Recruitment Support for New Zealand Businesses
Hiring the right people is one of the most important — and most expensive — decisions a business makes. Yet many recruitment processes are rushed, inconsistent, or designed without a clear understanding of legal risk, bias, or candidate experience.
At Epic People we provide end‑to‑end recruitment support for NZ businesses, helping you attract, assess, and appoint the right people — without exorbitant recruitment agency fees or guesswork.
With 30+ years’ experience in HR in New Zealand and overseas, including senior and executive‑level roles, we have led recruitment processes for everything from C‑suite and senior leaders to software developers, technical specialists, and administrative roles, including hiring from overseas.
Our recruitment support follows the full hiring lifecycle — so nothing is missed, rushed, or left to chance.
Recruitment Support Across the Hiring Lifecycle
Understanding the need for the role
Strong recruitment starts with purpose and clarity. We help you:
- Clarify why (or even if) the role is needed, homing in on why you are hiring
- Assess whether the role should be permanent, fixed‑term, or temporary
- Align the role with business strategy and future capability needs
- Identify risks, skill gaps, and workload pressures
- Understand exactly what you’re looking for in a new hire
This step prevents mis‑hires and ensures you’re solving the right problem — not just filling a vacancy.
Position descriptions that set everyone up for success
A poor position description leads to poor candidates. A great position description sets you up not just for a great hire, but also performance development, career planning and so much more as your new employee progresses through their employment journey with you.
We support you to create:
- Clear, fit‑for‑purpose position descriptions that accurately describe the role
- Realistic role expectations and accountabilities
- Selection criteria aligned to the critical requirements for the role and performance outcomes
- Documents suitable for both advertising and employment agreements
Well‑written position descriptions form the foundation for fair, defensible recruitment decisions.
Advertising roles and screening candidates
Attracting the right candidates requires more than posting a job ad.
We support your recruitment by:
- Writing attractive job advertisements based off your position description
- Screening CVs consistently and fairly for you, based on agreed criteria
- Shortlisting and screening candidates against objective criteria (including telephone screening)
This ensures time is spent on credible candidates — not volume for volume’s sake.
Designing robust interview and selection processes
Unstructured or poorly planned interviews increase bias and hiring risk. If you’re asking the wrong questions, you’ll end up with the wrong person.
We design structured, defensible selection processes, including:
- Interview frameworks and scoring guides
- Behavioural and situational questioning
- Panel interview support
- Use of psychometric testing* where appropriate [link to psychometric testing page]
- Designing relevant and robust selection tools and tests
*Psychometric assessments are used to complement — not replace — good judgement, helping you understand capability, fit, and development needs.
Candidate communication and experience
Recruitment is a two‑way assessment process.
While you are assessing candidates, candidates are also assessing you — your leadership, culture, professionalism, and credibility as an employer.
We help you:
- Communicate clearly and professionally with candidates
- Maintain momentum and transparency
- Provide appropriate feedback
- Protect and enhance your employer brand
A professional recruitment process directly influences acceptance rates and reputation.
Making the offer and appointing the right candidate
The offer stage is where many processes fall apart.
We support:
- Decision‑making and offer strategy
- Managing competing candidates
- Verbal and written offers
- Risk management at appointment stage
This ensures appointments are confident, timely, and well‑received.
Employment documentation and compliance
Recruitment decisions must be supported by compliant documentation. Getting your documentation and processes wrong can result in expensive mistakes if a new employee doesn’t work out.
We ensure:
- Employment agreements reflect the role and terms offered
- Documentation aligns with NZ employment law
- Appointment processes reduce future risk
- Clauses relevant to early or later termination are legally compliant.
This work links directly with our HR compliance support to ensure nothing is missed.
Onboarding and early performance support
Good recruitment doesn’t end on day one. And a great selection process should be followed up with an effective and engaging onboarding process.
We help design onboarding programs that:
- Set expectations early
- Accelerate productivity
- Improve retention
- Support new employees and managers
- Ensure payroll compliance
Effective onboarding protects your recruitment investment.
Recruitment and selection skills training for hiring managers
Recruitment outcomes improve dramatically when managers understand how to assess people.
We provide training that strengthens recruitment capability, including:
- Recruitment skills training – from writing the position description through structured interviewing, fair decision‑making, to offering the job
- Advanced communication skills training – questioning techniques, active listening, recognising bias, and understanding non‑verbal communication.
Our training ensures recruitment decisions are consistent, fair, and defensible — while creating a positive candidate experience.
Why recruitment expertise matters
Poor recruitment decisions are costly — financially, culturally, and legally.
A robust recruitment process:
- Reduces bias and risk
- Improves performance and retention
- Strengthens your employer brand
- Builds trust with candidates and employees
We combine HR expertise, commercial judgement, and practical process design to help you hire well — consistently.
Why choose Epic People?
Choosing the right HR partner matters — because the advice you receive directly shapes decisions about people, risk, and performance.
Our director brings 30+ years’ experience in HR across New Zealand and overseas, including many years operating at senior level (reporting to CEO). We have many years experience with managing or advising on in-house recruitment across many professional services industries, including banking, finance, tech and engineering. From C-suite roles through to hard-to-fill tech roles and administration positions, we get right down into the detail to get you the best hire possible.
Who our recruitment support is for
Our recruitment support services are designed for:
- Business owners who are growing and have limited recruitment experience
- Busy HR teams that need recruitment assistance but don’t want to pay agency fees
- Organisations that want to build their recruitment and selection capabilities while actually filling roles.
Recruitment support FAQ's
Do you replace recruitment agencies?
We provide an alternative to traditional recruitment agencies by supporting your end‑to‑end recruitment process at a fraction of the cost, while keeping decision‑making in‑house.
Can you support recruitment for senior or highly technical roles?
Yes. We have extensive experience recruiting for roles ranging from C‑suite and senior leadership through to highly technical, professional, and administrative positions.
Do you help with overseas recruitment?
Yes. We provide recruitment support to organisations hiring within New Zealand and from overseas. We help ensure processes, documentation, and decision‑making align with NZ employment requirements.
Can you help design fair and unbiased interview processes?
Yes. Our recruitment support includes designing structured interview and selection processes that reduce bias and support fair, evidence‑based decisions.
Do you provide recruitment training for managers?
Yes, building capability is an important part of recruitment support. We provide recruitment and communication skills training to build internal capability and reduce reliance on external recruiters. Find this training here.
Why use an HR consultant instead of an agency for recruitment support?
In short, a recruitment consultant is there just to fill your role. With recruitment support from an HR consultancy from Epic People, you get a much broader service and can build your internal capability at the same time. The fee structure will be different too. Check out our article – HR Consultant v Recruitment Consultant comparing the two.
Ready to talk to a consultant about creating an epic workplace?
Behind every epic workplace, is Epic People
Talk to a Recruitment Support Consultant.
If you need recruitment support for your business, let’s talk.
Whether you’ve got a role you need filled now, or want to build recruitment and selection capability, we’re here to help.
