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Octagon Professionals

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Nederland
The Hague
Octagon Professionals

HR services needed? Let Octagon handle it. Octagon Professionals is an HR services company with an extensive track record in the Dutch market of over 30 years.

We understand what it takes for international businesses to expand, restructure and set-up in the Netherlands. We support global companies of every size with perfectly tailored HR solutions on any strategic level. We are the employer of a large community of international, talented professionals who dedicate their experience, knowledge and time to our clients in order to expand, or operate, in the Dutch market. Our extensive experience and knowledge of the Dutch market enables us to add value to your business – no matter which stage of growth you’re in. Our dedicated and passionate team of expats, partners, and support from the community, enables us to understand your business well enough to implement the right HR solution for your growing business. No matter what your goals are in the Netherlands – We are in it with you for the long term. Long lasting partnerships enable us to provide quality services in an efficient, timely, and competitive manner, always working in a transparent and open communication style.

29/10/2026

Every deal is announced. The people part is not.

HuFriedyGroup signed an agreement on 27 October 2026 to buy the dental business of Mectron Dental in Italy, with the dental side of Mectron’s German sales company.

Mectron keeps its medical business. After closing, it will make the dental range for HuFriedyGroup under a supply agreement.

So the people side starts with a line drawn through one company: who moves to the buyer, and who stays. Under Italian law, a business transfer involving more than 15 workers needs written notice to the unions at least 25 days before completion or any earlier binding agreement.

Two more US buyers completed deals in the United Kingdom on 27 and 28 October:

Alamo Group Inc. bought Econ Engineering Ltd, a North Yorkshire maker of gritters and road maintenance vehicles, for about GBP 120m.

EVERSANA acquired Estima Scientific, a London health economics and outcomes research company.

For both, Day 100 falls in the first week of February 2027.

27/10/2026

A small collection of things that get lost between a US head office and a Dutch team.

"That's an interesting approach" means I don't like this. It's heard as approval.

"I'd love your feedback" means tell me it's good. It's heard as a real invitation to list everything wrong with it, and the list arrives.

Going the other way, "I'm away for three weeks in July" means exactly that, and gets read as an opening position.

The pattern is that nobody is being rude or difficult. One side softens by habit, the other takes words at face value, and both think they were perfectly clear.

What would you add?

23/10/2026

€4,752 in 2021. €5,942 in 2026.

Someone accepts your offer in December. The paperwork goes in on the 4th of January and their salary is now below the threshold. Nothing changed about the job, or the person, or the money. The year changed.

The IND raises the minimum salary for highly skilled migrants every January. For someone aged 30 or over it was €4,752 a month in 2021. It's €5,942 now, about 25% higher, and the 2027 figure lands in a couple of months.

The rule is simple enough once you know it: the threshold that applies is the one for the year you submit the application, not the year the person starts.

Extensions work the same way, which is the one people really don't see coming. An employee who's been with you for years, doing the same job on the same salary, can quietly stop qualifying.

It isn't complicated. It's just a date that doesn't usually make it into hiring plans and if you're hiring into the Netherlands this quarter, it's worth a look at which side of January your filings fall on.

16/10/2026

The Netherlands ranks 77th of 81 for business complexity.

And yet we see a lot of businesses coming from abroad that find the Dutch system difficult to navigate. Both things are true, because simple is not the same as familiar.

Low complexity describes the country. Difficulty describes the gap between that country and the one you came from. An American employer meets 104 weeks of sick pay obligation and reads it three times. A Belgian employer recognises almost everything and gets caught by the parts that look the same and are not. Same country, same ranking, different experience entirely.

A ranking tells you how much there is to learn. It cannot tell you how much of it you already know.

If you have taken an organisation into a new country: was it the complicated rules that cost you time, or the simple ones you assumed you understood?

09/10/2026

3,435

That is how many companies in the Netherlands were under ultimate American control in 2024. Germany, in second place, has 2,440.

The United States has held first place every year since 2008, and the gap has more than quadrupled, with 225 companies then, 995 now.

All of those companies had to become employers here. Dutch employment law does not arrive gradually, it applies from the first day. Sick pay, works councils with consultation rights before decisions.

If you have taken a business through that: what did you underestimate?

05/10/2026

Europe can build 10 rockets a year.
By 2031, it will need 14.

World Space Week runs until Saturday under the theme Rocket Revolution: reusable boosters, commercial providers, cheaper access to orbit. Europe's version of that story has a different shape.

Ariane 6 is targeting six to eight flights this year against a ceiling of about ten. ESA - European Space Agency is now studying what 12, 15 or 20 would take. And last month in Brussels, European Commissioner for Defence and Space Andrius Kubilius said European institutional missions alone will need 14 Ariane 6 launches a year by 2031.

The distance between those numbers is not a technology gap. It is an industrial one. Booster production, carbon-fibre winding capacity, propellant facilities and the transport that moves hardware between countries. Which makes it, in the end, a people problem.

Every one of those constraints is relieved by someone: Production engineers, AIT specialists, Quality and compliance staff, Supply chain managers.

Europe decided it wanted independent access to space. That decision is now a hiring question.

We recruit and employ specialists across Europe, from The Hague. If you're hiring into this, [email protected].

29/09/2026

Your non-EU specialist could be legally working in the Netherlands about two weeks from now.

The Highly Skilled Migrant permit is the Netherlands' fastest work-and-residence route, no labour-market test, salary-based eligibility, and decisions for recognised sponsors inside the IND's service standard.

The catch: only an IND Recognised Sponsor can file. Becoming one, is not as straight forward,

Octagon already holds recognised sponsor status. Your hire comes in under our sponsorship as their employer of record, no Dutch entity, no sponsor application. Eligible hires can also access other Dutch workforce benefits, such as the expat ruling, assessed per hire.

Swipe for the full route →

Hiring a specialist into the Netherlands? Tell us who, we'll tell you how.

25/09/2026

95+ nationalities placed.

Not because of where they are from. Because they fit the role, the qualifications and the culture.

But when a skill is hard to find, the shortlist stops being local. And hiring across borders means reading CVs, salary expectations and interview styles that all work differently from market to market.

We have been learning that since 1987. Entities across Europe and the UK.

Hiring for something hard to find? [email protected]

24/09/2026

"Hej, jak się masz?"

At Octagon, we know that building the right team takes more than understanding the local market. It takes genuine sector expertise, strong networks, and access to highly specialised talent.

Our focus on niche recruitment across sectors where the right expertise matters, from defence and space to engineering, has been proven over 39 years in the market.

Whether you're expanding into Poland or building an international team, our local knowledge and specialist recruitment expertise help you connect with the people who can make a difference.

Because the right talent isn't always easy to find. We know where to look.

23/09/2026

Niche recruitment isn't a smaller version of normal recruitment. It's a different job.

Three things change when the talent pool is measured in hundreds, not thousands:

1️⃣ Sourcing becomes research. You can't post an ad and wait, you map the market, person by person.

2️⃣ The best candidates aren't looking. They're heads-down on a programme. Networks and sector credibility do the work a job board never will.

3️⃣ There are extra layers: security clearances, export-control awareness, cross-border employment rules.

This is exactly why "post and pray" fails in space & defence.

Reach out to us, to discuss further: https://bit.ly/4yKxVR8

Adres

Maanweg 174
The Hague
2516AB

Openingstijden

Maandag	09:00 - 17:00
Dinsdag	09:00 - 17:00
Woensdag	09:00 - 17:00
Donderdag	09:00 - 17:00
Vrijdag	09:00 - 17:00

Website

http://www.octagonpeople.com/

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