Industry: Government & Public Sector

NCA: Reaching Investigators Through Targeted Recruitment Marketing

Posted on by jpatel
NCA: Reaching Investigators Through Targeted Recruitment Marketing

NCA: Reaching Investigators Through Targeted Recruitment Marketing

The National Crime Agency (NCA) turned to PeopleScout for a recruitment marketing campaign to help them stand out in their search for crime fighting investigators.

15,703 Applicants Across 143 Roles
225 Job Offers Extended
800+ + Candidates in a Talent Pool for Future Openings

The National Crime Agency is responsible for leading the UK’s fight to cut serious and organised crime. The agency’s focus is on the big threats—targeting and pursuing serious and organised crime and criminals who pose the greatest risk to the UK. The work is hugely complex, high-level and large scale. Officers operate at the forefront of law enforcement, building intelligence, pursuing the most serious and dangerous offenders and developing and delivering specialist capabilities for partner organisations.

It could have been an impressive proposition for the 1,500 investigators and other professionals the NCA wanted to recruit. But the NCA was competing with MI5, MI6, GCHQ and police forces for this talent. The intelligence organisations could be considered “sexier” brands. The police forces are better known and understood.

The NCA had been flying under the radar and needed to arrive on the scene with a bang. They turned to PeopleScout for a confident, attention-grabbing campaign to put their employer brand front-of-mind for their target audience.

Key Research

We conducted wide-ranging qualitative interviews and focus groups with key people across the agency in order to really get under the skin of the human experience of working there.

The key insights were:

  • When NCA investigators succeed the impact is huge and far-reaching. The criminal activity they stop covers everything from child sexual abuse to illegal firearms trafficking, cyber crime, kidnapping and extortion. The police, by contrast, have to deal with everything from shoplifting upwards.
  • A lot of the criminals the NCA targets feel they are untouchable. It’s very exciting to prove they are not.
  • The work is exciting, and we shouldn’t underplay that.
  • Investigators are often serving police officers or have strong links to policing. They rarely engage with usual recruitment channels, so we needed to think differently.
  • The agency saw location as key—they were keen to recruit candidates close to the locations of their regional offices.

The Core Message

To work in crowded streets and packed transit stations, our campaign needed to have immediate visual impact. The NCA hunts the big fish of the criminal world. So, we chose the shark as a perfect visual metaphor to illustrate the level of criminality the agency handles; it’s the ultimate hidden predator with a fin that creates an emotional reaction.

Our visuals show a huge shark fin bursting through the ground, towering over well-known landmarks and wreaking havoc in recognisable, urban UK locations in London and Manchester. Each visual represented the scale of damage caused by high-level crime, while storm clouds provided a suitable dark and menacing backdrop. These visuals were complemented with a simple message: No predator too big.

Media Strategy

We focused the recruitment campaign on outdoor media to reach the widest possible audience in our target areas. We identified outdoor locations that serve police officers on their daily commute—for example, Manchester Piccadilly station and the Metro line to Greater Manchester Police HQ—in addition to specialist online media.

The Results

We rolled out the campaign for digital, data, tech and specialist firearms audiences. The results were very impressive:

29,684 candidates to the NCA landing page.
15,703 applications across 143 roles.
2,228 candidates invited to interview.
225 job offers.
825 held in talent pool awaiting job offers.

This was a hugely successful campaign which drove brand awareness and a large number of applications. We exceeded NCA’s expectations, raised awareness of the NCA as an alternative employer for serving police officers and improved perceptions of the NCA as an employer with a unique offering.

AT A GLANCE

  • COMPANY
    National Crime Agency (NCA)
  • PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS
    Talent Advisory
  • LOCATIONS
    Regional offices in the UK’s urban centres
  • About NCA
    The National Crime Agency (NCA) is a national law enforcement agency in the UK focused on fighting organised crime, trafficking, cybercrime and fraud.
Contact Us

Bristol City Council: Recruiting the Manager at the Heart of a Mayor’s Vision

Posted on by mhill

SOLUTION HIGHLIGHTS

  • SUCCESSFULLY RECRUITING IN A COMPETITIVE SECTOR
  • NAVIGATING SMALL CANDIDATE POOL FOR THE LEADER THE CLIENT NEEDED
  • IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUALS WHO WERE WILLING TO RELOCATE

SCOPE AND SCALE

The Council’s Housing Delivery Plan identified a need for 800 new affordable homes per year. The Housing Strategy and Enabling Manager provides the strategic leadership to develop, enable and deliver this ambitious annual programme.


This role is all about sharing responsibility for affordable housing strategy across the public and private sectors. We needed to find a professional who could build great relationships in both areas and work collaboratively with partners and local communities. A persuasive advocate of the need for more homes to meet real human needs – today and tomorrow.

SITUATION

We were looking for an individual with in-depth knowledge of town planning policy and regulations; a qualified Chartered Town Planner (RTPI) or Chartered Surveyor (RICS) with membership of a relevant association. Finding an impressive professional working at the scope and scale of a large Unitary Authority was the key challenge. This person had to hit the ground running
in a new structure.

SOLUTION

The hiring manager brief highlighted three essential search criteria:

  • Detailed knowledge of housing and planning legislation in local authority and housing association sectors
  • Proven leadership track record in a local authority, housing association or housing organisation
  • Exceptional stakeholder management skills to advocate for the housing sector at a local, regional and national level

Candidates who met the first two criteria were numerous.
But most lacked the senior stakeholder experience. So we searched at a national level, positioning Bristol as a city where people could make a real impact on reducing inequality through housing strategy. This message really resonated. And we found good levels of gender diversity in the field. The final shortlist of four had a 50/50 male/female ratio.

RESULTS

We found healthy numbers of potential candidates in similar roles in other councils and housing associations, but few were willing to consider a new role at the time of the search.
Nevertheless, and shortlist of four excellent professionals was created and the role was filled with the outstanding candidate. They start in July 2020.

Fife Sports and Leisure Trust: Sourcing a Brilliant Female Leader for a Unique Time

Posted on by mhill

With the CEO of Fife Sports and Leisure Trust retiring within the month of our search, and no handover, we recruited an experienced, dynamic and strategic leader who hit the ground running.

SOLUTION HIGHLIGHTS

  • EXPERIENCED PROFESSIONAL
  • NOT A FIRST-TIME MD OR CEO
  • FINDING CREDIBLE STRATEGIC LEADERS WHO’D MOVED AWAY FROM OPERATIONS ROLES
  • CANDIDATES UP FOR THE CHALLENGES FACING FSLT
  • SUCCESSFULLY RECRUITING DURING NATIONAL LOCKDOWN

SCOPE AND SCALE

The Trust manages and operates 14 leisure facilities on behalf of Fife Council. They’re one of the largest employers in the town with 550 staff. Their mission is improving health and wellbeing across the Fife, offering facilities for people of all abilities.
The new CEO would need to foster good relationships with
the Council and balance the social and economic purposes to develop a sustainable leisure service. This would mean finding further funding and creating and delivering a long-term vision for FSLT, after coming back from a whole industry closure, owing to the Coronavirus outbreak in March 2020.

SITUATION

Finding senior strategic leaders who could lead FSLT through an important stage in their history meant recruiting a current MD or CEO who had held profit and loss accountability for their leisure service. There are a finite number of leisure trusts in the UK so it was vital to present this fascinating opportunity to the sector in a highly engaging manner to attract the highest-calibre candidates.

SOLUTION

We took a detailed brief from the outgoing CEO, and it became very clear that FSLT needed an accomplished new leader capable of creating an immediate impact. We searched the whole of the UK, engaging with the CEO at Community Leisure UK, the industry association, who shared the requirement in her network. It’s a close-knit community and the Trust has a good reputation. We leveraged the expertise in the sector to ensure we had a comprehensive shortlist of the most recommended professionals.

RESULTS

The results were very positive:

  • We achieved 72% engagement of passive ‘candidates’
  • Four candidates were invited for interview (75/25 male/female split)
  • Two candidates were invited for second interview (50/50 male/female split)
  • One great hire was made (female candidate appointed)

Kent County Council: Promoting a Career in Care

Posted on by mhill

Support workers make a genuine difference to real lives and Kent County Council (KCC) were finding it hard to attract the right people to fill their vacancies. They approached PeopleScout to develop a campaign to reach an audience that may not realise they had the skills and attributes to become care workers and show them they could have a meaningful career, just by ‘being you’.

SOLUTION HIGHLIGHTS

• RAISING AWARENESS OF MISUNDERSTOOD ROLES
• REACHING AN UNAWARE TARGET AUDIENCE
• CREATING STAND-OUT FROM THE CROWD

CANDIDATE SOURCING

SCOPE AND SCALE

Kent County Council, along with over 1,400 partner organisations, are committed to providing essential care and support, working with some of the most vulnerable members of the community. Their need to recruit was based on the requirement to alleviate pressure on nursing homes and hospitals by providing care in the clients’ own homes, therefore freeing up valuable beds elsewhere. Enabling clients to remain at home (when it is suitable) has been proven to be a good solution in healthcare pathways.

It was also important to demonstrate to the wider Kent population that KCC was taking positive and supportive action in what was a high profile and often criticised area for all local authorities.

SITUATION

With vacancies that aren’t clearly defined by specific skills or experience, it’s often challenging to convince potential recruits that a role is right for them. With ‘unskilled’ (in terms of qualifications) positions such
as these, the lure of other opportunities, including retail, is often more appealing and the lack of visibility or explanation of support roles alongside a misunderstanding of what is entailed, compounds this issue.
In addition to this, there was a lack of clarity about the genuine career potential that these jobs could offer potential candidates. KCC’saim was to raise the profile of the work they do in an area that is both sensitive and one that touches most people at some stage in their lives.

THE SOLUTION

To fully understand why existing support workers do what they do, we ran a focus group to investigate the motivators and to hear real life stories. Our creative team then set to work to produce a personal and  appropriate creative identity; one that would put the empathy and natural caring skills needed for these roles, at the very heart of the campaign. We concluded the best way to communicate this was by film, showing everyday situations where people made a difference, doing everyday things and how this translated into a care workers job.

This was driven by the central campaign message of “You’d be surprised how qualified you are to be a support worker – just by being you’’. With a small promotion budget and to ensure that the power of the film’s visuals were maximised, we used our Social Media product, SNAP, to push the film out to the target audience; using geographic and behavioural targeting methods.

RESULTS

The SNAP campaign ran for just over 2 weeks and in that time delivered over 51,000 impressions, converting to over 1,000 ‘clickthroughs’ – an impressive rate of 2.1%. Equally impressive, YouTube delivered almost 172,000 impressions and over 75,000 views.

Fife Council: Bringing Deeper Understanding to Fill Pivotal Role

Posted on by rharris

Head of Children, Families and Criminal Justice

Filling this socially and strategically important leadership role challenged our research capabilities. The role is pivotal in shaping the future of children and families· services in Fife – an area where 1 in 4 children are living in poverty. Understanding and communicating the role’s interesting remit, combined with the criminal justice element, proved essential to successfully filling the role.

SOLUTION HIGHLIGHTS

  • An ‘ideal’ person brief
  • Extensive deep search tactics
  • Non-traditional sources

SCOPE & SCALE

Fife Council brought this role to us a few months before the current incumbent was due to retire. We were tasked with identifying individuals with a strong background in leading services within children and families social care and already on the social work register in England or Scotland, or able to register. The role covered a wide remit, including Criminal Justice, and had also been merged with the Chief Social Work Officer role. We felt that this was a good selling point as it added interest to those who were looking to increase their responsibilities.

SITUATION

The role could not be filled internally, and it was a challenging location to recruit for, making search a much more viable option than pure media. Even with sourcing, 35% of individuals who engaged with us were not interested because of the location and a further 30% were not interested due to timings.

SOLUTION

RESEARCH

Following preliminary research, a briefing with the Executive Director of Education and Children’s Services provided further context and insight into children and family services in Fife. A version of the Directorate Improvement Plan was also shared with us to bring the role and its challenges to life. It was agreed that the ideal candidate would be working at
Head of Service level in a smaller Scottish Local Authority.

STRATEGY

We agreed on a project plan during the briefing. Timebound goals including benchmarking and work in progress updates were to be sent. Our search encompassed telephone, Linked In, referrals, CV databases and deep web searching.

OUTCOME

By using an intensive search for council documentation, and examining historical freedom of information requests, we were able to identify names of individuals who were otherwise absent from traditional sources – including their own council website.

RESULTS

Fife Council appointed an Acting Head of Service from a smaller Scottish local authority- as per their “ideal person” brief. In the candidate’s own words, she was delighted
to be offered the role and excited to be joining Fife Council. She also thanked us for contacting her as she was not looking for a new role and would have over looked this opportunity.

I was impressed with the extent of the knowledge of what Fife was looking for and the ability from our conversations to absolutely understand what type of person we wished to recruit. The process most definitely found us candidates who would not have otherwise applied and although there was still a small number of applicants we were able to appoint a suitable candidate to the post. This was my first time in using this service and would consider it for future senior appointments.

HM Treasury: Building Inclusion into the Candidate Experience

Posted on by rharris

CHALLENGE

Every year Her Majesty’s Treasury (HMT) recruits up to 150 graduates for their Graduate Policy Adviser programme, offering the chance to shape policies that affect a nation. A popular proposition, they sought our help to identify the very best candidates from almost 2,500 applications. While well-subscribed, delivering a satisfactory candidate journey had historically proved to be a challenge, and they were keen for our help to improve the application experience. A key objective was to attract a more diverse range of candidates, reflecting the diverse make-up of the UK population they would be supporting. Specifically, they wanted to engage a wider socio-economic, gender, ethnic and disability community. Understanding – and addressing – any adverse impacts on these groups was essential.

APPROACH

Our attraction strategy was to shift the perception that HMT roles are primarily ‘financial’ when, in fact, communication and analytical skills are the most important abilities. This allowed us to broaden the sweep of our attraction strategy in general and also, to target specific talent groups.

We reviewed all of HMT’s assessment materials to establish their fairness, and to ensure they represented best practice. We also monitored every recruitment stage for any adverse impact. Implementing a batched recruitment process, we established a structured schedule of keep warm emails, regularly updating candidates on their applications. And we also applied our standard reasonable adjustment process, making sure that every candidate with a disability-related request was personally contacted to assess requirements.

A recruitment team was also made available to support candidates throughout their entire recruitment journey.

‘The attraction campaign generated 49% of all applications and increased applications from key target audiences – particularly women, BME and state schools.’

RESULTS

Our analysis of the recruitment process also demonstrated that it was free of adverse impacts. For example, a disabled candidate was unable to complete the online test, so we worked with the online provider to replicate testing in Microsoft Excel, and completed the test with the candidate at our offices in London. The candidate was successful and progressed to the next stage.

All hiring targets were achieved. The attraction campaign generated 49% of all applications and increased applications from key target audiences – particularly women, BME and state schools. And HMT was thrilled with the results – so much so that they have asked us to take on further campaigns.

Derby City Council: Candidate Generation for Future Generations

Posted on by rharris

Derby City Council needed to recruit several Directors to drive forward their 2030 vision for a safer, stronger city. They engaged our expertise in Candidate Generation and Assessment solutions to ensure the right candidates were identified and assessed in a robust, pragmatic way. We delivered a streamlined, structured solution to ensure they had the information they needed to make successful appointments based on objective, role-specific insights.

SOLUTION HIGHLIGHTS
• A ROBUST PROCESS
• IN-DEPTH INSIGHT
• MEASUREMENT & VALIDATION
• BESPOKE CANDIDATE REPORTS
• SUCCESSFUL APPOINTMENTS

IDENTIFYING THE RIGHT CANDIDATES TO DRIVE DERBY’S 2030 VISION

SCOPE & SCALE

Derby City Council has a clear vision for 2030, based on building a “safe, strong, ambitious city”.To achieve this vision they needed to recruit a number of Directors to drive forward their ambitious plans.

SITUATION

Derby City Council engaged our expertise in Candidate Generation and Assessment solutions to ensure the right candidates were identified and assessed in a robust, pragmatic way

SOLUTION

IN-DEPTH INSIGHT
To target suitable candidates for each of the roles, our specialist Candidate Generation team immersed themselves in the culture of Derby City Council. They asked questions to understand the key success requirements, experience and qualities essential for each role. This also supported the development of a compelling, yet realistic, narrative that could be used to keep candidates motivated to complete the recruitment journey.

MEASUREMENT & VALIDATION
Our Senior Assessment Consultant ensured that each candidate completed two personality questionnaires to measure their profiles against the organisation’s key strategic level
competencies. In addition, our Occupational Psychologist conducted a 60-minute validation call with each individual to really get under their skin and bring their behavioral preferences to life.

BESPOKE CANDIDATE REPORTS
We then compiled a report on every candidate, highlighting their key strengths and development areas, providing briefs for the panel to use to probe further during the selection interviews.

RESULTS

SUCCESSFUL APPOINTMENTS
This streamlined, structured solution ensured that Derby City Council had the information they needed to make appointment decisions based on objective, role-specific insights.

A ROBUST PROCESS
It also made for a fair process which both successful and unsuccessful candidates found to be enriching, as they received insightful feedback throughout. Similarly, the assessor panel reported that the briefings helped to focus their questions at the final stage interviews for each candidate.