Michaela Ulicna

I firmly believe that having the right people in the right roles at the right time, with a focus on culture-add and diversity, can make all the difference when scaling teams. And I crafted this to be my career mission. At Founderful, I support our startups in setting up scalable people function, building talent communities across functions, and identifying top-tier talent for key C-suite roles. I serve as a sparring partner to founders who prioritize talent, invest in building strong people foundations, and care about a positive candidate experience. I get energized every day by diving into core people topics and sharing best practices. And I feel humbled at the same time for having the opportunity to contribute to the success of our founders by helping them build strong teams.

The Women in Digital Switzerland Mission is to build a strong, knowledgeable and inspiring community to empower diversity and inclusion in the Swiss digital economy. As a Zurich Chapter Lead, I am responsible for creating partnerships and organize key events to bring our community together and support diversity and inclusion, career opportunities, growth, connections and impact in Swiss Digital Economy. Events organized: ✔️ Swiss Marketplace Group (2025, 80 attendees) ✔️ Databricks (2025, 70 attendees) ✔️ Salesforce (2024, 50 attendees) ✔️ Google (2024, 30 attendees)

I joined at the start of a new talent advisory implementation to support growth at Lonza and contributed to scaling our team to 18 advisors in Switzerland while focusing on advisory approach and talent operational delivery. As a lead, I was responsible for Global Functions in Switzerland and managed a team of advisors who supported new careers for over 700 candidates between July 2024 and April 2025.

Acted as a Talent Lead for Youtube EMEA (~ 500ppl) setting up the talent strategies to meet yearly people plan focusing on culture add, diversity and inclusion and talent retention while leading team members to achieve talent goals for the business unit. - Partnered with regional and global leadership and cross functionally with People Operations, HR Market Leads, Compensation, Benefits, Payroll, L&D, onboarding etc. to ensure alignment - Led key C-level recruitment processes to ensure we hire the right senior engineering talent across the organization * Advised the leadership and employees on topics incl. Talent Management, Talent Acquisition, Onboarding, L&D, Internal Mobility, Talent Retention, DEI, Contracts, Immigration, Relocation. * Held stakeholders from the Business and Talent Acquisition accountable for implementing and executing the DEI strategy and reported on annual progress. * Program managed projects during the times of change to increase productivity, create better experiences and operational excellence. * Led senior leadership onboarding project resulting in an increase of satisfaction with the onboarding and support received in 12 months. * Project managed Munich Tech Location Strategy, collaborating directly with the Site Lead and HR Market lead and wider team in EMEA and APAC. * Managed internal mobility program for managers to increase visibility of suitable internal opportunities and provided coaching sessions to retain top talent. * Led EMEA and global hiring committees to ensure we hire top talent; trained and onboarded new team members and members of the committee, led global projects to align on committee processes. * Organized career development initiatives and events delivering the presentations to large audiences. * Led team members in EMEA and APAC to increase productivity and operational excellence; Interviewed, onboarded, mentored and coached new hires.

- Managed the full-cycle recruitment processes to hire the highest caliber of experienced candidates for Sales & Marketing and People Operations organization by designing and executing tailored recruiting strategies and working with and influencing leaders across the organization. - Supported People Operations organization of 400+ people as their dedicated Talent Lead; partnered with 40+ EMEA & US & APAC directors and managers to support their people plan & hiring for Dublin, London, Paris, Zurich, Munich & Tel Aviv’s offices. - Shared best practices and aligning on hiring with staffing partners across different offices and teams; Partnered with HR and L&D to ensure smooth onboarding for candidates. * Advised on compensation, relocation, immigration, benefits; negotiated the offers. * Managed projects for specific client groups to address complexity of senior hiring to decrease time to hire, make the hiring more effective, bring the diverse talent in, make the internal process more efficient and introduce pool hiring. * Acted as Staffing POC for MBA interns and graduates.

- Led a key transformation project of a Career department. Designed a comprehensive world-class career development program for MBA top talent with an implementation plan. - Designed a strategy for scale-up of career services team, including creation of job descriptions, recruitment process and on-boarding of a new team of career advisors. * Managed involvement of key stakeholders and career development teams in France, Singapore and Abu Dhabi. - Led Alumni Career Development Project mapping the current offering, benchmarking with other top business schools and creating a proposal for a new career development strategy for INSEAD alumni. - Advised top talent of diverse backgrounds and 80+ nationalities on best recruitment strategies and on specifics in different industries and markets in order to secure desirable positions upon graduation. - Gained understanding of the MBA programme and built wide network of MBA professionals.

Led Sales & Marketing HR Consultancy team and talent strategies resulting in an increase of the clients base & successful projects, and launch of Career Advisory services and Outplacement. - Orchestrated end-to-end recruitment and offer processes for senior to executive-level roles, empowering professionals to secure their dream positions. * Consistently ranked among the top performers on a high-achieving team, delivering exceptional results across a diverse range of industries (e.g. Tech, IT, Finance, e-commerce, retail, Telco, and services). * Built a strong network of candidates in wider CEE region to create pipeline and obtain referrals for top talent. * Recruited, on-boarded, trained and coached team members. Most successful projects: - Designed, launched and led Career advisory program and interviewing skills training for clients. - Helped to build a local management team for a Belgium technology company. - Worked on positions for several clients exclusively incl. technology, e-commerce, retail and professional services. - Belonged to top performers with high success rate and quick results. Received a very positive feedback from clients and candidates on professionalism and market understanding resulting in new business opportunities.

Delivered L&D plans for language and soft skills programs for 200+ employees in 50+ companies to upskills, improve their long-term career development & match with the needs of the organisations. - Conducted comprehensive skills analysis, completed detailed assessments, and provided expert advice to address the unique needs of employees and clients while empowering the team of 50 trainers. * Designed and led a new people development plan for a major Tech client (200 ppl) successfully to guide the workforce towards certification level competency. - Successfully launched new courses to strengthen employees’ career development. * Delivered engaging and impactful programs totaling over 120 hours per month, consistently ranking among the top 5 trainers for a diverse range of audiences.

Ran own successful B2C business leading teams of 2-5ppl in Utah, California and Washington State, selling educational products to achieve better education & careers for everyone resulting in exceeding targets and being promoted.

A member of non-profit educational organization that teaches public speaking and leadership skills as a part of Toastmasters International, headquartered in Rancho Santa Margarita, California (270,000 members in more than 13,000 clubs in 116 countries). Since 1924, Toastmasters International has helped people of all backgrounds become more confident in front of an audience. Achieved Competent Communicator and Competent Leader Award. Practised communication and presentation skills, delivered several presentations and workshops to small and big audience (10-90 people). Mentored others to achieve their goals. Mentored new club.