Every day is a school day – especially in recruitment

September always brings that familiar “back to school” feeling.

New starts. New routines. New shoes that will somehow be scuffed beyond recognition within a week!

It is also a good reminder for me every year, that learning does not end when you leave the classroom. Even after more than 20 years in recruitment, I’m still learning every day.

I’m learning more about people, leadership and potential. About the assumptions we make when hiring. And about the ways our industry needs to change if we genuinely want to create more inclusive businesses and leadership teams.

In fact, some of my most important lessons have involved unlearning things that recruitment has accepted for far too long.

Time to unlearn some old lessons

Recruitment has traditionally placed enormous value on familiarity.

The candidate who has already done the same job. The person who has followed the expected career path. The individual from the organisation everyone knows. Oh and that reassuringly familiar CV.

It can feel like the safest way to hire. But if we continually recruit from the same networks and measure people against the same narrow definitions of experience, we will inevitably keep finding the same types of leaders. And when leadership teams contain similar backgrounds, experiences and ways of thinking, there is a greater risk of groupthink. Assumptions go unchallenged, different perspectives are missed and businesses can become less able to recognise emerging risks or opportunities.

We know now that diversity and inclusion cannot be separated from commercial performance, governance or leadership effectiveness. So, this isn’t about lowering the bar or prioritising difference over capability. It is about questioning whether the bar has always been placed in the right position – and whether everyone has been given an equal opportunity to reach it.

Doing things differently

At Ultimate, we don’t pretend to have all the answers. Diversity and inclusion is an area where every organisation, including ours, should continue to listen and learn. What we have done is make a conscious effort to build fairness and objectivity into how we recruit.

That means not simply returning to the same familiar candidates or recycling an existing shortlist. Each executive search begins from first principles, considering what the organisation genuinely needs and exploring the wider market to find it.

It means looking beyond job titles and employer names to understand what someone can bring: their skills, values, motivations, leadership style and potential. It means using structured questions, recorded interviews and behavioural assessment to give clients a more consistent and rounded view of candidates. It also means being prepared to challenge a brief when the definition of the “ideal candidate” risks excluding good people unnecessarily.

None of those things provides a magic wand to “create” diversity. But together, they can help us broaden the talent pool, reduce the influence of instinct and familiarity, and give people a fairer opportunity to show who they really are.

For me, inclusion cannot be something considered at the end of a search, once the shortlist has already been created. It needs to influence how the entire process is designed.

A recognition that meant a great deal

Earlier this year, I discovered that somebody had nominated me as a Change Maker at the British Mortgage Awards. (thanks if it was you!).

Launched in 2022, Change Makers recognises people who are taking action beyond their usual day-to-day roles to advance diversity and inclusion or sustainability across the mortgage industry.

Spoiler alert - I was incredibly proud to be recognised at the awards in July (the eagle eyed amongst you may have already spotted the badge on my profile!). While of course, I’m proud personally, I also see the recognition as a reflection of the direction we have chosen at Ultimate. We want to challenge the traditional approach to recruitment, open up opportunities to a wider range of people and help our clients build stronger, more balanced teams.

I also recognise that there is more to do. Being named a Change Maker does not mean I have finished the race and won the medal. Far from it.

There is no point at which any of us can decide we have “done” diversity and inclusion. There will always be more to understand, more assumptions to question and more experiences to listen to.

For Ultimate, that means continuing to examine our own methods as well as challenging the wider market. It means improving how we search, assess and support people. And it means accepting that good intentions alone are not enough; they must be reflected in practical actions and better outcomes.

As a new school year begins, that is probably the biggest lesson I will take from this recognition.

Meaningful change rarely comes from believing you already know everything. Every day is a school day – and our industry still has plenty to learn.