Onrec.com Awards Evening 2007

Online recruitment magazine talks to some of the Sponsors attending the Onrec.com Awards 2007

Onrec.com and Online recruitment magazine are delighted to be building on the success of the previous two Onrec Awards ceremonies, and are bringing the industry together again to celebrate not only excellence in marketing, but also advances in technology, and to recognise the progress made by companies in adoption of online recruitment practices.

The Awards will complete a busy day for online recruiters, who will also have the opportunity to attend both morning and afternoon conferences, held specifically for the online recruitment industry, at the Caf Royal, London, from 9am to 5pm. The Awards will begin with a drinks reception from 7.00 pm, sponsored by SHL.

The Awards themselves are split into seven categories. The Innovative Offline Marketing and Innovative Online Marketing Awards both recognise the ingenuity shown by companies to promote their product, or services, on and offline, and will celebrate the best companies within the generalist, niche and suppliers to the industry fields.

The Award for Best Corporate use of Online Recruitment recognises the implementation by a company of an online recruitment strategy through the development of the recruitment area of their corporate website, and the Award for Best use of Online Recruitment by a recruitment agency recognises the work by agencies to create the most effective online strategy.

The two other Awards are Personality of the Year 2007, awarded to the individual whom has best promoted the industry over the last twelve months, and the Onrec Education Award, received by the company that has best educated and utilised online recruitment in their work practices.

David Hurst comments: íThis is Onrecís way of helping to recognize the best within our industry. We want to provide a stage for those within the business to be able to voice their recognition for the finest and most inventive of those working within the tradeí.

There will be a charity auction, hosted by Dan McGuire, MD, Broadbean Technology and Ian Partington, MD, Simply Online Services, with all funds raised going to Whizz Kidz. Whizz Kidz provide customised wheelchairs, tricycles and other specialised mobility equipment, wheelchair training, information and advice to change the lives of disabled children across the UK.

We look forward to celebrating another successful year for online recruitment with you, as well as raising money for Whizzkidz. See you there!

Auction lots include:
ï Two tickets for Six Nations Tournament Wales V England, 17th March 2007 at the Millennium stadium
Donated by eteach.com

ï Two tickets to attend the British Grand Prix Silverstone, 8th July 2007
Donated by Topjobs.co.uk

ï Case of wine, six bottles of Chateau La Garenne Puderan, Bordeaux 2004, presented in a wooden case
Donated by David Hurst

To celebrate a great year for online recruitment since the last Onrec awards, we asked our sponsors to reflect on what they had enjoyed most and what they were looking forward to:

Tom Atkinson from cashsimply.com
Q. Whatís been the highlight for you?
A. The highlight for me has been raised consciousness. By that I mean, a new platform from which ideas are springing and a new awareness of opportunities and new ways of looking at things. Itís as though we have all just got the point of Darwinís Origin of Species and we are looking at the online recruitment environment in a new way. Itís really exciting and itís going to keep developing.

Q. Whatís most surprised you?
A. I have been pleasantly surprised by the power of forums. At last they are informing and assisting a wide base of participants. I never expected them to be so powerful and I only see that power base increasing.
Q. What are you looking forward to in the next year?
A. We think we have learned a lot from watching others evolve ideas, both the brilliant and the not quite so good. We are really looking forward to launching our own unique online recruitment product this year, based upon our Perms Simply product, but for everyone - so watch this space.

Teresa Fearis, Business Development Director at SHL
Q. Itís been a good year for e-recruitment, whatís been the highlight for you?
A. The shift in focus from recruitment to talent management as clients realise the value of measuring and deploying talent within their organizations. SHL are strongly positioned to support this by providing the tools for objective assessment and performance measurement throughout the employee lifecycle.

Q. Whatís most surprised you?
A. How many organisations are still using antiquated methods of recruiting when there are so many effective, affordable e-recruitment solutions out there.

Q. What are you looking forward to in the next year?
A. Partnering with key technology providers in this space to offer clients a truly integrated talent management solution and proving demonstrable top line value.

Jason Pierce, MD, Skillsarena
Q. Itís been a great year for online recruitment since the last Onrec.com Awards, whatís been the highlight for you?
A. Growing recognition of the value of the online recruitment medium, and its power to source candidates quickly and effectively. Furthermore, I believe that online recruitment is continuing to gain momentum as a mainstream recruitment tool.

From Skillsarenaís perspective, this growth has been complemented by expansion of our own product offering to meet a growing number of skills testing, reporting and training requirements from our clients, especially from those recruiting specialist candidates.

Q. Whatís most surprised you?
A. The impact of continually changing employment legislation on organisations, in terms of their HR processes and procedures - and perhaps most significantly the resulting increase in time and costs.

Q. Whatís to look forward to in 2007?
A. Employment legislation and the issues arising from it has fundamentally changed the way organisations are managing their HR function. Fortunately, much of this impact can be mitigated by technology, such as that offered by Skillsarena.

Furthermore, we are also looking forward to fresh opportunities to develop bespoke solutions to meet our clients needs and commercial aspirations.

Recruitment resourcing e-tools company, ARC Technologies Ltd (ARC) are the new sponsors of the Onrec.com Education Award. We are delighted to be sponsoring the Education Award, said Piran Littleton, ARC General Manager. It recognises the efforts of organisations to educate a wider audience on the benefits of online recruitment, such as immediacy, simplicity and cost efficiencies. At ARC we wholeheartedly support this through our resourcing e-tools that post, search and track with the aim of increasing the recruiterís profitability.

Dan McGuire, Managing Director at Broadbean Technology
Q. Itís been a great year for online recruitment since the last Onrec.com awards, whatís been the highlight for you?
A. I think for me personally it was Broadbeanís million pound party. 2 years ago there were 4 of us turning over 250k and a million pound turnover seemed so far away. Considering the business was started on a 15k overdraft and weíve never had any external funding, it was quite an achievement, so it was a pretty large night. Weíre looking forward to the 2m party this year!

Q. Whatís most surprised you?
A. We relaunched the Recruiters Network with UK Recruiter this year and the response to that was really surprising. We knew there was demand for it but it pretty much sold out through word of mouth. By the time we mentioned it in the Onrec newsletter it was already oversubscribed. We knew there would be a drop out rate but for the first one weíd have been happy with 50/60 attendees - we had over 120 on the night. Weíll be doing another 4 events this year, all going to plan.

Q. What are you looking forward to next year?
A. Weíre just about to move into a bigger office so weíre able to start expanding quickly again. Weíve literally filled this office to the point of breaking. The office junior has to sleep in the office because heís trapped in the corner by all the desks. The feeling I have at the moment is just like when we started up, except that itís more intense. Weíve got an aggressive expansion plan and weíre able to administer it so much faster and with much more gusto than we could when there were only 3 of us.

Written by Lauren Mackelden, (Lauren@onrec.com) ñ Features editor, Online recruitment magazine.

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