Businesses encouraged to tap into Northumbria’s talent pool of overseas graduates

Recruiting international graduates is not always easy for small businesses, but they can plug crucial skills’ gaps and support the regional economy, according to Northumbria alumni and entrepreneur Mark Renney.

As founder and Managing Director of tech and software company Wubbleyou, Mark has been building his business since 2009. The Newcastle based company specialises in building scalable software for clients, helping businesses develop more quickly through leveraging technology.

Accelerated growth in the past five years has created recruitment opportunities for Wubbleyou, and recently Mark has hired two international graduates from Northumbria to add to the company’s skills base.

Nigerian Vincent Onyeabor has joined as an Associate IT Analyst, and Divya Behera from India is an Associate Project Manager. Both Vincent and Divya are being sponsored by Wubbleyou through the Skilled Worker Visa programme.

On the standard Graduate Visa programme, international graduates can currently work in the UK for up to two years after graduation. Businesses can extend this period of employment up to five years by sponsoring foreign nationals through the Skilled Worker Visa programme, once they have been granted a licence by the Home Office.

Mark says obtaining the licence can be challenging and costly, but he insists the payback for Wubbleyou has been significant and he believes many other small businesses and SMEs in the North East could benefit in the same way by opening new recruitment potential.

Mark explained: “Demand for top IT talent can be extremely high, especially given the growing ambitions and growing number of innovative and scaling tech businesses in the area.

“As a small but growing business we wanted to have the ability to invest in this top talent and be able offer employment to skilled international graduates beyond the standard short-term Graduate Work Visa. So we took the plunge and went through the process required to sponsor foreign nationals on the longer term Skilled Worker Visa Sponsorship.”

Wubbleyou is one of only an estimated 300 small businesses in the region to have completed this process, a small number Mark believes is due largely to the cost and administrative time it puts on employers.

He added: “International graduates are smart and motivated, they offer diversity and new ways of thinking and in my view, they have already demonstrated a high level of initiative and commitment by travelling halfway around the world to study.”

By Matthew Neville – Senior Correspondent, Bdaily

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