Specialist IT recruitment firm NeilsonYoung Consulting has increased headcount within its consulting team by hiring three new specialist recruiters, bolstering the team up to 10 full-time recruiters.
This growth has been in reaction to increased demand by the company's existing clients as well as the success of the company in acquiring new business on the back of a recent AAA empowerment rating.
"The market is buoyant, the IT industry as a whole has experienced huge growth this year and a subsequent growth in resource requirements," states Managing Director, Dusten Young.
NeilsonYoung has an enviable track record of delivery and as a result many clients have utilised their recruiting services since inception almost five years ago. This has resulted in a number of "preferred supplier" listings.
In addition, the benefit corporate companies enjoy by utilising a "AAA" empowered organisation has meant that a number of new clients have recently come on board.
"The team at NeilsonYoung Consulting has consistently delivered 'hard to find' IT-related technical skills over the last four years," states Rhona Wolmarans, HR Manager, Bytes Outsource Services. "They take the time to understand our resource profiles and business requirements, matching suitable competencies and skills to these specifications and work relentlessly to deliver in rapid turnaround times. In addition, they are always professional in their conduct and in our experience - a dynamic recruitment agency," continued Wolmarans.
Demand for specialist IT skills has exploded over the last 12 months. "Last year this time, we decided to close the offices early and spent December on the beach," says Caroline Nkosi, NeilsonYoung Recruitment Director. "This year, we will be staying open over the entire December period to help our clients with their recruiting requirements," continued Nkosi.
The team at NeilsonYoung consulting includes significant depth. "Some of our consultants have over 30 years' IT industry experience and we invest significantly in bringing the more junior team members up to speed quickly. We focus on understanding the business issues faced by our customers and train our team accordingly," states Nkosi.
In addition to traditional recruitment, NeilsonYoung Consulting does supply an executive search service to select clients.
The shortage of skills and unrealistic time lines set by clients to source suitable candidates makes executive search or "headhunting" a necessary evil. The NeilsonYoung research team and "industry intelligence" database has been bolstered with a new focus and further investments have been made to assist the team in identifying potential candidates quickly.
"Poaching skills from competitors or suppliers is frowned upon and publicly denounced by all, yet when the chips are down, and a crucial system needs to be implemented, our clients sometimes have no choice but to go this route," says Young.
Although NeilsonYoung provides an executive search service to its preferred clients, the entire approach is handled within a very clear engagement framework.
Candidates are made aware of an opportunity but only if a very clear growth path exists is the process taken further.
The dangers of job-hopping, burning bridges and common business ethics are discussed with each candidate. If even the slightest doubt exists about moving on, candidates are recommended to stay with their existing employer. Moving skills within competitors is also avoided as far as possible.
"The only long-term solution to the skills shortage is training and developing required resources from within - companies need to have structures in place to do this - we will not do work for a company that does not have a strong development plan in place; our search service is only available to select clients and as a last resort once all other avenues are exhausted," concludes Young.
Please feel free to contact Dusten Young or Caroline Nkosi for any resource requirements during the December period at dusten@nyc.co.za or caroline@nyc.co.za / (011) 465 2830.
Share
NeilsonYoung Consulting was established in 2002 on the premise that specialists with industry experience understand the human resource requirements of ICTe companies better than generalist recruitment companies.
Offering a specialised placement service, the company focused on recruiting high calibre IT, executive and solution sales skills. The company has subsequently undertaken assignments for many leading local and global organisations.
NeilsonYoung Consulting counts amongst its clients companies such as SAP, Cell C, Sun Microsystems, SAS Institute, MTN NS, Dell, Wesbank and divisions of FirstRand, Faritec, Dimension Data, Bytes Technology Group, ContinuitySA, Cisco Systems and Pebbletree Consulting.
Although the company remains a relatively small organisation, it has grown into a strong team of professional consultants with a world-class support infrastructure.
Editorial contacts