Lead Recruiter

The Lead Recruiter is responsible for leading and evolving Guardteck's talent acquisition function across British Columbia, Alberta, and Ontario. This is a hands‑on leadership role that combines strategic talent planning with full-cycle recruitment execution. As a player‑coach, the Lead Recruiter will manage their own portfolio of salaried and high-volume hiring needs while mentoring recruiters, driving recruitment excellence, and ensuring a consistent, high-quality hiring experience across the organization.

Leading the Function

• Own the talent acquisition strategy, processes and standards across Guardteck in BC, AB and ON
• Serve as player-coach: carry a personal requisition load while setting the pace, priorities and quality bar for the broader recruiting effort
• Coach, mentor and develop recruiters— build their craft, review their work, and raise the floor on screening quality, candidate communication and data discipline
• Allocate requisitions and workload across the team based on urgency, complexity and client impact, and act as the escalation point when a role or a mobilization is at risk
• Build and maintain the playbooks: intake templates, structured interview guides, screening criteria, offer processes and onboarding handoffs — so hiring is consistent at every site, in every region
• Own vendor, job board and sourcing tool relationships, evaluate ROI, and recommend where the recruitment budget is best spent

Full-Cycle and High-Volume Recruiting

• Manage concurrent requisitions across salaried professional and high-volume hourly roles, maintaining quality and pace without compromise
• Source, screen, interview, extend offers and close candidates across multiple talent segments simultaneously
• Lead large-scale mobilizations — new site contracts, seasonal surges and sudden client wins — using batch screening, group interviewing, hiring events and pre-built pipelines
• Apply skills-based hiring practices to evaluate candidates not just on experience, but on potential, adaptability, reliability and alignment with Guardteck's values
• Own the full candidate experience from first touchpoint to first day, ensuring every interaction reflects who we are

Proactive Sourcing and Pipeline Strategy

• Build and maintain a diverse, multi-channel talent pipeline — past applicants, referrals, alumni, silver medallists and direct sourcing — so Guardteck is never starting from zero
• Maintain a warm bench of pre‑screened, licence‑ready candidates for recurring and hard-to-fill posts
• Develop and nurture talent communities, keeping prospective candidates engaged and informed about Guardteck's culture, opportunities and growth long before a requisition opens
• Leverage market intelligence and labour data to inform sourcing strategy, anticipate future talent needs, and advise hiring managers proactively — not reactively
• Explore unconventional and niche channels: professional networks, community organizations, industry groups and social media, to reach candidates who are not actively searching

Hiring Events, Campus and Community Partnerships

• Plan, coordinate and lead hiring fairs and recruitment events — community job fairs, virtual hiring events and Guardteck-hosted open houses — representing our brand with energy, professionalism and authenticity
• Identify, establish and manage partnerships with post-secondary institutions (colleges, universities and vocational programs) to build early-career pipelines for security professional and administrative roles
• Cultivate relationships with academic career centres, co‑op and internship coordinators and student associations, creating consistent touchpoints long before graduation
• Engage community employment programs, newcomer support organizations, military and first‑responder transition programs, and other partners to diversify our talent pool and extend our reach into underrepresented segments
• Build the annual events and partnership calendar, set targets for each, and measure what each one actually delivers

Stakeholder Partnership and Workforce Planning

• Build trusted, consultative relationships with hiring managers across operations, security divisions and corporate functions — partnering on role design, candidate criteria and hiring timelines
• Advise hiring leaders and executives on market conditions, realistic candidate profiles and competitive compensation — serving as the go‑to talent expert in the room, not an order‑taker
• Participate in workforce planning with operations and finance, bringing forward data and market insight that helps leaders think ahead about their talent needs
• Partner with Operations on client mobilization planning, so staffing readiness is built into the contrac