Embracing tech as the enabler of future work
The demand for pioneering tech has accelerated dramatically over the past year as businesses have generated new ways of navigating the pandemic. Technology is also the tool that will help us streamline the process to recovery.
Whilst adopting such technology is a progressive step forward, we’re long past the point where tech should be viewed as a momentary saviour – something to buy, unbox, install and assume all will be well. The reality we find ourselves in is quite different; regardless of the global crisis, the way we look at tech has to change. Technology has become an everyday, always-on requirement of smooth business operations, forming an all-important part of our DNA. It is the enabler of the future of work, from alignment and efficiencies with partner and client systems, to internally empowering the success and wellness of our employees. Innovation in tech is exponential, so it’s vital to stay as close to the curve as is possible – something we have always strived to do, long before the challenges posed by the current pandemic.
Our story so far…
Technology has been the fundamental backbone of all of our recruitment businesses over the past 25 years. It’s hard to picture my early days as a graduate trainee, operating fax machines and fussing with the Tippex! As a team of young entrepreneurial recruiters, we learned many a valuable lesson along the way – from our dotcom market-focused business acquired by Harvey Nash, to James Harvard our pharmaceutical business acquired by Hays, which saw our operations scale beyond the UK, across Europe and as far as Australia & Japan.
Our next challenge was the very exciting Energy & Cloud transformation sectors, for which we launched EarthStream & CloudStream, undergoing a rapid expansion plan into Europe, US, Singapore and South Africa, the growth rate and scale was exceptional. In 2019 we were fortunate enough to be introduced to two businesses (Xcede & Etonwood) on a similar trajectory that had specialism at the core of their strategies and in 2020 with city funding we merged the three businesses to become what is now the TechStream Group.
Responding with agility
While the ability to be ‘agile’ has become a throwaway term that businesses like to use, we’ve proven our agility by pivoting extremely quickly through the pandemic – thanks in part to our journey so far. It takes courage to ask yourself whether something is honestly working. Rather than bury our heads in the sand, we have always taken this self-analytical approach. We all make mistakes, but – more often than not – this has allowed us to take advantage of some unique opportunities. As a relatively new set-up, we chaired one board meeting in person pre-Covid; little did we know, each and every meeting the following year would be attended remotely from our home offices, integrating the businesses and new processes remotely.
Until you put your best people side by side in the room, you never know what’s going to happen. Yet while we were denied the luxury of evolving the group shoulder to shoulder, our CEO William Jacques and chairman Andrew Goodman – along with all our investors and other forward-thinking individuals – helped make that vision possible; we all have different opinions, but we are ultimately seeking to achieve the same goals. Our new CFO Paul Hart (the former European CFO at Microsoft) also helped us fast-track this experience as we continue to ‘thinktank’ how to evolve the business at a good rate of knots!
Within 6-8 weeks of working apart, we quickly realised that the companies grasping the concept of remote working – paired with the willingness to act quickly – were the companies with staying power. We thought hard and fast about what we should be changing, and how we should be changing it. Both before and during the early days of the pandemic, we had already started to visualise what our business should look like. We knew that social media, CRM systems, and cloud-based technology were going to play a crucial role, giving us the ability to bring our vision home sooner. Due to a predicted downturn in recruitment, sales and activity, we grabbed hold of this opportunity by embracing integration projects and merging onto one CRM; projects that were scheduled go live – even as far in the future as 2021 – were brought forward. This would give us the ability to accelerate at pace once Covid had lifted, and we remain optimistic on this front as 2021’s first quarter is proving us correct.
The tech-driven future of work
We knew that by not adopting technology properly, we’d risk being left on the shelf. Companies that make it their priority to utilise the tech available to them – from CRM through to cloud technology solutions – not only stand a better chance of survival, but put future growth back on the table. As well as upgrading our CRM system to Microsoft’s Mercury xRM, we’ve integrated and expanded our presence across platforms like LinkedIn further – linking back to our finance and back office systems – to ensure digitisation of the business at all levels. Beyond the cultural shift of remote working, we’ve made it our corporate policy to provide employees with optimised work stations in order to fulfil their roles from home. With video conferencing now an everyday part of business operations, we recently launched our masterclass training; hosted by senior leaders from across the business, these sessions are open to employees across the globe, covering a variety of subjects – from wellbeing at home to gaining exclusivity with clients.
Would we have rolled out group-wide, video-based training (and the subsequent resource of training libraries) had the pandemic not happened? It’s likely we would have not. While both training and wellness in the workplace have always been a priority for us, the pandemic has now made them a top-board topic of conversation, along with the transparent dialogue around diversity and inclusion. We’ve had to revisit our culture and assess how we evolve the new dynamic of home working for each and every employee, and the myriad of personal circumstances we all happen to face.
Technology has proven tantamount to making this transition possible; not only does it continue to streamline the way we communicate internally, but it also empowers us to do so externally. Nowadays, we drive everything via video – from internal discussions to client and candidate meetings. With the daily commute, travel to client offices, or simply meeting for coffee no longer an option, it’s also been a massive time-saver, while allowing us to build good (if not better) relationships with people. Smaller, more regular meetings with clients have helped make this a reality, with improved usability making comms streamlined and slick; now, you can join and leave calls at the touch of a button (whether you happen to be in your shirt and tie, or your tracksuit)!
This is just beginning
Bringing speed, efficiency and accuracy to everyday business operations, tech ultimately enables the future of work through the connected workforce – providing employees with the virtual infrastructure that gives them the perfect platform to succeed, with the right approach to a culture of wellness and care. Being agile and nimble also enables businesses to respond favourably to change, putting them in the right shape to evolve as we at TechStream begin to map out the future. We now find ourselves faced with the choice of embracing tech, not only to iron out the creases, but in enabling us to do things differently, and do them better. I remain optimistic that tech will continue to transform the way we welcome this new era of change, empowering recruitment professionals to be at the cutting-edge of what they do – wherever their office may happen to be that day.
Tech has helped every business pivot their way through the pandemic, but everyone’s story is different. Share your thoughts by commenting below with the hashtag #TalentVoices.