This year, Paramount Recruitment celebrates its 14th year in business. Since the doors first opened in 2003, the specialist recruitment agency has experienced its fair share of successes and challenges, but has always overcome the obstacles to grow year after year. Here, founder Eugene McDaid shares his top four tips for getting – and staying – successful in your chosen field.

• Opportunity knocks

Whether it’s an idea for a business or the job of your dreams, opportunities don’t always come along when we are expecting them. Sometimes an opportunity will present itself and you just have to go for it; you never know where it might take you. As Richard Branson says, “I’d rather look back on life and say ‘I can’t believe I did that’ than ‘I wish I’d done that’.” Its natural to be afraid of stepping out of your comfort zone and trying something new but if you do your research, you’ll soon get the measure of whether an opportunity is going to work for you.

• When the going gets tough, remain calm and reflect

Throughout your career there will be set backs, from bad days at the office to missed jobs and promotions to restructures and redundancies. These are all part and parcel of your working life, it’s how you deal with them and what you learn from them that will determine how successful you will be in the future.

• Be prepared to adapt

In the face of change, the ability to adapt is a very powerful tool for future success. Having the ability to adapt is incredibly important in any situation, and putting yourself in situations where you have to think on your feet early on in your career can pay dividends later on.

• Innovate

Without the drive to improve and innovate, the door is left open for someone to come along and do what you do – only better. So even when things are going well, see if there are areas where you can improve and do things better, faster, more efficiently. If you need some inspiration, you can always look to other industries and see what ideas they use that you could adapt to your work.

• Don’t fear failure

The more senior your position, the more responsibility you are given, which can be scary when important decisions need to be made that have a major impact on the business. You will get better at making decisions over time, as your knowledge and experience increases but in the meantime our best advice is that if you believe it is the right call to make, then make it. The biggest rewards rarely come without risk.

Whether you are an individual or a business, getting to the top of your game takes determination, commitment and even a leap of faith – and staying there can be even harder. If you are a business looking to get ahead with some great new talent, or a candidate looking for the next position to help you climb a little higher, why not get in touch with us to see how we can help.