The head of recruitment and resourcing at KPMG Europe, part of the global accountancy firm, Ruth Elwood, is more aware than most of the importance of employer branding.

The company has been the proud winner of the Sunday Times Best Big Companies to Work For award in two of the past three years. “The employer brand is hugely important,” she says. “People make a considered choice not just in terms of the roles but in terms of the type of company they want to work for.”

However, while many heads of recruitment might have been content to rest on their laurels, and rely on the publicity to attract jobseekers, for Elwood recruitment has a much bigger role.

As she explains: “I am judged not just by getting people through the door and filling my vacancy numbers, I am judged by how they perform. Are they the right talent for this business? Do they take this business forward? Are they what our clients need?

“Without a world-class recruitment function and team you don’t have a business, because it’s people that make the business. I see recruitment as absolutely front line and absolutely fundamental to business success.

“It doesn’t end when you join or when we make the offer - it is continuous talent management. My job is to identify the people who have the potential to be our leaders of the future, not just to fill a vacancy.”

It is axiomatic, therefore, that for Elwood everyone who joins KPMG is talented. “Absolutely,” she says. “If they are not then I have failed, because we aim to recruit only the top talent - our clients expect it, and ultimately I am recruiting to put someone in front of our clients.”

So how does she define ‘talented’? “Someone who is ambitious and prepared to work hard for that,” she explains. To achieve finding these talented individuals, KPMG has developed a range of “market leading selection tools”, says Elwood.

These are no off-the-shelf products, but the firm’s own psychometric tests, covering verbal and numerical aptitudes as well as personality tests that pick out those most likely to have successful careers at KPMG.

As Elwood continually emphasises, the selection process is not something that is set in isolation from the business. Instead it is constantly tweaked to ensure the company gets the talent it needs. It does this by measuring employees’ performance, at one, three and five years, and linking it back to elements of the selection process, she explains.

One example is that because graduates with a 2.2 degree are 80% more likely to fail their professional accountancy examination, KPMG insists on a 2.1 as a minimum entry requirement.

KPMG’s selection process is also designed to be responsive to the changing needs of the business as it is affected by wider forces in the economy. This year the firm is likely to recruit 600 graduates and 500 experienced hires, compared to 1,000 and 3,000 respectively in the good times.

Secret of my success
Being prepared to put myself our there and take some risk

In these times of uncertainty, Elwood says greater weight has been given to specific competencies - for example, problem solving, career motivation and putting the client first.

“These weightings have been increased to ensure we really are selecting those who can demonstrate these skills to a high level,” she says.
For Elwood this is only possible because her role is intrinsically linked to talent management through her HR colleagues. “This is the only way we can keep reinvigorating our selection process and know what we are doing is the right thing, when the market changes as it has and demands a completely different skill set than perhaps was needed two or three years ago.”

Hiring managers also play a vital role in making sure clients’ needs are at the heart of the process, by working closely with Elwood’s team -from discussing the skills required to interviewing. “We are just there as the conduit to bring that person to them,” she says.

KPMG has also adapted the messages it transmits through its marketing to reflect the importance of flexibility. “There is no point somebody coming in and saying ‘I only want to work in London in audit’. That is not where it is - you will go where the work is because we can’t guarantee that that will always be where the work is.”

When it comes to flexibility, no one could accuse Elwood herself of not living up to what she demands in others. Beginning as a management trainee at Marks & Spencer, she moved into merchandising. She soon discovered she enjoyed interviewing and “jumped at” the chance of moving into recruitment, eventually recruiting up to board level.

With 20 years in retail under her belt, Elwood realised she needed to widen her experience, and joined KPMG in 2001. Since then in her own words “has moved through the ranks quite swiftly”.

Elwood clearly enjoys the people side of recruitment, describing its “buzz” as being able “to offer people an opportunity to maximise their potential”. However, she is keenly aware this in not the whole story. “It’s only a win-win for the individual and the business if you get the right person,” she says.

Indeed, she is certainly not one to soften the message when targeting the people KPMG wants. “We are not going to sit here and be fluffy and say ‘this is all lovely’ - it isn’t. These are hard and challenging jobs,” she says. The reason for this honesty is that people will self select out, she explains.

In addition then to being responsible for resourcing and recruitment in the UK, Elwood’s role covers seven merged its UK practice with Germany and Switzerland. And this August KPMG partners in the Commonwealth of Independent States voted to join the rest of KPMG Europe.

Elwood says the merger has created both opportunities and challenges. While intra-European moves are encouraged, not least to better serve KPMG’s European clients, the merger has clearly added a level of complexity to Elwood’s role.

Elwood says a major challenge is how to sell KPMG to potential employees in different countries. While in the UK you can use humour in your advertisements, Germany is far more corporate. As a consequence “the message that we are one firm and that the mergers provide staff with greater opportunities has to be tweaked”, she says.

Similarly the same selection tools cannot necessarily be used across all countries. For example, KPMG in the UK has been using online tests for seven years. However, Germany has only just started using them. Before this, Elwood adds she was told ‘that’s not the way Germany as a country recruits’. “That’s to do with educating the market,” she explains.

Mobility across KPMG Europe is actively encouraged, and there are currently 100 intra-European assignments going on.

However, despite the differences in selection across Europe, Elwood explains that “in theory” staff with similar levels of experience should be able to slot into corresponding roles in any part of the firm.

The recession, and expansion into Europe have clearly made significant demands on Elwood and her team. But already she is looking ahead to the next challenge -; being ready when the market picks up. But whatever the stage of the economic cycle, it is unlikely to shake Elwood from her fiercely-held belief that recruitment is much more than employer branding, but lies right at the heart of KPMG’s business.

fact
KPMG outsources its in-house support functions, temporary, fixed contract and permanent, to Carlisle Managed Solutions

Curriculum Vitae

Home town: Romford

University: Open University

1980-2000: Trainee commercial manager, merchandiser and recruitment manager, Marks & Spencer

2001 – to date: KPMG

2001: graduate recruitment manager for London

2002-3: senior manager graduate recruitment UK

2003: head of recruitment

2006: director, head of recruitment and resourcing, KPMG Europe

Company Profile

• KPMG Europe is comprised of KPMG in eight territories: UK, Turkey, Commonwealth of Independent States (Russia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Georgia), Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands
• In the UK, KPMG employs 10,000 partners and staff in 22 offices
• KPMG is one of the ‘Big Four’ accountancy firms. The others are Ernst & Young, PwC, and Deloitte
• KPMG’s services are divided into three areas: audit, advisory and tax

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