Inspiring Tech Leaders - The Intricacies of Technology Recruitment with James Perry, Founder of Osmium Partners

Joining us in this episode is James Perry, the founder of Osmium Partners.  We explore his fascinating journey from starting a career in technology recruitment to establishing his own firm in the industry.  James shares why he chose to specialise in technology and business change, offering a unique perspective on these critical areas.

We dive into the most sought-after skills in today's market and uncover strategies for employers to attract top talent.  With the seismic shifts caused by COVID-19, James discusses how the pandemic has reshaped our work and hiring practices.  For hiring managers, this episode is packed with valuable insights, including tips for assessing technical roles, balancing technical proficiency with soft skills, and ensuring the right cultural fit with tech teams.

We also look ahead to the emerging trends in the tech industry and the potential impact on recruitment.  Whether you're an employer, a job seeker, or someone interested in the future of tech recruitment, this episode is sure to provide you with actionable insights and expert advice.

Transcript

Welcome to the inspiring Tech leaders podcast with me Dave Roberts. Today I have the pleasure to be talking with James Perry, who is the founding director of Osmium Partners based in Manchester in the UK. James has been involved with the technology recruitment industry for the last decade has worked across a variety of different areas but with a passion for technology and business change. What a pleasure to have you here today James. Hi Dave, how are you? I'm good, so let's start so how did you actually start your career in technology Recruitment and how has it led you to creating Osmium Partners? So unlike most in the recruitment industry it was actually a planned career move so I did some work experience with a family friend of mine and in all honesty I don't really come from a business orientated family and I met this person and it gave me quite a bit of direction really, to go after that career and went in with a plan to build a career in there and and add some value and in the end it's led to me having my own business and creating Osmium Partners. But what made you want to focus in on technology and business change as your core specialism? So I have a genuine interest in technology in general and also everything around why technology enhances businesses and I think since I've been in recruitment that's enhanced even more so, in that a lot of business decisions now are directly driven via technology so maybe when I first went into technology recruitment technology teams were were almost there to keep the lights on, to a certain extent or seemed like that from the business anyway, but what has obviously materialised is that actually now CIOs, CTOs, IT Directors involved in business decisions that are generally focused on technology driven data and so on and so forth, so that's the interest in why I set up Osmium Partners, it is genuinely an interest of mine. So what skills in 2024 do you think are in most demand at the moment and how should employers seek to attract those best candidates? So it's very dependent on sort of sector what skill sets are in demand I've looked at a lot of data over the last few months of 2024 and it seems that cyber security and data professionals are very much in demand and and interestingly we do have a skill shortage in that type of professional in the UK. In regards to seeking and attracting the best candidates, in my opinion it comes down to how you can get your company message out to the tech Market ultimately, so it's not now just putting a job advert out and expecting people to apply, it's more being able to tell that story of what you are actually doing as a business, what you're doing with the technology stack, what your business drivers are and being able to put that across via social media, marketing campaigns, testimonials with your current employees, it's become a little bit more of a talent attraction program of work now to really go out there and get the best talent rather than maybe 10, 15 years ago you could go out to the market put a job advert out and you'd get a lot of good people through, it's a lot more of a head hunting type market now. And as you say, things have changed over the last few years but certainly I think the biggest change is probably in that post-covid world that we've moved into. So how has Covid changed the way that we work and the way that we hire people? It's had definitely a positive effect in that we have adopted more of a working from home hybrid model, which technology actually as a sector I feel like had adopted that quite well anyway, but it's definitely again enhanced the the hybrid model. In regards to actually hiring people, I didn't see as many teams and zoom interviews before for covid and almost every client I interact with now will use Teams in some form of part of the interview process, that may be a half an hour Teams called us to sound out the role it might be a completely remote based interview process. I've recently just hired a a senior role for a global client and they never met face to face, so hiring wise it's allowed us to to definitely be more sort of agile and time efficient. In regards to the way we work I do think it's an interesting one now in 2024, in that we are seeing a bit more of a shift now with our clients in that they are looking at the Hybrid model much more than fully remote roles, so two to three days a week on site which I know first thing candidates do ask is is this a fully remote role? is it hybrid? if it's hybrid how does it actually work? So building on that what sort of tips and recommendations would you provide to hiring managers when it comes to maybe assessments for technical roles? So I think again it depends on what role you are looking at recruiting, I do think if I'm completely honest that the tech Market is very much still a candidate driven market, so the days of sort of half an hour / hour long technical tests for a developer are well and truly gone, you just won't get the buy-in from people to do that, because ultimately these people are being approached for similar roles, so you do have to be really careful I don't think that that technical assessments are are dead completely in the recruitment process, but I think you do have to be understanding that people are taking time out of the day to to work on a tech technical assessment and they do ultimately have probably quite a lot of interviews going on at the time, so yeah I think it's all about the role and I think where the technical assessment fits in the process, so if that's a first stage to have a technical test, I would suggest that would be be the second stage, I would get the buy-in from the candidate that they're interested in the role, and that you're interested in them pursuing that position and then maybe second stage throw in a 10-minute technical assessment there. In all honesty my genuine advice would be is steer away as much as you can from technical tests because unfortunately the candidate market doesn't really like technical tests and that's from my experience. And what about when it comes to the cultural fit within a team, how do you balance that technical proficiency with the softer skills when evaluating candidates? yeah it's an interesting one, I think it comes down to us as recruitment Partners in that you need to invest enough time into understanding the client company culture you need to understand what the role in detail so where where that role fits within the function is it a development role where there may potentially need to be completely Technical and not so much leadership of people or interactions, so it is very much down to us as recruitment Partners to to get to know our clients, get to know our candidates and ensure that you're matching that culture fit correctly and not just matching the culture fit to the organisation, matching the culture fit to the team they're joining or the role that they are going to pursue in that company. So what are the emerging Trends in the tech industry and how are these going to impact Tech recruitment in the near future? It's interesting really I think there are a lot of of what people are calling RecTech tools out there at the moment, but from my side of things for us as a business I do want to keep the people element at the Forefront of the business, so as much as we don't want to be dinosaurs and we do want to adopt technology, I think we we ultimately need to ensure that the administration tasks are using automated process but in regards to the actual Tech Market itself, there's obviously massive conversations around AI and I think actually when people say AI, they they don't necessarily mean true AI at the moment and when I speak to a lot of CIOs, boards mention AI but what they generally mean from what I've heard is sort of process automation, which has been around for 15-20 years, so I do think a lot of companies are behind the curve on on the the true AI that we we talk about right now, so yeah it's an interesting one. Definitely agree with that in terms of the use of AI and the terminology and yeah actually is it automation, is it machine learning, the true definition is sometimes masked. So if people wanted to learn more about Osmium Partners, what should they do next? Yeah I mean by all means reach out to myself via LinkedIn, have a look at our website which is www.osmium-partners.co.uk and if you want an exploratory chat whether that be candidate or client by all means reach out to me, I'd be keen to to discuss the technology landscape with with anyone. Excellent, well thank you again for taking the time to talk with us today James, it's really been a pleasure to learn more about tech Recruitment and the evolving nature of the industry at the moment just want to say thank you once again for being part of the inspiring Tech leaders podcast. No thank you to you as well Dave you've supported me through uh the setup of Osmium, I look forward to catching up with you soon and thanks for listening everyone.

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