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New to Market

25 April 2025
Construction & property, Graduates/Apprentices/School leavers

National student lettings agency launches apprenticeship scheme

In a bid to support young people and grow skilled and knowledgeable individuals for the student lettings sector, loc8me recently launched its 18-month programme, which is open to anyone aged 16-18. The scheme will offer hands-on experience, mentorship and the opportunity to engage in paid work.

Raffaele Russo, founder of loc8me, said: “We’re thrilled to launch this apprenticeship programme, giving young professionals a real chance to learn, grow and begin building a career in an exciting industry.

“Now more than ever, young people are seeking opportunities, guidance and goals to pursue. With this programme, we’re investing in their future – and in the future of the lettings sector.”

Apprentices will have the chance to study the theoretical and practical elements of the lettings industry, and on starting, they will be given a mentor from the loc8me team to support their development via regular meetings throughout the course.

loc8me now operates in 13 major university cities across the UK, including Loughborough, Durham, Nottingham, Manchester, Leeds, Cardiff, Newcastle, Birmingham, Liverpool, Leicester, Hull, Bath and Bristol.

Freya Watson-Russo, academy co-ordinator, said: "At loc8me, we’re committed to nurturing the next generation of letting agents. … We’re giving young people the chance to build a future, gain confidence and carve their own path.”

Founded in 2008 by Russo, loc8me manages more than 2,500 properties and employs more than 75 staff members.

(L-r) Apprentice Ollie Coe, loc8me's marketing assistant and academy co-ordinator Freya Watson-Russo and apprentice Isabel Tebbutt ©loc8me

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14 April 2025
Creative/Digital/Media, Engineering

NEW TO THE MARKET: 14-18 APRIL 2025

• Manufacturing and engineering specialist Busy Bee Recruitment has relaunched its website. The refreshed online platform has a modern design and enhanced user functionality, offering an intuitive browsing experience that makes it easier than ever to explore current vacancies, submit CVs quickly and securely, access expert recruitment advice via a blog and submit vacancies directly online.

• Deel, a global payroll and HR provider, has launched a suite of AI-driven products to help companies hire, manage, and pay international teams. Deel will offer an all-in-one global workforce platform integrating payroll, HR, and IT, designed to support compliant operations across borders. Key updates include: Real-Time Payroll in over 53 markets (expanding to 130+ by 2027), offering instant calculations and faster processing; Deel PEO for offering top-tier benefits without enterprise-level costs; Benefits Admin for simplified, compliant benefits management across countries; Deel Talent for streamlined recruitment via trusted agency networks; Workforce Planning, Compensation, and Engage tools – powered by AI – for smarter headcount strategy, global pay management, and employee development; IT Lifecycle Management features like MDM, IAM, and EPP, supporting global device and security control.

11 April 2025
Creative/Digital/Media, IT/Telecoms

Spotted Zebra merges Interview Intelligence and Assessment in one platform

This is technology that transcribes, analyses and evaluates conversations through an AI-powered lens. The merger connects assessment results with interview data, addressing the growing challenge enterprise talent leaders face: making confident, objective hiring decisions when candidate information can be fragmented across multiple tools.

In a statement, Spotted Zebra says that enterprise talent acquisition teams are facing twin pressures from AI-generated candidate applications and deepening skills shortages. 

The launch responds to a critical market challenge, the statement continues; while more than three in four businesses report widening skills gaps, employers are inundated with applications with around half of all jobseekers using AI tools to apply for roles. Current solutions force companies to choose between expensive, disconnected systems or compromise on either assessment breadth and depth, or a scalable interview process and structure.

“We’ve integrated Interview Intelligence with Assessment because our enterprise customers are facing unprecedented challenges in talent acquisition,” said Ian Monk, co-founder and CEO of Spotted Zebra. “By unifying these previously siloed technologies, we’re enabling talent teams to make data-informed decisions based on a complete picture of each candidate’s capabilities.”

Unlike standard Interview Intelligence tools that primarily transcribe conversations, Spotted Zebra’s implementation establishes a data framework that truly connects skill measurements across different evaluation methods:

  • Real-time skill evidence mapping: Comprehensive role skills profiles are automatically created thanks to AI-powered intake meetings between recruiters and hiring managers. 
  • AI-assisted interview questioning technology: The AI-powered Interview Guides automatically generate targeted question paths for specific role skills profiles and each candidate.
  • Consolidated hiring evidence dashboard: The Decision Kit combines summarised skill data from both assessment scores and interview evidence, weighting each source appropriately based on predictive validity for specific skill types. 

According to the company statement, AI in Spotted Zebra enhances human decision-making, ensuring the final call on a candidate’s suitability for a role is objective, data-backed and always in the hands of the hiring team.

Headquartered in the UK, Spotted Zebra was launched in 2020 by Monk and co-founder and chief commercial officer Nick Shaw.

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10 April 2025
Creative/Digital/Media, Executive search

NEW TO THE MARKET: 7-11 APRIL 2025

• UK recruitment firm HRGO has launched ‘Betty’, an AI agent tackling recruitment ghosting by ensuring all job applicants receive feedback. Since its December 2024 launch, Betty has provided personalised insights to over 40,000 candidates. A survey of 1,000 users found 90% valued the feedback, addressing a major frustration in the hiring process at scale. Betty was named after Elizabeth ‘Betty’ Parkinson, the founder of HRGO back in 1957.

• Recruitment firm Sowena Group has moved into new headquarters in Manchester city centre. Perran Cooke launched Sowena Group last summer after more than a decade in the recruitment industry, including roles as regional MD for the North at executive search company PSD Group and as a director at Axon Moore. Sowena now has a team of five and has taken office space at The Tootal Buildings on Oxford Street. The company statement says Sowena Group is expected to deliver more than £650k in revenue this year.

Senior recruitment consultants Dave Kreitz and Mackenzie Harrop have joined Sowena in recent weeks, along with Leah Allen as head of marketing and Megan Buckley as marketing executive. Cooke said he expects the team to grow to 10 by the end of this year, creating roles for recruitment consultants, back office and support staff, market research specialists and a non-executive director. Sowena Group focuses on senior finance posts in high-growth and private equity and venture capital-backed businesses across the North-West and beyond.

18 February 2019
Oil & gas/Energy, Engineering, Executive search, Accounting/Finance

NEW TO THE MARKET: 18-22 FEBRUARY 2019

• Renewable energy staffing specialist Cathcart Energy has launched an office in Copenhagen. Nanna Bendixen has also been appointed as a new consultant, taking over responsibility of the company’s existing accounts in Denmark, and will lead the team in adding new clients to their growing portfolio.

• Global recruitment and consulting specialist Ignata has launched Ignata Actuarial & Investments, a specialist division recruiting insurers, pension funds and asset managers. The division is led by directors Peter Knowles and James Craven.

• Online recruitment referral platform Real Links has launched. The platform provides employee-generated referrals by tapping into the social and professional network connections of existing employees.

12 February 2019
IT/Telecoms

Start-up of the Month: TT Tech Solutions

Thakrar, who previously headed up the technology and financial systems division at former Apprentice winner Ricky Martin’s recruitment business Hyper Recruitment Solutions, told Recruiter working with Lord Sugar and Martin had given her the confidence to launch her own business.

“My network, my background, my eight years in recruitment have really given me a solid reputation in the space I recruit within.”

Looking ahead, Thakrar added she was uncertain whether she would seek external investment to aid expansion of her Thurrock-based business.

“I think I can call on my own savings to make sure I can keep all of the business, but I want it to grow so I would [look again] this time next year. I would love us to be based in London, somewhere in the Liverpool Street area… and have a solid team of about 10.

“We’re not massive but I really want to partner with organisations – to be an arm of their business. I want us to be onsite if we can at places and at organisations, and try and work with brands that are where we are – small brands that are growing, expanding and who really want to make a name for themselves in their markets as well.”

12 February 2019

Joining the dots: Exploiting big data to find talent

Video-interviewing, gamification, artificial intelligence (AI) and predictive analytics are all changing the face of recruiting. The HireVue recruitment platform, previously best known for video-interviewing, acquired predictive hiring and talent analytics platform MindX last year and is one of the first platforms to unite these technologies. So how are they combining to help recruiters make better hires?

Really big data

The value of big data has been espoused for many years but it is only now that its true magnitude is being fully exploited in recruitment, with platforms having had several years to collect and analyse information. HireVue draws on data from more than 9m on-demand interviews and is on track to collect them at a rate of 4m interviews per year. It also holds large amounts of data on gameplay behaviour and performance. It has used this as the backbone for a platform that uses AI to identify the definitive traits in top performers. Candidates can then be assessed against these through their own gameplay and video interview, which are undertaken on the same platform.

Predictive hiring

The game-based challenges are designed to evaluate cognitive traits such as problem-solving, mental flexibility, learning agility, attention span, creativity and quantitative aptitude. The platform can be customised but HireVue has recently launched pre-built assessments for specific roles and job-related competencies. Currently, they are available for call centre service representatives, sales reps, retail associates and software developers, and feature a combination of video questions, games-based challenges and coding challenges for technical roles. “We aim to predict whether a person will have the right cognitive ability and thinking style to learn and adapt in a role,” explains Dr Nathan Mondragon, chief industrial and organisational psychologist at HireVue.

Can algorithms be trusted?

Platforms such as HireVue introduce a high level of automation into the recruitment process but are recruiters ready to trust AI to identify talent? Mondragon doesn’t believe the industry has crossed this “digital divide” yet: “We need to show that algorithms from a research perspective are more trustworthy than human judgement.” Unilever is one of HireVue’s clients and has used the platform to filter up to 80% of the candidate pool. Its criteria was to ensure that its process felt “human not robotic” and had to be “better and more efficient” at selecting candidates than an in-person interview. The system has helped reduce time-to-hire by 90%, increase new hire diversity by 16% and deliver £1m in savings.

What about bias?

Algorithms are unambiguous and don’t have grey areas so, in theory, can reduce bias in the recruitment process. They are based on human data, and so are fallible. Mondragon says it is important for developers to continually run manual and automated tests on software. HireVue regularly checks for bias in race, gender, age, culture and disability, as well as other areas that might be relevant to different countries. “For instance, our tools can identify and remove a datapoint that might be causing a male or female difference,” he says, adding that constant checks are important as the bias can return. The algorithms also understand that there can be traditional differences in how a person performs on certain exercises.

Change management

Bringing more predictive technologies into the recruitment process and shifting towards more to data-driven decision-making requires culture change. Mondragon believes it should be accompanied by a change management initiative. The message, says HireVue, is that it is “teamwork” between the algorithms and the recruiters that makes the decision. “Customers use the score to facilitate human judgement,” he says. “We want to stop them making a bad decision.”

WHAT DO ALGORITHMS DO IN RECRUITMENT?

Algorithms provide recruitment platforms with a scientific and step-by-step set of rules to follow to solve a problem, which typically in a recruitment context is to find the right candidate.

11 February 2019
Public sector, Construction & property, IT/Telecoms

NEW TO THE MARKET: 11-15 FEBRUARY 2019

• US-based tech talent acquisition platform AmazingHiring has launched an AI-sourcing solution based on machine learning algorithms to enable users to find the right candidates more quickly. The solution allows users to choose the core skill or specialisation from a list and the AI technology will do the rest.

• Cambridge-based learning technology company Coracle Inside, which already provides its Digital Learning Platform to offenders in prison, has partnered with recruitment tech specialist Highr to create an online jobs board designed specifically to connect ex-offenders with job vacancies likely to be open to people with criminal records.

The Coracle Inside Jobs Board offers 200 jobs each week in London and up to 1,000 nationally at launch, with expansion plans to advertise more than 3,000 vacancies around the country before the end of the year. Jobs advertised on Coracle’s Jobs Board are generally semi-skilled roles in high-demand industries including construction, warehousing, social care and hospitality.

Vacancies in companies, which have signed up to the government-backed ‘Ban The Box’ and ‘Clean Sheet’ schemes designed to eliminate recruitment discrimination against ex-offenders, will be given prominence on the new jobs board. Coracle Inside has also built an algorithm to bring up additional vacancies in sectors known to be short of staff and looking to fill vacancies.

• Professional network LinkedIn is moving talent tools – Jobs, Recruiter and Pipeline Builder – onto a single platform. The move means recruiters will be able to see all their candidates, from whichever LinkedIn tool they’re coming from, in one unified pipeline.

LinkedIn added it is releasing more than 15 new product enhancements for LinkedIn Recruiter and Jobs over the next few quarters. New features include helping recruiters and their teams collaborate better, helping them to be more productive and providing them with smarter results.

• Property recruiter Lloyd May has launched property tech staffing specialist LMRE. Led by director Bradley Bartlett, LMRE’s core areas of focus will be within strategy & innovation, product development, software development and business development & marketing.

• Software provider O.C. Tanner has launched a culture assessment service, which aims to enable organisations to quickly and easily assess their workplace culture.

The culture assessment service, which can replace or complement employee engagement surveys, uses methodology to provide measurement, in-depth analysis and actionable recommendations so that organisations can build inspiring workplace cultures. It focuses on the six key elements of purpose, opportunity, success, appreciation, wellbeing and leadership which, following global research with 10,000 employees, O.C. Tanner discovered to be the building blocks of organisational culture.

• Midlands-based recruitment specialist SF Group has vowed to ditch all single-use plastic and turn to a more sustainable material – bamboo. SF Group has made the pledge as it launches its new name, brand and values this month.

Now known as SF Recruitment, the agency, which has offices in Birmingham, Leicester and Nottingham, has chosen bamboo to represent the values a recruiter needs to be successful and its drive to replace a wide variety of plastics being used throughout the business. The new tagline for SF Recruitment is ‘a natural fit’ – chosen to highlight the business’s philosophy on finding the perfect match between people and companies.

Recruiter Magazine

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