Why You Need To Use An Agency To Recruit IT Staff

May 19, 2022 | Hiring Resources, IT, News

Do you need to recruit IT staff right now? Finding the perfect IT professional to join your company is difficult. The UK, for the first time ever, has more open jobs than it does unemployed people. And the combination of Covid and Brexit probably haven’t helped. However, you still aim to source and recruit the best of the best who will fit both your role and company culture. Like everyone, you’re no doubt already busy/ Recruiting is always an extra thing to add to your long to do list. You’re battling to turn around an attractive job description, market your role, source ideal candidates, search through piles of online applications and conduct interviews. It’s a very time-consuming and lengthy process. But with time really of the essence in this market, it’s not the best way forward.

The market is moving so quickly, even if you do see a couple of remarkable candidates, you rush to contact them only to find out they are no longer available. Who’s snapped them up? One of your competitors maybe? Maybe it’s a competitor who has utilised a great recruitment agency like us?

If you feel like you’re losing the IT recruitment battle and you’re looking to boost your efforts, working with an IT agency is a strategy to consider.

The benefits of working with a recruitment agency to recruit IT staff

Here are just a few reasons why you should be working with an IT recruiter to source your next IT expert:

Experience

IT recruitment is our passion. We understand how important each candidate touchpoint is, along with strategies to source, engage with and convert talented applicants into keen candidates. This experience is invaluable in the current market. You need to partner with an agency who knows what works and how to get the best results for you.

A good recruiter will have a detailed understanding the market and their area of specialism. A recruiter who specialises in IT will have the industry knowledge to find you the perfect candidate. They understand the skillset you need, and some will even have hands-on experience themselves. Therefore, in a skills short market, if you’re struggling to find exactly what you need, a specialist IT recruiter may be able to make suggestions on how to widen your search.

Connections are invaluable to recruit IT staff

And it’s not just the experience to understand who you are looking for, and how to find them. Recruitment agencies will have a large pool of candidates. This is what sets us apart! Not only will a recruiter have an excellent database of candidates that they have been building over a number of years, but they will also have a strong network they can tap into. It’s amazing how many candidates get the job of their dreams for a recommendation from a colleague. A recruiter knows how to utilise their connections to get the best results for you.

At Langley James, we’ve been recruiting IT staff for 22 years now. Our network of candidates is one of the strongest in the market. This is what you really need in the current climate – a recruiter with a very strong database.

An IT recruiters’ mission is to support you in finding the ideal candidate. However, they also support their pool of talent to find the ideal role and workplace. It’s the perfect combination.

Time

Wouldn’t it be great to be able to hand over your IT recruitment needs to someone you can really trust? Someone who will get the job done and secure the very best candidate for you with minimal fuss. Allowing you to focus on what you’re good at – your job. Recruiters live and breathe recruitment. We know how to get results, even in the current market. A recruiter will have a plethora of tools at their fingertips that helps make your recruitment process more efficient. We know how to attract the right candidates. We can even make contact with people who may not actively be looking for a job but are likely to be excited by your opportunity.

But saving you time when you recruit IT staff isn’t the end of the story. Better still, a recruiter can even save you money by ensuring they source candidates who will become long-term, loyal employees. We do this by matching not just skills, but ambitions, values, and culture fit. This reduces the likelihood of starting the recruitment process again a few months later!

Finding the right recruitment agency

Not all recruitment agencies are the same. Therefore, it’s important that you select and work with the most suitable one for you and your business. Be sure to work with an agency that reflects your company values and can positively represent your company.

Once you’ve found the right recruiter for you, you’ll have a team of experts at hand, ready to find you the next pool of talent!

To find out how we work and how we can help you today, contact our team on 020 7788 6600

Jobs Market Remains Resilient

Nov 20, 2020 | News

Jobs Market Remains Resilient Despite an Inconsistent Economy.

We will look back on this time with curiosity post-pandemic when future economists tell their children’s children about a time when there was a 15% rise in GDP (Gross Domestic Product). They will also remember the quarter before when there was a massive 19.8% drop inconsistency, however, this is not a common occurrence and for that we are grateful.

While it’s fair to say that our economy has been erratic recently, there are some positive elements to take from the pandemic. For one, the job market itself has remained fairly resilient.

Despite the fact that official unemployment figures have risen by 4.8%, which represents a total of 1,620,000 individuals, peak unemployment records are predicted to be lower than that of previous recessions Britain has endured. This may be attributed to Britain’s ‘flexible’ job market; particularly when compared to its European counterparts. To put this into perspective, unemployment in the UK peaked at 11.9% throughout the 1980s, 10.7% in 1990’s and 8.4% in 2010 following the financial crash.

So why the optimism regarding Job Market Resilience?

It’s true the news surrounding the 95% ‘effective’ vaccine has had a huge impact on businesses’ confidence, which, combined with the UK’s flexible labour market, is reassuring signs that a bounce-back post-Covid-19 will see Recruitment levels recuperate quicker than other decades.

Other examples of the resilience of the job market are the number of jobs currently being advertised. The ONS showed a 146,000 vacancy rise during August-October, and CV-Library found that job postings in this 2nd English Lockdown (November 2020) were 88% up on the levels of job vacancies advertised in March 2020.

More businesses are learning to work differently and are now recruiting remotely, interviewing virtually, and onboarding new employees without meeting them. Some say the “new normal?”

At Langley James, we have experienced a steady and increasing flow of vacancies since June, despite local and national lockdowns. Indeed, savvy employers are aware this is a good time to find new blood for the IT projects.

IT professionals are also keen to see what opportunities are out there without jeopardising their current job security. They will contact us to discuss what roles we have and may not necessarily always apply for IT roles in the traditional manner.

To Conclude

In summary, despite the current spike in unemployment, good candidates, especially highly skilled IT candidates, are not necessarily easy to find. Advertise your role directly and you will be inundated with responses, and most likely not the candidates that you are looking for. As an established IT Recruitment Agency, Langley James can find you your next employee that may not be responding to adverts.

Langley James specialises in IT Recruitment throughout the UK our specialist teams cover IT Infrastructure, IT Development, IT Contracting roles, Cybersecurity, Data Analysts, IT Managers, IT CIO’s and IT CITO’s contact Langley James to deliver your next IT vacancy or IT Contract Recruitment Vacancy. We can help you to recruit someone worth recruiting.

6 Silver Linings for IT during Covid-19

Nov 17, 2020 | News

6 Silver Linings of the COVID-19 pandemic for IT

Unquestionably, the coronavirus crisis has dramatically shifted the way society functions on a global scale. The undue stress and anxiety caused as a result of the virus have had a profound impact on the world – a notion exacerbated by the increasing toll of lives lost from this disease.

Naturally, as social distancing measures are implemented in order to keep the public safe, humanity – and businesses as a whole – have relied heavily upon technology. Consequently, tech companies have experienced some major positives in the age of COVID-19.

Langley James has looked to find the positives that came from a very bad negative. These findings are summarised below;

Remote Work Success

The move from office to remote work has surprisingly revealed to businesses the effectiveness and potential of a primarily remote workforce. A study found that 82% of business leaders say their organisations plan to let employees continue to work from home at least some of the time, while 47% plan to allow employees to do so permanently.

The transition to working from home to both business hardware, specialists software, and cycle security has demonstrated the ability to work flexibly and subsequently save employers money on office rental, heating, and supplies. Most employee have found that they are financially better off with less money being spent on fuel, luches and clothes and having the flexibility to walk their dog, particpate in the school run and spend more time on domestic projects.

Pandemic Entrepreneurs

The pandemic has been a catalyst for many silver linings, one of which is the emergence of new entrepreneurs. Around a quarter of those who were made redundant due to COVID-19 were starting their own businesses. In the survey, Those who said they didn’t have plans to start a business pre-pandemic, do now; 51% said they identified new business opportunities due to the crisis.

The majority of sectors these entrepreneurs were venturing into mainly involved the hospitality, arts, and entertainment industries – a surprising finding considering these occupational spheres have been one of the worst affected as a result of the virus.

Increase in IT Monitoring Tools

Every day this pandemic is driving customers to think and work differently.

In light of the current climate, there has been a much-needed interest and increase of production tools across a variety of businesses.

Productivity is typically one of the most difficult things to measure. Striking a balance between monitoring employee productivity and allowing them space to be autonomous can be challenging. For example, financial giants Deliottes have published a report detailing their extensive implementation of online collaboration tools (such as a virtual KANBAN* board, virtual task list, etc.) to keep track of tasks that are outstanding, in progress, and completed across the team. These technological tools are now more important than ever with a limitation of social contact, facilitating team and individual productivity within the workplace.

Cybersecurity Increases

Another major finding is the increased and independent distribution of cybersecurity for insurance coverage to small and midsize businesses “at speed”. This speedy rotation may be attributable to the 100% move to online, as opposed to the traditional paper-based model.

At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, many organizations had to rapidly pivot from work in the office to a fully remote structure. While some were well prepared and able to accommodate such a shift, others were scrambling, increasing cybersecurity risk. The concern for insurance companies was how easily these companies were able to transition and whether they were able to do it securely.

Consequently, it seems the COVID-19 pandemic may prompt a lightbulb moment for a lot of organizations that cybersecurity risks should be front and center. As companies become increasingly reliant on technology to run their business, it should raise questions as to what happens if that technology fails. Cyber insurance acts as a backstop to be able to protect organisations from a system failure standpoint, yet less than half purchase a standalone cyber policy. Overall, this is accelerating the adoption of cyber insurance.

Enhanced digital interactions between companies and stakeholders

There has been a need for “accelerating digital interactions”. What this means is that in order to effectively communicate and interact online, companies have needed to open their data and services to their stakeholders through the medium of integration technologies.

Indeed, recent data highlight how consumer and business digital adoption has accelerated 5 years forward in a matter of around eight weeks in sectors such as Banking, who have transitioned to remote sales and service teams, and launched digital outreach to customers to make flexible payment arrangements for loans and mortgages.

Increasing consumer transparency.

Continuing the theme of openness, surprisingly, consumers have been more willing to share their data during the pandemic, to provide companies with vital information about their gender, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, post code, tv channels watched, and specific programs they watch. All this data has been obtained from the “Privacy + Privacy” study regarding consumers’ concerns about gathering data. The findings are summarised below;

For instance, a majority are somewhat or completely willing to share data on each of the following:

Gender (68%),
Ethnicity/Race (65%),
Age (62%),
Sexual orientation (61%),
Postcode (55%),
TV channels watched (54%),
Specific programs watched (53%), or
What they buy at the supermarket (50%)

It seems that we have been able to cultivate some major technological advancements within the business sphere as a result of COVID, which is likely only to accelerate as we adapt to our “new normal”.

Langley James Hires .Net Development Recruiter

Oct 29, 2019 | IT, News

New Net Development Recruiter

Leading IT Recruitment Consultancy, Langley James has appointed Richard Jones as Principle Consultant focused on .Net Professionals in London and the Home Counties.

Richard brings with him a wealth of experience gained from a 10-year career in the recruitment industry. Most recently, Richard completed a very successful 3.5 year period as a Senior Consultant for Scantech within the IT and Cyber Security teams. He has worked in the recruitment sector since 2010 and previously held agency positions at IT recruiters Jam and Korus.

In addition to his recruitment prowess, Richard is a world-class sailor having competed internationally and is currently ranked number 2 in the world.

“We’re very pleased to welcome someone of Richard’s calibre to the team. Expanding our Software Development team with a .Net specialist recruiter compliments our service range neatly and will pave the way for further expansion into IT’s key talent short sectors.” Commented Kieran Delaney, Sales and Marketing Manager.

This year, Langley James celebrates its 20^th birthday. In that time the business has grown into one of the UK’s most respected IT recruitment agencies working with a wide range of clients up and down the country. Focused mainly on IT Infrastructure, Software Development, Security and Support, Langley James has built a reputation for being able to provide strong, quality shortlists within just 72 hours of instruction.

“We owe much of our success to our focus on candidate attitude, client culture fit and career motivation. Most IT professionals can write a decent CV containing all the right keywords for our databases to search for, however fact matching only gets a recruiter so far. Our clients know that a Langley James candidate will not only possess all the essential qualifying criteria but will also likely match their unique vibe. Interviewing is a challenging skill that takes a great deal of practice to get right so, training and team sharing is at the heart of everything we do.” James Toovey, MD said in a recent interview.

Our expert IT recruitment consultants are here to take the pressure off you when recruiting someone new, permanent or contract. We liaise with candidates with the utmost care to ensure that their candidate experience is a positive one. Call us on 0207 788 6600 and let us help you Recruit Someone Worth Recruiting

Langley James Expands with New Hire

May 13, 2019 | News

IT Recruitment Consultancy Langley James has appointed Hayley McDonough to head up the newly created Creative, Coms and Media recruitment division.

Hayley joins the business as the IT Executive Search and Delivery Lead with seven years recruitment and senior level appointment experience.

Sharing her time between London and Chester, Hayley will focus on IT Management professionals with specific Support and Infrastructure expertise gained from the Marketing, Advertising, Publishing and PR sectors.

“We’re very pleased to have secured someone of Hayley’s immense talent at a time of such growth for the business. Having recognised the unique challenges and demands creative companies have of their IT Support teams we’re looking forward to Hayley expanding our client portfolio in the creative world.” Said James Toovey, Managing Director of Langley James.

Langley James is one of the UK’s best known IT Recruitment Agencies with 20 years experience specialising in IT Support & Infrastructure positions for all sectors and levels of seniority.