One of the leading international providers of business software and services to the telecommunications and financial services industries, Elephant Talk Communications, Inc recently announced the appointment of Willem Bekkema as their new manager of Human Resources.

The official appointment took place on the 1st of June and as the manager of Human Resources, Bekkema will be in charge of all human resources functions within the Elephant Talk Group. He will also be responsible for the development and execution of an international human resources management strategy that will be designed to meet the growth ambitions of Elephant Talk Group.

In a release, Steven van der Velden, chief executive officer and chairman of Elephant Talk, said that, “With over 15 years of experience, Willem Bekkema has proven to be a seasoned international HR leader who is effective at building a worldwide workforce for growth companies. We look forward to working with him on growing our staff to match our plans for expansion into additional markets around the globe.”

Before he joined Elephant Talk, Bekkema was the global manager of Human Resources for Atradius Collections, which is a branch of the credit insurer Atradius. During this period, he provided HR management solutions to a global leader in business-to-business debt collections which had 20 offices in Europe, the Americas, Oceania and Asia and a presence in 220 countries.

Bekkema has a Business Law bachelor’s degree from the Hanze University Groningen and also a masters degree in Organization and Management Sociology from the University of Amsterdam. During his early career, Bekkema worked in a number of senior HR positions for Arcadis, PA Consulting (News - Alert) Group, and TomTom International.  

On his appointment as the manager of Human Resources, Bekkema said, “This is truly an exciting time to be entering the international telecom and financial services industries with Elephant Talk, a company with aggressive plans for growth throughout the world. I look forward to contributing to the company's continued success.”

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