Waikato Business News November/December 2018

42 WAIKATO BUSINESS NEWS November/December 2018
HR, MANAGEMENT AND RECRUITMENT
Seek names Waikato recruitment company
best in New Zealand
A Waikato-grown business has been
recognised by Seek as the best in the New
Zealand recruitment industry, highlighting
that value and care for people is paying off
for the social business.
Human resource and
recruitment specialist
Agoge was awarded
2018 New Zealand Large
Recruitment Agency of the Year
at the Seek Annual Recruitment
Awards (SARAs).
The award is for the agency
with more than 20 consultants
showing commitment to workplace
culture, innovation, candidate
engagement, commercial
growth/achievement and contribution
to the New Zealand
recruitment industry as a whole.
The award was made doubly
special with Hamilton branch
manager Andrew South also
recognised as the New Zealand
Recruitment Consultant of the
Year.
With a vision of ‘People
Matter: Do Good’, the company’s
ethos of caring for people
is part of the secret to its success.
For Agoge founder Andrew
Nicol, winning the Large
Recruiter award was recognition
for the hard work of the
team who go all out to care
for people. “It goes to show
you can be in business and do
good,” Andrew said.
Agoge is challenging the traditional
model of a recruitment
agency, by focusing on being a
social business.
“Historically the industry
is renowned for a lack of care
and feedback to jobseekers, and
Agoge is challenging the industry
to take a more candidate caring
approach,” he said.
Doing good in the wider
The winning Agoge team. Photo: Seek Ltd
community is an important
focus. As a social business,
Agoge’s partnership with Good
Trust (founded by Nicol and
James Grafas) recently helped
bring water to more than 10,000
people in Cambodia. Agoge’s
initiative, one for one, sees that
for every week worked by an
onsite staff member, a person in
Cambodia gets access to clean
drinking water for one month.
“In the third world, clean
water changes everything. We
are excited to partner with the
Good Trust to provide so many
people with a lifetime of clean
water,” said Andrew Nicol.
“Because we work with
people in such a big way we
are constantly challenging what
we’re doing for our people and
how we can do it better,” said
Andrew South.
“It’s such an incredible honour
to be recognised.
“This award speaks so much
more of the incredible team I
have around me and confirms
that we are on the right track in
the way we care and serve our
candidates, clients and all those
we have the privilege of working
beside.”
Agoge was founded by
Hamilton entrepreneur Andrew
Nicol in 2003. The organisation
now has branches throughout
the country, and is successfully
competing with large multinational
organisations.
Use recruitment specialist to attract best talent
By BY LUKE HORTON
RECRUITMENT TEAM LEADER
Recent figures released
by Stats NZ reveal that
New Zealand’s unemployment
rate has fallen to 3.9
percent, its lowest point since
2008. This is good news; low
unemployment is typically a
positive economic indicator,
and certainly all the usual
reporting suggests that the
country is enjoying a period
of economic strength. Low
unemployment means that
the labour market is tight—
very tight in some industries,
sectors and regions. Here in
Waikato, we’re among the top
five locations enjoying significant
employment growth.
We were up 3.3 percent in
the last quarter, which translates
to 8400 more jobs. I’m
sure we’re all glad that the
NZ economy is booming, and
business confidence is roaring
along. The reality is that
all this growth comes with its
own set of challenges. Number
One: it’s increasingly
hard in Waikato to source
great talent. It’s unfortunately
the nature of the (labour
market) beast, when everyone
out there is looking to grow
their workforce, competition
grows fiercer.
So, what’s a business to do?
Advertising, sitting back and
waiting for applications is not
enough. It’s true that traditional
methods still work, some of
the time, for some of the candidates.
However, to attract the
very best talent, you need to
grab their attention well before
you advertise (communicate
your employment brand) and
be visible, where candidates
work, rest and play (mobile).
Once you’ve got candidates,
it’s essential that you move
fast; multiple offers are a reality
in today’s world. I admit
my bias fully, and believe that
organisations should partner
with a local recruitment specialist
like Madison. We’ll
take the time to truly understand
your business and people
needs, will make the process
quicker and easier AND
produce results you need, i.e.
talented people to fill your
vacancies. After all, we live
and breathe recruitment. The
challenges of a tight market
are just the kind of problem
solving we enjoy (most of the
time!). If you’d like to chat all
things Waikato-recruitment
related, give me a call on 07
8395660. For more opinions
and articles, visit www.madison.co.nz/hamilton
Experience a partnership with SEEK’s SARA winners...
good business
starts with
good people...
and we recruit the best
07 839 5660
madison.co.nz/hamilton