Using sophisticated software to gain competitive advantage

“When you’re setting up as a new company in a competitive market, you need as much firepower as possible. That’s why we chose Invenias.”

Campbell Reed’s co-founder Gavin Campbell believes that investing in “the market-leading, sophisticated Invenias platform” has given the firm a competitive advantage. Gavin and his business partner Oliver Reed opened for business in November 2016 as an executive and strategic search firm with international reach.

“We’d both worked for an international search firm before taking the decision to set up as an independent, self-funded business,” says Gavin. “Over the years we’d used a number of different systems, so we were well versed in what did and didn’t work.

“We knew that the platform we chose would play a very big part in our success going forward. A system giving us what we needed, when we needed it would send a message to the market – it says that we are prepared to invest in the best.”

The company looked at several executive search systems before choosing Invenias. “I’d heard about Invenias, but hadn’t used it before,” continues Gavin. “So, it was all new to me when we watched a demo. The reasons for choosing it as our cloud-based platform quickly stacked up.”

He cites a number of attributes, including its integration with Outlook, straightforward navigation, user friendliness, and the ease at which new candidates can be loaded onto the system. That’s not all, as Gavin explains. “I also really like the Invenias Professional mobile app. We’re on the move a lot and this gives us access to client and candidate data wherever we are.”

But even the mobile app isn’t the biggest wow factor of Invenias for Gavin. “What really sold it to me is how easy it is to track candidates in assignments and quickly create PDF-style reports that we can share with our clients. And then there’s Invenias Client, a secure and controlled web portal through which our clients can track what we’re doing for them at any given time. This is the cherry on the cake for me.

“I encourage our clients to use the client portal,” he continues. “It doesn’t just keep us on our toes – we’re happy for our clients to see what we’re doing – it gives our clients confidence in the transparency of the service we’re providing.

“It also speeds up the recruitment process because clients can view the candidates in an assignment and ask us to remove or add people, which we can then do immediately. Quite simply, the client portal brings our clients much closer to our business. I talk about Invenias and what it can do, both for us and the client, as part of any sales pitch because I am so positive about it.”

“Invenias Client is a secure and controlled web app through which our clients can track what we’re doing for them on any given day. This is the cherry on the cake for me.”
Gavin Campbell
Co-founder/Director

The Invenias system is also part of Campbell Reed’s own recruitment model. “When we interview for people to join us,” says Gavin, “we include Invenias in our description of what we do and how we do it. We’re able to show potential recruits that Campbell Reed invests in the best of everything, including our recruitment system. We’ve hired some senior people from within the recruitment industry and they love it.”

The assignment tracking capability is especially popular with the Campbell Reed team. Gavin says this is because it allows them to easily track every interaction with each candidate. “They can see who has spoken to which candidate and when, whether they have been interviewed, if their CV is in hand, whether the client has interviewed them, what the client’s feedback was, and so on. It’s then an easy matter for notes and updates to be added to each candidate file.

“The PDF reports that are then produced using this data are professional looking, easy for our clients to read, and branded with our identity. And as we send them out every week, the fact that we can get this level of quality without spending all day producing a report, is another big plus factor for the team.

“We make a brilliant job of what we do. And we all know that being able to effectively manage and report on our assignments helps us to tell that story in the marketplace. That’s what Invenias enables us to do.”