Expanding into new European markets is a big move. It signals growth, ambition, and confidence in your business strategy. But after more than 20 years in the staffing industry, most of it supporting financial organisations, including fintechs, financial exchanges, asset managers, and private banking clients, I’ve seen how often a well-planned expansion can falter because of one overlooked factor: hiring.

More specifically, hiring too late, planning too little, or assuming that the same talent playbook will work in every region.

When hiring becomes reactive, things start to unravel. Project delivery slows. Compliance risk rises. Candidate attrition creeps in. But the good news is, all of this is avoidable, if talent is treated as a strategic lever, not a post-launch afterthought.

The Real Challenge Isn’t Talent Shortage; It’s Misalignment

Most expansion teams are meticulous with their legal and regulatory preparation. They have local counsel, licensing applications, entity structures, and risk models all mapped out. But hiring? That often gets left until the final stretch, assumed to be straightforward, with job ads or existing suppliers expected to deliver quickly.
That’s rarely the case.

In European countries where Skillfinder has extensive experience including Luxembourg, Ireland, Switzerland and the Czech Republic, staffing is anything but simple. Each market has its own compliance rules, notice periods, tax structures, and cultural expectations. Same job title, different country, very different hiring expectations.

We’ve seen firms assume talent will be ready when they are, only to find out that the profiles they need aren’t available, aren’t affordable, or don’t meet local expectations. That’s when hiring becomes reactive, and expansion timelines suffer.

How Delays Begin: Warning Signs to Watch

Hiring challenges usually don’t show up all at once, they creep in. Based on what we’ve seen across financial and tech expansions, here are common indicators you’re heading for difficulty:

•You’ve set go-live dates but haven’t mapped out the key roles needed on the ground
•Salary budgets are based on HQ assumptions, not local market data
•You’re unsure how to engage contractors compliantly in the target country
•Your current suppliers don’t have the niche expertise or local reach you need
•Candidates are applying, but few have the required skills or speak the language

These aren’t uncommon problems. But they’re fixable, if you’re early enough.

How to Get Ahead of the Talent Curve

A successful expansion starts with people. And your staffing strategy should be embedded in the early stages of planning, not added after everything else is decided. Here’s what that looks like in practice:

Map the Right Roles - Before You Need Them
Don’t wait until launch to define who you need. Start by identifying the critical hires tied to compliance, delivery, and operations. These are often specialist roles we’ve recently supported, and they take time to find, engage, and onboard properly.

Benchmark Salaries and Skills Locally
Assumptions from your home market won’t hold. Understand what candidates expect, and what they’ll accept, for example in Zurich versus Dublin, or Luxembourg versus London. This helps with both budgeting, speed to hire and offer-to-acceptance success.

Understand the Hiring Landscape in Each Country
Each location brings different engagement models, tax setups, and candidate behaviour. Switzerland values long-term fit and cultural familiarity. Ireland’s fund industry is fast-moving but network-driven. The Czech market is booming in tech but short on senior engineers. You need local insights to navigate this.

Prioritise First Hires Strategically
Your initial team members are more than just operators, they set your culture, reputation, and delivery capability. Don’t treat them as transactional hires. Invest time in finding the right people, not just the available ones.

Streamline Your Supply Chain
At Skillfinder, we’ve helped clients consolidate their supplier network across Europe, making hiring more consistent, faster, and better. Working with fewer, better-aligned partners reduces admin and helps you onboard the right people faster, without compromising on fit or compliance.

Build Sourcing Plans for Niche Talent
Specialist Candidates don’t usually respond to generic job ads, especially in technical or compliance-heavy areas. Many of these candidates are passive, highly in demand, and need to be approached directly. We regularly support clients hiring for these roles, and the difference always comes down to targeted sourcing by specialists who understand the niche.

Final Thought: Expansion Is About Execution
A lot goes into expansion: regulatory readiness, funding, infrastructure. But it’s your people who actually make it work. Hiring may not get the same airtime as licensing or tax, but if it’s not handled early and locally, it can be the reason your plan falters.
You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression in a new market. Get the staffing right, and everything else becomes easier to deliver.

Staffing might be the last item on your checklist, but at Skillfinder, it’s the first thing we get right.