Are we saying goodbye to flexible working in 2024?

Our monthly digest to help you digest your coffee. Take a break from emails, pause the office banter, delay that meeting for a couple of minutes...

Top Tip

Senior hires without the risk ?

If your 2024 hiring strategy involves strategic senior recruitment, maybe a Head of department or a C-suite role, you'll likely be looking at executive search firms and considering whether the hefty upfront payment is worth it.

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Ask the Experts

Plenty of 2024 trends to look out for have mentioned employers back-tracking on their flexible working policies and requesting that employees return to working in the office ??

In the financial crime sector specifically, this could have some dramatic consequences. Our 2023 Financial Crime Recruitment Trends report found that 96% of respondents work either fully or partially remote.

Pritesh Chudasama shared his thoughts on this:

“It’s no secret that flexible working is in high demand after rising in popularity during the covid-19 pandemic. What may be surprising for some to see, though, is the severity of the weighting away from office-based working. Just 4% of our respondents are in the office full-time, which is an astounding shift from previous years. This goes to show that flexible working options aren’t a fad and employers do need to offer some level of flexibility in order to appeal to the talent market.”

Read the full report here.

From paying for candidates' interview time to AI taking over the recruitment process, read our 2024 trends to watch out for here.

MERJE Meets

2024 kicks off a new round of MERJE Meets articles. Before we dive into the new editions, take a look back at last year's pieces:

Lou Tipping - Head of Regulatory Risk & Compliance, Co-Op Funeralcare (Read)

Alice Sweeting - Senior Manager, Environmental Sustainability, YBS (Read)

Sheraz Afzal - Legal, Risk & Compliance Director, Quint Group (Read)

Peter Stanyard - Multi-Site Operational Lead, Tech Mahindra (Read)

Matt Tavener - Head of Compliance & MLRO, Frasers Group (Read)

What did you say?

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"I would like to give Jake Kelly a 5 for providing a great service to our business. Jake is very engaging, enthusiastic and professional and was able to identify a very good list of candidates."

Regulatory Affairs Manager, Energy

Jake, recently promoted to Principal Consultant, specialises in Compliance and Legal recruitment across all areas of financial services in London and the south east. If you're hiring for your team or looking for a new role, get in touch with Jake.

Read more about MERJE's 2023 news in a nutshell in our wrap up article here.

Pet of the Month

This month's pet portrait is Bob, Neil Johns ' dachshund who is more interested in staying on the sofa eating cheese than going back to work. The feeling's mutual, Bob... ??

Thanks for tuning in, we hope you enjoyed your coffee break! See you next month for more of the same ??

If you'd like to discuss your career or hiring needs, get in touch with our expert team here.