Introduction to StAAR

StAAR (St Andrews Applied Research) is at the forefront of innovation, working with the world-leading academics of St Andrews University to create exciting spin-out opportunities, whether it be science, tech, engineering or in any other field. The key aims of the organisation are to take original ideas and concepts through the many stages of business planning, funding, market analysis with a clear focus to create an organisation and /or a revenue opportunity that has genuine real-world potential.
With a history spanning in excess of 600 years, the University of Andrews has a global reputation as a seat of outstanding education and research but with a lesser reputation for their spin-out / start-up activities. As such, Eden Scott was engaged to support the newly formed, university wholly owned organisation to attract and recruit highly sought-after truly entrepreneurial individuals with a background in associated spin-out, start-up or early-stage company growth and development.
 

The recruitment challenge

Eden Scott was retained by StAAR to support the organisation in recruiting talented individuals, initially within 4 key skills areas

• Business Development Manager
• Innovation and Commercialisation Manager
• Enterprise Development Manager
• Business Analyst
  

Overview of the recruitment project

Eden Scott supported StAAR in all elements of the recruitment exercise including;

• Preparation and development of role profiles / job descriptions
• Creation of a client profile page within Eden Scott website highlighting the exciting opportunities that the roles offered in a start-up supporting spin-out / start-up organisations
• Posting of branded advertising on partner websites
• Undertaking a comprehensive social media campaign

Recruitment success

Whilst the recruitment exercise was focused on maximising all routes to market, the majority of recruitment activities were centred around making direct approaches to either potential candidates with the skills and experience sought or networking throughout the Talentspark community and simultaneously across all four initial skills requirements. 

A 3 stage recruitment process was created to not only ensure a robust process was in place in relation to recruitment of initial staffing for the organisation but also in order that an entire UK wide candidate candidate search was undertaken and the candidate journey maximised in relation to meeting all key stakeholders. Eden Scott successfully completed the recruitment for multiple posts and has since extended recruitment service provision across a range of additional discipline requirements.