SPEAKER_01 0:00

We're now using AMA to do that and there's some specific really interesting things around it for me. We ask candidates if they're happy to be screened by AMA. That's the first thing we do. The AMI can identify when a candidate has used AMA to answer the question. It takes what is said, transcribes that and then compares that to the scoring guide. So it is completely aligned and very objective.

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Welcome to Talent Download. I'm Darren Lancaster, I'm the CEO of Amberjack, and in this episode, we get really under the skin of the challenges and opportunities shaping how organizations attract, assess, and hire great people. Today I'm joined by Sharon Wilson, one of the account directors who works for Amberjack, and we're going to be talking about one of our longstanding uh partnerships that we have with Network Rail. Over more than a decade, that relationship has evolved from early careers recruitment, which is what we talk a lot about within the podcast series. But we're actually going to speak a little bit more broadly today and actually look at volume experience hiring campaigns and how they work with Network Rail. We're really excited about the work that we do with them. It involves the use of AI technology in the way in which we've screened, which we've spoken about previously on episodes with the assessment team and how that kind of works within organisations. And I'm really, really looking forward to getting a little bit more under the skin of it and understand some of the lessons that we've learned as an organization, how Network Rail have actually adopted that within the solution that we provide. Sharon, it's great to have you here today. So thanks for taking the time out to speak with us. We really want to get a deep dive for an audience, as I said, around Network Rail, but also I think sometimes a bit more broaderly your experience and what you've been doing. So maybe just give everyone a quick overview on you and just uh set the scene.

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Yeah, sure. I've been working in volume recruitment now for gosh 30 years, which makes me feel very old. Um I started off working for Sainsbury's in recruitment for much of 10 years, um always in volume. So for their retail management, for their retail in-store colleagues, and also for their head office. Volume was always an issue there. After that, I went to work for an applicant tracking system company where I was head of client services, and we managed volume recruitment again, uh, typically retail hospitality and leisure. And then when I moved to Amberjat, that was my first toe in the water of so I'd been in-house and hadn't really appreciated that as a supplier. Um so got to see things from a completely different angle, and again, volume was an issue. Um, so throughout that 30-year period, the volume has been there, and it's been in different guises really that have been a problem.

SPEAKER_00 2:49

Yeah, good. And sometimes when we we talk about volume recruitment, I sometimes think about a triangle of kind of the groupings of the way in which you think about how you classify what individuals are. And I think at sort of at the bottom of that triangle, you you have early careers recruitment, above it, you kind of have experience hires because that's the natural, you then have specialist hires, you then have right at the top, really, your senior management, and I think that's uh just for people listening today, that's the area that we'll we'll talk about because early careers is volume hiring by the nature of it, because of the application flow through, but when we sort of talk through volume hiring, it it's that kind of level above, it's that experience hiring group that we we're actually talking about today and we're thinking through, and of course, we'll touch upon early careers. But network rail has been a client for ours for over a decade, it's a long time to have a relationship with a client, it's great to have them as part of the service that we deliver and bajack. But from your perspective, what makes that relationship work so well with them and and for such a long period of time?

SPEAKER_01 3:59

Yeah, um I love working with Network Rail. They're really willing to try new things and be innovative. We have very open and honest, transparent conversations about issues, uh, about ways that we can solve it, and sometimes we'll have a tool that can solve an issue, not perhaps in the way that we need it to, so they're quite happy to pivot that slightly and use it in a slightly different way to achieve an objective. Um, they've always been at the forefront of trying new things, and that's great. That's what keeps me interested.

SPEAKER_00 4:30

What what was the moment you you kind of found? Because you've you've worked how long have you been at Amberjack?

SPEAKER_01 4:35

You've worked with this is my twelfth season of early careers.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

There you go. So it's a period of time. Was there a point because they started with us, was it within early careers when they they started? But how did that sort of how did that evolve and how did we get into I guess that space?

SPEAKER_01 4:50

Yeah, so we've always done their graduates and apprentices. Um, their number of hires has steadily increased in those areas over the years. Um, and as we became known for giving a great service, they asked us to start doing some screening work for their signaller recruitment. It soon became clear that their signaller recruitment was suffering in a number of different ways in terms of the process. So it was some great detailed conversations around actually our early careers process is going so smoothly. Could we do the same for the signaller population? It's it's a different population of candidates, the roles are very different, but actually the process could be the same. What can we do? And then off we went. And now we're recruiting in excess of 300 signallers a year for them, handling nearly 30,000 signaller applications.

SPEAKER_00 5:40

30,000 is a significant flow through. Yeah. And in my understanding of signallers for them, that they put them through a training course. So the actual application, what what kind of background do you come from to actually sort of be successful, I guess, and and to be part of that program?

SPEAKER_01 5:54

Yeah, they go through a 12-week uh training course in-house with Network Rail, but to be honest, the essential criteria are quite limited. They will accept anybody, really, from any organization or any background. Um, they have to be uh they have to pass a safety critical test, which is key. So their reaction times have to be quick, um, things like that. And in terms of essential criteria, they need to live close to whatever depot they're applying to. Cool. So that's typically what what might cause a bit of a challenge.

SPEAKER_00 6:24

Yeah, but that's a number of applications coming through for them, if you think about that 30,000 number and and what we have to process through is quite significant for them running through. And how have we adapted as an organization to have a relationship over a decade is is is long if you're in the service industry that we are and providing those services. How have we has there been lots of internal changes or of people sort of remained in place within the organisation?

SPEAKER_01 6:53

Oh yeah, we've we've had lots of internal changes, not least now the organisation is um trying to work out how it will morph into Great British Rail as Network Rail and the train companies all come together to form Great British Rail. So all of the trials and tribulations we've gone through in the past with changes are kind of being morphed into what's coming next. So we're working closely together to try and work out what's coming next and how do we get ready to best support the teams to still continue to recruit at pace, which is what we do now.

SPEAKER_00 7:24

And feedback's always an important part, I think, of any relationship. I guess we've we've sort of built that trust with them from the way in which we can share and how how do we do that? How does that work?

SPEAKER_01 7:35

Uh it's helping our main clients deal with their internal stakeholders more than anything, I think. And we're lucky in that we're able to provide really great management information to them to justify and and confirm that we're the right choice of partner for them and that their processes and their campaigns are working.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

Yeah. And you you spoke about when we started, we we began our journey in early careers for them, and we and we then expanded our services within the volume space. Were there lessons that we learned particularly with them around kind of management of early careers hiring for them?

SPEAKER_01 8:15

Yeah, look at I mentioned earlier location for network rail is is crucial. Um, all candidates need to live within an hour's travel time of the depot that they apply to. Um, and when you're attracting candidates and screening candidates against that, that can be really problematic. And often younger applicants, particularly for apprenticeships, don't really get how long it takes to get somewhere. You know, they think they can just get on the train or whatever and get there, and actually that's not true because the train doesn't necessarily operate at the times that they need to be there and all that kind of thing. Um, so we've we've transformed how we do that and how we check that over the years, and we've taken that and we've put that into the signaller process, which wasn't there before, and that's allowed us to build up huge talent pools of signaller candidates within certain locations that we can then tap into. Um, an example of that is we had a six-month period where three assessment centres were run from candidates from the talent pool, and all offers were made from that talent pool. Previously, that would never have happened. Um, and it's because of our ability to screen on that that location and be really clear with candidates about what it is they are required to do, understand and where they where they need to live in relation to the vacancy.

SPEAKER_00 9:31

I don't live miles away from Gatwick Airport and I was kind of brought up around Gatwick Airport, and one of one of those if you obviously a massive hirer within the region and and in particular where I was, but you had to sort of understand that you were getting up pretty damn early, you know, you had to get and you needed transport to get into the airport, it's not necessarily straightforward, you're kind of like I need to park quite far away. That understanding to a candidate is quite key, it's quite crucial, and it's interesting the way in which we've sort of provided that uh and did that. Um, did we look at when uh around the data and and the way in which we sort of brought those talent pools together? Was it through was it through kind of key attraction? Did did we manage the attraction part for network rail, or was it was that sort of managed by themselves directly in terms of identification of candidates?

SPEAKER_01 10:26

Um half and half. So Network Rail manage all of their media and adverts and stuff like that. We uh host and have designed uh websites for them to supplement their careers site. Um one of those is specifically for signallers, and it was around giving the signaller candidate population the same sorts of information that you would give early careers candidates because they hadn't done that before. So that was things like what's going to happen to me during the application process, a really clear outline of what the stages are, what will happen in each stage, how they need to prepare. That that's sometimes not seen in experience higher processes, and and that has given us a big edge in terms of getting candidates to apply and having an understanding.

SPEAKER_00 11:11

Yeah. And talking talking through the apprenticeship and and that type of hiring that we initially started with them and and managed, the the flow that we talked about in terms of the 30,000 applications is is high. Do we see the same within early careers? Is it the same level of applications that flow through us?

SPEAKER_01 11:31

Absolutely. I think Signal is something like 83 to 1, graduates 85 to 1, apprentices 71, 79 to 1 application to offer. So we're dealing with about, I don't know, 40,000 candidates a year.

SPEAKER_00 11:43

Yeah, and what we've seen, we've we've I think we've spoken about it on previous podcasts. Um the applications are going up and up because of whether it's one-click applications which now allow us, is creating a lot of headache for us and organizations. Actually, a lot of new organizations that I've been speaking to are coming to me and saying, How how do I manage this? I've sort of I've had an internal process, sorry, an internal recruitment team that's been managing it. I just can't deal with the applications coming through. How do we sort of solve that, I guess, in terms of managing through what's our process and to help them?

SPEAKER_01 12:22

Yeah, and and that's hit network network real hard in the past few years because with all the global turmoil and things changing, the railway is a safe, seen as a safe um place to work. So applications just keep going up. And if I look at where we are this season compared to last, we're higher already. We've still got a way to go, but we're we're going to smash that number from last season. So a candidate will visit our microsite, which will give them information about the role and the application process. They will then apply through our ATS, which has a series of uh questions around essential criteria, which will either kick them out of the process or not, and give them some decent feedback about why why they're not suitable if that's the case. They will then go through a future potential assessment, and Network Real have got some bespoke ones that we've created specifically for their roles, particularly for their level three engineering apprenticeship, which is the mainstay of the apprentice roles. And this is the same for Signal as they go through an online test too. That then culminates in a video interview, which we use AI to score to speed the process up, then an assessment centre, and then they'll get an offer. So there's a number of steps that the candidate has to go through, but as well as that, what we offer is extra communication to the candidates as they go through. So we've got an AI pocket mentor that a candidate can speak to on their WhatsApp or text to ask questions. They can ask questions 24-7 about the process, and the AI mentor will answer that for them. Um, and we've also got some mobile enabled content that we just sent out to 8,000 people actually at the top of the funnel to say, look, this is what the application process is about. This is what you need to have to be able to apply for this role. This is what's going to happen. Read about it and then make a decision because it's it's about giving them the information to say, actually, is this right for me or not?

SPEAKER_00 14:16

And I want to talk about a couple of points that you you picked up there regarding the AI and what how we're we're utilising that as a solution for them. And I'll come, I'll come back to that, I'll jump back to that in a in a moment regarding it. But when we think about the challenges of connecting sort of both worlds in terms of early careers and then sort of more experience hiring volume, are they the same ultimately? Was it was is there much difference ultimately kind of around it?

SPEAKER_01 14:44

No, it's just it's taking uh a great process that's very candidate-friendly and and engages people and pushing candidates through that. Previously, they didn't have that for signallers. It was a very process where there was parts handed off to different parts of the business and and it just didn't flow for candidates, and that's that's changed now.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

Yeah. And but was the the integration in terms of hiring managers and the way in which they interacted with it, it was very similar, I guess, ultimately. It was quite easy for them to adopt because we were picking up processes which they'd potentially seen in the past.

SPEAKER_01 15:19

Absolutely, and they still make the final decision. We we give them a short list, they make the final decision, so they're just getting suitably qualified candidates that that meet all their criteria.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

And uh what what would you say to talent leaders, HR, listening in, even business, I guess business kind of kind of leaders or managers, it's not always connected as well in terms of the way in which you think about it. You've you've got early careers, recruitment which deals with a lot of volume applications more than ever today, and then you've got volume hiring, which isn't always connected together, but in actual fact the process is the same. I've my background, I think I've I've spoken before on on the podcast, is I'm probably more from a specialist recruitment background in terms of the way in which I worked, but within that is it was always kind of recruitment outsourcing that I was doing, and if I worked with a large retailer, and we we used have to hire for them around about 250 to 300 hires for every store that opened, significant and in in interesting areas. I just believe that we as an organization as Amberjack would do such a better job at actually doing it because where my focus often would be was kind of the headhunting that kind of approach to actually find candidates rather than kind of dealing with this kind of mass application route. And it I just don't believe HR talent sometimes always kind of joined it together in terms of look at these guys here, they're really managing early careers well, and then into volume space. I I just don't think organizations always connect it uh together. I don't know how you how you see it.

SPEAKER_01 17:01

I agree 100%, and I think I think we can add so much extra value in terms of things like diversity. We've not touched on diversity yet. I don't know how we've not touched on diversity yet.

SPEAKER_00 17:10

Go for it now, let's just talk about it, let's happen.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

So clearly, most organisations have opened their arms to allow a diverse population of candidates to apply, and that's created a bit of an issue, right? Because we've got too many people now coming in the top of the funnel. However, they still want that diversity, and using our methodology and our approach, you can you can kind of have both. So you can you can have a process that is equitable and suits everybody, experience higher or early careers, and get them through in a great way that they enjoy, but also keep that diversity percentage where you need it to be.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

Yeah, and I think it's an important point. I was talking to uh talent lead lear just this week uh regarding diversity. It was interesting. I think when the the kind of the Trump administration came in within the US, there was obviously it him cutting out or the administration trying to cut out a lot of diversity jobs within central government, which was seen to be the mandate, kind of then created a little bit of a ripple effect, yeah, kind of through kind of commercial business and their priority order around diversity, I think I think dropped a little bit to be honest with you, in in what I saw when I was speaking with them at that time, and it's really interesting, it's come back, it's it's come back as kind of being back up as a key priority. I don't know how you're seeing it with the with all the organisations we work with beyond network rail.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Oh, absolutely. I don't think it's ever really gone away. And if we take network rail as an example, you know, in your head, the railway is a man's a man's area, so it's really crucial for them that they open the doors to to female applicants and get female offers. And I'm pleased to say we've managed to do that.

SPEAKER_00 18:50

In terms of diversity stats and thinking it through, do the do network rail target us particularly around any area, or is it just really look, let's look at this talent pool, but let's analyse it effectively to see see we're just getting the best fit?

SPEAKER_01 19:05

It it's more the latter, and it's more about maintaining the percentages that come in the top of the funnel through to the through to the end so that if we have 30% of females apply, we get 30% of offers.

SPEAKER_00 19:17

Yeah, and I I think that's quite that happens quite a lot to us with with the other organizations that we work within. There, I mean there's some amazing stats out there. If you're working in financial services, there's always been that that high level of interest regarding trying to create more female applications within within that area, and I think a lot of our responsibility often of course we offer attraction services as part of our our our offering, but it's really how do you target because you've got you've got this funnel which is massive, you talk about those 30,000 applications, but is it really being as diverse as we want it to be? Yeah, um, and not just at Network Rail, but at all organisations to actually feel that, and I think that's where we come in ultimately, it's kind of our specialism to help it. I don't know how you feel.

SPEAKER_01 20:03

Yeah, absolutely. I mean there's uh two and a half thousand stations in this country, and we could have a vacancy in any of them or all of them at any particular time. Um and each location has got its own challenges in terms of the demographics of that area. So it's really important that we uh give clients help and advice about how you deal with that and how you keep your percentages equitable as people go through the process.

SPEAKER_00 20:32

Yeah, I think massive. Now we we were you were talking, you touched upon it a little bit around some of the AI that we've introduced within our solution. Um I never get through a conversation a pod in any way without kind of it coming up. But I think it's really interesting what we've uh introduced within Network RAL. So maybe we'd just let people know what we've done in terms of each of those different products and things that have happened within them because I think that's there's lots of organisations that are trying to tackle, particularly within the talent space, the HR space, well, you know, we know products are out there, but how do we actually apply them?

SPEAKER_01 21:10

So we've always um given candidates pre-assessment centre calls before they attend an assessment centre to check, they know what to expect, where to go, what to wear, answer any questions that they might be worried about. We've always made those calls. Sometimes they're not answered, and they're not answered because the candidates at work or they just don't answer the phone or whatever it might be. So it was really key for the network rail team that we we got those people so that they were ready, particularly for apprentices who are school leavers actually. They're 17, 16, 17, they need that. Um, so we've introduced the AI Pocket Mentor, which a candidate can have a conversation with in their own time, 24, it's available 24 7, and ask any questions they want to about the assessment centre and put their mind at ease. And we've seen massive uptake in that um since we introduced it. Um We've used that also across a number of other organizations where we've got a need for protected characteristic candidates to be looked after in a sort of positive action type way. And they've been identified and coaching has happened at each specific stage of the process using the AI Pocket Mentor. And we've seen great engagement rates through that. I'm just waiting for the final information on that particular campaign. But so far so good, it's looking great.

SPEAKER_00 22:29

Good. And we introduced a product in terms of screening the actual candidate in terms of the way in which we looked and we scored that individual rather than historically we had we had to do it through via human kind of capability to basically do that screening. But of course, our applications increase and we talked about that big number that's coming through, so we had to think through a solution of how we did that. Maybe just talk through a little bit how we how we did that and what the the process that follows now.

SPEAKER_01 23:00

Yeah, so um we would have a team of 30 video interview screeners who would be screening from 9 till 5, whatever time, uh, to get through the 7,000 video interview screens we had to get through. Um we're now using AI to do that, and there's some specific, really interesting things around it for me. We ask candidates if they're happy to be screened by AI. That's the first thing we do. 85% say yes, they are, which I was surprised at actually. Um so that's great, but and those that don't want to be will still be screened by our team of screeners, so that's fine. Um, where that would have taken three months to screen, that's now screened in minutes, and we're able to say to the client, there's your short list, in minutes. It's really quite revolutionary, um, and it helps them understand the state of their pipeline way quicker than it would have done otherwise. Also, we offer with this AI scoring a human wraparound in terms of how we quality assure it. Um, we're not just going to abandon a client organization to totally AI, we're gonna check it, and we've checked it, and we've checked it, and it's it's really good. It's performing almost better than some human screeners because an AI doesn't get tired, it doesn't get through 7,000 and think, oh, I'm on the 7,000 and one. It just does them all in the same. And what has been a really interesting byproduct of it is that the AI can identify when a candidate has used AI to answer the question, which we were relying on people to do before. We trained them to spot that and they did. However, the AI is is way more articulate about when and how they've used AI to answer that question.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

It was the initial um from the client from network rail were there concerns or did they were they worried about us introducing that into the overall process?

SPEAKER_01 24:51

Not in any shape or form. Like I've said, that they're really keen to try and innovate and and remove the the difficulties and the blockers in the process. And that number of applicants being human screened took took a time. You know, you could just keep throwing resources at it, but the numbers keep going up, so something had to change, and they were more than happy to trial that.

SPEAKER_00 25:10

And I think this is massive, really, for people listening. I think that when I talk to HR leaders, talent leaders about the introduction of this tool, there can sometimes be concerns, you know, regarding it, and it depends what pressure you read, which newspaper you're you're particular to, in terms of some of the headline issues that they may produce. Obviously, there's been uh problems in the past uh regarding it, and I think the aspect that you pick up on around the way in which we overlap it with the human aspect, which kind of protects checks double. So it's not just something which we introduced in when we were developing the tool and when we were working with it. Of course, we did all those checks then, but we have we have senior quality assurance checks continuously and we randomly pick out individuals to do it. And you're right, the human getting a human to score someone on a Monday morning to scoring them Friday at five o'clock, you know, is is significantly different. I know how I feel, yeah, you know, later on in the week. So it's I I I think it's it's significant and it deals with the issue you've got at the top of the funnel because people are utilising tools to make more applications regarding it, and what do you do in terms of you're an internal team? How do you cope with that and how do you manage that? And their screening mechanism is proving you know hugely successful for us. And the the figure that you pulled out, so and you know, that 85% of uh candidates are quite comfortable to actually be screened is quite significant because that was a way higher than when we were testing.

SPEAKER_01 26:48

Yeah, and that that 85% has been maintained now across all of our intakes. So it's not just a graduate thing or an apprentice thing, that that's that's just the population are getting used to it now. So that's great.

SPEAKER_00 27:01

And I think I think also uh people get concerned regarding particularly an AI bias nature or of the tool, the ways in which we protect against that in the screening process.

SPEAKER_01 27:13

So our AI looks at what the candidate says, actually, rather than looking at how they look or where their eyes are looking or what they're wearing or what's in their bedroom or you know, whatever it might be. It takes what is said, transcribes that and then compares that to the scoring guide. So it is completely aligned and very objective. Other AI models aren't necessarily doing the same thing.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

I think that's massive because as we know, that a lot of the large language models, the training which they initially had did show a preference and a bias to white males, actually. It was a kind of that was the nature of kind of what they were reading and what they were learning from, which created a huge amount of bias in very early adoptions kind of of it and created some of those horror stories. And I think the point that you're making there is is so important that we're translating this into paper basically, with the it's what the person says goes on to a piece of paper in a digital world, and basically that's that's what it's reading from. So it does it makes no difference, you know, whether you're tall, short, fat, wide, whatever, wherever you are, it it makes absolutely no difference whatsoever in terms of it's just purely your output.

SPEAKER_01 28:24

And and what it also does actually is it gives really, really very detailed notes about why it has scored what it's scored, why it hasn't scored someone a five or a six, or and that's really great to be able to share with the hiring managers and with the organisation so they can get some confidence that actually it is as good as we say.

SPEAKER_00 28:43

Yeah, and I I think we what we're seeing is this kind of the slow, not even slow, actually, that adoption rate around other clients based around what network role of you know, they're they're the early adopters actually of utilising these tools.

SPEAKER_01 28:54

Absolutely. I had a call with a a legal client last week um who's adopting it for only 200 screens, um, but nonetheless they're really excited by it because of course the legal sector is is alive now with AI and how they're using it to work on a daily basis. So that's great to see us getting that into the legal sector as well.

SPEAKER_00 29:15

Yeah, great. Let's just turn tact a little bit and just talk about volume hiring for me, um, whether it's early careers, whether it's experience hiring, the issues always can the experience, you know, and I I think that could be more it's relevant it's more relevant today than ever already around it. How how do we do that? How do we manage that and and try and make that feel can it feels looked after, I guess, in in that volume of of applications that come through?

SPEAKER_01 29:43

Making sure that they get information in a digestible format of their choice. So we communicate with them via the applicant tracking system, and that's either by email or by text. We've got the AI Pocket Mentor, which is by WhatsApp, and we've got mobile enabled content that we send out that's available 24-7. So there's a whole raft, and of course, we managed a dedicated phone line. So there's a whole raft of different ways a candidate can uh learn about the role and the application process and speak to us. So that that's the first thing. Being really clear in the application process about what you want is the second thing. And the third thing, I think, is that we we ask them how they've found the process. We've got Net Promoter School throughout our processes, and we ask candidates at each stage, how have you found this process? They score us out of ten, they give us some commentary, um, and we monitor that in a monthly review with a client and say, This is what your MPS score is saying. It's really easy for us to make changes in the moment if candidates are saying, I really don't like that question, it didn't make sense to me. We can just change it.

SPEAKER_00 30:47

I was talking um to a wealth manager, um uh head of talent and wealth manager uh the other day, and we were talking, he his biggest concern is candidate experience from the perspective of the candidate. This this was actually particularly about early careers recruitment, but the candidate that's coming through, he their parents may be uh currently their wealth be may be managed by them, and and their experience is so important to them, and equally that candidate could be a future uh client of theirs, you know, uh working through, and again that becomes so hugely important to them. So the pain point has just become so acute to him that mass applications coming through are actually resulting in sort of dollars on the table ultimately for them, and it has that actual effect through, and I think that's what organizations really need to wake up on. I'm pretty sure they probably are weight to it, but it's massive, it's such a massive thing, mate. I've spoken before on the podcast about my my son going through an application process of some great brands, but he just couldn't understand. He was trying to get a placement a year, he couldn't understand why he was getting no response, you know, back from them. Luckily, none, none managed by Amberjack. So that was good, that was good regarding it. But just couldn't understand, you know, these leading brands that you kind of look and respected upon, and he was just getting zero response. And then funnily enough, he's only got two offers, you know, when he thought all was lost, two offers at the same, you know, within an hour around it just came out of the blue, but it had none of that interaction. I think some of the tools you talked about kind of help help within that process.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

Yeah, and actually that you were talking, I've thought of more that we've got that you know, we've we've got automated keepwarm tools that that go out from our applicant tracking system, and we've got a call centre platform that will alert us if a candidate email has a certain topic. So let's say a candidate's due to go to an assessment centre, they're sending an email, it hits an inbox that's got 300 emails in it. Our call centre platform will prioritize that email and say you need to read that one now. So our campaign delivery team can get on that, deal with the client prop, deal with the candidate problem and pacify the candidate, make them feel better. So, so our SLAs, our whole our whole um ability to service the candidate is backed up by the the myriad of different tech platforms that we've got.

SPEAKER_00 33:10

And uh looking ahead and and and and flicking back to you know specifically around network rail, what's the future do you think sort of looking like? You're really engaged with the with the client and understanding what do you think the future looks like uh from them from a hiring perspective? Is it same as generally in terms of roles, how how are they feeling?

SPEAKER_01 33:33

I think it's gonna start to diversify, and as the train companies come in, they'll be looking for the leading edge innovation that that we've got with Network Rail. So once once Great British Rail becomes established, I I think the future looks very different to the future we've got to the to where we are now.

SPEAKER_00 33:50

We talked um or you talked um earlier about how you evolve, how you work with different stakeholders, and that's been a success of the partnership and and how we how we like to work. We look forward to many more years, kind of you know, we adapt, we have to work with different clients in that way, and I think that's hugely, hugely important to them. I think we've done a lot about early careers, we've done a lot around volume recruitment, but I always like to think about ending the podcast with some quick fire questions for you. So I've done this with with everyone that's attended. So you are uh you're only allowed one word. So one word um describe working with network rail.

SPEAKER_01 34:33

Fun.

SPEAKER_00 34:34

Early careers or volume hiring, which gets your heart racing more?

SPEAKER_01 34:39

Early careers.

SPEAKER_00 34:40

AI in recruitment, exciting or terrifying?

SPEAKER_01 34:43

Exciting.

SPEAKER_00 34:44

The one thing every hiring manager forgets.

SPEAKER_01 34:48

Volume's not a great thing.

SPEAKER_00 34:50

It's a good one. Tea or coffee on a campaign launch day.

SPEAKER_01 34:54

Coffee.

SPEAKER_00 34:56

Best part of the job in one word.

SPEAKER_01 34:59

My colleagues.

SPEAKER_00 35:00

CVs overrated or underrated?

SPEAKER_01 35:03

Overrated.

SPEAKER_00 35:04

And one word of advice for someone starting a career in recruitment.

SPEAKER_01 35:08

Oh. Do it.

SPEAKER_00 35:10

Good. Interesting. I have got one more question actually regarding that. Why do you consider CVs as being overrated?

SPEAKER_01 35:19

In my head, they tell you what the candidate wants to tell you, not what you need to know.

SPEAKER_00 35:24

Yeah, I agree. I think it's f it's very so difficult to get the experience across of you as an individual. You know, you're you're forever, you know. I've got many children, and and you're always thinking about what they can actually put on that CV resume to actually kind of show their experience around it. And I just don't think it gives a full picture. And that's and and the evolution of the technologies, the things that you've described ultimately uh can provide those. So that's been a great conversation. So thank you. Thank you for that, Sharon. I hope everybody enjoyed listening. Uh, the network rail story really shows something that we're really proud of at Amberjack. I think I think the fact that we started off in the early career space with them and we were able to evolve our services into the volume space, but also the ability to keep the longevity of that relationship across is credit to you, credit to the team, what they provide. And we obviously clients evolving, things are changing within what the way which they work, and I'm sure we will evolve with them. So listen, thank you everybody uh for listening. I hope you join us for the next podcast. Uh it's been a great conversation today.