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About Us
Recruitment is a people business. It`s about understanding what makes people tick. It`s about helping people realise their ambitions and aspirations through positive connections. Small in size, but big in thinking – we are a dynamic new agency offering clients and candidates a unique service. We get under the skin of all the people we work with to facilitate fruitful introductions. We understand that time is the most precious commodity of all. That’s why our fuss free, straight down-the-line approach delivers real value to both candidate and employer.
We do the leg work to make sure the time you give is worthwhile.
Meet the team
Ian
Ian is a competent financial services professional with over 18 years of experience managing sales teams and selling financial services products and solutions. Ian started his career working for Cardif Pinnacle, a subsidiary of BNP Paribas. The following ten years’ took him into a number of senior business development roles. During this time, he consistently achieved income growth targets whilst managing major financial services organisations including banks, building societies and finance companies.
In 2008, Ian moved into the investment sector managing a sales team which focused on U.K. and European property investments. Ian’s knowledge of the financial services industry investment arena is extensive.
As a Director of Talent Octopus, Ian is responsible for client and candidate relationships with a particular bias towards financial services.
In his spare time, he spends as much time as possible keeping fit in the gym. He’s also busy running around after his 4 year old son and wondering how professional golfers make this sport look so easy!!!
Alison
Alison graduated as an Associate CIPD back in 1997 and continued to pursue her career in HR over the next 10 years. With a real passion for people, she always knew that HR and recruitment would be the right career path. During her initial progression Alison found her niche in recruitment, working for a large national agency and then a boutique advertising company where she recruited roles from junior to senior level.
In 2004 Alison and her Husband, Greg relocated to Spain where they had great success setting up a Fine Wine business. This was an eventful few years, as their business grew so too did two little people, arriving in 2007 and 2008. This brought about a re-re-location back to the UK to be closer to family.
Talent Octopus is Alison’s new baby and she believes that with her team she is able to bring a new approach to talent acquisition for her clients. Working in both external and internal HR roles she feels she is excellently placed to understand both client and candidate needs.
When not at work, Alison is busy running around after her active family including her furry first born, Chico. When she’s not chasing her family, she can often be seen running in the local area and has been labelled as the female ‘Forest Gump’, less the beard of course!
Greg
A successful and diligent Business Development professional, Greg has built a solid career in sales spanning 12 years. During this period he has enjoyed working with start-up companies, where he identified and secured new business whilst building solid connections with clients. He likes to adopt a professional and controlled approach in everything that he does and is a bit of a perfectionist sometimes bordering on OCD to the delight of his Wife, Alison (MD).
In 2009, after enjoying 6 fruitful years living in southern Spain, Greg and his now extended family of 5 consisting of wife Alison, daughter Edie, son Zac and not forgetting his Czech born Spanish Cocker Spaniel called Chico moved back to Blighty where he continued his career in sales and development, running and achieving remarkable success with the family fine wine business.
At Talent Octopus they believe that people make their business. Greg is at the forefront of the future growth of the firm and is responsible for driving new business revenue. As Business Development Director, Greg also heads up the sales and marketing sector. With his wicked sense of humour, can-do attitude plus exceptional networking skills he makes certain that long term relationships with Talent Octopus’ clients and candidates are achieved which in turn ensures return business.
Outside of work Greg is busy working out his strategy and game plans for his team’s next match. This is another task that he takes very seriously – managing his son’s under 7’s football team, ‘the Bulldogs’. When he’s not coaching he can be found supporting ’The Arsenal' at the Emirates, trying to keep some sort of shape by jogging or going down the gym or spending quality time with the family. After that any other spare time at home Greg enjoys nothing more than following the kids and dog around with a dustpan and brush easing his OCD condition!
Clients
Finding the right person for the job is not easy.
That’s why you need an expert partner that not only understands your business but has access to an extensive talent pool to expediently and efficiently deliver solid talent to your door.
Clients trust us because we deliver
We understand that time is precious, so we make sure your time working with us is productive. Clients tell us they like our proactive, can-do attitude, our speed (and of course, our prices), but most of all they like the fact that we deliver. We bring them strong, on-point, solid candidates. People that not only meet the brief but score on all round “fit” as well.
We don’t like what we do, we love it.
We would welcome the chance to see what we can do for you.
Call us on 01923 448 157 And let’s have a chat.
Candidates
Looking for something new? We are the people to get you there.
Our expert team of consultants have the knowledge and the contacts to help you. Whether you need a new move, a career change or a sector shift we are with you all the way helping with CV writing, interview tips, in-depth briefings and most importantly encouragement and motivation. Together, we will get you there.
Privacy Policy
Talent Octopus is committed to maintaining the protection of its candidate’s (data subject’s) data and in doing so, complies with the General Data Policy Regulation (GDPR) (EU) 2016/679.
1.0 How is your data collected?
1.1 Talent Octopus receive your data through a number of means: Job boards where you have placed a copy of your CV and profile; job advertisements placed in trade publications or via job boards; LinkedIn via a connected network.
1.2 When first contact is made by Talent Octopus, you will be requested to complete our Candidate Registration Form which collects your personal information and also requests your permission for your data to be passed to a potential employer.
1.3 We will also collect data relating to discussions/interviews held with Talent Octopus (either via telephone, Skype or in person).
1.4 Your data may also be collected when you use our contact form contained within our website under “Contact”. This process requires you to enter your name and email address.
2.0 What data is collected?
2.1 In order for Talent Octopus to carry out its main purpose ‘to source candidates for specific job roles’, it is necessary for data collection of the following: full name, address, email, telephone number, mobile telephone, skills information, previous job information and specific tasks carried out within these job roles as detailed within the Curriculum Vitae.
2.2 Via our Candidate Registration Form, we collect the following information: Personal details (title, name, address, home telephone number, mobile number, email address, nationality, date of birth); Current position details (current employer, notice period, current position, interview availability, current salary, holidays booked, position looking for, salary expectation); Eligibility to work in the UK (type of visa/work permit, passport number and national insurance number); Criminal convictions (detail and dates, if applicable); References including character reference (name, position, company, address, telephone, mobile, email, confirmation of dates employed and the position when you worked there). We will also request a copy of your passport and/or visa or work permit.
2.3 A summary of your answers to specific questions asked during discussions/interviews held with Talent Octopus will be collected in order to provide potential employers with an insight into your key attributes, promoting you for a specific opportunity.
3.0 Who we share your data with and why?
3.1 Your data is held in the strictest confidence and will not be provided to any third party by Talent Octopus without your prior authorisation. Your data is used for the sole purpose of finding you a job and to promote you to a potential employer. Typically, when a potential job opportunity presents itself, full details of this position will be disclosed to you and your agreement sought for your CV to presented to a potential employer. Personal data such as address, mobile and email will not be passed to the potential employer until a verbal offer of a job is made to you and your agreement sought for this information to be passed over.
3.2 Your data collected via our website is used for contact purposes only and will not be passed to any third party (potential employer) without your permission.
3.3 Talent Octopus do not use candidate data for marketing purposes.
4.0 Looking after your information
Talent Octopus store candidate and client data via Dropbox in the Cloud. Dropbox provide a secure cloud-based network which provides that strict limitation is maintained between the internal Dropbox network and the public internet. Internet-bound traffic to and from the production network is carefully controlled through a dedicated proxy service and those, in turn, are protected by restrictive firewall rules. Access to the production environment is restricted to only authorized IP addresses and requires multi-factor authentication on all endpoints.
To prevent man-in-the-middle attacks, authentication of Dropbox front-end servers is performed through public certificates held by Talent Octopus. An encrypted connection is negotiated before the transfer of any files or Paper docs and ensures secure delivery to Dropbox front-end servers.
5.0 How long will my data be stored for?
Your details will be held for the duration of the initial recruitment process. Thereafter, you will be asked for permission for your data to be held on our cloud-based system typically for up to a year. This will enable your data to be sourced in the event that a job may become available in the future. You may at any time decide to have your data removed from Talent Octopus’ cloud system by sending an email to info@talentoctopus.co.uk
6.0 Your choices and rights
Under GDPR you have the following:
6.1 Right to access and obtain a copy of the information we hold about you
You are entitled to request confirmation as to whether we process any of your personal information. Where this is the case, you may have access to your personal information and to certain information about how it is processed. In some cases, you can ask us to provide you with an electronic copy of your information
6.2 Right to correct your personal information
If you can demonstrate that personal information we hold about you is not correct, you can ask that this information is updated or otherwise corrected.
6.3 Right to be forgotten/have data deleted
You have the right to have your personal data deleted. You may make such a request at any time and Talent Octopus will evaluate if your request should be granted. However, this right is subject to any legal right or obligations where we may have to retain data.
6.4 Right to contest any automated decision we make about you
You have the right to contest any automated decision we make about you. An automated decision is a decision taken without any human intervention which has legal consequences. We don’t typically carry out automated decision making but, if we do, we will make it clear where such decisions are being made.
7.0 Breach notification
Where the Company has identified a personal data breach resulting in a high risk to the rights and freedoms of any individual, the Company shall tell all affected individuals without undue delay and will take the relevant steps to identify how this has happened and to rectify this immediately.
8.0 Contact
If you have any concerns regarding this Data Privacy Policy, would like to exercise your rights or would like to update information we hold on you, then you may either write or email the Data Controller as follows:
Alison Pearson
Talent Octopus Ltd
Meridien House
69-71 Clarendon Road
Watford
Hertfordshire
WD17 1DS
Email: alison@talentoctopus.co.uk
