"In my short time at the company, I can already see they do things very differently."
Adam Clarke joined Teachers Together as a Recruitment Consultant in December. He has worked in the recruitment industry since 2017. Prior to that he was a football coach for children and young people in Hertfordshire.
We asked Adam to share his thoughts and insights on his first few months at Teachers Together and how it compares with his previous experiences in the industry. You can read these below.
We take a different approach to recruitment
In my first couple of days with Teachers Together (TT) I couldn’t help but compare it to my previous workplaces. In recruitment, you are often told to expect there to be more lows and knockbacks than highs; that “this is a brutal industry”. When that’s the only message you hear every day, it can be demoralising.
Although you might think recruitment roles are all quite similar, in my short time at the company, I can already see they do things very differently at TT. Even in the vocabulary we use - calling a ‘temp’ a member and a ‘client’ a partner – shows that we want to work collaboratively and build a community.
As I got to know more about Olly’s background and exchanged stories with him about our previous recruitment jobs, I understood why he set up the company and places such a huge emphasis on maintaining our core values of “Transparency, Relationships, Understanding and Excellence”.
Collaboration isn’t just a buzzword
Any employee wants to feel valued by the company they work for and feel good about coming into the workplace. That may seem like an obvious thing to say but I can tell you from personal experience and those of friends who work in the recruitment industry, that it is not always the case!
Olly involves me in pretty much every decision-making idea which I really appreciate. That notion of collaboration extends beyond the small staff team at TT. We involve our members and partners when deciding, for example, which training courses would be most beneficial to offer our members.
As a result, TT has put on several free bespoke training workshops for members. Our next one is at the end of May: the “Good Autism Practice” module developed by the Autism Education Trust and delivered by the Luton SENS team. Even the timing of the training session was canvased with our members before we settled on a date during the summer half term break.
Going the “extra mile” is the norm
One thing that slightly blew me away was the fact that TT sent hampers and small gifts to members just before Christmas to show their gratitude for their work. They even do things like send birthday messages to members. That’s not something I’ve come across in this industry before and I appreciate that those little “pick me ups” can mean so much to the recipient.
Regular communication with our members is key to how Teachers Together operates and is something I’ve enjoyed taking on. It’s enabled me to really get to know our members and build relationships with them.
I think that’s one of the things I like most about TT. It’s more supportive than your typical recruitment agency. Even if it’s just checking in on members to make sure they’re comfortable, or sending a text asking, “How did your first day go?”. Equally, it means a lot to me when I get replies to my messages. I received a lot of nice responses from members welcoming me to the company and it made me feel like I am part of a community.
We are always improving
I really like that TT never stagnates. It’s always looking for ways to improve. Olly encourages the team to be forward-thinking and try out new ideas. Very early on I was asked to input on improvements we could make to our member onboarding process and we’re starting to see the benefits of the changes we made.
TT’s set up is far greater than anything I’ve had before. In particular, the tech side of things is a big difference. Being given a brand-new laptop with all the updates and everything ready to go was refreshing. I’m used to the loud sound my laptop made, thinking it was about to take off and doing a tuck and roll when restarting it!
Very recently we moved into a bigger office so that we have more space to expand our team as the business grows. Knowing it would be such a big milestone for TT makes me want to drive towards that goal even more.
----
Joining a new company can be daunting. From getting to grips with education sector specific terminology, to understanding TT’s unique processes, there’s been a lot for me to learn and implement in my first few months. But I am looking forward to building my knowledge further and bouncing ideas with the rest of the team to explore new opportunities and develop more ways to engage and support our members.
Adam Clarke, Recruitment Consultant
Comments