Today, Laura Johnson is joined by Andew Sully, Co-Founder & Co-CEO at Talenza.

Andrew is an experienced recruiter and business leader with an entrepreneurial attitude that has got him to where he is today. Championing change and going against the grain, Andrew explains how a rich career, working across multiple industries, has allowed him to perfect his customer service-centric business model.

Andrew’s proactive, entrepreneurial flair was clear from his time at university, 20 years ago. Identifying an opportunity, Andrew and a friend set up a painting and decorating business to assist their landlord while they were at university. This is where Andrew’s entrepreneurial drive and ability to evolve in the professional world began.

Andrew’s natural confidence with people led him to consider a range of careers from the police force to sales. Moving from Newport, Wales to Australia, Andrew secured a position at recruitment agency, SThree. Here, he was thrown in head first and exposed to invaluable experience, learning as he went along. As his time working at SThree drew to a close, Andrew admits that he knew he had to do something for himself, having learnt from the good, the bad and the ugly at this global business.

“They just lost their way around customer experience and what made them successful in the first place. They just didn't change and pivot the business model enough.”

Andrew is a firm believer of evolving in business, continually stressing the importance of learning and growing. Rejecting the notion that revenue should prevent internal evaluation, he explains how he has learnt to prioritise customer satisfaction in order to help his own business, Talenza, thrive.

Setting up Talenza in 2016, Andrew pledged to place customer satisfaction, teamwork and values at the center of his business model. Andrew candidly explains how he was forced to reevaluate and analyse whether Talenza was staying true to these values when Covid-19 hit. Adopting a refreshingly optimistic take, he admits that this crisis allowed him to pivot and evolve.

“If you're not learning, and you're not growing and you're not driving some sort of change in yourself, then you'll never stay at the top of the game.”

To hear more from Andrew, including how he manages to escape from work, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

This week on Strivin & Thrivin, we speak with Rebecca Powell, People and Culture Director.

Rebecca is a hands-on People and Culture Director with experience spanning from working in Australia’s biggest corporate bookmaker, SportsBet, to start-up companies. Discussing the unexpected twists and turns of her career journey, Rebecca reveals the lessons she has learnt and how she has evolved as a leader.

Rebecca career journey started when she joined SportsBet in 2014. Despite its magnitude, she believes that the constant innovation, change and growth gave SportsBet a start-up feel that she enjoyed. From here she transitioned to a real start-up, describing it as accidental but natural as she discovered that this is where she thrived.

Rebecca’s next move helped her to realise her need to be hands-on. Moving over to BetEasy, a smaller and younger company, Rebecca found a space where she could make a difference.

“I feel it's a lot easier to drive change and have an impact on things in those smaller companies.”

Having been made redundant at the start of the first COVID-19 lockdown, Rebecca seized the opportunity to volunteer for a Not-For-Profit Talent Acquisition & Human Resources company. This work led her to a maternity cover job in a start-up company which ultimately confirmed her enthusiasm for spaces in which she could directly drive change.

Rebecca’s best career advice shines a light on the value she finds in having a practical and positive network of people around her. Quoting her mentor when she was made redundant, Rebecca explains how being told to,  “Come out smarter than you came in”  forced her to open up to new ideas and ways of thinking.

Rebecca applies critical thinking to her role as People and Culture Director at IntelligenceBank, ensuring she always asks questions, even as a leader.

“It's how you conduct yourself. It's your thought leadership more so than anything else that I think sets one apart.”

To hear more from Rebecca, including her spin on “fake it ‘til you make it”, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

Today, Laura Johnson is joined by Andew Sully, Co-Founder & Co-CEO at Talenza.

Andrew is an experienced recruiter and business leader with an entrepreneurial attitude that has got him to where he is today. Championing change and going against the grain, Andrew explains how a rich career, working across multiple industries, has allowed him to perfect his customer service-centric business model.

Andrew’s proactive, entrepreneurial flair was clear from his time at university, 20 years ago. Identifying an opportunity, Andrew and a friend set up a painting and decorating business to assist their landlord while they were at university. This is where Andrew’s entrepreneurial drive and ability to evolve in the professional world began.

Andrew’s natural confidence with people led him to consider a range of careers from the police force to sales. Moving from Newport, Wales to Australia, Andrew secured a position at recruitment agency, SThree. Here, he was thrown in head first and exposed to invaluable experience, learning as he went along. As his time working at SThree drew to a close, Andrew admits that he knew he had to do something for himself, having learnt from the good, the bad and the ugly at this global business.

“They just lost their way around customer experience and what made them successful in the first place. They just didn't change and pivot the business model enough.”

Andrew is a firm believer of evolving in business, continually stressing the importance of learning and growing. Rejecting the notion that revenue should prevent internal evaluation, he explains how he has learnt to prioritise customer satisfaction in order to help his own business, Talenza, thrive.

Setting up Talenza in 2016, Andrew pledged to place customer satisfaction, teamwork and values at the center of his business model. Andrew candidly explains how he was forced to reevaluate and analyse whether Talenza was staying true to these values when Covid-19 hit. Adopting a refreshingly optimistic take, he admits that this crisis allowed him to pivot and evolve.

“If you're not learning, and you're not growing and you're not driving some sort of change in yourself, then you'll never stay at the top of the game.”

To hear more from Andrew, including how he manages to escape from work, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

This week on Strivin & Thrivin, we speak with Rebecca Powell, People and Culture Director at IntelligenceBank.

Rebecca is a hands-on People and Culture Director with experience spanning from working in Australia’s biggest corporate bookmaker, SportsBet, to start-up companies. Discussing the unexpected twists and turns of her career journey, Rebecca reveals the lessons she has learnt and how she has evolved as a leader.

Rebecca career journey started when she joined SportsBet in 2014. Despite its magnitude, she believes that the constant innovation, change and growth gave SportsBet a start-up feel that she enjoyed. From here she transitioned to a real start-up, describing it as accidental but natural as she discovered that this is where she thrived.

Rebecca’s next move helped her to realise her need to be hands-on. Moving over to BetEasy, a smaller and younger company, Rebecca found a space where she could make a difference.

“I feel it's a lot easier to drive change and have an impact on things in those smaller companies.”

Having been made redundant at the start of the first COVID-19 lockdown, Rebecca seized the opportunity to volunteer for a Not-For-Profit Talent Acquisition & Human Resources company. This work led her to a maternity cover job in a start-up company which ultimately confirmed her enthusiasm for spaces in which she could directly drive change.

Rebecca’s best career advice shines a light on the value she finds in having a practical and positive network of people around her. Quoting her mentor when she was made redundant, Rebecca explains how being told to,  “Come out smarter than you came in”  forced her to open up to new ideas and ways of thinking.

Rebecca applies critical thinking to her role as People and Culture Director at IntelligenceBank, ensuring she always asks questions, even as a leader.

“It's how you conduct yourself. It's your thought leadership more so than anything else that I think sets one apart.”

To hear more from Rebecca, including her spin on “fake it ‘til you make it”, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

Today, Laura Johnson is joined by Simon Bernadino, Founder of Lab17 and talent acquisition specialist.

When Simon took on his first role as a retail store manager at 21, he met a colleague and friend with the right connections to help him kickstart his career. Being introduced to the GM of a media company, Simon had his first taste of the business world and confirmed his interest in sales. Following this, Simon took a six month trip to London which turned into four years and the beginning of his recruitment journey. Explaining that the same friend introduced him to a global SAP recruitment agency, Simon admits that he found his skill for talent acquisition by falling into it.

With a taste for recruitment and the prerequisite of enjoying meeting new people, Simon continued on this path, exploring agency and in-house work before going on to found his own company, Lab17. Simon worked at a boutique recruitment agency before transitioning to the in-house talent acquisition team at Spotify.

With a wealth of experience in different recruitment environments, Simon founded Lab17 with his childhood friend and business partner, Nick Ingall. With Lab17, Simon and Nick were able to fuse their interest in tech with their desire to shift away from the traditional recruitment model. Describing Lab17 as more of a Talent Acquisition Consultancy, Simon explains that it was founded as a lifestyle business and adapts to a new partnership model.

“You have to have a genuine curiosity about tech and product development and actually attach yourself to the mission of an organization that you're actually interested in.”

Simon has an authentic interest in what he does and identifies this as the key to being successful in business. In terms of the best career advice he has been given, Simon expresses a similar notion, encouraging people never to outsource motivation.

“I never want to rely on pressure from peers or family or social media or just the world to motivate me to want to do something.”

Simon’s experiences with mentors have been outside of business, instead drawing parallels between the lessons he has learnt through his football coaches. Expanding his mentality on and off the pitch, he explains how invaluable lessons are learnt when dedicating yourself to a passion project.

“Find things that you’re passionate about and make sure you dedicate time to them.”

To hear more from Simon, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

Today, Laura Johnson is joined by Hassanah Rudd, Global Head of Talent at Squiz, tech start-up.

Hassanah has 25 years of experience in the recruitment industry and still loves what she does, today. Hassanah has lived in England, New Zealand and Australia, taking on a variety of roles. However, her passion for recruitment has never faltered.

Attributing half of her career moves to chance and headhunting, Hassanah speaks of the different stops along her career path as a stroke of serendipity. Finding her knack for recruitment when she was working at a job centre in Oxford, Hassanah’s move to New Zealand was facilitated by her confidence in her recruitment abilities. Here, she transitioned to in-house work and eventually the tech start-up where she works today.

Hassanah discusses the difference between in-house and agency recruitment, admitting that her passion lies with in-house. Although she credits agencies for teaching her a lot and allowing her to work with different industries, she explains that she enjoys being close enough to something to make a positive difference. Being headhunted for her first in-house role by a friend, Hassanah was thrown in at the deep end and never looked back.

Offering advice for those making a similar move, Hassanah stresses the importance of investing in relationships. Speaking candidly about the necessity of a strong network, Hassanah explains that in this space, building up trust is critical. Not only in terms of your peer group, but also key stakeholders.

“If you can develop really strong relationships, you can affect change. You can nudge the thinking.”

After these roles, Hassanah progressed into leadership positions and discovered she had to get comfortable being uncomfortable. At first suffering from imposter syndrome, she questioned her ability to lead leaders. However, championing mutual respect, Hassanah left a positive legacy at these companies and discovered that vulnerability and self-confidence were her greatest assets.

“You're never going to get it right all the time. So you also have to create a space where it's okay to fail.”

Hassanah acknowledges the value of mentors in her career, reflecting on one who gave her some advice that she still lives with and works on today. For this reason, she encourages finding a mentor that will sometimes challenge you.

To hear more from Hassanah, including why she never switches off, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

Today, Laura Johnson is joined by Anthony Enright, Head of People (ANZ) at Klarna.

Anthony kick-started his career in recruitment straight out of University, where he studied HR and Marketing. Since then, he has used his resilience, logic and genuine interest in people to navigate his way through the business world. Describing the peaks and troughs he has endured in his career so far, Anthony is open about his journey to discovering where he excels most within the HR space.

Anthony’s first job was a six month gig at a boutique recruitment agency which he candidly admits was not a role that played to his strengths. Acknowledging that sales was not the direction he saw himself going in, he transitioned into what he called a “half HR role”. In this role he was primarily responsible for administrative tasks from payroll to negotiating with contractors. This led him onto his first full HR role where he stayed for three years before moving onto Ansarada.

“And that's where I would say my career started to go a little bit more rapidly scaling in that context.”

Working for Ansarada for six years, Anthony credits this period for teaching him a lot, allowing him to figure himself out and critique himself. When asked for his greatest career advice, he reflects on the leadership programme at Ansarada, highlighting the importance of “touching someone’s heart before asking for a hand”. This human aspect runs as a motif throughout the conversation, epitomised by the fact that Anthony did a psychology degree. Essentially, he explains that he loves to get the best out of people.

“The more value you can produce for other people, the more valuable that you've become in general.”

When discussing the value of mentorships, Anthony explains that helping people early and often is one of the best things you can do. As a coach at the Startmate Fellowship programme, Anthony is well-versed in mentoring and helping people along their journey of career development. His advice is to accept that a cookie-cutter approach won’t always work.

“Everybody's going to have things that make them tick, and things that are going to go against their personal values, and being very clear or being able to articulate them is going to be helpful.”

To hear more from Anthony, including the lessons he has learnt through trial and error, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

This week on Strivin & Thrivin, we speak with Anita Thomson, Head Of Marketing & Communications at LOD, an alternative legal service provider.

A career spanning a number of different roles has brought Anita Thomson to where she is today. She has been leading the marketing and communications for LOD since 2016 but has a wealth of stories to share from her career journey to date.

“Seize any opportunity so that you can make an informed decision.”

Anita got her foot in the door while still at university, with an eight-week indigenous cadetship at Deloitte. This solidified her interest in the human side of business and led her to take on the first HR graduate position in Deloitte in Australia. Starting internally, she later moved onto graduate recruitment. This was a great opportunity involving big budgets and the opportunity to work closely with partners, and it set her up with the skills she would need for managing client expectations later in her career.

Anita then moved into an HR role. She made a smooth transition from being a consultant to a manager, and established herself within the generalist HR field.. She attributes her success to date, to the people she has met and worked with along the way, seeing many of them as “champions” rather than “mentors”:

“It's more about having champions as opposed to mentors...It's about surrounding yourself with people and having those people who have got your back and who are active supporters of you.”

After having her son, Anita moved to London and took on the role of Senior HR Manager at Ashurst, which offered the opportunity to put her HR skills into practise at scale. She describes many of her professional experiences as ‘fun’ and is a strong advocate for the advice that you must,  “Listen to your gut”. Following this mindset, she found herself at a start-up legal services company, and she hasn’t looked back.

At LOD, Anita decided to take the leap from HR to Marketing after seeing synergies between the two, from the communications side of things, to selling the employer brand and being challenged with the perception of being an internal support function.

While she’s incredibly proud of her career story, Anita stresses the importance of stepping up and acknowledging that you deserve a position at the table and admits that she should have asked more questions during her early career.

To hear more from Anita, including her views on the similarities between HR and marketing and how she made her career transitions so smooth, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

“The best advice that I’ve received over a period of time is to be authentic. It’s way easier to be yourself than to try to be someone else.”

This week on Strivin & Thrivin we chat to Lucy Briggs, Senior HR Business Partner at Mindbody, a SaaS company providing industry-leading fitness and wellness software.

Lucy lives and breathes all things HR and wellness. After discovering a genuine interest in the human psyche, Lucy changed university degree from Psychology to Human Resource Management and has never looked back. In this space, Lucy realised her obsession with driving success in businesses through people.

While her career path hasn’t been linear, it has taught her to take every opportunity and be open to change. Finding a position in a great company right out of university, Lucy was able to gain early exposure to executive level colleagues through her HR role, validating that she was in the right industry.

Lucy describes her transition into a not-for-profit as a personal decision that sparked her curiosity. Seeing people work beyond their salaries, with limited tech, inspired and taught her the importance of prioritising purpose as a professional driving force.

“They were working for a cause, they could see the purpose in what they did, and that was the driver over salary”

Next, Lucy took on an HR Advisor role at software testing company, Planet, entering into the tech world, which really excited her. Acknowledging the lack of people studying technology, Lucy believes it’s important to take opportunities to change the status quo and take on opportunities in the technology space when they come your way.

Today, Lucy works at Mindbody and truly champions the core values, with a professional and personal passion for wellness. Her top pieces of career advice today?  Be your authentic self and reject the notion that you should always stay late in the office.

“It feels like the perfect combination of who I am and what I do. I am a Senior HR Business Partner at Mindbody, but I am so driven by wellness.”

To hear more from Lucy, including her best career advice, her experience with mentorships and the way she stays goal-orientated, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!

Today Laura Johnson and co-host, Tim Griffiths, are joined by Quila, Employer Branding Leader at RMIT University.

Quila is passionate about her career and loves to tell the story of her journey to date. In her own words, that journey  can be summarised by three core principles, asking questions, taking opportunities and saying yes. That, and a true understanding of people.

“I'm really grateful that I said yes to every opportunity that I've been tapped on the shoulder for.”

Quila stepped out of University, straight into a full-time sales job at Xerox. Describing the environment as a “cutthroat boys’ club”, she says she loved it and hesitated to move on from a company influenced by family tradition.

However, deciding to take life by the horns, Quila transitioned into a sales job at a tech company and, after spotting a blue-haired, converse-wearing guy on her first interview, her idea of the working world was flipped on its head. She realised,  "Oh my God, people can be themselves at work?” Here, she threw herself into different opportunities, discovering a knack for digital marketing and community management.

Quila’s next step was moving to Australia with her husband and she admits the struggle of the job hunt in a new place wasn’t easy. However, after 26 applications she bagged a job at the Australian Post which proved to be one of her greatest adventures yet.

Learning on the job, she started out in social media and then transitioned into the group that pulled together the Employee Value Proposition (EVP). This was the start of her journey in Employer Branding.

Fast forward to today and she has now been with RMIT for two years where she is Employer Branding Leader.

When asked about her key learnings, Quila says you cannot underestimate the importance of treating each person differently and asking the right questions.

“You end up attracting people for the right reasons instead of it just being for a position description, or key selection criteria.”

And she’s passionate about the importance of authenticity in the way a brand presents itself to candidates online, calling out the “yucky” side of career sites that just include a rainbow of human beings in their header image to show they’re ticking boxes.

To hear more from Quila, including her admiration for Strivin’ podcast guest, Andrea Kirkby, her mentorships and her past misconception of HR, listen to the latest episode of Strivin and Thrivin now!