How To Recruit IT Talent Across Multiple UK Locations

Implementing a multi-location recruitment strategy involves a lot of planning, but for organisations facing persistent technology skills shortages, expanding beyond a single location can unlock a much larger pool of talent.

Understanding where relevant technology talent is concentrated, the level of competition in different markets, what candidates located in different areas expect, and how recruitment strategies need to adapt by location can help businesses build broader talent pipelines and fill urgent skills gaps faster.

In this guide, we’ll explore how organisations can develop a national hiring strategy and recruit talent effectively.

Why multi-location recruitment is increasing

Multi-location recruitment for niche tech workers is increasingly popular among businesses struggling to fill key skill gaps. While London remains the UK’s largest tech market, accounting for 59% of the tech sector value according to the UK Government, several other UK cities are becoming thriving technology hubs. Cities such as Manchester, Bristol, Edinburgh, and Leeds are all building sizeable technology communities, making multi-location hiring both highly possible and attractive to businesses.

There are several reasons why a UK-wide IT recruitment strategy is particularly beneficial to organisations.

Increased competition for talent

The significant tech skills shortage has intensified competition between employers. According to People Management, 52% of organisations are struggling to fill key tech roles, particularly within AI and data. Highly skilled developers, engineers, DevOps specialists, data scientists, AI specialists, cloud engineers, and cyber security professionals remain among the most difficult roles to fill, particularly at a senior level.

With certain skills sometimes being concentrated in particular regions, employers that restrict recruitment to a single city or office location often experience a much smaller candidate pool being available to them. Expanding hiring across multiple locations significantly increases access to qualified candidates, shortens hiring times, and reduces the risk of vital roles remaining open for extended periods.

Hybrid and remote working

The widespread adoption of hybrid and remote working has fundamentally changed businesses’ recruitment strategies. Employers are no longer limited to candidates who live within commuting distance of their office, allowing organisations to recruit nationally with ease.

Although some organisations have introduced office attendance requirements, hybrid working remains one of the most common working arrangements, with 74% of organisations choosing this method according to CIPD. Many companies still choose to offer remote working to attract and retain niche tech talent for their teams. This arrangement works very well when businesses are recruiting tech talent across multiple locations, as the talent does not need to be based near a particular office location.

Business expansion

Organisations often undertake multi-location recruitment as part of expansion plans. Companies that are opening new offices, entering new markets, or scaling operations often need to recruit multiple teams simultaneously across different locations.

Rather than building an entire workforce in one city, employers are increasingly creating teams across the UK that allows them to support local projects or access niche talent effectively. This approach can improve operational resilience and provide access to a broader range of specialist expertise.

Salary differences

Salary expectations continue to vary across the UK. While remote working has narrowed some regional pay gaps, location remains an important factor when benchmarking salaries.

London typically commands the highest salaries due to increased living costs and significant competition for experienced professionals between organisations based in the capital. In contrast, many other technology hubs have reduced living costs and slightly lower pay expectations. For employers facing budget constraints or the inability to compete with big tech companies in London, recruiting in other regions can provide better value while still attracting high-quality talent.

How to build a national recruitment strategy

Successfully recruiting technology professionals across multiple locations requires an established workforce plan and a structured recruitment strategy informed by regional tech markets in order to attract local candidates.

A well-planned national technology recruitment strategy helps employers reduce hiring costs, improve time-to-hire, strengthen employer branding, and build sustainable talent pipelines for future growth.

Workforce planning

An effective talent management strategy is an essential part of any hiring strategy. Businesses should look to forecast tech hiring requirements for the next 12 to 24 months if possible.

This involves identifying:

• Current and predicted skills shortages
• Future project requirements
• Succession planning for key technical positions
• Locations the business needs to expand to

By understanding future demand, organisations can start planning their recruitment early, identifying tech talent pools across the UK they want to access, and building talent pipelines.

Identify where talent is located

Multiple regions in the UK have made a name for themselves with certain technology specialisms. Manchester has become a leader in software development and digital services. In comparison, Bristol has developed strengths in engineering, semiconductor technology and aerospace, while Edinburgh has built a reputation in fintech, AI and data science. Furthermore, Leeds attracts investment across health technology and data  centres.

These technology talent hubs are often established through local universities’ with research specialisms that produce skilled graduates, local tech enterprises and regional investment. For recruiters and employers, this means specialist talent is now spread across multiple established technology markets rather than concentrated in one or two central locations.

Build regional talent pipelines

One of the biggest mistakes organisations make is only starting the recruitment process once the position has become urgent. This slows down the process significantly.

By continuously developing regional talent pipelines, businesses can build relationships with skilled professionals across multiple technology hubs that they can leverage when their skills are required.

Companies can create effective regional talent pipelines through:

• Partnering with universities and colleges
• Participating in local networking events
• Establishing internship programmes
• Encouraging employee referral schemes

How to establish employer branding across multiple locations

Strong employer branding becomes even more important when recruiting nationally. Businesses are not just competing against organisations in their local area, but also across the UK. Building a consistent employer brand across every location helps organisations attract and retain tech professionals.

Optimise the Employee Value Proposition (EVP)

One way businesses can strengthen their employer branding while recruiting across multiple locations is through optimising their employee value proposition. The EVP should clearly communicate why skilled technology professionals should choose that organisation over their competitors.

An effective EVP that enables multi-location recruitment includes:

• Evidence of a robust company culture that fosters and supports remote working or teams / office branches nationwide
• Salary and compensation packages that are attractive and competitive based on candidates’ local regions and skill sets
• Training and networking opportunities that aren’t limited to a single location
• Clear career progression opportunities outlined

While the core EVP should remain consistent nationally, it can be adapted to highlight benefits that resonate with different regional talent markets.

Maintain a strong online presence

When recruiting across multiple locations, the business must have a strong online presence. As the candidates are not in the organisation’s local area, they might not have heard about the business before or know anyone who has worked there. They will be looking up the organisation online to form their opinion of whether it is a good place to work or not.

Companies should ensure their careers website/page, LinkedIn page, employee testimonials, technical blogs, recruitment content, and social media channels accurately reflect their organisation’s culture, values, and working environment.

Sharing employee success stories, internal company culture and team news builds credibility with potential candidates across multiple locations.

Create an impressive candidate experience

An exceptional candidate experience can become a significant competitive advantage, particularly in a market where skilled technology professionals often receive multiple offers.

In order to strengthen their candidate experiences, businesses should:

• Maintain regular communication with candidates, including updating them on interview progress promptly and checking in with them during the notice period.
• Simplify the recruitment process. Make sure to keep interview stages as few as possible and not leave it too long between each stage.
• Offer constructive feedback to interviewed candidates whenever possible.

A great candidate experience bolsters employer branding, making the organisation an attractive place to work for tech professionals.

How to recruit remote technology teams

While organisations do not have to offer remote working arrangements in order to access talent based across the UK, many may choose to provide the option for remote working in order to attract more professionals with the skill sets they need.

Implementing a remote-based national recruitment strategy can be challenging for lots of businesses if they are used to only hiring in their local area for on-site roles. Effective remote recruitment strategies require a different approach to traditional local hiring.

When looking to hire remotely, businesses need to take a number of active steps.

Define working expectations

Organisations need to clearly establish the boundaries of the arrangement. This includes:

• Would the tech professional be expected to attend an office location on occasion?
• What their core hours are and if there is any flexibility with those hours?
• What equipment would be provided by the business?
• What level of communication is expected and who will be their line manager?

By making the answers to these questions clear, businesses can ensure that the remote working arrangement is well understood, which will help minimise issues later on.

Train leaders to manage distributed teams

One of the key reasons why remote working fails is poor management. Managing a remote workforce requires a different skill set to an in-person arrangement.

Organisations need to ensure that leaders are trained on:

• Remote communication
• Building team engagement
• Running virtual meetings
• Supporting employee wellbeing remotely
• Delivering constructive feedback remotely

Managers who are confident leading remote tech teams are more likely to retain employees and maintain productivity across multiple locations.

Assess remote working skills

Technical expertise alone does not mean the professionals will be able to work remotely effectively. Employees working remotely often need stronger communication, organisation, and collaboration skills than those based in an office environment.

Distributed workforce recruitment processes should assess skills such as:

• Self-motivation
• Written and verbal communication
• Time management
• Collaboration
• Problem-solving
• Accountability
• Adaptability

Behavioural interview questions and scenario-based assessments can provide valuable insight into how candidates perform in remote working environments.

Should businesses work with multi-location recruitment specialists?

In order to undertake a national hiring campaign effectively, organisations should prioritise engaging multi-location recruitment agencies. Such recuitment agencies have extensive experience with recruiting IT professionals across the UK and can help businesses using regional insights and national expertise.

Agencies that are actively recruiting across multiple locations can help businesses:

• Understand where the talent they need is based
• Support workforce planning strategies
• Be informed on local market insights, such as compensation benchmarks

Working with recruitent agencies like VIQU IT that have national expertise and reach ensures that national hiring strategies can be developed, implemented and nurtured effectively.

Need help establishing your multi-location recruitment strategy?

VIQU IT are specialist technology recruiters who have extensive experience hiring talent across the UK and supporting multi-site hiring campaigns. Find out more about our UK IT recruitment services or get in touch with our team today.