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20 May 2025
Oil & gas/Energy, Transport & logistics

International manufacturer invests £170m in North Wales facility

The UK and Welsh governments have welcomed the investment into a new facility from the international manufacturer.

The announcement comes as the UK and EU hold a summit to discuss future opportunities to boost economic growth.

The landmark development will produce more than 100,000 tonnes of non-combustible rock mineral wool insulation per year and create around 140 direct jobs, with more in local supply chains.

The announcement coincides with the UK-EU Summit that took place on Monday [19 May 2025].

Secretary of state for Wales Jo Stevens said: “This £170m investment by Knauf Insulation is fantastic news for North Wales and our UK government mission to drive economic growth.”

Using UK-First Submerged Arc Furnace technology, the new factory will produce non-combustible, low embodied carbon, recyclable rock mineral wool insulation to support the need for safer, more energy efficient and sustainable buildings.

The UK and Welsh government-backed North Wales Growth Deal and the Flintshire and Wrexham Investment Zone collectively support the decision by Knauf Insulation to lo-cate a second plant in the area.

As leaders in the production of sustainable building materials, Knauf Insulation’s expansion further supports the growing advanced manufacturing cluster in North Wales.

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20 May 2025
Creative/Digital/Media, IT/Telecoms

Human skills as important as ‘oven-ready’ tech skills

So says the CEO of the CIPD, the UK’s professional body for HR, learning & development, Peter Cheese.

Speaking last Friday [16 May 2025] at the Houses of Parliament launch of the UK Hiring Taskforce, Cheese told the 200 attendees that at the same time, however, instead of filling skills gaps, employers are also looking for potential in applicants through characteristics such as “attitude, aptitude to learn human skills like collaboration and communication, and critical thinking. The more we debate the future of work, the more we debate about AI impacting jobs and skills in the future, the more we are coming back to these core skills”.

Humanities knowledge is part of building such capabilities into organisations, Cheese said: “People talk now about the half-life of job skills is somewhere between three and four years. In other words, every three or four years, we’re going to have to retrain half of our workforce.”

Access to and retention of talent are a top issue for business leaders around the world, with “almost every organisation saying they can’t find all the skills. But then you question them on that, they say yes, we’ve been getting too focused on hiring what I’ve often described as ‘oven-ready employees’ and they don’t exist – partly because we are changing the nature of jobs at an ever-increasing rate”, Cheese said. “So, the reality of how we approach recruiting has got to be expanded from the point of view of the employers as well.”

He asked the audience: “So why do we seem to be reverting back to saying ‘I just want tech skills’? We know the world is not, unfortunately, going to be a better place if all we have are a lot of tech people. Frankly, we need humanity to work alongside that as well.”

Cheese has been appointed to the UK Hiring Taskforce steering committee.

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19 May 2025
Life sciences, Creative/Digital/Media

UK Hiring Taskforce launches to develop new hiring strategies

With 200 hiring leaders, recruiters, rec tech leaders and more in attendance, including Recruiter, the hiring taskforce kick-off also delivered the news that an association for recruitment technology providers is planned to launch in November “to have one voice with government, to give high risk assurance that they are people of good standing and to help us develop a rec tech roadmap”, said Keith Rosser, who as chair of the Better Hiring Institute is leading the joint force of parliamentarians and hiring leaders. 

“We want a national hiring strategy,” Rosser said in his address at the event. “What do we think the future looks like if we could start again – forget the baggage, forget the medieval CVs, the Victorian references, the industrial revolution, job adverts – and think about actually, what would starting again look like?

“And finally, a technology road map. What would rec tech look like if we had a magic wand? What do we need to consider? What do we need to debate?... What we want from you is your help shaping what needs to be considered, how we need to go forward, what are the things we really should be looking at?”

Organisers are hoping to gather concepts by November from the respective work groups, formed of people who sign up to participate, for strategy, technology and policy. “Those three work streams with then end in those three deliverables later in the year,” Rosser said.

“We want this to be the beginning of a new dawn,” he added. “We want to get leadership once more for the UK in hiring… It’s hard to imagine actually that once upon a time, the UK was a leader in this stuff… We just really haven’t moved forward. Today is our commitment to gain leadership once more.”

Viscount Camrose, shadow secretary of state for science, innovation and technology, will be the honorary president of the rec tech association when formed. 

Speaking on Friday at the taskforce launch, he said: “I’ve been worrying for years that the job market is too inefficient, but that it can be reduced in some sense, to a data problem. And I would love us to start making progress together in that director because actually, in a weird way, although it is a data problem, digitalisation and AI have made it worse. They have made it more difficult rather than less difficult, and I think we can go for some way this afternoon to starting that journey to correcting the problem.”

As examples, Viscount Camrose said: “Far too many jobs are far too overapplied; we see candidates receiving no response – even late on in the process, no response comes. And there are such huge advantages to all of us for doing that. First… if we are going to grow as an economy, we need to be more productive… and just placing people in jobs to which they are genuinely committed is going to boost productivity. 

“Second, economic inactivity. We have too many people who are economically inactive now, and how many of those people remain economically inactive because… it’s just too difficult to embark on the process of finding the next job. The easier we can make it [is] to everybody’s benefit. The third advantage is just national happiness.”

Also speaking at the event was Lord Chris Holmes, Paralympian swimming champion, who in 2023 introduced an AI regulation bill to address concerns about its development, fairness in use, privacy and other issues. He has since reintroduced it, terming it “light touch, right size regulation”, and believing that it has significant potential application in hiring. “If we get fairer hiring, if we get faster hiring, the aim for all of us today and for every day, we can truly have in the world the finest hiring ecosystem we can bring to bear,” he said.

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14 May 2025
Creative/Digital/Media, Engineering

NEW TO THE MARKET: 12-16 MAY 2025

• Global specialist recruitment company Eames Consulting has opened a new office in Philadelphia, focusing on technology and digital enablement. Located at the Wanamaker Building, 100 East Penn Square, this is the recruiter’s second US location, following its New York office, which opened in 2022. The Philadelphia team will be headed up by Steven Stahl, a highly experienced recruiter. Also joining are Sam Youngberg (managing consultant) and Callum Stainer (senior consultant), data and AI recruitment specialists.

• Eightfold AI, which helps organisations recruit and retain top talent, and upskill/reskill their entire workforce, has added two new foundational AI products to its portfolio. Expanding its capabilities in talent acquisition, Eightfold introduces AI Interviewer to automate candidate engagement and assessment, enhancing responsiveness and selection outcomes. The company has also launched Digital Twin, a personalised AI model that captures and applies employee knowledge across systems to drive real-time productivity and decision-making.

• SF Recruitment has opened a new East Midlands headquarters in Castle Donington, strategically positioned next to East Midlands Airport. The new hub unites the company’s Leicester and Nottingham teams, with the company broadening its expertise into STEM fields, including technology and engineering, alongside its core areas of finance, private equity and corporate services. Over 40 team members will be based at the new headquarters and plans for European growth are underway, according to the company statement.

24 September 2018
Public sector, Education, Commercial & office support, Banking/Financial services, IT/Telecoms, HR, Graduates/Apprentices/School leavers, Healthcare/Medical, Accounting/Finance

NEW TO THE MARKET: 24-28 SEPTEMBER 2018

• Psychometric assessments expert Peter Saville has launched 10x Psychology. The company provides assessment tools, predictive analytics and innovative solutions, spanning the entire employee lifecycle from hiring and leadership to employee wellbeing.

The new solution gives businesses the ability to predict the probability of each applicant or employee’s success and identifies where in the business the individual will be most successful and how to sustain their performance over time.

• Sharia-compliant challenger bank Gatehouse Bank has launched an apprenticeship scheme. The ‘Gateway’ Apprenticeship Scheme was jointly developed by Gatehouse Bank and early careers specialists Visionpath.

Six new recruits have joined the bank following a four-month selection process. This involved the bank holding engagement sessions in schools, assessments and Gatehouse Bank staff providing one-to-one mentoring sessions over a five week period to ensure potential apprentices gained a greater understanding of the career opportunities in banking. The apprenticeships will last up to 18 months with the six apprentices joining various departments across the bank including, treasury, risk, specialist finance and marketing & communications.

• Edinburgh-based healthcare recruiter Head Medical has extended its services to include the recruitment of operating department practitioners. Initially, Head Medical will help with placing practitioners (ODP) in Scotland but has plans to expand the roles and regions it is able to recruit for in the future.

Recent hire Katie Campbell will lead a team of recruiters experienced in hiring operating staff. The new division will sit within the UK and Ireland team.

• Short-term staffing specialist RedWigWam is launching a Student Ambassador scheme at universities across the North-West of England. The scheme aims to hire brand ambassadors and build a community of students at the campus where they study. Once recruited, the ambassadors will act as the face of RedWigWam at their university.

• Talent Ticker has launched. The solution uses predictive analytics and AI to interpret and analyse data identifying companies who are likely to hire or fire employees. Similar to stocks and shares at the top of Bloomberg, Talent Ticker displays a revolving task bar with a hiring upwards arrow in green and a firing downwards arrow in red for when companies are downsizing.

• Education staffing specialist The Classroom Partnership has opened an office in London, headed up by newly appointed director Jonny Harrison, who joins from Protocol Education.

• Recruitment firm The Jarell Group has chosen Birmingham to be the location of its national headquarters at newly renovated penthouse offices on the top floor of Number 60 Church Street.

• Chester-based invoice finance company Zodeq has launched its new Zodeq 360 service, replacing the business’ current payroll and back office support services. Features available within Zodeq 360 include: invoicing, payroll, credit control, timesheet processing, an end-to-end pension provision service, access to industry leading CRM technology and HMRC administrative management (ie. PAYE, VAT, NI and CIS [Construction Industry Scheme]).

19 September 2018
Marketing, Interim recruitment

Client demand for marketing expertise leads to new offering

Client demand for a more flexible chief marketing officer (CMO) resource has led tml Partners to launch a ‘fractional’ CMO element to its service offering, CMOconsultancy.

Simon Bassett (above), managing director at the senior marketing staffing specialist, told Recruiter demand for the new service came from clients who couldn’t necessarily afford a full-time permanent chief marketing officer with typical salaries on such roles ranging from £150k-£250k a year.

According to Bassett, clients told him that when they have hired a permanent CMO, their new recruit carried out the initial strategic marketing work over the first year or so but then sought pastures new. This was a common complaint among mid-sized private equity backed companies in particular, he added.

CMOconsultancy places one of its panel of tml Partners’ board level marketing professionals as a fractional CMO with a client. These professionals specialise in consulting and interim work, directing and advising the client on what their marketing strategy should look like.

Reflecting on his 15 years with marketing recruiter EMR before setting up tml, Bassett explained over his career, CMOs and marketing directors have often told him they feel underserviced by the recruitment sector: “If they go to any of the generalist headhunters or search firms, whether it’s a permanent or interim placement, they’re just that – they’re very generalist.

“The reality is that because marketing has been such an expansive industry and is evolving so much, actually the demand for marketing directors and CMOs is higher than it’s ever been.”

19 September 2018
IT/Telecoms, HR

Start-up of the Month: Detail

Paddison told Recruiter the firm operates a traditional technology recruitment agency model that sees candidates interviewed by consultants who screen them against six characteristics – drive, experience, track record, attitude, integrity and life experiences. Results are then fed into an algorithm that matches suitable candidates with clients.

“We plan to kill the CV. We view it as anathema in the modern world that people are hired for jobs on the strength of a piece of a paper. By thoroughly screening against these characteristics, we are able to better match candidates both on a functional level and in line with the cultural fit of a team or organisation,” he said.

Paddison explained that the machine-learning component of the technology also helps to recognise recruitment trends based on previous interaction with hiring clients. “These technical tools, coupled with our extensive industry knowledge, put us in a position to achieve outstanding results for our clients,” he added.

The firm also offers volume recruitment campaigns, with clients paying an arranged upfront fee for access to an agreed number of screened and interviewed candidates.

Looking ahead, Paddison said the firm aims to gain a strong foothold in the North East’s technology sector before expanding its services to other tech hubs across the UK.

17 September 2018
Oil & gas/Energy, Engineering, Construction & property, Executive search, HR, Graduates/Apprentices/School leavers, Apprentices/Grads/School leavers

NEW TO THE MARKET: 17-21 SEPTEMBER 2018

• Multinational oil & gas company BP has launched the Skills Refinery, a new global online portal, aimed at improving students’ employability. This initiative will culminate in a global challenge with the winning team of students receiving an exclusive, all expenses paid trip to the 2019 One Young World Summit in London.

The Skills Refinery provides students with the opportunity to test and develop their abilities in five skills areas – critical problem solving, innovation, influence and communication, cognitive flexibility and emotional intelligence. The Skills Refinery will allow students to test themselves, progress their skills by using interactive quizzes, track their own progress and discover what the five skills mean in practice in the professional world. In addition, an annual global challenge will be set for members of the Skills Refinery.

Launching in December, students will be asked to form teams to compete via video submission at a national level. The national winners will go on to challenge each other at a global level, for the chance to win an all expenses paid trip to the One Young World Summit next year, for its 10th anniversary in London.

In its first year, the Skills Refinery will be piloted in five regions – Australia, Azerbaijan, Singapore, the UK and the US, with a full global launch planned for 2019. It is open to undergraduate students in their first and second years of study, and is free to join.

• Charlton Morris is opening an office in New York at the end of the month. The new office will bring the global executive search and selection consultancy’s locations to three as it also has offices in Copenhagen and in Leeds.

• Construction recruiter Darcy Associates has moved its head office in Bristol to a new central city location at 2-4 Park Street. The move follows on from the construction recruiter’s opening of an office in Central Liverpool.

• UK-based blockchain hiring platform Zinc has launched. The start-up firm aims to simplify, accelerate and reduce the cost of hiring by open sourcing the interview process.

The Zinc ecosystem verifies a candidate’s information on blockchain and enabling workers to securely store it in a distributed network. From there, recruiters can request access to a candidate’s full and verified work history, aptitude and attitude reports on day one of the recruitment process, removing the need for tests and references to be retaken and collected.

Recruiter Magazine

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