Recruitment in the Childcare Sector

Love Childcare Recruitment are fortunate to work across multiple sectors of the childcare and children’s activity industry, giving us insight into good practice, challenges, and common mistakes, putting us in a great position to offer some helpful advice. You can read more about us here: Love Childcare Recruitment

The Workforce Meets a New Generation!

Our industry is currently grappling with high turnover, staff burnout, and difficulties attracting new talent. These challenges are amplified by Gen Z entering the workforce — a generation that prioritises purpose, personal development, and flexibility.

For Gen Z, like many other generations, working in childcare can be their dream job: meaningful, rewarding, and socially impactful. But we have to show them that.

Many organisations label Gen Z as the problem, however, we believe they can be the solution…if you’re willing to adapt and evolve.

Make the Process Engaging — Because the Work Is

If the job involves inspiring, supporting, and educating children, the recruitment experience should reflect that same energy. Whether it’s your job adverts, communication and interactions throughout your interview process, or your onboarding — make it fun and inject personality.

Our research and experiences have shown that candidates are applying for multiple jobs at any one time – often 3 or more! Recruitment shouldn’t feel like applying for a corporate office job. Let your passion for childcare shine through from the very first interaction as this could be the difference in someone choosing your organisation ahead of others.

Showcase Your Personality and Why You’re Different

In a competitive market, candidates are not just choosing a job — they’re choosing an organisation. So be clear:

• What’s your company culture like? What do your current staff say about their work?
• What makes your provision special?
• Do you offer flexibility, clear progression, or wellbeing support?

Highlighting your unique selling points (USPs) isn’t optional anymore — it’s essential.

A setting with a vibrant, child-first culture should be shouting about it on job adverts, on your website and social media, even creating ‘candidate packs’ to share with candidates, highlighting what is special about YOU. This is especially true when appealing to Gen Z, who tend to research and compare potential employers just like they would products or services.

Speed and Communication: Where Many Lose Talent

If your recruitment process takes too long or feels impersonal, you’ll lose quality candidates — fast. Candidates expect timely responses, clear next steps, and regular updates. Long silences or clunky processes lead to drop-offs.

Let’s talk ghosting…

Ghosting is a real problem and can be out of your control. However, you can limit the risks of being ghosted by candidates. If you want to, you should:

• Schedule interviews quickly after contact. At the very least, acknowledge their application and ensure there is a clear timeframe
• Confirm via text/email reminders. Junk folders can be your worst enemy when recruiting
• Build rapport early — make it personal. Take every opportunity to ‘informally’ meet and speak with candidates. Do you have capacity for an 5–10-minute screening call with all applicants?
• Don’t delay offers. Momentum matters!

And let’s be blunt: don’t ghost candidates. It damages your reputation and risks them ghosting you in return – they will very likely share this experience too. Instead, set expectations early, follow up promptly, and treat every applicant with respect — even those you don’t hire. They may come back in the future or recommend your organisation based on their positive experiences.

Understand Your True Cost of Recruitment

A slow or disorganised process doesn’t just delay hiring — it costs money. Time spent advertising, screening, interviewing, and onboarding adds up. And if new starters leave early because expectations weren’t aligned or onboarding was poor? Costs double.

Recruitment isn’t just a task — it’s a strategic investment. Many organisations are reactive in their recruitment when there is a need for proactiveness. A fast, efficient, and engaging process is not only better for candidates, it can also reduce financial risk and increase staff retention.

We’ve put together a helpful calculator here that can reveal the ‘hidden’ costs linked to recruitment.

Safer Recruitment and Onboarding

While speed and personality are vital, compliance with safer recruitment regulations must never be compromised. Every childcare provider has a duty to safeguard children by ensuring all candidates are thoroughly vetted and onboarded.

The key is to embed this into your process without slowing it down or negatively impacting the candidate experience. Here’s a few tips as to how:

• Clearly explain your commitment to safeguarding from the first advert
• Use pre-screening questions to rule out unsuitable applicants early
• Conduct structured interviews with scenarios and competency-based questions
• Ensure information regarding references, documents for DBS checks, and identity verifications are checked and confirmed as early in the process as possible
• Clearly communicate throughout – candidates can, and do, get frustrated when being asked for information without understanding why

Being efficient doesn’t mean cutting corners — it means building a process where safeguarding and compliance are seamlessly integrated, not tacked on at the end.

Final Thoughts: Recruitment That Reflects Your Values

Childcare is one of the most important jobs in society. To attract the right people, it deserves recruitment processes that reflect its value — ones that are warm, inspiring, informative, and efficient.

To recruit effectively in today’s environment, you need:

• A clear, engaging employer brand – and shout about it!
• A fast and respectful hiring process
• Communication that builds trust, rapport, and understanding
• A fun and people-centred experience
• Fully embedded safer recruitment practices

Get these right, and you won’t just fill vacancies — you’ll build a committed, passionate team ready to shape the future of your business!

You can read more about us here: Love Childcare Recruitment