Top 11 Recruitment Conferences You MUST ATTEND in Summer/Autumn 2015

Love them or loathe them, recruitment events and conferences are arguably the best way of staying in touch, not only with your fellow recruitment industry contemporaries but also with what’s going on in the industry – the big issues, the latest technologies, the new tools on the market etc.  So if you’re planning on attending a recruiting conference this year, make it a good one!

We’ve put together a list of 10 of the best worldwide recruitment events we’ll be attending throughout the Summer/Autumn months, and that you should be saving the date for and why:

Talent 42
9th-10th June, Seattle

Talent42 differs from other recruitment conferences as it caters solely for tech recruiters. The team at Recruiting Toolbox (who are all former tech recruiting leaders from companies like Amazon and Yahoo), first came up with the idea in 2012 and decided to base their conference around one simple question with one simple answer:

What’s the difference between a traditional recruiting conference, and a tech recruiting conference? Engineers of course!

John Vlastelica, Recruiter Toolbox’s managing director and Talent42’s producer, believes it takes a very skilled and knowledgable recruiter to find great tech talent. Candidates are notoriously hard to find and will often go to lengths to prevent themselves from being found on the likes of LinkedIn. That is why Talent42 focuses on providing tech recruiters with the latest insights into their hard to reach candidates in the form of new websites to find candidates and cool tools to help with the tech hiring challenge. The conference also offers ample networking opportunities, best practice sessions for attendees and product demos.

The show has sold out for three years in a row now and is attended by both tech recruiters and tech leaders, so anyone considering purchasing tickets to the event is advised to do so, as soon as possible. They promise Talent42 #willnotsuck!

Tickets: Tickets cost $995. Click here to buy.

Talent Leaders Connect #TLCon
11th June, Dublin

Talent Leaders Connect is the largest recruitment industry event series in the UK and Ireland and touts itself as “a cross between a structured conference and a social meet up”. So if you’re looking for a wide range of networking opportunities in a relaxed “informal style”, as well as fast-moving, high quality keynote presentations with interactive panel discussions, then Talent Leaders Connect is the recruitment conference for you!

The events (of which there are several across the UK and Europe) are exclusively for in-house teams and aimed directly at Heads of HR/Resourcing, Directors or Managers HR/Resourcing and Senior team members. Attending the event this year, for example, are in-house team members from the likes of Coca-Cola, Bank of Ireland, Primark Stores Ltd., Accenture, Boots UK, Etsy, Boston Scientific, Johnson&Johnson and PwC.

Speakers on the day include:

• Barry Vickers (Principal Resourcing Partner at Ericsson)
• Paul Kieran (Talent Acquisition Business Partner at Eircom)
• Lenna Thompson (Account Director at TheJobPost)
• Collette Feeney (Director of Talent Acquisition EMEA at Groupon)
• Bill Boorman (Founder of #TRU)
• Our very own Vincent O’Donoghue and Holly Fawcett who will be discussing recruiter productivity and how to help take yours from bad to good to great!

Tickets: Tickets are completely free for this event, which means you have no excuse for not attending and making the most of it! But be warned tickets are on a first-come, first served basis, so get yours early to avoid disappointment. Click here to register.

TREC 2015

From employer branding, to talent sourcing, to the candidate experience, to lead nurturing, what isn’t being discussed at TREC 2015 isn’t worth talking about!  Now in it’s second year, the Talent Recruitment & Employment Conference boasts a unique conference programme designed and driven by market participants, which means it acts as a rather brilliant “meeting of minds” session.

Insights derived from debates centred around emerging market trends, new challenges and sector opportunities relating to each of the above topics, will be invaluable, as will be networking opportunities with several senior European professionals from HR, Talent, Operations, Procurement and Recruitment including:

• Julie Johnson (Head of Talent Acquisition in the UK & Ireland at Johnson & Johnson)
• Andrew Porter (Head of Talent Engagement at Diageo Europe)
• Oliver Urpi (Global Talent Sourcing Manager at BP)
• Karen Ann Allchurch (HR Director at Arsenal FC)
• Peter Cheese (CEO at CIPD)
• Our own Johnny Campbell

Tickets: REC members pay £349 + VAT, non-members pay £399 + VAT. Click here to buy.

Talent Leaders Connect #TLCon
25th June, London

If you’re not able to make the half day event in Dublin, then the lovely people at TheJobPost are hosting its sister event in London a few days later.

The main focus of the day is diversity sourcing (a growing area of interest and concern in our industry, and a topic we should all be paying much greater attention to), and speakers include:

• Dan Robertson (Diversity and Inclusion Director at the Employers Network for Equality & Inclusion) who will be exploring the fascinating topic of unconscious bias
• Russell Amerasekera (Personal Brand Expert at Epiphany London)
• Steve Buckley (Director of Talent Acquisition at Lyst)
• Collette Feeney (Director of Talent Acquisition EMEA at Groupon)
• Jon Hull (Head of Resourcing at Carillion)
• Martin Lee (VP and Head of Sourcing & Research EMEA & APAC at Kelly Services)
• Our very own Johnny Campbell who will be discussing marginal gains and how they can aggregate to transform the way your business recruits talent.

Tickets: Tickets are also completely free for this event, and you can select whether or not you’d prefer a full day ticket, a morning ticket, or an afternoon ticket. Once again, tickets are on a first-come, first served basis, so be sure to register early to avoid disappointment.

SHRM 2015 Annual Conference & Exposition
28th June-1st July, Las Vegas

The SHRM Annual Conference & Exposition is the “largest and best HR event in the world”, and aims to provide your organisation with both the tools, resources and expert advice you need to create and implement the successful HR practices that will “ensure that your company will thrive”.

How do they plan on ensuring this? Through their incredible array of internationally-renowned speakers and access to thousands of solutions-providers in their expansive exposition hall, that’s how! The tagline accompanying this year’s event is “Hear stories that will energise and motivate you” and boy will this extensive line up motivate you:

• Mika Brzezinski (Co-host on MSNBC’S Morning Joe)
• Brendan Browne (Senior Director of Global Talent Acquisition at LinkedIn)
• Joe Gerstandt (Speakerand Author of Talent Anarchy)
• Mehmet Oz (aka “Doctor Oz”, the two-time Daytime Emmy® Award-winning host of The Doctor Oz Show)
• Jamie Naughton (Speaker of the House at Zappos)
• Lindsay Nelson (Manager of Client Insights at Great Place to Work)
• Steve Browne, SHRM-SCP, SPHR (Executive Director of Human Resources at LaRosas, Inc.)
• Darrell Andrews (Motivational speaker/strategist at Darrell Andrews Enterprises)

One aspect that is completely unique to SHRM, are it’s pre-conference workshops. Yes, to compliment your conference experience and get you totally in the zone for the days ahead,  SHRM runs a series of specialist workshops on a variety of topics prior to the main event. A full list of those workshops (each being held on 27th June from 1pm-5pm or 28th June from 8am-12pm) can be found here. Oh, and if that wasn’t enough, there’s even a dedicated Conference Community site attendees can access to meet and chat with other attendees before they even set foot at the event! These guys have thought of absolutely everything!!

Just make sure what happens in Vegas, DOESN’T stay in Vegas! Be sure to take everything you learn at this incredible event back to your office with you!

Tickets: For SHRM members tickets are priced at $1,730, while tickets for non-members are priced at $2,165. Click here to buy.

#SOSUNZ
27th July, Auckland

The brainchild of Destination Talent, the Sourcing Summit (#SOSU for short) started in Sydney in 2011 and is now held annually in Australia (#SOSUAU), New Zealand (#SOSUNZ) and Europe (#SOSUEU). At the time, the aim of the event was to highlight the growing importance of sourcing and to bring together sourcing practitioners to network and learn from each other, and we’re delighted to say that aim hasn’t changed. Each and every SOSU event focuses on vital hands-on learning relevant to the rapidly changing world of sourcing talent, and encompasses a range of learning and training formats.

The event is designed for recruiters, sourcers and talent acquisition professionals who “want to learn new ways of finding talent” and are serious about “upping their talent sourcing skills”, and each of the carefully selected speakers reflects that design. Not only is our own Johnny Campbell presenting and hosting sourcing workshops this year, but so are the following industry experts:

• Katrina Collier (Winning Impression) who has over 9 years of social recruiting experience under her belt and occupies a spot on The 100 Most Influential People in HR & Recruiting on Twitter.
• Gavin Buchanan (Global Talent Sourcing Manager at Fisher & Paykel)
• Paul Smith (Head of Sourcing at Korn/Ferry Futurestep)
• James Burroughes (Senior Manager Sourcing & Recruitment at Westpac)
• Adam Binks (Resourcing Manager at KPMG NZ)
• Amy Tea (Associate Director at Sheffield)

Tickets: Tickets are priced at NZ$495.

#SOSUAU
31st July, Sydney

#SOSUAU is the number one talent sourcing event in Australia, and for good reason. Like it’s New Zealand counterpart, the aim of SOSUAU is to help sourcing practitioners get down and dirty with hands on sourcing practices, and uses workshops as well as sessions with industry experts to give attendees practical take-home tips and tricks.

Once again, our founder and CEO, Johnny Campbell, will be attending in order to share his tips on how to source like a Ninja, but the following speakers will also be giving their expert advice and guidance on the day:

• Katrina Collier (Winning Impression)
• Chris South (Prominence) who has extensive expertise in the construction, technology and energy recruitment sectors.
• Laura Stoker (Executive Director at AIRS)
• Iain MacGibbon (Managing Director at Farrow Jamieson) who is New Zealand’s most “LinkedIn” recruiter with over 16,000 direct connections.
• Christopher Long (Sourcing Leader at SAP)
• Ivan Burrell (Oceania Talent Sourcing Manager at Ernst & Young)
• Lauren Stanton (Talent Sourcing Manager at Ernst & Young) who’s speciality is identifying and approaching high-quality passive candidates for senior, critical and hard-to-find positions.

If you’re in the Sydney area, we can’t recommend this event enough, so make the effort and come along. You will leave a better recruiter.

Tickets: Tickets are priced at AUS$605. Click here to buy.

#tru London
4th September, London

#tru Events are different to any other recruitment conferences out there. #tru is a recruiting “unconference” which means that in contrast to other conference and expo events, #tru is a “gathering of minds, experiences and opinions” as opposed to structured presentations and set talks. #tru sessions are run based on the BarCamp principle which means everyone can be an active participant in the recruitment and HR related discussions that take place, instead of just listening passively as they do when watching other speakers deliver talks at regular events. #tru’s emphasis is on communication and the free exchange of ideas between professionals and as such is also a fantastic networking opportunity.

Bill Boorman is the brain child behind #tru. Since 2009, he’s been travelling back and forth between 4 different continents and sharing his passion and experience of social recruiting, with a large audience of recruiting and HR folk. As such, he ensures that each #tru track or discussion, is lead by a thought leader in the industry. Previous track titles have included:

• Twitter Success Stories
• Campus To Career
• Social Footprints
• Fighting The Dragon of Social Recruiting ROI
• Going Mobile ‚¬€œ Successful Apps
• The Social Recruiter
• Branding Inside Out
• Facebook Recruiting: Fact or Fiction?

If you’re looking for a break from regular conferences and would like to share in others’ personal knowledge and opinions, as well as sharing your own, a #tru event is the one for you.

Tickets: Click here for ticket information.

SourceCon
17th-18th September, Dallas

Wondering how to tackle your constantly evolving sourcing challenges head on? Then get yourself down to SourceCon where they’ve been helping recruiters and sourcers like you to do just that, for the last 8 years on the trot. SourceCon is the premier event for tools and strategies to make your sourcing faster, with better results.

Following their largest-ever event in March and the overwhelming “energy and participation” of it’s attendees, the organisers have promised to focus their attention on taking this event to the next level, to encourage even more energy and participation! How? Well, they’re telling attendees to come prepared to “join the conversation and practice real-time, the strategies and methodologies shared by [their] speakers to ensure immediate impact” when they return to their offices. In other words, SourceCon Dallas is going to be the most practical, hands on one yet! Just how we like it!!! Expect “How to” roundtable discussions and sourcing labs aplenty!

In terms of speakers, it’s hard to find a more comprehensive list of industry leaders all at one event. Speakers and keynote presenters include:

• Craig Fisher (Head of Marketing and Talent Acquisition at CA Technologies)
• Dean DeCosta (Strategic Sourcing and Research Technologist at Lockheed martin)
• Jeremy Roberts
• Jim Schnyder (Senior Manager and Sourcing lead at PepsiCo)
• Joshua Jones (Senior Associate at ERE)
• Shannon Pritchett (Global Sourcing and Social Media Manager at ManpowerGroup Solutions)
• Our own Holly Fawcett who’ll be telling why we need to stop wasting our time and start using her productivity tips to increase efficiency.

So,whether you’re looking to explore the core fundamentals of sourcing and strengthen your know-how, learn new techniques and secrets shared by sourcing experts, or discuss leadership and the strategic sourcing initiatives that can take you to the next level, SourceCon is the conference for you.

Tickets: Early bird special is priced at $995, but is only available until July 10th, 2015. Receive a $50 discount per person on full-conference registrations when two or more attendees register. Click here to buy.

#SOSU EUROPE
23rd-24th September, Amsterdam

Although SOSU has been held in Australia since 2011, Europe didn’t see it’s first Sourcing Summit until 2013, when it’s maiden event took place in Amsterdam. Like it’s predecessors in the southern hemisphere, #SOSUEU aims to bring sourcing innovators from across Europe together to highlight the important role of sourcing in the region. And nothing is off the table for discussion! In fact, #SOSUEU pride themselves on the fact the event sets it’s gaze “on the whole talent sourcing life-cycle with a particular focus on the issues and challenges faced by sourcing leaders” – everything from privacy laws to the legal implications of social engagements will be discussed. The goal? To ensure every participant leaves with a big-picture view of talent acquisition and “the tactical nous required to be an agent of change”.

As the onus of SOSUEU is on improving delegates sourcing skills, alongside the keynote presentations there will be breakout sessions on both days dedicated to live sourcing – sessions attendees can bring their unique sourcing challenges for expert speakers to tackle, in an interactive format. For those of you interested in the techie side of things, #SOSU TECH will showcase some of the most innovative companies and new technologies driving sourcing productivity across Europe. You’ll even  have an opportunity to play around with the latest sourcing technology to put it to the test.

Speakers on the day include:

• Our own Johnny Campbell, who’ll be discussing what makes a high performing sourcer.
• Jim Stroud (Recruitment Strategies Director at Randstad Sourceright, USA)
• Irina Shamaeva (Founder of Brain Gain)
• Bill Boorman (Founder of #TRU)
• Shane McCusker (CEO of Intelligence Recruitment Software)

Tickets: Tickets are priced at €675. Click here to buy.

REC Agency Expo
30th September-1st October, Birmingham

The NEC Birmingham is once again set to host the Recruitment Agency Expo on 30th September and 1st October 2015. Now in it’s 3rd year, the Recruitment Agency Expo is the biggest event for recruitment leaders in the midlands and the north of England. This year will see 28 free to attend seminars (on the most recent industry initiatives, the hottest topics, as well as new and developing products), 14 free training sessions (bite sized, best practice training content to immediately implement within your recruitment business) and with the opportunity to meet over 80 suppliers. What more could you ask for?! Oh and did I mention it’s free to attend? Win-win.

Tickets: This event is free to attend! Click here to register to book your place.