Recruitment Service Lead

• Lead skilled recruitment people leaders for ADF Careers
• Implement innovative strategies and deliver excellent candidate care
• Enjoy career growth, a collaborative environment, and impactful initiatives
• Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane locations considered

As the Recruitment Service Lead for Army Reserve (ARES) you will lead, coach and mentor Recruitment Service Team Leaders, ensuring their teams deliver recruiting success across ARES depots nationally. This role involves leading a high‑performing, nationally dispersed team, reviewing, and implementing strong data‑driven recruitment strategies to meet ARES capability requirements and working closely with Army military personnel to meet recruitment targets.

ADF Careers is the largest workforce outsourcing solution in the southern hemisphere with over 80,000 applications received on average each year.
ADF Careers is on a mission to recruit the right people, in the right numbers, at the right time to support the Australian Defence Force to build, sustain and maximise Defence capability.

Our people are our greatest asset. We recognise and respect our people’s need to work in ways that support their careers, families, and lifestyle. That’s why we offer flexible working arrangements, learning pathways, additional leave entitlements and extensive corporate discounts across a variety of product and services. We want our people to be financially rewarded; to feel good and to go beyond what they thought possible at work.

Be you, and we’ll be better together.

To find out more about our great employee benefits and what it’s like to be part of the team, reach out to our friendly talent acquisition team.

As the Recruitment Service Lead ARES, you are responsible for leading, coaching and mentoring a team of ARES Recruitment Team Leaders to drive recruiting outcomes for Army.

You will be accountable for delivering high‑volume, specialist recruitment across multiple ARES disciplines, ensuring a positive candidate experience throughout the recruitment lifecycle. The role involves developing and executing candidate sourcing and recruitment plans, leading a high‑performing, nationally dispersed team, and translating workforce demand into practical, data‑driven recruitment strategies. You will operate as a senior people leader, with responsibility for leading leaders, and will regularly engage with senior Defence stakeholders.

You will:

• Lead, coach, and develop a team of Recruitment Team Leaders, with accountability for people leadership at scale (leaders of leaders), ensuring delivery excellence and sustainable recruitment performance across ARES depots nationally.
• Develop, execute, and monitor sourcing and workforce plans across multiple ARES disciplines to support demand forecasting and target achievement.
• Apply strong data analysis and insight to gain a deep understanding of ARES workforce requirements, identifying trends, risks, and potential shortfalls in target delivery or candidate pipeline health.
• Provide clear, evidence‑based reporting and analysis to support decision‑making, including presenting insights, risks, and recommendations to senior Army, ARES, and DFR executive stakeholders.
• Collaborate closely with Target Fulfilment and Enlistment teams to ensure the effective progression and enlistment of ARES candidates.
• Coach and develop teams to maintain a strong understanding of ARES roles, eligibility criteria, and legislative requirements, enabling high‑quality candidate guidance and outcomes.
• Contribute to DFR’s national recruitment strategy through the delivery of strategic, data‑led recruitment solutions focused on meeting ARES capability needs and priorities.
• Contribute to the management of the Adecco DFR Recruitment P&L, ensuring commercial performance, productivity, and target outcomes are achieved.
• Continuously review recruitment lifecycle processes to ensure compliance, efficiency, and consistency, identifying opportunities for improvement in a complex, multi‑stakeholder environment.
• Apply and embed DFR governance, policy, and process across all ARES recruitment activities, coaching teams to ensure adherence and risk mitigation.
• Review and analyse operational performance on a weekly, monthly, and quarterly basis, providing detailed reporting, insights, and 6–12-month operational recommendations to senior leaders and military personnel.
• Work collaboratively as a member of the National Recruitment Leadership team to foster a culture of transparency, accountability, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
• Build and maintain strong, effective relationships with ARES stakeholders, including depot Commanders, through a consultative, credible, and resilient engagement style, even in challenging stakeholder environments.
• Develop and maintain high‑service‑level client relationships by consistently meeting or exceeding Defence expectations and supporting a strong partnership between Adecco and the Commonwealth of Australia.

As a senior leader in recruitment delivery and national operational management, you will bring strong people leadership capability, workforce planning experience, and the confidence to operate at senior executive level. Your ability to combine data‑driven insight with relationship management will be critical to delivering ARES recruitment outcomes.

Your background will demonstrate:

• Extensive leadership and coaching experience in development of large, high performing, high volume, nationally dispersed recruitment, and/or customer service teams.
• Strong capability in mid‑term workforce and sourcing planning across multiple disciplines, informed by data, trends, and operational demand.
• Demonstrated success delivering complex, high‑volume recruitment operations using data, metrics, and analysis to drive performance and mitigate risk.
• Proven experience operating in fast‑paced, target‑driven RPO or large internal recruitment environments.
• Highly effective presentation, influencing, and relationship‑building skills, with experience engaging and presenting to senior executives and Defence leaders.
• Advanced data literacy, including the ability to identify issues, assess risk, and develop actionable plans to remediate performance gaps.
• A resilient, pragmatic, and consultative leadership style suited to complex stakeholder environments and competing priorities.

To apply for this position, you must be an Australian citizen and have the ability to maintain an Australian AGSVA security clearance.

If eligible, please submit your resume; applications are open to all qualified Australian citizens regardless of their background, identity, experiences and beliefs.

If you need assistance during our recruitment process, please email Bryley Ellis at bryley.ellis@adecco.com.au for a confidential conversation.

To apply for this position, please submit your application online through our designated platform. The deadline for applications is 11:30 PM (AEST) on Saturday 23rd May. It's important to note that applications will be reviewed and processed as they are received.