SARA New Zealand

The Awards

SEEK is thrilled to announce the return of the SEEK Annual Recruitment Awards (SARAs) in 2021.

The SARAs celebrate the people and recruitment businesses striving for excellence in the industry. This year, such excellence holds special significance as the industry continues to take strides forward from the challenges of 2020.

The awards – now in their 18th year – recognise the dedication and innovation of recruitment professionals from across the country, as chosen by a panel of expert judges.

Enter the SARAs for your opportunity to be recognised as a leader in the industry, showcase your skills and brand to clients and candidates, network with your peers and have your hard work rewarded.

The awards are SEEK’s way of showing appreciation for recruiters who take pride in delivering professional service and exceptional client and candidate support, and who inspire others to make a positive impact on peoples’ lives.

SARAs finalists will be invited to join us in celebration at a black-tie event on 18 November.

Nominate yourself, your agency or a colleague.

Award
Categories

Recruitment Agency of the Year

This category is open to all recruitment agencies and there are three Awards given, based on agency size:

Small Recruitment Agency of the Year (1-5 full-time consultants)
Medium Recruitment Agency of the Year (6-19 full-time consultants)
Large Recruitment Agency of the Year (20+ full-time consultants)

Judges are looking for commitment to workplace culture, innovation, candidate engagement, commercial growth/achievement and the agency’s contribution to the success of the recruitment industry as a whole.

Most Innovative Agency of the Year

We want to hear from progressive recruitment agencies that are harnessing data and analytics to provide insights, solve client challenges and fuel innovation.

This may be as insights delivered to clients to influence recruitment strategies, or as analytics that enhance business practices, relationships and processes.

Excellence in Candidate Engagement

The hiring process influences a candidate’s acceptance of a job offer, as well as their perception of the recruiter, the organisation and the sector as a whole.

Submissions should demonstrate how the agency goes above and beyond to provide an exceptional candidate experience which helps promote the professionalism of the industry.

Judges will be looking for recruitment agencies demonstrating best practice in candidate engagement with special emphasis on ethically building and retaining candidate pools.

Recruitment Leader of the Year

This category is open to all recruitment professionals at management level, or in a leadership role.

Submissions will demonstrate the ability to foster relationships, solve problems, communicate effectively, and adapt to change.

Judges are seeking someone who inspires and motivates others, performs to business objectives, and is making an impact within the agency and recruitment sector as a whole.

Recruitment Consultant of the Year

This Award is open to all recruitment consultants currently employed by a New Zealand Recruitment Agency.

Recruitment consultants can be either self-nominated or nominated by a peer within their agency.

The submission will demonstrate the achievements of the recruitment consultant, how they have excelled in an area of client and candidate engagement, and how they have contributed to the recruitment industry as a whole.

Best Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Initiative

This award is open to all recruitment agencies.

The winner of this award will treat diversity, equity and inclusion as integral to their organisation, and demonstrate their commitment through meaningful initiatives and/or strategies that benefit diverse talent pools and the business.

Judges will be looking for initiatives or a recruitment approach which maximises the potential of, and offers equitable opportunity to, a diverse group of people. Finalists of this award will consider and incorporate Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in aspects of the candidate experience.

The
Judges

Experts in their field, our exceptional judges have been hand-picked to select the winners of the 2021 SEEK Annual Recruitment Awards.

Bridget Cooksley

Manager Specialist Recruitment, Department of Corrections

Bridget has a wealth of recruitment experience within both agency and in-house environments in both New Zealand and Australia. She is currently the Manager Specialist Recruitment with the Department of Corrections (in New Zealand) where she looks after a national team of Senior/Recruitment Advisers, focussed on providing high quality recruitment support to the business and profiling the Department externally to excite people about the range of opportunities we have available.

Bridget manages the Department’s relationships with external partners including psychometric testing, advertising and pre-employment screening providers, recruitment agencies and is the main point of contact at Corrections for the All-of-Government recruitment solution. During her career she has worked tirelessly to increase the professionalism of industry, both when leading teams within recruitment agencies and building the in-house team at Corrections. She recognises that the best results are achieved when recruitment agencies work in partnership with their clients, where there is transparency, mutual respect and understanding. She expects to receive professional service from the recruiters the Department engages and is often heard reminding her hiring managers to ‘be a good customer’.

Rebecca Clarke

NZ Manager, RCSA Australia and New Zealand

Rebecca joined the recruitment and staffing industry in 2001 and has been passionate about it ever since.

In her current role as NZ manager for the RCSA (Recruitment Consulting & Staffing Association of Aotearoa and Australia), Rebecca is a conduit and champion for RCSA member voices across Aotearoa. She works closely with the wider RCSA team of specialists to support and empower their members to lead in the world of work through promoting the recruitment profession, enabling better business, providing networking and celebration opportunities, growing the next generation of recruitment talent, and fostering pathways to professionalism.

Rebecca is founder of the AskARecruiter meetup and #everydaycreative community in NZ, a volunteer at 10x10 Auckland philanthropy and recognised for Outstanding Contribution to the Industry in 2019. She has also previously judged the NZHR Awards and has been on the other side of preparing awards submissions.

In her own words: "There is no better time to be proud of the contribution recruitment, talent acquisition and staffing professionals make – we’re in the industry of jobs and getting people into employment and giving businesses the confidence to grow. What we do as an industry matters, and we should all be louder and prouder of the valuable contribution we make."

Kate James

Head of Organisational Development - Pacific, Coca-Cola Europacific Partners

Kate is Head of Organisational Development for the Pacific at Coca-Cola Europacific Partners – the world’s largest Coca-Cola bottler with over 30,000 employees across 25 countries. In her role she and her team develop initiatives that lead to exceptional employee experiences at each stage of the employee journey and ensure organisational effectiveness across inclusion, diversity, and community-based initiatives throughout the Pacific regions.

Prior to this, Kate led the Talent function at Air New Zealand where she supported enterprise-wide business and people transformation as a result of the impacts of Covid-19 and redefined the airline’s talent management framework.

Kate has had the privilege of working with some of New Zealand’s most successful and impactful organisations, such as The Warehouse Group and Auckland Council, to build and deliver bespoke talent frameworks.

She started her career in search-based recruitment in Australia and the UK many years ago and passionately believes that successful, wholistic talent management begins with the ability to identify and bring together critical talent, business, and purpose.

Amaria Osman

Senior Manager Recruitment and Talent Acquisition, Stats NZ

Ko Hikurangi te maunga, ko waiapu te awa, ko horouta te waka, ko Kakariki te marae, ko Ngati Porou te iwi. Nō Te Whanganui a tara ahau, Ko Amaria Osman toku ingoa.

Kia ora! I am a recruitment and talent acquisition specialist with 15 years in the industry. In that time I’ve worked in recruitment agencies, RPOs, as a contracter and in internal recruitment. I’m currently Senior Manager - Recruitment and Talent Acquisition at Tatauranga Aotearoa Stats NZ.

I believe recruitment agencies and service providers play an important part in the employment eco-system. They can add real value by providing different options, market information and an honest candidate viewpoint, which is really insightful and important to understand candidate behaviour. People are an organisation’s biggest asset and in order to excel we must have the right people contributing at all levels to the cause.

I really enjoy my career in recruitment and there is a whakatauki (Maori proverb) that beautifully summarises this: “He aha te mea nui o tenei ao? he tangata, he tangaga, he tangaga” What is the most important thing in this world? It is people, it is people, it is people. For me, there is nothing truer in the world.

Grant Burley

Past Co-Founder and Director

Grant commenced his IT Recruitment career in 1993, a few years on he’s helped establish and build a few of New Zealand’s better-known recruitment brands including Absolute IT.

Grant keeps himself busy by investing in new ventures, business mentoring and advisory positions. He’s always open to a chat and can be reached via most social media channels.

Aman Dhaliwal

Talent & Culture Development Manager, AA New Zealand

Aman is the Talent & Culture Development Manager at AA New Zealand, where he oversees nation-wide Talent Acquisition, Retention, Culture Development, and Immigration support services.

Since joining the recruitment industry in 2006, Aman and has worked for several successful NZ brands, including Fisher & Paykel Appliances and Fonterra.

Aman's key driver is to ensure recruiters continuously deliver an exceptional candidate/employee experience. He loves seeing people grow in their careers and believes the recruitment industry has a unique role to play in enabling people to feel empowered at work.

Judd Fowler

National Talent & Workforce Planning Manager, Fulton Hogan (AU)

Judd is a strategic recruitment leader with over 15 years' experience across a broad range of construction-based industries. He has worked within both agency and in-house environments.

Judd has held various management roles within which he has led resourcing strategies, international recruitment campaigns and has managed workforce planning across the operations in his remit.

Judd enjoys working in recruitment as there are few other professions that allow the chance to interact with as broad a range of people. This unique opportunity allows you to see the diversity of thought in the talent market which can help to drive both business and individual success.

Pauline Marshall

Talent Acquisition Manager, KiwiRail

Pauline is the Talent Acquisition Manager for KiwiRail, leading a sizeable internal recruitment function delivering talent to the business to achieve the business strategic objectives and meet growth targets, and is part of the HR Leadership team.

With over 20 years’ experience in recruitment and working within internal functions in high profile organisations such as Downer, Air New Zealand and Telecom (now Spark), and in a previous life several years within agency, Pauline has a wealth of experience as an HR Leader, leading recruitment teams to develop strategies that attract and engage a wide talent audience.

Pauline is delighted to be a part of the judging panel for the SARA awards again and is looking forward to seeing the best of the recruitment industry.

Avoid these 3 mistakes in your award submissions

The key to a win is to write a strong submission—a skill that can be honed, according to Charles Cameron, CEO of the Recruitment Consulting and Staffing Association (RCSA).

4 tips to write a winning submission

Entering the SARAs has many benefits but what is the difference between a run-of-the-mill entry and one that stands out from the pack?

SARAs Submission Checklist

Ready to start your SARA submission? We've created a checklist to make sure you get your submission all set.

Download now