Our leadership team
Elizabeth Pringle
CEO
Elizabeth “fell into” recruitment way back in 2007 when she had a role a Business Development Manager for Kaplan Financial – a financial training company that then began starting to find students roles within their client base to ensure that the students funded studied continued. From here she decided to run away and run pubs across the country, which is where her passion for food and wine really kicked off! This is often seen as he “Gap years”.
After much fun in places like Exeter, London, Hampshire, Manchester and even Slough – it was time to get back to the “real” world. Elizabeth joined Hays where she began her more formal recruitment career. Being in her 20’s and a typical egotistical senior recruiter – Elizabeth thought she could do better by herself. Enter Steven Pendergast – Bluestones Group CEO and founder.
Luckily, Ste had already decided to invest in a healthcare recruitment brand as his first investment following his own success within his own start-up. Fast forward 8 years and Bluestones Medical was reaching heights of £17Million turnover per annum and one of the UK’s most recognised providers to the NHS and private sector.
Having loved every minute of this journey, Elizabeth thought it was time for the next challenge and following an agreeable exit from Bluestones Medical, moved to Spain. Unfortunately, COVID put a stop to any real career advancements during this period, but once the dust had settled Steve Pendergast and Elizabeth once again joined forces. Elizabeth began searching for acquisitions and start-ups for the Bluestones Group, plus supporting a proportion of the Bluestones portfolio from a mentor position.
Here, Elizabeth, and the group, realised that there is currently a whole market within recruitment that needs help and support to start their own recruitment businesses and support existing business growth – but outside of their own portfolio. Over the groups 15 years history, all the portfolios back-office functions have been centralised, allowing MDs of the brands to focus on the front end of their business – where their skills really lie. This knowledge and experience was/is vital to the success of our portfolio and now by allowing external access to this – Elizabeth hopes to inspire and support other recruitment entrepreneurs to outsource and encourage more start-ups, more scale, productivity, and cost efficiency across the UK recruitment sector!
Julie O'Leary
Partnership Development Manager
Julie never planned to work in recruitment—like most of us, it wasn’t the dream growing up. She was thinking more along the lines of ballerina, princess, or chef! While she can cook, and she might hit the dancefloor after a few beers, princess probably isn’t the right title.
Her early career was spent in retail, working in visual merchandising for well-known department stores and independents—designing displays and managing in-store aesthetics. After taking time out to raise a family, Julie returned to work and, like many, found herself in sales roles. That path eventually led her into recruitment in 2002, joining a national agency as a rookie recruiter.
Fast forward to 2025, and Julie’s built a career she’s proud of. She’s worked with some incredible recruitment businesses—and a few that weren’t so great (but hey, you have to kiss a few frogs). She’s moved through the ranks: from consultant to branch manager, and eventually to Associate Director. She’s even done a stint in internal recruitment (haven’t we all?). In 2013, Julie had a short time with the Bluestones Group—and while it wasn’t the right moment then, the connection stayed.
Over the years, she kept in touch with Steven Pendergast, CEO and founder of Bluestones Group. A conversation that started casually turned into something more over the course of 12 months: an idea for a new kind of partnership. Something that would harness the power of Bluestones Group’s 15-year history, infrastructure, and support services to build something meaningful in the industry. With the experience and vision of Elizabeth Pringle—who had already successfully launched her own businesses through the group—Bluestones Support Partners was created. And for Julie, it’s the perfect blend of everything she knows and loves about recruitment, but with a fresh perspective.
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