As competition for skilled professionals intensifies across global markets, Civitas has launched a new initiative aimed at helping scale-up businesses build stronger strategies to attract, develop and retain top talent. The initiative comes at a time when growing businesses are increasingly competing not only with local employers but also with multinational companies and remote opportunities offering attractive salaries and benefits.
The guidance encourages founders to move beyond salary as the main attraction and instead build businesses where employees see opportunities to grow, take on meaningful responsibilities and contribute to a clear mission. By strengthening hiring practices and improving employee retention, the initiative aims to help scale-ups build stronger teams capable of supporting long-term business growth.
According to Civitas co-founder and CEO Ryan Osher, matching every salary offer in the market is not a sustainable solution for most growing businesses.
“Trying to match every offer can quickly become more than your business can afford,” he says, adding that the real challenge is creating “a comprehensive package that will attract the best talent.”
Osher believes many scale-ups underestimate the importance of clearly communicating why people should want to join them. While large corporations may compete through financial packages, growing businesses can stand out by offering meaningful work, faster career progression and the opportunity to make a visible impact.
“Scale-ups are often weak at articulating their vision and mission, but top performers are highly selective and actively look for purpose and a mission they can buy into,” he says.
He adds that companies should approach hiring with the same level of planning they apply to attracting customers.
“You wouldn’t expect people to buy without a clear reason, yet many companies still post job ads that say very little about why someone should join,” Osher explains. “A strong employee value proposition should explain the upside for them, whether that means more interesting work or the chance to take on real responsibility earlier in their career.”
Building stronger talent pipelines
Rather than waiting until vacancies arise, Civitas encourages founders to treat recruitment as an ongoing business function. Co-founder Paul Smith says businesses should continuously identify and engage talented people before they are actively hiring.
“The best time to look for talent is before you have an open vacancy,” Smith says, encouraging founders to maintain a running “black book” of promising professionals they encounter through business, networking and everyday interactions.
He points to South African entrepreneur Barney Beukes as an example of this approach. After being impressed by a restaurant manager who arrived at 1:00 AM to resolve a customer issue, Beukes built a relationship with him. That relationship later resulted in the manager being appointed managing director to establish a new business.
Smith says scale-ups should also apply marketing principles to recruitment by actively promoting company culture, identifying high-potential candidates on LinkedIn and creating regular opportunities for founders to meet prospective employees.
“A scale-up needs to build a marketing strategy behind attracting people,” he says. “This turns hiring from a last-minute reactive scramble into an ongoing pipeline.”
The initiative also recommends alternative recruitment methods, including asking new employees to identify the best colleagues they have worked with during onboarding, bringing senior executives onto advisory boards before offering permanent leadership positions and using freelance professionals who can transition into full-time roles as businesses expand.
Creating workplaces where people choose to stay
Attracting talented employees is only part of the challenge. Civitas says long-term success depends on creating workplaces where people continue to grow and feel valued.
Smith highlights one software development company within the Civitas network where employees have declined offers worth twice their salaries because of the company’s strong culture. The business achieved this by creating an engaging engineering environment, using trial weeks to ensure both the company and employees were the right fit and linking quarterly salary increases to learning and development milestones.
The initiative also encourages founders to provide mentorship programmes, introduce profit-sharing or phantom share schemes, recognise employee contributions immediately rather than waiting for annual reviews and ensure new employees are making meaningful contributions within their first three months.
Osher believes managing people effectively also requires stronger systems as businesses grow. He shares the example of a founder whose employees created personal “user manuals” explaining their communication styles, motivations and personal preferences. These documents are shared before new employees join the business to help managers build stronger working relationships from the start.
“These manuals are read before onboarding new team members so the team can manage individually rather than using a single style for everyone,” he says. He adds that some businesses are now using secure AI tools to organise this information, allowing managers to better understand employees and provide more personalised support.
Alongside investing in people, Osher stresses that maintaining high standards remains essential.
“A core part of a scale-up’s retention strategy is actually exiting weak people super fast,” he says, noting that high-performing employees quickly lose motivation when poor performance is allowed to continue unchecked.
To support better hiring decisions, Civitas recommends using skills assessment platforms such as Shadowmatch, TestDome and TestGorilla, assigning practical work assessments, and bringing in external specialists to evaluate candidates when founders are hiring outside their own areas of expertise. The organisation also encourages more rigorous reference checks that go beyond standard employment verification to provide a clearer picture of a candidate’s abilities and work ethic.
Through these practical strategies, Civitas believes scale-ups can build stronger teams without relying solely on higher salaries.
