Her Business awards 2010

Great news......Key Skills have been named as finalists in the "Her Business" Wellington Businesswoman of the Year awards......the category is Best Micro Business. We find out the results on Friday 3rd December........cross your fingers for us!

Hear from the employers, hear what Key Skills' customers have to say...direct from the horse's mouth!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2J4JkVqsEU

Meet the team at Key Skills Recruitment

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG5S-UxKac0

Reference checking in the news

We have all heard this week about the importance of reference checking!!  

Key Skills reference check every candidate.... from Labourers to Project Managers, transcripts of exactly what the referee has said are available for potential employers.

Copies of visas, qualifications and licenses are scanned and saved and are again available for an employers’ perusal.

If you need further security, drug or psychometric screening, all are available upon request.  These are carried out by highly experienced recruiters, call today for more information.

The Champions.....

Click here to see the winner and her prize

The Big Winner!

Congrats to Liz at Masterpet for winning the Rock FM and Key Skills $5000 SMEG beer fridge for your workplace, your workmates must be stoked with you!!

Win a fridge full o' beer

I just had my first morning out with the Rock roadies visiting workplaces to enter people into the draw to win the $5000 beer fridge, what an awesome response, not surprising since it's full of Tui Blonde!!! Register with The Rock website for your visit and entry form

Rock FM's new promotion with Key Skills Recruitment

Listen to the Rock 96.3FM Wellington for your chance to win a HUGE Smeg fridge full of Tui Blonde (the beer) for your workplace.....you may even be one of the lucky ones to get a visit over the next couple of weeks from the Rock Ute offering a few wee spot prizes!

Look out for the new signage on High Street, Lower Hutt

Just above Mr Bun, near Countdown a couple of pairs of the most distinctive orange work boots can now be seen, drop in for a coffee if you are passing!

Check out our latest You tube offering

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqIQLLgUvlk

Winter Brings Slips, Trips & Falls

Winter Brings Slips, Trips & Falls

As the weather becomes colder and wetter there is a significant increase in the number of injury reports involving slips, trips or falls.

It is important that we all take the weather conditions into account when assessing potential hazards involved in the activity to be performed.

When temperatures drop it becomes more difficult to operate tools safely and the risk of dropping tools or materials increases. Make sure other workers are not directly below you when working at height and stop work if your hands become to cold to work safely.

Before starting work make sure you do the following three things;

· If you don't know how - ASK FIRST

· Take 5 to think - BEFORE YOU ACT

· If it looks unsafe - IT PROBABLY IS

By doing the basics well all our guys will continue to return home safely at the end of each day.

Recent Dom Post article about a Key Skills temp!

National Health and Safety award for Key Skills temp

Congratulations to Joan Ikurere on winning a National Health and Safety award from the Department of Labour!! She was seen on a large commercial site in Wellington directing traffic and organising concrete trucks comings and goings with ease and confidence. She was recommended for the award and received it on Friday of last week. Joan is looked after by Shaun Duffy, Health and Safety Manager for Hawkins Construction. There is a picture of Joan on site at Easter in our April blog. We are so proud of her and thank her for all her hard work.

Key Skills welcomes Ati to the team

Key skills are proud to announce a new addition to their team – Ati Aaifou-Olive. Ati has worked in Industrial recruitment specialising in Manufacturing and Logistics sector for 7 years. Ati has just returned from a season of playing rugby in Ireland, prior to this he spent 2 years playing rugby in Scotland.

“Being in recruitment since 2002 has proven to me that it’s an industry that is always on the go, and you have to be on your game at all times, I love the challenges it brings. The differing needs and demands of both clients and candidates ensures your day is definitely varied! I’m really keyed up to be part of a great team and I am ready to add to the positive values Key skills offer to recruitment”

Outside of work Ati loves to be with his wife and 1year old daughter, playing rugby and other outdoor sports. He is also involved in developing sports projects for his local community.

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to all our hard working temps, here's a wee piccie of the temp with the biggest hours for the last 2 weeks....the lovely Joan, traffic controller for Hawkins on Willis Street, well done girlie!

Have a great break everyone, if you have any questions about public holiday pay/timesheet schedules etc don't hesitate to call.

Work place drug testing

Recently we completed our certificate in drug testing through ESR (ESR’s collecting agents are trained to follow strict procedures to comply with the requirements of the Australian/New Zealand Standard, AS/NZS 4308:2001 "Procedures for the collection, detection and quantitation of drugs of abuse in urine ). This means we are qualified to complete pre screening and post accident drug testing on our staff. The course was intensive, some of the things we learned were real eye openers such as:

- Eating Meal Mates prior to a drug test can produce a false positive!

- Drug use can attribute to 66% higher rate of absenteeism

ESR educated us on the different sampling options currently available. One option is onsite testing where results are given on the spot. Although this is possible the process is not as thorough and can lead to false positives where someone who has taken codeine based panadol or even had a bun with poppy seeds on it will return a false positive result! The most efficient method to drug test someone is to send samples taken by certified testers directly to ESR. Results are in within 24 hours, but will clear up if someone has taken drugs or has just eaten a tasty baked snack.

If you have questions around the process of drug testing please feel free to email us or give us a call.

Introducing Key Skills Newest Consultant!

Key skills are proud to announce a new addition to their team - Josh Galuszka. Josh worked in industrial recruitment specialising in the construction sector for 5 years before taking a 2 year break to work as a programme manager for an NGO.


"Having only worked in recruitment since I left uni I wanted to try something else to see what it was like. Working in the public sector was certainly a bit of an eye opener, but I missed the constant interaction with clients and candidates that comes with recruitment. Although things have certainly changed over the last two years I'm pumped to be back in recruitment."


When not at work you can find Josh walking the hills looking for deer in the Ruahines, Rimutaka and Tararua ranges, Diving the south and Wairarapa coast lines and/or playing a bit of footy for Hutt Old Boys Marist Rugby club.






Josh will be calling around many of his past clients over the next couple of weeks and would love to hear from anyone out there wanting to catch up.

You can call Josh on 04 920 1695 or email him on josh@keyskills.co.nz