Posts by Ross Clennett

My youngest son has recently secured a new part-time job. After ‘falling off the roster’ at Zambrero late last year (a topic for a post at another time), he applied for a range of roles via SEEK. He received crickets from almost every advertiser. One of his mates thought there might be a job at…

A recent GoFundMe post (including the photo, above) has publicly revealed the huge human cost of a mental health breakdown that led to the severing of the business relationship between xrecruiter cofounders, Blake Thompson and Declan Kluver, in 2025. The page was established on Tuesday by Angela Smith, a friend of Declan and his wife,…

Two and a half years ago I started working with an owner to help him build his own recruitment agency. He previously co-owned a successful business in the creative sector where he was now planning to recruit in. This type of move within a sector is not unusual – moving from client to vendor. What…

Astute Payroll founder and former CEO, Nicholas Beames passed away last Thursday, aged 50. Beames was an outgoing and popular figure in the local recruitment industry, although he was rarely sighted at industry events after leaving Astute ten years ago. Like many Australians of his vintage, Beames’s overseas travels in the late 1990s led him…

2025 marked my 37th year in the recruitment industry. It also marked the year in which my youngest child turned 18 and finished secondary school. When he was absent for eight days, attending Schoolies, his mother and I were temporarily ‘empty nesters’. After 26 years of being legally and morally responsible for at least one…

Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) has just released its ranking of the top 30 staffing firms in Australia by revenue, including year-on-year growth, noting that generalist companies were lagging the performance of more specialised businesses, especially those with a focus on the mining and renewable energy sectors. According to SIA research the five largest staffing firms in Australia, based…

The career rebirth of Ephram Stephenson continues unabated. The subscribers to The Ephram Stephenson podcast, “..the unfiltered podcast diving into the raw realities of business growth across industries – from explosive success to brutal pitfalls,” are still waiting for episode 2, exactly three months after the debut episode dropped (average 1.9 star rating out of…

Australia’s largest privately-owned recruitment and staffing business, WorkPac, has been purchased by ASX-listed Tasmea Limited. The purchase price of up to $60.7 million, which comprises upfront cash and Tasmea shares, plus potential earn-out payments, is targeted for settlement around December 1, 2025. The earnouts comprise two cash payments of $5.25 million each, for the twelve-month…

Over three decades ago, when I was in my fifth year as a recruiter, a conversation with my mother took an unexpected turn – into unfamiliar territory, specifically, my pay. The ensuing discussion revealed that I was out-earning my father, a career public servant, nearing retirement. I remember being struck with a sense of unease…

Photo credit: Stockcake You may have noticed the News Corporation newspapers (and their corresponding online versions) are all excited about the launch of their national advertorial campaign, “Back Australia: It’s Good For All Of Us”, featuring some of Australia’s largest companies as cheerleaders, namely Bunnings, BHP, Cadbury, Coles, Harvey Norman, Qantas, REA Group, R.M. Williams,…