Inside Talent Acquisition at DMA: A Q&A with Louise Kitcatt, Head of Talent Acquisition

Recruitment has changed more in the last two years than in the previous ten. AI now sits on both sides of the table, the skills shortage is biting, and the cost of a wrong hire has never been clearer. We sat down with our Head of Talent Acquisition, Louise Kitcatt, to talk about what it really takes to find the right people, and why “right” matters far more than “many.”

By the numbers: our year so far

Before we get into the conversation, a quick snapshot of what recruitment has looked like for DMA in 2026 so far:

• 42 roles advertised (including re-advertised and re-titled roles)
• 282,439 people have seen our adverts
• 18,466 clicked through
• 1,740 applied
• 110 first and second-stage interviews carried out
• 19 hires

Those numbers tell a story, and it’s a story about a funnel that narrows sharply at every stage. We started there.

For years, the default for many businesses has been to hand hiring over to agencies. We chose to build the capability ourselves.

Louise: “The honest answer is control and quality. An agency is paid to fill a vacancy, and they’re often paid per placement, so the incentive is speed, not necessarily fit. That’s not a criticism of agencies; it’s just how the model works.

Bringing it in-house means I’m assessing most candidates myself at the first stage, before they move on to the relevant senior people in the team. That matters, because I genuinely understand our business, our teams and our values. I’m not handing over a job spec to a third party and hoping they read between the lines. We can take a longer view, hold out for the right person, and give candidates a far better experience along the way. There’s a cost saving too, but that was never the headline for us. The real prize was owning the quality of who comes through the door.”

It’s an easy phrase to say and a hard one to deliver.

Louise: “Those numbers are exactly why quality matters. If I chased volume, I’d celebrate 1,740 applications as a win. But volume isn’t success, the right hire is. One strong application is worth more than a hundred that don’t fit.

In practice it means being clear and sometimes deliberately narrow about what we’re looking for, so the people who apply are the people who could genuinely do the role and thrive here. It means I’d rather re-advertise a role than fill it with someone who isn’t right. A vacancy is a problem; a wrong hire is a much bigger one.”

Generative AI can produce a polished, tailored CV in seconds. That’s reshaped the early stages of hiring in ways we’re all still working through.

Louise: “It’s genuinely a double-edged sword. AI has raised the floor – applications look more professional than they used to, fewer obvious spelling mistakes, better structure. But it’s also raised the noise. When everyone can generate a flawless CV, the CV stops being a useful signal on its own.

There’s a bit of an arms race going on. Candidates use AI to apply, and a lot of recruiters now use AI to screen. I deliberately don’t. I don’t use AI to filter applicants out, because my worry is that automated screening homogenises everything: you end up filtering for whoever’s best at using AI, or whoever happens to match the exact criteria word-for-word, rather than who’ll actually be best in the job. I’d rather read every application myself and make that judgement as a human.”

This is the practical heart of it. If a polished CV no longer proves much, what do you actually look for?

Louise: “I look for the things AI can’t fake convincingly: specifics, evidence and consistency. A great CV will tell you what someone did and what changed because they did it. A generated one tends to be fluent but vague, with lots of strong words, but not much substance.

The real test comes in conversation. You can spot very quickly whether someone actually did what their CV claims, because they can talk about it… the messy details, what went wrong, what they’d do differently. That’s where you separate the genuine from the generated.

My bigger worry, though, is the opposite problem. Someone good getting overlooked because they don’t fit the exact criteria we’ve set out. When I read an application properly, I can read between the lines. I’ll spot experience that doesn’t match our wording but is genuinely comparable, or someone who doesn’t fit neatly into the ‘box’ of our ideal candidate but could absolutely do the job and do it well. Those are often the people an automated filter would reject outright, and they can turn out to be some of the best hires. The polish on a CV matters far less to me than what’s underneath it.”

Finding people with the exact skill set you need has never been harder. How do you approach a market where the talent simply isn’t always there.

Louise: “You have to be realistic and creative. The ‘perfect’ candidate with every box ticked often doesn’t exist, or everyone else is chasing them too. So, we’ve shifted toward hiring for attitude and aptitude, and training for skill.

Some of the best hires we’ve made didn’t tick every technical box on day one, but they had the right mindset, learned fast and fit the culture. That’s also why our employer brand matters so much. In a short market, candidates are choosing us as much as we’re choosing them, so the experience of applying and interviewing here has to be good enough that the people we want actually say yes.”

From 282,000 views down to 19 hires is a steep funnel. Managing that volume without losing good people in the crush is a real challenge.

Louise: “Every stage of that funnel is a filter, and the goal is to make sure each one filters for the right thing. The top of the funnel – views and clicks – is really about reaching the right audience, not the biggest one. A well-targeted advert seen by the right 10,000 people beats a vague one seen by 200,000.

I read applications myself rather than letting a filter do it, I’m clear about what each stage is testing for, and I work hard not to let strong candidates slip through because of process. Volume is a tax on attention – the discipline is making sure the people who deserve a proper look actually get one.”

Re-advertising can look like a failure. But it can be reframed as a feature, not a bug.

Louise: “There are a few reasons. Sometimes a role genuinely needs re-advertising because the market’s thin, or because we’ve learned something and need to adjust the spec, the title or the salary to attract the right people. And honestly, sometimes I’d much rather re-advertise than settle for someone who isn’t right.

But it’s worth being clear that not every re-advert means a first round failed. Sometimes we advertise a role and it gets pulled because it’s no longer required, meaning the need changes on the business side. A role like that might end up being advertised more than once over time as circumstances shift. So, the headline figure of 42 adverts includes roles we re-ran for all sorts of reasons, not just ones where we couldn’t find the right person.

Either way, re-advertising is a sign we’re holding our standard, not lowering it. The cost of running an advert again is tiny compared to the cost of hiring the wrong person and starting over in six months anyway.”

A wrong hire is expensive and disruptive. But the probation period is the system working, not failing.

Louise: “It’s something we watch closely, but I’d gently push back on framing it as purely a problem. Probation exists for a reason; it’s the final check that someone is genuinely the right fit, on both sides. If someone isn’t aligned with our values, they tend not to last that period, and that’s the process doing its job.

What I’d actually worry about is zero attrition in probation. That might mean we’re playing it too safe and hiring people who are comfortable rather than right. A small amount of probation attrition tells me we’re taking the right kind of considered risks. What matters is learning from each one – was it the hire, the onboarding, or the role itself?”

“Culture fit” is one of the most overused phrases in hiring. How do you make it concrete.

Louise: “You’re right that it can be a lazy phrase, and used badly, ‘culture fit’ just means ‘people like us,’ which is dangerous. That’s not what I mean.

For us, values fit is about how someone works, not who they are. Do they take ownership? Are they honest when something goes wrong? Do they treat people well when no one’s watching? Those things are far more predictive of whether someone will succeed here than any line on a CV. We test for them with real examples…asking people to walk us through how they actually handled situations, not how they’d handle a hypothetical. Skills get you the interview; values get you the job and keep you here.”

Amid all the disruption, some fundamentals endure. What’s stayed constant.

Louise: “Despite all the technology, hiring is still fundamentally about people and judgement. No tool has replaced the moment in an interview where you understand who someone really is. Trust, gut instinct backed by evidence, and treating candidates like human beings; none of that has changed, and I don’t think it will.

The tools have changed how we find people and how we handle volume. They haven’t changed what makes someone a great hire. If anything, the more AI takes over the mechanical parts, the more the human judgement at the centre matters.”

Louise: “I think we’ll see the CV continue to fade as the central document, and a much bigger emphasis on demonstrated skills and real conversations. AI will keep handling more of the heavy lifting at the top of the funnel, which means the human stages will need to get sharper and more meaningful, not lazier.

The businesses that win won’t be the ones with the cleverest screening tools. They’ll be the ones who are clearest about who they are and what they value, because that’s what helps the right people choose them. My job is to keep us in that group.”

Thanks to Louise Kitcatt for her time and candour. If you’re interested in joining us, take a look at what it’s like to work with us on our careers page and check out our current opportunities.