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The quest begins before anyone leaves the village Before Talent Acquisition starts looking for candidates, there is usually a conversation with the hiring manager to define the role, clarify what is needed, and agree on what the search should look like. Recruiters often call this the intake meeting or job qualification. It sounds like a fairly ordinary first step, but this is where assumptions turn into requirements, preferences become selection criteria, and vague ideas some

What if, during one stage of your recruitment process, the hiring manager sat down, looked at the candidate and simply said: “Interview me.” Ask me anything you want about the job, the team, the company, our problems, our ambitions and the way we work. Tell me anything you think I should know about you. For the next 30 minutes, you run the interview. I think I would love this. What if we switched seats? Most interviews are heavily controlled by the employer. We have our quest

We all know the saying: “You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.” And yet - every day - I see job ads that do exactly that. They repel, they bore, they list. They don’t invite. They don’t encourage curiosity. I keep coming across hiring teams and recruiters who genuinely don’t understand why they’re not attracting the right people. And I honestly think they’re skipping the most important part: putting real thought into how they advertise the role. Don’t Post a Job

Since I attended my first Women in Nuclear event, I’ve been thinking a lot about how women relate to each other at work. When I Was Starting Out When I was starting my career (some time ago now...), I heard a sentence that stuck with me: “If you can’t rely on men to get promoted or recognised, you can rely even less on women.” It stung - partly because I didn’t want to believe it, partly because sometimes it felt true. In male-populated industries, we often assume women will

Companies focus so much on giving candidates a neat, fast, smooth process because they want top talent to want them. But here’s what I keep hearing: the minute the contract’s signed, the magic stops. Onboarding is bumpy at best, chaotic at worst. Sometimes non-existent. It’s like going on a few amazing dates with someone who goes all out to win you over - then turns into an asshole once you’re committed. If you want people to stay, treat them like they still matter after they

I once applied to work at a very small organisation - so small that I would have been employee # 4. As I was questioning some of their business practices, the leader told me something I’ll never forget: "You will never change the culture." At the time, I profoundly disagreed. But I knew it wasn’t worth wasting another minute trying to explain what I believed company culture really was. If I had joined this small organisation, I would have organically influenced their culture

When you set up your organisation, one of the most exciting tasks is picking your name and logo. Everything must mean something : the...

I’ve read multiple articles lately arguing that job hopping is a positive signal: agility, ambition, adaptability, the confidence to seize opportunities rather than staying somewhere because staying is comfortable. Some also criticize recruiters who still flag frequent job changes. I disagree with that part. Job hopping shouldn't automatically be a red flag. But it should still be a flag. Because, come on. We know what most companies are hiring for. They want people who will

How reassuring, experience. Someone who has done the job before. For years. Decades, even. Every keyword is there on the resume. You know, when you write your bullet points and add, your heart full of hope: 7+ years of experience in the discipline. 7, by the way. Why 7? What magical transformation happens between years 6 and 7? (Six, seveeeen...) 10+ years of experience in the industry. Anyway. We see experience and we feel reassured. They've done it before. They know what th

Have you ever been here? You receive a shortlist. It’s solid. The profiles make sense. There is even one person you can already imagine in the role. And yet something holds you back. You ask to see a few more candidates. Just to be certain. In case someone slightly better appears. More experienced. More aligned. More reassuring. On the surface, that feels responsible. Behind the scenes, it is not neutral. What really happens Candidates from the first batch do not stay frozen

After years of attending conferences, I’ve become fascinated by how people move in those spaces. The Big-Company Identity Bubble You can spot the big-company crowd instantly. They arrive in packs. They wear the company swag. They introduce themselves by saying the company name - and that’s enough, because everyone already knows it. There’s safety in that. Status. Identity. A ready-made tribe. And there’s a cost to that comfort: when restructuring hits, the loss isn’t just a j

“The answers seemed obvious.” Early in my career, I remember rolling my eyes at interns who asked questions that felt unnecessary. The answers seemed obvious. What time do we leave the office? It’s in the contract. They should know. Except contracts don’t tell the whole story. Yes, it might say 6pm in the handbook. But do people actually leave at 6pm? Everywhere? Without comments. Without raised eyebrows. Without having to justify it. That gap is where culture sits. When th

Camera on or off. It sounds trivial, doesn’t it? When we all learned to navigate online meetings in 2020, cameras became part of the etiquette overnight. We’ve all tried both. We’ve all had strong feelings about both. And yet, we still treat the choice as neutral. It isn’t. Camera on is usually read as a signal: I’m here. I’m available. I’m listening. In 1:1s, team catch-ups, workshops, or even quick working sessions, that signal matters. Faces give feedback. Micro-reaction

📖 “𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙂𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙩 𝙍𝙚𝙘𝙧𝙪𝙞𝙩𝙢𝙚𝙣𝙩 𝙍𝙚𝙡𝙖𝙮 𝙍𝙖𝙘𝙚” tells the all-too-familiar tale of Talent Acquisition and Hiring Managers trying to pass the baton… and occasionally dropping it. If this bedtime story feels a bit too real - and gives you nightmares instead of sweet dreams - you’re not alone. 😉

Workforce planning is often treated like an HR obsession at year-end - a spreadsheet exercise that line managers quietly roll their eyes at. And honestly, I get it. In environments as volatile as ours, planning six months ahead already feels ambitious. Projects shift, funding changes, contracts get delayed, and priorities flip overnight. Unless you’ve secured long-term contracts - or run a monopoly - predicting demand feels almost impossible. But that doesn’t mean planning is

We spend so much time with the people we work with that watching them go – whether they resign or are let go – can hit harder than we admit. Some of us put so much effort in how we welcome people in our company. But it's often forgotten or done quickly to say goodbye when they leave. So what should leadership say about the departure… and about the departed? In the workplace, transparency matters. But how much is too much? What should be shared with their direct teammates, a

Back to the (Recruitment) Future AI is revolutionising our world. We’re not sure yet if we’re heading towards a dystopia. Back in the...

Do you even remember Q1? Neither do I - yet this is when most companies run yearly evaluations, right when recency bias hits hardest. ...

In my previous article, Remote work or not remote work, that is the question , I explored the trade-offs between working from home and...

Shakespeare may not have imagined Zoom calls, but leaders today are still stuck with Hamlet’s dilemma: remote work, or not remote work?...