So, nice work; you have secured an interview, presumably for a company and job role you find attractive.  However, it is to be a video-conference or web-cam interview format …  So, should you be preparing and presenting in a different way?  Are the processes and protocols different or do the same rules apply? Read on! Well, my ‘standard’ interview prep still applies, i.e. be prepared, be confident, be enthusiastic and be specific. See my blog for way more details on preparing to smash your interview: http://macstaff.co.uk/interview-preperation-technique/   However, there are a whole new set of tips and tricks, outlined below, […]

So, congratulations, you have secured an interview, presumably for a company and job role you find attractive.  However, it is to be a telephone interview format.  So, should you be preparing and presenting in a different way?  Are the processes and protocols different or do the same rules apply? Read on! Well, the ‘standard’ interview prep still applies, i.e be prepared, be confident, be enthusiastic and be specific. See my blog for way more details on preparing to smash your interview: http://macstaff.co.uk/interview-preperation-technique/ However, there are a whole new set of tips and tricks to help avoid the snakes and climb […]

Down but not out! Diary of a recruitment entrepreneur Pt 5 (Yr2) So welcome back & at the point of writing Happy New Year 2018 🙂 It’s been ‘both’ hands to the pump in Macstaff recently, as I’ll explain. hence the absence. but now I think there’s a new tale to tell! My diary part 1 covered the leap of faith into my great recruitment unknown, part 2 was a celebration of the ‘firsts’ of Macstaff, part 3 was pushing through the daily grind. Part 4 was my obsession with scale-up.  Now this part 5 is dealing with set-backs, and […]

So your career is likely an important aspect of your life in a day and age where pretty much everyone has to work. In fact, your career is likely ‘up there’ with family, health and maybe religion as the 3 or 4 ‘big-ticket’ items that can keep people awake at night (either through fear or excitement). Yet, what I have observed during my 15+ years in recruitment, is that whilst most people acknowledge that their career is an important issue, few will think strategically about their career and plan accordingly. Most people will think about their next job and that […]

So again congrats on nailing your job search and securing a new role and hopefully exiting your previous company without burning any bridges. You will no doubt be excited about starting your new role but probably also have some ‘pre-match nerves’. Whilst every individual, job and situation is different I have drawn on my 15+ years recruitment experience, where I have helped literally hundreds of people transfer from job to job, in order to offer this general advice to ensure that you integrate readily into your new environment and ultimately succeed in the role! #1: Worry. Firstly, don’t worry! Through […]

So congratulations you have searched for a new role, been selected, been offered, have accepted AND resigned! You’re home and dry right? Ready to walk in to the sunset! NOT SO FAST … assuming that you are a valuable employee, and assuming that the axe wasn’t about to fall anyway through dismissal or redundancy, a counter offer is likely coming. I have found throughout my 15+ year recruitment career, primarily dealing with mid-senior level permanent roles, that the counter-offer is often the biggest ‘surprise’ in a recruitment process. However it really shouldn’t be a surprise and this blog will fore-warn […]

So congratulations you have searched for a new role, been selected, offered and have accepted. You’ve done the hard work right? Well there’s still one big job to do … handing in your notice AKA resigning! While some people can’t wait to tell their current Boss where to stick his job, and we’ll come on to that approach later , many people if they’re honest find it a difficult appointment / process especially is inexperienced. I can remember I was dreading handing in my notice to bosses I respected in my corporate agency role in order to start Macstaff which […]

So congratulations, you are the preferred candidate in a recruitment process and have been offered or are expecting an offer from a company you are hopefully interested in joining! So what now, hope for the best and whatever it is, it is? This very often seems to be the strategy; however with my 15+ year’s recruitment experience and success in negotiating literally hundreds of offers, this blog will give advice to navigate you through the offer minefield to the right result! #1: It’s not about the money. My first advice is, don’t make it about the money, (even if it […]

Maybe you’re in an active job search and want to know what salary to target? Maybe you feel your salary has slipped behind and you are considering looking for another job that pays what you are worth? Maybe you are looking for ammunition to take to your performance/salary review with your current company. Maybe it’s just idle curiosity. Any which way, salary guides and more specifically, “is MY salary a fair market rate”, is always a subject that creates interest and potentially controversy! This blog will give a few pointers on how to source and review salary information and also […]

So you’re ‘putting yourself out there’ by considering some job opportunities. Sending your CV into job postings, tapping up some contacts, maybe speaking to a trusted recruiter, hopefully attending some interviews. One of the most difficult parts of the job-search process, which isn’t blogged about too much, is handling rejection. Well congratulations, you’re already over the first hurdle, by virtue of the fact you haven’t let fear of rejection prevent you from getting started on your job search in the first place. A lot of people are stuck in a job they don’t want to be in, just the same […]

So you are in an active job search and/or are open to suggestions and have secured yourself an interview? Congratulations! The interview is where, ‘the rubber hits the road’, in your job search. Personally, I think reliance on an interview to determine the best candidate for a position is a broken system (the topic for another blog); none-the-less this is exactly how 90% of hiring decisions will be made currently. So be prepared to sell yourself, (this blog will give practical advice on how), as how you present will influence the likelihood of an offer. Also the better the interview, […]

So you are either committed to an active job-search or are a ‘passive’ candidate who wants to keep an eye on ‘what is out there’. Either way it could be a worthwhile strategy to get connected with one or more recruitment consultants / agencies. A common objection that I come across from people when sceptical about using a recruiter is “I don’t need a recruitment agency, I’ve always been able to find my own job”. This is fair comment and if this has worked well for you then you likely don’t ‘need’ one; just as you can find/buy your own […]

I am Macstaff’s Founding Consultant and Author of Job Search Job Done, Anthony McCormack. I’ve enjoyed success in the staffing and recruitment industry in North America, UK and Europe for 15+ years. In terms of a potted history, I graduated from Nottingham Trent University in 1996 and, in truth, ‘fell’ into recruitment, which has been my passion and profession ever since. I cut my teeth in driving and industrial recruitment with Securicor recruitment services, now Randstad, where I learned to work hard, act quickly and give great customer service. I moved for career development in 1999 into specialist recruitment with […]

So as always, but even more so when you are in job search mode, social media can be your best friend or your worst enemy, depending on how it is used or abused! I’ll go through a few a few tools/technologies and specific advice, however the over-arching theme here will be to ‘control your online brand’. In the employment market you are the product / solution and you are also the marketing manager for said product. You’re going to want to ensure that ‘product you’ has a high perceived market value and is widely known as effective, reliable and in […]

So here I sit in my local, on February 1’st 2017, enjoying the luxury of a lunch time pint, writing this blog. It was a time to reflect on ‘Dry January’ … and I’ve decided it was rubbish! Yes it was rubbish but also long, mostly boring, sometimes hard and often it seemed a thankless job. So why did you want to do it in the first place? (I hear you ask). I guess the primary reason was to break the drinking habit, or at least break the cycle. The habit had become, well habitual, certainly an ingrained solution to […]

So you’ve reviewed your options in the ‘planning your job search’ blog Jan 2017 and decided that moving is definitely your best option? So what next, dust off the old CV, add an entry and bang it out then, right? As somewhat of a recruitment veteran now of 15+ years, I can see that a fair proportion of the time, that that has exactly been the plan. Worse is if the candidate leaves a recruitment agent to update it for them before forwarding it on to the client(s), for speed. This tends to create a document that is potentially too […]

I recently completed the UWCB #Bath program, with the 8 weeks free training and fighting at glamourous event, as billed, this last 17th, December. This was one of 30+ other similar events happening throughout the country that weekend! I didn’t know anything about it until a female friend signed up for the one in Leicester … along with her Dad! I was certainly impressed and a little bit jealous 🙂 and started reading about UWCB and watching their videos online. I had established that one was also starting very soon in Bath and during that week I kept revisiting the […]

So you have drawn the conclusion that it’s time to move job? Are you going to plan your job-search before throwing yourself in at the deep end? Surely you just bang your CV out to job posts that catch your eye, and maybe a few agencies, and see what happens, right? From what I can gather, as somewhat of a recruitment veteran now, this is the default strategy for a majority of ‘candidates’. However, I would argue that your job and more importantly your career is actually a strategically important item. There is potentially a huge upside in getting it […]

Diary of a recruitment entrepreneur Pt 4 (of 5), 9 months So I won’t dramatize my recruitment entrepreneur’s year to date as a rollercoaster but it’s certainly been a wiggly line! I think that’s par for the course, though, you’ve likely seen the picture where the intended route to success is A to B, but the reality involves a journey via several other letters? My diary part 1 covered the leap of faith into my great recruitment unknown, part 2 was a celebration of the ‘firsts’ of Macstaff, part 3 was pushing through the daily grind. Here we are in […]