A fast-growing Manchester-based tech business has set itself a target of attracting 25% of its hires through staff referrals.
The CEO of AppLearn, which raised an eight-figure investment from Silicon Valley Bank and Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund 鈥� Maven Equity Finance earlier this year, is planning to create at least 60 new jobs.
Andrew Avanessian will be talking about his company鈥檚 approach at an exclusive event on June 29th entitled 鈥楾he Great Renegotiation: Is being a HR Director the hardest job in the world?鈥�
Talos360, a leading provider of recruitment technology in the UK, has teamed up with 老九品茶Cloud for the event and Avanessian will be speaking about his experiences alongside senior figures from TalkTalk, KPMG and Summize.
More than two million people across 137 countries already use AppLearn鈥檚 technology and Avanessian said they鈥檇 had to raise their game to attract the best staff.
He said: 鈥淭he combination of more vacancies than job seekers in the UK mean it’s an employee’s market.
鈥淥ur approach to that problem is to improve the employee experience in order to recruit and retain the best staff but it goes further than that.
鈥淲e want to raise engagement levels sufficiently for the team to become our recruiters – aiming for 25% of hires to be an employee referral. It鈥檚 a massive task and to do this you need to build the best employee experience.鈥�
AppLearn has recently been ranked聽15th聽in聽Best Companies’ latest league table of the聽best technology companies to work聽but Avanessian stressed this was just the beginning.
鈥淲e鈥檙e launching a mental health and wellbeing programme and adding volunteer days,鈥� he added.
鈥淭here鈥檚 also a lot more emphasis on Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) and using our own people to educate from a grassroots level rather than corporate messaging.
鈥淲e鈥檙e promoting from within and improving family leave benefits.
鈥淲hat we鈥檙e doing may be common place for larger organisations, but for our size, it’s huge – many SMEs won’t do half of what we do.
鈥淭his will help us retain, but will eventually help us recruit as people start to shout about us more and feel more confident about referring people.
鈥淚n the way that our customers are our biggest advocates, we want out employees to be our cheerleaders too.
鈥淲e are competing with household brands, and whilst, like many businesses, we鈥檝e found recruitment to be out biggest challenge post-Covid, we have never had an offer turned down and have been able to win in a difficult market.鈥�
The event on June 29th takes place at KPMG’s stunning Manchester offices and will feature a stellar panel of employers and industry experts ready to share their experiences.
Avanessian will be sharing a stage with Dean McGlone, Chief Revenue Officer at Talos360; Joanne Brien, Partner at KPMG; Darragh Lee, Head of Talent Acquisition at TalkTalk; and Ben Audley, Chief Revenue Officer at Summize.