How we find new team members

It’s selfish really; it’s in our interest to find the best possible people to work with us.

We look for candidates who are interested in the work we do and the work that our clients do. Have a look around our site to get a sense of who we are and how we work with wonderful clients. And for a sense of what day to day studio life is like, have a look at our daily photo project Everyday Cog.

We don’t care about your background; we care about your ability, enthusiasm and potential.

We do have specific requirements for particular roles. But beyond wanting to hear about your ability to meet those requirements, we try to remove any unnecessary conventions or barriers to us finding you.

If there’s any aspect of our recruitment process that you feel we could improve, let us know. We are definitely open to learning and adapting.

How we advertise

We don’t usually use agencies. We’ll advertise ourselves, across different platforms – some paid, some free. We are always interested in hearing about new and unconventional ways to extend our reach.

Each role is advertised with a job description and specification, including the required skills for that role. But don’t be put off if you don’t tick every box, we know that some candidates will need additional time and training in some areas.

We’ll include a job title because we know that is a useful signifier for some people. Although we’re not at all precious about job titles; if it’s important to you we can discuss changing it.

We will always include salary details (and they’ll always be above the London Living Wage level). We might include a range because some roles can flex and adapt around each applicant’s skills, experience and needs. We are always open to a discussion about salaries although we know that might not be easy for you to bring it up.

We’ll mention if a role is studio-based or remote; full-time or part-time. Or if we are open to discussion (we often are).

We’ll always include a closing date for applications. We will never close an application earlier than the advertised closing date, but we might sometimes extend that closing date.

Responding to our job ads

We won’t ask you for a CV. Instead we’d like you to describe your skills and experience, and to explain to us why you would be our perfect candidate.

Our tip: for each skill you talk about try to include evidence of that skill in action.

We’ll also usually pose some specific questions that tease out a little of the detail required for the role; these are an opportunity to show us that you know your stuff.

One way to show relevant experience is through a previous role in a similar environment to ours. But transferable skills from other fields are just as valuable.

We don’t mind how you respond. In writing is usual but if you’d be more comfortable using audio or video then we are happy with that (and tell us why).

And for some roles we’ll ask for examples of past work, as links or attachments.

How we’ll assess your application

We work through and anonymise applications before we assess them. We’ll hide your name and any cues that indicate your gender, heritage or the specifics of your upbringing.

That is obviously more difficult for audio and video applications so we will be mindful of the context when we assess those.

At this stage we’ll have a simple criteria so we are consistent in our approach to all applications. We will try to make our assessment criteria clear in our job ads.

If we feel like you’d benefit from telling us a little more, or expanding on a topic, then we might follow up with questions. Or, for some technical roles, it can be useful to give you a technical task to complete so we can assess specific areas of competence.

Interviews

If we’ve invited you for an interview then we really hope that you are the perfect person for the role. But we can’t employ everyone so we use interviews to chat with a few great candidates and explore their potential in more detail.

We want to get to know you so we try normalise the process as much as we can. We want you to be as relaxed as you can be (in the weird context of an interview).

We’ll arrange a time to suit you. We can schedule interviews outside of normal working hours if that will help you.

Most first interviews are via Zoom, and we might follow up with a second interview, in person.

We have at least two team members at any interview. We’ll let you know who, in advance. One will be the manager for that role.

We will send some questions, a few days in advance. And if it’s relevant we might highlight some of the areas we’d like to discuss from your application.

There will be no trick questions. We are genuinely trying to give you the best platform to convince us that you’d be the perfect candidate for the role.

We expect the process to be two-way. You’ll have questions of us so we’ll also invite you to send those to us in advance.

Trial days

It’s rare but for some roles we think that we would both benefit from candidates spending time in our studio, or working remotely on a specific project. We’ll talk to you about that process when we give feedback from your interview. We will, of course recompense you for your time (and travel) if we invite you to do this.

Letting you know

We aim to be prompt, useful and complete in our response to any application or interview.

We will reply to every unsuccessful applicant so you aren’t left waiting. If we’ve spoken with you or interviewed you then we’ll expand on our feedback and give you guidance (from our perspective).

If we are lucky enough to have found you to be our perfect candidate then we’ll email you and invite you for a follow-up video call to chat through any questions you might have. We’ll send you written confirmation of the job offer, a draft contract and a link to our handbook (all written in everyday English).

And we’ll give you time to consider the offer, review the documents and ask any questions before committing to the new role.