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What does 2012 hold for you??

It’s been another busy week here at Bettingjobs.com HQ and we are busy working with our clients in anticipation of the New Year starters!  It’s amazing that a simple change of date can bring a fresh approach to the workplace and many of our clients have already initiated recruitment campaigns with 2012 in mind.  That first week back at work in January is always a busy one for any recruitment company when many candidates reflect over the festive break and decide that they are going to look at pastures new.

However the candidates that are really ahead of the game are already in touch with us and many are now involved in exciting recruitment processes that will no doubt see them starting 2012 with a fresh new challenge!  That said it’s not too late, its only mid-November and if you are considering a move in the New Year then you should really be speaking with us now, why not get in touch to see what our clients are doing and what 2012 could potentially hold for you?

Another issue that has come up more than once in the office this week is the management of candidates CV’s.  We had an instance, and unfortunately this is not unusual, where a candidate had his CV submitted to a client by another recruitment company without his consent!  I can’t stress enough the important of working with a reputable gaming recruiter (of which there are several) as failure to do so can completely wreck your chances of employment.  Unfortunately on this occasion this is exactly what happened and instead of entering into an agency dispute the client simply scrapped his application and he was left with no chance of even an interview, all thanks to a recruitment company that just happened to have an old copy of his CV on file.  What a missed opportunity for the candidate and for us as the recruitment company who followed the correct procedure as we always do.  The warning is simple – be sure you are working with a reputable recruiter who guarantees that your CV does NOT get sent out without your consent!  If they do not state this during your consultation process then make a point of saying to them that you insist on being spoken to before your CV goes to any client!

That’s just about it from me this week, always good to catch up in blog land and please do get in touch if you would like to discuss any of the points raised today.

All the best

James Fleming James@bettingjobs.com

A Real Day in the life of a Bettingjobs Consultant

Given that Will left for Sunny Dubai, before finishing his  article and I know  the suspense is killing you all, I thought I’d let you know how our day really pans out here in Bettingjobs HQ

In a nutshell, my job involves matching job seekers to vacancies with employers…. if only if it was that simple. Unlike Will, I work in our Marketing team; however I use the term “Marketing” loosely given that we recruit for all roles in all locations, except for IT.  Our clients come to us because of our knowledge and expertise and our candidates utilize our services as they know we are connected with all the relevant companies they could want to work for. It is a very consultative environment where attributes such as industry knowledge, people skills and problem solving are absolutely key. Our clients and candidates are looking for consultancies who can become trusted advisers – not just matchmakers!

I can’t really describe a typical day as the role is so diverse – and that’s what I love about it. One day I will be headhunting a CEO for a start up gaming organization in Europe and the next I will assist one of the top iGaming organizations to grow their marketing team by 5. It’s all about finding the person with the right skill set for that particular client, which can be a great challenge. In between working on our current roles I am always looking for new clients to work with. This afternoon we agreed terms with a new marketing organization that is behind some of the top UK gaming brands, not only does this give us new and challenging roles to work on, it also opens up new roles for our candidates to consider.

Whilst there are other recruitment companies focused on the iGaming industry, most haven’t been around as long as us. This year will be our 9th year in the industry and part of our success is because we value our candidates as much as our clients. Many people we have helped to find new roles 2 or 3 times and have also worked with as a client on more than one occasion.

Although we mostly work from our HQ in Glasgow, we head to London frequently to meet our clients face to face. Industry conferences and shows also take place all year round and usually we attend 4 of these. It’s always good to get away from the office and meet our candidates and clients face to face, of course the cool locations and industry parties also makes it a little easier to be away from home!! Putting a face to a name at these instantly solidifies the relationships we already have with these clients and makes for a busy few weeks in the conferences aftermath. With 2 of our consultants back from partying….I mean working in Milan today, its sure to be a busy week

Social Media or Social Madness?

Social Media or Social Madness? Part 1
When I started my recruitment career back in the early part of the 2000’s, candidate acquisition was a phrase I had never used , email was a fax machine, LinkedIn was a Rolodex and connecting with someone meant picking up the phone and calling them. So as I sit here scrolling through the 55 emails I have received today from multiple social media recruitment networks, updating me on the recent movements of the several thousand connections that I have tucked away in my laptop, I have to ask, has Social Media improved a recruiters chance to find the perfect candidate, or is it the perfect way to waste time?
In the past the activity of sourcing candidates could almost been thought of as something rather underground or almost guerrilla like, with consultants using their own private and clandestine methods and networks to seek out the best talent for each vacancy. Our time was spent constantly talking to the people working within our respective markets, listening to the gossip and taking every opportunity possible to meet with potential contacts. These activities gave you the opportunity to build a reputation throughout the industry with both clients and candidates as a recruiter with a deep knowledge and strong personal network. This reputation and knowledge would be an essential part of a recruiter’s ability to build a successful recruitment desk whilst fending off the ever growing number new recruitment consultants joining the market. How then do we incorporate the ever growing social media and online professional networks which are changing the landscape of recruiting by removing the personal approach of phone calls and meetings, with the voiceless, faceless approach of instant message and mass email communication?
In reality this is something that every consultant is going to have to deal with in the near future as more and more candidates start to use these sites to find new opportunities, whilst clients start to uses them to source, attract and engage new staff members. Personally the thought of using social networks to attract or find candidates has been a new development for me and one I have really taken to, not because I am sure it is the best way to find that 1 in a million candidate but because I have always been a firm believer of moving with the times. LinkedIn, Twitter, Face book, Beknown, Bullhorn, etc …. are but a few of the new “times” being created that allows me to keep in touch with you and for you to see what new opportunities are out there.
Bettngjobs.com has recently joined these new times’ with the launch of our updated website ( I hope you like it), focusing on establishing ourselves as social networking gurus, working towards communicating with as many new candidates and clients whilst still trying to retain our old fashioned values of speaking to people on the phone and of course meeting everyone when we can. I will be sharing our progress over the next couple of months so stayed tuned.
I’m off on my holidays to Cuba now for a couple of weeks but I will update you on the social media experiment upon my return!
Jamie Walsh, Senior Consultant, Bettingjobs Malta

A Day in the Life of a Recruitment Consultant (Part 1!)

I wanted to give you an insight into the standard day of a recruitment consultant, well one at BettingJobs in any case. It may not be fully what you expected!

Having arrived in the office at 8.30am, first task is to check the BBC Sport page, sorry I mean first task is to check all emails that have arrived overnight! Joking aside, emails are checked on Iphone as soon as my eyes are open, convinced smart phone addiction will be a recognised medical condition in a couple of years…

Having checked the sport pages I set about planning the day ahead. The actual day to day tasks of a recruitment consultant don’t vary hugely; the only difference is how you prioritise them. Each day I ask myself what do I need to do and when do I need to do it…

It goes without saying that you prioritise matters that have a time restraint and need actioned immediately.

At the moment I am working with a US based client and having received interview confirmations overnight, I decide my first task will be to contact the candidates and pass on the relevant information. Tick box.

The next priority is to follow up with a client who conducted a few interviews yesterday through candidates supplied by BettingJobs. I am the lead client contact on this account, which basically means I need to do all the client contact work for my lazy colleagues! I can understand why clients request this, it must make their life easier but it sure adds to the work of the poor consultant who needs to do all the work on everyone’s behalf! Thankfully the client is quite pleased with the interviews and progresses with 2 of the 3 candidates. I inform my colleagues who contact the candidates and begin the process of arranging second interviews….

Next I move on to where recruitment consultants actually prove their worth, identifying suitable profiles for our client requirements. Personally I work on the technology team, our client requirements tend to be very niche and it is a labour intensive task to work through our network to try and find someone who may be at least open to discussing new job opportunities. I don’t think our clients really appreciate how much effort goes in to finding a software developer with specific experience of developing a poker product!   Trust me, it can take days, weeks even, if it is a particular skill set. For me, this is the dull part of the job, but as I said, I understand this is why clients will use an agency and I guess ultimately how they internally justify paying the invoices! There can’t be anything more important to any organisation than the staff you choose to hire, we take pride in the part we play in that process. Thankfully we have a great knowledge of the industry and use those insights to try and narrow the search to where we could find suitable candidates, always being aware of the fact we can’t headhunt from our existing clients!

So how do we find candidates? Well there is no silver bullet; the honest answer is hard work and persistence. However that alone isn’t enough, we need to have the knowledge of how to identify suitable profiles, how to entice them to have an initial discussion and then finally to ensure that there is a match between their expectations and those of the client. That is just the beginning of the process and when it involves relocation, it can, understandably, take some time for candidates to decide to move forward. The ability to do this only comes through experience and knowledge of both recruitment and the igaming industry generally, thankfully there is enough old heads in the BettingJobs office who have been around iGaming for a long time now.

Having spent a few hours resourcing, I only have 30 minutes before lunch so I spend that time working with a junior colleague who has just joined the team. There is a definite skill to training and it’s as much of a learning curve for me as it is for the new consultant! To be fair, the training is more “on the job” as this is the quickest and most effective way to learn. Recruitment is more of a mindset that anything else and that is what I try to constantly convey. You definitely need a passion for finding that perfect match and a unique ability to manage the process to a successful conclusion, a 6^th sense is a prerequisite!

That brings me up to lunch at 1pm and the end of part 1!

Relocation Guide

Relocation is a life changing decision to make and it involves considering many factors.

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