Rachel Bedgood talks about building a business in a changing world

Hosted by Lauren Roberts, today’s podcast welcomes Rachel Bedgood, founder of CBS, trusted screening experts who help organisations stay compliant and reduce risks through screening processes.

Rachel joins Lauren to share with PR Not BS listeners the ins and outs of running a background screening business and shines a light on this, often presumed boring, industry.

Lauren kicks off her chat with Rachel by asking her about the journey to become a business owner and the story behind how background screening came into her life.

“It was luck more than judgement,” said Rachel. “My partner said at the time that it’s a myth that working for someone else provides job security.”

Rachel shares how her business came from her paying £50 a week for a little office in her village in the South Wales Valleys, to becoming a successful UK and international business in Mountain Ash.

Listeners will get to hear from Rachel about the range of businesses she works with and how the appetite for background screening has expanded over the past two decades CBS has been operating. She guides Lauren through the details of how and why businesses across the UK are raving about CBS’s services.

Rachel shares how the background screening landscape has changed since she started and how her business has taken on challenges and changes with gusto. From the slower and paper-based systems of the 2000s to the faster and digital world of now. Rachel discusses the pivotal role of technology in her business.

Rachel also delves into the emotional complexities her business encounters on a daily basis and how there is a lot of shame, hiding, and embarrassment around background screening checks. She speaks about her experience of working with people to reduce stigma and provide support when it comes to sensitive information.

Rachel discusses the importance of her staff and how the impact her industry has on people’s lives is never lost on her or her employees.

“There are people behind our service who really care,” she said. “In our DBS department, there are people who know that the faster they process a document, a foster carer will be able to take a child into their home.”

Rachel dives into what 2026 is going to look like for CBS and reflects on the employment expansions in the past year and the upcoming months, commenting: “Oh, we’re very ambitious!”

She also chats about her ethos of ‘giving back’ and the charitable focus of her staff and herself by sharing the details of her charity events and the impact it has on her outlook as a business owner and the people in her local area.

“Businesses that are doing well should be giving back!”

As always with PR Not BS, Lauren asks the important question of why visibility is important to Rachel and CBS.

“Our industry is so white collar and lots don’t want to talk about it,” she said. “They err on the side of caution as if it’s a subject that shouldn’t be discussed in a promotional context.”

“We want to talk about CBS. One, because we think we’re brilliant and our customer service is brilliant and two because we love what we do and our teams are brilliant.”

Tune in now to get all the details of Rachel’s professional journey and see the reality of building a background checks company, not the BS!

To contact Rachel Bedgood at CBS, visit: https://cbscreening.co.uk/

To get in touch with Lauren and the Scott Media team, visit www.scottmedia.uk

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