Strivin & Thrivin

“People don't want to be sold to, you've really got to set yourself apart, build a brand and back yourself. But also just deliver and in order to deliver, you need to be resourceful and change up your messaging, be authentic and just be yourself and try to make a difference.”

This week on Strivin & Thrivin we chat to Secure Code Warrior’s Global Head of Talent, Nathan Reese. When it comes to scaling your team fast and gearing for growth, Nathan’s your guy… His track record includes helping Domain.com hire over 150 engineers in 18 months and growing head count at Ansarada from 100 to over 220 people too. Same same at Secure Code Warrior: where Nathan helped the team scale from 90-odd people to over 200 in 12 months.

A big part of the beauty of Nathan’s career, though, is the journey itself.  He didn’t start his career in recruitment, actually.  Instead, he started in sales, then moved into the agency side of recruitment. From there, he moved into internal talent acquisition and today he even owns a swag shop - this is probably why he has such an interest in personal brand…

“I would say the biggest thing for recruiters is branding. When you have that brand and that authentic-ness to help your recruitment teams deliver, people are going to come back to you. So I think your branding is very, very important, and in order to have a successful brand, you obviously need to deliver. And in order to deliver, you need to be resourceful, you need to have tenacity, you need to be constantly pounding the pavement.”

To hear more about Nathan’s career, key learnings and how he went from a sales person to some with a swag store as his side hustle (while helping businesses scale rapidly too), listen to this latest episode of Strivin & Thrivin.

On the podcast this week Laura and Tim catch up with Jo McCatty, Founder of Protoscience, a global career coaching business specialising in STEM and Life Science. Jo is also part-time Head of Talent for Invisible Partners and hosts her own podcast in her spare time.

Like many postgraduates, Jo went travelling after university and settled in London with the intention of pursuing her science degree to a career in pharmaceuticals. When presented with an opportunity Jo didn’t hesitate to take it up and hasn’t looked back since.

“It seems, I found people more interesting!” she says.

Though, while her career moved away from the sciences, she’s remained an advocate for it and woven it back into her career today. In this episode, we take a trip down memory lane to reflect on her career in recruitment and how the industry has served her over the years. Having worked in all corners of recruitment, Jo’s insight is broad and invaluable and we gauge how she believes success in this field comes with passion.

“You have to love the idea of helping someone find their next opportunity.”

Talking us through the key differentials between internal, agency and executive recruitment, we segway into Jo’s experience as a career coaches and the impact they can have on career success.

Jo is someone who champions career coaching having eased herself into it over the years, working it in around her full-time job before seeing an opportunity to make more of it, particularly in the STEM fields. Jo sees coaching as “a side passion project that becomes something that you want to do more of,” and has used her podcast to give voices to those within the STEM community and highlight opportunities and prospects for those pursuing careers in these fields.

“Good coaches, they meet you where you are and they give you what you need without you knowing what that is”

This week’s podcast is great for anyone considering a coach, mentor or STEM career. Jo shares fascinating insight into how she juggles parenthood, a startup, a podcast and a part-time job and it’s an inspiring listen!

Listen to the latest Strivin & Thrivin episode now!

Jeff Waldman, Founder of ScaleHR joins us on the Strivin & Thrivin podcast this week, to discuss the career journey that got him to where he is today.

With over 20 years in the HR industry, Jeff has an HR background that started in business and so has always had a business-orientated mindset. As it stands, Jeff is currently the Founder, Principal of a new company called ScaleHR, a company that works with growing small-medium businesses to help them scale their people operations and brand awareness.

Jeff isn’t someone who fell into HR or recruitment but rather he pursued it early doors when studying for his business degree. The strategies involved in developing effective workforces and driving good business results is what pulled him in. Retrospectively speaking, he believes his career trajectory hasn’t been based on titles and salary, but rather on the role and responsibilities.

“Don't chase money because money will come later on, chase the opportunity”

As we dive into Jeff’s career history, he shares his best and worst moments, encouraging listeners to trust their gut instincts and find companies and environments in which they can thrive. Now working for himself we discuss the importance of structure, staying abreast of everything in your industry and filtering out what’s applicable and relevant to you and your role.

In the HR industry, things are changing constantly and outdated information can quickly become conflicting with new information. As we learn more about this and the importance of maintaining good relationships with lawyers as you work hand-in-hand so often in HR, we get a great understanding of Jeff’s professional approach to work.

During this recording, Jeff shares his approach to mentoring, having been a mentor to others for a few years now, and how he aspires to lead his mentees to the best outcomes. We learn how a strategic approach to being a mentor helps drive the best results and how rewarding it is for both mentee and mentor.

Listen to all this and steal Jeff’s recommended reading list on this week’s Strivin & Thrivin podcast!

Welcome to the latest episode of Strivin & Thrivin, the career development podcast inspiring you to make some bold changes.

During this week’s episode, we chat with CEO and Founder of BoB Group - Meahan Callaghan.

Meahan founded BoB in 2016 in a bid to help HR people build successful careers and successful workplaces. During this podcast, we explore the similarities between customers and employees and what Meahan learnt during her stint as Chief People Officer at Afterpay, the shop now, pay later platform, as well as covering her time as ChiefCustomer and People Officer at Message Media. On reflection, she explains how Brene Brown’s definition of vulnerability helped her approach the challenges associated with Covid-19 and remain aligned with the leadership teams she collaborates with.

Enjoy our latest episode and be sure to sign up to Strivin & Thrivin for more career insights, mentorships and learning materials!

This week on Strivin and Thrivin we chat to Kristin O’Brien, a Senior People and Culture Leader specialising in Org Design and Business Transformation. She runs her own firm, KOB Consulting based in Melbourne, Australia to help structure companies in order to deliver growth.

Kristin has been exposed to businesses at every stage of their development and success, and she’s no stranger to redundancy, jumping back into education or relocating for work.

During our thirty-minute episode, Kristin discusses what an Org Design consultant is, pulling the strings across the business to ensure that the right talent across all sectors of the business aligns in order to bring the business’ operating model to life.

Having spent a big chunk of her career in corporate HR, Kristin has extensive experience working in international markets both for small startups and well-established companies and even businesses in decline. It’s this varied experience upon which she credits her understanding of how org structure impacts business success.

“My whole career, I guess I've gone for breadth rather than depth which I think has served me pretty well,” she tells us.

These days, while running her own consulting business, overseeing a portfolio of companies, Kristin enjoys meditation to start her days on the right foot, she’s learned to frame what’s important and worthy of stress and energy, without beating herself on things out of her control.

We cover everything from the reality of launching a startup, including the highs and lows and when to make the decision to step back. The career lessons Kristin has learned along the way are ones we all wish we knew as she shares what advice her younger self wishes she had known.

To listen to Kristin’s podcast where she shares some persona experiences and her greatest learnings over the years, download the latest episode of Strivin & Thrivin now!

“When you do combine your strengths and your values, you will be happier, more productive, you'll have a better sense of wellbeing”

During this episode of Strivin & Thrivin we talk candidly with Angella Clarke-Jervoise, Associate Director of Global Talent at EY.

Angella has been at EY for the past 25 years, having filled eight different positions within the company, though mainly around recruitment, after being attracted to the idea of working for a large international company. Like many, she fell into recruitment yet found herself in a number of unhappy positions at various companies early on.

It was during this period that Angella found herself confronting the issues she had at work, learning to be honest with herself and accepting that she needed a complete overhaul to find what was right for her. She’s someone who has taken to coaching and mentoring keenly, acting as a coach for others as well as having her own coach to guide her.

“I like to liken coaching with: we're together side by side, on a path in the dark and I'm holding the torch. You're taking the steps, I'm just holding the torch in the direction you want to walk.”

When sharing her three most important lessons learnt in the workplace, the standout one for her was acceptance.

“I wish I'd accepted that who I am is enough. I would have saved a lot of stress and angst and frustration,“ she tells us.

Angella helps us reframe how we think about ourselves professionally and playing to our strengths. Not only does this make a happier, more positive workforce, but it encourages people to double down on their strengths and build out from there.

Enjoy this emotional and inspirational podcast of Angella’s career and life lessons as she shares her learnings on how to be more receptive to other peoples feelings, her honest struggle of relocating for work and building and putting a greater focus on self care.

“Whatever you do in your career, you've got to have a real passion and energy around it”

Another week means another great podcast and this week we caught up with Lyndsey Devitt, People and Culture Director.

Having started her career as an accountant, Lynsey isn’t averse to high-pressure jobs. We quickly get into her career changes, learning her strengths, namely her ability to spot great talent and build effective teams.

Lynsey’s worked with a variety of organisations from startups to retail businesses, banks and educational institutions, expanding her breadth of HR exposure in different industries and learning to adapt to different company cultures and strategies. Her varied career has allowed her the opportunity to learn from a variety of leaders. It’s these informal mentors that Lynsey believes she has learnt most from, carving out leadership personas from what she has seen be effective and otherwise.

Lynsey moved into HR not for the people aspect, but for complexity that comes with working with people and establishing a people strategy that ensures the best business performance. She shares her belief that the most effective HR professionals are those who really take the time to understand how the business works, the complexity of its goals and objectives and to never assume all HR roles work the same.

“I have always been interested in businesses and how organizations operate. I think coming into the business world from an accounting standpoint, whilst it gives you a great foundation, what it taught me pretty quickly was that my passion lies much more in dealing with people-related matters and getting the best out of businesses from a people perspective,” says Lynsey.

To hear more of Lynsey’s experiences, her advice to new HR professionals and how to instill a thriving company culture in a startup environment, listen to the latest episode of Strivin & Thrivin now!

This week on Strivin & Thrivin we chat to Caitlin Fairchild, Head of Global Talent Acquisition at Xplor.

Caitlin is recruitment through and through, having started down her career path ten years ago upon her move from the States to Down Under straight out of university. She’s stuck with it ever since, becoming more impassioned with it as time went on.

Caitlin started in a fairly narrow recruitment role, but joining a startup during the early stages, she quickly broadened her skillset and added more strings to her bow, moving into the wider ‘people’ function at a pace.

“I don't think I'll ever fully detach from talent, I always just want talent to be a huge part of what I do,” she tells us.

In a fascinating turn, Caitlin explains how she’s naturally an introverted person and how her training and development in the workplace has helped her leverage the strengths of being an introvert and succeed in a naturally extroverted industry. We take a deeper dive into the qualities of introvert and extroverts within the recruitment and HR space and how each lends itself to great outcomes.

Now working in technology recruitment, Caitlin explains why it’s such an in-demand sector of late and what the qualities of a good tech recruiter are. The industry has become a community for software engineers and development professionals and having an understanding of it is invaluable as a recruiter. Caitlin highlights the importance of having a firm understanding of the industry you’re operating in, the people who are passionate about it and the skills necessary to successfully recruit the right talent.

Caitlin’s career has proven to be linear and rewarding in a short space of time. It’s interesting to hear her reflect so fondly on the last ten years and her successes.

To hear more about Caitlin’s experience, from setting up the Melbourne Recruitment Meetup to network with like-minded individuals, to her aspirations as a young girl, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

“I think every day is a learning day”

This week on Strivin & Thrivin we get to know Lauren Sharp, Director at Sharp People and Co-Host of the TaPod Podcast, for which her early career as a Cabin Manager at Ansett prepared her well for.

Sharp People was founded by Lauren and is a recruitment company focusing on the information, technology and communication industries in Australia. Sharp People focuses on talent acquisition, stressing the importance of a positive rapport with each recruit, something Lauren believes is typically lost via recruitment agencies.

Lauren shares her career experiences from starting out at Ansett as an Air Hostess where she channelled her love for travel and exploration, before moving into a recruitment agency and eventually setting in-house as a recruiter for technology companies, where her passion lies.

We get a feel for what that has been like for Lauren’s progression as she had to learn the world of computer software and recruitment at the same time, but found herself flourishing in the industry and eventually set up Sharp People as a side hustle. Like many others, Lauren was hit by the Coronavirus impact and soon found herself making a real go of it with Sharp People, to much success.

Like everyone else, Lauren is adjusting to a “new normal” post COVID, and the time to recalibrate has allowed her to focus on doing more of what she loves. So she bought a puppy, cranked up her own business efforts and set up TaPod with her Co-Host Craig Watson, a passion project for the two of them. On TaPod, they chat all things Talent Acquisition with TA leaders, Industry suppliers and agency representatives.

This Strivin & Thrivin podcast is a great episode about self-belief, investing in yourself and owning your career goals. Believe it or not, Lauren still finds the time to go to the gym, walk the dog, have a social life while working six days a week and most importantly, she loves it.

Listen to the latest episode now!

This week on Strivin & Thrivin, we catch up with Craig Watson, Director and Founder of Recstra, the platform for HR specialists looking for more flexible working hours. Recstra allows you to choose the hours you work while saving companies on excessive recruitment fees.

Craig tells us, from a young age he knew his talents lay in accounting and economics so, naturally, he concluded he’d grow up to be a “Super Accountant”. With the nudge from his mum, he trained to be a teacher, leaning on his personable skills and people qualities.

Today Craig is a family man who has established a successful career in recruitment. While his day job is at Recstra he also co-hosts Tapod, a podcast about talent acquisition. During his downtime, he catches up with family and spends his weekends being a surf lifesaver.

“I stumbled and stumbled and stumbled along for many, many years,” Craig tells us as he recalls his career journey and the defining moments in which he was able to identify that his strengths lay in working with people.

We broach the topic of in-house versus agency, during which Craig highlights the major pitfall of agencies is the race to fill seats rather than source a quality hire.

“This race to the bottom, it's all about who can fill the role quickest because the quickest person gets paid. So it affects quality and there's this pressure by agency owners for people to get the job done”.

We establish that to Craig, the importance of recruitment is being able to add value and finding the right people in order to do so. This means understanding each recruit and being more approachable.

“If people are more comfortable with you, they're more authentic”.

But this is only the tip of the iceberg. During our conversations, we cover everything from diversity to the impact COVID-19 has had on the talent pool. Listen to hear more from Craig on switching careers and taking the plunge on new projects. 

Available now on Strivin & Thrivin!