01
Donna Maplesden
Operational Designer & Commercial Lead
Decades inside construction, trades and labour recruitment. Leads every deployment with a full operational audit: every workflow documented, agreed and signed off before any build begins.
Business Operating System
BOS
Recruitment Management System
Built by recruiters. Engineered by AI.
The complete workforce operating platform for construction, trades and labour recruitment businesses.
Construction · Trades · Labour
Donna Maplesden · Jacob Stray
Technology Partner
coldlava.ai
01The Problem
The Reality of Construction Recruitment Today
Construction and trades recruitment is, by nature, reactive. Resourcers juggle candidates on whiteboards and paper. Compliance documents live everywhere and nowhere. Worker details end up in consultants' phones rather than the database - and growth ends up limited by administration, not by market opportunity.
01
Inbound calls answered by reception - written on notepads, not always entered into the database
02
Candidate databases permanently out of date - availability unknown, documents expired, workers who have moved on still showing as active
03
Multi-text job offers broadcast to operatives, then phones ring off the hook as everyone calls back at once
04
Compliance gaps that surface once an operative is already on site - and terms of business unsigned, or scattered across files, Dropboxes and inboxes
05
Resourcers spending most of their day chasing documents rather than filling roles
06
Client relationships managed in individual consultants' heads, and commission discovered at month end - too late to change behaviour
07
References requested manually - referee contact details rarely captured as sales leads
“There is no shortage of opportunity. There is a shortage of operational control.”
02The Platform
What BOS Is
BOS is not a CRM, an ATS or a compliance tool. It is one AI-powered system that runs the entire workforce lifecycle - from client order, through candidate onboarding, placement and finishers, back to available again.
Meet Gemma
Gemma is the BOS candidate-facing AI agent - not a chatbot. She runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week on WhatsApp and Telegram, in 11 languages, handling every inbound candidate enquiry automatically: qualification, document requests, job offer responses, availability updates. She manages the relationship from first contact to placement confirmation without a consultant, resourcer or receptionist involved - and hands over to a human the moment a query is beyond her scope.
And One for Your Team
Gemma faces your candidates. Hunter, a second AI assistant, faces your team: ask him in plain English - “who is available in Sheffield this week for groundwork”, “which CSCS cards expire in the next 30 days” - and it answers from live BOS data.
G
Gemma
online · 24/7
A real conversation from the live system - tap the link Gemma sends
EnquiryRegisteredDocuments verifiedGraded & liveMatchedFirst day on site
The conversation you just watched is the front end of that whole journey - every step that used to be a phone call, a notepad or an email chain now runs automatically.
03The Platform
What BOS Replaces
Your CRM
Full client hierarchy from company to hiring manager, with sales pipeline, call logging and credit limit enforcement.
Your ATS
AI candidate attraction, 24/7 qualification via Gemma, digital onboarding and intelligent matching.
Your compliance system
Verification, expiry monitoring, automated chasing and hard gates at allocation. No placement without compliance.
Your resource board
A live availables list, AI recommendations and first-accept-wins WhatsApp offers. Phones stop ringing.
Your e-signature process
Terms of business, contracts and induction forms - signed digitally, filed automatically.
Your reporting
A live dashboard: fill rates, P&L, compliance risk, commission and KPIs, refreshed in real time.
Your timesheet process
Weekly timesheets auto-generated and emailed per site - no manual work required.
Your Monday morning calls
Gemma confirms every worker is on site. Anyone missing: the resourcer knows immediately.
Your Friday check-ins
Gemma confirms who is needed back next week. Anyone not: the resourcer can sell them elsewhere before the weekend.
BOS does not add tools to your stack. It replaces the stack.
04The Proof
Proven in Production
BOS is not a concept or prototype. It is a live, operational system running in a high-volume, multi-site labour-intensive business - signed off and in active use. Every capability in this pitch exists in production today.
Live
Operational system, not a prototype
Multi-Site
High-volume, labour-intensive business
100%
Of capabilities shown here are in production today
You are not buying a promise. You are buying a system that already works.
05The Workflow
How It Works: Every Reference Is a Sales Lead
Gemma AIBOS AutomatedHuman ActionCompliance GateOutcome
- 01BOS Automated
Reference Requested at Registration
Auto-sent to the previous employer during registration - always before any placement
- 02Compliance Gate
Reference Received & Verified
Worker quality confirmed and rated on the profile
- 03BOS Automated
Referee Captured as a Contact
Site manager name, role, company and email stored automatically - and checked against the client database
- 04BOS Automated
Sales Intro Auto-Sent
Not already a client? A branded intro with rates and consultant contact goes out automatically
- 05BOS Automated
Lead Created in CRM
New prospect tagged to consultant territory, every communication logged to the site profile
- 06Human Action
Consultant Follows Up
The prospect lands on the consultant's weekly call list; onboarding, credit limit and e-signed terms follow
- 07Outcome
New Client Active in BOS
Supply begins; performance tracked; client record live from day one
Every reference is a potential new client - BOS turns a routine compliance step into a continuous business development pipeline, at zero marginal cost.
The Four-Hour Rule
When a Reference Cannot Be Secured, the Placement Does Not Stall
If a previous employer is unresponsive, the site manager is told in advance and gets the first four hours on site to assess the worker. Not satisfied? The worker leaves, is not paid for those hours, the client is not charged - and a replacement is sourced immediately at no additional cost. Gemma messages the site manager at the four-hour mark automatically.
A compliance edge case, turned into a client promise.
06Resourcing
The Engine Room: Matching, Offers and the Availables List
BOS does not just store candidates. It continuously evaluates them, surfaces the right person for every role, and turns spare capacity into revenue.
Filling Roles Without the Phone Round
- AI recommendations ranked on skill, compliance, travel distance, availability and performance
- First-accept-wins WhatsApp job offers; the rest auto-declined once filled. Phones stop ringing.
- Workers who text “I’m available” via Gemma go straight to the top of the list as their contract ends
- Reallocation first: workers finishing placements surfaced before the open database, and the database before advertising spend
The Availables List Sells for You
- Every morning: every available worker, with trade, grade, location and compliance status
- A compliant, graded scaffolder sitting available in Sheffield is a sales call waiting to happen
- Auto-generated campaigns advise selected clients of available labour - targeted by client, trade or location
- Problem workers cannot quietly reappear at another client: flags follow the worker, with Active, Caution and Do Not Rehire statuses
Your database stops being a filing cabinet and becomes a sales floor.
07Commercial Control
Commission, Margin and the Dashboard - Live
The simplest motivational tool in BOS: every consultant watches their commission build in real time, placement by placement. They do not find out at month end - they know at 10am what they have earned so far today.
What Your Consultants See
- Live commission tracker, updated on every confirmed placement - today, this week, this month
- Margin per placement displayed: charge rate minus pay rate, by engagement type
- Placing at a higher rate visibly raises their own earnings - a natural incentive to protect margin
What You See
- The dashboard: who is where, live P&L, compliance risk, pipeline pace and actions required
- Margin floor enforced at allocation - no placement below minimum margin without director authorisation
- Branch and director views: every consultant's margin, revenue and commission liability in real time
- Weekly summary reports generated and distributed without manual effort
Commission visibility changes consultant behaviour on the day it matters - not at month end.
08Compliance
Compliance Is a Hard Gate
Compliance is not a bolt-on in BOS. The system physically prevents placement if a candidate's documents are not in order - no workaround, no override without a director-level authorisation trail. And no client is supplied without signed terms.
The Gate
- Right to Work is a hard gate - no placement without verified RTW, and a human always performs the government portal check
- AI extraction and verification of passports, RTW documents and CSCS cards - colour, grade and expiry checked automatically
- Terms of business e-signed before any worker goes to site - enforced, not chased
- Non-compliant candidates cannot be allocated, regardless of urgency
The Chase, Automated
- Document expiry alerts at 60, 30, 14, 7 and 0 days - across the full database
- Automated chasing via WhatsApp: candidates upload through a branded, single-use secure link
- Agency Workers Regulations flags at weeks 10, 11 and 12 of every placement
- Full audit trail of every compliance action - who, what, when. GDPR compliant, UK data residency.
No placement without compliance. Not as a policy - as a physical property of the system.
09Who Built It
Built by People Who Know Recruitment
BOS was not designed by software engineers who studied recruitment. It was designed by a recruitment professional who spent decades inside the industry - the workflows were solved manually first, then engineered into a system that never forgets, never gets tired and never scribbles on a notepad.
02
Jacob Stray
AI Strategy & Architecture Lead, Cold Lava
The intelligence architect behind BOS. Translates operational reality into AI system design, and presents alongside Donna at every client engagement.
03
Oliver Tatler
Technical Lead & Build Architect, Cold Lava
Takes the briefs Donna and Jacob produce and builds the system that brings them to life, supported by Cold Lava's wider team of engineers and AI specialists.
Working With Us
Two Ways to Deploy. One Way to Start.
01
Licensed SaaS Platform
BOS is configured for your business and delivered as your own system. Your branding. Your data. Monthly licence fee based on headcount or active workers. Includes onboarding, training and ongoing support.
02
Managed Service
We run BOS on your behalf - configuration, ongoing management, updates and technical support included. For businesses that want the operational benefit without managing a platform. Monthly retainer model.
The best way to understand BOS is to see it running. We do not do slide-deck demos - every question is answered with a working demonstration, not a promise.
- 01A discovery conversation about your operation: systems, headcount, volume and where the pressure sits
- 02A live demonstration - then a proposal configured to your business within five working days
- 03A full operational audit, onboarding and data migration included in both models
The conversation starts with your operation, not a product pitch.
Want every capability documented in full? Read the complete pitch