A war for talent: how can the UK tech sector respond?

Digital environments are as much about people as they are about technology. It is something Softcat understands extremely well, and when it comes to recruitment, that can be a distinct advantage.

At the heart of Softcat’s approach to attracting and keeping the best talent is a focus on building the right culture, empowering people and giving them opportunities to thrive.

CEO Graeme Watt believes it is an important part of the company’s success story. “Our main differentiator is our culture,” he says. “We are people-led and we are customer-led, and if we are looking after our people and they feel motivated, and we give them the tools to be successful, they will be successful.”

There are many elements that go into creating a great culture, and while it starts with the basics – Softcat sends emails recognising colleagues’ birthdays and anniversaries – it requires buy in at the top. Watt sits on the same floor as his people rather than in a remote office and is accessible; they feel able to ask him for help if they need it. He believes he learns from being out there, seeing and hearing what’s going on around him.

Employees are also given a platform to share their ideas. “Innovation comes out of the empowerment we give to people. We encourage it – wanting to say yes to customers all the time means you need to innovate. To an extent we are influencers in all things technology.”

Watt stresses that Softcat does nothing ‘artificial’ to attract talent as he wants candidates who understand and appreciate the company’s values. It all comes down to finding the right fit. “We just get our name out there and look for individuals who are in tune with what we stand for,” he explains. “People are interested in joining a company that rewards and recognises achievement. A company that always tries to say yes to the customer, takes ownership, cares for one another – we really do look out for each other – has fun and does a lot on inclusion, diversity, charitable work and sustainability.”

That commitment to sustainability has made Softcat a trailblazer – it is the first IT company in Europe to have its net zero goal approved by the Science Based Targets initiative. “We have never seen sustainability as a check-the-box action,” Watt says, “it is important to people in the company – and new joiners. It comes from the heart.”

Softcat has been around for 29 years and is a major provider of technology solutions. Its origins lie in selling Microsoft software by catalogue – that is where the name came from – and it has evolved into an industry leader, moving from software to hardware to services.

Headquartered amid the relative quiet of Marlow, Buckinghamshire, the company has premises around the UK and internationally. Its London office is the largest pure play sales office with 250 people and that is as big as Watt feels they should be; he likes the intimacy and energy that comes from smaller teams and believes it helps to keep a culture alive.

Softcat’s physical footprint is another aspect of the company that has been shaped by valuing people. But this time its customers. “We follow the customer – if they need tech, we will find them what they require,” says Watt. This has led to small set-ups in Dublin and Arlington in the US, and a branch network in Singapore, Sydney, Australia, Hong Kong and the Netherlands, which helps to service UK and Irish customers that trade internationally. And this expansion has also opened up new talent pools.

When the business went public seven years ago, which was before Watt’s time, some feared the change would affect the culture it had worked so hard to create. But that has not been the case.

Watt explains, “There were concerns that we would lose agility, our closeness to customers and our culture and get tied up in governance and become too corporate. But we didn’t suffer from those things. We still like to challenge conformity because there has to be a better way of doing things. However, we became more of a brand name after IPO and that gave us credibility and has helped us as we have moved into the enterprise space. Has it aided recruitment? Maybe. If someone is thinking of moving, they might see less risk in an established name.”

It certainly hasn’t got in the way. Softcat was able to recruit 300 people during the two years of the pandemic and has continued a journey Watt describes as evolution rather than revolution. “We know when things feel right, and we do it,” he says. “All growth has been organic.”

Tech and talent; it is a powerful combination and it is apparent that Softcat is investing in both. And that is a very attractive proposition to potential candidates looking to build a rewarding career.

Tech companies are at the frontline of the war for talent, with businesses vying for candidates with sought-after skills. Most realise that when you look beyond pay, packages and perks, employee engagement and experience are essential for attracting, developing and retaining the right people.

Sage is a market leader in enterprise resource planning software, enabling millions of customers to grow in a digital-first world. Its appetite for exploring new applications for machine learning and AI is likely to appeal to any new tech hire.

“Our approach with AI is not to sell it but to use it to make our products better, and to create things we could not create otherwise,” says Aaron Harris, the company’s Global Chief Technology Officer. “We have to collaborate with teams all across the business – when building AI capability, you have to bring in the rest of the organisation.”

And that environment becomes even more attractive when you factor in the opportunities that are available to people. Harris continues, “Our teams know that the things they work on will get to customers. It is really important to these individuals that their work makes it out into the real world.”

During the interview stage, candidates are told about the areas Sage is investing in, and the range of innovative projects they could work on. This fosters engagement and sparks excitement. “It takes a lot of education to become a data scientist so these people are intellectually curious,” explains Harris. “That is what draws them to a job here – we can feed that curiosity.”

Many firms are focusing on company culture as a way to stand out in the marketplace. Values and behaviours matter to new recruits, especially post-pandemic as more people recognise the importance of purpose. Flexible and hybrid working are on many candidates’ wish lists, too.

Sage is remote-first. However, the company is taking the opportunity to rebalance after the forced separation that COVID caused. Harris says, “In product development, most teams already operated very effectively virtually because our squads are globally distributed, so there was not much disruption. The real disruption was that people missed the office and seeing one another. Post-pandemic, we are recalibrating and some teams are coming in more regularly. We have a hybrid working policy and the mandate is simple – it is up to you but when we need you to come in, you come in. Now, we are playing catch up, doing more off-sites and get-togethers.”

Sage doubled its headcount during the two years of the pandemic and Harris is delighted with how well the company has been able to recruit, given the challenges of COVID and tough competition for tech experts, including AI engineers and data scientists.

He believes teams should scale organically to be successful and by hiring at a steady pace, you can gain momentum and lay the foundations you need to grow. “When I started to lead the AI and data science teams, I did not understand how difficult it is to build AI-powered capabilities compared with traditional capabilities. It is a totally different approach,” he explains. “If I hired 1,000 data scientists, they would do nothing for a year – you first need to develop the tooling, processes and programmes for working with customers.”

Harris sees London as a great place to hire with, for example, the financial services industry producing lots of new data scientists. The US is also becoming more competitive. As a company, Sage definitely takes a global approach to recruitment – “we hire where we can find talent,” Harris says – and it has gained a foothold in different talent markets through the acquisition of new businesses. These include AI-based start-up Task Sheriff in Tel Aviv and Futrli, creator of the UK’s premier cash flow forecasting software solution.

“Start-ups have great ideas and technology, but they do not have the data or the customers, so they cannot get the flywheel going,” Harris continues. “We have millions of transactions flowing through our services, and a big team in AI, and we can apply AI to this beyond what they have already built. We bring scale, and they bring innovative technology.” And that can create opportunities for all employees.

A robust talent pipeline is also important to Sage; it has several graduate programmes with UK universities and is now looking to do the same in the US. The company is keen to move beyond recruitment and set up joint research projects with some of these institutions.

Innovation, collaboration, exploration and opportunity are drawing tech candidates to the firm and are helping it to compete with the biggest names in the industry. But what does Harris think really sets the company apart?

“We are global, remote-first and hybrid, we hire the best people and we have a great supportive culture,” he says. All qualities that are highly valued in today’s market.