Rupert Bayfield Snr, widely regarded as the grandfather of the IT Recruitment industry, and Anthony Lambie have renewed their association, which was so successful in the founding, floating and selling to Adecco of Computer People, for many years the UKís biggest IT Recruitment company.
Lambie has invested in Edinburgh company CyberTeam Resource Management, the enterprise set up by Bayfield Snr, his son (also Rupert) and Phil Notley in April of last year to take advantage of what they perceived to be a massive potential recovery in the IT Services market, a market which had been severely depressed for some years.
Bayfield Snr says, ìIíve been in the recruitment business for 35 out of the 45 years that Iíve spent in the IT industry as a whole and I know a thing or two about our market. These days I can see an up-swing before it happens ñ and here we have all the strands coming together to create the sort of booming market that we saw in the mid-nineties.î It was around that time that companies like Spring, MSB, Parity and Harvey Nash were created and floated.
Bayfieldís predictions have been proved right and his new company has rocketed into the market, taking on the competition and setting new standards of quality service. The success of the Edinburgh venture, which produced a seven figure turnover in its first year, has led to expansion into London and the north of England, partly made possible with Lambieís financial input. Ingram Forrest has been appointed as Corporate Finance Adviser.
Lambie and Bayfield Snr, along with two others, set up Computer People in the early Seventies. They took the four founder names ñ Vickers, Robinson, Lambie and Bayfield ñ to form the holding company name, amalgamating them into Vinson Lamfield International, soon abbreviated to The VLI Group. The former headquarters building in St Martinís Lane still retains the name VLI House.
Lambie retired from Computer People in the nineties and has been biding his time since. ìIíve been watching the IT Recruitment market and CyberTeam has the best business formula Iíve seen: excellent management who lead from the front, highly professional recruiters who are well-known throughout the industry, and slim overheads - which means keen pricing and top value for clients. No wonder weíre experiencing an upswing - weíre helping to create it!î he says. Staff and clients alike share Lambieís view and are flocking to the fold.
The renewed partnership believes that the negative trading statements issued by big listed companies such as Spring and Lorien, which claim the current market to be difficult, are merely a smokescreen for more fundamental internal problems. Rupert Bayfield Jnr says, ìI havenít been in it for as long as the Old Man, only 14 years, but during that time I have never experienced quite such a booming market as we see today.î
Bayfield Jnr and Notley agree that the big companiesí real difficulties stem from an inability to retain their own staff. This is proved by the ease with which CyberTeam has been able to recruit from them. Notley says, ìIf you canít service the client demand, because you donít have the staff to do it, itís no wonder the business is going downhillî.
Bayfield Snr says, ìWe think that these companies are still being managed by the austerity teams that were set up to guide them through tough times, and that they have not yet reverted to the entrepreneurial style, vital to exploit booming markets, and which has proved so successful for CyberTeamî.
CyberTeam opened its London office at the beginning of March and in Leeds at the beginning of August. Both are run by industry professionals, each of whom has 20 years highly successful experience. ìThe acquisition of these two experienced professionals demonstrates how easy it is to recruit from the big listed companies at any levelî says Bayfield Snr.
Computer People was able to cherry-pick the cream of the hardware sales forces, IBM, Honeywell, Burroughs in the Seventies, making it the most successful IT recruitment company there has ever been. Lambie says, ìItís like history repeating itself. CyberTeam is doing the same from their own competition, with the same effect: creating the highest quality team in the industry.î
If the shareholdersí experience is anything to go by, CyberTeam is going to emulate Computer People in its success profile ñ although Vinson doesnít feature this time, Lamfield rides again.
New collaboration for Grandfather of IT recruitment
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