Your Q1 Blueprint: Actionable Strategies to Smash Your 2025 Goals

2025 is here, and I have a feeling that this year will be incredible. 

The recruitment industry has been through a lot of ups and downs in the last two years, and it feels like we are out the other side and will achieve great things this year!

A lot of you are probably (and hopefully) over the ‘January Blues’ and ready to tackle the year. 

I expect that you’ve set some goals, but if you’re still looking for inspiration, we’ve put together a short and sharp Q1 blueprint so you can smash your goals this 2025!

1) Build a STRONG talent pipeline.

Whether you’ve started the year strong with jobs, or you’re not picking up roles as quickly as you thought you would, building a strong talent pipeline should be your priority. 

Great talent is what can get your foot in the door even with some of the most impossible, difficult clients.

What are you actually doing to network with candidates? 

Are you spending enough phone time and face time with them? 

Are you organising opportunities where you can make an impact and a great impression? 

A strong talent pipeline with talent that trusts you and only wants to be represented by you is critical to your success in 2025.

Actions You Can Take Today:

• Review and update your database with passive candidates and potential leads. This includes cleaning up your database so it’s easier to manage and access candidates.
  

• Build relationships through LinkedIn, networking events, and other industry spaces to maintain engagement with top talent.
  

• Coffee meetings, virtual meetings, catch-up calls; any way to engage with candidates - you should be doing it
  

• Create a list of candidates you interviewed last year but weren’t able to place. Reach back out to them and schedule a meeting! 

2) Prioritise high-impact and/or high-value roles.

What we mean by high impact is a role that will have a potential ‘domino effect’ on your career. 

This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to be the biggest fee (stay with me on this one) but it will make a SIGNIFICANT difference to your track record.

It could be a well-known client in the industry, or it could be a role that could determine how the rest of your year goes. 

For example, you may be trusted to deliver on a difficult role, which could then open doors for you to do more business with the same client. 

It may be a VC or PE-backed business, which then allows you to work with other organisations in their portfolio.

High-impact roles can also come in the shape of high value, so a juicy fee (and commission) for you. 

It’s important to try and strike a healthy balance with these, or in an ideal world - have a high-impact AND high-value role.

Actions You Can Take Today:

• Focus on low-risk high-value roles, and high-risk (but long-term reward) roles.
  

• Create scorecards to align evaluation criteria and improve hiring efficiency.
  

• Allocate more time and resources to high-priority searches.
  

• Review marketing material (such as decks) which will enable you to pitch better for high ticket business.
  

• Double down on FaceTime. This will give you an edge and a competitive advantage. 

P.S: If you don't know who these domino effect brands are in your niche/market - you need to KNOW and find out. That way, you can figure out which companies to prioritise and action.

3) Collect and utilise your data.

If you’re not using data to inform how you work as a recruiter, then it’s really time to get up to speed. 

Collect the data you have and use it to make better decisions. 

This could be client-related, candidate-related, or even improving your own productivity.

The best place to start is by looking backwards. Some prompts you can use for data collection are as follows:

• Who spent the most money with you?

• What did they have in common?

• How did you land them as a client?

If you have a CRM that has data points you can search for, look up smart prompts to uncover important data to help you direct your focus.

Actions You Can Take Today:

• Use recruitment analytics to assess performance metrics such as time-to-hire, cost-per-hire, and source effectiveness.
  

• Lean into figuring out the ‘science behind your success’ you should know this inside and out, as all the best recruiters do. 
  

• Identify bottlenecks in your hiring process and create actionable plans to address them.
  

• Regularly review and adjust your sourcing strategies based on data insights.
  

• Create a recipe for success with data at the forefront

4) Non negotiables. 

It’s really important to have boundaries and non-negotiables on a daily/weekly/monthly basis. In a world of distractions, we can definitely lose focus.

I’ve spoken extensively about non-negotiables in recruitment, and if you want to have a strong Q1 you need to actually implement things that will turn into habits.

It’s great having strategies and ideas written out, but it’s all about putting them into practice.

For example:

• Is it posting once a day?

• Is it speaking to your core network each day?

• Is it speaking to your existing clients each week?

• Is it making outbound calls to your dream client list each week?

• Is it billing X amount per month/quarter/half of the year?

Whatever it is, you need to figure out what the key things are that you will consistently stick to.

If you're not sure - make it your job to find out.

An example I’ll use to inspire you is personal branding and creating non-negotiables with it.

Whether it’s your employer brand if you’re an owner, or your personal brand if you’re a consultant, your brand and how you’re perceived in the market is crucial. 

Don’t be a silent scroller and sit in the background, start engaging and making yourself known in your space.

This could be creating a non-negotiable such as posting once a week to build your brand and confidence. Sticking to this is naturally going to give you results when done consistently. You can then build and add more non-negotiables once you do the first one successfully.

Actions You Can Take Today:

• Make a list (that is achievable) of daily, weekly, and monthly non-negotiables that look at areas such as BD, candidates, client work, and branding.
  

• Review these non-negotiables and track them at the end of each month to see if you are hitting them.
  

• Try to integrate these non-negotiables as quickly as possible so they feel like a part of your routine - and the results will follow!

P.S. Whenever you're ready, there are 3 ways I can help you:

#1: Do you listen to my podcast? I release a weekly episode with either a top-performing recruiter or recruitment entrepreneur to find out how they achieved their success so you can learn directly from their journey Check out my latest episode and subscribe to the show.

#2: Promote your brand to over 5,109 recruitment professionals by sponsoring this newsletter (bookings available from Feb 2025).

#3: Want to improve your job-to-fill ratios and new client pipeline? Hector - Our online skills development platform, helps recruitment teams build BD strategies that drive results, enhance the quality of jobs won, and fill roles faster—without the need for costly external trainers >>>> Book A Free Skills Assessment Session With Me Here to see how we can help your team achieve these results too!