Award categories and criteria

The SARAs are open to Australian and New Zealand-based recruitment agencies and RPOs. View the categories and criteria to determine the awards you'll enter and the information you need to showcase.

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Awards categories

Recruitment Agency of the Year (Small, Medium and Large)

The winner of this award will be able to demonstrate their dedication and pursuit of excellence across culture, innovation, growth, candidate engagement and contribution to the success of the recruitment industry.

RPO of the Year

The winner of this award will demonstrate how they support and promote their customer's brand in-market, apply innovation and efficiency to solutions, execute effective business partnership and drive candidate engagement.

New Recruitment Agency of the Year

The winner of this award will be an agency that has made its mark on the industry in a short time, demonstrating merit across culture, innovation, growth, candidate experience and industry contribution.
This new category is open to recruitment agencies that have been in operation for one to two years, and have created great outcomes for candidates, clients and the industry.

Outstanding Progress in Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

The winner of this award will treat diversity, equity and inclusion as integral to their organisation and within their clients’ workplace. They will demonstrate their commitment through meaningful initiatives and strategies that benefit diverse talent pools and the business.

Excellence in Candidate Experience

The winner of this award will be able to demonstrate their commitment to providing an exceptional experience for candidates throughout their job search journey.

Recruitment Leader of the Year

The winner of this award will be a recruitment professional who inspires and motivates their team, performs to business objectives, and makes a positive impact within their agency and the overall recruitment industry.

Recruitment Consultant of the Year

The winner of this award will be a recruitment professional who has excelled in the area of client and candidate engagement, and has contributed positively to the recruitment industry as a whole.

Your SARAs submission checklist and entry tips

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What the judges are looking for

Our panel of industry experts assess entries using the following guiding criteria. This criteria has been designed to recognise outstanding professional service and client support across the recruitment industry, and shine a light on the positive impact recruiters make on people’s lives. Here's an overview of what the judges will look for:

Client and candidate centricity

How are you putting the candidate and your clients at the centre of your strategy or initiative/s?

Innovation

How are you doing things differently and challenging the status quo? What sets you or your agency apart?

Growth

What are your targets and how do you know you are meeting them?

Industry impact

How does this achievement improve your team, your agency, or the broader recruitment industry?

Judges

Experts in their field, our exceptional judges have been appointed to select the winners of the 2025 SEEK Annual Recruitment Awards.
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Take a look at our confirmed 2025 SEEK SARAs judges below.

Danielle Berto

Talent Acquisition Director, Thales Australia

Danielle is the Talent Acquisition Director at Thales Australia, where she leads a team responsible for hiring nearly a thousand talent individuals across 35 sites in Australia every year. With about twenty years of international experience, Danielle has worked across multiple industry verticals throughout her career. The last ten or more in tec...

Lesley Horburgh

Managing Director, APSCo

Lesley has had a long relationship with the global recruitment profession dating back to her capacity as Owner of Recruitment Extra magazine which was founded over 20 years ago, along with the highly coveted Recruitment Excellence Awards. She joined APSCo Australia as MD in 2019 to help drive growth across the Association and support profession...

Charles Cameron

CEO, RCSA

Charles Cameron is CEO of RCSA, the peak industry body for recruitment and staffing in Australia and New Zealand. Charles has twenty years of experience consulting within and leading an industry which inspires him every day. Charles is Vice President of the World Employment Confederation and leads over 50 recruitment and staffing associations fr...

Thalia Thomas

Head of Recruitment, ANZ

As Head of Recruitment for ANZ, Thalia leads delivery-focused, agile teams that support the bank's transformation agenda by finding, engaging and hiring talent across Australia, New Zealand, International (Asia, Europe, America); as well as recruiting our contractors globally. She has been working in talent acquisition for 16 years, starting in ...

Steve Burnell

General Manager – Talent Acquisition, Bupa

Steve leads Bupa Australia's Talent Acquisition function as General Manager, overseeing the design and execution of its recruitment strategy. During his tenure at Bupa, he has driven the strategy, design, and implementation of improvements to talent acquisition practices within the organisation, including a specific focus on developing Employer ...

Alex McVeigh

Talent Acquisition Manager – Employer Brand, Sourcing and Projects

Alex McVeigh is an Employer Brand and Recruitment Marketing specialist, passionate about helping organisations attract, engage, and retain top talent through compelling storytelling and strategic branding. With over 15 years experience at leading companies like Alinta Energy, Commonwealth Bank and Deloitte, she has led employer brand transformat...

Maree Fiore

Head of Talent Acquisition, Bunnings

Maree currently leads the Talent Acquisition team across Bunnings and is responsible for overseeing the recruitment team's operations across Australia and New Zealand. She has over 20 years’ experience within Recruitment, HR and Talent Management working in both agency and internal environments predominantly within the retail sector. Maree’s fo...

Zorica Vasiljkovic

National Talent Acquisition Manager, Fulton Hogan

Zorica brings over a decade of experience in recruitment and talent acquisition, having worked across several industries in South Australia and Victoria. Currently serving as the National Talent Acquisition Manager at Fulton Hogan Australia, she leads a dynamic team dedicated to attracting and engaging top talent, essential for delivering critic...

Richard Fairclough-Rushton

Head of Talent Acquisition G4S Australia and New Zealand 

Richard Rushton is the Regional Head of Talent Acquisition at G4S, a global leader in security and services with over 800,000 employees across the globe. With over twenty years of experience in the field, Richard brings extensive expertise in recruitment and talent acquisition, including executive search from both agency and in-house perspective...

Andrew Retschko

Senior Executive- Talent Acquisition, Inclusion and Sustainability, Medibank

Andrew Retschko is the Senior Executive - Talent Acquisition, Inclusion and Sustainability at Medibank, an integrated healthcare company providing private health insurance and health solutions to 3.7 million Australians. He has spent the last six years in the recruitment industry, commencing in a boutique agency before moving into executive sear...

Matthew Coleman

Director, Talent Acquisition People Services, Serco

Matthew Coleman is a recognised leader in Talent Acquisition, currently Director of Talent Acquisition at Serco Asia Pacific. With over two decades of experience, Matthew has shaped recruitment strategies across a range of complex, large-scale organisations, including senior roles at Korn Ferry and Deloitte. His work has driven transformation fo...

David Tracey

Recruitment Manager, Tesla Australia & New Zealand

David has over 10 years’ experience building and managing strategic high performing internal Recruitment teams at both The Walt Disney Company and Telsa. Originally from New Zealand, he has worked in London managing teams recruiting across multiple European countries and is now based in Sydney leading Tesla’s recruitment efforts across Australia...

Meagan Anderson

Director, Talent Acquisition and Diversity & Inclusion, Austin Health

With a career that commenced in manufacturing engineering, Meagan ultimately found passion and purpose in more people orientated professions. Initially moving into the recruitment industry, Meagan held senior leadership roles with a number of firms locally and spent four years in a global role based in Switzerland. Since then, Meagan has worked ...

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