Best Business Student Award

In the week even high achievers struggled to secure university places, we were delighted to be able to give Peterborough Regional College student Chris Burling that extra something to set himself apart.

Chris was the winner of the Best Business Student award at Peterborough Regional College – an award we have sponsored for the last two years.

According to his tutors when Chris started his BTec course ‘he had very little self-confidence’. But they said ‘he applied himself well to his studies… is well motivated and has achieved excellent attendance’. They also said his ‘self confidence has grown…. And he has given verbal presentations and led groups which have helped him to develop’.

He was unable to attend the official presentation evening because he was working – he’s a part time swimming instructor at the pool near his home in Godmanchester.

That’s a demonstration of Chris’ work ethic which also resulted in a string of distinctions and merits throughout his course.

He was a charming young man, very polite. He’s now looking for some more part time work to gain some practical work place experience before going to Northampton University next year to study accountancy and finance.

He wasn’t the most academic student, or the most confident but he applied himself and, as a result, was chosen to receive the award, a valuable addition to his CV.

There’s a lesson in there for teenagers who are starting to despair about their chances of gaining a solid grounding from which to launch a future career. Academia is important but demonstrating a good work ethic and developing as a person is just as vital.

Unemployment figures

The number of people working in the UK has jumped by the largest amount in more than two decades. Unemployment now stands at 2.46 million.

But in an interesting twist the figures show the rise in employment was lead by a record number of part-timers and people aged over 65 remaining in work.

That ties in with our experience.

The number of opportunities has increased – certainly since this time last year – which is good news. But many employers are remaining cautious and preferring to take on temporary or contract staff. Often the thinking is that, if all goes well, the person will be offered a permanent contract but, for the moment, they’re reluctant to make a wholesale commitment.

And, from the other side, we’re finding that candidates winning at interview are the ones who are flexible and happy to consider temporary or contract opportunities – rather than the ones holding out for full time permanent positions.

While these kind of roles don’t offer long – or even medium – term security they can be a valuable stepping stone and a way back into the workplace and we often advise candidates to seriously consider them.

The other thing we advise is a positive approach – in fact, you might have seen me saying just that on the Anglia Television news bulletins on Wednesday. However frustrating it is answering the same questions for the 20th time you have to approach each interview as if it’s your first – but with the benefit of having done dress rehearsals!

Anglia approached us to talk about the employment situation in Peterborough – something we like to think we know quite a lot about! One of our candidates was interviewed on camera too, talking about the difficulties of finding the right kind of work.

You can watch the full report by clicking here.

Agency Workers Regulations: do we have to provide temps with car parking spaces?

* Guest blog from Nel Woolcott, Recruitment Partner

I’m still wading through the comprehensive notes I made following our Breakfast Law Briefing where Tom Hadley, director of external communications for the REC spoke.

His presentation on the Agency Workers Regulations was excellent – he was obviously incredibly knowledgeable, and very passionate, about his subject.

He shared some very interesting points and valuable insights.

He has been involved in high level discussions about the finer points of the Regulations which will be in place by October 2011.

The Regulations overall say that, after a 12 week assignment, temporary workers must receive comparable pay and benefits to a permanent employee doing the same job.
It’s the ‘benefits’ part of that which could be the most challenging part for employers to manage.

According to Tom the discussions and feedback they have had is that generally it is felt temporary staff won’t quibble over the odd few pennies an hour difference in their salary to that of employed staff.

“It’s collective facilities which can become a big issue, things like access to the canteen, on-site gym or car park,” Tom told our seminar.

Generally, the regulations will give temps the right to enjoy those perks, if staff do. But there is a ‘get out’ clause for employers. If the number of car park spaces is restricted or the gym is very small for instance employers won’t be obliged to offer the facility to temp workers.

It is those kinds of issues which we will be discussing with our clients before the cut off date of October 2011 to ensure they have a transparent policy in place.

Work shy students? It’s a myth

Guest blogger ACR Business Coordinator Claire Latham

It’s holiday time – great news for your staff probably not such good news for you. If your office is anything like ours, despite the best laid plans, we often find ourselves with a spell over schools holidays where we’re more short handed than we’d like to be.

We regularly stop the gaps, as it were, with students.

We get a lot of university students, and post A’ level students, registering with us in the run up to the summer holidays. Most are looking for short term work either to pay off student debts or maybe to fund a summer holiday.

For them, temporary work has many benefits. First and foremost, it pays! Secondly, it’s a great opportunity to get a peek inside a sector they may be interested in working in in the future. Thirdly, it looks good on their CV to have work experience under their belt.

For you, as an employer, taking on temporary staff over the summer spell can pay real dividends.

We have temps on our books able to cover a huge range of disciplines – from simply answering phones and taking messages, to meeting and greeting, to carrying out detailed project work or overseeing a department in the manager’s absence. That means there’s no need for a department to be partially closed, or on a go-slow, over the summer.

Temps can be taken on for as long or short a period as you need. One client found their two receptionists had holidays which overlapped by a day. We were able to provide them with a temp to cover that one shift.

We find students are often given excellent feedback by companies – they’re keen to make a good impression with a view to further work in the future, they’re new to the business so often able to inject something fresh to the mix and, if they’re forward-thinking enough to register with a recruitment agency, it tends to mean they’re not shy of hard work!

Student support a pleasure

We were pleased to be able to support Peterborough Regional College’s student awards again this year.

The ceremony – a rather glittering affair – is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate the achievements of students.

Karen Dykes from ACR attended the event to mark our sponsorship of the Best Business Student award which was won by Chris Burling.

With budgets tight across the board, this kind of support of local activities can often fall off the list of business’ priorities. We’ve always taken the view that when times are tough, it remains a vital investment in the future – both for us and for the students who deserve a hand up the ladder.

Seeing the pride with which they received their awards was, Karen said, ‘heartwarming’.

The students were treated to some inspirational food for thought too from special guest Ade Adepitan. He survived polio as a younger and now has a career as an international wheelchair basketball player and TV presenter.

Definitely a worthwhile event to be involved with – and an enjoyable one to attend.

And just a quick mention: We’re a team here at ACR and we’re all involved in many different aspects of the business. With that in mind, although this is officially ‘my blog’, I thought it might be good to give others the chance to speak out – in a ‘guest blogger’ role. So, over the coming weeks, others will be penning some words for this page, sharing their thoughts and ideas. They’ll get a name check so you know who they are.

And now you can listen too….

We’ve worked with Martin Bloom from Hegarty LLP Solicitors over a number of years. He’s incredibly knowledgeable when it comes to employment law and a popular presenter at our regular Employment Law Briefings.

Martin was one of the key speakers at our latest Seminar on the subject of the Agency Workers Regulations, giving an in depth look at the way the Regulations are likely to be interpreted on a legal platform.

Martin’s insight was, as ever, thought provoking and invaluable.

For those who couldn’t write quickly enough to take note of everything Martin said, and those who weren’t able to attend, please click here to listen to the podcast of Martin’s speech.

Agency Workers Regulations: reassurance from REC

An early start for us all – but what a worthwhile one!

We welcomed Tom Hadley, Director of External Relations at the Recruitment and Employment Confederation, to talk to around 80 HR professionals from Peterborough businesses about the Agency Workers Regulations in October 2011.

The breakfast seminar was held in conjunction with Hegarty LLP solicitors with their employment law expert Martin Bloom giving a comprehensive overview of where companies are going to stand legally.

Tom then talked through the history of the introduction of the regulations right through to the lobbying that the REC did in the run up to the election.

After a spell of inactivity during the election campaign, the new coalition Government is now engaged in pinpointing the finer details of the regulations – and Tom and the REC are involved in those discussions.

Tom was keen to emphasise the reality of the new legislation. “Employers must remember that fundamentally a lot of things are going to remain the same. You can take on temporary workers when you need them and get rid of them when you want to.
“We are also pleased that about 70 per cent of what we have pushed for has been accepted as part of the regulations.”

We were pleased to hear Tom highlight the part agencies like ours will play over the coming months. It was also reassuring to hear him say that he felt the temporary market wouldn’t suffer despite the introduction of the regulations – one of the biggest industry fears.