In this episode of The Leader Show with Lou Carter, Robert Dusik of TITANS Freelancers shares the journey to becoming a Most Loved Workplace, emphasizing values like competence, reliability, and fairness. He highlights the role of their C-level academy in fostering leadership alignment and collaboration.
Robert also underscores the firm’s commitment to human rights, inclusivity, and environmental protection, alongside a strategic focus on ethics to ensure compliance and success. Lastly, he describes how TITANS Freelancers excels in matching the right IT specialists with clients, ensuring a perfect fit for both parties.
Hey folks! Thanks for joining us on a brand new episode of The Leader Show with Lou Carter. We are joined by Robert Dusik, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of TITANS Freelancers.
TITANS Freelancers is a leading IT outsourcing firm in Slovakia that has been enhancing companies’ IT project capacities for over a decade. The firm enables organizations to adjust their IT team sizes flexibly, swiftly onboard new specialists, and cut labor costs while concentrating on their primary business. Titan’s Freelancers is ranked 51st on the Global Top 100 Most Loved Workplaces 2003 list.
Robert is an Applied Informatics graduate from the University of Žilina and an IT freelancer who worked in Vienna. He played a key role in developing TITANS’ largest insurance system.
Now, with that said, let’s find out what makes TITANS Freelancers a Most Loved Workplace®.
Firstly, Lou inquires about the impact of being a Most Loved Workplace on TITANS Freelancers’ customer base and the journey to becoming a Most Loved Workplace in Europe.
In response, Robert shares that 11 years ago, he and co-founder Marek didn’t initially focus on company culture. They eventually established a code of ethics based on three pillars: competence, reliability, and fairness. This approach was affirmed years later when employees independently aligned with these values during a workshop.
Robert attributes the company’s success and growth to finding the right people who share these values, indicating a strong, value-driven company culture.
Lou praises the rapid growth of TITANS and asks what factors contributed to it and how this growth was scaled in a way that aligns with the company’s culture.
Robert attributes TITANS’ rapid growth to the introduction of a C-level management layer two years ago, which transformed their leadership structure and facilitated scaling with their culture. Previously, communication and value transmission were direct due to the smaller size of the organization.
The expansion necessitated finding leaders capable of embodying and transferring the company’s core values to the broader team. It involved a meticulous and prolonged interviewing process to ensure alignment with the company’s ethics.
Currently, six C-level managers collaborate closely, both among themselves and with the founding team. They also participate in a C-level academy designed to refine their leadership skills, communication, and ability to disseminate the company’s values further down the organization.
According to Robert, the C-level academy at TITANS Freelancers has significantly contributed to aligning departmental efforts towards the company’s unified mission and vision, which is essential for both its internal culture and business growth.
Additionally, Robert emphasizes the importance of having department heads like the Chief Sales Officer, Chief Marketing Officer, and Chief Recruitment Officer work together rather than in silos. He aims to make TITANS the first choice for IT freelancers and clients who need IT specialists.
This collaboration was facilitated by tools and methodologies from Forbes Ideal Place, including culture and feedback assessments. The process involves in-depth discussions among managers on the interdependencies of their actions and finding ways to communicate and achieve the company’s primary goal collaboratively.
Moving on, Robert shares that TITANS Freelancers’ commitment to inclusivity and values starts from the top, with him and co-founder Marek valuing human rights and environmental protection. Their vision emphasizes respect for individual uniqueness and prioritizes inclusivity, including support for the LGBTQ+ community, which is significant given the political and social challenges in Slovakia.
They aim to be a positive example in their society by promoting fairness and reliability as core values, regardless of potential risks. This stance aligns with their vision of being the number one provider of IT services by creating an inclusive and values-driven company culture. They are also part of a community of companies that support these ideals, demonstrating their leadership in advocating for inclusivity and human rights within the business sector.
Lou follows up by inquiring about the presence of anti-gay laws in parts of Europe. He asks Robert if there has been any objection from political or other leaders to Robert’s stance on inclusivity or if there’s been more awareness of such a stance.
Robert highlights that TITANS Freelancers has not faced special pressure from political leaders or the government regarding its stance on inclusivity. He strongly believes in following the company’s principles and setting a positive example. He suggests that if inclusivity works in countries like the USA and the Netherlands, it should also work in Slovakia.
Lou commends Robert for his forward-thinking approach, which he links to the company’s commitment to social responsibility, sustainability, and operational efficiency.
Next, Lou highlights the intriguing rapid growth due to transparency, sustainability, meeting financial duties, employer excellence, and PDPA compliance. He asks Robert how TITANS Freelancer ensures such compliance and maintains these standards.
Robert emphasizes that the company’s compliance and success are not the result of a single action but rather a combination of adherence to a strong code of ethics. This holistic approach, grounded in the company’s core values, enables them to meet modern compliance requirements effectively.
He highlights the importance of working diligently, leveraging technology, and establishing clear rules and norms to achieve and maintain success. For Robert, success is viewed as an ongoing process that requires constant effort, underlining the philosophy that yesterday’s achievements are not enough to rest upon, and the work towards success must continue daily.
As the discussion draws to a close, Robert explains that TITANS Freelancer’s approach to connecting IT talent with clients goes beyond mere skill matching. It involves a deep understanding of technical requirements and personal fit within a team.
The company’s proprietary technology aids in this process, but the crucial work is human-centric. It means listening carefully to client’s needs, considering team dynamics, and determining whether an introverted or extroverted personality is needed.
This meticulous matching process is handled by senior recruiters to ensure the right individual is placed in the right environment, fostering long-term, mutually beneficial relationships.
Thank you for your time!
Lou Carter : Robert Dusik is an Applied Informatics graduate from the University of Žilina in Slovakia, where he spent nearly six years in Vienna, Austria as an IT freelancer specializing in software engineering for a major global insurance and financial services firm.
Titan's Freelancers is currently ranked number 51 on the 2023 Global Top 100 Most Loved Workplaces list. He contributed to developing the company's largest insurance system and managed application processes, system database optimization and team communication. Robert is also the co-founder and group CEO of Titan's freelancers. Today, I look forward to talking to Robert about how he became a Most Loved Workplace and why it's so important to him and his business success.
It's great to have Robert Dusik, CEO of Titan's. Wow! This is very cool because Robert is a self ascribed geek and proud and he says, and he also prides himself in being a great father, he cherishes that role. And a Titan, where he is dedicated to his profession and really learning right now where he has been inspired from ancient Greek philosophy and mythology, all of his underpinnings of his work, and how that has becoming a Most Loved Workplace has really helped him in his business and in developing his philosophy and really learning about what the Titan's way is and how that is so well-aligned with Most Loved Workplace and how that helps with what he does to be a more engaged high, high-performing workforce to also help his customers.
Robert, nice to see you. Tell us where you're calling in from and where your company is.
Robert Dusik : Hi Lou! Hi everybody! Thank you for having me in the first place. Right now I'm in Bratislava, Slovakia, so right the heart of the center of the Europe, basically.
LC : Center of Europe. This is wonderful. What a great time to be talking with you and learning from you and learning about your business. Number one, what is happening with your customer base? How will you do business with Most Loved Workplace being the core of that now. How you've brought that in the SPARK model and so let's start it up.
Let's figure out where we should go from here. So how did you do it? First of all, I want to talk a little bit the code of ethics, but how did you become a Most Loved Workplace, where you are in Europe? Tell me more. Yeah.
RD : Basically the fun fact is that when we started the company like 11 years ago, we never thought of a culture itself, how the culture should look like in the company, but we, I am talking we, I mean Marek and me, we are two co-founders of the company and two co-CEOs until now. Basically, we agreed to have something like a code, we can call it values that we use when we are communicating, cooperating to each other and basically we decided there will be three pillars.
We build the communication and we built a relationship on. It is competence on the first place and reliability and fairness. And from now on we started to cooperate and basically maybe after five years when we already had some staff and we had a kind of a workshop together, when we asked our people in a team what would they say, what our values really are, and all of them basically on their own, they aligned to those values.
We had more of them, but when we decided to prioritize the three of them, we came to those. So I believe this is the best appreciation if your people see the same values as you decided to build your business up on after telling them. So it means that they saw us possibly as role models. We did a great job in finding the right people in who we sought the same values, and it just went from one to another and from one to another. And in past few years we have grown rapidly, but I'm still very happy to say that people share those values with us.
LC : This is great. You've grown rapidly. What accounted for your growth and how have you enabled that growth to build at scale with your culture?
RD : The most significant thing was that two years ago we started to build another layer in management, C level management. It was a game changer because until then it was mostly us and the people in more of a direct communication, so it was much easier to show and sent those wellies to those people. But once we decided to be solo management, we needed to find some people who will be able to transfer those values a little bit lower.
So, it was a quite challenging process and it always starts with us on a very proper interviewing process that usually takes a little bit longer, but we pay very much attention to detail because we know that if we do, it'll pay off later. And indeed, at the moment there are six C-level managers who are cooperating together between each other, but we are working with them intensely and we have created a C-level academy where those people right to find ways how to work, how to communicate together and how can they shift those values and those things to the people below them.
LC : So tell me more about the academy. How has this helped with business in general to help you with your growth or was it more your internal culture?
RD : Well, yeah, of course it is linked because we found out that it is very nice to have a great Chief Sales Officer, Chief Marketing Officer, Chief Recruitment Officer, and so on. But they might work like individuals finding the best for the particular teams, but we wanted them to work closely together so they can move the whole firm towards the vision and mission we share with Marek.
And we just figure out with the help of other company, it is called Forbes Ideal Place that is under the brand of Forbes Magazine. And they are helping us using several tools like for example, pools check that is measuring the pools within the company based on the culture, based on regular feed backgrounds one to one and so on.
We are harnessing all of it. We are bringing it on the table. We still have our managers and we are discussing how actions of one department or one manager affects the other one. And we are trying to find the ways how to communicate to achieve one goal, the simple goal of our company to be the choice number one for IT freelancers, we cooperate and to be choice number one for the clients we provide IT specialists.
LC : Got it. So it's really a way for everybody to be aligned with the vision as well as sell better and serve your customers and represent that one goal and vision.
RD : Well, of course, yeah. Let me just say that we were never fans of long statements and sentences. We just decided to say if they are the first choice for the customers, if we are the first choice for the freelances, we are doing well. And then there is a tremendous amount of work putting that and dismantling it into smaller chunks to explain to each department what it really represents for recruitment, what it really represents for sale, what it really represents for other departments, finance, marketing, IT department and so on.
LC : I'm wondering too, you have such a cool vision, right? And I'm wondering how does protecting the environment and human rights apply to that, right? I want to learn more about your perspective on that you actually have a company vision that you respect, uniqueness, individual uniqueness and prioritizing environmental and human rights. Tell me more about your beliefs around this and how that connects to your overall vision for being the number one provider of IT.
RD : Well, it is very easy. First of all, it comes from the very top to the bottom. So me and Marek, we are both people who appreciate and who values other human beings regardless their beliefs, regardless, their nationality and so on. It is something that is I put into the stone in this company and it shows to other people that everybody is welcomed here or until they stick to the values we have stick to the values we share. We are open to LGBTQ+ community because mainly in this particular era, in this particular age is very important to us.
And also because maybe of the narrative and political situation in Slovakia, that goes a little bit against of it. So we really think that we need to be some kind of the standpoint here in Slovakia showing it doesn't really matter who are you cooperating with unless the cooperation is set on the right values, like fairness, like reliability, it goes all, all right, well hand in hand together.
LC : That's excellent. I mean you're really taking a stance and environment that doesn't necessarily support it and there's risks associated with that.
RD : It's our job and it's our duty and we basically don't really care about the risk associated because it's very important and it's very crucial thing and a signal that you set out to the company and to the society and the other companies and the other leaders are joining. There are very nice communities of companies, very strong names that joined together to support the idea of it. And we are very proud of being members of such a community.
LC : There are. They call them anti-gay laws in some parts of Europe. Have you found any objectivity or objection, not objectivity, it'd be different. Objection to your stance on human rights that have been from political leaders or other leaders or are you finding more openness and awareness to such a stance?
RD : I would say what we see and what we really feel is that there is no special pressure against the company of our own because those people who sat in parliament or the government, they don't really care about the companies and their life within. What they care about is populism and what kind of signal they show to people and about the masses they take with them on the route.
And we just need to live our lives setting the principles and some kind of the messages that is not all right. Because once you take those people, once you take the community within, nothing changes for you. Everything's all right and it's working. So by leaving an example, I still believe is the best way how to show the rest of the world, the rest of the citizens, the rest of the country, that it's viable working mechanism. If it works in the USA, if it works in the Netherlands, there's no chance it shouldn't work in Slovakia as well.
LC : How awesome of you to do this, Robert? It's really impressive. It wasn't until 1962 in Slovakia, right, that same sex activity was legalized. And even now civil unions still have not been completely legalized yet. There are some significant movement in those areas with various legal activity. So you're really taking a stance against such thinking. I mean that's extremely forward thinking of you.
RD : Not only us. And I wouldn't take pride for that because there are plenty of respectful companies and people who can see the good from the bad and basically just need to stick to the right side. I would say it's not the political type of the think, it's a principle of what kind of the person you want to be.
LC : You know, and this kind of brings you to doing the right thing. I think it's awesome what you're doing, and this is around really who you are as a company and maintaining reliability, quick response times, timely feedback, this meeting financial obligations, this kind of social responsibility, sustainability principles seem to be at the core of what you do.
RD : Well, of course we are in an era of business. We are in a type of the business where time is very crucial because we are usually required to deliver kind of the specialists within the very short timeframe. And it's up to us to be very quick and effective, on the other hand. And we realize that from the very beginning, me and Marek, we both are IT guys, we are both programmers. We have studied programming and we worked as engineers and then we decided to start this new concept based on those values.
But of course based on some very analytical approach, and as a programmer, it is very close to us. It has always been. So we have been always thinking about the company as about programming a software. So first we made an analysis, then we tested it and then we decided to do the first software on our own. And when we had a software solution, we decided, okay, we can bring up the first member of a team so we can use the power of computing because we should use the computer power for those things people shouldn't do. And on the other hand, on contrary, we should only use the people for those things, computer cannot. And then you can achieve something very unique where effectiveness is growing rapidly.
LC : And that's the thing, it's the growth and rapid growth that is what's interesting about what's happening there and how that happened, right? Because of you coming out and expressing how you can be open, sustainable, meet financial obligations, showing your responsibility as an outstanding employer and really also ensuring compliance and PDPA because that's so important, right? Because you're able to do that and able to provide that to the world with global companies that provide IT services and that is of tantamount importance. How do you ensure that compliance in your company, how do you make sure that happens?
RD : Well, I always say it is never a result of one action, to be honest. By building up a strong strategy that stands on the legs of a code of ethics that is coming out from our values, putting it all together, it makes a great mixture and cocktail of resulting into such a thing like being compliant with almost everything that is very necessary to be compliant in the modern world.
So it is basically that you have to work in a timely manner, you have to use technology, you have to innovate in every other way. Basically, you have to take responsibility for your own actions. You have to build up rules and norms simultaneously, and it all results in something that might be called a success. But I always say there's nothing older than a yesterday success.
So it's a constant thing that has to be done every day from single morning until the evening and then again and again and again.
LC : Outstanding. That's exactly right. So let's go back to culture and then we'll take it from there. Is what's important to you and for your clients for sort of a common culture? Do you find that they want some similar things from your freelancers and what are those similar things that you say?
RD : Definitely, on the one hand, the funny thing is we are using technology and a proprietary made ecosystem. This is one thing, this is working on itself, but on the other hand, it's a work of people for people with people on everyday basis. And we never pride ourselves to say that we find the best IT specialist, no other companies to find the best IT specialist. What we do, we say that we are the best matchmakers. There is a crucial difference because we need to understand properly, listen very carefully to what customer says, not just from the technical point of the expectation, but also from the other set of expectations.
What sort of team it is. Is there a guy needed to be introvert or extrovert and we need to put it together? Then we go to other systems, we take out the results, and at the end it's a work of senior recruiters to match it properly so we can bring the right guy to the right position, otherwise he'll not be working. So you don't have to find the best of the best to the position does not require the best. You need to find the guy who's going to be happy there in the environment, in the team, and then the relationship can be very long-term and prosperous for each party involved.
LC : Absolutely. The prosperity for each party and your connection and commitment to excellence and everything you do is more than a parent, as a proud dad, self ascribed geek, and a Titan through and through with all of your values and the way in which you live and work your life in your life. You are definitely someone that I admire and really have appreciated having you today on our Leader show. Thanks for joining us, Robert Dusik.
RD : Alright. Thank you very much for Invitation. It was lovely to share some ideas with you, Lou.
LC : You too, Robert.
