BEST CONTRACTOR SERVICE 2023

VHR

Founded in 2003, VHR is an international technical recruitment company providing engineering solutions across numerous sectors. Initially serving the aviation, automotive, engineering, defence and marine industries, VHR has since expanded to include the renewables, construction and technology sectors, specialising in recruitment, training and relocation. International clients are at the heart of VHR, with staff speaking 17 languages across eight global offices, currently trading with 120 clients in 52 countries.

  • VHR conducts regular security audits and vulnerability assessments to identify any potential weaknesses in its systems and take appropriate action to address them promptly. All VHR staff are regularly trained on cybersecurity best practices, including password management, phishing awareness and data handling procedures.
  • The company’s Contractor Care Offering has been very successful, resulting in increased employee satisfaction, retention and loyalty. A key benefit is the reduction in staff turnover, leading to a reduction in recruitment costs and disruption. Providing a supportive work environment with the hiring of onsite representatives has led to improved employee morale and job satisfaction. Some 82% of VHR’s business in 2021-22 came from repeat business.
  • Following a rigorous audit by HMRC in 2021, VHR was found to be compliant with every aspect of the minimum wage audit. It works proactively to ensure full compliance with all regulations related to contractors on its books. The commitment to compliance and transparency has enabled it to ensure that its contractors are not liable for any non-compliance issues.

Judges’ comments 

“The winner produced an impressive entry showing end-to-end involvement with contractors working cross border, catering for their requirements, transport and accommodation, and supporting them through potential minefields of legal requirements and regulation.”

BEST CLIENT SERVICE 2023

Harper Fox

Harper Fox Search Partners provides senior leadership talent and executive search solutions for the global energy, engineering, manufacturing, transport, technology and utilities sectors. It is a female-owned boutique search firm, offering a bespoke service to its clients, with offices in London, Birmingham and Texas.

  • The business excels in 100% retained STEM executive recruitment, placing board composition, C-Level, director, senior leadership talent and niche technical requirements internationally. 
  • Harper Fox benchmarks all relevant industry professionals to pinpoint highly relevant candidates from longlist to shortlist. The comprehensive candidate assessment produces a 97% candidate retention rate. They also support organisations to pinpoint future leadership talent within their business.
  • It leads businesses to define equality objectives to develop a cohesive strategy, which it says will attract, present and advance diversity recruitment. This is supported by equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) business analysis, gender pay gap advisory, and identifying and removing bias from the talent recruitment process. It has achieved a 43% increase in placing diverse talent, compared to the industry average of 11%.
  • The company’s complementary resources include a 30+ page EDI Guide, Trailblazer Talks video podcast series tackling taboo topics and the launch of its first in-person non-profit, Harper Fox-funded EDI in STEM event, STEM:Diversified.

Judges’ comments 

“Harper Fox was the stand-out winner, with the judges bowled over by services offered such as coaching, talent mapping analysis, benchmarking, video podcast series and the STEM event. The entry was backed up by excellent statistics and client testimonials. It clearly puts a huge amount of effort into understanding client needs and wanting to be a force for good in the recruitment industry.”

Highly commended: ersg

“We awarded a highly commended to ersg for clearly going the extra mile for clients in some challenging markets. We also liked initiatives such as the client service charter, which demonstrates its commitment to transparency and responsible business practices.”

BEST CANDIDATE CARE 2023

Bluestones Medical

Based in Chester, Bluestones Medical is a framework-approved healthcare staffing provider, supplying healthcare staff to NHS and private clients across England and Wales. It specialises in Community Nursing, General Nursing, Mental Health and Theatres.

  • Bluestones Medical Marvel Experience maps out the journey a candidate goes on from when they join the business, and beyond the two-year mark. It includes wellbeing and up-skilling checks, a review of their journey so far and one-year anniversary gift. It also sets the standard of candidate care everyone who works internally for Bluestones Medical must deliver.
  • Its benefits package includes free private healthcare, a £300 refer-a-friend scheme, regular free mandatory training, 1-2-1 revalidation support and regular appraisals.
  • Despite working in a high-pressure environment with limited resources during the Covid crisis, and the fear of contracting the virus, the team of healthcare workers continued to provide the best care possible for critically ill patients.

Judges’ comments

“The winner is Bluestones. By the nature of its industry, candidate care and engagement are essential. It illustrated going beyond the normal and achieving the highest of standards. Its data-driven approach, innovation and creativity made them a stand-out winner. Bluestones was the one business that focused on skills transfer. Its comprehensive demonstration of the importance of the candidate and their journey was emotional and touching. The way the business combines volume and professionalism is great to see. A worthy winner.”

BEST RECRUITMENT AGENCY MARKETING TEAM 2023

Charlton Morris

Search firm Charlton Morris has three divisions – CM Medical, CM Life Science and CM Industrial – with 80% of their work outside the UK. Generating revenue, either independently or in collaboration with the sales team, is the primary aim and their marketing function is a revenue-generating department.

  • Charlton Morris has a headcount of just over 120 people, with offices in Leeds, Manchester, Peterborough and London. Last year it turned over £12.7m in revenue. The firm has also hired 88 people in the same time frame, with more than 75% of those hires mentioning its brand and/or marketing as a key reason for joining.
  • It developed its content creation efforts, creating highly engaged and valuable communities across the key markets, through the launch of four separate podcasts and accompanying newsletters, with over 1,000 subscribers and over 1,000 downloads during this period.
  • New business attributed to marketing – from articles, podcasts, webinars or equivalent – represents a 46% increase year-on-year. Some 194 vacancies were generated through the content and on average, a vacancy over that time frame was worth £6,025 to the business. Charlton Morris also attributed more than £150k of placed candidates as being sourced directly through engaging with content online.

Judges’ comments

“This winner successfully illustrated the importance of marketing to any smart recruitment business. The marketing team are central to the business, as a recognised revenue stream – adding value through impressive content driven campaigns, generating new inbound business and generating significant revenue upside.”

Highly Commended: Harrington Starr

The judges also awarded Highly Commended recognition in this category. “This recruitment business showcased innovative thinking in how it uses content and social media, for strong commercial success.”

BEST IN HOUSE RECRUITMENT TEAM 2023

Talent Acquisition & Onboarding Team – Direct Line Group

Direct Line Insurance Group is a UK-based insurance company, formed in 2012 by the divestment of The Royal Bank of Scotland Group’s (RBS) insurance division through an initial public offering. The company owns a number of insurance subsidiaries, and the group is listed on the London Stock Exchange. It is also a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.

  • When the in-house recruitment team was created in late 2021, the mandate was clear: design innovative acquisition approaches to attract talent and transform how it recruits. There was also a focus on building a creative, aspirational employee value proposition that ensured Direct Line Group built its reputation as an employer of choice and delivered a futureproof workforce of diverse, skilled individuals.
  • Direct Line Group’s direct sourcing strategy is driven by candidate and market insight/analysis, which allows the business to maximise the commercial returns of a direct hiring strategy. It also has business partners in place who are SMEs, providing deep insight into market trends and insight.
  • The talent acquisition and onboarding team has been recruited for their diversity of thought and solutions-oriented approach. Direct Line Group has delivered a new careers website that delivers data-driven intelligence and hires inclusively. The new employer brand and employee value proposition has been built from comprehensive desk, competitor, focus group and internal research. It has inclusivity at its core and interacts directly with the new careers site, giving candidates a realistic insight into working at DLG.

Judges’ comments

“We were impressed at the approach taken to create a new team/ethic with an innovative approach as old processes were replaced – all of this while creating a new brand, ensuring both companywide awareness and a unique and impactful EVP. Complex demands were met as a ‘true expert’ TA and onboarding team and new careers website were developed. All was achieved within the required timescale with multiple hires completed.”

Highly Commended: Talent Attraction and Acquisition Team – EY

MOST EFFECTIVE EMPLOYER BRAND DEVELOPMENT AND CANDIDATE EXPERIENCE 2023

#BeYourself Cabin Crew Recruitment Campaign – Virgin Atlantic in partnership with Amberjack

British airline Virgin Atlantic was established in 1984. It operates to destinations all over the world from its main hub at London, Heathrow, had a reported total revenue of £2.9bn in 2022 and has nearly 8,000 employees across its operations.

  • Virgin in partnership with Amberjack completely redesigned its recruitment experience to be innovative and engaging, and widen accessibility; it also identified potential instead of focusing on experience. In 12 weeks, it welcomed 5,000 candidates into their process, invited over 1,000 to assessment centres and offered 512 candidates roles within the organisation.
  • The branding had to tackle Covid, and it emerged from the pandemic with a new campaign ‘See the world differently’. It focused on championing the rich individuality of the airline’s people and customers, building on research that shows travellers find most airlines’ crew impersonal in their service. In contrast, Virgin Atlantic crew are encouraged to be their true selves on board and on the ground.
  • Virgin in partnership with Amberjack received 4,921 candidates, had an application-to-hire ratio of nearly 11:1, and they achieved a net promoter score of +64 compared to the industry average (24+). Offers were made to 516 crew within 12 weeks and the diversity of hire included 20% ethnically diverse candidates, 27% males and 38% to those over 25 years old. All diversity of hire statistics exceed industry averages

Judges’ comments 

“The judges felt there was a clear winner in this category. The campaign in question not only illustrated real success in attracting the volume of talent required, but it did so in very a human way. They showed a real desire to innovate and not be afraid of challenging their brand – really ground-breaking. Well done!”

BEST USE OF DIGITAL/SOCIAL MEDIA 2023

EY

Ernst & Young Global is a British multinational professional services partnership headquartered in London. EY is one of the largest professional services networks in the world and, along with Deloitte, KPMG and PwC, is one of the Big Four accounting firms.

  • EY’s digital team has worked to shift the mindsets of internal business stakeholders by delivering engaging and effective contact which targets and meets the needs of prospective candidates.
  • The careers site managed by EY includes all updates, enhancements, content, experience and structure changes. It included EY Pathfinder (interactive), Clinch – where candidates ask questions to ‘EY insiders’, Watson candidate experience (AI tech) – culture, benefits and uploading CVs and ‘Our World. Your Way’ – a virtual experience to help students visualise a career with EY.
  • Across EY’s social channels, the team shared more than 770 social posts originated by them with the traffic reaching more than 3.5m impressions and 156k engagements, with engagements 262% higher year-on-year. Paid social media across Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn also saw 22m impressions, 158k link clicks, 3m video views, 185k engagements.

Judges’ comments 

“A unanimous winner. What stood out most was the holistic nature and approach EY takes to social/digital that really leaves no stone unturned. Whether for the careers website, social channels or areas like employee advocacy and engagement, this high-energy entry demonstrated the positive impact such an approach is having. It was also clear how the TA team uses such tools to be a true business partner to the organisation. The use of gamification… is appropriate and engaging. We should also mention EY’s commitment to building in-house digital expertise, which is clearly giving it an advantage in the market.”

AGENCY RECRUITMENT LEADER OF THE YEAR 2023

David Green, CEO at Remedium

David Green is CEO of Remedium, a recruitment business he founded nearly 10 years ago. He recognised that the NHS had a chronic recruitment problem that was reliant on agency locum doctors to plug the gap and has sought to address that situation. The company places clinical staff on permanent and fixed-term contracts.

  • Green has demonstrated an unwavering passion for solving the UK healthcare staffing crisis by creating a supportive and collaborative work environment that encourages open communication and feedback, actively seeking out and valuing input from the team.
  • In November 2022, Green brought Remedium to sale, achieving a seven-figure EBITDA, with a multiple of 12 times in a permanent marketplace that would usually attract half of that.
  • His achievements between 2021 and 2022 led to a bidding war between three high-end buyers. Some of those achievements included a 400% increase in bottom line, 60% increase in turnover, 500+ doctors recruited in a year, four people became £500k billers in one year, and Remedium gained its first £1m client.

Judges’ comments

“The winner showed an exceptional strong ethical approach to recruitment in a sensitive and international sector. He was using his experience and knowledge to work with regulatory bodies, influencing wider policy and the development of codes of practice in a field with complicated issues, demonstrating the wider contribution of the recruitment sector. The judges said that if every recruitment leader followed this example to become an industry influencer, then this would elevate the perception of recruitment as an industry itself. We were impressed by the success Green has had, particularly the challenges over the last few years. However, this is testament to his business leadership skills and his success shows that commerciality and ethics are not mutually exclusive.”

MOST EFFECTIVE EMERGING TALENT RECRUITMENT 2023

Atkins Graduate and Apprentice Programme – Atkins in partnership with Amberjack

One of the biggest design, engineering and project consultancies, SNC Lavalin’s Atkins, is well-known around the world. It also has well-established graduate and apprentice programmes, along with recently developing an Early Careers Recruitment Strategy.

  • Atkins runs a virtual work experience programme for 14-18-year-olds, which provides information on careers in engineering, sustainability and life at Atkins. Designed to help inform and inspire the next generation, 731 students participated with 75% stating they are likely or very likely to consider a career in engineering post-programme.  
  • Emerging talent candidates are fully engaged during the recruitment process, with a ‘buddy’ offered. Each candidate is fully informed/briefed of prospective roles. Atkins also has a flexible approach, with some candidates wanting more communication than others. All new hires are invited to social gatherings before joining. 
  • Atkins’ core objectives of its programmes are improving access to engineering, and it recruits a diverse cohort to support this, with 50.6% of the 731 students identifying as BAME. Some 65% of applications came from students from ethnically diverse backgrounds, with 27% converting onto the placement programme, which comprised 54% BAME applicants, as well as 36% female.

Judges’ comments

“Atkins demonstrated a breadth of innovation, supported with great, tangible results and an excellent overview of its execution. Its care and commitment shone through in the submission. It showed a wide community involvement, detailing numerous career options, international offerings and clear a diversity and partnership approach. Atkins is setting the right foundations for itself, its candidates and its clients.”

IN-HOUSE RECRUITER OF THE YEAR 2023

Rebecca Lester, People & Development Business Partner – Recruitment at Mollie’s Motels

Rebecca Lester’s role was to implement and manage the recruitment strategy for Mollie’s Motels, a motel, diner and drive-thru chain inspired by the classic American diner. 

  • Prior to Lester joining the company, Mollie’s recruitment drive was managed solely by line managers. Her contribution to the company has been significant as she has brought structure, control and success to the recruitment practices.
  • She has created a workplace culture that is welcoming to all employees, and a clear strategic recruitment policy focused on building and growing Mollie’s to scale.
  • Lester has implemented programmes and initiatives aimed at promoting diversity, equality and inclusion, such as unconscious bias training and employee resource groups. She ensures that the company taps into a wider talent pool and creates a more inclusive workplace.
  • She also instigates and nurtures community partnerships to give access to employment and apprenticeships for current and new employees and sits on a Neurodiversity forum, which shows a commitment to understanding and supporting employees with diverse needs. 

Judges’ comments 

In a very tight and competitive category, the judges felt that Rebecca Lester offered a solid written submission, but her interview with the judges eclipsed the opposition. If she were to win, Lester told the judges, she wanted to use it as a platform to promote inclusion and support neurodiversity initiatives. “She demonstrated a commitment to understanding and supporting employees with diverse needs. Lester stressed ‘one size does not fill all’ and that recruitment needed to focus on inclusive processes, with her assertion that ‘Diversity of the Workforce’ was a critical factor in commercial revenue. As the war in Ukraine intensified,” the judges noted, “Lester immediately provided support by reaching out through forums and Ukrainian job boards to successfully recruit refugees into the teams across both Mollie’s sites. She also supported them to adapt to life in the UK by arranging UK life language courses, translation tools and supporting them to make friendships and connections in work.” In the judges’ view, Lester’s inspiring and engaging personality would be a perfect role model for other recruiters. Finally, the judges felt that Lester was an outstanding brand ambassador for her company.

Highly Commended: Joan-Eric Miguel- International and Early Careers- HCA Healthcare UK