Contract Recruitment – Business Unit Lead

ECW Search; Aylesbury; Hybrid; GBP 90,000 - 150,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive package

Uncapped commission

Profit share

EMI scheme

Autonomy to build division

Budget to hire

Pension

Away days

Hybrid work

Job summary

ECW Search in Buckinghamshire is seeking a senior Contract Recruitment Business Unit Lead to build and lead a specialist desk, shaping the market strategy and expanding a profitable contractor book.

You will win and manage high-value assignments, forge long-term client relationships, and hire and mentor a growing recruitment team, with hybrid working 3 days per week.

Qualifications

• Proven track record in contract recruitment and building a desk or contractor book.
• Experience managing margins, gross profit and customer results.
• Ability to develop new contract customers from scratch and scale a division.

Responsibilities

• Build ECW's contract recruitment business from the ground up.
• Develop the initial market and go-to-market strategy with the founders.
• Identify contract and interim opportunities with existing customers.
• Build new customer relationships through proactive business development.
• Develop specialist contractor networks within your market.
• Win and manage contract recruitment assignments.
• Build a profitable book of contractors with recurring gross profit.
• Take ownership of rates, margins, pipeline and commercial performance.
• Shape systems, processes and infrastructure as the business grows.
• Hire and develop additional recruiters as the division expands.
• Grow the division into a standalone revenue stream for ECW Search.

Skills

Contract recruitment

Business leadership

P&L management

New business development

Team leadership

Strategic planning

Tools

CRM systems

ATS

Job description

Contract Recruitment – Business Unit Lead

• Highly Competitive Package
• Market-Leading Uncapped Commission
• Profit Share / Long-Term Ownership Opportunity
• EMI Scheme
• Full Autonomy to Build the Division
• Budget to Hire and Grow
• Pension
• Plenty of Away Days
• Aylesbury - Hybrid - 3 days per week

The Company:

ECW Search is a highly profitable, privately owned and self-funded recruitment business specialising in commercial hiring across the UK, EMEA and US.

We work with market-leading global brands and high-growth businesses across Automotive and Consumer, providing retained search, permanent recruitment and embedded talent solutions.

We have built a strong permanent recruitment business and are now looking to add contract recruitment as a significant part of ECW Search.

We already work with businesses going through major periods of change, investment and growth where specialist contract talent can solve problems that permanent recruitment cannot.

The opportunity is there. We now want someone with the experience and ambition to build the business unit.

The Role:

We're looking for an experienced contract recruiter who has built and managed a successful contract desk and wants the opportunity to take that experience further.

The initial focus will be specialist contract recruitment across the markets ECW Search already knows well, particularly Automotive, Consumer and the wider Manufacturing and Engineering market.

We see significant opportunity across Engineering, Manufacturing, Automation, Supply Chain, Projects and Transformation, although we want the person joining us to have a major say in where we focus.

This is not about building a high-volume, low-margin industrial temp desk.

We want to build a specialist contract business based on good customers, difficult-to-find skills, strong margins and long-term relationships.

You will:

• Build ECW's contract recruitment business from the ground up.
• Develop the initial market and go-to-market strategy with the founders.
• Work with ECW's existing customers to identify contract and interim opportunities.
• Build new customer relationships through proactive business development.
• Develop specialist contractor networks within your market.
• Win and manage contract recruitment assignments.
• Build a profitable book of contractors with strong recurring gross profit.
• Take ownership of rates, margins, pipeline and commercial performance.
• Help shape the systems, processes and infrastructure required as the business grows.
• Hire and develop additional recruiters once the business supports further investment.
• Build the division into a significant standalone revenue stream for ECW Search.

The Person:

We're looking for someone who understands contract recruitment properly and can demonstrate what they have built previously.

You may be a successful contract recruiter who has reached the point where you want more control over the business you are building, without taking the risk of setting up completely on your own.

You'll ideally:

• Have a successful track record within contract recruitment.
• Have personally built a contract desk or contractor book.
• Be able to demonstrate contractors out, gross profit, margins and customers won.
• Understand how to develop new contract customers from scratch.
• Have experience managing and growing existing accounts.
• Understand contract rates, margins and the commercial side of running a contractor book.
• Have strong candidate and contractor management skills.
• Be comfortable being hands-on with recruitment while the division is being established.
• Be commercially ambitious and comfortable taking responsibility for a P&L.
• Have the ability and ambition to recruit and lead a team as the division grows.
• Enjoy working in a small business where decisions can be made quickly and good ideas can actually be implemented.

Experience within Manufacturing, Engineering, Automation or related technical markets would be useful, but it isn't essential.

The quality of the person and their ability to build a contract business is more important to us than arriving with exactly the same market experience as ECW Search.

The Opportunity:

We want the person joining us to think about this as building a business unit, rather than taking another recruitment job.

There is no predetermined ceiling on the size of the division.

If the model works, ECW Search will invest in additional people, technology, infrastructure and markets to grow it.

We offer flexibility and trust, with an expectation of three days per week together in Buckinghamshire.

If you've built a successful contract desk and want the backing and freedom to build something much bigger, we'd like to hear from you.