UK 
United States
RecFest 2024 was not only a blast but also provided recruitment professionals with an opportunity to learn from and listen to the real-life experiences of talent acquisition professionals. In this insight, we revisit some of our favourite sessions so you can broaden your knowledge and gain fresh perspectives.
Eploy and partners AssessFirst UK, and Eli Onboarding came together to deliver an insightful Round-Up session of essential takeaways from RecFest 2024. The webinar covers a summary of five sessions from the day, perfect for those who couldn’t make it to RecFest or those who want to review the standout moments and key insights.
If you would like to watch the full session on demand, you can do so here.
Here are the highlights from Eploy, AssessFirst UK and Eli Onboarding:
Rachel @ Eploy top picks:
'Journey with Simon Reeve’’ - Lee Gudgeon (Reed Talent Solutions) and Simon Reeve
This session gave attendees a glimpse into Simon Reeve’s life and youth. In his younger years, Simon wasn’t as successful as he is now, as an established presenter, author, journalist, and adventurer. Back then, he struggled with finding employment, until his enthusiasm and dedication helped him kickstart his career as a runner at The Times Newspaper. Simon used his personal experience to share an important message - organisations often need to take a chance on young people, who start their careers as a blank canvas, and giving them an opportunity can be life-changing.
‘’A Look Behind the Curtain (and Cushions and Throws) at Dunelm’s Connection with Talent’’ - Olivia Williams (Dunelm)
Olivia is the Employer Brand Manager at Dunelm. Her session shared valuable insights into how Dunelm managed to build a strong culture, attracting approximately 150,000 applications in a year. Olivia emphasised the importance of a careers site, as Dunelm’s newly refurbished one acts as the main channel to engage with candidates. Dunelm’s new careers site offers candidates heaps of dynamic content, which resonates with the roles they are interested in and helps them better understand Dunelm’s culture and message. A true example of candidate engagement.
Laura’s @ Assess First top picks:
‘’Rewriting Recruitment: AI, the Brain, and Inclusive Hiring Strategies’’ - Toby Heales and Jack Garriock (MeVitae)
This session offered insights into how our brain processes information and how it affects unintentional bias in the recruitment process. Toby and Jack’s talk highlighted real-life examples and encouraged the audience to share their firsthand experiences of bias in the recruitment process. Discussions like this enable organisations to find solutions to create a recruitment process free of intentional and non-intentional biases.
’Beyond the Resume: The Rise of Skills-based Recruitment’’ - Dominic Joyce (Maverick Otter), Benjamin Broomfield (HR Grapevine) and Matt Alder (The Recruiting Future Podcast)
This talk looked at skills-based hiring and why businesses shouldn’t completely rely on it. Dominic and Matt shared that this approach is not as straightforward as most would think, due to the importance of soft skills. Having hard skills is great, however with the right approach, enough enthusiasm, and the right processes and culture in place, skills related to the role can be taught, further displaying the importance of a good onboarding process.
Sarah @ Eli Onboarding top pick:
‘’New EVP, Now What? The Roadmap for a Global EVP Rollout’’ - Craig Barnett (Symphony Talent) and Dan Perkins (Sanofi)
Craig and Dan’s session concentrated on the importance of an EVP and how to take it to market. They highlighted how difficult it is to roll-out an EVP smoothly and successfully, even with a clear roadmap and a ring-fenced budget in place. These challenges often arise due to multiple stakeholders and internal policies overcomplicating the roll-out process.
This is just a small snapshot of the sessions round-up. If you would like to watch the full session on demand, view the webinar here.
For more recruitment insights:
Why not review if your careers site provides a good candidate experience from these real-life examples in our recent blog.
If you want to learn more about how Eploy’s Applicant Tracking system can streamline your recruitment processes and improve candidate experience, make sure you book a demo with our sales team.
