TPP Not for Profit is a recruitment consultancy specialising in meeting the needs of organisations in the charity, arts and public sectors. Each month we cover a recruitment or retention topic from the viewpoint of the third sector.
Every year, close to 2 billion Christmas cards are sent in the UK. Approximately 30% of these include a charitable donation. This month, we look at which charities have the best Christmas cards.
All the cards we’ve chosen are not only fun and attractive, but they all have some connection to their charity, whether featuring an image related to the organisation or cause or having been designed by some of its beneficiaries. This can be especially difficult for charities associated with healthcare issues or other negative topics, but all of these have managed amazingly.
All of these cards are also sold directly by the charities, so all or most of the profits go directly to the cause, unlike many charity cards sold by high street retailers.
Of course, this list only represents our opinions. If you have a favourite charity Christmas card that we’ve overlooked, please post a link in the comments below.
These cards cleverly link to the organisation they are supporting by featuring a London bus with a 'We are Macmillan Cancer Support' registration plate. The backs of the cards also feature information about Macmillan Cancer Support and the work that they do.
This card, entitled ‘Christmas Morning in Afghanistan’, is both beautiful and thoughtful; reminding us of our forces who are serving overseas at Christmas time.
Each year, Mencap runs a Christmas Card Competition for people with a Learning Disability. This winning image was by Luke Milligan of the Oakdale School from the 2007 competition.
These cards from Amnesty feature colourful doves of peace and are printed using wood from the UK, certified by the Forest Stewardship Council. All cards carry the message 'Season's Greetings' in nine languages (French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian, Chinese, Irish, Scots Gaelic, Welsh and English) – reflecting Amnesty’s worldwide focus.
Sreepur cards are individually hand-crafted by the women of the Sreepur Village Outreach Project in rural Bangladesh. The producer group have Fair Trade recognition and are able to work from home without neglect of childcare. All proceeds from the sale of cards are returned to the Sreepur Village, home to more than 500 abandoned children and more than 100 destitute women.
These beautiful cards are extremely popular and have completely sold out for this year.
Do you have a favourite Charity Christmas card? Post a link in the comments below.
The recruitment industry as a whole has a pretty poor reputation,
and many people over the years have experienced a bad level of service
from recruiters, either as a candidate or a client. For charities,
where the crossover
between employees, donors and volunteers is so large, it’s particularly
important that their recruitment partner offers an effective service,
but, more importantly, an ethical one.
In this post, we look at how this reputation has been earned and how you
can make sure you’re working with an ethical and principled recruitment
consultancy that shares your values.
Why the bad rep?
It’s a common perception that recruiters are simply out to make a quick
profit, and will do virtually anything to fill a role, regardless of the
quality of the fit.
Some common complaints about recruiters include:
Recruiters don’t have any real knowledge or experience of the industry they are recruiting for
Agencies charge far too much and don’t offer value for money
Candidates are pressured into taking jobs they are not sure about, just so the recruiter can earn their commission
Recruiters don’t listen to either their clients or their candidates
Recruiters put forward candidates without meeting them face to face or sometimes without even getting their consent first
Agencies place candidates in a role, only to poach them to another role after the guarantee period has ended
All agencies share the same small pool of candidates and don’t encourage diversity among their candidates
In some sectors, where all that matters is getting a candidate in place,
however short-term, this approach can suit both agency and employer.
However, most not for profit organisations need employees who are right
for the role, committed to the cause and likely to benefit the
organisation in the long term, and they need a recruiter they can trust
to supply these candidates consistently.
So how do you make sure your agency is reliable?
When you work with a supplier, it’s a good idea to assess the service
they provide. We’ve put together a checklist of questions you should be
asking your recruitment partner – a reputable consultancy will be able
to provide evidence to back up all of these.
TPP currently work with over 50 clients on Preferred Supplier List
(PSL) agreements. These include a service level agreement to ensure
that we meet our client’s needs, challenges, budgets and priorities, so
we are constantly being asked to provide evidence about our service
levels. Any other consultancy should be able to do likewise.
Do they interview candidates face to face?
Some recruiters will do anything to fill a role before their
competitors, even if it means sending over a candidate’s CVs when they
have not met (or occasionally even spoken to) the jobseeker in question.
At TPP, we pre-interview all of our candidates before we send our
shortlist over; in person wherever possible. We always meet temporary
candidates face to face, but occasionally interview permanent candidates
on the phone if geographic or time constraints apply. This means that
we have explored in depth the motivations for each candidate, and are
confident they are a good long-term fit for your organisation. We also
verify their UK right to work, so we don’t waste your time with
candidates who aren’t eligible.
Meeting face-to-face also allows us to ‘sell’ your organisation to the
candidate. The very best employees are always in demand and can often
pick and choose. Having a third party pointing out the benefits of
working for your organisation can often make all difference We also
brief our candidates about the role and prepare them for interviews, so
you can see their best side on the day. Do they really understand your sector?
Too often, recruitment consultants aren’t dedicated to recruiting for a
particular kind of role or in a particular sector, so they don’t have
the specialist knowledge required to understand how your organisation
works, the kind of employees you need or any grasp of trends and issues
in your sector. Not for profit organisations are structured differently
from corporate organisations and require staff with specific skills and
motivations, so it’s important your recruiter ‘gets’ this.
At TPP, the structure of our teams mirrors the internal structure of our
clients, so one consultant won’t recruit for all of your roles.
Instead, we have a fundraising team who only recruit fundraisers, and a
finance division who specialise in finance and accountancy staff, etc.
Combined with the fact that we only recruit for not for profit
organisations, this gives our consultants a really good understanding of
recruitment trends and employees’ motivations for moving, both within
the broader sector and within their job function.
Do they keep in touch enough (but not too much)?
It can feel like recruiters constantly bombard you with telephone calls
and emails, trying to get you to see candidates who just aren’t right
for your organisation. But when something goes wrong or you’ve got a
question, suddenly you can’t get hold of them. This is especially
frustrating as a candidate, when you just don’t know what’s going on.
TPP are scrupulous at keeping both our clients and candidates updated
throughout the recruitment process. We know that candidates kept
hanging in the dark can often simply go elsewhere, so we are constantly
in touch with them so any potential issues can be tackled before, not
after, an offer is made.
And once we have successfully placed a candidate, we don’t just forget
about them. We follow up on their progress with both employer and
employee to make sure they are settling in on their journey to adding
value to your organisation. We also only discuss new opportunities with
candidates we have placed if they contact us directly or apply for one
of our advertised roles.
TPP are also passionate about sharing our knowledge and expertise with
the sector. We send our clients updates on trends in the sector which
are likely to affect them and our monthly email newsletters have a
wealth of recruitment and HR tips and advice.
Do they support the sector in which they work?
While other not for profit recruiters have employees who volunteer, or
run the odd industry seminar, none of them works on the same scale as
the TPP Giving Back
programme. We want to help both our clients and candidates to achieve
as much as they possibly can, so we offer a wide variety of free
services to help them do so.
These include:
Free advertising for volunteer roles
Free use of our boardroom and interview space
Free professional development seminars and networking events, including our new Inside Track series
Free career and recruitment articles and advice, and regular salary surveys
Free CV and career advice clinics and workshops
£100 IoF CPD voucher for every fundraiser placed through us
Our staff are also encouraged to volunteer
with paid leave and many are trustees or regular volunteers for
charities. All of us have chosen to work with the third sector, and we
feel it’s important to give back as much as possible.
Do they offer a diverse range of candidates?
There is a great deal of evidence that having a diverse range of employees
makes an organisation more effective. This is particularly true for
charities, where there has traditionally been a disconnect between the
type of people who work for the charity and their beneficiaries.
TPP are proud to have consistently represented an extremely wide range
of candidates for over 17 years, including those with disabilities and
from the older population; one of our part-time temporary workers is a
77 year old for example. Our huge database and wide range of
partnerships with associations and groups means that we can find
candidates outside the usual pool of jobseekers, including those elusive
‘passive candidates’. Because of our reputation and longevity in the
industry, we also attract many commercial candidates who need a trusted
partner to guide them to the right career within the sector.
Do they have a good reputation in the sector?
One of the best ways to judge the service a supplier provides is to ask other people who have used them what they think.
TPP constantly monitor the service we provide and our customers’
satisfaction. 95% of our clients and 98% of our candidates would
recommend TPP. We also constantly receive testimonials from both our
candidates and our clients. In fact, earlier this year TPP was voted
Best Recruitment Agency in the Partners in Fundraising Awards. We were also been shortlisted for Best Consultancy in the Charity Times Awards.
Do they have industry accreditation?
A reputable recruitment consultancy should always be a member of a professional body, such as the REC, IOR or APSCO. At TPP, we’ve gone one step further and are very proud to have gained REC Audited
accreditation. Launched this year by the REC as the gold standard for
recruitment, this award aims to differentiate those recruiters who can
demonstrate that they operate best practice in areas such as customer
service, staff development and client management. The process of
attaining this standard starts with a diagnostic and also includes a
detailed onsite audit by a REC expert who not only checks processes,
systems and compliance but they also talk to staff and management to
ensure they truly are a gold standard company.
We are delighted to have achieved REC Audited status and to be the first not for profit recruiter to do so!
Do they monitor their level of service?
TPP pride ourselves on delivering a principled and ethical service, but
we do not sit on our laurels and assume all is always perfect. We have:
an in-house Marketing Department who conducts the quality surveys and feedback questionnaires
an internal Compliance Department to ensure that our candidates details are checked and double checked
an internal Client Services Department who impartially monitor our
service to clients, conduct service reviews and can implement PSLs and
Service Level Agreements
So you can be confident that our service is continuously monitored and improved.
Before you decide to work with any recruitment consultancy, do make sure
you know the answers to the above questions. Not all agencies are
alike, and your choice of partner could affect both the productivity of
your organisation and possibly its reputation!
The job market tends to be cyclical – lots of job openings tend to result in candidate shortages and candidates are plentiful when jobs are in short supply. The recent economic downturn has kept the market stable for longer than normal – high levels of redundancy and unemployment have created huge pools of labour while cautious employers have been recruiting less.
However, all the signs indicate that we are now at a tipping point as the market recovers and unemployment drops. According to the latest REC report on jobs, vacancy numbers are continuing to rise at a rapid pace but candidate availability is falling. Commenting on these results, Bernard Brown, Head of Business Services at KPMG, said: “Demand for staff may be up, but the number of individuals putting themselves on the market has dropped for the fifth consecutive month. Perhaps the pay on offer has to rise to encourage staff to ‘make the move’. If it doesn’t we could be about to witness a growing gap between what the employers need and what employees are prepared to do.”
At TPP, as well as a general increase in the number of vacancies in the not for profit sector, we have also noticed a general increase in candidates declining offers that have been made to them. There are some skill sets that have always been in short supply, such as income generation, but other areas are now starting to see skill shortages, such as digital marketing. The demand for candidates in general is increasing, which means they can be much more choosey. Not for profit organisations should be placing more emphasis on candidate care and making sure they are kept happy and engaged throughout the recruitment process.
Below are TPP’s top tips to ensure your candidates feel loved:
1. Ensure the offer package is right
Obviously you need to make sure your salary is as competitive as possible, which means you need to know what similar organisations are offering. Salary is not the only thing to consider though, particularly for charity candidates, who are often looking for a better work-life balance. Make sure you mention benefits and opportunities for flexible working, as these are often really powerful draws.
Candidates are often thinking about the long term when moving roles, and the opportunities for development are likely to play an important part in their decision. Almost all roles offer employees the potential to learn and grow their abilities, even if they do not have a direct route for promotion. The trick is to find the ways in which candidates would be able to make the most of the role and themselves and to make sure they are aware of them in the interview.
In these days of slashed training budgets, any promises of CPD you can offer are a great way to make your organisation stand out. Remember, TPP give all fundraisers placed through us a £100 voucher to spend with the IoF on CPD.
3. Don’t take too long to make a decision
This is probably the most common reason why organisations lose good candidates. If they have great skills and experience, it’s likely that other organisations will want them as much as you do and candidates will not wait around if they receive another offer. While we appreciate it can be hard to make decisions quickly in non-profit organisations, particularly if Trustees have to be involved, waiting for an offer can be a really negative recruitment experience for the candidate.
4. Offer constant feedback and communication
On similar lines, one of the most common frustrations for candidates is a lack of communication and feedback. Even if you are rejecting them, every candidate deserves to know they are not being taken forward and given a reason for that decision wherever possible.
Remember, the large crossover between potential employees, volunteers, advocates and donors make it especially important for charities to take good care of candidates.
At TPP, we know that managing the offer process starts when we first meet the candidate.
We take the time to really understand why they are leaving their current
job and their motivations and requirements for a new role. We drill
down into their key criteria, which is often very different to a
candidate's stated motivations, to maximise the chances of a satisfactory recruitment process for all parties.
In today’s current job-heavy market, there are some charity jobs that will produce literally hundreds of applications, particularly the more generic administration roles. It’s daunting facing such a mountain of paperwork, and it can be tricky to know where to start. In this post, we look at ways to make it easy to shortlist applicants to find the people you want to interview.
Unlike recruiting for more specialist roles, where you may need to compare applicants with very different CVs, the goal here is to exclude as many unsuitable candidates in the shortest possible time.
Log all applications
Firstly, best practice is to log all applications with the candidate’s name, email and source of their application. When you scan their CV you can also add in some brief notes on their skills and experience. This may seem like a lot of work already, but it will help you keep track of who you’ve rejected, who you might be interested in and where your applications are coming from (useful for deciding where to place future advertising).
Define your criteria
Before you start going through CVs, it’s very important to define exactly what your ideal candidate will look like. You should use your job description and person specification to pull together two lists; essential criteria and desirable criteria. Be really strict about the criteria you term ‘essential’ – as a rule of thumb there should be twice as many desirables as essentials.
You can then go through your CVs and score each against your lists of criteria. Any that don’t meet all of the essential criteria can be quickly discarded. Working to lists of criteria also allows you to split up the CVs with other team members and ensures you are all shortlisting on the same terms.
It’s also a good idea to decide before you start to shortlist how many candidates you want to interview – this will help avoid the temptation to keep anyone in who ‘may’ be suitable.
Conduct your shortlist in stages
The quickest way to shortlist is to do it in stages. The first stage is to run through all the CVs and simply exclude those who don’t meet your essential criteria list, and note this on your spreadsheet. This should immediately make the pile of CVs much more manageable.
In stage 2 you should go through the remaining CVs and assign the candidates scores against each item in your list of essential criteria, recording the scores on your spreadsheet. This will give you an easy way to rank candidates and give you a top ten to work with. At this stage, you should also check for any inconsistencies in their CV and make sure that their presentation, spelling and grammar, and attention to detail are flawless on both their CV and covering letter (if applicable).
In the final stage, you should start with a list of candidates who would all be able to do the fundamentals of the role. You can now go through and score them against your list of desirable criteria, which will help single out the candidates who will be able to pick things up more quickly and contribute that bit extra to your organisation.
Bear in mind that it is extremely unlikely that you’ll find a candidate who matches every single item on both your list of essentials and desirables. Indeed, the very best candidate may sometimes require you to think outside the box. But it’s important to try and stick to your original lists wherever possible in order to minimise unconscious bias as much as possible.
Give everyone a response
Everyone who takes the time to apply for a role should receive some form of response, even if it is just an automated email. Keeping your spreadsheet of applicants up to date should make it easier to ensure everyone gets an update on their application.
This is particularly important for charities, whose audiences of employees, volunteers, supporters and advocates tend to widely overlap. A simple email thanking candidates for their interest but expressing regret that not everyone can be asked to interview should be enough. You can even remind them of all the other ways they could support your organisation.
Sounds like a lot of work?
The fact is, however you manage the process, shortlisting for most roles is always going to require a big investment of your time. TPP regularly handle roles for our clients that generate high volumes of response; we recently had 116 applications for a Finance Assistant role and regularly deal with vacancies generating several hundred applications.
Some organisations prefer to recruit for lower level roles internally, but these are the ones that typically eat into your valuable time. If you think your working hours could be better spent, talk to us about handling your vacancy. We’ll deal with all the administration and candidate liaising, and will interview all candidates, prior to sending you a shortlist. We also try to make sure all applicants have a positive recruitment experience, whether they are successful or not, and we will always present your organisation to candidates as an attractive opportunity. And best of all, you only pay when you appoint a candidate.
For more information about our recruitment services, visit our website or contact us on 020 7198 6000 or info@tpp.co.uk.
By Kate Maunder, consultant at TPP Not for Profit 
