Recruitment - Homegrown agency plays to Bermuda's strengths.

(From Reinsurance)

The Bermudian (re)insurance market has seen nothing but growth since the early nineties and the issues of recruitment have always been challenging.

The island wants to provide employment opportunities for its own people while the big companies want the experience and high profile of people who have worked in the other big reinsurance markets such as London and New York. And all the while, the tiny island is feeling the squeeze as more and more people arrive to be part of the opportunities that are now on offer.

The James Partnership has been active in Bermuda for several decades, initially assisting in recruitment for captive companies in the 1970s.

Britt Reiss, managing director, says that the new service, bermudaREcruit, has come about as a direct result of the expanding market. "Our focus on this industry allows us to be fully aware of market developments and trends that affect recruitment and executive search in this area. Our understanding of the insurance and reinsurance industry enables us to interact with candidates at all levels regarding employment opportunities in the market. We are able to source candidates worldwide for executive assignments, including many Bermudians seeking to return to the island," she comments.

While the service is centred around a website, www.bermudaREcruit.com, Ms Reiss emphaises that it is not just a place to post up a resume and hope for the best.

The services include candidate search and selection for executive-level appointments, recruitment of support staff, immigration advice and processing, relocation assistance, outplacement services for redundancies and counselling on hiring and human-resource issues pertinent with the employment of staff in Bermuda. Louisa Freisenbruch, associate director, adds: "By utilising our database of local and global contacts, our website, advertising and referrals, those people seeking employment opportunities and our clients looking to hire those candidates should be comforted by the fact that they have a central resource dedicated to this industry, rather than going to a generalist agency with generalist recruiters."