In an industry so fast-paced and dynamic, our Consultants will tell you that no two days at Concilium Search are the same. With many of our meetings conducted out of office - whether that be in London or abroad, we caught up with Consultant Lucinda Denney to find out what her average day entails at Concilium...
05:30AM – I wake up & check emails to ensure everything is in order and catch up with US colleagues/clients (particularly important on days when I have candidates attending face to face interviews – I am the first port of call if something goes wrong e.g. car pile-up on the motorway, flight delay, wisdom teeth emergency… believe me, it’s all happened and it’s important to act fast!)
05:45AM – Early morning shower & cycle to work (if it’s raining, I very quickly decide to take the bus instead)
07:00-07:15AM – Arrive at work. Officially, my day starts at 8:30, however I always find it useful to get in early to check a few important tasks off the day’s to-do list before the office gets busy.
08:00-08:30AM – During this time I work on my social media presence. This varies, however, usually it involves doing 1 of 3 things.
- Posting an industry relevant news article to LinkedIn
- Creating a job advertisement for a newly assigned position to share among my network
- Contributing towards the Concilium Search blog by writing posts (such as this one!)
- Enhancing our online presence as a company, and for myself a Consultant is a key factor of our recent growth.
08:30-08:45AM – I conduct the morning meeting with my team (Associate Consultants Katherine Flynn & Harvey Jackson). Team meetings are focused time where we discuss our plan for the day, and how we expect to achieve our collective targets for the week.
08:45-09:00AM – Before 09:00AM I typically catch up with Managing Partner, Head of Permanent Search (and my boss!) Richard Walker-Taylor on my team’s business updates, the day’s planned activity, issues of high importance and preparation for important client calls & teleconferences organized to discuss our on-going retained searches.
09:00-12:00PM – This morning period counts as my ‘key call hours’ – during this time I take my planned calls for the day. The majority of these are arranged ahead of time with candidates for the active vacancies that I am working at this point. These calls will involve introducing an opportunity to a candidate (1st stage qualification) or finalizing the details of an application (final stage qualification). After completing a successful call during these hours’, I will often finalize the written profile of a candidate and submit their profile directly to the client or to a Concilium Search Account Director – this is when the fun starts as we wait for feedback on next steps!
12:30-13:15PM – I always take 10-15 minutes to go for a walk during my lunch hours. I find this helps to focus my concentration for the afternoon and something I encourage my team members to do every day!
13:15-13:30PM – Prep for afternoon meeting and catch-up on any emails that came in over lunch. Prep for afternoon meeting typically involves taking a critical look at the results of my morning and re-aligning my activity for the afternoon to ensure that I reach the day’s set targets.
13:30-13:45PM – Conduct afternoon meeting with Katherine & Harvey. Our afternoon meetings are typically shorter and have a stronger focus on re-alignment of goals and evaluating the successes of the morning. Morning & Afternoon meetings are a core pillar of our days at Concilium Search – they start exactly on the minute at 08:30 & 13:30 of each day and help us all to focus our energies for the day to produce strong results.
13:45-17:00 – Again, these are my key call hours. For the afternoon they are often more client focused. During this time I will often be in touch with clients to discuss candidate interview feedback, offers, contract negotiation and the assignment of new positions. Additionally, during this time I will schedule interview preparation sessions for my candidates who have interviews scheduled for the coming week. I work with them in these sessions, preparing their answers for interview questions, working on their presentations and discussing any concerns that they have about the interview.
I find these sessions very enjoyable as we always make a lot of progress which leaves my candidates ready to face the challenge of an interview and come out successful!
17:00-18:00 – This is my ‘variable time’, during this hour I will often have meetings with colleagues regarding monthly business, with Maduka (our CEO) to discuss my performance and personal development, or with Concilium’s new Associate Consultant group that I mentor to assist with any questions or areas of difficulty as they develop as Recruitment Consultants within their particular markets.
18:00-18:45 – I dedicate 45 minutes to business development activities during this time. This typically involves identifying opportunities with potential new clients (conducting market research on industry specific news & events to predict future hiring trends or potential opportunities to create new partnerships) or looking into the market for potential openings for a select group of high-quality candidates that I have been working closely with who are conducting strategic job searches.
18:45-19:00PM – This is clean-up time (no, not the kitchen!), rather so my emails and my Bullhorn records (Concilium’s invaluable candidate database). Finally, before I leave for the evening, I print out a new to-do list and fill this with my tasks for the next day (this way I always have an idea of what the demands of the next day will be, meaning there won’t be too many surprises along the way).
19:00 – I leave the office & make the journey home. However, if I’m working with our US team or we have a particularly heavy set of client demands this can be much later!
The nature of our work typically requires 1 ‘late night’ per week – however, as a team (coupled with some good food), these nights are often fun and really productive!
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