Welcome to PureKat
We’re delighted to meet you. PureKat Consultancy is a friendly bunch of highly skilled recruitment specialists, waiting to help you find the next great member of your team, or take the next step in your work life.
Hello, my name is Katrina Smith, aka Kat, and this is the story to how PureKat Consultancy came into existence.
I cannot pretend that ever since I can remember I had a burning ambition to start my own business or have a career in recruitment. What I can tell you is that I left school after sixth form not really knowing what I wanted to spend the rest of my life doing!
I spent the first five years working in various roles for a number of different local businesses. There was a common denominator – all my jobs involved communicating with people. I discovered early on in my career that I love dealing with people and that my outgoing, some would say gregarious, personality meant that I had a natural flair in this area. I was a “people person”.
In my early twenties, I had the overwhelming urge to go and “discover myself”. My first trip backpacking around Asia gave me what I know will be a lifelong love of travelling. As a Haverhill girl experiencing a different continent and culture for the first time, my eyes were well and truly opened. I saw just how differently people in other parts of our beautiful planet actually live. The inequalities that exist in the human race struck home and I realised how fortunate I was.
A new, more mature, Kat returned to the UK after that first adventure. Eager to “knuckle down” and take a more responsible, “grown up” approach to life I worked for almost four years as an Account Manager for a leading labelling company in Haverhill. Here I honed my people skills and learnt the intricacies of how businesses work. Eventually, feeling stuck in a rut, the backpack came out again and another year of travelling in Southeast Asia ensued.
In my early twenties, I had the overwhelming urge to go and “discover myself”. My first trip backpacking around Asia gave me what I know will be a lifelong love of travelling. As a Haverhill girl experiencing a different continent and culture for the first time, my eyes were well and truly opened. I saw just how differently people in other parts of our beautiful planet actually live. The inequalities that exist in the human race struck home and I realised how fortunate I was.
A new, more mature, Kat returned to the UK after that first adventure. Eager to “knuckle down” and take a more responsible, “grown up” approach to life I worked for almost four years as an Account Manager for a leading labelling company in Haverhill. Here I honed my people skills and learnt the intricacies of how businesses work. Eventually, feeling stuck in a rut, the backpack came out again and another year of travelling in Southeast Asia ensued.
On my return in February 2011, I had the opportunity to join a recruitment agency in Haverhill as a Business Development Manager and Office Manager. I soon discovered that I could do something that scared most people rigid, I could sell!
I had finally found my niche – recruitment. I had a role where I could combine a love of interacting with people with a talent for selling. I could finally unleash my creativity and utilise my business acumen to devise successful marketing campaigns. All of this was set against a backdrop of a fast moving, challenging industry where positivity was the key to survival. It was exciting and I loved it!
As time went by the nagging feeling that there might be a different approach to recruitment grew stronger. I had found my niche but it was not perfect. Deciding to take some time out to mull over my future and to get some perspective back in my life I left to travel again. There was no doubt that recruitment was the right industry for me – I just needed to find the right company to work with.
When I came back to the UK, I began working with another recruitment agency, looking after the operational side of their business. I experienced a very different approach to recruitment but it did not take me long to realise that this was not the answer I was looking for either!
I was starting to develop my own vision as to what a perfect recruitment consultancy would look like. In July 2017, that vision manifested itself in the launch of PureKat.
Life experiences gained from extensive travel, the lessons learnt from holding key positions in two recruitment agencies, and the customer-facing roles in my early career, have shaped PureKat. Recruitment is a challenging industry. Recruiters have successfully earned the disdain and distrust of the vast majority of the population – and there are reasons for that reputation! I reflected long and hard on my time working for other recruitment agencies. I prised apart every element of the candidate and client experience and asked the question “How could this be better?”
The PureKat philosophy takes the best of what your standard recruitment agency has to offer and disregards the rest. I have added in a healthy dose of honesty, exuberance, drive and determination and finished off with a big dollop of humility. The result – an honest, hardworking professional recruitment consultancy that is also a little bit quirky and fun. A recruitment consultancy that I am proud to put my name to.
Welcome to PureKat Consultancy.
I was starting to develop my own vision as to what a perfect recruitment consultancy would look like. In July 2017, that vision manifested itself in the launch of PureKat.
Life experiences gained from extensive travel, the lessons learnt from holding key positions in two recruitment agencies, and the customer-facing roles in my early career, have shaped PureKat. Recruitment is a challenging industry. Recruiters have successfully earned the disdain and distrust of the vast majority of the population – and there are reasons for that reputation! I reflected long and hard on my time working for other recruitment agencies. I prised apart every element of the candidate and client experience and asked the question “How could this be better?”
The PureKat philosophy takes the best of what your standard recruitment agency has to offer and disregards the rest. I have added in a healthy dose of honesty, exuberance, drive and determination and finished off with a big dollop of humility. The result – an honest, hardworking professional recruitment consultancy that is also a little bit quirky and fun. A recruitment consultancy that I am proud to put my name to.
Welcome to PureKat Consultancy.
