1. Tell us something about the origin, growth and success of ‘ Antal International network ’? When, where and how did it originate?

Antal started in 1994 as company owned operation in mid level to senior level executive recruitment. It entered franchising about 5 years ago. I am a major investor/shareholder/director and run the business as CEO.

Historically what is really interesting is Tony Godwin the founder, went into Eastern Europe, e.g. Russia, Poland, Hungary long before any other western recruitment firms.  Even today, due to this history, Antal has gone into and successfully penetrated mainly developing as well as developed economies and feels very comfortable and confident–frankly ,unlike many of our competitors both inside and outside of franchising in doing this as we have blazed this trail before.  This is why we are very optimistic and excited about expanding into India.

In Russia and Poland and now China, Antal has surged to the leadership position in recruitment and is arguably the fastest growing privately held recruitment business in the world today.  We intend to do the same thing in India, i.e. become the clear market leader .

2. When did you start franchising? From where did you get the inspiration to opt for franchising as a mode of expansion?

I have been in recruitment franchising for 26 years and for 19 of those years in the global market, in excess of 40 countries, always in executive and mid range recruitment.  I got my start studying at the feet of giants in the USA, Alan Schonberg and founder and CEO of the largest franchise in recruitment there, MRI (where I served as marketing director for my first 6 years in franchised recruitment) Bob Angell, arguably the most successful USA based franchise salesman in the history of this industry, with over 2000 sales in his career.

I have sold about 600, 375 in the USA and 225 globally.  With Bob retired and Alan effectively retired from active duty.  I’m the ‘old man’ of the global industry at 56, –but still have a lot of juice left!

Alan and Bob remain friends and Alan is still my number one lifetime mentor. They have irreplaceable experience and wisdom.
Tony Goodwin , the founder of Antal International, saw that franchising could be a great way to expand his highly successful group of wholly owned businesses and he and I got together to combine our thinking and expertise to drive the business forward via franchising….and this is clearly getting a positive result!

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