Success Story

Gayleen Toll, Founder and Owner, tells the Precruitment Story.

After ten years of working at a senior level in the recruitment industry in the United States and Australia I had a clear idea of what it takes for a recruitment agency to be exceptional. Often, in the large corporates, the culture is so entrenched that it is difficult to express fully your own ideas and beliefs. I elected to open my own recruitment business to implement all my ideas about achieving excellence in the profession that I love.

After balancing market opportunities and my desire to live in Queensland, Cairns was identified as an ideal place to start Precruitment, my own company. In October 1998 with my heart beating faster than usual, I opened the doors to a tiny office space in Cairns Corporate Tower and began to implement my dream.

I expected Precruitment would slowly develop over two or three years. How wrong I was! Nine months after nervously opening that door we had relocated to much larger offices on the top floor of Cairns Corporate Tower and we had a staff of nine!

Two years later, in 2000, we opened in Townsville followed by Gladstone in 2002 ad finally Brisbane in 2006.

I am often asked about our success. The answer is not a simple one line answer such as “its all about hard work”. Of course, hard work is a key ingredient in any successful operation, that’s a given. Precruitment has been successful because we have not lost that passion to create an exceptional recruitment agency. I have based our business upon four principles that have not altered since the beginning. They are:

• Ethics and professionalism.
  Ethical behaviour is an integral part of being professional. We strive to be absolutely professional in all that we do. It is a never-ending quest, almost an obsession, within Precruitment. We strongly support the RCSA Code of Professional Conduct. We require all Precruitment team members to sit for and pass the RCSA Code of Professional Conduct exam.
• Nurturing Relationships.
  Establishing and maintaining great relationships with our clients, candidates and the Precruitment team members is essential to our operations and business success. I am focused on all three parties. Our staff are our most valuable asset and I try my hardest to provide them with a great working environment and to encourage them to share, both financially and emotionally, in Precruitment’s success. We have been very lucky over the years as we have always had a great team spirit and culture, which people tell us they can feel when they walk into one of our offices.

  I think it is vital to establish close long-term relationships with our clients and candidates. To do so you must be genuinely interested in them and enjoy their successes as their businesses and careers develop. It is a really satisfying part of our profession.

• Having fun while doing serious business.
  This one is really important! In our corporate Vision and Values we state that one of our enabling objectives for success is to have fun while doing serious business. It is really important that the working environment is one in which people enjoy themselves, have lots of laughs, celebrate every success however small and not dwell on the disappointments. It comes from the attitude of the principles in the first place and must be a part of the culture, as “fun” cannot be manufactured. It’s a natural process flowing from great attitudes in the team.
• Passion.
  The magic ingredient that cements it all together! I have a passion for recruitment and I have always sought people with passion to join Precruitment. People who are passionate about the important job that we do have been essential to our success.

Precruitment has survived through a range of economic cycles. Precruitment survived the millennium bug in 2000, the introduction of GST and the collapse of Ansett Airlines in 2001 and most recently the GFC. The GFC has been the most challenging crisis but fortunately we prepared early and implemented a survival strategy. A part of the strategy was to close operations in Brisbane and Gladstone and to concentrate on our heartland of North Queensland.

Business is a constant stream of challenges. It is really pleasing to know that the dream I had in 1998 continues to be a success. Time and again we have met and overcome challenges by the application of the four principles, ethics and professionalism, passion, nurturing relationships and having fun doing serious business.

I have really enjoyed the experience of growing a successful business.