The Post: Founding Director, Vibrant Talent
The Post Holder: Craig Thompson
Craig Thompson set up his company, Vibrant Talent to help employers attract and retain staff and to give employees a better sense of job satisfaction.
Give a brief outline of your career to date.
I’ve worked in a wide range of businesses across retail, hospitality and catering, airline baggage handling, security, marketing, contact centre, recruitment and training roles, amongst others. I gained enough experience to know there was a problem with the world of work – people weren’t happy and businesses couldn’t keep and engage the initially enthusiastic people they would hire. I wanted to do something about it so I set up Vibrant to play my part in building a better working world – helping companies become vibrant workplaces where people would want to take jobs, have a positive experience of work and stay!
What was your favourite subject at school?
I didn’t like school and couldn’t wait to leave, which I did at the first opportunity at 16. I’ve always struggled to do things if I can’t see the big picture of how they’ll become useful to me in a practical sense.
Did you go on to further/higher education, if so what did you study and where?
I didn’t really know what to do when I left school. I had been so focused on getting out I hadn’t thought so much about what to do next. I ended up doing a Double Award AVCE in Hospitality Management at tech – really just because lots of family members worked in that industry and I had experience in it myself but highly strung chefs and establishment owners put me off. I decided not to pursue a career in that industry and randomly ended up at university, despite not doing A-levels, after my sister applied on my behalf. I have a degree in media but opportunities back then in Northern Ireland were sparse. It took for me to get out into the world and have some life experiences before I really felt my calling.
How did you get into your area of work?
By my mid-20s I had been promoted in a contact centre and become responsible for the Recruitment and L&D functions. It drove me mad going to great lengths to find people to join the business only for them to leave soon after. Staff absence and turnover was a constant problem and it didn’t need to be. I had always been frustrated with the world of work from the employees’ perspective, but now I was frustrated from the employer side too. I felt that if we just cared more for our people and they got a better return on their investment of a lifetime spent at work they would engage, deliver and stay. I looked around and thought so many people are miserable. They spend more of their life working than anything else they will ever do, they make great sacrifices for employers only to struggle to get by, retire and die. They disengage, go off sick and leave at volume – who is benefiting if we run businesses this way? I knew the world of work needed to change for the sake of employers and employees.
Is this what you always wanted to do?
I had a huge values conflict with the world of work. I couldn’t, in good conscience, keep being the salesperson attracting people to join a business and give their all for it when I knew it didn’t think twice about their needs. So I got out but I would be lying if I said I knew what I was going to do next. I’m the kind of person that has to jump and build wings on the way down! Eventually I decided that the only thing I could do, was take my frustrations and channel it into something positive – so I created Vibrant as the vehicle to do that.
Were there any particular essential qualifications or experience needed?
I am CIPD qualified but I’m close to a decade in business now and for me purpose, desire and commitment are the critical ingredients to building a successful business. If what you want to do matters enough you’ll find a way and learn on the journey.
Are there alternative routes into the job?
There are more traditional routes like going to work for a consultancy business and working your way up.
What are the main personal skills your job requires?
Running a business requires every skill because you’re wearing every hat but without serious resilience, mental toughness and creativity to find solutions Vibrant would not have come through Brexit, the pandemic and then the cost-of-living crisis consecutively.
What does a typical day entail?
There are no typical days!
What are the best and most challenging aspects of the job?
The best is seeing the difference our cultural transformation work makes to real peoples’ lives. The most challenging is getting the opportunity to speak with the right people in the right companies. I would like to work with more businesses in Northern Ireland but you often have to know someone who knows someone. As a result a lot of our work is with companies across mainland Europe, North and South America.
Why is what you do important?
People giving 100,000 hours of their lives to employers deserve to be looked after, and businesses that do that will perform better as a result.
What advice would you give anyone looking to follow a similar career path?
Most things in life aren’t as serious as people will have you believe. Lots of people will try to scare you, but if you have a calling and you answer it then that’s a pretty good way to live a meaningful life to me.
If you weren’t doing this what would you like to do?
One day I’ll set up an enterprise to help homeless people.
What is the one piece of advice you would give to yourself on your first day?
It’s not going to be easy, but it’s going to matter. So roll with the punches and remember why you do what you do.
Describe your ideal day off.
Lying on a peaceful beach, sipping piña coladas and cooling off in the sea!
And finally, what’s the key to any successful job search?
Be proactive in building and maintaining a personal brand, get known for what you represent, connect with people, and when the time comes they’ll be chasing you.
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