First-Knight

Posted by deverellsmith on 30th October 2019 -

devtalks… with Knight Frank’s Jonathan Richards

Jonathan Richards, Recruitment Business Partner at Knight Frank, was the first guest to step up to ‘breakfast with devtalks…’ hosted this morning at the company’s London offices by CEO Andrew Deverell-Smith.

devtalks… draws leading figures from across the world of property and this morning’s bar stool interview covered the hiring cycle and insights into one of the industry’s most successful and established companies.

Focusing on “People. Process. Systems”, Richards gave an overview of Knight Frank’s HR challenges and innovations from a company that now employs more than 19 000 people across 500 offices in 60 territories.

“Knight Frank has an extremely motivated and dynamic culture,” Richards explained.

“Four words that sum our business up are: independent, international, commercial and residential. We look for a collaborative and entrepreneurial approach from our hiring partners that can add to and boost our culture.”

“We’ve enjoyed a longstanding relationship with Knight Frank,” said Andrew Deverell-Smith.

“The deeper the partnership, the more work we’re able to do. No debt, no loss and private ownership across 60 countries bears testimony to how an organization can expand on a significant scale and still retain its integrity and high quality performance.”

“deverellsmith will always be one of our core partners,” said Richards.

Gender equality remains a major issue in the UK property industry and across all areas of business. According to the 2017 BBC gender pay gap report, 78% of companies pay men more; 13% pay women more and 7% are of equal pay.

They are constantly building relationships across the industry,” he added.

“When they put their heads together they work as a very dynamic team that nobody in the industry can match – they provide a critical mass from a fantastic group of people.”

deverellsmith currently have a range of permanent and interim roles at Knight Frank.

For more information please contact:
interim: Georgia Littlejohn: T: +44 (0) 207 291 1518: E: [email protected]
permanent: Lucy Norman: T: +44 (0) 207 291 1519: E: [email protected]