Category Archives: Recruitment

News, Recruitment

Firms are neglecting key parts of remote recruitment strategies that help attract and retain key talent, warns Omnipresent

  • Less than 1 in 8 organisations adjust pay differentials according to geographic location
  • Just 35% of employers consider the impact on compensation and benefits in their remote working policies
  • Two-thirds of firms state that a lack of market data is problematic when adjusting geographic differentials

According to Omnipresent, an Employer of Record that helps organisations employ people globally, firms are largely unprepared for the barriers they encounter when hiring employees in remote locations – particularly when hiring overseas.

The warning comes after research from Aon showed that companies focus on certain aspects of their remote location strategies but neglect others. For instance, 75% of organisations consider the eligibility of individuals to work remotely and 68% consider the technological requirements of remote work. Despite this, just over a third (35%) review the impact on compensation and benefits in their remote working policies and fewer than 1 in 8 UK organisations (12%) adjust pay differentials according to geographic location.

Consequently, Omnipresent states that failure to go beyond planning the technical logistics of remote work and remote hiring strategies means that organisations risk losing their competitive edge and as a result, could lose out on key talent and could even face retention issues among current workforces.

Matt Wilson, co-CEO and Founder at Omnipresent, advises:

“When creating remote hiring strategies, particularly in different countries, employers must consider benefits and compensation, pay brackets as well as cultural differences and communication methods to ensure every employee can work well and is part of the team.

“Remote offerings can be based on pure legal requirements of local laws and regulations but most employers understand the best strategy is to look after employees’ needs so each is motivated and productive. Overcoming key hiring barriers to attract and retain the best talent is often about putting employees first and understanding, culturally, what they expect from their employers in their particular location.”

Problematically, however, Omnipresent says that many organisations are not getting the relevant guidance to understand how to tailor offerings to different locations. Aon’s global HR pulse survey emphasises this issue, highlighting that organisations struggle to adjust geographical differentials due to a variety of factors.

For example, over two-thirds of organisations (68%) feel that internal communication is a barrier, two-thirds (66%) state that a lack of market data is problematic, 58% state that employment related regulations and compliance is a barrier and 56% feel that tax related regulations is an issue when modifying geographic differentials.

Matt Wilson summarised:

“How organisations set their benefits and salary benchmarks is key to promoting fairness and transparency within an organisation – ultimately showing the right level of care here helps attract and retain the right employees. While most employers understand how to set benchmarks based on roles, we can see that more struggle to adjust this based on location – especially when the location is in a different region with different pay and benefits expectations. Should you pay equally for equal work regardless of location, pay local rates, or something in between? Should you offer the same benefits package globally, or tailor benefits packages to local expectations and needs? These are difficult questions that organisations must think carefully about how they build a fair, competitive and sustainable global compensation strategy that aligns with their values. 

“There are a few more key steps that can be taken to ensure that remote recruitment strategies and benchmarks are planned effectively. Firstly, don’t simply put ‘remote’ on a job description aimed at anyone – target specific markets so that remote job descriptions, their translations, as well as the pay and benefits advertised are tailored to the candidates the company is hoping to find. Localisation is key. Seek guidance, too, on local job markets, employment laws and employment related costs as information is available to help adjust strategies.

“Ultimately, the benefit of remote recruitment for employers is that they can find the best talent to suit their requirements, so putting time into developing a remote strategy that caters for logistics and peoples’ needs is essential.”

News, Recruitment

Young workers need to be mobilised to help fill “vacancies vacuum”

Government support for skills and retraining is essential to ease recruitment difficulties, according to the latest Labour Market Update from the CBI and West Midlands-based recruitment specialist Pertemps.

The monthly report shows that the number of vacancies continues to grow and highlights significant shortages in certain industries, notably driving and with hospitality, with more pubs, restaurants and other venues open – despite an additional four-week wait for final restrictions to be lifted.

Pertemps Chair Carmen Watson believes a change is needed to get things moving and, in particular, we need to mobilise young people in the jobs market to fill the vacancies vacuum – where there are scores opportunities but very few people to fill them.

“The jobs market continues to increase significantly in both permanent and contingent vacancies. In particular, the hospitality industry is looking more positive,” said Carmen.

“There is also a lot of movement in food manufacturing and for jobs like HGV drivers and workers with digital skills.

“We are, however, experiencing a sea change in candidates’ career choices, as a result of the pandemic, and it’s therefore helpful for employers to liaise with recruiters who can match the right skills for their roles.

“An on-going concern is the economic inactivity rate of young people and we would urge employers to consider greater use of apprenticeships and traineeships to grow our future talent. This will undoubtedly need support from central Government if we are going to fill this vacancies vacuum.”

The latest CBI/Pertemps Labour Market Update shows the number of payroll employees has increased for the sixth consecutive month, up 197,000 in May to 28.5 million. However, still 553,000 below pre-pandemic levels.

Furlough has been successful in limiting job losses through the pandemic, evidenced by the fact that redundancies continue to fall. There has also been an increase of 113,000 in employment in the three months to April 2021 compared to the previous quarter, but still down on the same period a year earlier, by 353,000.  Overall, the employment rate rose by 0.2% to 75.2%.

Other findings:

  • All age groups saw a rise in employment, with those aged 35 to 49 the biggest winners (+71,000), followed by those aged 65+ (+18,000)
  • Youth unemployment fell by 8.7% (51,000) compared to previous quarter
  • Number of self-employed decreased by 20,000 in the three months to April
  • March to May 21m estimated 748,000 – a quarterly increase of 147,000.

Last week, Pertemps highlighted a gulf in the UK currently between available jobs and available people, and is calling on candidates to make the most of the boom in job opportunities as the economy drives forwards after nearly 18 months of interruptions and uncertainty.

HR News, News, Recruitment

Ravi Joshi: The top nine criteria when choosing a sourcing partner

Written by Ravi Joshi, Head of UK, Golden Bees

Recruitment challenges evolve continuously. Amidst a ceaseless war for talent, it is more important than ever for the talent attraction department to measure performance indicators and optimise recruitment budgets, based on a keen understanding of candidate behaviour, and the potential of new technology.

As a result, choosing the right partner for your recruitment sourcing can be a matter of commercial life and death. There are nine key factors that should be kept In mind when choosing the best recruitment service or technology.

Ease of implementation

The impact of any new technology or service is determined by its uptake.  That uptake is determined by the ease of use and even before that, in the ease of implementation.

A tool that is too complex will hamper employee adoption and an implementation that is too time-consuming will add cost and delay the recruitment of key talent.

The ideal solution must be easily integrated into existing processes, it must be quickly operational and easy to use for employees.

Key questions that can reveal how easy a new tool will be implemented and used include:

  • Once the contract is signed, how will the solution be implemented?
  • Does the partnership include support and training?
  • How easily can it sync with existing technologies)?

ATS integration

An Applicant Tracking System (ATS) is an industry-standard tool that helps a business manage the talent funnel. It is vital that any news sourcing solution must either provide its own ATS or seamlessly connect with existing software and processes.

To ensure that a new sourcing solution will fit smoothly into existing recruitment processes, a business needs to address the following questions:

  • What support is available for the current ATS?
  • Is the prospective sourcing solution already integrated or can integrate with an existing ATS?
  • How quickly can this integration happen?

Candidate insight

It may seem like stating the obvious but knowing your candidates is critical and it begins from the very earliest stages of sourcing. Candidate data analysis enables a business to make informed decisions and optimise investments based on understanding candidate behaviour.  Any talent sourcing partner should support this by showing how to reach the right candidates, at the right time, on the right medium, with the right role.

This can be evaluated by asking:

  • Does the solution allow the business to track candidate involvement throughout the candidate journey?
  • How does the tool compare the performance and costs of different resources?
  • What KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) are available?

Industry expertise

Deep domain expertise has ever been more important.  The knowledge of the specific challenges of a given industry is a keen competitive advantage.  Any recruitment strategy must be adapted to these challenges, especially in competitive industries or for premium roles.

Employer-branding can then be used to differentiate a business from its competitors – but this will be in vain if the talent sourcing tool or service is too generic.  This can be determined by asking

  • What is the talent partner’s DNA?
  • Have they fully understood the challenges of a given business or industry and tailored their recommendations?
  • Have they had experience of working with competitors in a given industry?

Account management and support

The quality of the support offered by a sourcing partner goes a long way in ensuring the success of campaigns. Support should include system training, monitoring the campaigns, regular meetings to discuss campaign performance, reporting and insight.

Questions to consider here include:

  • Does the service or tool make recommendations to improve performance?
  • Is the partner well informed about the nuances of your industry?
  • What resources (human and material) will be made available in the course of the account?

Measure the success

With the emergence of Pay per Performance recruitment media in the last half a decade it has become critical to measure the performance of all recruitment sources. The accuracy of any recruitment campaign is defined largely by the ability to assess the performance of a given source of candidates. Typical metrics may include:

  • The number of impressions
  • The number of clicks
  • The number of CVs submitted
  • The number of qualified resumes
  • The click rate
  • The application rate
  • The cost per qualified candidate

This then necessitates some key initial questions:

  • Does the business accurately track campaigns and sources already?
  • What metrics are tracked and what do they mean to the business?
  • Do the reports provided by your suppliers align with yours?

Optimisation using tech

Performance-based technologies such a programmatic recruitment can replace traditional  “post and pray” methods of sourcing. These solutions go beyond tracking performance by using AI to introduce optimisation and adjust campaigns in real time.  To evaluate the optimisation capacity of a sourcing partner, consider the following:

  • What KPIs are they able to optimise?
  • Can you differentiate between Cost per click or Cost per Application?
  • Is the optimisation automatic or does it require manual intervention?

Reach

An ideal sourcing platform should take the guesswork out of the channel distribution by being based on data.  It should be able to show the best performing channels and highlight underperforming ones.  Agnostic delivery is closely linked to multi-channel distribution – that is, depending on the role or the skill set required, the most effective acquisition source will not always be the same.

Diverse channel options enables a business to adapt to changes in candidate behaviour and ensure the right type of hiring. The ideal platform should enable  a business to adjust investments to trigger the right channel at the right time and for the right person.

This can be examined by asking:

  • On which channels can a business advertise roles through the new tool?
  • Does the solution offer access to all the performance indicators per channel?
  • Are the channels included in the offering tried and tested?

Employer branding

Companies with a strong employer brand reduce their recruitment costs by up to 43%  and this begins with the approach to candidates at sourcing. All communication channels must reflect the employer brand strategy. This can be assessed by asking:

  • Does the solution envisaged provide an employer-branding service?
  • What distribution media are being proposed?
  • What performance indicators do they monitor?

 

Golden Bees is hosting a webinar on how to apply these points to the search for a sourcing partner on 11th May 2021.  To register your interest, please visit: https://ressource.goldenbees.fr/webinar-10-criteria-to-consider-before-choosing-your-sourcing-partner

 

News, Recruitment

Five tips for reducing ‘time to hire’ from skeeled

Written by Nicolas Speeckaert, provider of AI predictive talent acquisition software

Time to hire is an important element in talent acquisition as top candidates on average only stay on the market for 10 days, plus the longer the process the higher the cost per hire, says Nicolas Speeckaert from skeeled, a provider of AI predictive talent acquisition software.

Speeckaert says, “Time to hire measures how quickly a business can select and recruit the best candidate for a role. Tracking and reducing time to hire though is not just about speeding things up, it’s about developing the most efficient process to hire the right candidate faster, but without skipping an important part of the process.

“As we move into the post pandemic world competition for talent is expected to be fierce, particularly for certain roles such as technology, e-commerce and healthcare. Whilst some roles take longer to fill than others, it’s important for businesses to track their time to hire so they can improve their talent acquisition process.

“Tracking time to hire is an important way of making sure employers dedicate the right amount of time and resources to the various roles their hiring for, while also making sure the overall recruitment process is working efficiently.”

Speeckaert suggests the following five steps employers can take to reduce time to hire:

Automate CV screening and candidate matching

One of the most time-consuming parts of recruitment is CV screening. Some vacancies can receive hundreds of CVs especially since the Covid-19 pandemic when lots of redundancies have meant more people chasing the same roles. Analysing large-volumes of applications manually is hard and very often inefficient.

One solution is to use AI-powered talent acquisition software which speeds up the process as the system automatically parses and screens the CVS. In addition, software that is equipped with matching and ranking algorithms saves even more time as it weeds out unsuitable candidate’s right at the start of the recruitment process and focuses on the candidates that do match the job requirements.

Use your recruitment data

The right talent acquisition software can also automatically track and measure the time to hire. This saves time and allows companies to get the insights that matter to answer critical recruiting questions. By finding out how long it takes to hire a candidate, companies can identify areas of improvement and take action.

Use pre-employment assessments

Pre-hire assessments such as cognitive ability, personality and motivation tests are a key part of an effective selection process. They allow employers to predict a candidates’ ability to succeed in a role, enabling more informed hiring decisions and speed up the process, while ensuring the quality of candidates.

Automate candidate communication

Candidate communication is often one of the most frustrating aspects of the recruitment process, not only impacting the time it takes to hire someone but also affecting the overall candidate experience negatively. Using an automated email system is a great way of ensuring effective communication with candidates with little effort. Talent acquisition software allows employers to create and share within the team a set of email templates that can be personalised and to candidates in a timely way.

Automate interview scheduling

Interview scheduling can be a hassle for employers and candidates. Finding a suitable time for everyone often leads to days of emails exchange delaying the entire recruitment process. Interview scheduling can be simplified and taken from days to hours using talent acquisition software with the right calendar integration and a self-scheduling tool. Employers can send automated interview invitations to multiple candidates at once and let them choose an available time slot from the calendar.

For more information on skeeled visit: www.skeeled.com

News, Recruitment

The Portfolio Group ranks number one on Trustpilot for exceptional service

Specialist Recruitment Agency, The Portfolio Group, have been ranked on Trustpilot as the number one Temp Agency and is second placed in the Recruitment category.

With over 600 reviews, the organisation has consistently maintained an Excellent 4.9/5 star rating and has most recently gained 378 reviews in 2020.

Along with being one of the Top 10 ranked businesses in HR & Recruiting, this accolade showcases their outstanding service levels and exceptional experiences, as rated by real candidates and clients.

Danny Done, Managing Director at The Portfolio Group, said:

“Ranking number one for Temp Agencies and so high in other categories is a significant achievement for the business considering the challenging year we have all experienced. The Portfolio Group have always committed to the rigid but straightforward practice of continual communication throughout the recruitment process, whether there is progress or not. This shows how highly regarded and valued that approach is by both candidates and clients alike. 

“We pride ourselves on a personal and individual experience for every candidate and client, which proves we do as we say.

“We are particularly pleased that we were able to maintain such high levels of service throughout lockdowns and widespread remote-working and have been able to provide key workers such as Remote Temporary Payroll workers continual business support throughout the past 12-months.

Done added: “Even though the job market remains unsettled, we will keep delivering quality talent to our clients and promoting covid-safe recruitment through remote on-boarding and working, which is now embedded into our recruitment offering, and as a result, many of the reviews and feedback we have received highlights its success.”

AI, HR Tech, News, Recruitment, Talent Management

How AI technology can help companies attract the talent for the future workplace

Recent data from Gartner, Inc. has shown that the total number of skills required for a single job has been increasing by 10% year-over-year since 2017, and that one in three of the skills typically required for a role in IT, finance, or sales back in 2017 are now obsolete[1].

Nicolas Speeckaert from skeeled, a provider of predictive talent acquisition software, says this emerging skills gap could be a big challenge for companies in the future, especially factoring in the disruption caused by COVID-19.

Nicolas says, “The pandemic has changed the world of work and the skills needed must reflect new ways of working. Digital skills are highly sought after following a surge in technology usage during the pandemic.”

“Companies are also seeking people with great soft skills – they want candidates who are resilient, emotionally intelligent and able to build rapport at work, creative thinkers and good communicators, who can help them adapt to the new way of working and help their business thrive in the future.”

“We recommend companies review their existing skills set and whether job requirements have changed and make use of AI technology to recruit the right people with the right skills and talent they will need in the future.”

One way AI technology can support talent acquisition is in the screening and sifting of the CVs of job applicants. skeeled offers a pre-screening tool, powered by machine learning and Natural Language Processing, which accurately sifts through CVs and selects only candidates that match the requirements and ranks and evaluates them against an employer’s job specification. The technology not only saves companies hours of administration time and money, but accurately selects candidates based on their skills.

Speeckaert adds, “Soft skills are in high demand right now, and companies can make use of AI-based assessment technology to help identify these skills because the technology uses algorithms to predict a candidate’s desirable traits and future performance and identify if they would be a good fit for a specific role.”

“Because AI technology selects in a completely objective way, it helps companies remove bias from the early stages of the recruitment process and enables them to build diverse and inclusive teams and make fairer hiring decisions. With diversity and skills being key priorities for businesses this year, this approach to talent acquisition could be a real game changer and enable companies to focus on growth and success with the right teams in place.”

For more information on skeeled visit: www.skeeled.com

News, Recruitment

skeeled partners with Work Horizons to offer digital recruitment solutions to UK customers

skeeled, a provider of predictive talent acquisition software, has signed a partnership agreement with Work Horizons, a UK specialist in organisational renewal and career coaching, who will offer skeeled’s predictive talent acquisition software to its clients as part of its portfolio of digital solutions.

Work Horizons employs 50 HR consultants, executive and career coaches, counsellors and recruitment specialists and they work with organisations with 500 employees or more across all industry sectors.

Headquartered in Luxembourg, skeeled launched in the UK last year, as demand for virtual talent acquisition solutions accelerated. The COVID-19 pandemic increased this demand, as many more companies adopted digital hiring processes.

A 2020 report from Cielo[i] found that 82% of hiring managers will continue to interview using video once the pandemic is over. Two fifths (41%) are happy to onboard staff virtually and 32% are not concerned about making job offers without physically meeting candidates.

For Work Horizons, one of the key attractions of skeeled’s predictive AI technology is the fact it automates many traditional recruitment processes, especially the time-consuming early stages when candidates are screened and selected for the interviews. The software includes a pre-screening tool, powered by machine learning and natural language processing (NLP) techniques to harmonise recruiter and applicant terminology. This accurately sifts through CVs, selecting candidates that best match and fit with the job description. It also includes predictive pre-hire assessments allowing companies to select candidates with the right attitude and potential.

Rob Ball, Founder and Director of Work Horizons, says, “Hiring and retaining the right talent will be a fundamental challenge for businesses emerging from the pandemic. Currently, there is a candidate rich market with many candidates competing for roles, and companies will need tools to hire people with the right skills, talents and aptitudes that will support their future growth, and we’re confident that skeeled’s software can add real value to the hiring process.”

“It has the advantages of a slick applicant tracking system, but with the intelligence of predictive analytics which will free up people’s time from the laborious parts of the selection process, so that they can concentrate on their own diagnostics and creating an onboarding approach that truly represents the organisation’s culture. These benefits will, we believe, reduce poor hiring decisions and strengthen the employer brand.”

Nicolas Speeckaert, skeeled’s Co-Founder and Managing Partner says, “We’re delighted to partner with Work Horizons, a relatively young company with big ambitions, like us. There are many synergies between our companies and working together will enable us to help UK companies introduce modern digital recruitment processes that will save them time and money and ensure they make the best hiring decisions.”

skeeled and Work Horizons are officially launching their partnership with a free webinar called ‘Talent Acquisition in Unprecedented Times’ on 23rd February 2021 at 12 midday (GMT). This will be an interaction discussion focused on sharing insights and inspiration, with an expert panel including Jo Carr, Karen Moore, and Nigel Betteridge from Work Horizons and Nicolas Speeckaert, and António Gomes from skeeled.

Employment Law, Law, Recruitment

Top North Wales recruiter and legal firm join forces for virtual employment law event

FURLOUGH, Brexit and IR35 will be among the topics discussed at a virtual employment law event.

Supertemps and S2 Recruitment, based in Colwyn Bay and Bangor, have again teamed up with Manchester legal firm JMW Solicitors for a free seminar covering a wide range of themes on Thursday March 4.

The session will be held online due to the Coronavirus, and the pandemic itself will be among the issues employers can raise during an online Q&A.

Sarah Ellwood, Managing Director of Supertemps and S2 Recruitment, said: “Given the unprecedented situation we have been in for almost 12 months I’m sure a lot of employers will still have questions about the impact COVID-19 has had on their workforce, and the effects it could have in the future.

“From furlough to the vaccination roll-out and PPE (personal protective equipment) there have been challenges and obstacles for private and public sector organisations in completely unchartered territory.

“And there are other changes on the horizon, including IR35, and whether furlough will end in April and what happens when it does. We hope people will join us to find out more.”

Representing JMW Solicitors will be partner Simon Bloch and Paul Chamberlain, Head of the company’s Department for Employment Law.

“The National Minimum Wage and some of the most interesting and insightful employment law cases of the last 12 months will also be covered on the day,” said Simon.

“I’m sure people will have a lot of questions given everything that has happened in the last year, and we will do our best to answer them.

“Sadly, we cannot hold the event in person as we have in the past, but our partnership with Supertemps and S2 Recruitment continues to grow – as does the popularity of these seminars – so we hope to see a positive response.”

Jobseekers and employers can also watch videos with advice and guidance on a range of subjects from virtual interview preparation and furlough vs working, to online on-boarding of new starters and how to respond to the challenges of COVID-19.

Sarah added: “One of our biggest priorities since the onset of the pandemic has been to keep North Wales working and be there to support not only our clients but any organisation that needs our help.

“We are starting to see positive signs of recovery but obviously there will be long-lasting reaction for many people; there are also opportunities and as things start to open up again, we could see the landscape change – it’s important we are all ready for that.”

To register for the free employment law seminar, visit www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/employment-law-update-2021-tickets-137660176293?aff=. Spaces are limited to a maximum of two people per organisation.

For more information, visit www.supertemps.co.uk or www.jmw.co.uk.

Watch videos with tips and advice from Supertemps and S2 Recruitment on their YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/channel/UCyDDc48hfPJTMq_4pyI3ZAQ/playlists

News, Recruitment, Talent Management

skeeled offers employers six tips for online recruiting during the pandemic

Business looking for a competitive advantage when it comes to attracting top talent need to start thinking about the challenges ahead post Covid-19 and start adapting their recruitment processes says, Nicolas Speeckaert, Managing Partner at skeeled.

This comes as research from XpertHR[i] in the USA reveals that recruiting and hiring are HR professionals’ top concerns for 2021; and a global survey by jobs site, Monster[ii] highlights that the top recruiting challenges this year include the skills gap, virtual recruitment and the recruitment process.

Nicolas Speeckaert says, “HR departments have played a key role in building an innovative and proactive culture to help businesses respond to COVID-19. We’re still navigating uncertain times, so HR leaders and recruitment teams need to have strategies in place to attract talent with the right skills to help their business recover and for many, this will require a fresh approach to talent acquisition.”

Six tips to help HR leaders set up a new talent acquisition strategy & ensure hiring success:

  1. Identify New Hiring Goals – Many organisations have digitised their businesses, creating new roles that didn’t exist before. What was once the ideal candidate, may not suit the current needs of the business. Companies need to identify the roles needed, the skills required to succeed in those roles and the ideal candidate profile, taking into consideration possible changes in the company culture since the start of the pandemic.
  2. Review Recruitment Process – Running a recruitment audit will fine-tune the hiring process and highlight changes needed, making sure they are aligned with the new recruitment goals. This should include evaluating everything, from how easy it is for people to apply for a role, to how candidates are being screened and assessed. HR should update communication protocols and improve the selection process to attract and hire the best candidates.
  3. Improve Job Diffusion – Recruitment marketing is key to attracting the right talent. HR leaders should make sure they are using a talent acquisition tool that allows them to easily create and run efficient job campaigns, reaching and engaging with the ideal candidates through the most effective sourcing channels for their business.
  4. Boost the Candidate Experience – Unfortunately, some organisations still don’t give the candidate experience the importance it deserves, however, providing a seamless experience and creating meaningful connections with candidates is even more essential now. Companies must deliver a clear message to candidates that promotes trust in them as a future employer. This may require fine-tuning the current recruitment process, giving recruiters the chance to develop a more thoughtful, engaging, empathic and transparent process, which will remain valuable even after the pandemic is over.
  5. Leverage Technology in the Interview Process – Technology can improve the interview process in many ways. Online video interviews allow the recruitment process to progress even if recruiters and candidates cannot meet face-to-face. A talent acquisition suite also gives recruiters additional tools to improve the process, such as interview scorecards so they can conduct structured interviews and evaluate candidates with the same criteria. The one-way video interviews also offer the chance to see the candidates before meeting them, so recruiters can assess basic skills and company fit – making it a great screening tool.
  6. Use Predictive Assessments – Predictive pre-hire assessments allow companies to be more strategic and run an efficient selection process, by moving from traditional experience-based assessments to selecting candidates with the right attitude and potential. Soft skills are in high demand, and recruiters can now make great use of AI-based assessment technology that uses algorithms to predict desirable traits and future performance, to discover a candidates’ true potential and identify the perfect fit for a given role.

[i] https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/talent-acquisition/pages/recruiting-is-top-hr-concern-2021.aspx

[ii] https://www2.staffingindustry.com/site/Editorial/Daily-News/Top-global-recruiting-challenges-for-2021-Monster-report-56276#:~:text=The%20top%20recruiting%20challenges%20of,job%20board%20operator%20Monster%20Worldwide.

News, Recruitment

Wade Macdonald celebrates 30 years in business

Wade Macdonald, specialist recruiter based in the Thames Valley region, today celebrates its 30th anniversary.

The company was founded in February 1991 by work colleagues, Dominic Wade and Philip Macdonald. Both saw a gap in the market for a recruitment firm that challenged the stereotypes, they wanted to create a firm that was ethical, customer-centric and transparent.

When asked about this ethos, Philip said: “So many recruiters were, and still are, numbers focused. While, yes, we need to have a good grip on the bottom line, this isn’t what recruitment is about. Recruitment is about people.

“We wanted to be different and so, we worked hard to build a successful business on the foundations of open communication, friendliness and solid working relationships.”

The company has gone from strength to strength over the past three decades. Having weathered four recessions and currently navigating the pandemic, Wade Macdonald’s turnover has remained consistently strong.

In addition to rising to become the largest independent recruitment business in the Thames Valley region, Wade Macdonald currently ranks in the top 10 per cent of the top independent recruiters across the whole of the UK.

Post-pandemic, growth plans are on the cards for Dominic and Philip who look to expand into new sectors and scale internationally.

Development plans include:

Advancing into the Data Science sector to fulfil the demand the pandemic has created for higher volumes of Data Analysts and Data Scientists.
Engaging with more Blue-Chip clients overseas and moving the business from a national to an international name.
Grow the current team substantially.

Dominic, co-founder, commented: “I am phenomenally proud of how much the company has grown and evolved over the past 30 years. Most importantly, our ethos and values have remained ever grounded into the foundations of the business.

“We have built a strong reputation which has created long-lasting working relationships, friendships and created a fantastically strong team of specialists who also strive to fulfil the same values.”

Dominic and Philip met in 1986 while working for the same niche recruitment firm, The Focus Group. The pair gelled immediately, both sharing the same business values and both with the dream to set up a unique and innovative recruitment business.

Philip added: “It’s been an amazing 30 years, but none of it would have been possible if I didn’t have a business partner by my side who complemented my every move and vice versa. Here’s to the next three decades of Wade Macdonald.”