What a difference a year makes!

I am very proud to say that I am now a partner of Pratap Partnership – our very own, fast-growing recruitment business!

This time last year I had just left my last employer. There was a lot of uncertainty as to what the future may hold for my career until April 2019, when we officially launched Pratap Partnership. Since then, things have gone from strength to strength. The uncertainty, apprehension and worry of last year have been replaced by pride, confidence and optimism. The past seven months have taught me a lot and I feel like I am in the best place that I have been in my career.

As with many recruiters, my career in recruitment followed a brief career in another direction. After graduating from the University of Durham with a degree in Business & Finance almost 15 years ago, my ambitions were to succeed as an Accountant. I joined PKF (now BDO) on their graduate training scheme, but after three years specialising in Corporate Tax and a failed round of CTA exams, I very quickly realised I had taken the wrong turn in my career - Tax probably was not the right option for me.

I decided to explore other avenues and a friend suggested I should consider recruitment. After some research I realised it played to a lot of my strengths and with the opportunity to specialise in professional practice recruitment, much to my parent’s disgust I decided to take the leap. (I can enjoy telling them now that I was right!)Although a career in recruitment was quite daunting, I feel that my skills and knowledge gained from previous roles was directly transferable and provided a solid foundation for path in recruitment. Starting out in recruitment coming from a finance background was incredibly beneficial to my role as a recruiter as I was familiar with the practices and processes with which my clients operated. This insider knowledge meant I had context to my clients’ requirements, and I was very quickly able to speak to them in a common language, which I think helped me build the strong level of trust with my clients that I have today.

There are only a small number of consultants in Yorkshire who specialise in practice recruitment and I often wonder why; It is a market that I have always loved. There are always challenges around shortages of candidates and the bright lights of industry often attracting many away. It is a sector that you must invest time in to understand and see its full potential, both as a recruiter and as a candidate.

When I look back at some of my early placements in recruitment, it is fantastic to see how many of those candidates are now successful directors and partners within some of the region’s leading firms. My career has grown alongside many of my candidates which has helped me be build a strong network of a similar generation. My network is what allows me to service clients leveraging off the long-established networks I have built up to provide clients with the best knowledge of the practice market today.

The last six month have honestly been the most enjoyable of my career so far, I have already had some fantastic wins across corporate finance, transaction services, in house M&A and tax including placements at partner and director level. I can only put this early success down to the existing relationships I had with my clients and candidates, who have all been such a big support to Pratap Partnership and I cannot thank them enough.

We are all looking forward to the next twelve months with a lot of optimism for the whole accountancy sector across Yorkshire and for the practice sector in particular. We are looking forward to working more closely with the institutes, investing more time with our clients and meeting new ones