After our eerily quiet January and February, March has continued as a frenetic pace! And it’s really strange to think we’re into the last couple of weeks of our first year in business.

The week started with just Paul and I in the office, Lisa had the day off, having been to see The Civil Wars play live on Sunday night. We’ve been working on a campaign for Skype, which goes live next week. It’s a small(ish) project but will include press, online, outdoor and a microsite so there’s plenty of little details to get ironed out. It’s also going to be an interesting experiment for me, as all the offline elements include a QR code. I’ve been sceptical for a long while about whether anyone actually scans them in practice, so we’ve tagged and tracked all of them separately…we’ll let you know the results!

On Tuesday we had a planning call with a clients development team to talk through how we’ll be integrating the design and branding work we’re doing for their careers site with their existing Applicant Tracking System and recruitment database. We’ve also been working on some refreshed designs for the HR section of  a client’s intranet which are shaping up really well. Helping to create a coherent brand for HR across their business.

On wednesday Lisa and Sally went down to Slough for dinner and a catch up with long-time friend of Chatter, Ian Ruddy and then experienced the pubs of Windsor after, propping up the bar with Her Maj no doubt…Lisa also gained a valuable insight into the graduate recruitment process at Akzo Nobel, by earwigging on their briefing in the hotel bar. Apparently, they do it quite well!

On Thursday and Friday, Paul and I (still holding the fort) ended up busy all day working on a pair of careers site projects and various other things that crossed our desks…and completely failed to make it to the Yorkshire Mafia conference at the Royal Armouries…ah well, maybe next year. (We said that last year, oops!)

And finally (as i’m writing these notes a little late), on Saturday I went to the official opening of the Bradford pond (or City Park as it’s more properly known.) It was a really pleasant afternoon and evening, with plenty of entertainment laid on and a really great atmosphere and community spirit. Even the protest against the proposed demolition of the old Bradford Odeon went off peacefully and was really friendly.

Jon here, my turn to write this weeks Chat and it’s been a busy one as usual. In the past week and a bit I’ve written about 10,500 words of proposals for client web projects for which we’ve also done some really lovely creative (as always, thanks to the Flock).

Lisa has been down to London and Slough at a series of meetings with friends new and old, which all went really well. Paul’s also been well travelled, before he was struck down with gastric flu on Wednesday. He’s spent the rest of the week feeling terrible, it might be the flu, or it might be the diet of daytime television he’s been subjected to. Read the full article

I saw an interesting convergence of news stories from both the UK and across the pond this week, both of which had a recruitment spin to them…

About a fortnight ago, here in the UK, our Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg launched the government’s “Business Compact” on social mobility. There’s a range of provisions involved in the scheme, a lot of them aimed at reducing the impact of a “jobs for the boys” and “who you know, not what you know” culture in UK recruitment. Read the full article

This week kicked off as busily as ever with Paul and Lisa working on a tender and new business proposals and on Monday a visit from our dealer. Dealer in confectionary that is, but the way we get through chocolate in this place is as if it’s an addictive illicit substance. Talking through options for spreading a little Christmas cheer next month.

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Sunshine, fresh air and royalty. That sums up this week at Chatter. Monday saw Lisa and Paul heading down to “that London” for the day, to talk employee engagement with one of the world’s biggest financial and investment management organisations.
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