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Category: Recruitment Agencies

SThree reports record performance

The recruitment specialist’s contractor order book is up 43% year-on-year

SThree, specialist recruitment firm reported “record performance” this week with net fees rising 19% at constant currency year-on-year to £355.7m – a reported all-time high for the business.

The London-listed firm reported “strong” global growth with 23% in Germany, 24% in the US, and 19% in the Netherlands. Those three are SThree’s largest markets and account for 74% of the group’s net fees.

Contract and permanent net fees were up 17% and 24% year-on-year, respectively, with contract net fees representing 75% of group net fees, compared to 76% in 2020, with the contractor order book up 43% year-on-year.

The group also reported a record adjusted profit before tax of £60m, up 111% year-on-year.

The board described the balance sheet as “robust”, balance sheet, with net cash totalling £58m at year-end on 30 November, up from £50m at the end of the 2020 financial year.

It proposed a final dividend of 8p per share, up from 5p a year earlier, taking the full-year dividend to 11p from 5p year-on-year.

That was in line with the company’s dividend cover target of between 2.5x and 3.0x, as previously communicated.

SThree reported that the strength of its contractor order book and recent trading was tracking ahead of expectations, with the directors now anticipating double-digit net fee and profit growth for 2022.

On the environmental, social and governance front, they said its renewables business – accounting for 6% of net fees – was up 22% from 2020, which was ahead of its target to double the share of that business from 2019 to 2024.

Timo Lehne, interim CEO of STHree commented: “Our record-breaking full-year performance reported today demonstrates that we have a robust strategy focusing on STEM and flexible working, implemented by a talented management team, and the hard work of our people globally. As the market rebounded in 2021 following the impact of COVID-19, we saw demand for STEM skills increase across all of our key markets.

“Whether it is engineers building green infrastructure, developers aiding digital transformation or the scientists helping to develop the next life-changing drug, we are proud to have placed more than 22,000 skilled people and, combined with our ESG efforts, we impacted over 33,000 lives this financial year.”

“We are well-positioned, we demonstrated our ability to navigate through unforeseen challenges, such as COVID-19, and we continue to evolve our delivery model.”

The CEO said it would further invest in its infrastructure and people in 2022, to enhance its platform and drive accelerated margins in future years.

 

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Key tech trends for recruiters to watch

Over-specialization adding to skills shortage
Finding, attracting, hiring, and retaining top talent in technology continues to be a challenge as we enter the new year.  The resultant trends post pandemic that have enabled the necessity of a wide-spread workforce have become a Pandora’s Boz that will likely stay open forever.

Recruiting top professionals in technology is one area that has long been in flux. According to Ryan Kellner, Head of Data Science for Hudson Gate Partners, adjusting to talent needs in the sector should be nothing new.  He believes that, like in each year, there are some very specific trends that have come to light as well as some challenges that continue to be seen.  Mr Keller said, in reading the tea leaves of the technology world, that one thing is certain, and the recruitment industry must pay heed, and that is: many people are never returning to the office full time again.

“Growing up in Indianapolis in the 80s and 90s, all the tech firms were downtown, and everyone lived in the suburbs and made the commute back and forth every day,” said Mr Kellner. “Then some companies got wise and said, ‘We can get better talent by building our headquarters in the suburbs because we will get the talent that doesn’t want the long commute!’ They were right. All the good developers flocked to solid companies that were a five- to 10-minute drive from where they lived. They could get their kids out to the bus, participate in after-school programs, and everyone’s work/life balance got a bit easier.”

This same thinking is where we are at now post-COVID, he said. “The factor that seemingly dictates my response rate to recruiting calls and emails the most these days is not the company, it’s not the salary, it’s not the perks. It is whether the job is fully remote or not,” he said.

What you’re up against 

According to Mr Kellner, the job market is so hot these days for good people in tech that candidates seem to be looking for reasons not to continue with the interview process. “I was recently working with a strong developer with an MS in computer science and five years in financial software development who was interviewing with some of my clients,” he said. “I asked him where else he was actively interviewing and he listed every FANG company, Tesla, Robinhood, etc. If you want to hire some good developers in 2022, this is what you’re up against.”

To hire top talent, employers need a plan on how they are going to make that person pick their company over the current batch of trendy tech companies. “If you aren’t selling why your company is great in the first interview, it’s not happening,” said Mr Kellner.

Once again, this highlights the importance of the employer brand and is a trend to watch in 2022.

Double-edged sword for recruiting

Mr Kellner reported another noticeable trend of the last two years and that is those with traditional software engineering backgrounds increasingly wanting to specialize into fields like data science, machine learning, AI, blockchain etc. Keller believes that this variety of specialization options is a double-edged sword for recruiting because while it’s creating a great number of hyper-specialized individuals, it’s also draining the core demographic of pure software developers.

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Jobs figures rise 97% year-on-year

UK region in every sector outstrips job postings for 2020

The latest reports from Reed.co.uk, have stated that over 3.3 million jobs were added onto its website in 2021 – that’s a whopping 1.5 million more than 2020 which equates to a year-on-year rise of 97%!

Reed.co.uk also reported a 25% increase in new jobs posted last year compared with 2019, when 2.7 million jobs were recorded before the start of the pandemic.

September saw the most amounts of job postings with 357,489 created which was an increase of 150% compared to 2020 and 60% compared to 2019.

Similarly in December which is month where job postings usually fall in the lead up to the holidays and new year recorded nearly  350,000 new live vacancies. December was the second most active month of 2021 and a 151% and 132% increase on 2020 and 2019’s figures respectively.

Job postings in every sector on Reed.co.uk were up year-on-year compared to 2020, with Customer Service (510%) and Transport & Logistics (337%) seeing the highest percentage increases, followed by Banking (305%), Strategy & Consultancy (255%), Hospitality & Catering (176%), Retail (170%) and Manufacturing (136%).

In terms of the number of new jobs created, Transport & Logistics was the most active sector in 2021 with 376,000 jobs posted, followed by Customer Service (338,954), IT & Telecoms (264,184), Education (256,301) and Health & Medicine (168,558).

Further evidence of a jobs boom was reported by Reed.co.uk through its regional analysis of job vacancies on the site. Every region across the UK saw job vacancies for last year outstrip 2020 and nearly all saw more jobs added than before the pandemic. South East England and London were the most active regions for job postings with both seeing over half a million new vacancies added last year, a 77% and 108% increase year-on-year, respectively.

Recent analysis of Reed.co.uk’s jobs data also suggests that the ongoing jobs boom will continue into 2022, with over 32,000 jobs live on the site in 24-hours on the first Tuesday of the new year – a new record.

James Reed, chairman of Reed Recruitment commented: “As we move into 2022, the momentum which has built up in the jobs market is showing no signs of slowing down either. It is now the best time in fifty years to look for a new job. In this newly established sellers’ market, jobseekers hold all the cards and should feel empowered to find new opportunities whether to explore different industries, improve work-life balance, increase wages or boost career prospects. I urge anyone thinking of switching career to explore the opportunities available to them.”

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Will banning umbrella companies affect labour shortages?

TUC should be lobbying for statutory compliance

According to HIVE360, the recent blanket on umbrella companies will escalate the current war on talent and worker shortages, put pressure on pay rates and penalise both good and bad operators. The government’s call for evidence invites views from stakeholders on the role that umbrella companies play in the labour market, and how they interact with the tax and employment rights systems. It sets out the concerns that have been raised by some stakeholders, as well as government action already taken to tackle tax non-compliance and improve protection for workers, and closes on 22 February 2022.

David McCormack, CEO of HIVE360 has stated that the government’s current call for evidence on the umbrella company market – recruitment companies in particular – are already reeling from the effects of Brexit and the pandemic and the consultation’s timing could not be worse.

McCormack said: “A ban would penalise legitimate transient workers. It would put immense pressure on pay rates for umbrella workers, who struggle to understand the implications and will seek their current rate of pay as a PAYE rate, meaning higher pay rates that many companies simply can’t afford at this time. For the recruitment sector, this would mean vastly increased processing costs – which their clients would understandably be unwilling and unlikely to pay to cover the higher labour costs.”

McCormack, who has first-hand experience of the various payroll models used today and was the head of his own umbrella business before setting up HIVE360, believes that there is widespread misunderstanding of all umbrella companies, and people are tarnishing all umbrella businesses with the same brush. Commenting further, David said:

“The proposed total ban on the use of umbrella companies, would be a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Rarely does a blanket approach address the real issues, and an all-out ban on umbrella companies would be no exception. The TUC doesn’t appear to understand the roll of umbrella companies, or that there are multiple types. Rather than lobbying government for a total ban on their use, the TUC should be lobbying for statutory compliance and an independent statutory body that administers and polices clear rules and consequences, and which governs the industry in an effective, consistent and unbiased way.”

He added in a statement: “Companies have to take part in the government’s call for evidence on umbrella companies, which closes on 22 February. They must understand that HMRC doesn’t appear to be effective in curbing the multitude of ‘mini’ umbrella companies, which is the side of the industry that predominantly gets the whole industry a bad name, and involves the use of multiple companies to access multiple amounts of employers NI allowances and effectively removes the obligation to pay one of employment’s core statutory taxes.

“IR35 has tried to address this – but failed.  The simple solution is to require the end user and the recruitment agency to answer one simple question (and this could apply to labour only supplies or all agency supplies only) that simply asks: ‘Are you accessing the employers NI allowance yourselves or is your NI bill over £100,000?’ If the answer is yes from either party, then the agency should be liable for any unpaid employers NI.”

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42% of employers don’t admit to challenges

Does your company suffer from toxic positivity?

A recent study by Leadership IQ, an employee engagement and leadership training company, found that an organization that pretends everything is fine or sends companywide memos avoiding topics that can’t be positively spun might be suffering from “toxic positivity”.

Toxic positivity in organizations is often seen when leaders avoid sharing or discussing the tough challenges they’re facing. The study showed that only 15% of employees believe that their organization always openly shares the challenges facing it. By contrast, 42% said their company never or rarely shares its challenges.

There’s a long-standing belief among many leaders that talking about tough issues scares people and worsens the situation where the reality is the opposite. The study found that if an employee believes their company openly shares the challenges facing it, they’re about 10 times more likely to recommend it as a great employer.

It’s not just sharing organizational challenges where toxic positivity appears, however.

In a complementary study, The State of Leadership Development, more than 21,000 employees were asked to what extent their leader responded well to hearing about problems. Disturbingly, a mere 26% of employees said that their leader always responds constructively when employees share their work problems.

Developing resilience

The key to developing resilience, optimism, self-efficacy, and a host of other emotional-wellness skills is to acknowledge reality, not to deny, avoid, or dismiss it. Wallowing in misery will, of course, increase negative feelings. But denying misery or tough challenges is even worse.

To avoid toxic positivity, leaders need to accept that their employees are not clueless and can’t handle reality. In fact, ignoring or dismissing reality is one of the fastest ways to undermine employees’ trust in leadership. Instead, leaders should acknowledge reality and then focus their efforts on developing and explaining plans to make that reality better.

“Toxic positivity is an excessive and distorted form of positive thinking. It’s putting a positive spin on all experiences, no matter how dire or tragic,” explains clinical psychologist Dr. Andrea Burgio-Murphy. “For example, you could be experiencing toxic positivity when a friend or boss minimizes or refuses to acknowledge your negative feelings. Or perhaps they go further and try to spin your dire situation in a positive way, like ‘this is a blessing in disguise’ or ‘all things happen for a reason.”

Please share any newsworthy content with debbie@talintpartners.com 

 

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Postcard from Dubai from TALiNT Partners’ MD

The series of TALiNT Partners’ awards continued with the TIARA Recruitment Awards – UAE hosted in Dubai on 4th November and resulted in a resounding success. Ken Brotherston, TALiNT Partners’ MD, shares his experiences of a great week spent exploring Dubai and workforce trends in the region. 

It’s been over 10 years since I last visited Dubai so I was more than a little interested to see how much it has changed since I was last there. I was also looking forward to the three events we had scheduled for the week as I was hoping they would give me some insight into the talent challenges in the region and how they compared to our experiences with other markets.  

 On a physical basis Dubai just keeps getting bigger; the rate of new buildings in the last decade is astonishing, as is the continuing speed with which new ones are going up. The limited time I did have by the pool (honest!) was certainly not spent in quiet contemplation, given the constant cacophony of pile drivers and dumper trucks; and if the scale of construction is a sign (*and it generally is) then there is no lack of confidence about Dubai (and the wider UAE’s future). 

But what about from a people perspective? Our three key sessions gave a wide ranging perspective: the first, at London Business School’s campus in the Dubai International Financial Centre, brought together the Head Of Staffing for LinkedIn for the region, Susana Correia, Ron Thomas, a highly experienced CHRO and one of the local market’s foremost commentators on workforce trends, and Michael Morcos, Vice Chair of the Board Practice  at Korn/Ferry, the world’s largest organisational consulting firm in a discussion with a group of executive MBAs. The key takeaway from this session was undoubtedly a confirmation that capable senior execs (and especially those with transformations and/or project management capabilities) are in more demand than ever before and, as employers become ever more flexible, on how and where their key execs work with them – it is opening up entirely new talent pools.   

Our second session of the week was our Talent Conference, bringing together key employers, staffing solutions providers and HR tech firms to look at trends across the wider market. Peter Hogg, Talent Acquisition Director, Schneider Electric demonstrated the power of creating an internal talent market place whilst Ghenwa Habbal, Head of Talent Management, Ford Middle East & Africa discussed how to use a digital capability to create a total talent approach.  

Darren Grainger, MD of NES Fircroft emphasised the importance of strategic supplier partnerships; Jonathan Rook, Managing Director of Sova Assessment highlighted the possibilities of digital assessment, not least for some of the large nationalisation programmes going on across the region.  

It was also very powerful to hear Nihal B. Hammad, Director, Human Resources, Albatha Healthcare Group, talk about diversity in the region and whilst it is important to balance D&I initiatives with local customs and practices, progress is being made. No doubt some might say not fast enough but that’s a discussion for a separate blog. 

Our final event of the week was the culmination of our TIARA staffing campaign to recognise the achievements of a range of staffing firms and solutions providers in the region and it was fantastic to see some of the impressive work being done by so many firms across the region and in particular to celebrate our Recruitment Industry Leader of the Year, Aws Ismail, of Marc Ellis Group who judges commended for his investment in establishing a strong team, an open and supportive culture and for his support for his local community through an incredibly difficult year.  

The MENA region, and the UAE specifically, is continuing to go from strength to strength. As we look at new ways of working combined with, for example, nationalisation programmes, this will help to open up new markets in which to trade or sell services and create a larger pool of educated and engaged talent. And as the region works towards a longer-term strategy of relying less on an economy based on fossil fuels, the energy and dynamism of the region will create a lot of exciting opportunities for some time to come.  

By Ken Brotherston  

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Magazine Feature: 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 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

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 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.”

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

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.

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.” 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– 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.”

“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

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 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

View the full magazine here: https://library.myebook.com/RI/talint-international-november-2021/3722/

 

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Saffery Champness Hall of Fame winner crowned at the TIARA Recruitment Awards

Trinnovo Group the biggest winner of the night!

On Wednesday 20th October winners of the 2021 TIARA Recruitment Awards were revealed at a Gala Dinner for 450 guests at The Brewery in London, attended by CEOs and senior executives from the UK’s top 500 recruiters.

“Resilience is a fitting theme for the 2021 TIARA Recruitment Awards,” said Alex Evans, Programme Director TALiNT Partners. “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. This year’s winners are the champions of change that the industry needs to adapt and prosper to a constantly evolving talent market.”

This year’s Chair of Judges was leading human capital dealmaker Katie Folwell-Davies, Investment Director of Twenty 20 Capital. Commenting on this year’s finalists, she said: “Those companies that stood out for me were those that had invested through the pandemic – in headcount and technology – and had been able to demonstrate through their KPIs and their numbers the growth that was going to come from that investment.”

Jason Martin, Head of Strategy at Access Recruitment – headline partner of the TIARA Recruitment Awards – judged categories including the Best Recruitment Company to Work For and Recruitment Leader of the Year. “What has stood out in recent years, but even more so this year, was the focus on D&I and L&D,” he said. “I have really been impressed by the lengths that recruiters have gone to to invest in their people and the technology to support that. Those businesses have come out of lockdowns in the best shape to succeed over the next year.”

Trinnovo Group was the biggest winner of the night, taking the awards for Growth Recruitment Company of the Year, Best Recruitment Company to Work For with revenues between £20m and £50m, and Recruitment Leader of the Year for its founder and chairperson Ashley Lawrence.

Reed Global chairman James Reed was inducted into the TIARA Hall of Fame for his successful international expansion of Reed, spearheading the Keep Britain Working campaign in 2020, and for being a high-profile champion of the recruitment sector and its economic contribution.

The 2021 TIARA Recruitment Awards campaign was supported by headline partner Access Recruitment and supporting sponsors including: 6Cats International, Blackwood Capital, Clearwater International, Fore:Two Group, Gambit Corporate Finance, Grant Thornton, Mercury, Mishcon de Reya, Odro, Parasol Group, PurePro, Saffery Champness, Sonovate, Twenty20 Capital  and VacancySoft.

The full list of TIARA Recruitment Award winners and highly commended finalists is as follows:

The Saffery Champness Hall of Fame Award

  • Winner: James Reed, Chairman, Reed Global

The PurePro Back Office Team of the Year

  • Winner: NRL

The Sonovate Client Service Award

  • Winner: Sigmar Recruitment

The Access Group Tech Transformation Award

  • Winner: Advantage Resourcing
  • Highly Commended: Omni

The Fore:Two Group Candidate Service Award

  • Winner: ersg

The Blackwood Capital Diversity & Inclusion Award

  • Winner: Goodman Masson
  • Highly Commended: Trinnovo Group

The Odro Innovation Award

  • Winner: La Fosse Associates

The VacancySoft Marketing Campaign of the Year

  • Winner: Signify Technology

The Clearwater Growth Recruitment Company of the Year

  • Winner: Trinnovo Group

The 6Cats International Recruitment Company of the Year

  • Winner: NES Fircroft

The Grant Thornton Specialist Recruitment Company of the Year

  • Winner: Signify Technology
  • Highly Commended: NHS Professionals

The Parasol Group Temporary Recruitment Company of the Year

  • Winner: TFS Healthcare

The Mercury Best Recruitment Company to work for (£5m to £20m)

  • Winner: The Barton Partnership
  • Highly Commended: Xpertise Recruitment

The Twenty20 Capital Best Recruitment Company to work for (£20m – £50m)

  • Winner: Trinnovo Group
  • Highly Commended: JCW Group

The Gambit Best Recruitment Company to Work For (£50m+)

  • Winner: Amoria Bond

The Mishcon de Reya Recruitment Leader of the Year

Winner: Ashley Lawrence, Chairperson, Trinnovo Group

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Record hiring outlook for Ireland

Net employment outlook at third strongest in Europe

According to the latest ManpowerGroup Employment Outlook Survey, employers across Ireland anticipate the highest level of hiring in 17 years, for the fourth quarter according to The Net Employment Outlook for Ireland stands at +34%, the third strongest in Europe. The powerhouse area behind this positivity is the manufacturing sector – up 53 percentage points from the previous year to +39% for Q4 2021.

Transport and logistics is also poised for headcount growth, with employment outlook rising to 39% for the coming quarter. The retail sector also intends to hire significantly, bouncing back with the promise of continued government employment supports for the industry remaining in place until March 2022.

Elsewhere, the finance and business service sector remains strong, up ten percentage points on last quarter to +20%. However, the construction industry is being hit by limitations to supplies and hiring plans and has contracted 19 percentage points from last quarters record high, yet the employers in the sector remain optimistic with a hiring Outlook of +20%.

  • Nationwide, employers in all industry sectors report positive hiring plans for Q4.
  • From a regional perspective, employers in Dublin are reporting positive hiring intent with an outlook of +39%, with Munster being the most positive province for the next quarter at +44%.
  • Larger-sized organisations (250+ employees) are reporting the strongest hiring confidence for Q4 with an employment outlook of +39%.
  • Currently 69% of employers are struggling to fill roles. This leaves us with a significant talent gap where employers need to be investing in recruitment drives, upskilling and retraining programmes as long-term solutions to filling roles.

Photo courtesy of Canva.com

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Economic recovery at risk, says REC

Recruiters report difficulty in sourcing candidates

A survey conducted by the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) reported that nine in ten recruiters (88%) say that labour shortages are one of their biggest concerns for the remainder of 2021, while skills shortages are a major concern for two in three (65%).

With shortages hitting every sector of the economy and many staffing companies reporting the tightest labour market they’ve ever experienced, the REC is calling on business and the government to take urgent action to solve the problem.

Recruiters have a significantly higher number of roles to fill than before the pandemic, with three in five (58%) having at least 30% more vacancies than pre-pandemic. Of the 191 recruiters surveyed, almost all (97%) said that it was taking longer than usual to fill those vacancies, compounding the problem. Half (50%) reported that it now takes more than a month to find suitable candidates.

Recruiters reported several factors were affecting their ability to source candidates. The top reason was skills shortages (cited by 65% of respondents), followed by the new immigration rules (57%) and their clients not being able to offer competitive salaries (53%).

In response, the REC has set out a number of asks for both government and business to help solve this crisis:

  • Set up a cross-government forum including the Business, Education and Work and Pensions departments, as well as business organisations. This would restore the importance of workforce planning in the economic debate between business, government and other stakeholders, not only focusing on skills.
  • Broaden the apprenticeship levy and increase funding for training at lower skill levels. This would improve progression and transition opportunities for lower-skilled and temporary workers who need them most, and encourage business to do more here in the UK, not less.
  • Allow flexibility in the point-based immigration system and a visa route for lower-skilled workers, which would allow firms in the worst-affected sectors like logistics to access staff at times of pressing need.
  • Increased focus from businesses on workforce planning, staff engagement, attraction and retention policies. Firms need to raise workforce planning up to the senior leadership level, and work with key professional partners like recruiters to boost performance, productivity and staff wellbeing.

This also follows recent research from British Future, which found increasingly positive public attitudes towards immigration. Two thirds of the public (65%) agree that employers should be allowed to recruit from overseas for roles in shortage – showing that a more flexible immigration system would be popular as well as helping businesses to fill crucial vacancies.

Kate Shoesmith, Deputy CEO of the REC, said:

“Worker shortages are a huge problem for employers and their recruitment partners, across all industries and regions. Vacancy numbers are far higher than pre-pandemic, and it is taking much longer to fill them. This is putting the recovery at risk by putting capacity constraints on the economy, as last week’s GDP figures showed. In our survey, recruiters also highlighted a wide range of factors that have combined to cause these shortages – this is a complex problem with no one easy fix.

“As such, we will only solve these shortages through a collaborative approach. We’re glad that multiple government departments are coming together in a joint forum to tackle the issue, but to be effective it must also include business and industry experts. Government must allow more flexibility in the immigration system so firms can hire essential workers like drivers from abroad, and also improve training opportunities for lower-paid and temporary workers. Meanwhile companies need to focus on how they will attract and retain staff through improved conditions and facilities, not just pay.”

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