Graduate recruitment: Dains main driver for growth?

Why are graduates the specific focus of the recruitment drive, as opposed to more experienced recruits?

McNeilly: To be completely honest, we are recruiting at all levels across the business. We are very much a growth business. What we’re trying to do is to harness the undoubted talents of young people and give them an opportunity to grow. What we find these days is that we’ve got a great opportunity with some of those younger individuals, to bring them on board, and to develop them into advisors. And that’s distinct from purely being an accountant, purely being an auditor, purely being a tax consultant, we want people to develop and grow as advisors, because we firmly believe that’s where the market is, and will continue to be over the course of the next generation.

A lot of staff have risen through the ranks at the company. Is that important to the company?

McNeilly: Very much so because we’ve got a strong sense of culture within the business. And as a result of that, if you work in the business over a number of years you get a thorough understanding of the ways that we work here. People that work at Dains that have long careers here care about outcomes for their colleagues. So they’re compassionate in the way that they work with their colleagues every day. But they care about outcomes for their clients, too. And the longer you’re here, the easier it is to understand that mentality.

Millward: It’s those development opportunities. We want people to join us and know there’s a career path for them. But equally, I would say that if we bring people in, who are qualified or more mature they equally bring something to the business, because you always need to inject something new.

Why do you put emphasis on a strong work life balance?

Millward: It’s important, because without that, I think in this day and age, even pre COVID. If you’ve got a good culture, people have got a good work life balance, you’ll perform better. And so we’re constantly looking at what we can do to make improvements. We have discussions with working parties so it’s not just us always coming up with the ideas we’ll take on board what people say, and that could be through surveys, it could be meetings. So, for example, we’ve had a manager’s meeting recently and we listen to what people have to say, and we address that, and we take action.

McNeilly: I think a lot of firms aspire to get a better work-life balance , and I think to truly live, it means that you can differentiate yourself from the markets. All the time, we’re trying to find ways of getting that balance better and better. Because we know that it’s so important to people. And if you’re working 60-70 hours in another firm, you can come to work here with a great group of people and a fantastic group of clients.

What do you look for in a candidate?

Millward: I think there’s a number of things. First and foremost we are going to look for technical ability in some roles. But it’s somebody who wants to learn, someone who has the same values as we do. And we find that out just through the probing questions that we ask. It might be that someone hasn’t got the skills, but they’ve got the capability, they might have those transferable skills that we look for. And we consider whether that is somebody that we believe we can take through the business and give them the support and the guidance that they need, and help them to go up.

McNeilly: The best two things my parents ever gave me. Work ethic, and a smile on your face. Right? So if you start with that we want people to walk through the door who are warm. Yes there’s a general level of academic ability that you’re going to need in our sector. Absolutely. We all understand that. But once you’ve got that, if you if you want to work hard, and again, you care about the outcome, you’re curious, and you want to make a difference, then we are type of business where you’re going to flourish.

Were the acquisitions a factor behind this recruitment drive?

McNeilly: In truth, the recruitment drive is as much about our organic growth here in the Midlands. But everything that we do in the Midlands, we aim to replicate elsewhere within the group. So the recruitment drive is alive and well across the whole of the business. Earlier this week, we were holding discussions with our team up in Scotland, in terms of how we can repeat precisely the same sort of recruitment drive that we’ve delivered here. So we see great opportunities in the market that you know. We’re going to keep going across the board really.