Who are the Recruitment Canaries?

The recruitment industry is often seen to be very competitive, with agencies jostling over clients and unwilling to share successes and insights with one another. In fact, if you search ‘Cross collaboration recruitment agencies’ online, you’ll find next to nothing! However, the Recruitment Canaries are bucking the trend on this.

In 2018, our MD Matt Collingwood and Niyaa’s Dalvinder Shoker were discussing collaboration in the recruitment industry (or the lack of it!). They both agreed that with the growing number of start-ups and SME recruitment businesses in the West Midlands, there was a real opportunity to put some structure around their network and ultimately share successes instead of shrouding them in secrecy.

After garnering interest among their contacts, Matt and Dal took a risk and organised the first Recruitment Canaries conference. The event was a huge success and was an excellent opportunity for Matt and Dal to understand what sort of collaboration Birmingham recruitment leaders were looking for and how the Recruitment Canaries could aid this.

Since then, the Recruitment Canaries has gone from strength to strength, gaining 67 recruitment agencies as members, with a combined total of 400 employees and a turnover of close to £100 million. In addition to organising multiple conferences and over 200 hours of training from the UK’s key recruitment trainers, the Recruitment Canaries has used its combined buying power to save over £70,000 by sharing/ buying resources in bulk and its members have generated £250K in total, simply by sharing clients and taking a more holistic approach to recruitment.

So, what does Matt and Dal ask of West Midlands-based recruitment leaders looking to join the Recruitment Canaries…? Absolutely nothing, apart from them being willing to share knowledge and insights with other Canaries whenever possible!

If you’re interested in finding out more about joining the Canaries and our next conference on 27th June 2019, please get in touch with Matt or Dal today.