South Yorkshire has the investment, innovation and quality of life to compete for ambitious talent. Pete Shillito, founder of recruitment experts Shillito Group, argues that now we need the confidence – and careers – to match.
I’ve had this conversation many times over the years: we don’t shout loudly enough about the good things happening here.
It often feels like other cities are far more at ease in celebrating their successes. Something positive happens across the Pennines and you don’t hear the end of it, whereas around these parts we can sometimes be strangely deferential about our achievements.
That matters when you’re trying to attract – and retain – talent. We’re competing with places such as Manchester, Leeds and, inevitably, London for talent, and while salary and career opportunities will always be fundamental, people also want to live somewhere that feels confident in itself and like it’s going places.
We have plenty of evidence to support that story. South Yorkshire was recently named the UK’s number one Rising Star tech ecosystem, while major investment has been announced from big names such as McLaren, Rolls-Royce and Sheffield Forgemasters, alongside businesses including Special Melted Products, Independent Forgings and Alloys and Advanced Manufacturing Sheffield. Taken together, we’re talking about hundreds of millions, if not billions, of pounds being invested across the region.
The question is how many people outside South Yorkshire know about it, and whether that investment will translate into the long-term careers we need to keep talented people here.
Studies have shown how our universities do well at retaining graduates immediately after their academic careers end, but statistics also show this drops off after the first couple of years. To me, that suggests people like living here but need to see where their career goes next. You can offer someone a good entry-level job, but they also need to believe they can build a successful career here over five, ten or 15 years, with the salaries, opportunities and stability that allow them to picture a future in South Yorkshire.
Of course, attracting talent is about more than work. We have an incredible theatre scene – the largest outside of London – and the Snooker World Championship is staying at the Crucible with significant added investment now behind it. Our sporting heritage is extraordinary: the rules of football were created here, while Sheffield regularly produces world-class sporting talent. It should at least be enough to give us a bit of a swagger (and certainly a dedicated football museum!).
The city centre is changing too, with its role evolving beyond traditional retail and towards hospitality, leisure and experiences. That wider infrastructure matters because people considering where to build their lives will look at the whole package: the job, the salary and what they can do when they leave work.
There are already some great organisations banging the drum. We recently got involved with Digital Forge, which is bringing investors, startups and established business leaders together to talk about how we grow businesses here. TECH SY, the Sheffield Innovation Spine and others are doing incredible work across the technology ecosystem. We need more of that, but we also need to get behind the people already doing it by attending events, sharing success stories and talking positively about the investment and opportunities being created.
I think certain sections of the local media could do with getting on board, too. There can be a tendency towards the negative, where we’re very good at shouting about what has gone wrong but less comfortable making a big deal when something goes right. Of course, scrutiny is important, but if every piece of good news is immediately counterbalanced with negative clickbait, it inevitably affects the story we tell about ourselves.
Ultimately, other cities and regions aren’t going to start shouting about South Yorkshire on our behalf. If we want ambitious people to come here and stay for the long term, all of us have a part to play in selling what the region has to offer. There’s plenty happening here to justify a little more confidence, so perhaps it’s time we got a little better at showing it.
shillitogroup.com
