A different approach to the recruitment of talent

Since the Financial Services Royal Commission in 2019, there has been much recruitment activity for risk and compliance roles across the industry. Demand for risk and compliance professionals has risen as organisations review their governance, risk and compliance frameworks to ensure they are sound and robust, and implemented appropriately by the right employees.

However, finding the right people to carry out critical roles and responsibilities is not an easy task. Especially in light of the current job market for risk and compliance professionals, where demand exceeds the supply of high calibre talent. In addition to the Royal Commission, this increased demand is driven by border closures over the last couple of years reducing the pool of migrant talent, and superannuation fund merger activity prompting the restructure of risk and compliance functions.

Adding to the difficulty of recruiting short-term roles in particular, job candidates are looking for greater stability in the roles they apply for, declining shorter-term contracts with the hope to land longer term, permanent roles. This is an unsurprising result of the impact of COVID-19 on the perception of job security.

As organisations search for skilled risk and compliance candidates, and other professionals across their broader business functions, it’s becoming clear that a successful search requires external support, from recruitment agencies or otherwise.

This is where we can help. Hall Advisory is more than a boutique consultancy. Among our broader governance, risk management, compliance and strategic advisory services, Hall Advisory fulfils outsourced roles as well as recruits for permanent roles in the risk and compliance space.

In this blog, we cover our recruitment service offering, insights on current recruitment approaches, our approach to recruitment and what makes our services different to that of typical recruitment agencies.

Finding the right resources

As employees come and go, and the regulatory environment changes and organisations evolve, resourcing gaps can appear. These gaps can be particularly challenging to fill for specialised roles, such as those in the governance, risk and compliance space.

The recruitment of permanent specialist staff can, however, involve an extended search for the right candidate. Perhaps you’ve considered several options to fill your resourcing gaps, including outsourcing the role for a fixed term or ongoing basis, or recruiting an employee on a contract or permanent basis.

Whatever your circumstances and preferred solution may be, Hall Advisory can assist you based on your needs, budget, skills required and desired flexibility of the arrangement.

Our recruitment services

Hall Advisory currently supports organisations in recruiting for roles across:

Governance, risk and compliance resourcing – across all levels (e.g. Chief Risk Officer, Company Secretary, Governance Manager, Risk Manager, Operational Risk Manager, Compliance Manager, Responsible Manager, etc.)
Executive recruitment – across all specialities (e.g. Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer, Chief Member Officer, etc.)
Company Director recruitment – across all categorisations (e.g. Independent Non-Executive Director, Executive Director, Committee Member)

In respect of director recruitment, our team often conduct board performance assessments and skills gap analysis to assess the effectiveness and performance of a board (see our ‘The key skills and attributes of an effective company director’ blog for more detail). The recruitment piece can therefore be added as an extension to this service. The same applies for several of our other services.

Our recruitment services are on a fixed cost basis. Further, we charge fees only based on placement of a suitable candidate. That means if the search is unsuccessful, you will not incur a fee from us.

The recruitment market

We have observed current recruitment approaches in the market and heard a range of anecdotal evidence from our clients and industry colleagues:

Recruitment fees are very high. Some agencies provide transparency in relation to their fees, whilst for others, there’s a lack of clarity around how fees are calculated.
Reporting on the available candidate pool, long listing and short listing may not be prepared comprehensively or may not be provided at all.
The recruiter approach may not be perceived as authentic from a candidate’s perspective. Some candidates believe many recruiters are driven by earning repeat commission payments, rather than finding the right fit for the benefit of all parties involved.

In terms of Hall Advisory’s recruitment services, we adopt a technical and relational approach that is integrated with our specialist consulting services.

Our approach to recruitment

As Hall Advisory is not a recruitment agency but rather provides recruitment services that align with our service offering, our approach is different. We don’t aim to just fill a position. We seek to work with our clients, understand their needs and objectives, and find candidates who are of appropriate fit for both the technical requirements of the role and the cultural dynamics of the organisation.

Our recruiting service also ties in with our consulting work. For example, we have filled Chief Risk Officer positions on an outsourced basis at very short notice, later sourcing effective permanent replacements from the market, while ensuring our clients’ governance, risk and compliance needs are fulfilled at all stages of the process.

This approach can also be adopted for other speciality areas and positions, such as the Chief Financial Officer role, leveraging the experienced finance professionals employed by Hall Advisory that are qualified accountants.

The advantage of this approach is while one of our team members is assigned to the gap fill arrangement, we can commence the process of any structural and cultural change required to help move your organisation forward and get a first-hand view of the skill set and cultural fit required for the permanent candidate.

As part of our core services, we can also continue to assist clients on discrete projects and provide ad-hoc specialist advice thereafter.

Why Hall Advisory?

The Hall Advisory team brings deep technical knowledge and a wide range of practical industry, regulatory and consulting experience. Our different perspectives help you close both resource and knowledge gaps that may exist in your organisation.

Our knowledge of the technical requirements relevant to each role and the candidates available in the market positions us to effectively manage the recruitment process for our clients for the respective roles.

We can not only draw from the wider talent pool but also put our own team members forward to fill roles promptly where required, including directorships and committee chair and member appointments. Our selection of the appropriate candidate for a role is based on fit above all else.

As with our consulting work, we adopt a relational approach to our recruiting projects and elevate the process well beyond a transactional arrangement. It’s a different approach with the right motives.

How we can help

Hall Advisory can assist you with specialist expertise to fill the resourcing gaps that you may have. We collaborate with organisations to determine which recruitment approach is best suited to their specific requirements and provide flexibility with in-house or outsourced resourcing support during the recruitment phase.

For more information about how we can support your recruitment efforts and your wider governance, risk, compliance and strategy needs, contact us today for a confidential, no-obligation consultation.