CWJobs at RecFest 2019
RecFest is a highpoint in everyone’s recruitment calendar. Find out what some of CWJobs’ highlights were from last year’s event.
Last month, CWJobs attended RecFest, the biggest independent recruitment event in the UK. Now in its sixth year, the event is always a highlight in our recruitment calendar.
This year, the festival brought together 3,000 recruitment professionals to expand their view of the recruiting world. The event saw 100 speakers share their insights over five stages, sharing 40 hours of content.
Our Head of Product, Bonnie Andrews took over the Brainfood stage, where she discussed how the UK’s tech workforce perceives the industry, with a view to gaining a better understanding of how to attract & retain tech talent.
Drawing on insights from CWJobs’ Confidence Index report, Bonnie discussed the underlying reasons why 1 in 5 UK tech workers aren’t confident overall on the state of the industry. She also explored some of the key skills that are set to dominate the industry’s future, including cyber security and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Key themes: artificial intelligence and diversity
Some key themes from the event included the role of AI in recruitment and the promotion of diversity in the industry. At the start of 2019, CWJobs predicted that both these areas would play an important role in recruitment over the coming years.
Artificial Intelligence in particular, is a rising sub-sector of the industry with Adobe’s Digital Trends report citing that 31% of businesses say that implementing AI is on their agenda for the next 12 months.
At the festival, we heard several speakers discuss the use of AI in recruiting, including Spyros Magiatis and Rob Long from recruitment software company Workable.
Diversity was discussed from various viewpoints and several positive case studies were highlighted by speakers including Siobhan Kelly-Bush and Peter Hogg from Schneider Electric.
At CWJobs, we’ve previously written about how companies can help close the gender gap in the IT industry by focusing on diversity and flexibility, so these talks were particularly inspiring to us.
A valuable event for the recruitment industry
With 32 immersive experiences on offer, including exclusive wearable technology, RecFest is an event at the forefront of the recruitment industry, celebrating its people and the work that they do.
We enjoyed meeting new people and building our network and we appreciate the value that events like RecFest bring to the industry.
The gathering of the UK’s recruiters provides the opportunity to discuss the important issues that effect the industry’s future. We for one, were pleased to see the positive impacts that technology is having on recruitment best practices, particularly in relation to removing bias and promoting inclusivity.