Andy Hargroves - Team Leader of Cruise & Technical Shipping

Andrew Hargroves shares his secrets of a successful day in the office as a Team Leader of

Cruise and Technical Shipping at Faststream Recruitment in Southampton, UK.

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6 am: Working out at the gym is my morning ritual. It energises me and prepares me for the challenges of the day.

8 am: Since I like to start early, I often get to the office by 8 a.m. I grab a coffee and catch up on my emails. As a team leader, I have two aspects of my job: managing my own tasks and leading my team. The first thing I do is to handle most of my own recruitment tasks, so I can focus on the second aspect afterward. That’s why the mornings are the best time for me to speak with clients or arrange meetings with people.

8:30 am: The second aspect of my job is to lead my team. My team starts to arrive from 8:30 a.m. onwards and to ensure the day runs smoothly, I make sure that I have a pot of coffee ready for everyone. I then check in on them and find out their plans for the day and any updates from the night before.

10:30 am: After checking up on my team, I focus on outbound business development or client work. I divide my time into hourly segments and monitor my performance as I work.

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12 pm: I enjoy going for a walk at lunchtime, to refresh my mind. I prefer to have an early lunch, as most people take theirs between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. This gives me an hour of tranquillity in the office.

1 pm: I usually use this time to review the applications for some jobs that I have. Then I start calling the candidates to qualify them before discussing the position with them or introducing them to the client. After that, I conduct a search on our extensive database and then on LinkedIn to find suitable candidates and contact them by phone.

Next, I send a follow-up email to see if they are interested in the opportunity we have. I usually do that for an hour or so for one job and repeat that process for a few positions. I probably work on two to three positions at a time and spend an hour on each one to give them enough attention. If something is more urgent, I will allocate more time for it.

3 pm: Since I work in the cruise market, many of my clients are based in Miami, which is five hours behind my time zone. That means 3:00 p.m. here is 10:00 a.m. there. So, it makes it the perfect time for me to contact them and discuss the opportunities they might have.

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4 pm: I always ensure that my admin is up to date, all my emails are replied to, and all the applications are processed for the day. I also plan my diary for the next day. I am good at keeping my day well-organised.

My job as a team leader has a lot of time pressures and I need to balance the time I spend with my team and the time I spend on my own recruitment.

4:30 pm: I check in with the team to see what they have done for the day and what their plan is for tomorrow. We also have a bit of a chat in a casual environment.

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5 pm: I have flexible hours, so I usually leave when I finish my tasks for the day. Sometimes I work later if I have projects in America, and other times I leave at 5:00 p.m. I have the freedom to do that, which is one of the best things about my job. I don’t have a fixed schedule. I can start and end my work whenever I want, as long as the job is done.

6 pm: I'm a morning person, so I've normally been to the gym before work, so the end of the day really is the end of the day for me. So, I will go home and generally hit decompress for a bit and have dinner with my wife.

​If you're interested in a career with Faststream, please get in touch by filling out the form below.

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