TALiNT International November 2021

November 2021

Hidden strengths Plus...

- World Leaders in Recruitment - TA Trends in US & APAC - Side hustle or hassle?

TIARA 2021 winners showcase new ways recruiters & RPOs add value for employers

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TIARA Awards 2021 London

TALiNT International November 2021

Ashley Lawrence, Chair

Winner of Recruitment Leader of the Year, TIARA 2021

3 Leader

Pioneer spirit The best in the industry are transforming the perception of the sector as a professional service with new models and approaches.

I come from a long line of recruiters. My grandmother started one of the first, if not the first recruitment agencies in South Africa in the 70s. And even though that’s not the career path I chose for myself – my mother was a secondgeneration, legacy recruiter – it seems fitting that I find myself, almost full circle, working in an industry which is being transformed by so many new pioneers as it was back then.

It’s been a pleasure being part of our TIARA Awards over the last month, which celebrate those setting new standards in the sector.

The TIARA Talent Solutions Awards were held at the magnificent IET at Savoy Place. It was great to see 250 of the industry’s finest braving the elements to celebrate its support of the UK’s biggest employers through the pandemic – and pose for team snaps against the grand London skyline.

It was also a privilege to be involved in the judging process for the TIARA Recruitment Awards, with 50 of the UK’s best recruiters shortlisted that collectively generate over £8.4 billion in revenues and employ over 35,000 people. It was glorious to see James Reed, newly inducted into the TIARA Hall of Fame, inspiring 500 recruitment leaders as a champion of the sector. You can find out why our winners won and what impressed judges in our TIARA supplement which starts on page 26.

All of this year’s TIARA winners showed why recruitment and RPO is a professional service and why they are investing in training and development of their own talent to attract and keep more of the right people in the industry.

This was a key theme to emerge from our World Leaders in Recruitment Summit last month, where the industry’s leading CEOs and senior executives came together to explore talent and technology trends. Read our summary of speaker insights from page 13.

One of our speakers, workforce futurist Andrew Spence, predicted that the side hustle will become the norm for more people and change

the way people manage their careers. But is the side hustle a hobby that enables people to profit from their passion, or something employees must do because they’re not paid enough?

TALiNT Partners’ MD, Ken Brotherston, shares his opinion on page 86.

Debbie Walton Editor TALiNT International

Side hustles can be a way of pioneering a new service or business idea. The question is, can you channel this pioneering spirit in your business, or will more employees become competitors?

All of this year’s TIARA winners showed why recruitment and RPO is a professional service and why they are investing in training and development of their own talent to attract and keep more of the right people in the industry.

About TALiNT Partners TALiNT Partners provides insight, content, connections and strategic support to the world’s recruitment & talent acquisition leaders.

We work hard to connect, collaborate and concentrate our efforts to ensure our events, experiences, consultancy and media solutions offer the best support for the talent industry.

Published by Talent Intelligence Partners Ltd Upper Ground Floor 18 Farnham Road Guildford Surrey GU1 4XA www.talintpartners.com Editorial: debbie@talintpartners.com News & features: debbie@talintpartners.com Advertising & Sponsorship: andy@talintpartners.com

TALiNT International November 2021

4 Contents

Contributors

08 News analysis

08 Remote work creates new belonging crisis 09 Record high payroll figures 10 60% of candidates lost at application stage 11 UK regions with biggest staffing issues

13 Changing perceptions World Leaders in Recruitment debate talent and technology priorities for 2022

Natasha Crump Amoria Bond P14

Affi Khan CPL UK - Technology and Healthcare P14

Anthony Genas Introhive P14

Saira Demmer SF Recruitment P15

Guy Hayward Goodman Masson P18

Nazai John CPS Group P19

Emily Ayre BRUIN Financial P19

Gary Jones Hudson RPO P22

18 Heated debate

Why are recruiters struggling to find and keep their own recruitment talent?

21 US: TA challenges

Sourcing tactics for pharma/life sciences

24 APAC: TA trends

Leveraging employer brand & ESG in TA

26 Champions of change TIARA 2021 insights: How this year’s winners are transforming the sector

28 TIARA Talent Solutions Awards 2021 Top solutions and providers honoured

52 TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Crowning the UK’s top staffing firms

86 TALiNT Talk

Goodbye C-19 & take side hustles with you Picture credits: iStock, Unsplash, Canva, Baz Seal | baz.london Disclaimer: This publication has been prepared for the exclusive use and benefit of the readers of TALiNT International and other contacts of TALiNT Partners and is for information purposes only.

Unless we provide express prior written consent, no part of this publication should be reproduced, distributed, or communicated to any third party. You must not rely on the information in this publication as an alternative to advice from an appropriately qualified professional. In no event shall TALiNT Partners or any of those contributing to this publication be liable for any special, direct, indirect, consequential, or incidental damages or any damages whatsoever, whether in an action of contract, negligence, or other tort, arising out of or in connection with the contents of this publication. © Talent Intelligence Partners

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Marisa Liao Deliveroo P24

Natalie Tait Bank of America, Singapore P24

6 TALiNT Scene In-person events and virtual roundtables abound as industry leaders gathered across London to discuss HR Tech, Talent Solutions and the latest market trends in the UK, US and APAC regions…

29th September 2021 — The rising demand for new skills and ways of working were the topics discussed at the AMS APAC virtual roundtable, hosted by TALiNT Partners’ own Debra Sparshott, Employer Programme Director. Co-hosted with AMS, the event brought together TA leaders from SiemensHealthineers, Bank of America, Deliveroo and Google amongst others. Read more on page 24.

7th October 2021 — TALiNT Partners and Retinue Talent Solutions co-hosted a lively and wide-ranging discussion at the stunning Haymarket Hotel in London looking at how many TA leaders have dealt with challenges when ‘their teams halved, and their workload doubled.’

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14th October 2021 — We were back at the Beaumont Hotel in Mayfair (one of our favourites) for another brilliant Talent Solutions Leaders dinner to discuss current market trends and also share some insights from our recent awards – the comparisons between our employer awards for in-house teams vs our talent solutions awards were especially interesting.

19th October — Deloitte hosted the annual HR Tech Leaders Dinner on the scenic 14th floor of their London offices to debate deal and valuation drivers, sector trends and market predictions with founders and CEOs at the forefront of the sector. This included recent TIARA Talent Tech Star Award winners Arctic Shores, the newly rebranded Talos360, Eli Onboarding, Paiger and Pixid.

TALiNT International November 2021

8 News analysis

Remote work creates belonging crisis Research conducted by LinkedIn showed 86% of employers are planning to offer their staff flexible working opportunities and because of this, leaders are focussing on ensuring their workforce feels included, regardless of their work location.

The study of more than 250 C-level executives in the UK revealed that as businesses look to offer hybrid (56%) and remote working (10%), leaders say their biggest concerns are that employees feel that working from home may result in their missing out on promotions or career decisions (35%) and that proximity bias may arise where leaders favour employees who they regularly see (32%).

Out of sight, out of mind – employees are concerned A complementary study of over 1,000 workers in the UK found that nearly half (44%) of workers believe that people who choose to work from the office are more likely to be favoured by bosses or senior management.

Nearly 39% say that working from home may negatively impact their

10%

Businesses offer fully remote work

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career because they get less inperson time with their superiors. A third of workers believe that being in the office is ultimately better for career progression.

Similarly, research undertaken by HR tech platform Connectr, revealed that the pandemic has upended employees’ priorities and emotional support and a sense of belonging has moved right to the top of the list of important workplace benefits.

Almost a quarter of workers now believe that having their individuality recognised is also important. This has more than doubled since February 2020. Other things employees are looking for in employers since the

35%

Leaders’ biggest concern is employees who work from home miss out on promotions

pandemic include being proud of the company they work for, having their opinions listened to, and being part of a supportive and inclusive team.

“It’s imperative that proximity bias doen’t become an issue that impacts peoples’ careers,” said Adam Hawkins, Head of Search & Staffing, EMEA, at LinkedIn. He believes that ensuring everyone feels included at work, regardless of their location, is crucial to not only attracting and retaining great talent, but also creating cultures where people can truly thrive.

“Leaders must work closely with HR teams to facilitate the appropriate training and guidelines to ensure career progression is centred around performance, and not location.”

39%

Workers who feel working from home negatively affects their career

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Graduates’ career confidence grows The CFA Institute conducted a survey on the career outlook of more than 15,000 current university students across 15 markets. The results found that, globally, 58% of respondents still feel confident about their future career prospects following the pandemic.

Traditionally stable sectors, such as finance, are attractive for graduates with respondents across all 15 markets putting finance as one of the top five most valuable majors for finding a career.

Graduates reassessing careers The survey results showed that those studying accounting and finance were particularly confident, with 80% believing their prospects are as good.

Despite this confidence, 46% of the

respondents reported they are reassessing their career paths in light of the pandemic and new motivations. Top concerns now include low pay in their preferred sector (26%), lack of jobs in their preferred sector (25%) and working in a sector that doesn’t fulfil or interest them (26%).

Margaret Franklin, CFA President and CEO of CFA Institute said that it’s worrying that graduates currently don’t see the finance industry as making a positive social impact.

“This issue is only going to increase in importance, and industry leaders need to make sure we are on the front foot in educating students about the positive impact an investment career can have for people and our planet.”

Payrolled employee figures surpass pre-pandemic levels Labour market stats published by the ONS showed that vacancy numbers have reached another record high with the number of payroll employees up by 207,000 having surpassed pre-pandemic levels. This is 122,000 higher than levels seen before the pandemic hit in February. The UK’s employment rate increased by 0.5 percentage points last quarter to 75.3%, while the unemployment rate was down 0.4 percentage points to 4.5%.

Record vacancies may not be good news...

According to analysis of job listings

by Adzuna, people looking for work may not be in the right areas to fill them, with different regions facing different employment challenges.

London is by far the worst place for workers to be in if looking for employment, with more people looking for work than jobs

advertised. London saw 13.4% of over 16s unemployed or furloughed which was the highest in the country. Vacancies were 104% of what they were pre-pandemic; this was the smallest growth nationally.

In Northern Ireland, vacancies grew by 154%, the second steepest in the country, but there are comparatively fewer people looking for work.

This location phenomenon could result in continuing crisis for businesses battling to find staff as the economy grows. Matthew Percival, Programme Director for Skills and Inclusion at the Confederation of British Industry said that companies have found hiring difficult this autumn and the official data is beginning to tell the same story, with the number of people on payroll exceeding pre-COVID highs and record vacancies.

News in brief 40% of businesses report decrease in revenue A report published by Addition, the outsourced finance solution for SMEs and start-ups has revealed that over the last 12 months, 40% of businesses have reported a decrease in revenue, with Leicester-based companies the hardest hit and Manchester coming in second with 35%. Cities have also struggled to recruit employees, indicating that skill shortages and economic fluctuations are massively impacting the job market across the UK. In Bristol 39% of businesses are struggling to recruit the right talent.

One in four (25%) firms in London are finding it hard to recruit, and Newcastle is the least impacted, with a mere 13% of businesses with concerns about recruiting.

Signs of burnout up 31% According to Google search data, the last three months have seen a 221% spike in searches for work stress. This is the culmination of a year of heightened risk of mental exhaustion among employees, with the latest data showing a 31% overall increase in searches for “signs of burnout” over the last 12 months. Experts are urging HR and leadership teams to pay attention to the issue as winter approaches as it’s generally acknowledged as a time of year when mental health concerns often surge.

65% of workers consider changing roles According to research conducted by international recruitment company Aspire, employers are facing the worst candidate shortage on record with 65% of people currently working are either searching for or are open to new roles. This will offer hope to hiring businesses. Employers have, however, been advised to plan for a potential ‘great resignation’, which is likely to see existing workers move jobs if businesses can’t meet the changing needs of staff. Aspire founder Paul Farrer said that salary is often the first consideration but flexible working policies, clear progression paths and a genuine commitment to D&I are equally important.”

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10 News analysis

Candidates losing patience with long, complex application process 60%

of job seekers abandon the application process if it takes too long

With job vacancies across the UK reaching a record high of 1.03million employers must streamline onboarding processes or risk losing candidates to the competition amid skills shortages, according to identity services firm, Sterling. Research has found that 60% of job seekers abandon the application process if it takes too long or is too complex with a separate study suggesting that a positive candidate experience makes

a candidate 38% more likely to accept a job offer from a company.

“There is no doubt that acute skills shortages across the UK are driving the need for efficient onboarding processes, said Steve Smith, Managing Director, Sterling EMEA. “With rising vacancy numbers and competition for talent intensifying, employers must quite simply

streamline background screening processes or risk losing candidates in the process.”

The economy is coming back to life with UK employment now at prepandemic levels. Employers across almost every sector are crying out for skills – and in this jobseeker-driven market, refining the candidate experience can be a competitive advantage.

46% of workers ‘are uncomfortable with unvaccinated colleagues’ With a survey by CV-Library revealing that almost half (46%) of workers feeling uncomfortable around unvaccinated colleagues, employers are faced with another dimension when it comes to retaining talent.

According to the survey of 2,000 professionals, a massive 58.5% of UK employees want to know if their colleagues have been vaccinated against COVID-19 and a further 58.8% would speak to their manager about it. A third (32.4%) of respondents admitted that they would consider changing jobs rather than work with a colleague who hadn’t been vaccinated against the virus.

TALiNT International November 2021

“With the Government warning of a tough winter ahead and many UK professionals returning to the workplace, in some capacity, it’s understandable that staff want to remain as safe as possible. However, this presents a unique challenge for business owners and managers,” said Lee Biggins, CEO and founder of CV-Library.

He believes that staff safety should be the ultimate priority, but it’s also important that employees who have chosen to not get the COVID-19 vaccine aren’t discriminated against.

“It’s a fine balance and, with the

current record job postings and staff shortages, businesses need to do all they can to keep hold of their staff and ensure that they’re both happy and comfortable in the workplace,” he said.

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Rise in minimum wage & NI a ‘double whammy’ “For minimum wage employers in sectors such as hospitality, who are very much still feeling the financial pressures of COVID-19, a further increase to their employment costs will be far from welcome.”

The UK Chancellor confirmed a rise in the National Minimum Wage (NMW) in the autumn budget, which presents a “double whammy” for employers who are facing this increase at the same next year as the increase in National Insurance.

The REC commented that deciding that the rate can get back on path in one year, rather than two, will put pressure on sectors like care and hospitality. The trade body maintains that the big unanswered question is about progression from lower-paid roles – too many workers miss out on supported training by the inflexibility of the apprenticeship levy.

“The size of the increase to the top rate – the National Living Wage (NLW) – is also around the level we saw prior to the pandemic,” said Richard Maitland, partner at MHA. “Although there was a ‘COVID-19 blip’ for the current year when the increase was much smaller — the increase from April 2020 was £0.51 an hour — and this current proposed increase (April 2022) is £0.59. The rise from April 2021 which did factor in the effect of the pandemic was unusually low, at just £0.19.

“The UK needs a reformed model, where temporary and flexible workers can do shorter bursts of training that reflect labour market needs and raise their pay.”

Revealed: UK regions with top recruitment challenges Cities most impacted by talent shortages are revealed in a new report published by Addition, an outsourced finance solution for SMEs and start-ups. Leicester-based businesses were hardest hit with 40% reporting a decrease in revenue over the last year.

Manchester came in at second with 35%, and London was sixth with more than a quarter (26%) of businesses reporting a loss in revenue.

Certain areas over the UK have also struggled to recruit employees, demonstrating that skill shortages and economic fluctuations are massively impacting the job market across the UK. In Bristol 39% of businesses are struggling to recruit the right talent.

One in four (25%) firms in London are finding it hard to recruit, and Newcastle is the least impacted, with a mere 13% of businesses with concerns about recruiting.

Revenues impacted most

Most recruitment struggles

1

Leicester

Bristol

2

Manchester

Glasgow

3

Edinburgh

Leicester

4

Bristol

Southampton

5

Leeds

London

News in brief Almost half of workers want their dogs at work A study by Ivory Research has revealed the list of priorities a typical Gen Z worker will consider before accepting a new role. Following the boom in dog ownership during lockdown in 2020, welcoming pets in the workplace is a top priority for nearly half of Gen Zs (48%). Hybrid working is also one of their top requirements, with a whopping 87% of those surveyed stating they wouldn’t accept a role that was 100% office based and 74% saying the ideal home/office balance is three days in the office and two at home.

A quarter of workers receive no response to job applications Despite the war for talent challenging the recruitment market, new research commissioned by Reed.co.uk, has found that 24% of workers that have applied for jobs since the start of the pandemic have had no response to their applications. Long wait times were reported by those who did receive a response and transitioned through the hiring process, with 17% of workers made to wait more than two weeks between interviews. More than one in ten (13%) workers report receiving contact from companies they had previously applied to.

Recruitment recovery fears Skills shortages continue to threaten operational recovery, according to the latest UK Recruitment Index by APSCo and chartered accountants Saffery Champness. The biggest challenge facing recruiters is a shortage of candidates, with 47% reporting this as a concern. The continued impact of Brexit and the long-lasting effect of IR35 means the recruitment sector is struggling to meet demand. This dearth of talent extends to the staffing sector too, with 43% of recruitment businesses worried about a shortage of recruitment consultants, which is driving up salaries.

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• • • • • • •

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Changing perception If the staffing sector wants to be valued as a professional service, it needs to raise entry level standards and train talent instead of just rewarding top billers.

How should staffing firms make the most of their talent and technology to adapt to new workforce trends? This year’s World Leaders in Recruitment Summit was designed around this and related questions that have been debated in PointSix events in 2021 to help senior execs make better strategic decisions for 2022.

After the accelerated adoption of talent tech through the pandemic, where has it delivered the best impact and ROI for recruiters? What new models and services will drive the next phase of tech transformation? With unprecedented demand for experienced recruitment talent, how can recruiters build better employer and partner brands? How are new workforce trends changing client and candidate demands?

In the midst of post-Brexit/COVID-19 skills and talent shortages, what is the role of the recruitment sector in training to fill demand and driving greater diversity and inclusion?

Supported by partners including Bullhorn, Introhive, Odro and SourceBreaker, this year’s Summit brought together over 80 CEOs and senior executives from the UK’s top 500 staffing firms to learn from peers and experts in panel debates and roundtable discussions.

Opening the Summit with his keynote market observations, Mark Cahill, MD of

By Alex Evans, Programme Director, TALiNT Partners

ManpowerGroup UK, highlighted the forces driving both digital and business transformation – from the rapid rise in remote work to an increased focus on ESG metrics, strategic talent management, and platformisation to better optimise data and insight for skills mapping.

“Those companies digitising most are creating the most jobs, with 86% of employers that are automating planning to increase or maintain their headcount,” he observed.

“To adapt to new workforce trends, we need to build, buy, borrow and bridge,” he added.

“Invest in L&D programmes to grow your internal talent pipeline; recruit externally for talent that cannot be built in-house in the required timeframe; cultivate communities of non-permanent workers to complement existing workers; and help people to move up into new roles within your organisation.”

“Staffing firms are in the midst of a transformation similar to that seen by the large professional services companies.”

Anthony Genas, Industry Director, Introhive

TALiNT International November 2021

14 World Leaders in Recruitment Summit

“I’ve seen a lot of recruiters using PR and terminology to sound more like SaaS businesses to achieve a higher multiple on valuation but there is a massive risk to building your own tech if it’s too bespoke.”

Katie Folwell-Davies, Investment Director, Twenty20 Capital

Adoption & Intergration The first speaker panel explored drivers for transformation and how to get the best ROI from tech.

Scott Siwicki, Group Client Solutions Director at RGF Staffing UK, explained that they built their own bespoke platform to streamline the process for recruiters and candidates and bring it up to standard for a 21st century recruitment business. It won the TIARA 2021 Tech Transformation Award for its impact on the business. “Adoption was driven by good integration with complementary platforms and training from good partners,” he added.

SourceBreaker was one of these partners.

“Training is a vital part of adoption and senior leadership involvement, from setting a clear vision to attending sessions, boosts buy-in,” said CRO Adam Dale. Asked to predict the next big thing for talent tech, he added: “Recruitment is a people business. Tech needs to enable better interaction with candidates by automating the sourcing element.”

This latter point was echoed by Affi Khan, CEO of CPL UK – Technology and Healthcare, who said: “Before deciding what to automate, map your customer journey and determine where the friction points are to better manage the relationship between candidate and client. You have to understand your value add, stay focussed on it and decide if you’re a tech business or a recruitment business.”

This led into the next panel on the trends and models enabling growth for recruiters, with many staffing firms exploring RPO and platforms to generate new sources of revenue.

“Staffing firms are in the midst of a transformation similar to that seen by the large professional services companies,” said Anthony Genas, Industry Director at Introhive. “The

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staffing firm of the future is one that takes advantage of its relationships, knowledge and database to increase margins by diversifying into other talent related revenue streams like outsourcing and advisory roles. Not just placing people but consulting on best practices.”

Katie Folwell-Davies, Investment Director of Twenty20 Capital, said technology was enhancing the human element in recruitment and its equity value. “I’ve seen a lot of recruiters using PR and terminology to sound more like SaaS businesses to achieve a higher multiple on valuation but there is a massive risk to building your own tech if it’s too bespoke. It’s better to partner with a good provider,” she observed.

Brendon Flood, Executive Director of Staffing 360 Solutions, said recruiters should optimise technology to be better recruiters, not to become recruitment technology companies.

“Tech must be an enabler to everything we do,” he explained. “To grow our business, we needed to use tech to move into markets where we can work remotely. Things that can be commoditised should be but it’s our market insight, candidate knowledge and talent networks that differentiates us.”

Commenting on this point, Amoria Bond chairperson Gary Elden said he had seen various tech players trying to disrupt recruitment but failing to build a big enough pool of candidates.

“Whoever controls the candidates, controls the market,” he said.

“If you can’t evidence the strengths in your business, it’s not a strength – whether it’s DE&I or purpose – so authenticity is our focus.”

Natasha Crump, ESG Director, Amoria Bond

Saira Demmer, CEO of SF Recruitment, said the role of technology hadn’t changed much in simply eliminating any tasks or admin that wastes consultant time. However, having recently announced a new employee ownership model for her business, she felt that it had a new role to play. “We want our people to be more autonomous masters of their destiny, working how and where they want to, so technology needs to support their learning, coaching and leadership development as well as their productivity and wellbeing,” she explained.

Bullhorn’s Account Director, Stuart Johnson, observed that the two key tech trends playing out are automation and self-service. “Twelve months ago, our customers were running 2 million automations a month through our technology. It’s 2 million a day. Technology advances have changed customer expectations around self-service. Customers now want a Netflix experience, where relevant roles and opportunities are served up to them when they are ready through an app. Broadly speaking, recruitment is still offering a Blockbuster experience where the onus is on the customer to sift through a warehouse of opportunity themselves.”

TA Challenges The second half of the Summit looked at the talent challenges facing recruiters and their clients. TALiNT Partners Employer Programme Director, Debra Sparshott, set the scene with a summary of insights from the latest Employer Benchmark Survey.

“The priorities for corporate employers and TA teams are finding an easy talent mapping tool so they know what they have and gaps they need to fill; tapping into wider and deeper market knowledge to find the right candidates; creating more emotional engagement with candidates to reduce the frequency of drop-outs; and balancing their employer and customer brand,”

Debra explained. “DE&I is central to their workforce strategy, but they know they need help from their recruitment partners on this as well.”

Saira Demmer CEO SF Recruitment

Affi Khan CEO CPL UK

Anthony Genas, Industry Director (Accounting & Consultancy), Introhive

But how are recruiters building their own employer and partner brands at a time when they’re competing for recruitment talent?

A panel on this topic kicked off with Tim Cook, Group CEO of nGage Recruitment, asked why the recruitment industry has a bad reputation for attrition. “The churn tends to be at the front end; if it’s too easy to join a recruitment business, it’s easy to leave,” he said. “We need to set a professional services benchmark to attract the right people, then pay the right money and give the right training to develop them so they can grow a division, not just a desk.”

Is the Great Resignation impacting recruitment?

“It’s a fact and we call it the Great Reshuffle,” said Adam Hawkins, Head of Staffing EMEA & LATAM at LinkedIn. “People are thinking carefully about their next move and have different expectations of what they’re looking for from work since the pandemic. Our latest survey data found that 46% of consultants are considering a change of role, and 19% want it to align with their personal purpose. When recruiters, or young people coming into industry, are looking for jobs today they want to understand a company’s flexible working policy, its culture and values, and its approach to diversity and inclusion. These are all factors contributing to people’s career decisions and it’s giving firms pause for thought.”

Amoria Bond defended its Best Recruitment Company to Work For title for a second year at the 2021 TIARA Recruitment Awards for its 12-times return on investment in training and development. “If you can’t evidence the strengths in your business, it’s not a strength

16 World Leaders in Recruitment Summit

“We need to set a professional services benchmark to attract the right people, then pay the right money and give the right training to develop them so they can grow a division, not just a desk.”

Tim Cook, Group CEO, nGage Recruitment

– whether it’s DE&I or purpose – so authenticity is our focus,” explained Natasha Crump, Amoria Bond’s ESG Director. “Employees are the best brand ambassadors for the business, so we have showed them how to build authentic personal brands that highlight our strengths – which has improved D&I and attracted more clients and candidates.”

Explaining the role of video in this, Dougie Loan, CRO of Odro, said: “Video helps to foster a higher level of trust with a more authentic personal brand, and we’ve seen this with our own business. Employee generated content has attracted 39 of the 48 people working at Odro.”

The final panel offered some predictions on workforce trends and how recruiters should adapt.

“Workers will increasingly look for meaning, equity and flexibility from employers,” said workforce futurist Andrew Spence, who added that side hustles will become more prevalent for those seeking the control, autonomy, and money they are not getting from their day job.

In order to deliver the right candidates for the right roles, recruiters will need to invest in their candidate and contractor communities.

Commenting on its own lifetime candidate initiative, Gattaca CEO Kevin Freeguard said: “We have focused on building trusted relationships with candidates to nurture and develop their careers. Contractors work for us for decades because we care about their progression.”

Mike Ruddle, CCO of NHS Professionals, said the candidate knowledge from partner agencies and their expertise in nurturing them into new NHS roles was vital through the pandemic. He also saw the impact of training, which is a key priority for 2022. “If we are to build long-term

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relationships with our contingent workers we need to invest in their training and development just as we would for our own employees.”

The Summit closed with an emotional keynote from Steve Ingham, CEO of PageGroup, who talked about how his perspective on disability – as an employer and a recruiter - changed after a skiing accident left him paralysed.

“Disability is an important part of the diversity debate and there is an opportunity to unlock a largely ignored workforce to address talent shortages,” he said. “We need to focus on the ability and resilience of people who have overcome physical and mental health challenges - and empower people to be more open about them - to make organisations more inclusive.”

Just as the recruitment sector needs to improve the way it’s perceived - so it’s recognised and valued as a professional service - it must be a more authentic and inspirational champion of inclusivity.

RECRUITMENT IN NUMBERS • £36.4bn The total turnover of UK’s top 500 recruiters in 2020 compared to £40.8bn in 2019 (TALiNT International Recruitment Power List 2021) • US$20.8bn The global RPO revenue forecast in 2027, after 18.5% CAGR from 2020-27 (Grand View Research) • 59% Of employees were hired from previous recruiting roles, up from 33% in 2020 (LinkedIn)

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As a leader, I wanted to give my team the best product in the market to do their job – I genuinely believe that SourceBreaker is that product.

- Andy Heyes Managing Director, Harvey Nash

If you are interested to find out how SourceBreaker enabled Harvey Nash to: Reduce time spent searching for CVs Improve ROI from job boards & proprietary database Increase placements per recruiter Decrease ramp-up time for rookie consultants

Then click on this ad to read our Case Study.

Or visit www.sourcebreaker.com to book a bespoke demo, and a member of the team will show you how SourceBreaker can help you achieve your business goals!

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18 PointSix: Recruitment Talent

Heated debate As the market hots up for recruiters and RPOs, their biggest challenge is talent gaps — but why are so many competing for people within the industry and so few bringing in new skills from other sectors?

The recruitment market is hotter than a phaal curry with a side dish of dragon’s breath chillies, creating huge opportunities for agencies and solutions providers. According to Talent.com, 75% of hiring managers have seen recruiting costs increase and new data from the ONS in September revealed that job vacancies increased to over a million for the first time since records began in 2001.

Many recruiters and RPOs are busy making hay while the sun shines, but are increasingly struggling to attract the talent they need for their own organisations. Competition for the best consultants is now more intense than finding good candidates.

Demand for recruiters is rising exponentially across the UK and Europe, according to LinkedIn, which had 6.8 times more recruiter roles on its platform in June 2021 than the same time last year. However, LinkedIn research found that fewer are hiring from outside the industry than in previous years so ‘they’re increasingly competing for the same narrow set of candidates’.

It also found that the number hired from previous recruiting roles has almost doubled from 33% in 2020 to 59% in 2021, attributing this in part to redundancies last year and a preference for hiring those who need less training. Of those sourced from outside recruitment, the top roles were HR (35%) and sales (12%), including account managers, project managers, and customer service representatives.

With specialist consultants in such high demand, many will be tempted to start their own business or go inhouse. Are we likely to see a surge in staffing firms like the 46% spike in 2018 after nearly 8,500 new recruitment start-ups were registered at Companies House? With the average growth in pay hitting a record 8.8% from April to June this year (ONS), will the so-called Great Resignation hit recruitment?

TALiNT International November 2021

By Alex Evans Programme Director TALiNT Partners

TALiNT Partners convened our first in-person PointSix dinner for 30 staffing and RPO leaders at the stunning Ham Yard Hotel in London to debate these and other important questions.

Hosted in partnership with Access Recruitment, it explored the talent challenges facing the sector and solutions that are helping the industry’s top performers to adapt.

Opening the event with Access Recruitment’s Head of Strategy Jason Martin, I asked: “Who is winning the war for recruitment talent, what incentives are most effective, and why? How have the best in the sector achieved the greatest ROI from training, technology, and leadership development to emerge as the best recruiters and RPOs to work for? And what should leaders in the sector be doing to build a larger, more diverse pool of recruitment talent?”

This last question was addressed immediately by Guy Hayward, CEO of financial services recruiter Goodman Masson, who collaborated with Apsco and the REC last year to design the ‘UK Recruitment Diversity & Inclusion Index’.

“This survey helped to identify those doing great things that could inspire other recruitment firms,” said Guy, who was himself inspired to create Programme One, a collaborative campaign to bring at least 100 new black recruiters into the sector by 2022, and 500 per year after that.

“Programme One is now supported by over 60 partners; we’ve engaged with schools and community groups to build a pipeline of ethnically diverse talent, and we can offer

“Everyone is speculating about who will return to offices first and most frequently and the majority will be white men.”

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coaching to support them and help to create more inclusive organisations.”

Building a pipeline to attract more diverse talent into the sector is one thing, but what can recruitment firms do to improve the perception of the sector where only top billers are celebrated and anyone who doesn’t buy in to the sales culture is shown the door? The pandemic has changed attitudes and motivations, forcing recruitment leaders to compete for talent, or keep their people engaged, in new ways.

“I have seen some big changes in expectation from different generations of candidates that we are looking to recruit, partly as a result of the pandemic,” said Nazai John, Head of Talent Acquisition & Employee Engagement at IT and engineering recruiter CPS Group. “Younger people aren’t as interested in drinks after work, or socialising with colleagues, because they have got used to working independently from home.”

This observation was echoed by several in the room who have changed their policies on how they celebrate wins with the team and find new ways for future leaders to be noticed without having to go to the pub. Sagar Ruparelia, CFO and COO of Antal International, has recruited over 80 new starters this year across its global franchise network and kept new starters engaged with regular opportunities to contribute ideas and updates as well as awards and recognition of front and back office.

Presenteeism may have reassured managers in the past but, despite greater trust in remote workers, it poses new management challenges.

“Everyone is speculating about who will return to offices first and most frequently and the majority will be white men,” said Ken Brotherston.

“Women took the brunt of home-schooling

Nazai John Head of TA CPS Group

through lockdown and are more likely to want to work remotely and flexibly for childcare and school runs, so they won’t be as visible as men when competing for promotion,” observed Emily Ayre, MD of BRUIN Financial and a double TIARA Award winner for D&I. “As leaders, we need to create equal opportunity but that also means managing the motivations of different generations.”

The high average attrition rate for the recruitment sector has been the norm for a long time, with managers less inclined to invest in training and professional development because their talent might take it to a competitor, help them start their own business or move to a more senior inhouse role.

Guy Hayward CEO Goodman Masson

Emily Ayre Managing Director BRUIN Financial

One leader of a major staffing business confided that internal surveys had revealed that 55% of their people leave every two years. Another director of a specialist recruitment and RPO firm shared a revelation that came from research into the jobs that their people were going on to after leaving.

“We found that our compliance specialists and other back-office staff were leaving to become project managers and inhouse leaders in other organisations and industries; we didn’t realise the skills we had until we lost them,” he explained.

Jo Major, APSCo’s former head of external relations and D&I strategy — and founder of Diversity in Recruitment — dispelled some generational myths about attrition in the sector.

“While millennials are still more likely to leave after two years, Gen Z are more likely to stay for around four and a half years because they are looking for job security after so much uncertainty.

“Recruitment companies put so much effort into attracting talent but so little into ongoing development and creating more inclusive

TALiNT International November 2021

20 PointSix: Recruitment Talent

organisations – which every generation expects from an employer.”

“We have certainly seen lower attrition, higher engagement and better performance from investing in L&D, and also supporting our people in building their personal brands as subject matter experts,” added James Chorley, Client Relationship Director at PeopleScout.

Online learning has been a key area of growth for Access Recruitment – and a focus for their own acquisition strategy.

“Staffing firms can invest in their teams by helping them understand what will help them to be more successful as individuals – especially given the fact that many will remain in remote or hybrid roles without peers sitting beside them to learn from,” said Access Recruitment Head of Strategy Jason Martin. “Performance dashboards provided by Access NorthStar visualise how productivity can be enhanced, as well as offering leader boards to help companies and consultants benchmark how they are doing.”

So how are the best recruiters attracting and retaining the best talent? I asked Cara Myers, Group Talent Director of Trinnovo Group, who were crowned Best Recruitment Company to Work For at last year’s TIARAs and is shortlisted again in 2021.

A big part of Trinnovo’s rapid scale has been attributed to its investment in leadership development, with all managers offered MBAs. “Managers at Trinnovo are incentivised to maintain our culture and values as part of the engagement of their teams as it’s tied to their bonuses,” Cara explained. “By championing our values and encouraging the behaviours that relate to them we have been able to improve

TALiNT International November 2021

D&I as well as the retention of our people.”

Trinnovo chairperson Ashley Lawrence is one of seven recruitment leaders shortlisted for a TIARA leadership award this year who successfully championed their employer brand through lockdowns to attract talent from within and outside the industry.

The final thought for this PointSix debate was that all recruitment leaders should be pro-active and high-profile champions for their industry as well as their business to attract more diverse talent from other sectors.

“Younger people aren’t as interested in drinks after work, or socialising with colleagues, because they have got used to working independently from home.”

Nazai John Head of Talent Acquisition & Employee Engagement CPS Group

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Turn your CRM data into intelligence Configurable, visual dashboards that enable you to guide performance across your recruitment agency for optimal growth.

Book a demo TALiNT International November 2021

22 US Talent Acquisition Trends

Healthy competition TALiNT Partners and Hudson RPO convened a panel of TA and HR experts from across the pharmaceutical, life sciences and healthcare sectors to discuss new approaches to the challenges they face TALiNT Partners’ Employer Programme Director, Debra Sparshott provided aggregated statistical analysis of key roles in the sector across the US to frame the discussion. Notable highlights were huge disparities in average pay with highly inflated salaries in large cities. Additionally, the analysis showed tenure of over eight years for some potential candidates, further compounding the escalating battle for talent with high compensation. Higher salaries as seemingly the only weapon to attract talent is putting smaller firms and those trying to recruit outside their locality at a significant disadvantage.

Soaring compensation packages The statistical picture certainly resonated with the panel. Gary Jones, Director of Talent Acquisition at Hudson RPO, Life Sciences Division, reflected “the candidate pool is a lot healthier than ever before, but it’s also a lot more competitive” and government stimulus packages form part of that competition, making individuals choose not to work.

With increasingly inflated compensation packages and job titles, many organisations are breaking their own salary band levels just to secure talent. “I routinely see people being overtitled and overpaid for the levels that they’re at, and that’s been a big challenge for us” reflected an Associate Director of TA at a leading US muscle biology therapy company. An HR specialist at a US-based consulting firm highlighted the knock-on effect for legacy employees: “We’re wheeling and dealing and making some deals that we normally wouldn’t have and we didn’t do for existing employees so that creates inequities. It’s a dangerous flow.”

Panel members shared other initiatives like daily pay and commented that sign-on bonuses were now routine.

Additionally, many candidates, who have worked remotely for over a year, are not prepared to relocate or attend site. The VP of HR explained:

TALiNT International November 2021

By Marnie Clarke Features Writer TALiNT Partners

“Candidates want to stay remote when their entire team would sit here in South San Francisco. It’s tough to try and bridge that gap with us because our culture is not ready for remote leadership.” Some candidates are reluctant to go back on site, particularly within manufacturing “a lot of our jobs have to be on site. And I’m having trouble with people wanting to work remotely,” explained the Director of a quality compliance and technical services firm.

Get back control and be proactive It can seem like the challenges are beyond TA’s control, however Gary advised looking at what you can control, “the most common mistakes are waiting on candidates to come to you. Reach out to candidates and you have more control over the process.” Many of the panel expressed concern about being too pushy and harassing candidates; however recent analytics found that candidates were actually responding to the fourth or fifth outreach, explained Amanda Gruwell, Sales Director, Hudson RPO. It is important to keep on persevering. “Candidates want to know that you’re serious. They want to know that you’re committed to building a relationship with them and, I think for a lot of recruiters, they’re just not used to doing that,” highlighted Ken Brotherston, Managing Director, TALiNT Partners.

Streamline your process “Think about what you can enhance. How long is

“Streamline your hiring process.

Candidates respond to a process that is run quickly and fits into a week.”

Gary Jones, Director of Talent Acquisition at Hudson RPO, Life Sciences Division

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your process, are you having them jump through hoops, are they interviewing for three to four weeks? Are they spending two weeks in your database before they’re being contacted?” asked Gary. Time is critical in this battle for talent. Gary advised, “Streamline your hiring process.

Candidates respond to a process that’s really tightly fit into a week”.

He observed that multiple stages and large panels of interviews show a lack of cohesion.

“The candidate sees that, whether it’s subconscious or conscious, they’re comparing their candidate journey to their experiences with your competitors, and if you’re going up against a competitor who has a much more streamlined hiring process, you’re going to lose.” Debra elaborated, “one of the things that can really dilute your process and increase your number of interviews is a lack of calibration of what good looks like. Take that step to calibrate this really clearly at the front end of the process.”

Involve the whole organisation Amanda highlighted “we have a client that has made it a company-wide initiative that finding top talent is their number one priority. That’s really important because everybody is on board.”

The Director, TA, of the clinical trial compliance company agreed: “The challenge is trying to get our business partners to understand how competitive the market is in today’s world.

We’ve given shared insights, and they have seen a couple of candidates slip through their fingers, but it’s getting the entire organisation to realise that and be really nimble in the process with us.”

Utilise technology There are so many new tools to help streamline your process and help recruiters save time, and can really help recruiter burnout. “You can only do so much. And if you can automate a lot of that heavy lifting, it’s very helpful,”

advised Amanda.

Enhance your EVP “There are many clients we work with and when you look at their career site and pull up three jobs, they have three different formats with three different messages,” pointed out Gary.

Amanda Gruwell Sales Director Hudson RPO

Gary Jones Director of Talent Acquisition Hudson RPO, Life Sciences Division

The consistency of your employer brand is so important and lets your particular culture shine through. “A lot of people are interested in the culture of the company because they would like to work in a company that has a smaller feel, where they feel like they can make an impact quickly,” confirmed an HR consultant.

“You have to shift into the candidates’ mindset.

Making sure that you list out what’s in it for them and that might be things you may not even think of, like free parking, that may resonate,” highlighted Gary.

An HR consultant explained that they’d seen this in practice in a local firm: “People were dying to work for this company, it was crazy. They would take massive pay cuts. And they would talk about the M&Ms that were in every break room, and the cookies on Friday, and I couldn’t believe it. These people were so excited. But it was those types of things, soft things that people really appreciate and enjoy.”

Get your house in order Think about what you can control and review your processes to compete. Twelve months ago, there were mass redundancies and now we are facing talent shortages. Things can shift rapidly.

Gary summed up: “Everything that we’re talking about are things that we should already be doing, in terms of EVPs, in terms of evaluating your processes, in terms of AI. We need to be mindful, as leaders of TA, that there are some basic principles that we must continue to be on top of regardless of the market.”

TALiNT International November 2021

24 APAC Talent Acquisition Trends

Creative solutions

With rising demand for new skills and ways of working, talent acquisition (TA) teams are being forced to rethink their recruitment strategies, and their very definition of talent to go beyond their traditional candidate pools. is that they enjoy about working with us; that always comes back to people and culture.”

Employers are striving to keep up with increasing candidate expectations in a scarce talent market, creating a distinctive and compelling message to potential candidates and delivering an application journey that creates loyalty and aspiration.

How can TA leaders navigate these challenges to bring in the skills needed by their organisation in a rapidly changing workplace? That was the focus for the latest TALiNT Partners Roundtable with AMS and TA, recruitment and HR experts from a variety of sectors in the APAC region.

“The demand explosion for talent this year, in practically all geographical markets, has been unprecedented, with companies globally facing the storm of a huge talent crunch,” noted Neil Jones, Head of Asia Pacific at AMS, describing the last 18 months in the TA world as “somewhere between exhilarating and petrifying.”

A key theme to emerge was the rising importance of a strong employer brand and value proposition. “The differentiating factor is candidate experience,” highlighted Marisa Liao, Deliveroo’s Head of Global Recruitment.

“However, we can’t rely on the customer brand alone anymore. Even within our smaller markets, candidates are looking at Glassdoor, as well as Google delivery reviews, to get more information on the company culture and employee experience. They want to know if the company they’re joining has empathy, and if there’s that sense of community and connection, especially now with remote and hybrid working.

We need the authentic voice of staff, and to use it to tell candidates what it’s like to work for Deliveroo.”

It’s also about differentiating the employee experience from the competition, noted Natalie Tait, Head of HR for Bank of America in Singapore: “It’s about looking at why people join us and why they stay with us. And asking what it

TALiNT International November 2021

By Pepi Seppal Features Writer TALiNT Partners

Debra Sparshott Employer Programme Director TALiNT Partners

Tait is spending time working with the organisations’ TA teams, as well as learning and leadership development teams, to look at ways to build their hiring manager capability. “As well as focussing on how we engage with candidates during interviews, we’ve also been doing a lot of work around early engagement, particularly with junior talent. How do we keep them warm?

What’s going to keep them engaged? And how do we leverage technology to do that?” she said.

Jess Lo, Regional TA Lead at Scor in Hong Kong, also believes the company proposition is really important, especially during interviews. “It’s an opportunity for you to tell your story but not everyone is good at interviewing or presenting the company to candidates,” explained Lo. Scor is now training managers to better deliver that message.

Richard Farmer, Head of TA APAC at Environmental Resources Management agreed.

He believes candidates are also basing their decision to join a firm on a company’s response to issues like climate change, DE&I and ESG. In fact, that’s one focus his company is using to retain workers who are sometimes “offered up to treble their pay by competitors.”

That’s a focus for Scor too. Scor now has a sustainable investing policy to stop investing in the non-renewable energy sector in order to attract younger generations who care more about social and environmental issues. Lo is also making sure that these messages are included in all marketing and employer branding.

“This focus really creates attachment to the brand for these generations. And I’m not just talking about graduates as this is something that is desired also by mid-level experienced hires,” she highlighted.

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TALiNT Partners’ Employer Programme Director Debra Sparshott also noted a real acceleration in the importance of DE&I, climate change and ESG among candidates over the last 12 to 24 months, and “it’s definitely increasing”, she pointed out.

The value proposition in the post pandemic world has inevitably changed, noted Jones. “It’s not just about how you employ people; the way they work and where they work, are becoming increasingly important too.” Google’s Global Staffing Lead Sanjeev Somasundaram agreed: “Some candidate segments want the value proposition of flexibility. In fact, focussing on that value proposition alone resulted in more applications from women who had taken a career break, as well as more underrepresented people.”

All the experts agreed that the market has forced companies, especially in the APAC region, to find more innovative ways to source scarce talent. That has meant hiring from other disciplines – both externally and internally. “We are starting to employ people for HR from consulting backgrounds, and have people with MBAs fresh out of college, with no HR credentials,” revealed Somasundaram.

In fact, the majority of attendees confirmed that they are also looking at internal mobility to fill their current recruitment gaps. “That’s been a big focus for us at Bank of America,” noted Tait.

“We’re seeing a lot more cross-functional mobility and it’s really enabling people to develop their careers. The bank even has a dedicated internal mobility team, tracking over 50% of our internal mobility in the region.”

Consumer household brand Electrolux is focussing on career development and internal mobility, confirmed its Director HR, Mansi Argarwal. “We are doing a cross-pollination movement of teams internally. So, for example, I’m about to hire somebody from the marketing team for my HR team. And one of my team

Neil Jones Head of Asia Pacific AMS

Natalie Tait Head of HR Bank of America, Singapore

Marisa Liao Head of Global Recruitment Deliveroo

members has just moved into after sales,” she explained. “Not only do we get to retain talent that is a good fit for our culture, but it also helps to change the DNA of the entire company, and challenges the status quo.” She believes it’s a great way to bring in fresh thinking and achieve a growth mindset and agility.

Collaboration and a closer alignment of TA and talent management functions, are key to internal mobility success, confirmed Tait: “It’s really important for TA teams to have lists of people that have been identified for internal moves, for example. Traditionally that information was held tightly by learning and development, but now they’re realising the importance of TA to identify talent gaps and create succession plans. So there’s been a lot of collaboration to, not only plan where and how we move talent but, also what support is needed for talent when it moves into a role so they can get up to speed and be effective in their roles quickly.”

The conversation now “is very much around the use of technology in order to bring the coordination and collaboration of different departments together,” Tait added. In fact, technology is not only being used to enhance employee experience, but also to improve collaboration between HR and specialist departments, to better ascertain where the skills gaps are, and how to move talent. It’s also being used to remove internal silos to better support internal mobility and retention.

The biggest challenge with tech is “How do you get the balance right with what you automate, what you outsource, who you partner with, what you self service and what you administrate or delegate without putting the business, people and culture at risk?” pointed out Ignatica’s Head of HR, Mark McLeish. For him it’s about “taking the best of traditional HR and combining it effectively with tech.” But that’s another long story.

TALiNT International November 2021

26 TIARA 2021 Insights

Champions of change Winners of this year’s TIARA Talent Solutions and Recruitment Awards are championing the change this industry needs to adapt and attract the best new talent from other sectors This month’s TIARA winner supplement showcases award-winning recruitment and talent solutions companies that have impressed an esteemed panel of independent judges, and it’s worth noting what stood out this year.

D&I initiatives, client collaboration, best use of technology, training and thought leadership all differentiated this year’s winners and showed how market leaders have raised standards whilst building deeper and more valuable relationships with clients.

Best use of tech Judges saw more examples of bespoke solutions this year, often optimised in tandem with off the shelf tech.

Guidant Global won a Best Use of Technology Award for helping their clients adapt to remote operations while maximising lead generation, video interview technology, AI and chatbot tools to manage, interview and assess talent in a faster, more engaging and convenient way – which halved time-to-hire. Similarly, NES Fircroft optimised market leading solutions to grow their contractor population but also developed their own expense app, NESFTime, to provide a seamless claim system for contractors globally.

Advantage Resourcing won the Tech Transformation Award this year for building its Availatemp platform and mobile app, which automated recruitment workflow and enabled candidates to set their own preferences – which saved hiring managers up to 80% of the time they would using traditional hiring processes.

SourceBreaker also helped them to dramatically increased their talent pools and closed-lead generation.

Some TIARA winners triumphed for investing in personalisation. Reed Talent Solutions introduced a People Partners Team (PPT) to proactively support contingent staff and quickly

TALiNT International November 2021

By Alex Evans Programme Director TALiNT Partners

resolve challenges in a highly pressured environment. AMS worked with HSBC to create a Reasonable Adjustments (RA) Candidate Care role after analysis around disabled and neurodiverse applicants found that candidates were falling out at a variety of stages in the process and needed more support – which resulted in over 150 finding new roles within the bank.

Sigmar Recruitment won the Client Service Award for its collaborative approach as the pandemic struck, giving clients the option to pay a small percentage of the fee per month for permanent placements (for 12 months) and stop paying if the client leaves. This highlighted the quality of candidates that stayed and thrived.

Driving D&I Impact on inclusion and diversity, internally and for clients, was clearly a focus for recruiters and RPOs this year, with some great initiatives and results.

AMS won Best Talent Solution Provider to Work For based on the diverse demographic of the business, its inclusive culture and employee-led initiatives around LGBTQ+ awareness, mental health and wellbeing, ethnicity, neurodiversity and gender.

Goodman Masson won the D&I Award for making Diversity, Inclusion & Respect central to the culture and strategy of the business, with four specialist internal networks created to

“The individuals honoured this year tell a story about the kind of leaders it needs to adapt to new market challenges and opportunities.”

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formalise the way the business looked at diversity and how to support clients with staffing and RPO services. This included the creation of a knowledge platform and a thought leadership programme of podcasts, webinars, and seminars attended by over 1,250 clients to kickstart their own D&I drives.

Training and upskilling Pre-pandemic skills and talent shortages have become acute over the last year and awardwinning recruiters have stepped up by training and upskilling candidates.

Tech recruiter La Fosse Associates won the Innovation Award for its Futureproof programme to help clients struggling to hire and retain software engineers. Designed with the help of top CTOs to develop future tech superstars to meet their clients’ needs, this free course attracted a wider, more diverse pool of candidates and built more sustainable pipelines and improved their clients’ employer brand.

NRL won Back Office Team of the Year for a knowledge transfer initiative led by its compliance team that created a future model to train more internal teams to take on more NAECI projects, a key growth area for the business.

Thought leadership Conferences and thought leadership campaigns have grown in popularity as they help to position recruiters and RPOs as sector specialists while building talent networks. Despite lockdowns, the best adapted with virtual events to help candidates to network and upskill to fill talent shortages.

Scala recruiter Signify Technology won Specialist Recruitment Company of the Year and Marketing Campaign of the Year for its ‘Scala in the City’ virtual conferences which enabled it to reach an international audience of more than 2,500 people and create a more diverse candidate pool.

Hays won the Employer Brand Award for creating a new talent brand supported by a new CRM system to successfully promote its client Honeywell as a fast-paced, techno-advanced organisation with D&I at the core of their business strategies. It re-purposed and reimagined content to show how diverse employees are shaping the future of the business with a focus on STEM - using stories, video content and social imagery.

Champions The individuals honoured this year also tell a story about the kind of leaders it needs to adapt to new market challenges and opportunities.

Rosaleen Blair, chair of AMS, was presented with the TIARA Talent Solutions Lifetime Achievement Award for her ability to deal with market challenges with resilience, innovation and adaptability. “Rosaleen has strategic vision and business acumen in spades,” said TALiNT Partners MD Ken Brotherston. “What sets her apart is her warmth and sheer likeability.”

Reed Global Chairman James Reed was honoured as a high-profile champion of the recruitment sector who actively campaigns to improve the way it is perceived and valued.

“As a passionate ambassador for the industry, James Reed spear-headed the Keep Britain Working campaign in 2020 to provide access to market insight, advice, and upskilling opportunities for jobseekers during the pandemic,” said TALiNT Partners Director David Head. “James joins his father Sir Alec Reed in the TIARA Hall of Fame for his global expansion of Reed and as a leading commentator on the value of recruitment to the UK economy.”

Those leading with resilience and purpose to promote recruitment and talent solutions as a professional service will not only succeed in their own businesses but will drive prosperity for the wider industry.

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Shining a spotlight Ken Brotherston explains why a TIARA Talent Solutions Award provides a compelling level of credibility to those who win them.

2021 has been a remarkable year for the Talent Solutions sector. The need for business transformation has been evidenced in many different ways across the sector with some inspiring work delivered by outsourcing providers.

powerful endorsement to differentiate solutions for buyers looking for reassurance on the right provider for their needs and the quality of our judging panel provides an even more compelling level of credibility.

The ability to respond at scale and speed to complex, high profile requirements has been, quite simply, astonishing.

Our judging process is designed to be independent and rigorous and built around the expectations of demanding and often highly complex employer requirements, and based on key performance metrics, case studies and testimonials.

Furthermore, a year ago the industry faced the future with trepidation. No one predicted the current boom in demand and whilst there may well be other economic shocks to come, for now, the sector is riding the crest of a wave.

TALiNT Partners’ Talent Solutions Awards have established themselves as the pre-eminent awards campaign in the sector and are a perfect platform to showcase the best work the sector has to offer.

From nimble, fast moving scale ups looking to re-imagine what is possible, to the world’s largest and most successful players delivering game changing work for their clients and a range of mid-market operators with a clear focus and high levels of agility, they all showed why they are so important in helping their clients find and keep the people they need.

The TIARA Talent Solutions awards offer a

Ken Brotherston Managing Director TALiNT Partners

I would like to extend my thanks to our esteemed panel of judges, for their time and commitment in choosing this year’s winners and in providing the feedback that will help both winners and finalists improve their solutions and grow their businesses. Their range of experience brought an amazing diversity of different perspectives.

I am grateful to all of our sponsors and, in particular our headline sponsor, Cornerstone OnDemand, for their ongoing support of our TIARA Talent Solutions Awards. Everyone here at TALiNT Partners is thrilled to have been able to play a part in helping these businesses get the recognition they so richly deserve.

Photos courtesy of Baz Seal | baz.london

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TALiNT International November 2021

31 Rosaleen Blair Founder AMS

The Lifetime Achievement Award The TALiNT Partners’ TIARA Lifetime Achievement Award recognises a leader who has made a long-term and significant contribution to their industry.

From AMS’s relatively modest beginnings in 1996 to a global leader with over 4,500 employees, operating in 100 countries, Rosaleen has been at the helm. Her ability to deal with market challenges is a testament to her resilience, and her ability to continually innovate and evolve is a testament to her adaptability.

Rosaleen is genuinely unique and has strategic vision and business acumen in spades. What sets her apart is her warmth and sheer likeability and these genuine qualities are a huge part of her reputation that make her such a worthy first winner of this award.

As well as being Chair of AMS, she is an active philanthropist and entrepreneur with a wide and growing range of other interests, especially in backing female-led businesses. We believe that she’s just getting started and the industry will watch in wonder to see what Rosaleen will do next.

“We believe that she’s just getting started and the industry will watch in wonder to see what Rosaleen will do next.”

Rosaleen Blair receives the Lifetime Achievement Award

Ken Brotherston, MD TALiNT Partners

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The Best Early Career Initiative Award Bright Network’s mission to connect the next generation of workers with work opportunities, insights and advice, made them worthy winners.

Research showed that confidence hit its lowest level amongst graduates during the pandemic. Bright Network reacted to address the profound impact the pandemic had on early talent opportunities with Internship Experience UK. This was a national initiative to support the professional development of the entire student population with the support of over 120 employers, government departments, media outlets and industry bodies. The initiative became the world’s largest work experience network with 120,000 applicants, 75,000 completers and 1 million hours of learning. Over 1,000 graduates have since got in touch with Bright Network to tell them they’ve secured a role, citing their involvement in Internship Experience UK as a key reason for their success.

It has since created a blueprint for virtual work experience in the industry.

The Department for Work and Pensions, who worked in partnership with Bright Network, praised the initiative “to support graduates with opportunities to build employability skills and meet leading employers, preparing them for their early career, and the prospect of fulfilling sustainable careers”. Google also praised Bright Network for “making sure all the students want to be at the events and are interested in the companies – which makes for very high-quality interactions.”

The work continued with Internship Experience UK 2021. It provided more bespoke experiences for the participants and now runs across two more sectors to give even more insight, while also providing employers an avenue to connect with ambitious and diverse students virtually.

Judges said: “Their entry stood out for its innovation and ethical approach to their candidates.”

From left to right: Neil Griffith, CERIPH director and judge, gives the Best Early Career Initiative Award to Bright Network’s Ben Triggs, Kirsten Barnes and Anu Manthri

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

Highly Commended

TALiNT International November 2021

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The Horsefly Analytics Employer Brand Award Hays Talent Solutions’ approach to technology that keeps the human touch in all interactions resulted in a successful employer brand recruitment campaign for their European client.

The Employer Brand Award celebrates distinction in elevating a client’s employer brand to have a measurable impact on their talent strategy.

By creating a new talent brand and sourcing team that defined a new employer brand strategy, Hays Talent Solutions’ partnership with a large multi-national conglomerate effectively implemented a new CRM platform – which enables the client to send tailor-made campaigns to talent pools that are segmented by location and job category. Hays used gender decoding software to ensure job posts were free of bias and provided training on how to write inclusive job descriptions.

These campaigns used re-imagined content to curate themed messages that enhanced the reputation of the client as a fast-paced, technoadvanced organisation, with D&I at the core of their business strategies. The new content highlighted diverse employees, their roles and how they are shaping the future of the business with a focus on STEM - using stories, video content and social imagery.

Hays Talent Solutions impressed the judges with an effective and well thought through content strategy which was delivered effectively across multiple channels.

Judges said: “Hays Talent Solutions demonstrated an innovative approach to content creation and sourcing which had a highly positive effect on improving D&I.”

From left to right: Mike Basnett Sandiford from Horsefly Analytics presents the Employer Brand Award to Hays Talent Solutions’ Colin Wolfsbauer, Mark Cull and Sara Thompson

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

TALiNT International November 2021

The Parasol Candidate Experience Award Reed Talent Solutions demonstrated an unwavering commitment to delivering a quality, engaging candidate experience.

The Candidate Experience Award recognises companies that show clear evidence of delivering a consistently good experience at every stage of the candidate journey.

Reed Talent Solutions’ (RTS) partnership with a financial services agency set out to support its workforce and bridge the gap between permanent and non-permanent workers to improve retention. With this in mind, RTS introduced a People Partners Team (PPT) to proactively support contingent staff in a highly pressured environment with strict targets and difficult complaints resolution.

PPT initiatives involved one-to-ones, drop-in sessions, managing wellbeing calendars and sharing newsletters. The hands-on availability of the PPT enabled contingent staff to resolve and escalate enquiries or challenges swiftly which resulted in mitigated risk for HR and created a supported candidate experience.

The judges praised Reed Talent Solutions for their personalised approach by investing in a face-to-face initiative in an increasingly digital working landscape.

From left to right: Lindsey Tunstall and Michele Smith from Reed Talent Solutions receives the Parasol Candidate Experience Award from Greet Brosens

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Judges said: “Reed Talent Solutions brought a demonstrable step change in the experience delivered to candidates.”

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The Nétive Diversity & Inclusion Award AMS were praised by judges for a brilliant example of improving access and support to people with a range of disabilities.

The Diversity & Inclusion Award recognises talent solutions providers who demonstrate a clear impact against a progressive D&I agenda, whether helping an employer take their first steps or reach new levels of inclusion.

HSBC, in partnership with AMS, decided to analyse information around disabled and neurodiverse applicants and found that candidates were falling out at a variety of stages in the process and needed to offer more support.

Together, AMS and HSBC discovered that it wasn’t about attracting more applicants, but looking after those that were already applying.

The Reasonable Adjustments (RA) Candidate Care role was created for this purpose so candidates could have an in-depth conversation about reasonable adjustments or opting into the existing Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) before progressing with an application. This enabled them to highlight potential challenges and any support they needed to be successful – not just within the recruitment process but once in a role.

From left to right: Jack Newman from Nétive presents the Diversity & Inclusion Award to AMS’ Fuchsia Carter and Chris Brady

Eighteen months after the initiative went live the RA Candidate Care Consultant has been involved in around 2,000 candidate applications, supporting over 150 of those into new roles within the bank.

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Judges said: “AMS must be commended for how they embrace employees in the moment but also that they support long-term change.”

Highly Commended

TALiNT International November 2021

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TALiNT International November 2021

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The Cornerstone OnDemand Best Use of Technology Award Guidant Global demonstrated a clear understanding of their clients’ unique needs and quickly adapted new technologies in order to meet them.

The Best Use of Technology Award recognises companies that solve a business issue through the implementation of a new tech solution or using existing tech in an innovative way.

As the pandemic hit, Guidant Global rapidly adopted new technologies to facilitate remote operations and realised they must enable their clients to do the same – so provided a comprehensive suite of technology options, both proprietary and partner-owned, to solve urgent workforce challenges.

They used digital tools to help engage, manage, interview and assess talent in a faster and more convenient way by removing time consuming, manual screening calls from the process.

They optimised Leadoo’s chatbot qualification technology, which quickly converted website application traffic into qualified candidate leads.

They also implemented Hinterview, a two-way video interview tool that candidates use on their desktop or mobile devices. This enabled quicker feedback and better selection for Guidant Global’s clients, and gave them an easy way to verify eligibility documents over video.

These tech implementations saved up to 75 hours of screening time across 100 applicants alone, and halved time-to-hire of temporary staff from 20 days to 10.

From left to right: Simon Rookledge, Karina Townley and Anella Lewis from Guidant Global receive the Best Use of Technology Award from Cornerstone OnDemand’s Andrew Brown

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Judges said: “By flexing a range of solutions to address specific issues, Guidant Global clearly demonstrated how technology can be deployed to effect positive culture change.”

TALiNT International November 2021

Sonovate provides tech-driven finance for the global contingent workforce.

We’ve funded over £2bn in 40+ countries, working with thousands of businesses from startups to enterprises.

sonovate.com Say hello 020 4538 8550

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The Sonovate Best Talent Solutions Firm to Work For AMS were the clear winner in this category thanks to their dedication to creating an inclusive workforce and enabling employees to steer their own career.

The Best Talent Solutions Company to Work For recognises employers of choice who demonstrate innovation and impact in the attraction, induction, development and retention of their own talent.

AMS give their employees the opportunity to choose their career focus and offer cross-specialist opportunities. Their diverse demographic, including cultures, social mobility, age and gender brings with it a broad range of personal styles, values and beliefs and is representative of a truly diverse company culture.

Employee resource groups lead innovative actions in diversity and inclusion that have increased representation in the business. These include a wide range of initiatives around LGBTQ+ awareness and support, mental health and wellbeing, ethnicity, neurodiversity and gender.

AMS were commended by judges for demonstrating impressive results in building a diverse workforce.

Judges said: “AMS demonstrated successful attraction, retention and engagement of staff over a long period of time and through the challenges of rapid growth.”

From left to right: Simon Woods from Sonovate presents the Best Talent Solutions Firm to Work For Award to AMS’ Rachel Arter and Richard Schofield

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

TALiNT International November 2021

Talent Solutions 44

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The eTeam Client Service Award By customising their talent attraction campaigns, Lorien demonstrated a deep understanding of their client’s needs and were able to deliver impressive results.

The Client Service Award celebrates those winning support and recognition across the whole client community for dependable, timely results.

Lorien’s client in financial services were branching into new markets and needed a partner that could deliver the technology talent to support it. With over 500 hires to make in its digital space their client needed a specialist provider that could offer the access, scalability and agility of a large-scale RPO in a competitive London tech talent market.

Lorien supported their client’s tech talent brand launch, delivered data-led, innovative talent attraction campaigns and paid particular attention to its priority around a strong inclusion and diversity focus. They invested heavily in their attraction strategy by hosting virtual events, creating new content, and communicating their client’s EVP to a network of over 150,000 digital specialists, generating 219 LinkedIn posts in a year and receiving 4,872 likes. As a result of this investment, the client received a staggering 17,358 applications for roles in the first year.

The judges were impressed with Lorien’s entry for its crispness, clarity and the quality of its supporting evidence.

Judges said: “Lorien’s success brought innovative thinking across a number of areas in what was a complex and fast-moving environment.”

From left to right: Lorien’s Dan Smiles and Annelise Smith receive the Client Service Award

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

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The Giant Group Best New Talent Solutions Provider As a young business, Join Talent demonstrated incredible growth, innovation and agility in a challenging market The Best New Talent Solutions Provider Award recognises newer entrants to the market delivering value to clients through innovative approaches. Join Talent were praised by the judges for their rapid growth with a good range of impressive customers.

Join Talent have achieved sustained, high growth over the last year and attribute their early scale-up success to the loyalty of their clients, their culture and their growing leadership team. By blending agile techniques with design-thinking tools they have been able to quickly comprehend the complexity of a TA function and environment, and use their experience to deliver an impactful solution for their clients.

One Head of Talent Acquisition at a leading online electronics retailer praised Join Talent, saying: “Scaling up our digital function to manage the new shape of our business was our biggest priority during COVID-19. Join Talent sprang into action with just a couple of days notice and delivered positive impact from day one. The team brought quality, pace and immense value for money. They have also supported us on a range of consultancy projects inside and outside of TA, and have supported our CTO and his team in rethinking their approach to assessment, selection, role levelling and market mapping.”

From left to right: Daniel Haslam from Giant Group presents the Best New Talent Solutions Provider to Join Talent’s Alastair Frater

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Judges said: “Join Talent showed clear evidence of client retention and sustainability, supported with impressive plans for the future of their business.”

TALiNT International November 2021

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TALiNT International November 2021

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The iCIMS Long-Term Partnership Award, Challenger Judges praised Page Outsourcing for demonstrating the dedication and commitment required to ensure a progressive and successful partnership.

A collaborative, long-term partnership is the goal of all talent solutions providers and the new Challenger category recognises established, specialist providers, independent scale-ups and new subsidiaries or divisions of larger businesses.

Judges were impressed with a partnership that Page Outsourcing began in 2016 with a brief to fill 240 senior hires across the Engineering and Technology sector within a year. In the last five years, it has placed more than 1,600 candidates across 10 locations in Europe. By taking ownership of the external recruitment process for their client, Page were able to meet the workload plan for a specialist division. An agile approach, with continuous revision of SLAs, ensured that its specialist team exceeded their candidate targets, reached those international experience, and onboarded them successfully.

Judges praised Page Outsourcing for its continued focus on the client’s objectives via weekly and quarterly reviews and sharing best practice with the team. By setting clear goals and targets aligned with the client’s key success criteria — and maintaining a consistent, stable team — Page were able to build a sustained and trusted relationship.

Judges said: “Page Outsourcing showed great testimonials and NPS scores, demonstrating a deep understanding of the challenges faced by their client.”

From (need to amend): Gavin Simpson (iCIMS) awards Oliver Harris and Guillaume Pican from Page Outsourcing as winners for the Long-Term Partnership Award, Challenger

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

TALiNT International November 2021

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The iCIMS Long-Term Partnership Award, Enterprise Reed Talent Solutions, in partnership with the London Borough of Lewisham, demonstrated great examples of evolving the long-term partnership to bring about progress and transformation.

Reed Talent Solutions (RTS) have worked in partnership with the London Borough of Lewisham as their managed service provider of contingent workers since 2007, providing a digital workforce solution that has delivered measurable benefits for Lewisham and their constituents.

Their service-driven partnership has enabled the continuous delivery of quality, retained talent, through extensive networks of proven workers and carefully selected suppliers. Judges commended RTS for delivering fulfilment rates of 98% and consistently reducing costs on the contract year-on-year.

Continuous innovation is a key objective and Lewisham has seen RTS consistently implement a bespoke recruitment platform, pioneer the introduction of consultancy services, digitise the candidate journey and provide 24/7 preemployment vetting for 100% compliance. It also supports temporary workers with training and coaching managers.

Judges said: “Reed Talent Solutions transformed the manual recruitment process and historic supply chain to produce significant savings for their client.”

TALiNT International November 2021

Vicky Fernandez (iCIMS) presents Reed Talent Solutions as winner of The Long-Term Partnership Award, Enterprise

TIARA Talent Solutions 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

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The Talent Solutions Provider of the Year Award The full judging panel voted Reed Talent Solutions provider of the year after a hat-trick of wins at the inaugural TIARA Talent Solutions Europe Awards.

The Talent Solutions Provider of the Year recognises a top performing partner who consistently delivers incredible candidate service whilst building long term partnerships with their clients.

This year’s award was voted for by a TIARA panel of 17 eminent judges who combined client and industry perspectives. This included Chair of Judges Jim Richardson, Director at Megella; Sharron O’Donnell, Head of Resourcing at Virgin Media; Julie-Anne Page, Global Head of Talent Acquisition at Rolls Royce; and Umang Panchal, Head of RPO Sales – EMEA and Global Account Director at LinkedIn. They debated a number of factors including an ability to deliver innovation under pressure and impact across a broad range of talent challenges.

Reed Talent Solutions won three awards this year, including the Parasol Candidate Experience Award and the ICIMS Long-Term Partnership Award, so stood out for their proven dedication to improving the candidate journey and building sustained and successful client relationships.

Judges said: “Reed Talent Solutions proved their deep dedication to the client and clear focus on delivering an incredible candidate experience – excelling and having a positive impact across each key area of service delivery.”

From left to right: Jim Richardson (Chair of Judges), Lee Gudgeon from Reed Talent Solutions and Andrew Brown (Cornerstone OnDemand)

TALiNT International November 2021

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Resilient Recruiters Alex Evans explains why a TIARA is the most powerful endorsement for the recruitment industry Resilience is a fitting theme for the 2021 TIARA Recruitment Awards. The COVID-19 crisis hit the staffing sector hard in 2020, but those best able to optimise their talent, technology, and brand have taken advantage of new ways of working and competing for market leadership.

able to demonstrate through their KPIs and their numbers the growth that was going to come from that investment,” she observed during our judging event in September.

A TIARA is a powerful endorsement to TALiNT International’s inhouse and agency audience to not only attract new clients but the industry’s best talent as well.

TALiNT Partners is unique in that we cover the whole talent ecosystem, and the TIARA judges reflect that breadth of perspectives. This gives us insight into the changing needs of employers and what’s relevant for the best and most forwardthinking recruitment companies.

The TIARAs are distinguished by the rigour of its judging process and the quality of its judging panel. Katie Folwell-Davies, one of the most experienced, successful, and highest profile deal makers in the human capital sector, took over from Hudson chairman Ian Nash as Chair of Judges for the 2021 TIARA Recruitment Awards to bring a new perspective on growth, innovation, and purpose.

The TIARA judging panel is distinguished by some of the industry’s leading executives, NEDs, and chairmen alongside heads of TA and HR from some of the world’s largest employers.

They support our judging process with their reputations as well as their considerable experience and insight, which makes a TIARA a hard award to win. It has to be exemplary, and it must impress respected leaders.

“Those companies that stood out for me were those that had invested through the pandemic – in headcount and technology – and had been

This is what makes a TIARA the most powerful endorsement for UK recruiters and why our distinctive ‘R’ trophy is such a coveted accolade.

TALiNT International November 2021

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Photos courtesy of Baz Seal | baz.london TALiNT International November 2021

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The Saffery Champness Hall of Fame Award James Reed, Chairman of Reed Group, was inducted into the TIARA Hall of Fame as an active campaigner for job creation and a high-profile champion of recruitment James Reed first entered the recruitment industry in 1992, although it’s fair to say he was born into it. In 1997 he was appointed Chief Executive of Reed and went on to become Chairman in 2004. Now head of a global recruitment company, James leads more than 3,000 employees who work in 140 locations around the world. They receive 50 million job applications every year and have helped more than 150,000 long-term unemployed people get back to work.

As a passionate ambassador for the industry, James Reed spear-headed the Keep Britain Working campaign in 2020 to provide access to market insight, advice, and upskilling opportunities for jobseekers during the pandemic. He is also the author of three bestselling books and a media commentator on work and labour market issues – with recent appearances on BBC News, Sky News, Radio 4 and The Apprentice.

James joins his father Sir Alec Reed in the Hall of Fame for his global expansion of Reed and as a leading commentator on the value of recruitment to the UK economy.

From left to right: James Reed from Reed is awarded The Hall of Fame Award by Saffery Champness’ Partner, Richard Collis

Judges said: “James Reed thoroughly deserves his honour for an impressive career, a great track record of success, and his support of those in the recruitment sector.

James is a worthy entrant to the Hall of Fame.”

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The PurePro Back Office Team of the Year Judges praised NRL for the success of its knowledge transfer initiative to extend its NAECI expertise across the business.

NRL’s National Agreement for the Engineering Construction Industry (NAECI) compliance team, based in their Wigan branch, historically worked closely with project teams nationally to ensure that strict regulations and working agreements are adhered to. An increase in NAECI activity created a new opportunity to extend the Wigan team’s expertise and impact beyond its one site to the wider business.

This back-office improvement project began by upskilling and training compliance colleagues in NRL’s north east branch. Knowledge around working agreements, internal learning and compliance processes, onboarding, industrial relations management, payroll, and other functions was successfully passed over to the Sunderland team which enabled them to provide the local, on-site presence needed to successfully deliver a regional NAECI labour supply solution. This knowledge transfer created a future model to train more internal teams to take on more projects.

NRL was recognised for enabling growth, innovation and improved performance that benefitted their clients, their business and the career progression of employees.

Judges said: “The deep understanding of NAECI compliance contributed to an increase in revenue and created a training model to scale the delivery of more projects.”

NRL accepts the Back Office Team of the Year Award from Sandy Scott, CEO, PurePro Solutions Limited

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Sonovate provides tech-driven finance for the global contingent workforce.

We’ve funded over £2bn in 40+ countries, working with thousands of businesses from startups to enterprises.

sonovate.com Say hello 020 4538 8550

The Sonovate Client Service Award Sigmar was praised for its innovative pricing model and talent solutions developed with clients to help them adapt to the pandemic which resulted in high satisfaction scores.

As the pandemic began, Sigmar developed a pricing model designed to benefit both the client and themselves. Clients were given the option to pay a small percentage of the fee per month for permanent placements (for 12 months) instead of an up-front fee of 10 times more. Should the candidate leave, the client stops paying.

This collaborative approach was valued for sharing the risk with the client during a very challenging and uncertain time, but it also highlighted the quality of candidates that stayed and thrived.

Sigmar was also praised for RPO projects developed with clients that addressed D&I challenges by carrying out in-depth analysis into the candidate journey at each stage of the process. By analysing job descriptions for gender coding and implementing video technology, Sigmar was able to curate a more diverse pool of applicants made up of 11 different nationalities, dramatically reduce interview time and time-to-hire, and improve the cultural and motivational fit of candidates.

All of this resulted in superb reviews and high satisfaction scores from clients and candidates.

Judges said: “Sigmar’s successful focus on D&I and international service during uncertain times resulted in business growth for them and their clients.”

Sigmar Recruitment received The Client Service Award presented by Sonovate’s CCO, Simon Woods

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Attract. Manage. Pay.

The Access Group Tech Transformation Award Advantage Resourcing was praised for setting a clear long-term strategy for tech transformation and for its success in driving adoption for all key stakeholders.

To combat the challenges of virtual recruitment, rising unemployment, skills shortages and talent availability at the start of the pandemic, Advantage Resourcing designed and developed an on-demand proprietary recruitment platform with a mobile app called Availatemp.

To drive adoption within the company, and with clients, they created steering and beta testing groups along with internal champions from its leadership team. Availatemp is designed for infrastructure and industrial roles and aims to remove the middleman in the recruitment process through automated hiring. Candidates are able to set preferences such as preferred work days, locations, shift patterns and salaries.

The app then generates suitable vacancies that the candidate can apply for. By automating the recruitment workflow and allowing a selfservice approach, it’s estimated to have saved hiring mangers up to 80% of the time they would normally use through traditional hiring processes.

Coupled with a new purpose to further digitalise/automate Advantage Resourcing, we drove productivity and amplified engagement with employees, candidate and clients through the use of a new HR tech stack including SourceBreaker, Odro and Textio which dramatically increased their talent pools, reduced bias and closed-lead generation.

Judges said: “By building their own staffing platform during the pandemic while optimising off-theshelf solutions Advantage Resourcing demonstrated effective leadership and team engagement.”

Advantage Resourcing’s Scott Siwicki and Ben de Wulf receive The Access Group Tech Transformation Award from Volcanic Commercial Director Steve Barnhurst

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

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The Fore:Two Group Candidate Service Award Judges praised ERSG for their innovative D&I programme to increase the number of women working in the energy sector and their dedication to candidate safety during the pandemic.

By investing in a solid ED&I strategy that involved the development of inclusion boards and projects, ERSG not only increased the number of female placements for their clients but also beat the ambitious target they set for their own internal management team. Projects included a D&I survey to gauge employee views and formulate ideas, sponsoring inclusive charities, and updating all vacancies with inclusive language to increase diverse talent pools.

To support women who want to break into the male-dominated renewable energy sector, ERSG established a networking forum called ‘Women in Wind’ which posted live vacancies, content and set up meetings to discuss industry-related news. This forum now reaches a growing number of subscribers who are bringing more diverse talent into the sector.

During the pandemic, ERSG quickly made the safety of their workforce and their candidates a priority. Judges praised them for implementing a COVID-19 safety plan for every project using government-advised best practice and guidelines for travel, accommodation, preaccommodation, entry checks and track and trace to protect contractors.

Judges said: “ERSG’s proactive approach to IR35 and its investment in candidate wellbeing by implementing a structured COVID-19 safety plan is commendable during such trying times.”

ERSG were awarded The Group Candidate Service Award by Jeff Blakemore, CEO & Elise Perry, Head of Key Accounts at Fore:Two

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

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The Blackwood Capital Diversity & Inclusion Award Goodman Masson was praised for making DI&R a central pillar of their business and how they engaged their entire staff in delivering a more purpose-led staffing and RPO service.

In 2020, the board of Goodman Masson set out their ambition to make Diversity, Inclusion and Respect (DI&R) the centre of the business.

To achieve it, they took every employee on a journey of education and awareness around unconscious bias and cultural competency. This included DI&R training on a range of elements, from how to lawfully take positive action in partnership with clients during the recruitment process to removing bias language from the advertising and shortlisting stages.

Four specialist internal networks were founded in January 2020 to formalise the way the business looked at diversity and how to support clients with its staffing and RPO services. By implementing a series of podcasts, webinars, and seminars — that were attended by over 1,250 clients — they created a knowledge platform for these clients to kickstart their own D&I drives.

Judges also praised Goodman Masson for bringing its values and purpose to life in its ‘befriending programme’, where furloughed staff provided much-needed social interaction to lonely and vulnerable residents in social housing. The programme was run by 34 staff on furlough who spoke to over 2,600 residents.

Judges praised Goodman Masson for its commitment to DI&R, which is integral to both its culture and services.

Judges said: “Goodman Masson proved that its commitment to DI&R is integral to both its culture and services. Its scheme for furloughed staff to voluntarily take on outreach work is truly exceptional.”

Ronny Grosman, Managing Partner at Blackwood Capital, presented The Diversity & Inclusion Award to Goodman Masson

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

TIARA Talent Tech Star Winners ‘21

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The Odro Innovation Award La Fosse Associates impressed judges with their ‘Futureproof’ initiative to develop tomorrow’s tech players for their clients, which resulted in higher client retention.

La Fosse Associates prides itself on developing entrepreneurial consultants who build their own desks within niche tech specialisms. With over a decade of experience in top-to-bottom tech recruitment, they realised their clients were struggling to hire and retain junior tech talent.

Their innovative response was the creation of ‘Futureproof’, a technology training company which launches and develops future tech superstars by training junior talent and deploying them into leading businesses to launch their careers, also helping clients build more sustainable pipelines of diverse talent and improve their employer brand as a result.

The free course removes barriers to entry for people from diverse backgrounds and has attracted a wide pool of candidates: 43% female, 57% minority ethnic, 85% lower income backgrounds, and 46% career changers.

Five months of continued assessment, three months of full-stack development and tech fundamentals training, plus ongoing associate and manager training and development throughout their two-year placement ensures associates are committed and adaptable. This has in turn increased client retention and repeat business.

Judges said: “La Fosse Associate’s innovation resulted in new clients, new revenues and new strategic partnerships to support long-term growth.”

Odro’s CRO Dougie Loan presented La Fosse Associates with The Innovation Award

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

The Vacancysoft Marketing Campaign of the Year Judges praised Signify for quickly adapting their marketing strategies to continue supporting the Scala industry during the pandemic.

As the pandemic hit, Signify were forced to cancel their in-person networking events, including their popular conferences for Scala professionals to network and learn as well as enabling consultants to directly engage with clients and candidates. A change of tack was needed so they scaled up their social media and online presence with the creation of ‘Scala in the City’ virtual conferences. This enabled engineers to continue developing their skills and engage with peers during lockdown. This free, online, global event also enabled Signify to reach an international audience of more than 2,500 people — thereby identifying an innovative way to connect with communities and generate a more diverse candidate pool.

Judges also commended Signify Technology for its commitment to its staff and D&I. Signify is a black owned business, 50% of the team identify as women and 30% of the team identify as black. Not one Signify employee was furloughed or made redundant during the pandemic and their ‘all hands on deck’ approach supported significant year-on-year sales growth.

As partners of the ‘Programme One’ diversity initiative, Signify launched marketing campaigns including Black Stories Matter, which enabled it to attract diverse talent and create D&I awareness in the Scala community.

Judges said: “Their ‘Scala in the City’ virtual conferences helped engineers to upskill and connect with peers through COVID-19 while deepening engagement with potential candidates and clients.”

Vacancysoft’s Group MD Larysa Chaplin presents The Marketing Campaign of the Year Award to Signify Technology

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Recognising excellence Clearwater International is delighted to support the Growth Company of the Year category at the 2021 TIARA awards

I have been advising recruiters on creating and realising value for over 20 years, and am delighted to have been asked to support the TIARAs which recognise and reward industry leaders for their hard work and success.

At Clearwater International, our heritage is in working closely with entrepreneurs, founder shareholders and management teams on their growth journey and ultimate liquidity event.”

Marcus Archer, Managing Partner

t: +44 845 052 0300 clearwaterinternational.com

The Clearwater Growth Recruitment Company of the Year Judges praised Trinnovo Group for achieving sustained and substantial growth across all key metrics and international expansion through the pandemic.

While many recruiters managed the threat of the pandemic with redundancies and furlough, Trinnovo Group responded to the economic uncertainty of 2020 by investing even more in attracting and retaining top talent while developing its leadership programmes to support global expansion in the US and DACH. Collaboration between its East and West Coast teams to scale internationally through the pandemic increased headcount by 75%.

This translated into impressive commercial performance, with the Group doubling its client base. Judges were also impressed with the expansion of its social enterprise, ExMilitary Careers, into the US which supported growth while laying the foundations for future success. It registered over 50,000 candidates from an often-overlooked community, impacted over 5,000 disadvantaged individuals across their charitable outreach programmes, and engaged both new and existing clients as registered employers to support the initiative.

Trinnovo Group are awarded The Growth Recruitment Company of the Year Award by Dan Shrimpton, Director at Clearwater

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Judges said: “Trinnovo Group’s pandemic-defying business strategy to invest in talent and global expansion has been under-pinned by a strong purpose and values aligned to their service.”

6CATS International is the expert supplier of compliant contractor management solutions to the world’s leading recruitment businesses.

6CATS takes the stress and uncertainty out of engaging contractor workers around the world, enabling recruiters to focus on their core business.

6CATS International is proud to sponsor the INTERNATIONAL RECRUITMENT COMPANY OF THE YEAR at the 2021 TIARAs

info@6catsint.com www.6catsint.com T: +44(0) 20 7374 6957

The 6CATS International Recruitment Company of the Year Judges praised NES Fircroft as an industry leader in compliance and for its impressive and sustained international growth.

With over 30 specialist personnel delivering expertise in compliance, risk, quality and data protection across the globe, NES Fircroft demonstrated an understanding of the intricacies of regional legislation and a proven ability to offer their clients best in class service.

By conducting monthly Commercial Compliance Audits on all new placements, their compliance percentage ranged from 97.7% to 100% – which far surpassed industry norms. NES Fircroft also optimised technology to better support clients and candidates during the pandemic. Their tech suite included AI to search local markets, a chatbot tool to contact and pre-qualify candidates, and a video solution for remote interviewing.

In 2021, they expanded their tech solution by developing an expense app for contractors, called NESFTime, which dramatically streamlined the process and enabled a seamless expense claim system for contractors. They have grown their contractor population from 12,000 in 2019 to a record high of 20,500 in 2021 while also expanding their geographical footprint to Taiwan and Chicago. Judges commended their commitment to compliance and contractor support while maintaining impressive growth profit through the pandemic.

Judges said: “By under-pinning the best use of AI, video technology and its own app to help contractors submit their time and expenses more easily, NES Fircroft is able to deliver best in class service to their clients and contractors.”

NES Fircroft received The International Recruitment Company of the Year Award from Jon Clarke, MD at 6CATSPRO

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

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The Grant Thornton Specialist Recruitment Company of the Year A clear specialist in Scala, Signify Technology was praised by judges for its commitment to supporting and upskilling candidates through the pandemic to address talent shortages.

Signify Technology demonstrated its commitment to the Scala industry over the last 12 months by teaming up with well-known industry thought leaders on a series of online initiatives to upskill and support engineers while addressing sector talent shortages.

This included industry-specific updates as well as Scala programming courses for Signify tech employees. This training, set up during the pandemic, now forms part of Signify’s onboarding programme for its own new starters.

Judges praised Signify for not only demonstrating its Scala specialism and support but also its commitment to staff wellbeing throughout the pandemic. This was evident in quarterly mental health workshops facilitated by professionals, a mental health first aider as part of the team, and special leave given to those who needed it. To beat the stress of lockdown, Signify’s CEO created a health league table to ensure staff prioritised their mental wellbeing. Each employee was rewarded for completing an act of self-care such as meditation or reading, with prizes awarded based on their activity.

Grant Thornton’s Transaction Advisory Services Partner, Carl Parker, presents Signify Technology with The Specialist Recruitment Company of the Year Award

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Judges said: “In addition to going beyond in its upskilling of Scala candidates, Signify was commended for its enviable working culture and a clear focus on mental health and consultant support through tough times.”

Highly Commended

The Parasol Group Temporary Recruitment Company of the Year Judges praised TFS Healthcare for its 360-degree solution for trusts, having a clinical-led business with deep understanding of how to place the best candidates.

TFS Healthcare’s in-house clinical team, with vast experience working in multiple healthcare settings, gives them a competitive edge in the market for its solid understanding of the mix of nurses and healthcare assistants needed to staff the industry.

A mentorship programme, ongoing assessment and bespoke interview processes have ensured that TFS places nurses where their skills are best suited. Coupled with regular on-site (or online) meetings, values-based clinical appraisals, welcome packs and 24/7 ongoing support, their managed service and collaborative approach to recruitment has resulted in over 80% of workers saying they’re likely to recommend them to a friend.

Their clinical-led service has helped it to achieve excellence in a highly competitive market and has resulted in a 70% increase in their client base over the last two years. TFS Healthcare now holds over 40,000 candidate records and have helped over 1,300 healthcare professionals into roles.

Doug Crawford, CEO at Optionis Group, awards TFS Healthcare with The Parasol Temporary Recruitment Company of the Year Award

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Judges said: “TFS must be commended for its investment in learning and development and mentorship of nurses, as well as its collaborative approach to appraisals and sharing best practice.”

Digital Transformation for Recruitment, with Limitless Scalability.

www.mercuryxrm.co.uk

The Mercury Best Recruitment Company to work for (£5m to £20m) Judges praised The Barton Partnership for its investment in staff development and wellbeing as well as its bold strategies to drive agility and customer engagement.

The Barton Partnership has seen a great return on its investment in a new Head of Talent & Development, brought in to manage their people process and develop a bespoke competency framework. By implementing structured training, mentoring and coaching, all of its consultants are on track to be promoted every year and it has been crowned a TIARA Best Recruitment Company to Work For. Boasting an employee retention rate above 80% in 2020, and high employee satisfaction despite the challenges of the pandemic, The Barton Partnership demonstrated growth and resilience during COVID-19 and remained profitable, growing both revenue and headcount.

Judges were also impressed with their ondemand talent offering, called HourlyConsulting. com, which connects contractors with clients for short burst consulting support. This gives clients access to highly skilled and fully vetted consultants who can be engaged immediately and remotely. This agility means that The Barton Partnership is able to work with greater flexibility, with independent consultants able to shortlist candidates quickly with very competitive pricing options.

Judges said: “The Barton Partnership showed clear evidence of aligning their values with their clients and ultimately providing a great place to work for their growing team.”

The Barton Partnership won The Best Recruitment Company to Work For (£5m to £20m) presented by Mercury’s Marketing Manager, Dan Fox

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

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The Twenty20 Capital Best Recruitment Company to Work For (£20m to £50m) Judges praised Trinnovo Group for showing how great values have translated into positive financial, commercial and social outcomes to make it an employer of choice in recruitment.

Trinnovo Group responded to the economic uncertainty of 2020 by investing in the attraction, development and retention of talent and leadership programmes. During the pandemic their headcount increased by 75% and client numbers doubled while focussing on new geographies to drive rapid scale.

Judges were impressed by their belief that there is a societal dimension to running their business and that it’s not just about a balance sheet. They have aligned purpose and profit by expanding its social enterprise Ex-Military careers into the US, which has helped over 5,000 disadvantaged people across their charitable outreach. This has been under-pinned by a focus on diversity and inclusion, sourcing the widest possible career opportunities for a group where D&I is very often overlooked.

This programme resulted in the registration of over 50,000 candidates and 1,135 employer organisations – 22% of which were existing Trinnovo clients. Their dedication to promoting diversity has resulted in both higher employee and client retention. They were also Highly Commended for a TIARA D&I Award this year.

Judges said: “Trinnovo Group are truly an employer of choice. Their internal staff engagement metrics are outstanding and they are making significant progress on D&I.”

Trinnovo Group were crowned The Best Recruitment Company to Work For (£20m to £50m) presented by Chair of Judges Katie Folwell-Davies, Investment Director at Twenty20 Capital

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Highly Commended

Specialists in the Staffing Sector

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Gambit is proud to sponsor the ‘Best Recruitment Company to Work For (£50m+)’ award at the 2021 TIARA Awards

The Gambit Best Recruitment Company to Work For (£50m+) Amoria Bond demonstrated a twelve-times return on investment in staff development and personal brand, which kept it profitable through the pandemic.

Amoria Bond clearly showed that a commitment to training, diversity and ESG has made it an employer of choice in recruitment and driven commercial success. Judges were impressed by the way they aligned their employee value proposition to three priorities for their people: Career Progression, with a clear 10-Steps-Plan; Community, which aligned training and development with D&I and CSR commitments; and Culture, to foster respectful relationships.

As founding partners of the D&I Charter, Amoria Bond appointed Inclusion Advocates which has balanced the gender and ethnic minority balance of new hires and the board.

In 2020, an enhanced learning platform was launched to add recruitment, sales skills and enhanced leadership programmes to a Learning Management System which already housed thousands of hours of expert-led video content.

They also introduced dedicated wellbeing hubs and mental health first aiders.

The results are impressive, with over 50 promotions over the last year, a 10% increase in staff retention year-on-year (with four global offices reporting 100% retention over the last 12 months) and a 3% rise in per-head income.

Judges said: “Amoria Bond has proven its commitment to ESG and improved D&I which has clearly supported the attraction and retention of both clients and consultants.”

Amoria Bond triumph for the second year in a row to win the Gambit Best Recruitment Company to Work For (£50m+) Award

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

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The Mishcon de Reya Recruitment Leader of the Year A hat trick winner at the TIARA Recruitment Awards, Ashley impressed judges with his ability to inspire, engage and develop future leaders at Trinnovo Group.

Ashley Lawrence leads by example. A great believer in personal and professional development, he is also a champion of diversity, inclusion, and profit with purpose.

Having studied an executive MBA from 2016 to 2018 he recognises the value of investment in education and invested heavily in L&D to support organic, meritocratic growth, from a bespoke new starters’ Training Academy to Future Leaders’ and Advanced Leaders’ Programmes. As a result, 75% of consultants are promoted every 12 months and over 80% of employees are engaged in training at any time.

Diversity is clearly at the heart of the business.

An employee-led Diversity & Inclusion Team (DIT) grew from six people to 30 members in 2020. Ashley also created the framework for new sourcing methodologies after becoming a partner with FastFuture, a 12-week virtual programme aimed at thousands of young people from underrepresented backgrounds. It has assisted 4,500 young people to hone their digital skills and find work and is on track to help a further 3,000 every quarter until 2025.

Ashley co-created Ex-Military Careers with his brother following his experience to match employers with candidates, provide mentoring and upskill candidates. Recognised as one of the most professionally run social enterprise platforms of its type, it has over 700 registered businesses advertising over 3,000 jobs in the UK and US – which has supported business growth as well as social impact.

Judges said: “Ashley Lawrence is a leader who listens and learns. He has clearly demonstrated the return on investment in developing leaders to scale. Trinnovo Group punches above its weight, all while bringing its purpose and values to life.”

Ashley Lawrence, Chairperson at Trinnovo Group receives The Recruitment Leader of The Year Award from Nick Davis, Senior Partner at Mishcon de Reya

TIARA Recruitment Awards 2021 Finalists

Affi Khan CEO CPL UK - Technology & Healthcare

Ashley Lawrence Chairperson Trinnovo Group

Richard Stevens CEO Momenta Group

Colm McGinley CEO MCG

Amy Golding CEO Opus Talent Solutions

Jamie Woods CEO JCW Group

Sasza Bandiera CEO Oyster pArtnership

86 TALiNT Talk

Goodbye COVID-19 and take the side hustle with you A new hip and happening ‘thing’ that employers are encouraged to allow their staff time to pursue, the side hustle should be neither cool or celebrated as it’s indicative of employers not willing to pay enough for much-needed talent...

As we, sooner or later, look at an economy beyond the pandemic there is one aspect of how a lot of people work that has crept up on us over the years and has generally been accepted as not a bad thing – the side hustle. But for some time now I’ve been concerned that this cool-sounding, funky term actually disguises something much more invidious and that is a reliance of too many people to need more than one job; and an unwillingness of employers to pay a proper wage.

From what I can see, side hustles fall into different categories: doing something you enjoy in your spare time that may or may not make a little money (often traditionally known as a ‘hobby’) is one. Alternatively, it may be a more serious undertaking: one of my senior colleagues here at TALiNT Partners is a trained counsellor and does important work with her clients outside of her work with us from which she gets a great deal of fulfilment. Calling this a side hustle, whilst technically accurate, feels disrespectful and a bit demeaning.

There are jobs done by students whilst studying or during the summer holiday. Back in my day these were mainly referred to as, er, student jobs! I do have a friend whose daughter continues to offer tutoring to students while she studies to qualify as a lawyer. To be fair, that’s a great example of a ‘side hustle’ although I’m pretty sure once she qualifies as a lawyer and has her 2,000 billable hours to hit, it will almost certainly fall by the wayside.

Renting your spare room used to be called ‘having a lodger’ now it’s having a side hustle

TALiNT International November 2021

through Airbnb. I’m not sure I see much of a difference.

Ken Brotherston, Managing Director, TALiNT Partners

But by far the number of people who seem to have a side hustle – Uber drivers, Deliveroo riders, cleaners – are people who are generating income to pay rent, buy food and generally do the things they need to and there’s nothing ‘side’ about it; it is income that is central to their ability to get by.

A 2019 survey from CV-Library suggested that 60% of people who had a ‘side hustle’ were doing it to supplement their basic income and it’s likely that COVID-19 will have made this worse rather than better.

The government announcement of the rise of the national living wage will undoubtedly make a difference, but I can’t help but think that de-glamourising this notion of a side hustle and calling it what it is for most people and that it’s an essential element of their income – will also help.

So, for most people, a side hustle isn’t optional, and it certainly isn’t cool.

And as we look across the economy at sectors desperate for staff – the care sector, hospitality, driving and warehouse staff to name a few, I can’t help but think that those employers who pay enough to have 100% of the work effort from their people, especially those who have shown the commitment, drive and often ingenuity to hold down more than one job will reap enormous benefits. That would be a nice result all round.

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Working with organisations as an executive coach, it has been a great privilege to see clients I have helped are becoming effective leaders of the future who can help transform an organisation. I get such a sense of pleasure and satisfaction when I see a client stop and have an “aha’ moment when they’ve suddenly had a shift in perspective. It’s also very rewarding to get feedback like: “I just don’t waste all that energy overthinking anymore”, “My anxiety has improved, I worry less, performance has improved”, “Finding out what drives individuals on my team has helped me develop them.”

Others have fed back: “I’ve learnt to overcome side-tracking negative thoughts when planning or approaching tasks”, and “understanding my values and what’s important has driven the desire to take effective action and stay committed.”

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TALiNT International November 2021

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