Clodagh Murphy’s Post

So great to have moved office this week..... we've been looking for about 18 months!! We wanted to stay in the city centre & to have a modern open plan office space. So to have finally moved into our new home at Broadwalk House is brilliant. Big thanks to the team at Clockwise Offices and particularly to Mason Summers for making our move so easy. To say 'WE LOVE IT' is an understatement.

Slightly different start to our Monday… usually Joanne Caine & I meet for an early morning walk with the dogs. Its always a great start to the week and keeps us aligned as we navigate running a business together. This week, I’m away (wfh for the start of the week, with a few days off at the end), so we caught up on the phone while both walking. Jo had the delight of seeing some deer, while I had my toes in the sea!

Lots of fun last night at the Tozers LLP table quiz in aid of Hospiscare. Our brains were certainly stretched! So lovely to spend time with colleagues outside of work raising money for such a wonderful charity…. And seeing the hidden talents of music knowledge - who knew Charlotte Ferguson (MCIPD) would know so much about Taylor Swift 😀

Packed house at the Great South West conference this morning. Interesting to listen to Minister for State for Industry, Sarah Jones MP. Lots of great ideas, energy and ambition for the Southwest. Let’s hope we see our region better represented and receiving a bigger share of the spend and voice in Westminster!

Blooming chuffed for our team at Cathedral Appointments | South West Recruitment & CA Tech Talent to have been shortlisted for the Recruitment & Employment Confederation awards. We passionately believe in the service we deliver to clients and candidates. We know we set the bar high for ourselves - we genuinely take pride in everything we do and work hard to get it right for clients and candidates. With 126 years of recruitment experience between us and more than 35 years working in the region we continue to learn, adapt and do all we can to empower careers and elevate businesses. Being shortlisted in the 🏆 Demonstrating High Standards in Recruitment Award 🏆 category is a testament to the hard work, and dedication of the fabulous team here. ⭐ Our team is what makes Cathedral Appointments brilliant ⭐ #recawards2024

It's all about AI..... sitting here listening to Radio 4 this morning (yes, I'm that old) - talking about AI in recruitment with a focus on how candidates are adding 'key words' to the bottom of their CVs in small white font - so only visible to the machine learning (or AI) searching for them. Think this is pretty clever and will surface more CVs, but fundamentally, a good recruitment process has got to be about so much more. You can't just look for skills, so much is about culture match and alignment of aspirations and ambition for candidates and employers. Graduate candidates were talking about how they were selected in / out by a 'bot' for a role - I've got to say, I struggle with this! If you want to find the best candidates, you've got to speak to them. Not just once, but multiple times. I think AI can help the recruitment process, (we are using it to be more efficient and it's working really well). But if used to cut corners it will surely lead to issues in the hiring process - delays / wrong matches to name just two. What do you think, will AI/Machine Learning replace the personal side of the recruitment process?

Early morning run with this one, truly love getting out early when it’s bright. Not looking forward to the change in daylight hours heading our way as Autumn approaches.

This time of year young people here in the UK and at home in Ireland receive their exam results. I remember, many moons ago, feeling the pressure of those all-important end-of-school exams and the expectation and fear of the results. My journey through school/university/work/travel wasn't a straight line, in fact I dropped out of Uni after my first year and then travelled to San Francisco as soon as I got my green-card. My motive to go - I followed a boy!! At the time it felt like I was lost, making mistakes and unsure what I wanted to do when 'I grew up'. I can safely say my twisty journey has been the making of me. I learned more about life during my three years in San Francisco than in the 22 years growing up in Dublin. Since then I've completed my degree and a masters - doing them in my late 20's and early 30's after I'd worked out a little more about what made me happy. Exam results don't define any of us. What makes us who we are is the experiences we have in life and how we deal with the challenges that come our way. To all the families out there in results mode, this is a special time, a time for a new chapter and a time to reflect on how much has been achieved so far. Enjoy it if you can. Why this picture: I used to travel to work on the cable car... I started work at 7am each day and loved the early morning quiet.

There’s nothing like a ‘cheeky’ tipple after work at the end of the (in office) week! Yesterdays was extra special as we celebrated 36 years of Cathedral Appointments | South West Recruitment. Huge congratulations to Joanne Caine - you are an amazing lady, you have drive, determination, and kindness in equal measure. You have led the team brilliantly through challenges and change and here we are heading into the year ahead excited by the opportunities it will bring our way. We missed you Charlotte Ferguson (MCIPD) & Joanne Howell - we will celebrate with you both in a few weeks when you are back from hols.

As a hiring manager, I used to think that you just needed to put an advert out and you would fill the role. Whilst this may have been true at one time, it certainly isn't today. In the last 6 months, we've seen a growing trend of us matching candidates to roles they haven't applied for. It now stands at 75% of our roles are filled this way. The feedback I've had from businesses I talk to is that "putting an advert out there" isn't working in the way it once did. I am not yet fully sure why we're seeing this trend, but I think contributory factors are: 👯 there is so much noise on the internet for candidates, with so many platforms and different roles, there are only so many hours in the day for candidates to spend searching and applying, as a result, they are missing roles in the noise. 👩💻 tech changes have enabled recruiters to find active and passive candidates faster (assuming they can afford to invest in platforms) 🙏 many established recruiters are using dedicated resourcers/researchers to enable them to find and reach more candidates It will be interesting to see the trend as it develops further and as the economy opens up a bit more over the next few months.