Graduate Recruitment to Smaller Business: Moving from Evidence to Action Leigh Sear, SFEDI Solutions Tracy Scurry, Newcastle University Business School Laura Brammar, The Careers Group Graduates into Smaller Businesses Conference Birmingham, November 2013

The Next Hour … Introductions The Evidence – Leigh Sear and Laura Brammar Action – Group Activity and Discussion Summary and Next Steps

Setting the Scene Longstanding debate around how to increase levels of graduate employment in smaller businesses A number of recent articles and policy papers have outlined the importance of enhancing graduate employment amongst SMEs, as way of support learning and skills development But gap between the evidence base and action

Setting the Scene … when I look into graduate recruitment trends amongst small firms, the picture is less promising. The research points to a mutual lack of understanding about the benefits to both sides … But studies also find that the potential benefits and opportunities of working in small businesses exceed graduates’ expectations, particularly with regards to levels of autonomy, flexibility and input into the business. I believe this supports the case for doing more to encourage graduate employment in the SME sector (Lord Young of Graffham, 2013, p. 37/38)

Setting the Scene … the idea that small businesses will want to employ graduates is likely to be dependent on the particular circumstances of the firm … may be influenced by differing aspirations about growth … and linked into their general attitudes toward training and development. Although there has been some effort to explore how these circumstances might differ from the view of the graduate … there has been less effort to explore the perceptions of graduate recruitment in particular sectors from the perspective of specific types of SMEs (Pittaway and Thedman, 2003, p. 4).

Setting the Scene Employer Size% of graduates% of total workforce 1 to %36.6% 50 to %14.6% 250 or more44.2%48.8% Not known9.7%- Question not answered13.1%- Total100% Sources: BIS (2012) and HEFCE (2011)

Headlines and Highlights: The Demand Side Canvas A key theme within the current evidence base is the notion of a mismatch between the skills and knowledge that graduates possess and those that are required by SMEs The characteristics of the SME life-world influence perceptions of the contribution/value of graduates to business development and approaches to recruiting and developing people SMEs who are considering hiring graduates faced difficulties around recruitment as a different approach is required than that they would normally use for non-graduate recruits

Headlines and Highlights: The Supply Side Canvas Evidence indicates that graduates have unrealistic expectations about job prospects and their own employability – Within this context, there is of a need to consider the positioning of SME employment Research has shown that graduates tend to see SMEs as a back-up option, reflecting negative perceptions about pay, benefits, working conditions and opportunities for career development and progression The research suggests that graduates have limited engagement with SMEs during their time at university (e.g. programme content, placement opportunities and guest speakers)

There is a need to ensure that graduates are able to demonstrate their employability to prospective SME employers Evidence to suggest that graduates are not providing enough information when making applications, failing to articulate and emphasise their strengths and experiences to small business employers Headlines and Highlights: The Supply Side Canvas

Headlines and Highlights: The Policy Canvas Type of market failureExamples from the evidence base Information failuresDemand side – the perceived need for graduates; the perceived quality of graduates Supply-side – lack of consideration of SMEs as a graduate labour market outcome, perceived lack of status of SME employment, perceived lack of career opportunity within SMEs SME capacity constraintsResources available to recruit graduates through formal methods Resources available to support the development of graduates when in employment ‘Consumer’/’producer’ behaviours Entry points into HEIs for SMEs to working with graduates Attractiveness/value of small businesses vs. large business ‘brands’ for University Careers Services

SMEs and Graduates: Best practice and lessons for future Laura Brammar Senior Careers Consultant, Research Unit The Careers Group, University of London

12 Who are we? –The Careers Group is the largest careers service in the UK. –Work with over 200,000 students and recent graduates –Deliver careers and professional development consultancy to corporates including Cancer Research UK, Unilever, BMA, and many, many more –Research Unit informs our practice through relevant research –See or

13 What we want to know –What examples of best practice exist within SMEs who successfully recruit and develop graduates? –What more can higher education careers services do to increase the number of graduates successfully recruited and retained by SMEs?

14 Preliminary Research Question How do SME employers successfully recruit and retain graduates and how can higher education careers services help them to do it even better? –Initial stages - Semi-structured telephone interviews with 16 SME businesses so far –Various sectors- software technology firms, management consultancy, educational charities, biotechnology start-ups –Range from just 2 employees to 150 employees

15 What we heard… –‘What is crucial for us is making a speedy response to any CVs we receive that we like. We need to show that as an SME we can respond immediately. Feedback has told us that people really appreciate that. More importantly, we need to fend off the competition who won’t hang about offering the best applicants alternatives roles as they get snapped up.’ –Healthscience communications firm, 120 employees –‘We used to really waste loads of time doing traditional interviews. We’d interview lots of candidates and barely find anyone who was suitable. Instead we now use video interviewing. After pre-screening CVs we ask them to record their answers to 3-5 questions that we supply them with. Based on the video interview we then invite them in for a full interview. It has been a fantastic way of cutting time and cost for us.’ –Sales and Marketing Incubation firm, 16 employees

16 What we heard… –‘We’ve tried hard to offer a really good introduction for the graduates. They can either rotate around the technical teams or just pick one to focus on. Even better, they can change midway through so we are really flexible, much more than a larger firm would be.’ –Technology and software firm, 150 employees –‘As a really small charity we do have a problem about the amount of CPD we can offer. We can’t cater in house due to size and we equally can’t afford to send staff on expensive external courses. [We linked up with other SMEs to offer wider CPD programme] so we offered a workshop on safeguarding work with children and another charity offer some training on IT, another on Project management skills.’ –Educational charity, 2 employees

17 What we heard… –‘We really like the pre-screening done by the university as part of the (Santander) scheme, as we are a small team and need to focus on our commercial clients.’ –Biotechnology start up firm, 4 employees –‘We are small so we don’t offer a graduate scheme. Instead we prefer spontaneity as much as possible. We start new recruits working alongside more senior people on relatively easy tasks. –IT and Marketing platform firm, 14 employees –‘The second year was a bit better as we were better at understanding the deadlines for fairs etc. [as some were] much earlier than we expected so we missed out the first year. We also went to more targeted events.’ –Technology and software firm, 150 employees

18 Identified best practice –Use of technology in recruitment practices –Use of speedy and personalised responses to applicants –Use of established recruitment schemes e.g. Knowledge Transfer Partnerships –Liaison with university careers services over scheduling of events –Provision of flexible and diverse training routes –Absence of a fixed and rigid ‘scheme’ –Pooling of training and development with other SMEs

19 What we also heard –We tend to appeal to slight risk takers who are willing to look beyond the obvious, and finding them can be tricky.’ –Sustainability research and consultancy firm, 26 employees –I was worried that they would be naive and that they wouldn’t understand things. My fears though were completely unrealised and they have been excellent.’ –Management consultancy firm, 7 employees –[We’d work with another university] if we were targeted. But that targeting never happens. It hasn’t happened in 20 years.’ –Sustainability research and consultancy firm, 26 employees –‘When we need staff we need them ‘now’ not once a year which doesn’t fit with when graduates are available.’ –Recruitment website for Science, Engineering and Technology employers, 15 employees

20 Identified opportunities for improvement by HE Careers services –Emphasise enterprise/entrepreneurial aspect of SME work students and graduates. –Produce more ‘market intelligence’ aimed at SMEs outlining wider skill development of degree programmes –Proactively ‘target’ SMEs to start the connection and contact (Witty, 2013) –Provide more graduate/SME case studies emphasising effective alternatives to ‘fixed graduate schemes’ –Facilitate more research into the motivations of students and graduates (e.g. rewards, value, culture) to help SMEs complete effectively

Moving from Evidence to Action AWARENESS RAISING Storytelling Case studies EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE Enterprise education Engagement events ENGAGEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT Mentoring Recruitment portals Internships Placements SME/Graduate Champions

Moving from Evidence to Action SMALL BUSINESSES GRADUATES HE CAREER PROFESSIONALS

Moving from Evidence to Action Questions to reflect on: How can we develop a shared understanding of each other’s world? How will we know it is working? What are the professional development implications for me?