It is not only Irish workers who have been moving overseas in search of better opportunities since the financial crisis hit in 2008. Irish companies too are increasingly looking across the water to Britain for a new market for their services.
One enterprising young Kilkenny man has recognised an opportunity in this for himself and, for the past two years, has been running a recruitment company in London connecting employers and employees with a shared interest or background in Ireland.
At just 27, Will Norton has a wealth of international experience behind him already, but his first stint abroad was far from typical. With a civil engineering degree from UCC, he was selected to take part in a Glanbia graduate programme in 2009, which saw him working as a project manager on the construction of a $90 million cheese-making facility on the Texas-New Mexico border.
“It was a very conservative town just off the Bible Belt, which parachuted me out of my comfort zone,” he recalls. “I matured very quickly that year and learned a lot.” On returning to Ireland, he spent six months working at the company’s Co Cavan plant, before quitting to head Down Under.
Settling in Melbourne, he was managing up to 60 people on large infrastructure projects. It was a well-paid job which afforded him a great work-life balance, but he felt he was too far from friends and family. He always liked London, which was closer to home, and decided to make that his next destination.
After a few months working with an Irish construction company in the city, he handed in his notice at the end of 2011 to concentrate on his own business, Sonas Recruitment, which had started to grow wings. “All these Irish tech companies and construction companies were moving over here to the UK because of the crash, but the structures didn’t seem to be in place for them to connect with individuals, especially young educated professionals,” he explains. “I was 25 at the time, and I thought, who better to tap into this new phenomenon of young Irish like me who were emigrating?”
Norton worked out of his house in London, building a website and formalising the business. He soon hired his first employee, Derek Byrne, who was the same age as him and helped him to crystallise the concept. "It became clear pretty quickly that the idea was good and had the potential to grow into something successful. We approached companies and prominent Irish people in London, introduced ourselves as enthusiastic young guys who were proud of what we wanted to achieve, and people were receptive to that."
They have since built strong relationships with a number of Irish universities, and organisations like the London Irish Business Society, the London Irish Graduate Network, the British Irish Chamber of Commerce and Irish community groups like the GAA.
“They often contact us saying they have good candidates who have just arrived and are looking for a job,” he says.
“Companies here really like the attitude of the young Irish arrivals, because if they are coming over it proves they have ambition. Just by being in London with a good degree, you have a lot going for you.”
London can be quite an anonymous and intimidating place for a young person to begin looking for work, but connecting with other Irish people can be a great place to begin, he says. “The biggest stumbling block for people looking for work internationally is their lack of a network. Ireland is a small place, and we are usually only one degree of separation from anyone you meet. When you emigrate, you lose that immediately, but we compensate by creating new communities of Irish people abroad.”
Most of their clients are Irish companies expanding to the UK for the first time or taking up a contract there and are looking to hire. “The perfect individual for them is an Irish person already settled in London, who has London experience and London contacts behind them. Because they are Irish, they will relate to the culture of the company and the company will relate more to them.
“They might know someone who went to the same university, or who lived where they are from. Their background will be more easily recognisable to an Irish employer than, say, a candidate from the UK.”
They also help to recruit people still living in Ireland but looking to move over, and to assist Irish companies to lure internationally experienced Irish people back to work in Ireland. “Smaller tech companies are finding it quite difficult to compete with the likes of Google and Facebook for employees, so we help to find Irish people with London experience who want to move back home,” he says.
The company now has four full-time employees in London and two part-time in Dublin. Early next year Norton hopes to open a New York office, and they are also considering replicating the concept in other destinations. In the long-term, he hopes to move the company headquarters to Dublin. “I would like to move back to Ireland eventually. It is home, at the end of the day.”
