to collapse.

Matteo Nicolo:
Yeah, Peter, if I may say, I think LinkedIn and Indeed are the easy scapegoat to justify the collapse of this joint venture. Because clearly—at least in somebody’s mind—the future was already defined since day one.

Because there is nobody that will make me change my mind that you cannot assess the success or failure of a joint venture not even eight months down the road after you launch it.

And you know, at first—I told you when we met—at first intellectually I was really thinking, “But how come? What is the logic of making everything fail?” But then, really digging more into the practices of private equity, I understood everything.

Because, you know: buy the business, load it with debt, put a little cash out as real money outflow from the company, then cut cost, reduce the employees, spin off the profitable parts of the business. Then you get with a shell, already make several times your initial investment, you remain with this shell—by the way, you host it, you put it… it depends not directly from Apollo; it depends from Camaro Holding, which depends from another shell company.

So you insulate also all liabilities from possible creditors and then, anyway, the debt is not yours. You bankrupt everything.

You know something very interesting I read: when a company is privately equity-owned in the U.S., it has one chance out of five to go bankrupt. Business—the average statistic throughout the country—is 2%. So we’re speaking of a factor times 10. And basically the logic is always the same: we squeeze, we cut cost, we extract all we can, and then once everything is sucked, we just throw it away.

And usually, you know, most of the time it’s the employees, we the clients, that are going to pay for it. And this applies to every industry. Now, our industry, we’d say, the hurt people are the employees. But in other industries, you have the people in healthcare, you have the first aid, you have utilities, you have a lot of sectors.

Steven Rothberg:
Interesting.
Peter, I think we have time for another question or two.  Yeah, well, I’ve got one and you’ve got another one and we can wrap with yours.  The question that I’ve got, Matteo, is that I kind of suspect that a number of people in our audience would basically say, “Okay, I agree—probably legally okay. Morally, ethically”—my words, not yours—“really shitty.”

What do you want? Like, what would make Matteo and the other couple of hundred Monster European employees feel like, “Okay, we’re really disappointed that the company that we gave, like, blood, sweat, and tears to is gone, but we get it. We need to take care of ourselves and our families”?

So like, what are you asking for?

Matteo Nicolo:
Yes, absolutely. We are just—considering Randstad—I mean, the introduction I did on Apollo I think speaks for itself in general of what is our expectation of private equity. By the way, I reached also to Apollo, to the partner that was at the forefront of this joint venture, and they never got a response. So , no surprise on this.

Yeah. What do we want? Well, basically, as we said, unfortunately, we can’t claim back our company because this is too late. So the only thing we want, at least, is to have an ethical—

closure of the business. Ethical closure of the business. What does it mean? It means that Randstad should step in and, in each market, pay people according to the local legislation.

In France and Germany, for example, they also signed collective agreements with employees. And, you know, by the way, this was signed—I’m speaking of France—in 2023. We were having regular rounds of layoffs. So this suited the company to have a frame so that people would stay there and they would know, “Well, in case anything happens, at least I’m protected.” Now that it doesn’t suit them anymore, they want to cancel it.

So we are just asking: basically, you respect your commitments. Full stop. Now we can’t get the company back, but at least you close it respecting the law and respecting the collective agreements where these exist. Full stop. That’s all we ask.

Steven Rothberg:
So, just to clarify—because I think they might say something to the effect of, “Well, we are respecting the law. We are respecting the agreement. We’re liquidating the company and therefore we don’t have to give you anything.”

Correct me if I’m wrong—I think what you’re saying is: respect the law, respect the agreements as if we were being fired, right? And then, so if France requires Randstad to do A, B, and C in the event of firing an employee, that’s all you’re asking for.

Matteo Nicolo:
Absolutely. Because also remember that when I say that everything has been well framed legally, it’s still borderline. You know, it’s not really black and white. So there is some responsibility that we can claim to the company. We can claim that this whole joint venture was a trick since day one, and we have also some solid arguments. So when I say that what is done is legal, it doesn’t mean that we do not have any legal recourse. It’s to say that on the surface, everything is done as it should.

Peter Zollman:
I think that’s a good place to wrap up. Obviously, we wish you and your co-workers the best. What has happened is indeed a shitty situation—as Steven described it.

It’s tragic that Randstad bought a company and couldn’t figure out what to do with it, but it happens. It’s tragic that private equity—in this case Apollo Global—bought a company, made a ton of money from all indications, made a ton of money, and then, you know, basically ran out of interest, put the company to bed.

At least in the U.S., some employees will continue—and I guess, apparently, some of the technology employees in the Czech Republic will continue as well. Good for all of them. We hope that Randstad—and perhaps Apollo Global, but we know better—we hope that Randstad will step up, do the right thing, and we hope you will keep us posted.

AIM Group will carry the stories, the articles as necessary. Chad and Cheese have been in your camp as well—good guys—and we’re glad to see them jumping on the bandwagon. And we hope that ultimately people are treated right, which is all that one can ask. Whether it’s Randstad, whether it’s Monster, whether it’s CareerBuilder, whether it’s Apollo Global, whether it’s any company at all—layoffs happen, cutbacks happen. It’s not a good thing. Never been a good thing. I’ve been on both sides, unfortunately. But treating people the right way is what matters.

And in this case, from all indications, Randstad in particular is not living up to its core values. And when we asked them to comment, they said, “Talk to Monster.” Which, of course, is absurd, because Monster, the entity, has nothing to do with this. It’s Randstad’s decision. They’ve made a decision to walk away, and, you know, that’s apparently who they are, despite what they say on their website.

Closing words, Steven. Otherwise, we’ll wrap up and post this online.

Steven Rothberg:
I really want to thank you, Matteo, for working with us to put this episode together, spending this time. This isn’t an easy thing for anybody to discuss, but there are heroes in this world, and the work that you’re doing to help your fellow employees in Europe makes you a hero in my mind. And thank you. Thank you for that.

Thank you for joining us as well. I know you’re on vacation and you’ve spent the last two weeks not vacationing. But I hope your daughter had a great time at her program.

And your wife has enjoyed her vacation in New York City without you—mostly.
And when you fly back home tomorrow—maybe when you arrive on Thursday, Thursday morning—there’ll be some good news from Randstad. I wouldn’t hold my breath, but one can hope. Hopefully.

Matteo Nicolo:
Yeah. So, thank you very, very much.

Yeah. And just as a last statement, if I can: please, you know, also something—why are we so attached to Randstad in this situation? Because Randstad was our shareholder for nearly 10 years, and it’s during Randstad’s tenure that the company got to this sorry state. So that’s why we feel that there is really a need—a real need—for some corporate responsibility there.

Thank you again for inviting me. It was a real pleasure to talk with both of you, and all the best, and hopefully speak soon again.

Steven Rothberg:
Thank you, Matteo. Fly safely.

Peter Zollman:
Thanks. Safe travels home.