Onboarding and Retaining New Hires in High-Volume Hiring Scenarios

Whether it's due to rapid expansion, or a sudden surge in new projects, the need to bring in a large number of new hires quickly can be a challenge, particularly during the onboarding stage..

The Significance of Onboarding in High-Volume Hiring

For a successful start, set clear expectations for new hires, including their roles, duties, goals, and how they'll get feedback. Use tools like job descriptions, checklists, and training materials. Ensure these fit with your company's culture and values, and explain their importance in the bigger picture. If you need any help defining your company culture and incorporating it into your hiring reach out to our partner Holler who can help.

First impressions matter, and this is especially true for new hires. A well-structured process sets the tone for a positive employee experience from day one. It helps new employees feel welcomed, informed, and valued, increasing the likelihood of their long-term commitment to your business. High-volume hiring often means that new hires must quickly become productive members of your team. Effective onboarding improves this transition, ensuring that employees understand their roles, responsibilities, and how they contribute to the organisation's goals.

Effective onboarding can improve employee retention by 82% - Glassdoor

Here are some ways you can implement effective onboarding:

Standardise Processes: Develop a standard onboarding process that can be adapted to accommodate high-volume hiring. Create a detailed onboarding checklist, including all necessary paperwork, training modules, and introductions to key team members.

Leverage Technology: 49% of HR professionals use onboarding software to help improve onboarding. Invest in HR technology and onboarding platforms that streamline the process. Automation can significantly reduce administrative tasks and ensure consistency across the onboarding journey.

Provide support & resources: Only 12% of employees believe their organisation does a good job of onboarding new hires. Consider setting dedicated onboarding coordinators or mentors who can provide customised support to new hires in high-volume scenarios. Coordinators can help ease the transition and give the newcomers a support system and a point of contact for questions and guidance. Encourage open communication and seek feedback from new hires about their onboarding experience. Use this input to improve the onboarding process continuously.

Capgemini is a great example of a company that has created a successful onboarding strategy. Last week they released their new Collaborative Engagement Onboarding Platform which provides new joiners and existing employees moving into new roles with personalised and easily customisable learning experiences that ensure they have the training they need to excel in their new role.

Retention Strategies for High-Volume Hiring

Employee turnover can cost an organisation 33% of an employee's annual salary - Work Institute

High turnover rates can be harmful to any business. A robust onboarding process can reduce this risk by ensuring new hires feel connected to your company culture and understand the growth opportunities.

You want your new hires for the long term. This includes providing them with ongoing support, resources, engagement, motivation, and feedback, and ensuring they have a clear career path and growth potential. You can use tools like performance reviews, career development plans, and succession planning to help them achieve their goals and aspirations. You can also create a culture of learning, innovation, and collaboration, where they can thrive and excel.

Regular Check-Ins: Schedule regular one-on-one check-ins with new hires during their initial months. This shows your commitment to their growth and well-being within the organisation.

Recognise and Reward: Acknowledge and reward the achievements of new hires. Whether through formal recognition programs or small gestures of appreciation, recognition can go a long way in boosting morale and retention.

In high-volume hiring scenarios, onboarding and retaining new hires may present unique challenges, but they are crucial for the long-term success of your company. A well-structured onboarding process, supported by technology and a focus on employee engagement, can significantly enhance your ability to fill positions and form a committed and motivated workforce. By following these best practices, you can turn high-volume hiring scenarios into opportunities for growth and success.

Are you planning to hire a high volume of employees in 2023/2024?

Get in touch with the Scalability team today - [email protected]

Why scaling tech firms with diversity matters

Similarity kills innovation. When team members are too alike, things can get missed and overlooked. Diverse teams win more often and more persistently. You can think of it like your firm is serving all customers, not just themselves.

So, why does scaling tech firms with diversity matter?

Consider your DEI Plans Continuously

If tech firms want to scale responsibility, diversity, equity and inclusion, it can't just be a side project. Your DEI should bring together your organisation's direction, from marketing, customer strategies through to talent acquisition, CSR, rewards and learning.

To set a direction, Create arrangements and generate commitments to DEI initiatives in the workplace to kickstart the process. Top leaders should take the plunge. Articulate their individual and collective perspective, values, and culture; consider how experiences of power and privilege may affect their approach. That of others; evaluate how dynamics of DEI may affect their marketplace and business strategy.

It's always good to remember that DEI initiatives are about more than just focusing on the figures. Employees’ perceptions of equity and inclusion are driven by organisational culture and the behaviour of leadership. Every DEI initiative should begin with an assessment of the organisation’s culture. 

Understanding Unconscious Bias

Unconscious bias is when we make a judgement/ decision based on our prior experiences, our own personal Deep-seated thought patterns. The majority of the time we will not be aware we are doing so.

Understanding unconscious bias is rooted in recognising it at the start, and accepting that unless it's addressed, it will be difficult to attract, hire and scale your company with a diverse workplace. 

What can HR leaders do to address unconscious bias in the workplace?

While HR cannot eliminate unconscious bias, they can definitely boost awareness within HR processes, employee relations and the workplace culture. 

Lead by example and look inwards

HR leaders can impact their work community by modelling the behaviour they want to see in the workplace. Treating others fairly by judging people and coworkers based on their characters and abilities. Not on their external appearance or physical traits, can set the scene for minimal bias.

Incorporate practical training. Bias is part of human nature. Yet, HR leaders can plan a training program that can encourage individuals to examine their natural instincts and determine whether their notions stem from solid reasoning or perceived stereotypes. The training can guide people in practising active listening, mindfulness, and treating each other as a unique individual.

Are you looking to scale up your tech team with diversity, check out our other blog.

The Absence of Diversity Prevents Innovation

When diversity is absent at the decision making table, teams risk being irrelevant to the customers and communities they wish to serve. Asking what/whose perspective are we missing or how are we mirroring the community and the consumers we want to serve? It helps teams recognise the lack of diversity as an opportunity. If there are perspectives missing or leadership is not representing those we want to serve, then there is an opportunity to get better.

Innovation. The lifeblood of progress and growth, thrives on diversity. When we bring together people from different backgrounds, cultures, and experiences, we unlock a world of creativity and potential. Unfortunately, the absence of diversity can act as a formidable roadblock to innovation. By limiting perspectives, stifling fresh ideas, and perpetuating narrow-mindedness, a lack of diversity hampers our ability to push boundaries and find ground-breaking solutions.

At the core of this issue lies the limitation of perspectives. When a group lacks diversity, it also lacks a variety of viewpoints and insights. Innovation requires us to look at problems from multiple angles, challenging the status quo and finding new paths forward. Without diverse voices at the table, ideas become stagnant, recycled, and devoid of the transformative power that comes from embracing different worldviews.

Better Talent Acquisition and Retention

In today's competitive business landscape, talent acquisition and retention are crucial for the success and growth of tech firms. One of the key reasons why scaling tech firms with diversity matters is the ability to attract and retain top talent. By fostering a diverse and inclusive work environment, companies can tap into a wider pool of candidates, ensuring they have access to a diverse range of skills, experiences, and perspectives.

When tech firms prioritise diversity, they send a clear message that they value and welcome individuals from different backgrounds. This inclusive approach not only attracts a more diverse applicant pool but also helps create a sense of belonging for employees. People want to work for organisations that respect and celebrate their unique identities, as it enhances their job satisfaction and overall engagement.

Meeting the Needs of Diverse Customers

Global marketplace diversity is not limited to the internal workforce of tech firms. Customers themselves come from diverse backgrounds, cultures, and demographics. Scaling tech firms that prioritise diversity are better positioned to understand and meet the needs of their diverse customer base.

A diverse workforce brings a range of perspectives and insights that can enhance the company's ability to develop products and services that resonate with different customer segments. By having employees who can relate to and understand the unique challenges and preferences of diverse customers, tech firms can tailor their offerings to better meet those needs.

So, for example a tech firm with a diverse team may have employees who have first-hand experience with specific cultural norms or preferences. This knowledge can help the company design products that are culturally sensitive and inclusive. It allows for the customisation of user experiences to accommodate different languages, accessibility requirements, or cultural nuances.

In conclusion, the importance of scaling tech firms with diversity cannot be overstated. Embracing diversity brings a multitude of benefits that will positively impact every aspect of your business. From enhanced creativity and innovation to improved decision making and risk management, diverse teams provide a competitive edge in the rapidly evolving tech landscape.

Scaling tech firms with diversity is a win-win situation. It enhances creativity, improves problem solving, expands market reach, attracts top talent, fosters customer satisfaction, and contributes to a more equitable society. Embracing diversity can help  companies unlock their full potential.
For more advice on how to scale up your company and learn more about diversity, get in touch with a member of the Scalability team! Call us on 0208 157 1710 or email us on [email protected]

Types of business growth and how they can help you scale up!

Looking to take your business to the next step? There are so many different ways that you can promote growth and scale up your company. 60% of business owners believe their revenue will continue to grow if they adopt scaling techniques. This blog sets out clear points with visuals for how you can ensure you scale up as efficiently as possible!

There are 4 key growth strategies that you can utilise for your companies potential. All business’ should at least consider implementing some of these growth strategies into their plans to help them scale up. They are all essential parts of increasing revenue and expanding the company to guarantee success. The Key strategies are: Market Penetration, Market Development, Product Development and Diversification.

Scale up using Market Penetration

This strategy is best for business growth when your aim is to generate more sales of a pre-existing product or service and increase your presence in that market. This is done successfully by converting customers from competing companies who are supporting your business instead. Another way is to target your loyal customers and try to increase their use and dependence on your company. 

Market Development

This business growth strategy is perfect when you’re looking to explore a new market that you haven’t previously tackled. You can do this on a geographical basis. This is when you expand your team out to new offices across the country or even internationally. By doing so you will increase your brand’s exposure and ultimately grow your reach out to new markets.

Product Development

Product development is another type of business growth and involves launching new things from your company. This may be goods or services that you have decided to expand your company with. For example you may decide to hire contractors to provide temporary expertise knowledge

Scale up using Diversification

As the name implies, this growth strategy involves expanding your business by exploring completely new marketing while launching new services or products. This has the largest risk factor as it requires your company tackling completely new areas of business. The marketing strategy and advertisement campaigns will need to be looked at as they’ll need to target a different audience so it may involve elements of trial and error to begin with. The most logical way to do this is by targeting these new products or services at your current loyal customers. By doing this you have a ‘safety net’ of people who you know are guaranteed to be interested and who already trust the company.

Horizontal Diversification:

Horizontal diversification is a growth strategy that involves a company buying new things such as investing in more advanced products or services to then sell to pre existing customers. Developing new products is usually very different to the existing ones however they will still be aiming at the same consumers.

Vertical Diversification:

This involves diversifying in a strategic way to help the process for your consumers. It’s a growth strategy that involves the journey of the consumer by releasing good or services for sale that’re directly related to what you previously offered to customers. An example would be a company who sells furniture may start to offer paints or different add-ons related to furniture. As this would be developing their products and services in a way that’s relevant to their pre-existing goods and services.

Concentric Diversification:

This form of growth strategy is similar to vertical diversification. This strategy will mean that you’re entering the same industry as any suppliers that you may use. This will then cut out the ‘middle man’ and will save you having to rely on external third parties.

Conglomerate Diversification:

This is the opposite to the growth strategies discussed above. Conglomerate diversification is the process in which your company expands to a completely unrelated industry to the one you entered previously. This way you will be attracting a whole brand new pool of consumers. As it is a vast investment large companies are more likely to use it. This is because it’s something completely unrelated to what you’ve previously focused on as a company so there is an element of risk.

What Growth strategy should I use for my business to scale up?

So you understand all the main growth strategies but you’re still unsure which to apply to your business? Your ambitions and end goal are both factors that will help in deciding what strategy is best suited to you. Each come with different severity of risk – but sometimes the greater the risk the greater the reward!  

Hopefully now you’re clear on all the different strategies mentioned above! If you’re still looking for assistance on scaling up your company our team here at Scalability are all happy to help! No matter what your scale-up ambitions are, our team of experts will immerse themselves into your brand,  uncover your key talent insights and activate a series of campaigns to ensure you attract the best technical hires.

For more advice on how to scale up your company, get in touch with a member of the Searchability team! Call us on 0208 157 1710 or email us on [email protected]

Tech Events in 2023

Whether you’re an employer or an employee there are so many ways your career and your company can benefit from attending Industry events so why not give them a try? From networking events to tech conferences and skills festivals, there’s definitely plenty to be learnt from attending events.

Some people find networking overwhelming or may even feel slightly intimidated by it. If you’re wondering if industry events are worth attending in 2023, here’s some top tech events this year and reasons why you and your business would benefit attending!

Meet other people who share your passion and career:

Attending different tech events not only will you meet a plethora of different people who all share similar passions, goals and ambitions career wise, but you'll also be in the presence of a lot of your competitors when you're there! This is a great way to expand your network by talking to different people throughout the day. Remember to connect with them on LinkedIn to continue the relationships between people in the tech world. By doing this you’ll be able to grow stronger relationships and expand your professional networks. This could help your company scale up as speaking to people in the same industry and asking if they’re open to looking for different roles and potentially joining your company is a great way to expand your team and open up opportunities for the business to scale up.

Expand your Network

Meeting new people and connecting with them on LinkedIn is a great way to expand your professional network. Another great way of doing this is by joining different social media groups. Subsequently, it will increase your social media presence before and after the event. Making sure you stay active and known in the industry, will lead to more brand exposure for your company. People will be likely to engage in business with you, after they've seen how active you are on social media. Building a portfolio of your work so they can see that you'd be a trusted and successful business part.

Cropped shot of a group of colleagues having a discussion in a modern office

Positive Brand Exposure:

By expanding your professional network, you’ll also be promoting your company’s brand and culture. This will allow you to work towards scaling up as it’ll allow you to promote your business and attract more people to apply for roles at the company. This is a great way to kickstart growth and build your team. By highlighting your company's culture it'll attract the best candidates for your business. People at these events will often have a genuine interest in the industry too. This means it’s a great place to meet people who are genuinely passionate about tech which is exactly want you want from candidates.

Make a Lasting Impression:

As a result of lockdown in 2020, there has been a huge rise in remote working and meetings through virtually rather than in person. Even though that’s become the new norm it’s still so important to meet people in the industry face to face to make a more authentic and lasting impression. It’s a lot more memorable seeing someone and engaging in convocation face to face as oppose to just on a screen via teams.

Different Tech events in 2023 to Consider attending:

Digital Skills Festival on the 6th Feb :

  This is taking place in Manchester and is for any industry or educational professionals to talk about different issues within the tech sector and try to find solutions for those issues.

All About the Technology Industry on the 21st Feb :

The all about technology industry event is taking place in central Oxfordshire. It’s aim is to allow people to obtain new skills enabling them to pursue a career in the tech industry if they want to. It’s a short course and all services are completely free of charge!

Reframe Women in Tech on the 30th and 31st March:

The Reframe women in tech event will be taking place at Emirates Old Trafford. It’s the 3rd year this event has taken place, you can purchase either a 1 day or 2 day ticket. The aim of the event is to provide different speeches and workshops to help empower and motivate.

Green Tech Conference on the 16th March:

This event is taking place on Oxford road in Manchester. It is set to discuss upskilling and innovating growth in the tech sector to be more eco friendly and economic. It’s welcoming a variety of companies and individuals who’re all aiming to or are already in the process of developing innovative new technology. This technology reduces the emissions and carbon footprint resulting in a greener future. Guest speakers include:

London Tech Week:

London Tech Week is taking place from the 12th of June till the 16th of June. It’s being held in Westminster London and is featuring live speeches. This with provide you with advice and information about the tech ecosystem from innovative founders. This year is London Tech week’s 10th anniversary! It’s offering networking hubs, live streamed content and many different zones to find out all things tech!

Hopefully now you feel confident as to why it's important to attend industry events and can find some in 2023 that will benefit you and your business!

For more advice on how to scale up your company, get in touch with a member of the Searchability team! Call us on 0208 157 1710 or email us on [email protected]. Or take a look at our website for more info scalability.agency

How scaling up and growth are two separate processes

Scaling and growth are often incorrectly used interchangeably, as they’re seen as being very similar processes it can be hard to separate the two and distinguish between them both. This article will develop your understanding of the two and enable you to differentiate between the two to help set yourself direct goals.

It’s important to know which to focus on between growing and scaling as a company, Harvard business school research results show that half of all start-ups will fail after the first 5 years of being formed. These figures rise to 70% following the 10 year mark which highlights just how important it is to really understand how growth and scaling are separate processes and which to set your attention to for maximum success.

To put it simply, Scaling refers to an increase in income at a more rapid rate than costs rising whereas growth usually involves the increase in resources at the same rate as revenue. Failing to grow as a company can be catastrophic however it can be equally as damaging if there isn’t a focus on scaling up. Companies must be strategic with when to focus on scaling and when the focus should shift to scaling as 2/3 of the fastest growing companies result in failure. It also must be notes that Growth must occur before a business is able to scale up. This is because once a business has managed to grow substantially, it should then be able to be able to manage profits and other factors more efficiently – enabling them to scale.

How to tell the two apart:

Both growth and scaling up are vital processes in the success of a company, deciding which to focus on is pivotal for your company. The goal of growth compared to the goals of scaling are both slightly different so here’s a few ways you can tell the two apart:

The Company's Priority:

With growth, the company’s priority will be to attract customers or business in traditional ways such as introducing offers and different promotions in order to meet demands. Whereas if a company is scaling up then they will usually turn to more modern platforms such as social media or mass emails taking a more holistic approach.

Overall Gross Profit:

The gross profit when a company is focusing on growth is usually fairly low as they’re spending vast amounts on resources like new employees to help meet the demands of the growth. In contrast when scaling up the company will focus on consistency and as they focus on their existing employees capability and utilise their skills rather than hiring masses of new people, they therefore have minimal spending's so their gross profit is extremely high.

Growing a business

Business growth involves a business generating an increased amount of revenue and resources such as employees, offices, technology etc. In order for a company to be able to grow these increased resources must be managed in an effective way, an example of this would be hiring more people if your current employees are being overworked or bringing in contractors to specialise on a particular upcoming project you have in mind for the company that would be too difficult for your current employees to complete. This therefore would increase the amount of money spent on.

Why not try one of these 5 ways to help accelerate the growth of your business:

Scaling a business

Scaling a business involves the increase of revenue while resources such as time and money remain at a minimum level. Here at scalability we have comprised a 7 step plan of how to scale up your business with ease as shown below. This involves identifying your growth objectives to set yourself a timeline of how long you want to focus on scaling up for and which skillsets you want to utilise.

Next key feedback is given by the team at Scalability including interview availability and giving feedback on CVs. After this dedicated recruitment and employer brand professionals from Searchability will immerse themselves into your scale up journey and help you reach your targets. After this our Accelerator fund will be discussed which is unique as it allows you to adapt your payments based on how much you’d like to spend and when you’d like to pay it, it’s flexible to make scaling up even more accessible to almost any business.

Following these steps the hunt for the top talent for your company will begin with our specialist recruiters finding the best candidates to help reach your scaling goals. To help set your company up for long term success we also provide recruitment marketing and employer branding to attract the right candidates and future business partners.

Hopefully now you know the difference between scaling and growing your business. If you’re looking to scale up then why not get in touch with a member of our specialist team who can help you grow your tech team at an accelerated pace.

No matter what your scale-up ambitions are, our team of experts will immerse themselves into your brand,  uncover your key talent insights and activate a series of campaigns to ensure you attract the best technical hires.

Ready to Scale? Get in touch

Organising Company Events to Celebrate Pride Month

So, Pride Month is back and you want to know what events your company could throw to show their support?

Organising company events for your workplace can be tricky, but the support you give is a reflection on your organisation. Pride Month is about celebrating the positive changes that have occurred over the years in the LGBTQ+ community. It's also is an opportunity to peacefully protest and raise awareness of the current issues the community are still facing.

People within community have often faced countless amounts of discrimination in the workplace over the years, which makes it even more important for organisations to stand in solidarity and celebrate their rights.

Here’s 5 event ideas you can use this Pride Month to show your support…

  1. Trivia Games. Either virtually or in the office, this is a cheap way to celebrate which can involve all your staff. Set the theme as LGBTQ+ and you can learn more about the community as you play!
  2. Lunch and Learn. Make it corporate event in a restaurant and hire out a private room or just order pizza for the office! A lunch and learn is a great incentive for your employees to gather together and have a good time. At the same time, they will get the chance to either hear from a speaker/watch a presentation on LGBTQ+ to learn more on the topic.
  3. Fancy Dress Charity Day. Here at Scalability, we came to work in our best fancy dress outfits. We hosted a bake sale and gave the funds to Myeloma UK Charity. If you do this, don't forget to post pictures on your social media!
  4. Drag Show. Take your employees or even invite clients that you work with to a drag show! Full of songs, dancing, drinks and food – where better to celebrate than with some LGBTQ+ friendly queens during Pride Month!
  5. Participating in Local LGBTQ+ Pride Events. If you’re stuck on ideas to get your employees together or simply don’t have the funding, then you could join your local events! A great example of a company that does this is Salesforce, every year they have a huge presence at Pride events around the world!

How to organise your event with staff

Firstly, it’s important to remember that not everyone may want to celebrate Pride Month, for religious, private and in some countries even legal reasons. If someone doesn’t want to participate for whatever reason, you must respect their wishes. For those who do want to join in, here’s a couple of ways you could reach out:

Pride Month Office Party

Be Genuine

It's good to recognise that celebrating Pride Month in your organisation should not be just viewed as an advertising opportunity. More companies are hopping on the bandwagon of giving a ‘corporate effort’ with their marketing. This results in their efforts not looking genuine and in turn, raising authenticity questions to the LGBTQ+ community. That’s not to say you have to spend all your work hours focusing on Pride, but doing more than just the standard rainbow coloured logo change could show a more true effort.

There are plenty of ways your organisation can get involved without having to even spend a penny! Arrange a small in-office party after work to show LGBTQ+ employees/allies that you’re a company who cares. Show you appreciate and celebrate everyone’s differences as this is important if you want to grow your company.

According to statistics as of 2019, 21% of LGBTQ+ employees in Europe reported discrimination in the work place, specifically transgender people. If your company has no tolerance for discrimination, it will lead to a retainment in employees. You'll also see an increase in applications with prospective employees when they see the type of brand you represent yourself as!

Ready to Scale? Get in touch

Employer Branding Definition: Lets Clear This Up

Employer branding is not a new concept, yet over the last few years the number of companies investing in an employer brand strategy has increased enormously. What IS surprising however is how there is still a lot of confusion over exactly what employer branding is, how you can control it and whose job it is to do so. In this blog we have decided to clear things up with a clear employer branding definition.

The Employer Branding Definition:

Brett Minchington (CEO of Employer Brand International) defines the employer brand as the perception of your organisation as a “great place to work”.

It’s similar to consumer branding and marketing, but instead of selling your products / services to your brand customers, you are “selling” the benefits of working for your organisation.

Employer Branding Definition – How does it exist?

Every company has one, whether they realise it or not and it is largely made up by the perceptions of your employees (past and present) who have a real authentic view of what it is like to work for your organisation. It’s all about perception, and how are you seen as an employer. A company Director may perceive their organisation to be a great place to work with an open and supportive culture, where as 70%+ of their employees could disagree with this entirely!

Employer Branding Definition – How do we discover ours?

If you aren’t actively managing your employer brand, then the first thing you will want to do is try and “discover” what exists already so that you have a solid understanding of what is working, and what you may need to work on improving in the future.

Use your EVP as a base

Your current employer brand is influenced by your EVP (employee value proposition) – which is the unique set of benefits that an employee can receive in return for the skills, capabilities and experience they bring to your organisation. For example this may involve compensation, healthcare and other work-based rewards, job security, variety in the job role, challenging projects, your values and beliefs and more. Pull together a list of what you feel you offer across the board to your employees, and once you have this “employer brand essence” on paper you will need to test how well you are delivering on these EVP’s. Learn more about developing your EVP in our eBook here.

Examine all existing data

You may have carried out employee surveys before, hold data from exit interviews and have a log of internal feedback in your organisation. If you do it’s time to take a look and see if what you perceive to be delivering to your employees is matching up to how they feel about working for you. Exit interviews are invaluable for this, because an employee who is leaving is far more likely to be honest about how they feel about working for you than an employee who doesn’t want to cause upset or be seen to be negative about their employer.

Carry out employee surveys

Whether you have existing data or not, one of the best ways to discover your authentic employer brand is through an employer survey that tailors questions around your EVP. The key findings you’ll want to take away are the answers to these questions:

  1. Why were you attracted to our organisation?
  2. Why do you think our organisation is unique?
  3. What do you value most about working here?
  4. What is it that makes you want to stay at our company?
  5. Why did you decide to leave? (only relevant for an exit interview)

Employer Branding Definition – How can we change it?

The findings of your employer brand discovery phase will give you an idea of your employer brand strengths and weaknesses, so if there is something you wish you were doing better then now is the time to start making plans to change. For example, if the majority of your employees fail to see your organisation as offering a good work-life balance then you might want to look at introducing some flexible working options into the company to help improve this in the future. The idea here isn’t to bend to every whim and employee demand, but if you can make some small changes to make your company a better place to work for your employees then it is only going to benefit you in the future.

Employer Branding Definition – How does it affect our company?

Investing into an employer brand strategy is a proven way to improve your ability to attract and retain the best people. According to Glassdoor 69% of active job seekers are likely to apply to a job if the employer actively manages its employer brand, and what is even more surprising is that 84% of candidates would consider leaving their current company if another company with an excellent reputation offered them a job. There is so much transparency today, with review sites like Glassdoor and a culture of advocacy on social media, that there is literally nowhere to hide your flaws as an employer. The good thing is it is encouraging more companies to actively manage and promote their unique employer brand, however the companies that fail to realise this are likely to find it even tougher to hire and keep hold of their best people.

Employer Branding Definition – Who owns the process?

This is another thing a lot of people are confused about. In some organisations it falls on the shoulders of HR, others Recruitment, sometimes it's the marketing department… you catch the drift! No two companies are the same, but the most successful employer brand strategies will be backed up by an employer brand team – with representatives from across the whole organisation (e.g. Directors, Department Managers, Marketing, HR and Recruitment). Using a team approach as opposed to giving all responsibility to one department will give you the added benefits of multiple skill-sets, less bias on key decisions and consistency in your messaging and approach as you roll out any new initiatives to the company. You’ll probably want to appoint a “Team Lead” still to make sure that someone is keeping up the momentum with the employer brand strategy and plans, with the benefit of a team to back them up.

Employer Branding Definition – Where can we promote it?

This is the fun part! Once you have a good idea of exactly what your employer brand is, you’ve made internal changes and you’ve got the backing of your employer brand team, you’ll want to promote it to help you attract great candidates. Social media is one of the best locations to showcase your employer brand. You can make tailored pages that are aimed specifically at candidates, sharing content such as "a day in the life of the team" and encouraging your employees to share and engage with that content too. The good thing about social media is that every post doesn’t have to be perfect. It’s not like you are shooting a high budget recruitment video for the website, you have more freedom to show your personality and you can upload content straight from your smart phone. Sometimes your content will capture life at your company as it happens, such as a story on your Instagram page. There is plenty you can do to give an insight into your culture and environment! Make sure you bolster your careers site with plenty of relevant content too, anything visual works really well, as do employee stories and testimonials so this is a really great place to start.

If you want to discover, shape and promote your unique employer brand then check out our eBook here, or get in touch with one of our employer branding experts at [email protected] / 01244 567 968 today.

From: JobHoller.

Scalability Partners with Roke on Exciting Hiring Drive

Where it all started for Scalability - The Journey

Scalability has been created to help businesses that need to scale a technical team, deliver against aggressive growth targets. What has happened for us to launch this product?

Steve Williams has been with Searchability for over 5 years, building out our South East team from 1 to 14 recruiters. We've seen massive growth in the tech market over the past 5 years, but the pandemic of 2020 has completely changed the landscape, with candidates options multiplied and businesses struggling to secure technical talent through their previously tried and tested channels.

London’s growth took place against the backdrop of an incredible year for the UK tech industry. As one of the world’s leading technology hubs, investment grew 2.3x in 2021, the highest growth since 2013 to 2014 when it grew from £1.5 billion £3.5 billion. 

We've asked Steve a few questions around what prompted the creation of Scalability, and what it offers to companies looking to scale in 2022:

Since the pandemic we know the market has been crazy, how did it did the tech scene as a Recruiter?

The pandemic massively changed the tech scene in terms of recruitment.

In 2020, when the first lockdowns were put in place and the furlough schemes were introduced a huge number of businesses made redundancies and froze hiring. We saw a number of businesses in MedTech, sustainable buildings and video/broadcast technology thrive and increase hiring. Candidates looking for work was astronomic, meaning that companies that kept on hiring had the pick and could secure hires relatively easily. An example that sticks in my mind was a client that asked me to find a full stack JavaScript engineer, skilled with NodeJS and ReactJS, as well as knowledge of AWS/Docker/Kubernetes/CI. This is a niche skillset, and would usually require a thorough headhunt. I placed a job advert at 5pm, woke up to over 50 applications and placed a candidate within 48 hours.

As we moved into 2021, we saw companies adapt and remote working explode. Businesses had their 2020 and 2021 recruitment budgets to use, as well as shortage of staff due to redundancies and hiring took off. Important things to note here, are that there are now more jobs advertised than actual candidates to place, companies are hiring remotely, so a technical candidate from Hull or Glasgow, can now work for a company in London and attract a London salary. Recruitment into London based companies exploded, whilst businesses based elsewhere saw staff losses and struggled to compete with the London market. During this period we also saw a reduced flow of candidates from the European Union into the UK market, further reducing the number of available candidates.

In all, things have seismically changed in the World of tech recruitment, meaning that businesses needed to adapt to fulfill hiring needs.

How did you decide that there needed to be a specific solution put in place for this requirement?

To be completely honest, this was completely client led and is the reason that we've 3 unique packages for Scalability.

I've been asked by 3 large clients to:

They were wanting to scaling at speed for not just one Developer, but a whole team and others departments.

If you look into our packages, and our case studies you'll see the reasons we've put together something to help any business looking to scale, without implementing onerous long term contracts, whilst guaranteeing delivery or money back.

What excited you most about the Scalability proposition?

I'm really excited to be able to work with businesses in a more consultative and in depth manner. With our current client base we are integrated with internal teams, we can answer questions on a company, their ethos, what makes them different, why should I work there as if we work for that company. It's a totally more immersive way of recruiting from agency side, which provides high level results and is extremely rewarding.

Check out our 7 steps to scale solution…

Get in touch today - Scalability.

Driving Diversity and Inclusion into your tech scale-up strategy

Scaling a team is the best way to continue to build and grow your business. It’s tempting to replicate a recipe for success and hire like-minded individuals as you know that’s what works. However, how do you get new ideas and grow if everyone is the same? Businesses with a diverse workforce have found to be 36% more profitable. Now more than ever there is an increasing demand for keeping diversity and inclusion at the forefront of the hiring mind. Here’s how to approach diversity and inclusion when scaling your team.

Onboarding experience

Onboarding is a first pivotal moment for making employees feel included from the get go. Therefore building an inclusive onboarding experience is so important. An initial meeting with a Manager or HR to discuss the ins and outs of the role and company will instantly make them feel involved. The less questions your new employee feels they have to ask the more they have learnt and therefore feel included within the company. Once they feel like they know what’s happening in the business they personally need to feel included. Using neutral pronouns when hiring anyone allows the candidate to dictate their pronoun. From here everyone should learn how each individual would like to be addressed. Alternatively, creating an option of how everyone would like to be addressed on their first day with a tick box or within the HR system allows everyone to feel comfortable in the situation. Producing a diverse and inclusion workforce.

Cognitive diversity

A start-up company at the beginning is going to be made up of people who all invested in a new idea. Therefore, having similar values and interests. However, if everyone had the same style, performance may be hindered as there is no new creativity. This is where cognitive diversity should be explored. Hiring individuals with different University Degrees or with a unique working background, will allow them to bring their suggestions to the table and help your business. Not only will this create new ideas, but it will allow your business to thrive and grow with diversity and inclusion.

Unconscious bias

Unconscious bias can be a huge setback when developing a diverse and inclusive workplace. An unconscious bias is when we subconsciously have ideas of stereotypes and attitudes in certain experiences and environments. This can be explored through the Equality Act 2020 which protects: age, disability, gender, marriage, pregnancy, race, religion, sex and sexual orientation within the recruitment process. Creating collaborative projects and programmes to include all individuals can help to address any already existing unconscious bias within the workplace. Allowing for a more inclusive workplace when scaling your team. 

Joining the team

When starting as a new hire everything will feel a little daunting. Sharing insights into the company’s roadmap and where you are heading with the scale-up will help them to understand priorities within the business. Understanding how each team works is a huge part of settling in. You should prepare your team for the new hire. They will need to know there will be a change in dynamics and how their responsibilities and work may now be delegated differently. Overall, decisions made by diverse teams outperform individual decision makers 87% of time. So, there is no time like the present!

Environment

Creating a diverse workforce allows individuals to thrive and fulfill their potential. You need to make sure your environment caters to this. Whether this is wheelchair access or additional support for sight or hearing impairments, these need to be sorted out prior to the new employee starting. Finding out exactly what will help employees to work successfully is the key to creating an inclusive environment. 

Leadership

Having a diverse and inclusive leadership team is a great starting point. Diverse leadership teams attain 73% more revenue from innovation. Not only will diversity strengthen the capabilities, but it will allow for a roadmap for when more diverse individuals are hired into the company. If a leader can experience joining a company and portray how they felt joining it will only help the company create a better more inclusive onboarding experience. A diverse leadership can introduce new courses and events so that people within the business can also learn about diversity and inclusion.