From fragmented acquisitions to a coherent dual-brand strategy

During the pandemic, the business moved quickly to acquire a number of health and care recruitment organisations, many of which had entered administration or were under significant financial pressure. These acquisitions played a critical role in maintaining workforce supply during an unprecedented period, supporting health and care services when demand was high and capacity was fragile.

However, while the organisations continued to operate effectively through that period, the work of integration had never been fully completed. Each business retained its own brand, identity and operating assumptions. While those brands were well known and trusted in their own right, the lack of consolidation created increasing complexity — for clients, for candidates, and for the teams working across them.

The challenge I was given was to complete what the acquisitions had started: to bring clarity and coherence to a fragmented brand landscape, while respecting the legacy, trust and contribution of each business. This needed to be done in a way that supported future growth, reduced internal complexity, and reflected the reality of a single, integrated organisation — without disrupting ongoing service delivery in a vital sector.

I treated this as an integration and leadership challenge, not a branding exercise. The priority was to bring clarity to a fragmented landscape — understanding how the acquired businesses operated, where trust already existed, and how brand, legal entity and operational frameworks needed to align to support future growth.

Rather than forcing a single identity across very different audiences, I developed a dual-brand strategy that reflected how the organisation actually worked: a clear client-facing workforce solutions proposition alongside a distinct candidate-facing staffing brand, both anchored within the wider group brand. This simplified the external picture while respecting the legacy and credibility of the individual businesses.

To support this properly, I restructured the marketing function, secured increased investment, and moved the organisation from multiple siloed marketing budgets to a single, consolidated budget. This reduced inefficiency, improved decision-making, and removed barriers that would have made embedding the new brands significantly harder.

Alongside the brand strategy, I led the development of a new combined website with integrated job board functionality, oversaw internal communications and engagement, and directed the phased replacement of all legacy brand assets over a six-month period. Brand changes were deliberately aligned with legal entity updates where required, ensuring operational and governance frameworks reinforced — rather than undermined — the new structure.

• A fragmented acquisition history was resolved. Multiple legacy brands were retired and replaced with a clear dual-brand structure, revealing the true size and breadth of the business to the market for the first time.

• The proposition became intelligible and differentiated. Clients and candidates could clearly understand the difference between the staffing agency and the master vendor / managed service provider — removing long-standing confusion and creating a credible point of distinction.

• Growth opportunities were unlocked. Capabilities that had previously been hidden behind individual brand names became visible, enabling cross-discipline growth (for example, medical, nursing and social work) that hadn’t been possible before.

• Internal barriers were broken down. Teams that had continued to operate along legacy brand lines were able to work as one business, reducing friction, improving collaboration, and enabling more effective use of shared resources.

• Operational confusion was removed. Brand and legal alignment eliminated unnecessary complexity — including duplicated systems and multiple inboxes — reducing risk and improving day-to-day effectiveness.

• The structure proved durable. The dual-brand model remains in place and has since been used to integrate further acquisitions quickly and consistently, embedding clarity and confidence in a challenging market where agency spend is under sustained pressure.