Insights

​LGBT+ History Month is now! This month we have been tweeting about our favourite LGBT+ pioneers and HERE we would like to share a quick piece on things that you can do to show your solidarity and allyship.

​Please click HERE to read our February edition newsletter.

​We at Veredus would like to say a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all. We would like to recognise the incredible efforts of those in the business to keep the morale high and the momentum going when the world around us stopped. We would like to thank our clients and candidates alike for their continued support and faith in Veredus. We would like to say how grateful we are for the positives that have come out of this most trying of years - the amazing energy and flexibility of the team given the difficult circumstances, the embracing of new technology and ways of communicating, the collaborative and inclusive way that everyone has pulled together that will pave the way for the future. Finally, whilst cognisant that 2020 will have a long-lasting and sometimes devastating impact for some, we would like to take a moment to appreciate with optimism some of the remarkable things that this year has instigated - the potential for truly agile and inclusive ways of working, time spent reconnecting with our families, a focus on making genuine and real-time improvements to diversification and the tackling of inherent and systemic racism, an increased awareness of how vulnerable and underprivileged members of our society are supported and a move to make radical changes, co-operation, a sense of community, a renewed interest in simple pleasures....the list goes on. We look forward to closing the book on 2020 and look, with hope, to 2021​#veredus #veredusinsight #veredusinterim #veredussearch #veredusa&d

​SEND specialist and experienced Educator, Sandra Harrison, speaks frankly HERE about the impact of COVID-19 in her sphere, BLM and her hopes for the future.

​please click HERE for the latest news in the Veredus world

​Click HERE to read Magda Stainton's latest article published in the MJ

​Our latest newsletter looks at the future of the transport sector and where we may find ourselves post-COVID. Please click HEREto read.

​Click here to read what Magda Stainton, Director - Local Government & Social Care, has to say about the future of Health and Social Care in the UK

Click HERE to read about ​Steve Bell and Nick Cole discussing an exciting new partnership with The GC Index©

​Please click here to read our June edition newsletter in full.

Neal , Associate Director of our Healthcare practice, shares his thoughts on how technology can relieve the current and future burden on our healthcare systemDigitising Healthcare​

​Please click here to read Magda Stainton's MJ article on Care after Covid. Magda looks at what local authority adult social care needs to do to be sustainable in the ‘new normal’ life after COVID-19, and outlines how interim and permanent recruitment specialists can help them get there

Please click HERE to read our findings following research around how the Local Government estate will be re-imagined following the Coronavirus pandemic.​​

​In Spring 2019, Veredus was retained by Active Learning Trust to conduct an executive search and selection campaign to recruit a new Chief Executive Officer. The Active Learning Trust is a multi-academy trust working with 21 schools across the East of England with a strong record of school improvement. The Trust is committed to excellence in education and the wellbeing of its pupils and to an uncompromising professionalism in everything they do. Since its inception in 2012 the Trust has grown steadily into one of the leading multi-academy trusts in the region.In advance of the retirement of Active Learning Trust’s interim CEO, the Trust were seeking an exceptional candidate to take forward and develop the organisation in its next stages of consolidation and development. Working closely with the Board of Trustees and in partnership and collaboration with a range of stakeholders, the CEO would lead the Trust schools on the next stage of their journey to an outstanding organisation. The Veredus team was tasked with finding an outstanding senior leader who could wholeheartedly embrace the vison and values of Active Learning Trust and empower others to do the same. They will be highly accomplished at developing professional networks and partnerships, understand that financial probity and strong governance are at the heart of a secure organisation, and have a track record of strong leadership in a large organisation and determination to make a positive difference. Active Learning Trust were willing to consider a range of relevant backgrounds, and we were tasked with finding strong candidates with an education background at Executive Head and CEO level, from a sector leadership role looking to take on a bigger challenge, or a quality assured service focused and multi-site environment with knowledge and ambition improve the life chances of young people. We ran a small online advertising campaign and conducted a vigorous and thorough executive search campaign, across the education sector in the UK. We built a long list of 20 candidates, seven of which were progressed to Veredus’ preliminary interview stage, with four candidates then shortlisted for final panel interview. As a result, two candidates were deemed above the line and appointable by the panel. Both candidates were invited to a second meeting with the panel, and an appointment decision was made, with Veredus successfully handling the offer negotiations and placing the preferred candidate in the role. ​

​For any business to grow and succeed in the long-term, it’s important to have a good talent acquisition strategy in place. It can offer you the best way to build a strong pipeline of talent, who believe in your business, both for today and for whatever tomorrow might bring. This is particularly true for talent at the top of the organisation. The risks get higher and the talent pools get smaller the further up the corporate ladder you go, so it’s vital to have a well-thought-through strategy in place ready for when senior, hard-to-replace employees leave. If you don’t, you could find yourself without crucial skills, experience and knowledge just when you need them most.Whether you’re considering your options for creating a strategy or looking for ways to improve an existing one, here are our top tips for future-proofing your talent acquisition.1. Recruit with the aim to retain and to build a pipeline of future talentEverything you do with talent acquisition should directly link to your long-term business goals. Think about how your future talent pipeline can help you achieve those goals. What kind of talent do you think you’ll need in the next few months and years? What types of people do you want to attract to your business to create the right culture and ethos? What senior roles do you need to have a succession plan in place for now, to ensure there’s no break in leadership? How can you speak to potential candidates in a way that makes them want to work for your company? If you can answer these questions, you’re in a good place to start building a strategy which can future-proof your business.2. Own your employer brandThat brings us nicely onto employer brand. Every business has an employer brand whether they’re in control of it or not. So it’s worth taking the time to decide what your story is. Everything you do and say will affect people’s perception of your company. Talent attraction is about convincing candidates they want to work for you even if you’re not hiring for a specific role. You need to be talking about the things that matter the most to candidates – your culture, your values and the benefits of working for you – like flexible working options. You should also highlight how candidates can grow with your organisation – show them what the future could look like.Talking to customers, clients and prospective employees can provide powerful insights into your brand and how it’s perceived in the market. Use those insights to become an employer of choice.3. Streamline your recruitment processYou want to make it as simple as possible to apply, so that you don’t lose anyone on the journey. That includes everything from optimising your career site for mobile to ensuring you have robust processes in place for following up on applications easily and responding in a timely way. In addition, if you can track your applications easily, it will be simpler to create a pipeline of future talent that you can call on when recruitment peaks unexpectedly or when a senior member of the team leaves.4. Focus on data to help you deliverThe strongest talent acquisition strategies are built around data and insight. Analysis of available data can help to identify areas for improvement, enabling you to focus your efforts on key priorities. Let data do the hard work for you, so that you can identify hard-to-fill roles and see if they line up with surplus candidates in the talent pipeline. It can also help you to establish better ways to target top talent: by analysing data around your ideal candidate audience and what they want to hear or respond well to, you can target them more effectively, choosing which messages to amplify for which audiences.5. Consider different sources and mediaWhen you’re looking at how to approach candidates, step away from the traditional recruitment channels and think bigger. You could use social media to talk to a more passive audience about your culture, values and employer brand. You could look at building or improving an employee referral scheme, which could use people who are already great advocates of your business to attract new candidates. There could be niche channels that you haven’t considered – like networking events, conferences or specific online websites that candidates might be interested in. This could be especially helpful if you’re looking for interim leaders with the skills and expertise you need to fill critical shortfalls, run specific projects or cover for senior leaders when they are away from the business – they are hard to fine and you’ll have to take a broad approach to recruiting them.6. Always be ready to adaptChange is constant. From shifting platforms and media, to shifting perceptions in different generations, nothing stays the same forever. It’s good to keep an open mind and be ready to change the way you approach candidates if new data comes to light.At Veredus, we provide a different approach to talent acquisition and retention, through the use of proven executive search and selection and interim management services.Find out more and let us help you with your recruitment needs today.

​Reflecting on our latest research, ‘the insight edge to talent acquisition’, the new world of work will require completely new types of metrics from those currently being tracked. Within talent acquisition, we may measure the strengths of candidates for permanent roles on their long-term track record, cultural fit and their skill sets, but evaluate contingent workers on a wholly different set of criteria, such as speed of response, level of compliance and daily rates. Data and insight on these metrics are increasingly accessible to HR and recruitment leaders, especially as much of this data is becoming more readily available online. On top of this external data, businesses are becoming increasingly aware of the range of data that is available to them internally. But are we using this data effectively? Our latest research from the Human to Hybrid series found that a third (31%) of organisations feel that their workforce and HR data is ‘fragmented’ and ‘disparate’, making it difficult to derive meaningful insight from the data they have at their disposal, with 83% of HR and recruitment leaders acknowledging that they need to improve their use within talent acquisition. It seems the analysis of the data is what HR and recruitment are finding to be the most difficult part of the process, perhaps where there is a lack of skills or just not enough time in the day for them to consider this. In some cases, there is too much data available, and the process of pulling this together and asking the important question “so what?” is the missing link. This is where support and expertise can be best placed. Organisations are certainly aware of the power of data, but this sometimes manifests itself negatively. There is an increasing risk around the use of data, particularly from a people perspective, and particularly with the introduction of GDPR. We are all much more aware of how we handle data in a compliant and secure way, but organisations are still unsure and unclear on how to do this and report that their concerns around data protection is the biggest barrier (41%) to making better use of their data. Therefore, using data related to people becomes an added risk if it is not done in the right way and handled correctly. Data in itself is only useful if someone can understand it and make sense of it. But even that is only the first step; the next step is deciding what to do as a result of this analysis that makes data truly powerful.  To look at the other side of the coin, the research found that nearly half (46%) of organisations rely on ‘instinct and gut feeling’ when it comes to assessing current skills and identifying skills requirements. So, although we have access to more data and seem to realise its value, something is still telling us to trust our instincts rather than the data available to us. Write Research are often engaged on projects where we are asked to gather and analyse data which proves or disproves a gut feeling, or to test out whose gut feeling was correct. For example, “our Chief Executive thinks that we should build our new software development team in San Francisco, but the CIO thinks it should be in Mumbai. We need some data to verify which would be the better option, and should we consider some other locations too?” Or “the Hiring Manager is telling us that we are not paying enough to attract the right calibre of talent, but we need some evidence to support this.” It is this process of gathering together and analysing the information and using it to answer questions within your business where data can have the most powerful impact.  Perhaps the real niche point is the ability to use data, but then to use a human element to overlay it and turn it into insights. This gives you the evidence, but also allows for some element of gut feeling, or perhaps common sense to be considered, before coming up with an overall recommendation and way forward. If you would like to understand more about the services we can offer around market, talent and competitor intelligence, analysis, mapping and benchmarking, get in touch with us today. 

​The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is at the heart of the criminal justice system, working with its partners to protect the public and create a safe society. The CPS’s role is to make sure that the right person is prosecuted for the right offence, and to bring offenders to justice wherever possible. The CPS sought to appoint a new Chief Executive Officer (CEO). This is a critical leadership role with executive responsibility for the operational and strategic management of the CPS, which has approximately 6,000 staff. Working in close partnership with the Director of Public Prosecutions, and with direct line management for the Executive Management Group, the CEO provides the strong and clear leadership and direction required to shape and develop CPS’ vision and strategic priorities, driving performance to deliver a first class and professional service. The CEO actively collaborates with the Attorney General, Attorney General’s Office and other government departments and agencies to lead and direct significant criminal justice system change and wider Civil Service reform priorities.Veredus was retained to find such an individual. The process was overseen by a Civil Service Commissioner and we were briefed by a senior panel that included the recently appointed Director of Public Prosecutions and senior stakeholders from HM Treasury and Attorney General’s Office. We were tasked with generating a strong and diverse field of candidates who would bring an outstanding track record of driving delivery, major change and performance improvement in a large, complex and high-profile organisation. They needed outstanding leadership skills, communication, influencing and relationship management skills, and the ability to engage constructively with a wide range of senior stakeholders and build strong networks across government. This was a very demanding assignment, and we conducted a vigorous and thorough national executive search campaign, contacting over 200 individuals. The search was broad and covered the criminal justice sector, relevant government departments and agencies, government regulators, ombudsman and complaint handling bodies, local government, leading criminal law private practice firms, and relevant areas of the private sector. We built a long list of 29 candidates, 8 of which were progressed to the Veredus preliminary interviews. Ultimately, 3 candidates were taken forward to the shortlist, one male and two female candidates. The candidates underwent psychometric assessments and we took telephone references and conducted additional due diligence. These final 3 candidates were then presented to the selection panel for final panel interviews, after which an appointable candidate (a chief executive of a high-profile public body) was identified and appointed to the post. The CPS was extremely pleased with the quality and diversity of the shortlist and with the successful candidate.

​A global logistics firm had been making some progress with gender diversity at senior levels; however, the turnover rate was high when compared with the male turnover rate, and gender diversity gains were being negated by attrition. The company appointed Write Research (now Veredus) to undertake a comprehensive research exercise to target senior women in blue chip organisations, to investigate their key career drivers.We were asked to target women at senior level (£70,000 - £120,000) in the UK and BRIC countries. Approach:We spoke to 50 women and specifically asked questions around the ability to work flexibly, the concept of a glass ceiling, and the flexibility to work around family commitmentsWhat we delivered: We provided a report that included approaches to diversity elsewhere, examples of fresh thinking and comparisons between the UK and growth marketsAny numbers of appointments made from this research in the future will incur no placement fees, saving the business significant recruitment costs

​As a result of recent and expected major new client wins, a household name in technology consulting anticipated an immediate to short term (0-6 months) requirement for cloud talent, at all levels from manager to director, across Western Europe and North America. Write Research (now Veredus) were engaged to build, develop and manage talent pipelines of the strongest cloud talent in the market. As a result, we went out and identified over 300 cloud talent professionals.What we achieved:We successfully filled eight vacancies immediatelyDelivered usable insight back to our client as to candidate perceptions of our client as both a brand and a potential employerWe are also now actively managing relationships for our client with over sixty of these individuals so that they are ready to move into the business as and when vacancies arise.

​As business leaders, we’re all aware that we are standing on the edge of a period of monumental change and recognise the need to re-imagine every part of our organisations, particularly how our operations are resourced and ‘work’ is carried out.Throughout 2019, Capita People Solutions have published a series of reports and strategic papers to help businesses and HR leaders to plan and manage the shift from a Human to a Hybrid workforce. Human to Hybrid is the transition to the future of work where we exist in a fully optimised digital environment. It is framed around the idea that there are key drivers that will improve employee experiences enabling HR to recruit, train and retain talent with enhanced outcomes across the employee lifecycle. Undertaking comprehensive, independent research amongst both business leaders and employees, comprising of Interviews with 500 business leaders and 2,031 employees within organisations in the UK, this paper aims to give unique insight into the realities, challenges and opportunities presented by the shift to a truly hybrid, tech-enabled state.Download the full report here.​