Key Strategies for Successful Tech Recruitment

Leverage social media for tech talent scouting

Social media platforms are not just for socializing; they’re goldmines for tech talent scouting. Platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, and even GitHub can be invaluable for recruiters looking to connect with potential candidates. By engaging with tech communities online, sharing insightful content, and participating in relevant conversations, recruiters can build relationships with passive candidates who might not be actively looking for new opportunities but are open to the right offer. Tailoring your approach to each platform maximizes visibility among tech professionals and positions your company as a desirable place to work.

Implement a referral program

A well-structured referral program can significantly amplify your tech recruitment efforts. Since your current employees understand the company culture and the job’s technical requirements, they can help identify and attract candidates who are a good fit. Offering incentives for successful referrals not only encourages participation but also speeds up the hiring process by tapping into the networks of your workforce. Moreover, candidates referred by current employees tend to have higher retention rates, making this strategy both efficient and cost-effective.

Highlight company culture and career growth opportunities

Tech professionals often prioritize a potential employer’s culture and values and clear paths for career advancement. When crafting job postings or communicating with candidates, emphasize your company’s culture, mission, and vision. Share stories of employee success, innovation, and how tech teams contribute to the company’s goals. Demonstrating a commitment to professional development and outlining potential career paths can attract ambitious candidates looking for a place where they can grow and succeed.

Utilize data-driven recruitment strategies

Incorporating data analytics into your recruitment strategy can greatly enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of your tech hiring process. Analyze data from past recruitment cycles to identify the best sources of high-quality candidates, understand the characteristics of successful hires, and refine your interview process. Tools that help track applicants and measure the performance of your recruitment channels can inform more strategic decisions, allowing you to allocate resources to the most productive avenues and significantly improve your overall hiring success.

Additional Resources

• RedStream Technology
• Tech Terms You Need to Know as an IT Recruiter
• The Challenges of IT Recruiting and How to Overcome Them
• The Best Interview Questions to Ask IT Candidates

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Tips on How to Build an Effective Team

Cultivate clear communication channels

In today’s digital landscape, having clear and open lines of communication is vital. Utilize project management tools and platforms that allow for real-time updates and feedback, ensuring that every team member is on the same page, regardless of their physical location.

Leverage collaboration technologies

Take advantage of the plethora of digital collaboration tools available to enhance teamwork. These tools can range from shared documents and spreadsheets to sophisticated software that supports brainstorming sessions and project tracking, fostering a collaborative environment that can function seamlessly online.

Encourage continuous learning and adaptation

With the constant evolution of digital tools and practices, encourage your team to engage in continuous learning. Provide access to online courses, webinars, and workshops to stay updated with the latest digital trends and technologies, enhancing the team’s overall effectiveness.

Foster a strong virtual team culture

Building an effective team in the digital realm also means creating a strong team culture that transcends physical boundaries. Organize virtual team-building activities, celebrate milestones, and recognize achievements to build camaraderie and maintain high morale among remote team members.

Additional Resources

• Teaming
• Leadership Hiring Techniques to Build a Stronger Management Team
• Tips for Building a High-Performing Remote Team
• How to Improve Collaboration in The Workplace

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

High-Volume Recruiting Strategies

• Create a Clear Hiring Plan: Develop a comprehensive hiring plan that outlines the roles, skills, and number of hires needed.
• Utilize Recruitment Marketing: Invest in recruitment marketing to build a strong employer brand. Use social media, job boards, and targeted advertising to reach a wider audience.
• Leverage Employee Referrals: Encourage current employees to refer suitable candidates. Employee referral programs can be highly effective in high-volume hiring.
• Implement an Applicant Tracking System: An ATS streamlines the application process, helps manage candidate pipelines, and organizes applicant data for easy access.
• Pre-screening and Filtering: Use pre-screening questions or assessments to filter out unqualified candidates early in the process, saving time and resources.
• Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO): Consider partnering with RPO providers who specialize in high-volume hiring to handle certain aspects of the recruitment process.
• Continuous Talent Pools: Build and maintain a database of potential candidates for future openings, reducing the need to start from scratch each time you have a vacancy.
• Use AI and Automation: Implement artificial intelligence and automation tools for tasks like resume screening, scheduling interviews, and sending follow-up emails.
• Use Temporary Staffing Agencies: Partner with staffing agencies to provide contract workers during peak hiring periods.
• Analytics and Metrics: Use data to track the effectiveness of your high-volume recruitment efforts. Adjust your strategies based on performance metrics.

Additional Resources

• Mass Recruitment: The Complete Guide
• How to Accelerate Your Recruitment Process
• AI Recruiting Techniques

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Tips for Improving Your High Candidate Drop-Off Rate:

• Streamline the Application Process: Ensure the application process is straightforward and user-friendly. Lengthy or complicated applications can deter potential candidates.
• Communicate Clearly and Consistently: Keep candidates informed about their status and next steps in the process. Regular communication can keep candidates engaged and reduce uncertainty.
• Optimize the Interview Process: Schedule interviews promptly and be respectful of candidates’ time. Consider reducing the number of interview rounds if possible.
• Feedback and Follow-Up: Provide timely feedback after interviews. A constructive feedback loop can leave a positive impression and encourage future applications even if a candidate is not selected.
• Enhance the Employer Brand: Showcase your company culture and values in your job postings and on your career site. A strong employer brand can attract and retain candidates.
• Use Data to Identify Issues: Analyze your recruitment data to understand when candidates drop off. This can help you pinpoint specific issues to address.
• Leverage Technology: Use recruitment software to automate and streamline parts of the hiring process. This can improve efficiency and candidate experience.

Additional resources

• Candidate Experience Best Practices
• Candidate Journey Map: What It Is & How to Create One
• The Importance of Candidate Engagement
• Hiring Hacks to Accelerate Your Recruitment Process

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Top Tips for How to Speed Up Your Hiring Process

• Refine Your Job Descriptions: Craft precise and concise job descriptions to attract the right candidates.
• Tech Integration: Leverage technology like ATS for efficient candidate sourcing and tracking.
• Internal Process Streamlining: Ensure smooth internal communication and decision-making to expedite hiring.
• Economic Adaptability: Recognize the impact of economic trends on hiring speed and adjust strategies accordingly.
• Effective Interviewer Training: Train interviewers to assess candidates objectively and effectively.
• Employee Referral Program: Implement robust employee referral programs for quality hires and quicker placements.
• Transparent Candidate Communication: Communicate the hiring process clearly to reduce candidate ghosting.
• Third-Party Recruiter Consideration: Carefully assess third-party recruiters for compatibility and efficiency.
• Quality Focus: Prioritize finding the right fit over a rush to fill positions for long-term success.

Additional Resources

• How to Leverage Recruiting Metrics to Improve Your Hiring Process
• How to Involve Employees in the Hiring Process
• Hiring Hacks to Accelerate Your Recruitment Process
• How to Improve Your Time to Hire

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Effective Passive Recruiting Techniques

1. Employer Branding: Showcase your company’s culture, values, and employee experiences online to attract passive candidates.
2. Employee Referrals: Motivate current employees to recommend potential candidates.
3. Social Media Presence: Engage on professional platforms like LinkedIn to catch passive candidates’ attention.
4. Networking: Expand your network at industry events to build relationships with potential candidates.
5. Talent Communities: Engage with potential candidates through newsletters, webinars, or forums to keep them interested.
6. Content Marketing: Produce industry-related content to position your company as a thought leader.
7. Job Boards and Platforms: Post job openings on these platforms, as passive job seekers may browse them.

Additional Resources

• Attracting Passive Candidates: Ways to Secure Top Talent
• Innovative Sourcing Techniques for Recruiters
• How to Create an Employee Referral Program
• Steps for Building a Successful Employer Branding Strategy

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Steps for Successful Succession Planning

1. Initiate Early and Maintain Continuity: Kick-off succession planning well in advance, ensuring it’s an ongoing practice. Circulate employee expertise to prevent hasty decisions when the time presses.
2. Mirror Organizational Culture: Choose future leaders who exemplify your company’s culture. Align talent nurturing and advancement with these core values.
3. Anticipate Role Openings: Spot and sequence roles that may soon open up, like impending retirements, and strategize for their eventual filling.
4. Plan for the Unexpected: Succession planning turns unforeseen exits into smooth transitions. Pinpoint backup successors to step in without missing a beat.
5. Validate Your Plan: Test drive your succession picks by entrusting them with leadership roles in temporary absences.
6. Merge Succession with Recruitment: Weave succession planning into your hiring processes. Prepare for the gaps left by those moving up internally.
7. Involve Staff Aspirations: Include staff in discussions about their professional aspirations, promoting horizontal as well as vertical growth.
8. Recruit With Professional Guidance: Bring in staffing professionals to navigate and refine your approach to succession planning.

Additional Resources

• Steps to Strategic Succession Planning
• Strategic Workforce Planning: What it is & Key Steps
• The Future of Recruiting: Predictions for the Next Decade

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Tips for Hiring for Soft Skills

• Clear Job Descriptions: Begin with a detailed job description emphasizing the technical and soft skills required for the role.
• Behavioral Interviewing: Utilize behavioral interview questions that require candidates to share real-life examples of demonstrating specific soft skills.
• Group Assessments: Conduct group activities during the interview process to evaluate a candidate’s teamwork and collaboration skills.
• Role Playing: Engage candidates in role-playing scenarios to observe their problem-solving, adaptability, and communication abilities.
• Feedback Loop: Seek feedback from all interviewers to comprehensively understand a candidate’s soft skills.
• Reference Checks: When speaking with references, ask pointed questions about the candidate’s interpersonal skills and teamwork capabilities.
• Structured Interviews: Ensure consistency by having a structured interview format that evaluates soft skills across all candidates.
• Use of Technology: Employ AI-driven tools and platforms that analyze a candidate’s responses or body language to gauge soft skills.
• Continuous Improvement: Regularly update and refine your hiring processes based on feedback and changing company needs.

Additional Resources

• The Best Behavioral Interview Questions to Ask Candidates
• How to Assess Soft Skills in an Interview
• Emotional Intelligence Interview Questions to Ask Candidates
• The Ultimate Guide to Interview Scoring Sheets

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Tips for Informing Candidates of Interview Decisions

Maintain clear and timely communication

Clear and timely communication is paramount when informing candidates of interview decisions. It’s respectful to let applicants know your decision as soon as possible, whether it’s positive or negative. This approach enhances the candidate’s experience and reflects positively on your company’s reputation. If there is a delay in the decision-making process, keep candidates updated to manage their expectations and reduce anxiety.

Deliver the news with empathy

When informing candidates of a negative decision, it’s essential to do so with empathy and understanding. Rejection can be disappointing, so be kind and appreciative of their time and effort. Personalizing your message can go a long way in softening the blow and leaving the candidate with a positive impression of your company, even if they weren’t selected for the position.

Provide constructive feedback

Offering constructive feedback is a considerate gesture that can help candidates understand why they were not selected. However, feedback should be delivered thoughtfully and constructively, focusing on strengths and areas for improvement. This approach supports the candidate’s professional development and reinforces your company’s commitment to growth and learning.

Encourage future applications

Even if candidates are not the right fit for the current position, they might be suitable for future opportunities. Encouraging them to apply for relevant vacancies in the future keeps the door open for potential collaboration. This positive note ensures that candidates feel valued and considered, fostering goodwill and possibly leading to future engagements with talented individuals.

Additional resources

• How to Give Interview Feedback (Positive or Negative)
• Costly Hiring Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
• The Secrets to Successful Interviewing
• The Do’s and Don’ts of Communicating with Candidates

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Interview Training 101: How to Effectively Interview a Candidate

• Understand the Role: Familiarize yourself with the job description to tailor your questions accordingly.
• Prepare in Advance: Review the candidate’s resume, portfolio, and any other relevant materials.
• Structure the Interview: Begin with easier questions to put the candidate at ease, then transition to more job-specific or challenging ones.
• Use Open-Ended Questions: Favor questions that encourage detailed responses over simple yes/no answers.
• Listen Actively: Give candidates your full attention, make eye contact, nod, and avoid interrupting.
• Avoid Biased Questions: Steer clear of questions that could be discriminatory or irrelevant to the job.
• Evaluate Soft Skills: Look for qualities like adaptability, communication, teamwork, and problem-solving.
• Assess Cultural Fit: Ensure the candidate aligns with the company’s values without compromising diversity.
• Seek Feedback: After the process, ask candidates for input on the interview experience to identify areas for improvement.
• Reflect and Evaluate: Post-interview, review your notes and assess the candidate against a consistent set of criteria.
• Communicate the Outcome: Whether or not the candidate is successful, inform them of the decision promptly and respectfully.

Additional resources

• Interview Formats to Use When Hiring
• Top Interview Red Flags to Watch Out For
• Interview Scoring Sheets
• How to Assess Soft Skills in an Interview
• How to Give Interview Feedback

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Tips for Embracing Digital Hiring

• Digital presence: Having a strong online presence is essential in the digital age. A user-friendly website gives potential candidates a great first impression of the company. At the same time, active profiles on major social networks can help engage a wider audience, foster community, and showcase the organization’s culture and values.
• Leverage social media: Platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter aren’t just for socializing; they’re tools for job postings, showcasing company events, and even for headhunting. They also allow for interactive engagements with potential hires.
• Engage in SEO: By optimizing job listings for search engines, you can reach candidates who are actively searching for specific roles or industries. This means using relevant keywords, meta descriptions, and quality content in your postings.
• Use data analytics: Digital platforms provide rich data. By analyzing metrics from recruitment campaigns, companies can identify successful strategies, areas of improvement, and insights into candidate behaviors.
• Engage with AI: AI tools can automate repetitive tasks like resume screening, answer frequently asked questions from candidates, and even predict which candidates might be the best fit for a role based on data analysis.

Additional Resources

• What is Recruitment Marketing and Why it Matters
• Digital Recruiting Trends to Be Aware of
• Everything You Need to Know About AI Recruiting Techniques
• How to Set Achievable Staff Growth Goals

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

Tips for Making a Good Candidate Experience

• Clear Communication: Keep candidates informed at every step, from the acknowledgment of their application to updates about the next steps.
• Simplified Application Process: Ensure your application form is user-friendly and concise. Avoid repetitive or irrelevant questions.
• Transparent Job Descriptions: Provide comprehensive details about roles, expectations, and company culture to set clear initial expectations.
• Prompt Responses: Aim to respond to applications and inquiries swiftly, even if it’s just an acknowledgment of receipt.
• Personalized Interactions: When possible, tailor your communication to acknowledge the individuality of each candidate.
• Respectful Treatment: Even if a candidate isn’t a fit, treat them courteously and respectfully throughout the process.
• Feedback Opportunities: Give candidates a chance to provide feedback on their experience and take their insights into account for future improvements.
• Structured Interviews: Plan interviews in a way that allows candidates to showcase their skills and get a feel for the company culture.
• Clear Timelines: Give candidates an estimated timeline for decisions and try to stick to it, or update them if there are delays.
• Constructive Feedback: If a candidate isn’t selected, offer constructive feedback when appropriate to help them in future applications.
• Use of Technology: Leverage modern HR technologies, like chatbots or AI interview schedulers, to make the process smoother for candidates.
• Company Values and Culture: Showcase your company’s values and culture so that candidates can assess their fit beyond the job role.

Additional Resources

• Candidate Experience Best Practices and Why You Should Follow Them
• Sample Candidate Experience Survey Questions
• How to Give Interview Feedback (Positive or Negative)
• The Dos and Don’ts of Communicating with Candidates
• How to Elevate Your Employer Brand to Recruit Top Candidates

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome: 0:03
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast, your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. I’m Pete Newsome, joined once again today by Ricky Baez. Ricky, how are you?

Ricky Baez: 0:13
Pete, I am energetic and excited. I can tell I love it. I had coffee, like four cups, so I am. Yeah, I’m going to crash this afternoon, all right.

Pete Newsome: 0:22
But we get the benefit of what it’s doing for you in the meantime. So we’ll take it and then let your wife and son worry about how you are.

Ricky Baez: 0:30
That’s right.

Pete Newsome: 0:31
That’s their problem later on. Exactly, exactly. But in the meantime we’re going to focus on what makes a good candidate experience, or I dare say, a great candidate experience. That’s something you know a little bit about, right.

Ricky Baez: 0:45
That is something that’s near and dear to my heart and I’m very passionate about. I’m trying to contain my excitement with the amount of caffeine I have right now. Don’t, don’t hold back, let it fly, got it? I love this topic because we get to bog down. We as an organization, we get to bog down at finding the candidate, putting the processes in place and not enough time, and focusing and giving them that great candidate experience. So I think that is a small arm of branding that is an important piece of organization really need to pay attention to.

Pete Newsome: 1:19
Well, we know that for every candidate who’s hired, it’s going to be a lot of candidates that aren’t, so that is as important a part of this as anything else. So let’s just let’s just talk about what a candidate experience is. How would you define it?

Ricky Baez: 1:35
How would I define a candidate experience? Well, I mean, I hate to use the word to define it, but it is what you know, what is. It’s what the candidate goes through. That gives the candidate Maybe the employer doesn’t realize that gives the candidate the same type of information that you, as an employer, get from the candidate in the interview process. That that first step, that first step in building that foundation with that candidate, is crucial, because if you don’t build it right, that candidate may make up their mind about jumping ship to come to you before you even thinking about making an offer to them.

Pete Newsome: 2:14
Well, I think I think you’re correct, right that every interaction you have matters, and to me, the candidate experience is defined in the eyes of the candidate, right? It is their perception of how those interactions go. And so the main thing for me with all of this is you have to be conscious of that going in, you have to commit to being conscious of it, and if you are and you do that, then odds are it’s going to be a great experience. If you’re not, well, probably the opposite.

So that’s to me why it’s so important, because if you’re not thinking about it, it’s easy to quickly forget about the candidates who aren’t at the top of your list, and that’s a common complaint about recruiters. We all know that that they’re not as communicative as candidates would like, they’re not responsive, and it’s always the candidates who aren’t at the top of the list, right, it’s easy to like the most attractive candidate in the room, right, we know that that’s who gets the attention, but that’s not how your reputation is going to be built. That is not what’s going to leave a great, lasting impression. So you’ve got to think about all of this in advance.

Ricky Baez: 3:36
And Pete, here’s how I look at it. If you are an organization, in your interview in five candidates for one position, five for one. At the end of that process, here’s what you’re going to you no longer have five candidates, you have one employee and four marketing campaigns. That’s right, that’s what you have, and you got to make sure your marketing campaigns has the right tools to tell the story to other people you want them to know about your organization. Do not skip on the people who don’t get the job. They’re going to talk about you.

Pete Newsome: 4:08
Or you have four glass door reviews you don’t want.

Ricky Baez: 4:10
Exactly.

Pete Newsome: 4:12
Which is which is which is real. We know that happens and when it comes to those those kind of reviews or conversations that people will have, it’s never the ones in the middle, right, it’s the ones that have the best experiences or the worst. Those are what your, your marketing is going to be really good or really bad. No one’s ever reviews. Yeah, it does review and say it was okay, it was just as I expected.

Yeah, it’s not filled with a lot of marginal reviews. Right, it’s fives or ones for the most part, which is it’s human nature. So, but we can control it, right, that’s the good news. Um, like, like so many things in life, you can control what you pay attention to. So let’s start at the top. What are the things that make a good candidate experience? Let’s list them out, or do you want to clear?

Ricky Baez: 5:04
Communication from the very, very beginning. Pete, to me, recruiting and onboarding go hand in hand, and I just did an onboarding class a couple of weeks ago and the first question I asked is when does onboarding start? And people say, oh, with the offer letter. Is what they accept? No, it starts as soon as they apply for the job. And as soon as they apply for the job, you got to start telling your story clear and frequent communication of what the candidate is going to respect. The more they know about your interview process, the less likely they’re going to ghost you, because they know what to expect. Right, and there’s a little attachment to it. If they see you as just a number, is easy to drop that number off and go to the next interview.

Pete Newsome: 5:46
That’s exactly right and you know. Start with your leverage your website, put the information out there for the candidates and you mentioned in the interview process. Make it clear, set a tone and an expectation being in staffing. We ask all the time. We encounter every type of process that exists, from one phone interview, you know, in an offer, to multiple interviews and panels, and very complex, drawn out processes.

We like the former better than the latter, for the record, everyone does, but the most important thing is to know, and if we don’t know, then we can’t prepare the candidate for it. So that is something that staffing companies learn very quickly, but I don’t know that organizations always think about that, and even though they should, you have to prepare the candidate from all the way to the finish line, right, and so then there’s no need to apologize, there’s no confusion, and so that setting the tone right from the start is huge.

Ricky Baez: 6:57
There’s the best way to put it. When you get into your car, you go in somewhere you don’t know, you go to your GPS, you put it, you punch the information of the GPS and you follow it. You have to be the candidate’s GPS and let them know what they’re going to expect. One interview, two interviews, three interviews Pete, I once went through five interviews. It was annoying, it wasted my time and I would have been upset if I didn’t get that job. But I know three other candidates went through five interviews and they didn’t get the job Right.

Pete Newsome: 7:26
Right. Those are the ones who do get upset, right, it’s, no one likes to go to an interview and not have an offer. We know that. But odds are, it’s going to happen to everyone throughout their career, probably multiple times. That’s the deal. But the sooner you can let a candidate know that they’re not in consideration, the better. So try to avoid those long interview processes. Every situation is different. That’s a topic for a different podcast and probably one that we should do to talk about that in detail. But let’s just keep this concise and say the shorter your interview process, the better the candidate experience is going to be. Right, that’s. I don’t think anyone would dispute that. But we know that organizations don’t think about that as much as they should.

Ricky Baez: 8:13
They don’t. Because I guess the old mentality is you should just be happy that you’re interviewing. I mean, yes, that’s true, but right now, don’t give people the illusion that they have options. Make your process so valuable. They don’t look anywhere else. So, yes, let’s keep it concise, because, although you don’t want your time wasted, that street has a two-way street they don’t want their time wasted as well, especially the top caliber people. The top caliber people are not going to have the patience for a loose process. Why? Because they know they have an option to go somewhere else. Way better that the process is tightened up. Yeah, so it’s also how concise, how well oiled your process is is going to attract the type of candidate you want to employ.

Pete Newsome: 9:02
Absolutely. And look, you build relationships through this process and the goal is to build ones that leave a good, lasting impregnation, as you said earlier, not just for the marketing aspect of it. But you may want to hire your second choice at some point, your third choice, if your first option doesn’t accept. I was just playing pickleball last night, if you can believe that. My newfound hobby, pickleballs, your newfound hobby, yeah, and one of the guys I was playing with happened to just make an offer to a candidate today or yesterday and said that the candidate asked for 60 days before they could start.

And it was such an interesting conversation because I thought, wow, boy, that’s a great way to have things fall apart at the end. So they’ve been through all of this and now the candidate springs this. So I’ll tell you there’s an expectation that the candidates need to be consistent with delivering that information up front. But you want to build these reputations or these relationships as you go. So no one’s surprised, right? I mean, that is that’s something.

Ricky Baez: 10:09
I’m surprised right now Somebody asked for two months.

Pete Newsome: 10:13
Two months before I can start and we know that time kills deals. But as you’re building these relationships, you want to understand the candidate’s personal situation and motivations and drivers. That’s a huge part of it. So you’re on the same page, because we really want it to be a everyone needs to be happy at the end with the good, and that’s the goal.

Ricky Baez: 10:40
So Well, I was going to say can I calibrate on something? Because I want to make sure the audience understands what we’re seeing right For the people who are out there listening from a candidate’s perspective. The reason we’re saying that? Because, pete, they’re probably thinking that’s not unreasonable. I want time to make sure that I’m making the right choice. From an employer’s perspective, that’s 60 days without a position there where they’re losing money.

So if you’re thinking about this from a candidate perspective, thinking that’s not unreasonable, it is kind of unreasonable because we as an organization we are losing money for every minute that position is not there making money. And to ask for eight weeks of time, that’s just eight weeks of unproductivity that the organization is just may not tolerate. I’m sorry I don’t have any organization that’ll say yes to that.

Pete Newsome: 11:30
Well, I won’t. I won’t name names, but this organization wasn’t having it. I’ll say Got it so but. But. But there’s expectations and I’ll I’ll say, obligations on both sides of this. So if you go into the interview as a candidate, I think you should assume Now I’m going to, I’m going to change that you should don’t try not to assume anything on either side. And in Once again, being in staffing, we know what questions need to be asked, because our goal is to make a match and a connection that is going to last. Every staffing company should operate that way, so we know the pitfalls, and time of the thing stretching out is one of those.

So of course, we encourage our clients to shorten their interview process and be concise with it, but the main thing is again to know same thing with the candidates Do you have vacations planned? Are there any reasons that you won’t be available for the foreseeable future or through that interview process? Because if we’ve already done our job on the front end, we know how long it’s going to take, we know what the plan is, we match that with the candidate and sometimes often in fact you could have the best candidate on the market potentially.

But if they’re not aligned with the availability for interviews and the timing, it’s not going to work. So the more you know up front, the better. I could talk all day about that because it’s such a critical part of the recruiting process, but for this purpose, be concise, communicate it and get everyone on the same page, Alright so now for improving the candidate experience in the recruitment process.

Ricky Baez: 13:10
Pete, have you ever read a job description that was like eight pages long?

Pete Newsome: 13:17
No, because nobody would.

Ricky Baez: 13:21
Well, I read it because I’m like what about this? I’m still looking for something to say wow, this was worth it. Folks, if you really want, if you really want to attract people, please do not copy and paste a job description in the ad. Don’t do it, because what you’re doing there is think about it. If you’re going down an Isle of Public, app at a public, so you want to buy macaroni and cheese, but you see the box of macaroni and cheese, all you have is listed as ingredients Some of the words you’re not going to understand, right, you’re not going to buy it.

But if you see the picture of a nice bowl of creamy gold and mac and cheese, you’re going to buy that. Right, the ingredients. It’s your job description. The picture is your ad that you put out there. You’ve got to make that ad enticing and you got to make that ad something that compels the candidate to apply, tell a story behind it and make the process easy. Pete, I cannot tell you, when I was interviewing back in the day, how many times I was asked to submit a resume and then I had to turn back around, spend 40 minutes filling all the information over again. Right, I stopped. I’m like I’m not going to put up with this and go somewhere else.

Pete Newsome: 14:31
Yeah you have to put up with that at your doctor’s office. You don’t have to put up with that as a candidate. I like that.

Ricky Baez: 14:40
You’re not giving me a colonoscopy today. I just want an interview. I’m not going to put this in there Exactly.

Pete Newsome: 14:47
So, yeah, simplify it. There’s just because software systems and applicant tracking systems now that exist and all these tools, just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should Got that right. And so, if you’re thinking about the candidates experience and put yourself in their shoes, I mean that’s the easiest way to do it. What would you want to go through? Would you want to be, you know, accountable for filling out all that information more than once?

No, of course not. No one likes that. We all know what it feels like to have entered 10 things on a phone and then have the rep pick up live and ask you for the same information, right when you call your bank or a good one, right? Yeah, it’s the worst right. So don’t do that with candidates. Make it easy for them, make it easy to apply, communicate early and often in the process, and give them your attention along the way.

So that’s the next thing that I think we should talk about, because Candidates are going to decide whether to take a job not just based on compensation or what the work is or the title. They’re going to decide based on how they feel about the opportunity, and if they don’t feel that they’re important, they’re not going to move forward, and so you have to give them your attention and focus throughout this process and let them know that they’re valuable Folks.

Ricky Baez: 16:13
This is I hate to put it this way. This is a relationship you go and eat harmony I’m not even going to say Tinder, but you go and eat harmony and all these other places. Right, we’re planning a fish where you want to find that, that, that spouse, that significant other. You’ve got to do your best to communicate with them. Let them know why this is a good idea, right? So same thing here. If you, as an organization, are not constantly communicating with the candidates, somebody else will.

And when somebody else will, then they leave. And then you’re wondering why they didn’t finish the process? Because of lack of communication, lack of engagement, and the more engaged a candidate is in the process, the more likely they’re going to see it through the end. Absolutely, that’s a fact.

Pete Newsome: 16:58
Yeah, and, like you said, it’s earlier, it’s a. You never know when the candidates going to come back to you. It’s a round world. So if they’re not your choice, tell them as soon as you know. People don’t like delivering bad news. It’s human nature. We all know that no one likes to. I I. There’s nothing worse for me in in as a staffing professional than having to terminate a candidate who doesn’t deserve it.

Right and and for budget changes or organizational shifts, whatever it might be. It’s an inherent part of the job. We all know that’s what we signed up for. I’ve been doing this for a long time and guess what? It never gets easier. Never, it never gets easier. You have to do it. But it’s awful. But do it because the sooner you do it, the better it is for everyone. You’ll feel better as an individual who had to make that call, but you’ll leave the right impression. Bad news early is good news, absolutely it always is from you.

Ricky Baez: 17:53
I got that from you.

Pete Newsome: 17:54
I use that every day, no one else. It was smarter.

Ricky Baez: 17:57
Early is good news. It’s, it’s true, because the more you leave them hanging folks, the more different ideas go in their head and the ideas are going to be negative. Remember, they’re going to talk about you over dinner. How they talk about you, it’s exactly up to you and how you create this experience.

Pete Newsome: 18:12
And yeah, and I’ll go even once up further If you’re going to keep, if you’re going to tell them you’ll keep them in mind for future openings. Actually keep them in mind for future openings. Have a system for that. Make sure you do it. But don’t say it if you don’t mean it. It’s okay, right, people need. It’s the information they need to hear, even though it’s what they don’t want to hear. We’re not a good fit for the this organization. If you’re never going to be, tell someone why. Right, do them a favor, help them improve.

There are things that happen in an interview that will prevent a candidate from ever getting hired by an organization, or at least while those individuals are still there. I mean I we don’t need to go into specific examples right now, but it happens, right, people don’t always perform well in an interview. It’s okay, good, thank you, wonderful. If you don’t want to be left wondering. If you don’t have to either, and because if you don’t know why you burned any chance of ever being successful with that company, you can’t improve for the next one.

Now, that’s tough. It is not for everyone to do and not every situation is appropriate to do it in. But, where possible, give candidates feedback, do it as quickly as you can if they’re not going to be your selection, and then move on, because as the interviewer you may end up somewhere else one day. You may be in it. It is a round world. I could give lots of examples.

Ricky Baez: 19:43
I’m glad you’re not saying flat, I’m okay. As long as you’re not saying flat, I’m okay. There are people, but you know what? But let me say this above I got an above and beyond for that, because one of the things I like to do with my clients when I’m helping them out with this is look, give them feedback, but send them some kind of a consolation price right Flowers, edible arrangements, something. Put that in your budget.

Think about what that does to the psyche of the person who didn’t get the job. Think about how motivated that person is gonna be for the next opportunity they get, because they’re gonna tell everybody look at how they treated me and I didn’t get the job. Could you imagine if I got it? What story does that say about you? So think about that. And before people say that costs a lot of money marketing dollars, papa, that’s all. It is right Not shut up to marketing dollars, because you want as many people out there who didn’t get the job to talk as positive as possible about the experience.

Pete Newsome: 20:39
Well, and yeah, you know you’re serious when your Puerto Rican comes out, Rick, yeah that’s right how we know, but Because I busted out the papa, that’s right, but we do have to acknowledge it, that’s not always practically.

Ricky Baez: 20:51
Can’t send everyone flowers as much as you’d like.

Pete Newsome: 20:54
But you can send them a survey, you can ask for their input, you can ask for their feedback, and I know you’re a big fan of surveys, so why don’t you talk about that for a second?

Ricky Baez: 21:03
No, yes, but send them a survey. But never send the survey blind, right? Because if you send the survey without talking it up, you’re gonna get a lot of negative responses because the people are still reeling from the fact they didn’t get the job right. But if you call them and something I wanted to add, Pete, as soon as you give them a call, because, remember, the person doesn’t know they didn’t get the job. So when they get that call from you, right, Saying hey, they’re gonna think, oh my God, I got it. Communicate early in the conversation.

Hey, we selected somebody else. And here’s an important part the decision has already been made. I would like to give you some feedback. But, folks, if you don’t say the decision has already been made, the candidate is gonna start thinking about wait, I missed this, I missed that. I still have a shot. They don’t. This is not to negotiate. This is just solely to give you feedback and ask them first. If they say, yeah, go for it, Then send that survey. You will get more accurate responses if you prime that survey with that conversation.

Pete Newsome: 22:04
Yeah, ask them for their opinion and you can see it directly or you can see it on Glassdoor later.

Ricky Baez: 22:15
I like that right. Either you see it by your own hand or you’ll see what everybody else sees without your hand involved.

Pete Newsome: 22:21
And we do see it publicly on job boards and you see it, people who have a bad experience want to vent. They want to be heard and I expect and believe that in many cases, if they had an opportunity to vent directly to an organization, they would take that versus being public with it, especially if the organization cared enough to take that feedback to heart and do something about it. Now I know as a staff and company owner that there are times that our candidates have a lesson, ideal interaction with one of our recruiters.

Just the law of numbers dictate that, right. Yeah, that’s true. We put as many protections in place and training and our process to avoid that at all costs, right, but we’re talking thousands of candidates a month that we interact with. So perception is reality. So whether they should have a bad impression or not is irrelevant, but we know that happens and every once in a while I’ll get a message from someone and I genuinely appreciate it. Now we get lots of. We get a lot more positive reviews significantly than we do negative ones, thank goodness, right, but I value the negative ones just as much. If someone comes to us and says I don’t appreciate the way this happened, I didn’t like this Now, maybe something that we had no control over with our clients. But guess what I still want to know, because I take that feedback to our clients and that’s usually how it happens.

Again, thank goodness it’s not a complaint with us. I didn’t get feedback. I was waiting, I had to wait too long and because in almost every case I’ll tell you, what people have an issue with is when no one is communicating with them. That’s right. It’s never feedback like recruiter A was rude to me or disingenuous or whatever it might be. It’s always I didn’t hear. I was left hanging. And if you look at the complaint on recruiters as a whole, that’s it right. They don’t get back to me. So if you go in the opposite direction and you approach a candidate who wasn’t selected and said, not only am I getting back to you, but I want to know what we could have done better on your behalf, they’re going to appreciate it in a way that will set you apart from everyone else. I like that.

Ricky Baez: 24:56
I like that. That’s a great way to prime it. I wasn’t even thinking about that right. Even have that communication, then say, hey, you’re gonna get a survey, right? Please let me know how we could have served you better. I’m going to start doing that, pete. I’m going to steal that from you. Well, it’s, it’s You’re doing that.

Pete Newsome: 25:15
You’re not going to get it if you don’t ask for it. That’s what I mean. You might, but you’ll you do. I don’t know of an organization who wouldn’t want to improve, and I don’t know of an organization, whether it’s Apple or or Amazon, the most successful organizations out there I have I have. I’m sure that they still would like to improve and get better.

Ricky Baez: 25:40
Absolutely.

Pete Newsome: 25:40
So no one ever sits back and says we’re good enough. So if you want the feedback and you’ll actually use it ask for it, use a survey. We’ll put some. We could go through a list of questions here. I’d rather just put them in the show notes, and so we’ll. We’ll do that, and so hit the link. That will, that will add, and you can see that some questions there will recommend what you should put in your survey. So, ricky, let’s, let’s, let’s, let’s not Belabor this too much. But what else do you have, anything else for wrap up that you think could build a positive candidate experience? What would you? What?

Ricky Baez: 26:17
would you want to. At the end of the day, it’s what I want. I’m not going to give any little tiny. I’m just going to give an idea Right At the end of the day. Put yourself in the mindset. Put yourself in the mindset on what your ideal candidate would want, what your ideal candidate would expect. Forget the idea of people should be happy that they’re interviewing. That doesn’t exist anymore. People have options and if you want to attract your top tier candidates, you have to build the process in a way that attracts a top tier candidate and what they would or would not support. So all I’m saying is put your mind in the person you’re trying to attract and build the process surrounding that. That’s never, ever going to steer you wrong. Just do your own.

Pete Newsome: 27:01
Absolutely. There’s two things that I want to add before we wrap. One is to if you, if you’re, in a high volume situation. So there’s different kinds of recruiting. There’s the high level recruiting, where you need to find one candidate who’s very in a very niche role, so you’re not going to be speaking and interacting with with too many people in that situation. But then there’s the opposite, where you may hire for a class of 20 plus people in a training where your candidate pool could be massive and you may have thousands of candidates.

So take advantage of technology if you need to. I mean, that is a big change from from when I started in the dark ages, ricky, where we didn’t have automated tools, but now they’re. They’re prevalent, they’re not overly expensive. So if you were in high volume recruiting, take advantage of that, because, look it’s, I get it because I live it. You can’t hold everyone’s hand the way you want to.

You can’t have personal interactions with thousands of candidates if you have a small recruiting team. It’s not realistic. So shame on you if you don’t take advantage of technology to reach out directly, because, as we’ve, I think, established very well, at this point the worst thing you can do is not communicate and so give, give people that. And then the last thing I want to say is measure yourself, hold yourself accountable, make sure that you leverage technology and tools for that as well. Are you, have you responded to everyone? How quickly are you responding to everyone? Those are things that you should. You should measure and then manage to it, and and not cut any corns.

Ricky Baez: 28:46
That’s right, you said it best. I think if people, if people start the process like that, they’re going to have a great, great pool of candidates to choose from and great marketing campaigns.

Pete Newsome: 29:00
Can’t forget that piece Absolutely there’s. There’s nothing better than a mouth yeah. Then then starting a new search and already knowing who your candidate pool is, who you can look to recruit because they’re candidates you interacted with in the past. And if, as a recruiter, I can tell you that there is absolutely nothing better than to say well, I’m going to fill this job quickly and easily because I already have candidates in mind from the last time.

And that is up to you and your actions. If you treat all of your candidates the right way, coming in, you’ll, you’ll be able to build that pipeline in that, in that, in that base to draw from the next time. And if you don’t, well, recruiting is going to be a constant uphill battle for you. You’re always starting from scratch because you haven’t built relationships along the way and everyone knows that no one. If I think of my candidate interactions over the years, as we say it already, most are not going to get hired, most applicants aren’t going to get hired. Most candidates you call and recruit and source aren’t going to get hired. But you can have a lot of good relationships at last if you just treat them the right way and plan for it, that’s right, it’s.

Ricky Baez: 30:15
And, by the way, for everybody listening eight and I’m sorry, pete, you don’t know this, I’m going to throw this out there HR Florida is coming up here in in Florida, for those of you listening, in Florida, it’s a huge HR conference at the end of August. I’m speaking there and I’m going to speak about this, this very thing how to revamp your candidate experience to attract the best and the brightest in the future and keep them in the future. Right, perfect. This is what we’re talking about right now. That’s perfect.

Pete Newsome: 30:45
We’re going to end that session Watch, all right, good, we will, we’ll put. Ricky can get us that info and we’ll put it in the show notes as well for that too, so everyone can come out to HR Florida.

Ricky Baez: 30:53
Roger, that Awesome. Thank you Appreciate that, Pete Well that’s it for today.

Pete Newsome: 30:56
Thank you for joining us. Drive safe, have a great weekend and we’ll talk soon.

Ricky Baez: 31:03
Candidate experience. Folks have a good one, all right, okay.

How Staffing Agencies Work

• Client Needs Analysis: Staffing agencies first identify their clients’ hiring needs by understanding the skills, experience, and qualifications required for the job vacancies.
• Candidate Sourcing: They use various sourcing techniques to find potential candidates. These include job postings, networking, headhunting, and searching through their existing candidate databases.
• Screening Process: Staffing agencies screen candidates through resume reviews, interviews, and sometimes skill assessments to ensure they are a good match for the client’s needs.
• Candidate Shortlisting: They present a shortlist of qualified candidates to the client company for consideration.
• Interview Arrangement: Agencies often coordinate interview schedules between the candidates and the client company.
• Job Offer and Negotiation: If the client company selects a candidate, the staffing agency may handle job offer negotiations on behalf of the client, discussing salary, benefits, and other employment terms.
• Onboarding Assistance: Once the candidate accepts the job offer, the staffing agency may also assist with the onboarding process, handling paperwork and administrative tasks.
• Ongoing Support: Staffing agencies typically maintain an ongoing relationship with both the client and the employee, providing support and assistance as needed.
• Payment Structure: Staffing agencies usually get paid by the client company, either a flat fee or a percentage of the hired candidate’s first-year salary.

Additional resources

• Staffing Services
• How to Choose the Right Recruiting Agency
• The Benefits of Working with a Staffing Agency
• The Truth Behind These Top Recruiting Myths
• Positive Returns from Investing in a Recruiting Agency
• Is Your Business Ready for Professional Staffing Services?

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome: 0:01
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast I’m Pete Newsome, I’m joined again by Ricky Baez and we are your source for all things hiring, staffing and recruiting. Ricky, how are you today?

Ricky Baez: 0:11
I am doing great, Pete, living the dream. My friend, living the dream, the dream, the dream. You are the dream. I don’t know, man, I can be pretty free to some people. Well, I didn’t say you were a good dream, just said you’re the dream, so that’s what we’ll go with.

Pete Newsome: 0:31
So, Ricky, today we’re going to talk about staffing agencies, and now I’m a staffing company owner, you’re an HR professional, so let me just get this out of the way. Why do you hate us?

Ricky Baez: 0:46
Whoa, you just kicking the door down there in the UBC. Look, I don’t hate you guys. I just I’ve had bad experiences and maybe I’m going to talk myself out of it because I hate you guys. I just I’ve had bad experiences and maybe I’m going to talk myself out of it because I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I hate you guys. I don’t know what you’re thinking right now. I don’t know what you’re thinking right now. As far as I know, I’m the only person who thought of it, because I’m one of the first to say you should never treat a future relationship based on previous experiences right.

Pete Newsome: 1:30
I don’t think I know that a lot of HR professionals see us as the adversary instead of an ally, and that is a source of frustration to a lot of staffing professionals, and it’s a perspective that I’d like to try to change. I do try to change wherever I can. I think I’ve been successful a number of times throughout my career, but it’s still a prevalent thought and it’s one that I understand at some level, but I also completely reject that idea because we’re here to be an asset. We’re here to be a resource and an ally of HR, never the adversary.

Ricky Baez: 2:22
So is it HR that has an issue or, more specifically, corporate America recruiters that have an issue with?

Pete Newsome: 2:27
Staffing agencies. That’s right. Okay, so HR broadly right, depending on the size of the organization, talent acquisition professionals in particular, and not all this is. You know, I’m having fun with this. Of course, it’s a general statement, but there’s also a lot of truth to it as well.

Ricky Baez: 2:47
Yeah, there is there is, and again I’m here to say that there is not. I think it’s fair, because the person might be listening right now, that I explained the full story, because as soon as I said I’m like, oh man, she’s going to hate me. No, but look, I was overseeing the HR operation for a huge call center in the city north of Orlando, lake Mary Florida, and it’s a call center that’s in five miles radius of five of the call centers. So we needed to hire 200 people relatively quickly and we were having a hard time. I had a recruitment team.

We were having a hard time picking from the same well as four other businesses were Sure, but the staffing. we just came and made all these promises we have. You’re going to need help with the amount of people within the same year away. You’re onboarding, ready to get all this ready man. We pulled out all the stops, I think. I think we got maybe 30% of the people that we were promised and about 50% of them stayed for about half of the time. So it was a huge failure. And, oh, my boss, let me tell you, Pete, I’ll take my liquor man, my boss, and before I gave her an opportunity to come talk to me in my office, I went to her office. I’m like Lena here’s what I’ll say her name, because she and I get along great. I’m like I messed up. Here you go, here’s what happened. So, yeah, I had a big big, a big learning opportunity.

Pete Newsome: 4:18
There you go, that’s what I’m going to call it. So we know that. That not all. First of all, I will say to I’ve never made a promise other than if we work together long enough, things will go wrong. That’s the only promise I’ve ever made, because when people are your product, as as as they are for a staffing company, you don’t control a lot of things that happen, but you do control what comes out of your mouth, and so if you promise anything, you better be able to back it up. But I think today I’d like to spend time on what makes a staffing company valuable to an organization, because we serve a very important purpose as a supplement to what the internal team can do, as you just described, and we certainly don’t want adversarial relationships. We want to be seen as a partner Now that word gets overused, we know that.

But it really is a partnership when it’s done right, because the staffing company is an extension of the organization. We are representing our clients out in the market, and so if that’s not a partnership in the business world, I don’t know what is when we’re recruiting on behalf of another company. So let’s, let’s spend time on that today and just start with the basics of what a staffing agency really is. Now we go by a few different terms depending on who you are, sometimes organizations and times all these phrases are blended together.

Now I could do a whole show and I could talk for an hour about what differentiates a headhunter from a staffing company, from a recruiting firm from a temp agency. To me, these all have their own time and place to be used, but for this purpose, let’s just call staffing company an organization who works on behalf of a third party or on behalf of their client to recruit candidates for a need, be it direct employees or contract employees. So we’ll use we’ll just use it in that phrase, if that’s okay, perfect.

Ricky Baez: 6:29
I’ll give you the HR director’s definition, and it’s this, thank God, right, because the last thing I want to focus on is the five representative from engineering that just got to my desk and never told me about. The should have been filled five months ago and all these other things coming in. So now, seven years later, owning my own business now and dealing with clients, I see how this, this can be a lifesaver. It can be a lifesaver for small to medium sized businesses who just don’t have to ban it.

Pete Newsome: 7:01
That’s right, yeah, and there’s a number of reasons why we’re needed. One is exactly what you just said time Recruiting, when it’s done right, is it’s quite an effort and you may get lucky, which you can’t rely on. You may be Google, which you’re probably not in terms of having a line out the door. So even in a candidate’s or even an employer’s market where you can post and add and receive hundreds of applications we know that happens today. We talked about it the other day on our last podcast about resume reading. But that’s the problem. You receive so many applications. You can either ignore them, which doesn’t help fill your job. You try to look at all of them individually.

You don’t have time to do that not effectively. So the first thing I would say that a staffing company contributes in terms of value is saving time to those who don’t have it, because this is all we do All day. Every day, we recruit. The other thing that we do is provide expertise that you may not have, and if this engineering job that you mentioned, well, you’re going to have to get your arms around the criteria for it, understand what a qualified candidate really looks like in that space. Well, if you’re an HR professional and you wear a lot of different hats. It’s understandable that you wouldn’t have much depth of understanding of these individual roles and so you’re starting from scratch, and that’s a learning curve.

That can be a painful process. Right, and again, add time to the equation where, if you bring in a staffing company, this is what we do all day. Every day, we take new positions, we work to understand the criteria involved in the hiring process. We look to understand as best we can what a qualified candidate looks like, and then we go. Now the third thing I’ll say that it’s valuable that we contribute is the tools and resources. This is the world we’re in all day, every day. So, even if you’re a competent recruiter in an HR department, a corporate HR department, you still get pulled in lots of other directions. You go to corporate meetings.

You have to do all the good corporate citizen stuff, whatever. That is right. You know this world better than I do. Well, we have blinders on right. Our team in an organization like Four Corner Resources that is a staffing company. This is what we do, right? This is all we do. We don’t get involved in all the other HR stuff, right, that comes along not when things are going well, anyway, we don’t. So there’s a lot of efficiencies to be gained and the goal is to deliver as few resumes as possible, as few candidates as possible, as few interviews as possible, to get that higher. And that is what we do, because we screen candidates at a very deep level, only giving you the right one, hopefully as few as possible. Ideally, that is one in return and get to know that role.

Ricky Baez: 10:25
Now, from a staffing perspective, is it one company has different departments and who recruits for what? Or is it like a generalist style type of business model? I’m not that familiar with that.

Pete Newsome: 10:40
So every organization it works differently. There’s some very niche companies that may only work for one specific job title that is common out there. I’ll just use one that’s obvious to everyone, which is nursing. There are companies that do nothing but nursing. There’s companies that only do travel nursing in particular. There are companies that only do nurse and desktits, for example. Right, that can be its own specialty. You look in the IT space there are companies that do one specific kind of developer.

That’s all they’ll recruit for and that is their whole business built around that niche. So it depends. Usually companies I would say for the most part those that aren’t that specific tend to stay in a number of places, either like IT, for example, or finance or marketing. Or there’s blue collar recruiting firms that do day labor work or construction positions, that’s usually. Those don’t cross over. So there is a baseline of expertise that exists in that department or industry generally when you start recruiting, because the important thing from that is that you’re not starting from scratch.

You’re starting with the car already rolling down the road, so to speak, versus having to figure out how to get into first gear, which is where that efficiency comes from. So staff and companies usually have a large database that they’ve been in business for any length of time, I think. For us, we have close to a million resumes in our database right now, with notes on the candidates, with details of what their compensation looks like, what kind of job that they would leave the one that they’re in for, what their career goals and objectives are, what kind of commute they’re interested in, whether they want to work exclusively, remotely. So these are all the things beyond the resume that, when done right, the recruiter, the staff and company is already in tune with, and that’s why there’s such an advantage of speed when it comes to starting from scratch as a corporate recruiter.

Ricky Baez: 12:59
So I think I have the best way to describe that. So if I go to my kitchen right now, I got a leaky faucet, I’m not a plumber. Instead of wasting five hours on YouTube trying to figure it out, making five to six trips to Home Depot because I bought the wrong tool, I just sell out the money for an expert to come in and he or she knows exactly when needs to happen, does the job and leaves.

Pete Newsome: 13:24
Yes, that is well, we’ll take it Now. You mentioned something else that I want to touch on before we go too far by it, in terms of what the advantages are of working with a third party In this scenario. You described in your former life of having the staff, a call center where four others probably similar pay, similar schedule, similar work environment. You were competing against all of them Due to professional courtesy. Maybe now you could tell me I’m wrong in this, but generally speaking, you probably couldn’t aggressively pursue those employees who were working at those other places. You couldn’t call in there, you couldn’t go right to their doorstep, so to speak. But a staffing company can, because we are incited to aggressively recruit on behalf of our clients and we don’t have to apologize for that. We don’t have to consider those professional courtesies. So that’s often an advantage.

Ricky Baez: 14:24
Look, I’ll say this here we may or may not have been involved in guerrilla marketing and because we’ve heard through the great lines that there was a call center down the street who just not getting their employees right, and I may or may not have gone to Staples and bought some five by sevens and put them in 500 cars in the parking lot.Pete Newsome: 14:42

Well, good for you. If you did that, most won’t right. So that is like I said. It’s typically a value that the third party recruiting company can deliver, but not always. I used to be asked all the time when I was selling where do you get your candidates right, where do they come from? And my answer would be from everywhere. That isn’t a client today. That’s it. That is where my candidates come from. That’s a place. That’s a place Anywhere. That’s not my current client. That’s where we’re recruiting from right, because we are very proactive. What’s that?

Ricky Baez: 15:24
Isn’t that a wide net? Because didn’t you say now, okay, look, you know what. Let me ask this, let me ask about four corner resources.

Pete Newsome: 15:31
Okay, at 4 Corner Resources.

Ricky Baez: 15:34
It’s now. I know the recruiters very well, I know the managers very well, but primarily it’s IT staffing right and is there a niche for four-corner resources? Primarily that they staff for.

Pete Newsome: 15:49
I thought it was IT. Right, yeah, we do. We do a lot of IT. That’s what we were founded to do. But as our business has evolved, we’ve branched out into other areas. We do a lot of finance, we do a lot of marketing, we do a lot of call center, we do a lot of administrative, we do legal, we do HR so pretty much anything you would find in a corporate setting. That’s what we recruit for, but our core has always been IT.

Ricky Baez: 16:14
So now that said, this is something that I learned once I started working with you is I thought it was just staffing, but there’s a lot more to it from a staffing perspective, because they’re staffing, which means that you hire them, so you hire the employees under your contract, and then you put them to work over there, so they’re a contractor for your clients, but you take the payroll and tax burden for that employee.

Pete Newsome: 16:40
That’s right. So contract staffing, it works exactly that way where by any I was going to say technically, but it’s not really technical at all it is by any standard of measurement the employee, the contractor, is our, they’re our employee, they’re our W2 employee more often than not. So we take care of, we have all the responsibilities that any employer would when it comes to payroll, taxes and insurances and healthcare.

So any government mandate and requirement, we have that burden and responsibility. So that is the nature of the relationship between the contract employee working on the at the client side, or a lot of those are virtual now, of course, and so the way we make our, where our income comes from, is this in our profit is effectively the difference between what we pay the the contract employee, plus taxes and fees that we have to add on to that, of course, like any employer would, subtracted from the hourly rate that we bill our client, and you know that’s where our profit comes from. So we pay a labor rate and we have marked up bill rate and the difference again is how we earn a living.

Ricky Baez: 17:58
So Well, I was going to say that may sound a lot to some people, but that is the huge pro for the organization, right? Because if I have a, if I own a business I own an engineering business and I have a project that I need labor for, right, and I’m only going to use people for about six months, why not go to experts and say, look, I’ll pay you extra amount of money, I don’t have to worry about taxes, benefits, nothing, and if I don’t like how they work, I’ll just cancel a contract. Right, there’s no. No progressive discipline possibly would have to follow because they’re not an employee. So I know that sounds like it’s a lot of money changing hands, but to the size of the business owner, that’s the huge cost savings and huge headache that they don’t have to deal with.

Pete Newsome: 18:41
No, you’re at your 100% correct. There there’s a big convenience factor is probably the, the. Did you record that? Pete said I’m 100% correct.

Ricky Baez: 18:51
I need that amplified through everybody’s speakers in my zip code.

Pete Newsome: 18:57
Thank you, thank you, sorry, did we cover that? Are we good? Yes, sir, but but you are, you’re 100% correct. That convenience factor, we’ve got it. It’s on record. It is an unfortunate part of the scenario, but it is reality that not every employee who’s hired is going to work out. Not every duration that was expected on the front end is going to come to fruition that way. And no one likes to be fired. We know that no one likes to do the, do the terminating either. Well, you don’t have to. When you, when you’re an employer using a contract staffing company, you make the call to the third party, to the staffing company, the staffing company has to handle the terminations.

Ricky Baez: 19:48
So I have an amazing idea, pete. I think you and I should do a LinkedIn webinar right Talking it, but it’s not called the apprentice, it’s called the contractor, and when somebody, they’ll do all these different activities and if they come back to the table, you and I will review and instead of saying you’re fired, we’re going to say you’re canceled.

Pete Newsome: 20:11
You’re canceled, I don’t. I don’t know. I don’t know if I want to be associated with that word in particular right now, but or or I don’t know if I want, so you’re going to play the role of Donald Trump in that, because I don’t know that I want that. That was popular, that was. That was a popular thing 10 years ago. Right now, for something, Something tells me it wouldn’t be quite so popular. I don’t know. Maybe I’m wrong.

Ricky Baez: 20:36
Obviously I’m joking, but it’s. It is easier, though. It is easy for an organization to just say you know what I’m done, this is not working. And when I first started working with you, that wasn’t new to me, right? Because when I worked, when I worked in corporate America, you don’t just do that, you’ve got to go through a process, and that was a huge learning curve for me. I’m like, oh, that’s right, this is a contract, you can cancel it for whatever reason.

Pete Newsome: 21:03
I just wasn’t used to it. Those are those things where everyone knows the deal right and it doesn’t happen most of the time, Thank goodness. But in uncertain economic times like we’re in now, budgets get cut and those phone calls come. There’s been periods where I didn’t want to answer by phone because I knew any call that came was going to be bad news. I didn’t want and I’m referring to 2008, March timeframe when COVID hit, when contractors were getting cut left and right because employees, employees everywhere were getting cut, and so those are.

No matter how many times you do it, it’s a call that no one likes to make, but I have to say it is a pro of using a contract staffing company because you don’t have to deal with it. It is one less burden on you as an employer when it’s just a phone call away without any reason. Now we still like to give those reasons and, truth be told, as the staffing company in this, we lose out to. So the employee loses their source of income, we lose our source of income as well, and so believe me when I say we don’t make a habit of working with companies who would do that regularly. We would avoid them at all costs. We understand circumstances. What we don’t want to get involved with is an organization who doesn’t realize the true life impact of that kind of behavior.

Ricky Baez: 22:35
So that’s contract staffing. So how much, how big of a difference is contract to hire? Now I understand what it is right Contract to hire you start at a contract and then, if they like, you, they’ll keep you.

Pete Newsome: 22:46
Yeah, so there’s a couple of different ways to look at that. One is what I consider to be project based work, or seasonal work, where there is an end time that is hard and fast, or at least it’s known to everyone. When the project’s over, the work is finished, when the season ends whether it’s a holiday season, a summer season we used to do a lot of recruiting for a company that used to have to ramp up for hurricane season it doesn’t matter what the season ends is. When it ends, so does the work, and so a lot of contracts operate that way Now. Some could be very long, some could be years in duration, but there is no expectation that there will be a I hesitate to use the word permanent, because we know it’s not actually permanent but direct employment at the end of the contract period.

On the other hand, there is very often where, rather than hire the employee directly to the company’s payroll, they’ll Start that individual out as a contract employee through the staffing company again. Sometimes every every variation of this exists. Sometimes it is a hard and fast time frame, a Three to six or nine or twelve month contract, at which point that individual will be expected to convert to a direct employee. So in those scenarios the contract employee understands a deal going in and is expecting in those cases to have the opportunity to convert to be a permanent employee and the employer is expecting that individual to To come on their payroll after the contract period. So the reason to do that you, if in case you were going to ask is it’s, it’s it’s a great on ramp For a number of reasons.

It’s, you know, call it a try and buy period. That’s kind of a crude term but that’s used a lot. Or it’s an opportunity for the staffing company to be paid Incrementally rather than in a lump sum, which is what would then be considered a direct hire scenario where right off the bat, the the employee who selected is hired directly on to the employer’s payroll, never on the contract staffing companies payroll, and so the staffing company knows cases make their money With a lump sum fee. That’s often a big check to write. That’s when we get into these other terms of headhunting, for example, or retain searches. It’s a different world than then contract staffing, and so it’s. It’s it’s sort of a best of all worlds scenario at times for that contract to hire scenario to work and that that happens a lot too, where the situations do change, as we talked about a few minutes ago, and sometimes it’s open-ended, right.

Sometimes that’s con, what I call contract. It may be higher, right, like we don’t have headcount. We think we might at some point. We have the need. Right now we can hire as a contractor and let’s see what happens. Where, in those scenarios, there’s a lot. It’s a lot more uncertain, there’s no Hard and fast expectation on either side, and so what’s important in these scenarios is open communication, where what you don’t want is for the individual whose livelihood revolves around this. Forget the employer, forget the staffing company.

There’s a real person involved who needs to know the deal going in and make a decision accordingly. So if I’m recruiting you, ricky, and I say, hey, you’re gonna work a contract for six months, at which time you’ll be able to convert to a direct employee of our client, and we talk about the salary you would be converted at and everyone’s happy, well, you’re going to count on that right, and that’s going to weigh in to whether you accept the job or are interested in moving forward In with the opportunity. So you don’t want to say it. If you don’t mean it, obviously, the other scenario could be though.

Hey, Ricky, we think there’s an opportunity for you to convert to a direct employee. Their client has budget and can foresee work for the next six months. It’s kind of cloudy after that, and so, depending on your situation, that may still sound appealing to you, or it may be reason to to turn down the opportunity if you’re gainfully employed somewhere and that’s a risk you may not be willing to take. But, man, if there’s myriad situations and examples of that. And so I’ll say again, it really just comes down to being open on all sides and communicating accordingly, so nobody is surprised by how things work out.

Ricky Baez: 28:04

Thank you. That really does help right, Especially for everybody listening and for me now that I’ve got to work with you for a few years and I better understand the different tentacles that the octopus has.

Pete Newsome: 28:18
Well, I’ll touch on a couple of things since I mentioned, and then we’ll move quickly past, or we can stay here all night. I mentioned retained search, and so that is a service that a company like ours will offer for executive positions, so hard to niche, positions where you know going in. Everyone acknowledges that the candidate pool is small. Sometimes it’s an executive search that phrase gets blended in a lot too. So you can have a retained search that’s not executive right. You could have an executive search that’s not retained, but oftentimes it will go together. And the way a retained agreement works or a retained search is the employer pays a percentage of the fee upfront for the search to be initiated, and so if the recruiting firm is going to invest a lot of time in that effort more than normal, right, because the candidate pool is small then it makes sense that they would require some portion of the payment upfront.

Because what you run the risk of in the world of contract staffing, everything you do almost, is on a contingency basis, meaning I’m working for free, effectively as a staffing company, until I deliver a candidate, not just that you’ve hired, but they’ve walked in the door and they start working. So if you just run that out, there’s a lot of time that can be spent and there’s a the likelihood that you’re not even successful If your client doesn’t end up hiring your candidate. All that work has no income behind it. So a retained search is one where you ask for a portion of the payment upfront, and that’s been really prevalent more so in the last six months as it’s been a really tight candidate market.

You’ve seen that happen in for lower level jobs. There’s something that’s called recruitment process, outsourcing or RPO, where the organization effectively hands over the recruiting effort to the third party, where they take that on and they really truly act as an extension of their client, representing them in the market. And then the last thing I’ll mention is payrolling, and payrolling is effectively for various reasons at times where there’s a known individual who our client wants to hire but they don’t have the means of carrying that individual on their payroll. Maybe it has to do with benefits or compensation or whatever headcount issues they have internally where we as a third party can take on that person as an employee who then works on our client’s site. So a lot of different flexible options. I know that’s a lot at once, but I want to do at least put them out there, since we alluded to them earlier.

Ricky Baez: 31:14
So let’s say I own this huge corporation. I’ve got 400 employees, but I got 400 employees I need to recruit. I know that I’m about to get busy here in a bit. What are some of the things? How do I know I need a third party staff in the industry?

Pete Newsome: 31:33
Well, when you’re hiring, needs can’t be met right and there’s a lot of things that could lead to that it could be a spike, as I think you were just describing. I just picked up a big project that requires resources and talent that I don’t have. Do you have the means to fill those positions internally? If yes, great. You don’t need a staffing company. If no, well, you probably do, because if it means lost revenue or a decreased customer service or putting too much burden on your internal staff who’s already working for you, well, there’s a big downside to each of those things.

So, if you can’t keep up with your hiring needs, you need it sounds like a what’s the Jeff. If you might be a Redneck guy, you might need a staffing company if you can’t keep up with your hiring or project-based needs. Ricky, if you have a new project that’s coming online and you need technical talent to do it that you’re not going to need indefinitely, right, once the development effort’s done, you don’t need those people anymore. That would be a great reason to reach out. Or if you just don’t have the expertise right, there’s so many reasons why a position may stay open longer than the business would like for it to, and for any of those reasons, you should ask for help, because you’re losing money. If you don’t, odds are.

Ricky Baez: 33:05
That’s interesting. So now here you talk about it and just dice it down like that and dissect it the way you did. You’re selling time.

Pete Newsome: 33:14
Sure, that’s where you’re selling Time and expertise. Well, yeah, I mean expertise, which I mean could equal time, ultimately. Yeah, with time, somebody could become an expert, but they don’t have time for that. That’s such a great way to put it right Back to what we were talking about in terms of we’re in this mode all day, every day, and if you’re only going to put on this recruiting hat intermittently, you’re starting from scratch, and that is going to take a huge investment of time just to catch up. Right, and why would you want to expend that time? You wouldn’t so. And we haven’t even talked about the resources and tools at our disposal as a third party, because this is all our business.

Does we’re suited for that? I always use the oil change analogy in these scenarios. You could change your own oil, but you’re going to make a mess. You may not do it right, it’s going to take you longer. Is that worth the? I don’t know what is an oil change these days? Is it, I don’t know, like 40, 50 bucks? Gosh, I remember when they used to advertise $14.99 for Jiffy Lo, I guess. I guess I don’t. What’s the organic fuel that has means?

Yeah, well, I drive an electric car, so I don’t have to worry about that very much. But so times have changed. But yes, do you want to change your own oil right and get messy and take time and maybe do it wrong, or do you want to go to an expert who can do it very efficiently and so do you have to hand them the money to do it? Yes, but if you value, put a value on how your time would otherwise be spent, you probably would work out in a way where you shouldn’t try to do it yourself. Same thing with recruiting. That makes sense. That makes perfect sense. Wow, how do you find them?

Ricky Baez: 34:59
Though I mean because I know you got LinkedIn right and let’s say I’ve got that product and I know I don’t know if I say it right now, people are going to know I’m not going to look at the yellow pages. And for those of you who don’t know, years ago we used to get these big blocks of paper and book with little thin papers. And I know that you’re going to get a lot of money and I know that you’re going to get a lot of money, and I know that you’re going to get a lot of money and I know that you’re going to get a lot of money and I know that you’re going to get a lot of money and I know that you’re going to get a lot of money. No-transcript. So what are some of the things I need to look for to know this is a legit organization.

Pete Newsome: 35:38

Sure Well, ask for referrals that’s always a great thing to do of others who’ve used staffing companies before, had good experiences. Look at who is providing thought leadership in the space, who is out there publicly. Look go to companies’ websites, if you find them, and you can tell pretty quickly the quality of an organization based on their digital presence. So look at that. See who their candidates are, ask what kind of companies they work with today. Do they have testimonials on their site? Do they have the company logos on their site?

That’s a pretty big indication of how well a company is doing and a good indication of how well they could do for you. And then I always recommend going to clearlyratedcom. Clearly rated is a site that exists to rate staffing companies. They do some other things, but that’s one of their core objectives where it is independent. Are you looking it up right now? I can see that you’re looking it up, but clearly rated the way they work is. They allow candidates and employers who’ve worked with staffing companies to rate them independently. That’s probably as good as any of a source to go to to find out who’s good in your market, who’s good in your industry. You can slice and dice it that way. Or, if you’re listening to this, just use four corner resources. That’s probably the safest route to go.

If I’m being completely transparent, here’s what I’ll commit to anyone listening. If we’re not a good fit for you, we’ll give you guidance on who is. Because one of the things that we operate based on is we don’t take on any position we don’t intend to fill. That means we end up turning down a lot of business if it’s not a good fit. Because, if you think back to what I said earlier, most of the time we’re working on a contingency basis, so it does us no good to take on a role that’s not going to lead to revenue. That doesn’t help our reputation, it doesn’t help our expenses internally.

It’s not why we’re in business. I will also back that up by saying don’t call a staffing company unless you’re serious about using them and ready to hire. Because when we’re asked to fill a job, we spend a lot of time qualifying the prospect, the prospective client, to make sure that they’re committed and serious. Because once we say go, once they tell us to go, we’re heads down until we produce the candidate. That’s how we operate, because we intend to fill every position we take on. Just know that it becomes a very serious thing when you ask a staffing company for their time and effort, because that’s the only way they make money.

Ricky Baez: 38:43
So you said something that I drill into the heads of my students every semester. When we start talking about filling that business need, how to start a business, how to become an entrepreneur, I always tell them find, solve a problem, but don’t look to get a sale. Look to help your customer. If you look to help your customer, the sale will come organically. If you look to sell first, you are going to put some people off. You know who was good at that? Tony Shea. It’s the late Tony Shea, because he has since passed away. He was the CEO of Zappos.

Pete Newsome: 39:25
Oh, of course.

Ricky Baez: 39:26
Yeah, when he was at a conference back before Amazon bought Zappos, he was at a conference with other CEOs and he was telling his other CEOs how his company would help employees with whatever they were going back and forth. And one of the CEOs called it. Like if I call it 800 number right now and I ask for directions for pizza, they’re going to help me. Now, this was at a time before smartphones weren’t as good as they are right now to find something. So yeah, they’ll do that. So he called the 800 number and says, hey, I’m interested in some Nikes. To what size? So look, I’m in San Francisco. I don’t have access to a phone book. I’m looking for a piece of joint. Here’s my hotel. Can you help me? The guy helped him out.

Pete Newsome: 40:11
That’s great, come on.

Ricky Baez: 40:12
If you do that with any other organization, I’m like I’m not going to and then hang up yeah, you’re not focusing on your customer, but that shows if you’re there to help the customer, regardless of the sale, the right customer will pay more for your services than what you have to buy, than anywhere else because of how you view the customer.

Pete Newsome: 40:34
I love it. That is beautiful. That’s a great story. So, ricky, is from an HR standpoint, what do you think are some? What do we say, are some misconceptions? Is there anything that I’ve mentioned today that that has surprised you? Maybe not you in particular, because you’ve worked with us so closely, but other HR professionals may think we operate in a different way than we do. Or maybe I could ask what misconception did you have prior to working closely with us a couple of years ago when we first connected?

Ricky Baez: 41:10
So the first misconception I’m going to I said it earlier is from the recruiter’s perspective. Right, when the recruiter comes in, when a recruiter is, it’s working on something and help is brought in, from a leader’s perspective, you should have a conversation with that recruiter. That way he or she doesn’t feel like they’re being put to the side. So that’s one misconception is that they think that the current recruiter is not working with it. At the end of the day, it’s a tool, it’s a systems, and if you bring in a third party agency to help out with a class that you need to start in a couple of months, it allows you to recruit it to focus on other things. Again, you’re being bought time. So that’s to me that’s one of the biggest misconceptions formed from an HR leadership perspective. I don’t know if I had a misconception. I’m just being honest here. I just had a bad taste in my mouth from my previous experience.

Pete Newsome: 42:02
Okay.

Ricky Baez: 42:03
I know that’s not all of them right, but I’m not going to forget, because I learned a valuable lesson, Pete. I learned that if the offer is too good, right, too good to be true, then it probably is too good to be true and I should have asked more questions. I’m like where is this magical well of candidates that you have access to that I don’t Help me understand. So it’s, I think. Again, it’s not a misconception, it’s more of a learning opportunity of what questions to ask later on. And now I know working with you.

Pete Newsome: 42:35
I know exactly what that is. When you look back on that scenario where they didn’t produce do you have a? Where do they go wrong?

Ricky Baez: 42:43
I think they were so excited to get this contract that they started throwing anything to the wall. It was a lot.

Pete Newsome: 42:51
It was a lot. So were they sending bad candidates, or were they not sending candidates at all? Nothing, nothing. You said crickets earlier, so I guess yeah, crickets.

Ricky Baez: 43:02
Crickets I mean just a few showed up and I pulled out all the stops. I pulled out all the stops and I had egg on my face and I’m glad that happened, because now I know going forward, for what to ask and I’m not doing this contract, All right.

Pete Newsome: 43:18
So what would you ask differently In that scenario, knowing now, right, what you didn’t know? Then, if you went back with all the knowledge that you have, other than just saying hey, I know you’re not going to produce, what could you have said to vet them better?

Ricky Baez: 43:34
What I would have said is maybe we signed this contract a month ago and I need 50 resumes right now. Let me see them, Let me see them, Let me have my team take a look at them and if they’re more relevant to the role that we’re looking to hire for, then yes, you’ve got legit people right. But if you have a hard time producing a sample, you’re going to have a hard time doing the job.

Pete Newsome: 43:57
Yeah, no, I mean I guess in a scenario where an organization says I want you to help me fill this position or positions, right, doesn’t matter whether it’s one or 50. It’s all relative that no one else has been able to fill that I haven’t been able to fill. I’ve used this company and that company, I’ve exhausted my resources. Now I expect you to pull a needle out of a haystack? That’s not the business we’re in. I would tell you. I would say you have a problem that I may not be equipped to solve. So I would need to dig into that. And I would dig into that by saying, okay, tell me exactly what you’ve done.

Well, I posted it on Indeed. Okay, that I can note no surprise there, right, that you haven’t been able to fill the position. If it’s just been a matter of posting job ads, who else did you use as a? I already tried to use staffing companies. That’s a common one that we hear with companies coming to us for the first time. Depending on who they tell me they’ve used, I’ll make a determination on how good of an effort I think that has been applied. All staffing companies are created equally. So if they give me a reputable company or two and say they’ve done everything they can. I’ve done everything I can. Now I expect you to deliver. I’m out right Like that’s not.

Again, we’re not magicians. I would say you probably aren’t paying enough. You probably have a broken process. Your expectations aren’t in line with the market. I don’t know what’s wrong yet, but I know something’s wrong and I’m not here to spend my wheels trying to solve it. That’s not a reason to use a new staffing company. That’s a reason to check yourself and what you’re doing. So use us when you at the forefront of the scenario right. Use us when you’ve anticipated a problem, anticipate a limitation on being able to fill the positions that you have open with the right quality and the right time frame. Don’t come to us after you’ve exhausted all your options and expect us to clean up your mess. We’re not doing it.

Ricky Baez: 46:14
I just want to tell you, from any chart perspective, same thing. Hey, I need some help. I’m like, oh, so what happened? I don’t know. So we’re halfway through a lawsuit.

Pete Newsome: 46:24
Exactly. It’s too late for me, man. Yeah, exactly. Okay. So do we miss? Do we cover? I know we’ve covered a lot. We could probably drill down into any of these things individually. Any more questions that you think we may have missed?

Ricky Baez: 46:41
I’m looking. The only one I really wanted to drive home is to differ between contract to hiring and contract staffing.

Pete Newsome: 46:49
Okay, I think I get that question so much in class, really Interesting.

Ricky Baez: 46:55
I do well in my recruitment, selection and retention class. Right, I do get that a lot and I do a good job at explaining it. I haven’t had that much experience in it, but I know what it is. That’s what I’m saying for the next recruitment, selection and retention class. I know we keep talking about it. We’ve been talking about it for years for you to come to class and you talk to my students I’ll be there.

Pete Newsome: 47:16
Yeah, so it’s really intention. I think that’s. If you had to sum it up in one word, is the intention for this relationship, this working relationship, to end after the contract period? Whatever the contract period is based on is over, or is it intended to be indefinite or maybe ultimately result in the individual converting to a direct employee? So that’s really. It starts off the same. The parameters are the same. It’s really about what happens at the end of the contract. Do they go on, or do they go on about their way somewhere else, or do they stay on as a direct employee? So once you get your arms around the concept, I think it makes a lot of it’s easy to understand.

Ricky Baez: 48:07
It’s an awesome world man. I gotta tell you now that I see it from both sides, especially how many different services an organization like this can offer. It can offer. I think it’s a huge headache saver.

Pete Newsome: 48:22
Headache saver. I like it Well, it can be and it should be, if the perspective is the correct one and the role that the staffing company plays versus the role that they don’t play. We’re not trying to take anyone’s job, we’re trying to be. We exist to be a supplement, an extension, a resource, a partner, all of those things. And when a relationship’s healthy, it’s seen that way and it flows that way. There’s open and transparent communication and each party’s accessible and each party respects the position of the other. So, and I think what I’m just described as any healthy relationship that those things have to be in place for. But I think the point of all of this is there’s a great need at times to call a staffing company, identify when those needs exist. Try to do that as early in the process as possible.

Develop relationships that can become partnerships. They don’t have to start off that way. It has to be earned that trust has to be earned in reliability, because that’s really what our value is. You have to be able to trust us and rely on us. You experienced the organization that you couldn’t trust or rely on. Okay, I contend that they that’s probably because you said it they were too excited with the opportunity without stopping to realize that they have to deliver to make any money. They have to deliver to continue. It’s not about getting a contract signed. That’s where too many make a mistake early on is hey, I have an opportunity to fill these positions. Well, that’s meaningless right until you actually fill them. So make sure you have a mechanism and a path to actually fill them, not just the potential to fill them, and that’s how success happens.

Ricky Baez: 50:24
Excellent, excellent, excellent. And you know what, for the record, I get along with the person. He was still today, because we still talk about it today, and I’m going to call after this and say hey, I talked about you.

Pete Newsome: 50:35
Well, is she still in staffing or is she moved on? Okay, well, maybe she maybe shouldn’t call her. Yeah, I mean, I think I should give her a heads up. I ain’t said no names. I ain’t said no names, so I don’t even know who it is. I’m going to find out when we hang up. So let’s do that now. We’ll say goodbye so I can figure out who this, the villain of the story, is. So, all right, well, ricky, we did it. We beat the horse on this. I’m sure there’s more to come, so long without beating a horse. Well, we, we were due. We were due, so we did not cancel that word yet. But if you have questions, hit us up please. If you have comments on this show or topics that you want us to talk about going forward, we’d love to hear from you, and that is higher calling H I R E C A L L I N G at f4cornerresources.com. Look forward to hearing from you. Thanks again.

Tips For What to Look for When Reading Resumes

• Relevance to the job: Check if the candidate’s experience and skills align with the job requirements.
• Stability: Look for steady employment history without frequent job changes.
• Progression: A record of promotions or increasing responsibilities is a good sign.
• Customization: The resume should be tailored to the specific job application.
• Quantifiable achievements: Look for specific, measurable results in the candidate’s work history.
• Attention to detail: The resume should be free from spelling, grammatical, and formatting errors.
• Professionalism: The resume should maintain a professional tone and appropriate language.
• Skills and certifications: Check for any specific skills or certifications required for the job.
• Education: Confirm the candidate’s educational qualifications, especially if a certain degree is required.
• Keyword matching: The resume should contain keywords and phrases mentioned in the job description.
• Gaps in employment: Pay attention to any unexplained breaks in the candidate’s employment history.
• References: Ideally, the candidate should provide professional references for further validation.

Additional resources

• Reviewing Resumes 101: How to Select the Best Candidates
• What to Look for in a Resume
• The Top Resume Red Flags
• How to Recruit Employees Quickly and Effectively

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome: 0:01
You’re listening to the Hire Calling podcast, your source for all things hiring, staffing and recruiting. I’m Pete Newsome, joined by Ricky Baez, of course. Ricky, how are you today?

Ricky Baez: 0:18
It’s yes, it is summer, and I can’t think of any better way to spend my summer than inside in an air condition office reading resumes Reading resumes That is what today is all about how to quickly identify potential in a resume.

Pete Newsome: 0:36
I think it’s hard to read resumes effectively, thoroughly .undefined quickly. dib’t ayou ?

Ricky Baez: 0:46
It is really hard when a recruiter has hundreds of other positions to recruit for. It’s a balance. It’s a balance of how much time you give one resume versus the quantity of resumes you have to read an entire day. You get to find that perfect balance.

Pete Newsome: 1:04
I think that’s what we’re talking about today. It is How to make the most out of interpreting resumes. Not all jobs are alike. We know that Some have very high volume applicants. I see those on LinkedIn. There’s posts that have a thousand people who apply. If you’re that recruiter, you’re going to have a very hard time giving each resume the attention it’s probably due.

There’s other jobs that have very few applications or candidates are hard to come by because the candidate pool is small. We know that it is nearly impossible. It is impossible to be too general and also accurate in a discussion like this. What’s saying for the middle? and talk about most positions which probably have a fair number of resumes to look through by the recruiter but also need to be efficient in doing so. You just can’t spend a lot of time. You can get lost in resumes.

Ricky Baez: 2:07
Let’s explain that because I’ve had conversations with a lot of people who are not in HR who don’t understand that concept. They’ve been in conferences where it says a recruiter has a really small amount of time to scan a resume. People ask why would a recruiter not give enough time to a resume to make sure they’re looking for the right person? Again, it’s time You and I were talking before we started out recording that there’s a lot of work and not enough time and that’s a great problem to have, but it is a problem If you don’t have a solution for it.

Pete Newsome: 2:42
It remains a problem and candidates don’t necessarily understand the volume that’s associated. Of course, they stopped and thought about it and looked at the number of applications. What I see candidates becoming frustrated with is unresponsiveness. It’s just not practical for most recruiters busy recruiters to dive too deeply. I don’t think we want them to. We want them to not miss great candidates, not miss qualified individuals, but we also don’t want them to linger.

Let’s talk about look, if we were given advice to candidates right now, i’ll say treat your resume like a magazine that you’d see in the checkout line, or a newspaper, if those things still exist where you have to grab the reader’s attention with the headline and you have to give them a reason to want more. It’s marketing 101 and that’s what people probably struggle with as much as anything. That’s why the resume writing industry is so prevalent, which always surprises me, because all these resources are available online. But nonetheless, people need that extra help and certainly want it at times.

But you have to toot your own horn. That’s what we’re looking for. As a recruiter, when you open a resume, i need that attention grabbing headline to make me continue, otherwise I’m moving on. I’m grabbing the pack of gum and not picking up the magazine.

Ricky Baez: 4:17
You just have to pack it of gum, some wrinkly speriment gum, the one that lasts like 20 seconds.

Pete Newsome: 4:23
I haven’t been chewing gum lately. I need to. I don’t even know what’s on the market. I was a HUBBA Bubba fan back in the day, but I don’t know if that still exists.

Ricky Baez: 4:33
Here’s the thing You have to. The big question now becomes all right, what is that headline? What should I put out there to make my resume stand out? There’s no one answer for that, because it really depends on who you are. It depends on what kind of position you are, you are applying for in the culture of the organization. Right, if you do your homework or research the organization, who they are, the cultural values, you’ll be able to get a good sense of what kind of a resume strategy you’re going to put together to really grab your attention. And make no mistake, folks, the candidate that spends the time to research and home and does the homework for that company, that person is going to have a much better chance to have the resume picked up and get a call back to you.

Pete Newsome: 5:21
And so I’m glad you make that point, because if you are a recruiter, in trying to determine, with very little information at your disposal, who to invest more time in, the one that’s clearly taken the opportunity and made the effort to customize their resume for your job and I’ll just say it because I have to even writes a cover letter, we’ll move on from that. Right, but that’s a candidate. If I know nothing else, I know that they’ve showed a certain level of motivation and interest and they haven’t just clicked blindly, going down a long list of job titles.

So that’s a great thing If someone has highlighted their experience and tailored it for your job. Stop and pay a little closer attention, because of the first step in all this is look, you’re trying to do two things You’re trying to rule in the right ones and rule out the bad ones. So we’ll talk about red flags a little bit later, but let’s find the ones that have relevant experience and I will say, as someone who’s looked at hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of resumes at this point it might be millions that you don’t want to have to figure out what you’re looking at Right. That I mean. It has to tell a clean, clear, concise story, and it has to jump off the page at me. The thing I’m looking for is does this person have relevant experience and-. If that jumps out at me, then I’ll go to step two.

Ricky Baez: 7:01
So, Pete, I got to tell you from a former recruiters perspective nothing and this is for all the recruiters out there and also for all the candidates out there looking for a job, to give you a glimpse inside a recruiters mind. Nothing annoys me more than nothing gets under my skin, more than I’m going through a resume, and it has absolutely nothing to do with the position that they apply for. Like nothing to do and look a recruit is an average of nine seconds to look at a resume, right, and if I look at a resume has nothing to do. That’s just nine seconds that we just wasted out of my life, that I’m not going to get back.

Pete Newsome: 7:38
I’m just being honest, that’s right. So well, ok, so that’s on the candidates to set that stage and we’ll address them separately in a different show. How to say sorry, that’s right. So, if I’m so, you’re this recruiter, what are you looking for? Well, you’re looking for the history, right, professionally. You’re looking for key criteria. That’s how I think of every matching, every job description with every candidate. I want to know and if I’m recruiting on the job, i will know the key hiring criteria.

So that’s what I’m looking for initially, most jobs that we end up recruiting for in the professional world. We’re not looking for education and certifications per se. We’re looking at skills and experience, as The way I like to think of it is what you’ve done in the past is a really good indication of what you’ll be able to do for me in the future. So that’s that’s always the, the lens with which I look at a resume. So I want the skills, i want the work history. That’s that’s where I go. What about you? Do you, do you differ?

Ricky Baez: 8:39
Oh, no, no, no, I don’t. That’s why I kind of parked up, because I love what you just said there. You don’t just look for certifications and education although that’s important, right, because all a college degree is and I’m just going to just to say it It’s a receipt that you got an education. I’m not looking on whether you’ve got an education or not. I’m looking to see how you’re using it. So, on a resume as a recruiter, what I look for is examples of what you’re doing with that education and certification you got.

I want to see tangible examples that I can see as a recruiter, that that could be valuable to the organization. The recruiter is an expert and they know what the job description is. It’s it’s like so we’re looking something to fulfill those needs for the job description. So always put down from the camera Disperspective. Always put down how you’re using it from a recruiter’s perspective. Do not let, do not let. Do not get carried away by the shiny of school Right, if you see the graduated from Harvard, you’re like, oh my God, I’m going to bring this person in. Well, no, take a deeper look. If they got a humanities degree from Harvard, that’s not what Harvard is known for.

Pete Newsome: 9:49
Well, if they’re. If they were Harvard grad, i might bring them in anyway. But the most schools, to your point, become increasingly less important as your as a candidate’s career evolves. We all know that, depending on the, the skill set, the position type, some degrees are going to be more relevant than others. There’s many professions today where a college degree would have been mandatory and the not so distant past 20 years ago I worked for a large company earlier in my career that would not promote people above a manager level unless they had a master’s degree, which I found absurd then.

I find even more absurd now. Bad, joy, bad. That’s a bad line to draw in the sand, but nonetheless every organization has the ability to do that, because your goal in this is to find the best candidate for that particular job. And as someone’s career progresses, as they’re able to accomplish and do more for you, potentially the degree that they have is probably not going to be the biggest indication of how effective they’ll be, but everyone needs to figure that out for themselves. So if your organization does happen to value degrees greater than most, to a degree greater than most, then of course you’re going to highlight that. But for the most part, for me, i need to see the skills

Right, I need to know they’re capable of doing the job number one. And then I’m going to look at the work history And that is where you want to see a clear path to understand what it is, and I think of it, and often describe of this section, as as driving down a busy street. Right for me in Orlando it’s Orange Avenue, right through the heart of downtown. If you start hitting lights, it feels like you’re going to hit every light, but if it’s all green man, you can sail through and it’s a beautiful thing. So that’s how I want to see a resume. I don’t want to have to understand why there’s overlapping dates on job history. If that means to me that is one of the biggest red flags and something that I’ve seen. More of our more time spent among our recruiters over the years trying to justify, explain, understand It’s, it’s. It’s something that just always jumps off the page at me and I’m out If I see if I can’t follow the career path.

Ricky Baez: 12:15
So that’s an important piece there. right, It’s because it’s as a recruiter I am looking. I’m looking to fulfill this position as easy as possible, as efficient as possible, Because once I’m done with this one, I have ninety, nine thousand other ones that I have to do. So what I look for as a recruiter is for all the information to be there, readily accessible, as quickly as possible, that I can read within nine seconds and then make a decision from there on forward. So for everybody out there listening from a candidate’s perspective because I know we’re talking about the recruiters perspective it’s like hey, I’m looking at both sides of it. man, I got to look at both sides because you got to understand here I am bringing military logic.

Pete Newsome: 12:57
You got to understand the enemy in order for you to understand which which the candidates most definitely or not, but go on.

Ricky Baez: 13:14
You’ve got to get your system down for you to balance how much time you look at a resume versus what you have to do later on. So you’ve got to come up with your own system. And what I would do as a recruiter that way you connect better with your candidates is you do a little video about that system and put it on social media, put it on LinkedIn. That way you let everybody know.

Pete Newsome: 13:36
It makes it easier for you, would you not believe? Yeah, so I’m going to share what may be an unpopular opinion, as I’m prone to do. Maybe it won’t be, i don’t know, but here’s my strong belief that most people are bad at writing resumes. Okay, why? I would agree with that. Why are they bad? Because they don’t do it very often. They’re not in the business of reading resumes, as we’re talking about. They’re not in the business of interpreting resumes or deciding whether it’s candidate A or candidate B who you’re going to move forward in the job.

They’re good at doing their job. They’re good as a teacher or a doctor or a software developer or a designer, whatever their role might be, none of which has to do with writing resumes. So recruiters need to acknowledge that, at least internally, and look at resumes. I’ll say it again, through that lens. That’s not what I’m looking for. When people go to resume writers, they’re looking for something that, to me, doesn’t really make the difference in whether they’ll be selected.

Now, the resume writers, of course, will share their success stories, but these candidates were probably going to get hired anyway. It just so happens to be. I’m sure they don’t share their stories of candidates who didn’t get hired, but it’s not because your resume was great, but you can rule yourself out by having a bad resume, and that’s what I’m talking about when I think of conflicting dates on your job. That doesn’t take someone who is a great resume writer. That just takes someone whose career makes sense, and so it either tells a good story or a bad one. So don’t get hung up on looking for a great resume, or people get upset that there was a typo or bad grammar. You know what?

Go talk to the 10 people in your life. They’re closest to you and, depending on who you are, i would venture to guess that their grammar is not excellent. Have them write emails. I bet it’s not great. Now, does it show that a candidate takes time to spell check things and to have someone proofread? of course You can get into all that, but don’t get hung up on things like formatting or phrasing. People generally are not good at that, and we know it, and so I just think we tend to get confused as to what we’re actually looking for in a resume at times, which is a bad path to go down.

Ricky Baez: 16:28
I may be on the opposite side of that, pete, because from a recruiter’s perspective I get. About formatting, i completely understand, because that’s just where the words are on the resume. But if I see a grammatical error, if I see a spelling error on a resume, it’s a huge reflect from me And I understand that people hardly write resumes. I completely understand. But this is the one piece of document where they’re supposed to be putting their best foot forward And if this is the level of care that I see the best foot forward, imagine when they’re comfortable at work.

Now the opposite is so, so true. What I was saying about, actually you were saying it that a recruiter would give more time to that person who took the time to craft that personalized resume to the organization. Now that’s a person that when I hire, if I hire, they do well. That’s a person that I know. They showed me that they’re going to take that kind of level of care in anything they do. So the nonverbal cues is just as important as a verbal one. What?

Pete Newsome: 17:33
do you think, yeah, i mean, look, it’s inexcusable to not use spell check or something like that. What I’m really referring to are just general grammar problems that people will have, or bad phrasing or, like you said, formatting or the way the headers look. Those are things that really don’t have much bearing on a software developer’s ability to write great code and to operate efficiently and to be a good teammate and whatever is important for that particular role. But look at their skills, look at their work history, look at longevity right, not so popular today either.

We want to act like that doesn’t matter, but here’s why it does Because it shows you’ve had the ability to deal with challenging times and adversity. If, when I see a resume of someone who’s only worked at all their jobs a very short time, it tells me they haven’t had to deal with or successfully deal with too many challenges Because we all get the honeymoon phase right, you’re in, you’re new, great, you get this grace period, you’re training, whatever. But when I see people who’ve consistently left after a year and a half, i think, hmm, you haven’t really gotten through the muck at all and come out clean on the other side.

Ricky Baez: 18:55
That’s the threshold a year and a half to use short.

Pete Newsome: 18:59
It is short, sure. Well, i need to see that you’ve been able to stick it out at some point, right, that’s what? because I, or I have to be. It’s okay to do this, too, if you’re okay with someone, probably not lasting very long, but again, this is something that I have when I have to make decisions. Out of 200 resumes, potentially, who do you think I want to go with? Do I want to go with the one who’s never worked for a job more than a year and a half, when I’ve just told you I think the first year almost is a grace period in many companies, right?

Or do I want to see someone that’s had a history of success in advancement? Because I’m also looking for that. I want to see that you’ve succeeded where you were previously. As I said earlier in the show, what you’ve done in the past is the best indicator of what you’ll be able to do for me in the future, right? So if what you’ve done is not accomplished, much of significance anywhere, you’ve been. Okay, that’s what I’m going with, because I don’t know anything else about you.

Ricky Baez: 20:08
And I agree with that, i do. You know it’s a you have from a recruited perspective. You have to take a look at that past experience. But, pete, you know some people because, you’re right, some people are horrible at writing resumes. Not a bad thing, it’s just that they haven’t had that practice. And then other people could be great at writing. They’re just not good at, you know, patting themselves on the back. And that’s what a resume is. It is a walking talking. It’s magazine cover, exactly how you said. Right So, but here’s my thing. Here’s my thing from from a recruiter’s point of view. Job hopping today, job hopping today doesn’t really strike me as bad as it did 20 years ago. And the reason for that is is because I understand from a recruiter. I understand today’s workforce. They’re not as attached and loyal to a company like their predecessors have, would you not?

Pete Newsome: 21:03
agree with that? I do, but it’s about showing accomplishment, so it’s a good segue into that. Next thing to look for is is data, that is, i want to see tangible evidence that you’ve been successful in your role. If you’re a software developer, tell me what you’ve built. If you’re a designer, show me what you’ve, what you’ve developed or you designed. If you’re a salesperson, tell me what you’ve sold. Give me metrics, give me numbers, give me the data that I need to see. So, when you’ve been, if I’m hiring a salesperson, if I’m hiring a recruiter, we’ll say, since that’s who we’re talking to, and I see that you’ve worked at a string of places for never more than a year and a half, well, how good of a recruiter can you be for that company where you haven’t been through multiple cycles?

And you know I don’t and especially if your job I’ll say this too, and this is like the third thing I’ll say that’s probably going to be unpopular in some circles, like you said in today’s times is that I don’t. If I see just linear, if I’ve seen your progression stay flat and you’re going from recruiter to recruiter to recruiter jobs, you’re not advancing right. So well then, then again, here’s what we’re talking about. We’re talking about a resume being the book cover, the magazine cover that’s going to determine whether someone will pick it up to read it.

Okay, and if I have five resumes that I’m looking at even though we know we have hundreds, and I have a choice between year and a half job hoppers, or I look at someone who’s been at their places previous employers for three years, five years, demonstrable progression on their resume. I see metrics, I see awards, i see recognition and accolades. Who are you picking? Who are you picking? And you find who is everyone going to pick.

So that is the problem with this And this is more of a societal point. Right, and I rolled my eyes at you when you were talking about you know, here’s a message for candidates. Well, it is a message for candidates, but anyone who has to make hiring decisions is that if you don’t know anything else about the person coming in and you’re going to compare what you see to others, you’re always going to want to go with the ones who seem to have more longevity and progression in their career. It’s just smart. Why would you do anything differently?

Ricky Baez: 23:57
So it’s not that I would do anything differently, i’m just looking at the opposite concept as well. So job hopping, yes, if somebody jumps around a lot, that’s a red flag. But if somebody stuck around for an organization it’s a 30 years and that’s the only organization they know, wouldn’t that limit how they work in different industries? Because all they know is that one company. they need their job, but they only know their company’s way of performing that job It would.

Pete Newsome: 24:23
And so if you see someone whose job hopped a lot and let’s just continue this fictitious year and a half scenario but I do, it’s not that fictitious, right? We see it all the time That and, by the way, those are usually people giving the most career advice out there, just for the on LinkedIn, for the record, and I guess they’re good at finding jobs. But I think I want people who are good at keeping and succeeding in the jobs.

But if you You have to make a decision, do you want someone who can hit the ground running quickly, because that’s what you’re going to interpret from that, or do you say I don’t see any demonstration of success or achievement? That’s how I see it, so I’m just going to play the odds. And if I see someone that’s been at a company for 30 years, what depends on what I want them to do? Do I need that level of deep knowledge and expertise that I’m sure they would come with? Yes, maybe, then I’ll hire them.

Do I need someone to hit the ground running quickly and be agile and flexible? No, probably not. So the situation and the need will dictate how I interpret longevity at a job. But this is more of a general statement that I want to see accomplishments and I want to see progression. And you said what if someone doesn’t want to move up? Okay, depending on the role, that may not be the person I want to hire. Do I want to hire? So what? you just asked me, the way I heard it was do you want to hire someone with ambition or without?

Ricky Baez: 25:55
What I mean. But you’ve answered it correctly. It depends on the job. If you look at somebody who just make widgets, and that’s it. When you look at any kind of ambition, this position doesn’t necessarily move up, and you don’t want to move up.

Pete Newsome: 26:08
That’s made in heaven And sometimes that works against candidates, Right? I mean, where they’ll say, whoa, I’m afraid they’re not going to be in this job too long, I’m afraid they’re too ambitious and want to move on. I mean, I’ve received that feedback a lot over the years from companies that want the person to stay in the same seat. Now the same problem exists. So right, if you’re going to job, hop anyway.

Ricky Baez: 26:29
You’re not, you’re not, you’re not, you’re not you’re not going to be able to rely on that?

Pete Newsome: 26:37
Yeah, i depended, again depending on the role. Do I want that in a salesperson? No, no, definitely not. Do I want an accountant? Sure, right, i mean, that’s, if, that’s, if that’s all I ever want or expect from them. Sure, but to your point, every job and situation is unique.

Ricky Baez: 26:57
It is, and you know, and yes. so a lot of job hopping within a small amount of time is a red flag. Staying in one company for a long time could be a red flag, depending on how you want to do it. What about employment gaps? How do you see those?

Pete Newsome: 27:13
Again, it’s. It’s. If we’re being completely transparent, as we always are, it depends on what I’m comparing it to. Is it a small candidate field? Then I’ll be more forgiving of all of these things that we’re talking about. If it’s an abundant pool of candidates, who am I going to go with? The one that’s shown consistency, because you have to either accept or not, and I’m okay if the answer is not. It’s just, it’s not how.

How I would operate and have operated successfully, i’ll say, as a recruiter over a long time. But if I don’t have anything else to operate on, I’m going to make some assumptions based on what you’re showing me on the on the cover of this book. So if I see a work history that’s hard to follow or inconsistent, or big gaps, i don’t know, do I have time to stop and address that? You said it earlier nine seconds per resume. So how much of that’s getting consumed with understanding why there’s a three-year gap?

Ricky Baez: 28:21
Right. Well, i mean, here’s the thing, right to me, if that nine seconds it’s, it’s spent on what they write on their summary. Right, here’s my skills, here’s what I do, blah, blah, blah, and then I’m like I’ll move on to the next. Sometimes I don’t get enough, i mean, or if I’m trying to put too many things together.

Pete Newsome: 28:41
I’m done with the resume. You can use this analogy It’s, it’s. It’s analogous to so many things that exist in the world. I was looking for for something at the mall last weekend, with my wife looking for a shirt for a very specific purpose. I went to the rack, I scrolled through with my eyes, found one I liked and then picked it out. Why, I don’t know, because that’s the one that caught my attention. It was the right color, It appeared to be the right fabric. You know the brand, whatever it is. Then I go to the next level right, Here are three shirts I’m going to try on.

Right, It’s just like three resumes I’m picking out. But that means you didn’t pick out every other shirt or every other resume. So why are you picking out those and not others? Because they hit all the right points, clearly stating the qualifications, the work history, the experience, the data, the awards, the, maybe longevity, right, But as much as anything else, you’re not throwing a lot of other garbage at me. And so if I see a shirt, you know if it’s, if it’s so off from what I’m looking at, right. If I’m looking for a winter shirt and I see one with short sleeves, I’m moving on right. I don’t have to dwell on why it has short sleeves or understand what happened, and it’s an evolution to end up with short sleeves. It’s just not what I want.

Ricky Baez: 30:08
I’m just glad that I’m not the only one who attacks a mall that way. I hate malls And I think our wives should be on this show with us, because my wife goes in with a strategy. She’s there for eight hours. I go in, I go into the mall to find what I want exactly how I look at her.

Pete Newsome: 30:26
Right? Well, we went with right. We went. I said, hey, i need to go, i need this shirt, I need it for a reason. She’s like, great, i’ll go. She jumped at the chance to go with me, of course. And 10 minutes in, I’m like, all right, I’m already over this. She’s like, well, we just got here. I’m like, I don’t know, I just want the shirt, just like I want the candidate. I don’t want to look at resumes unnecessarily, I want to get right to the point. So the more tailored, the more specific, the more relevant and the more easy to understand and give me the feeling that you’re worth more than those nine seconds. That’s the goal. And so we could justify anything, and there’s lots of reasons. Now, here’s the thing, and this is now.

I’ll speak to a candidate and say, if you have a resume that is not easy to interpret, or you see potential red flags, whether you think there should be a red flag or not, right, and whether you’re justified and there’s lots of reasons, and I fully acknowledge that some great, great employees probably have an awful looking work history Then you’re going to have to figure out another way in the door, right, don’t, don’t compare, don’t send your resumes into a pile where where a bunch of others are going to look good, Figure out something creative, work with a recruiter And, by the way, i know all of these things because as the owner of a staffing company for two decades our recruiters are constantly having to figure out gaps and resumes, understand things that on the surface are don’t make a lot of sense, fix formatting, and this is which which drives them crazy. So we know all these things And they’re not insurmountable, but it does make you at a harder hill to climb.

Ricky Baez: 32:10
So it’s so. We talked about the, the copy. We talked about what kind of information that happened. How many red flags are you good at figuring out if somebody’s exaggerating their?

Pete Newsome: 32:22
stuff. Well, i assume everyone does, right. I mean, to some degree, most will exaggerate, but I don’t. I, you know that’s an interesting one. What’s your take on that? I don’t, i mean exact. There’s exaggerating, and then there’s there’s being dishonest. Are we, are you separating those things?

Ricky Baez: 32:46
What’s the okay? so let’s split hairs here, right? So exaggerating to some point does dabble in dishonesty, because if you’re exaggerating what you can do, you’re painting a false picture to somebody else about your credentials, is it not?

Pete Newsome: 33:02
Yep, it does. So give me an example, though. right, I’m the greatest recruiter in the world. Are we talking, you know, subjective exaggeration? or I filled a million positions in a week? Okay, now, that’s not an exaggeration, that’s dishonest. So I think it depends. I think that you find those things out Now, once it’s on the resume, and you see something extraordinary jump out, because that’s what’ll happen, right, you’ll see things that either are potentially too good to be true or they’re amazing and you wanna drill deeper, or things that are potential concerns that you need to drill into. So that’s on the candidate to defend, and I don’t know that I can pick those things out just from the resume itself, without drilling down further, and do a conversation.

Ricky Baez: 33:54
This is one of those things that I don’t know what I’m looking for, but when I see it, I know it.

Pete Newsome: 33:59
There you go.

Ricky Baez: 34:01
Yeah, because once I’ve seen situations that I’m like whoa, there’s no way. And that comes with experience, right, i know how our sales costs are, no worse. I know how a government entity works. So a recruiter that comes from there, in an environment that sorry, let’s say I’m looking for a recruiter, right, i’m a recruiter looking for a recruiter. And then I know they’re coming from a government agency. I know that a recruiter or the local government maybe recruits 50 positions a month and they’re telling me I’ve failed, actually failed. 600 positions every month. That’s a huge. That’s not a reflect, that’s a red blanket.

Pete Newsome: 34:33
Right.

Ricky Baez: 34:34
And now I’m gonna have a conversation. Actually I’m not gonna have a conversation. I’m not because I know actually it depends. I’m thinking out loud here. If it’s too exaggerated, i’m not even gonna give them a call. But if it’s like, wow, this is a little bit more than normal, you’ve now given me the need or the want to follow up with you, so maybe a little exaggeration is good.

Pete Newsome: 34:59
Well, i don’t know about that. I don’t see that You think that, maybe that it would be more common than it is. But I think people are used to having to defend what’s on their resume and are careful to put things in writing that are blatant untruths. So I don’t. but I agree with you. If you know, have intimate knowledge of the role and know what a too good to be true looks like, right Filled 600 positions in a week by myself. Okay, i know that’s not true. Why would I? I don’t think that’s someone you’d screw around with. You don’t?

Ricky Baez: 35:40
I mean, if you do, you ask them to just come to the NTV with a bunch of water and say do your magic, Let me see some wine out of this.

Pete Newsome: 35:47
There you go. So what about reading resumes? I mean so any other tips that we have that you’d want to offer to someone who how they should approach? I feel like I’ve given some of mine today That I want to be as efficient as possible and get to the. I want to get to the finish line, just like I wanted the shirt right. The goal was to get the shirt, the best shirt and with the littlest effort, and I think that’s how every recruiter intends to operate. Whether they do or not is a different question, but everyone wants the best candidate as quickly and efficiently as possible. So how do we get there?

Ricky Baez: 36:29
So how do we get there? I know this was something that I struggled with when I was a recruiter And what I struggled with is finding that balance of spending enough time, because I know how much time I put in my resume. right, when I was in college I knew my professor didn’t read my papers. So that’s when now, as a professor, i read papers. So as a recruiter I try to find, i try to give every candidate the most time possible.

But at the end of the day it’s almost impossible to do that because you as a recruiter have a responsibility. You have a job to do to find that candidate. Every day that that position is empty, it’s more money the organization loses and that’s the hat you need to have. So for me, what I like to do, i organize myself. I study that job description like nobody’s business, and I mean study it to the point that I almost know it by heart. If you study that job description, you test yourself to know what’s in it. You will be a whiz and reading resumes faster to make a determination on whether that candidate should be given an opportunity to interview. But I’ve seen a lot of recruiters who just jump in. they skim. they spend as much time on the job description as a resume, and that’s a mistake.

Pete Newsome: 37:51
Well. So job descriptions have sort of evolved in a way. I think that have led to that, because recruiters know that they often don’t accurately represent the true hiring need. Job descriptions are its own discussion on good and bad. I think to your point. While I said most people are bad at resume writing, most are bad at job description writing too. But they don’t have to be they just no one likes to do it. It’s a bad, that’s not fun. Let’s get past that. Let’s just get the candidate. So get the right job description in place.

You’ll have more accuracy in your applicants and the resumes that you receive. But as a recruiter I wanna understand what the most relevant parts are to that and then match those up with the resumes that I’m looking for and to fill the job with as few candidate interviews as possible. And that’s an area where I think people get lost too. So maybe my philosophy is what leads me to being harsh about some things like gaps in resumes or job hopping, where I am just trying to get to the candidate who is going to get the job and be the best one available.

So that means I wanna rule out. I will be faster to rule people out than I will to rule them in. As a result And that’s one of my strongest recruiting beliefs right If you is to rule out all the bad and then you’re only left with good. Right. So now, if it’s a skill set where there’s only five people within a thousand mile radius that can do the job, i’m going to be more accommodating. But if it’s a big candidate pool, like we talked about earlier, you don’t get a second chance, right?

Ricky Baez: 39:46
And look, here’s the thing from a career progression perspective. this is to the recruiters. from a career progression perspective. if I’m overseeing a recruiter and I got two recruiters, one of them is taking their time to fill this position. They have a lot of interviews Because to schedule interviews you take time away from leadership hiring authorities, from their regular jobs to interview Who do I pick for promotion? It will be the person who fully understands the entire business picture, because what you just said their peep is crucial.

You want to fill that position with as little interviews as possible. More interviews equals more productivity loss equals more money loss. That’s what that means, and a recruiter who understands that and finds a way how to be more efficient in bringing those in the higher ups are going to notice that. So, again, find the most efficient way. I can tell you the best way again for me is a job description. I know you said sometimes they’re old, but whenever I see it, whenever a recruiter tells me this is old, excellent, let me connect you with my HR generalist. We’re going to go ahead and get that updated ASAP. We should not put that to the side.

Pete Newsome: 40:56
Right. Well, i know, and I think on most of the time, the vast majority of the time, there’s about three to five things that really, really matter for a job, and that’s this is a kind of a very broad, gross exaggeration perhaps, but that’s usually how. What I’m looking for is let me start with those things, and those things have to be abundantly evident to me on the resume. The rest of the things need to be in place, where I’m not concerned about drama coming in from the candidate. And again, just let’s make it smooth and easy.

And I can tell you unequivocally that throughout the thousands and thousands of people we’ve recruited in place successfully over the years, there’s been many more that we haven’t successfully placed, that we’ve recruited. And through all of all of those experiences, one, what’s become clear to me is with their, one red flag may as well be 100. So if, if we’re new together as a candidate, I’m the recruiter, you’re the can, I’m the recruiter. And early on in my relationship with you there’s a, there’s a flaw or a problem jumping out, why would I want to invest more time and effort in that?

So I’m looking for red flags, right, because I know what, if you can do, if you, if you’re a Drupal developer, if you’re an interior designer, i will know I need to make sure that you are a good Drupal developer, right, I need to know that if you, if you’re design, style and experience and capabilities match the client’s needs. But I don’t know if there’s a lot of other baggage and problems that come in or come in with you. So that’s what I’m going to try to rule out first. Right, I’m going to rule out all the bad and then and then be left with the good.

Ricky Baez: 42:52
That makes sense. That and that brings me to this next point then, because if, if I’ve seen situations where a recruiter is looking for that diamond in the rough, looking for that unicorn, right, and they find that unicorn, but that unicorn also has red flags. When you find that diamond in the rough and the unicorn, sometimes that diminishes or devalues the value of a red flag to the point that some recruiters ignore it. And then six months later they’re like, oh man, well, we knew this at the interview because they all the quality he was looking for overshadowed that reflect. So what I’m saying here is do not lower your standards from red flags just because you see somebody come with a skill set that is 100, that that is what you’re looking for.

Pete Newsome: 43:36
So we got to be careful with that as human beings and in fact I’m putting together a book right now on this, and I’ve started started thinking a little bit about what the title will be, and it is going to have to it’s. It’ll end up being something about ruling people out, right, because you know, recruiters want to find the right candidate Yes, of course, but we have to be equally focused on excluding the wrong ones, if not more focused on that, and that’s and that’s where new recruiters struggle the most is looking. You don’t want to see the red flag, so you don’t see them.

You should go into that. Can new candidate resume conversation as soon as possible. If there are red flags, you want to know them immediately. So back to the resume point. If you can identify a red flag in those first nine seconds, great, you don’t have to invest 10 seconds. That’s a win. If you don’t identify it in those first nine seconds with the resume and you go deeper, well, hopefully you can identify it before you pick up the phone and schedule a call. If not, then then the first conversation and so on. So what you don’t want to do is find out after the person’s been hired that there was an oops. This is why they had the gap on the resume. This is why they don’t stay anywhere very long.

So play the odds, because we have limited time and the odds indicate that the cleaner and more straightforward resume is, the better the candidate process is going to go, and they’re going to be a better, higher Well then let’s say goodbye. I think that’s good. You always get the close. Is that the last word? Are we going to call it good? All right, awesome. Well, this was good, Ricky. Thank you so much. Hopefully we’ve shed some light on resume reading and some things to consider. We love feedback, so hit us up, hire calling H-I-R-E-C-A-L-L-I-N-G at 4cornerresourcescom. We love feedback. If you have suggestions or just say you think we’re wrong and you want to share why, we’ll be happy to address that on the air too. So, Ricky, thanks so much. Thank you, sir.

Ricky Baez: 46:00
You have a good one. You did a great job spelling that, by the way, because I’m like H-I-R, so, yeah, you got it All right folks have a good rest of the day.

Recruiting Metrics to Measure

• Time to hire. Measure it, and then look to improve it. Don’t be content with a long time to hire. And if you’re unsure whether your time to hire is too long, seek help. And if a position goes open for a long time and there’s no impact on the business, consider whether the position is necessary.
• Cost per hire. How much is it going to take for you to fill the position? And then, where can you improve it? Start tracking everything. Understand where you’re spend money – job boards, internal resources, talent acquisition, and social media. Identify it, establish that baseline number, and then look for opportunities of improvement.
• Source per hire. Determine the different methods and sources you’ve used in the past. Indeed, CareerBuilder, Monster, ZipRecruiter, LinkedIn, and even your own internal website. Which ones created the right level of efficiency, quality, and cost?
• Job acceptance rates. Look for the root of the problem. Consider whether you are paying too low, whether your expectations are unrealistic, whether your organization or the job within the organization is so unattractive that no one wants it, or your hiring process is just too complex or lengthy.

Tips on How to Use a Data-Driven Hiring Strategy

• Use an applicant tracking system. This software tool will help you identify what you need to measure, commit to actually measuring it, find opportunities to improve and, compare. And if you haven’t used one already, start as soon as possible. ATS data will help tell a story to your internal team, get buy-in for spending money, get buy-in for making changes, and reach the leadership at the top. 
• If you only measure one thing, you won’t get the full picture. Measure all of these things and then tie them together to really understand the data. Go above and beyond that as well – don’t just focus on the data for filling a role, but look deeper into what it took to hire the best person for the job.
• Consider a third-party recruiter. They do all the work before you will ever see a resume. By the time a candidate is submitted to you, they already know the candidate is a good fit. Whether you are spending too much time or too much money hiring candidates, think about the value these professionals bring to the table. 

Additional Resources

• Key HR Metrics You Should Be Tracking
• Ways to Reduce Your Average Time to Hire
• How to Leverage Data to Improve Your Recruitment Process
• How to Reduce Hiring Costs

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome: 0:00
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast, your source for all things hiring, staffing and recruiting. I’m Pete Newsom with Ricky Baez again today. Ricky, how are you?

Ricky Baez: 0:09
I’m doing good, Pete. How about yourself?

Pete Newsome: 0:11
I’m doing great. I’m doing great. It’s Friday, it’s beautiful outside, that’s right. You’re back from Europe. How was your?

Ricky Baez: 0:16
trip. It was amazing National Lampoon’s watch out. Maybe some more videos coming out later.

Pete Newsome: 0:23
We’re going to have you run it over a cyclist in London, we’re going to have you randomly showing up at someone’s house in Germany, and which may have happened Do we have some clips coming.

Ricky Baez: 0:37
Oh my, let’s see. Let’s see what it should be all says Well, welcome home.

Pete Newsome: 0:41
Sounds like you had a great time. Enjoy seeing the pictures that you posted and I’m envious. I’ve been here.

Ricky Baez: 0:49
Well, i mean, all I’m saying is I’m glad to be back, glad to be back in the US.

Pete Newsome: 0:53
Well, good Back to be recording and talking about what’s important in the world of recruiting, and today we’re going to address something that maybe isn’t the most sexy topic, but it certainly is important to anyone who hires regularly, and that is using data and the analytics that come from that to improve. Assess your recruiting process Probably doesn’t happen enough. I don’t think companies generally take the data aspect of their recruiting as seriously as they do in other parts of the business, like managing profit and loss, for example, but you may have a different perspective on that.

Ricky Baez: 1:37
Well, i think people will be surprised at how organizations don’t use data to guide their. their hiring and you have to. right, for you to plan a marketing campaign is no different than you planning on vacation for your family. You got to get a budget and got to get a purpose. So, you can figure out what you know how much things cost, because then you have to stay within that budget. Right, because if you don’t stay within that budget, you know your P and L, your profit and loss is going to suffer from a leadership perspective and you can’t.

The whole reason of you hiring somebody to begin with is so the organization can conduct business, and how the organization conducts business is to get a profit out of something, and if you’re spending way too much on one part of that, you’re not going to make a profit and you just make a big mistake. So, yes, data is very crucial in the hiring process to make to make sure you’re doing the right thing for the organization. I agree.

Pete Newsome: 2:32
Now I have a biased perspective on this. perhaps So I want to hear what you have to say from from the other side of the table, which is the internal HR perspective. So I’m coming at this always from a third party standpoint And when I work with the company on contingency meaning we don’t generate any income or revenue as a third party recruiter until the candidate is hired and starts I always want to understand how they approach hiring and time to hire in particular. So I don’t think companies necessarily do a good enough job And this is a general statement.

Some do but understanding how the downside to a position remaining open And so everything you just mentioned, when you, when you consider your budget and how, how to increase efficiency and your recruiting, those things become much more important when you realize that there’s a real cost in a downside to a position staying open.

But I’ll say, most organizations out there don’t put, don’t see, put, don’t place the right value on on that open position, meaning they don’t realize the harm that it’s done, they don’t realize it’s costing them money. Now again, i’m I don’t want to appear biased with that because of course I’m I’m motivated for that position to be filled quickly. That’s how I make make a living. What do you think about that?

Ricky Baez: 4:05
Well, from its what I think about it. it’s, it’s, i think I can best describe by giving you an example of how I, how I used to run my recruitment team back when I was working as C or so improvements And but in in order for me to get support from the top. now this is just the recruiting manager trying to get support, more finances, more money for for the recruitment effort is for me to calculate the impact of the absence of somebody in that position.

If I had to calculate how much money is lost for every empty seat per hour and that was $1,000 for every empty seat per hour we had to fill 316 positions a year. Right, and man, let me tell you, when you pull that number, you pull that data. it really, it really brings things into perspective because that gives you a certain motivation from a recruiter that otherwise wouldn’t be there. You’re costing the organization money for every day this, this position goes on field. So what are you doing to stop that bleeding?

Pete Newsome: 5:05
So we’re talking that’s what it was. We’re talking thousands of hours, thousands of dollars a day, Right, for an empty position. Now, did the company buy into that? because if you follow that logic out, then you’d say, well, if, if this is going to cost the cost of an open seat is north of a hundred thousand dollars a month, then anything we spend less than that is is a win. But I don’t think most companies are reaching into their pockets To spend a hundred thousand dollars on an open call center position, right?

Ricky Baez: 5:36
So we know that we’re not so far less than that, so far less. And no, it’s, it’s. But it Paints you a good picture and it paints where you are in that puzzle and what you need to do in that puzzle. Right, so that’s so. So our budgeting was about 10 to 15 percent of what that monthly income would be for that person. And if I couldn’t bring that that person in at 10 to 15 percent, then something was wrong with my process.

Either something was wrong with my process or a new, a new competitor came into town who’s stealing all of our people. We have to look at all those variables. The worst thing you can do as a business owner is to jump into Into a recruiting venture with with blindfolds on and not have an expert who’s been doing this for a while, not have somebody Who knows the numbers inside and out who can come in. Take a look at what your plan is, mason, tweezing that plan and kind of help you bring that person across that finish line. So It’s, you have to pull those numbers out so you can see how much help you need.

Pete Newsome: 6:36
Well, let’s get specific and talk about the numbers that matter, and and so back to the first one. I think the most important one is Do you know your time to hire and do you? do you have a target? Do you have history? and in What you just said, if you’re starting from scratch, you’re starting from scratch right. You should get guidance from someone like you who’s an HR consultant, someone like Four-corner resources as a third-party staffing company.

Now You have to select wisely. If you’re, if you’re looking for that help, so go with someone who’s experienced incredible and and and That’s its own conversation, perhaps but once you Establish that this is important to you and you buy into that, and then you have to start measuring. What is a good time to hire? Can you put a general amount or date of time on that, or is it going to vary significantly by position?

Ricky Baez: 7:34
It’s good, it’s both. It’s going to vary significantly by position, but you have to do your own research on it, right? Or you could buy that, that, that research out there. But if you’re looking for customer service people, right, it’s. It’s. Even if you’re starting out as a brand new organization right now, you need to track how long it takes for you to hire somebody. And let’s say you’ve tracked it for two years, you take a look at the past 12 months and see how long on average it takes to fill that position.

That’s, that’s your marker right there. For customer service, it could be 30 days. Right, it could be 15 30 days. It really depends on on how the market is. But let’s say you’re you’re, you’re partnering with an engineering firm. Let’s say you’re partnering with a doctor’s office and you’re trying to find somebody who specializes in the lower intestines I don’t know, it’s a really, really neat specific skill set.

Obviously, that’s going to take a lot longer because it’s those types of resumes don’t just fall out of the sky, right? you really have to go out and find a recruiting firm, a third-party firm that specializes in that. That way, you go into the world, find out what’s best for you and then you get out quickly. I have seen that when you go out to a third party to fill out those specialized positions, they turn out to bring in better candidates because they know where to look and they know where to find.

Pete Newsome: 8:54
They’ll that that type of person well, so it depends on the position the third party Recruiter in theory has a lot more dedicated time to focus on on on recruiting. But it’s fair to say that the larger the candidate pool, the faster you can fill a role. Absolutely. Now it doesn’t mean to say I’ll just. You know, since you brought up the third-party recruiter aspect, if you have a, if you have to fill those customer service positions at scale and you have to do it quickly, that you still may need to leverage a third-party recruiter.

So you have to understand what the situation is and then buy into How fast you need to fill the role. So if you say as a company and I’m constantly surprised, even though I’ve been doing this a long time when I hear timeframes of lead time that recruiters have internal recruiters, corporate recruiters to fill certain positions, where Those are measured in weeks and months, at times right 60 days to fill a staff level role That a third-party recruiter would measure in hours and days to fill, and so I think there’s a lot of improvement to be made.

From in my experience of where I see that time to hire being too loose, too generous. So Let’s again start from the premise that an open position costs company money. It may damage customer service, it may cause employee burnout for those who are having to pick up the slack. So a lot of bad comes with an open position and as that third-party recruiter over the years. And we’ll get past it after this and Continue with the this where we should be in this episode.

But I’ll tell you I you know, if I have a client and they can’t tell me what happens if They that position goes unfilled, i’m skeptical of working with them. Because if anyone who thinks an open position is no big deal, well, they’ve either have a position open They probably don’t need or they’re not approaching it in the right way. So time to hire, measure it and then look to improve it. Don’t be content with a long time to hire And if you’re not sure whether your time to hire is too long, get help. You seek help.

Ricky Baez: 11:10
Absolutely seek help, absolutely, and look in and I know you and I have talked about this in the past. I mean you also get unintended information with this kind of data. Because if, if a position goes open For a long time and there’s no impact on the business, then what a good partner should do is look that you even need, need this position, right, right, obviously you’re not feeling any pain.

If you’re not feeling any pain to me, that tells me you just Bernie payroll. Right so let’s and you know, maybe that’s a leaf that the company has yet to turn that you helping them in that process. So that’s adding more value to that partnership. There you go.

Pete Newsome: 11:46
Okay so. So I like that a lot. And then the next one of course we have to think about is cost per hire. Yeah, how much is it going to take for you to fill the position? and then, where can you improve it? So it’s not about just identifying it, you have to identify it first. So that’s where the data comes in.

You have to know what you’re what you’re spending on job boards, what you’re spending on internal resources and for talent acquisition and recruiting, what you’re spending for social media, what you’re spending on third-party recruiters. So there’s all of these aspects that go into it. And then you, you have to identify it, establish what that baseline number is and then look for opportunities to improve it And especially with the way things work today.

Ricky Baez: 12:31
I mean again back with my old company. We used to use indeed a lot, a lot, and if I remember I’m just pulling this number out of the air I think my cost per hire was about $15 per position, right, and indeed once it’s calculated all the way to the end, not per applicant or hire. And then later on we started to experiment with different things because the well went dry. So we decided to do radio ads Pete, who does radio ads these days? I know we did And I think I spent I must have spent like $4,000 on a radio ad for one month And I got two hires out of that, two hires. So I quickly went from $15. Okay.

Pete Newsome: 13:11
Ricky, hold on, i have to stop you $15 for an. Indeed, you weren’t spending $15 on. Indeed, someone’s giving you bad data on that. No, back then. Yeah.

Ricky Baez: 13:23
On, indeed, 2016?.

Pete Newsome: 13:25
I don’t know. A job posting, a single job posting was hundreds of dollars back then.

Ricky Baez: 13:31
Oh, but wait a minute. So it depends on the organization, right? Because on the organization we had $250,000 license that I got a little bit out of that, But I’m trying to find out.

Pete Newsome: 13:41
I don’t even think indeed existed in 2016. Just for the yeah, they were maybe the new kid on the block back then. Maybe that’s why? Maybe they were giving their job postings away Back in 2016,. That was when Career Builder was, i think was the strongest.

Ricky Baez: 13:57
Well, that’s why I prefer it back then, because there’s a lot. It’s very different right now, very different.

Pete Newsome: 14:03
I just don’t want anyone thinking that $15 to fill a position is something that they could expect to.

Ricky Baez: 14:10
What is it right now, these days? I don’t know.

Pete Newsome: 14:12
I don’t think it depends on the organization, but just if you but see, i would argue you’re not really measuring. even if you had a very inexpensive cost of a job board, how many resumes did you have to go through? How much time did you have to use in internal staff?

Ricky Baez: 14:30
Oh, no, no, no, that’s a whole different. No, i get that, because then I have to measure man hours and how much this takes and everything All different thing. No, i’m talking about from a from an advertising perspective. Right, because we spent $4,000 on this ad. We hire two people, and now what We hire in two people cause me thousands And I’m like, all right, we need to go back and do something else, do something different.

But you have to know what that price is and what. What Pete was alluding to early. You have to count the man hours that are in there, that you have to interview, the man hours to shift through these resumes. These are things that you have to account for. So you, if you don’t have that number right now, start today, start tracking everything today. Start talking to your recruiters. Let them know to track everything on paper.

Most importantly, let them know why you’re doing it, because they might be freaking out, thinking, oh man, if my job on the line? no, not really. We’re just trying to see how you’re spending your time so I can keep track of my hours. So, 2016, completely, completely old information.

Pete Newsome: 15:34
No, well, you know, look, i thought about it. You had a few seconds to think about it. I think, indeed, was really coming into prominence a little bit earlier than that. So I think you’re right about that. Time blurs for me as it goes on. But still, the $15, you weren’t getting anything for $15 on Indeed, that I can tell you. Okay. So Thanks, inflation. So cost per hire and then source per hire. Since we’re talking about that, let’s address that in terms of job boards like Indeed. Indeed is 800 pound gorilla. Today It’s been career builder, in the past It’s been monster.

Zip recruiter is prevalent. Of course, linkedin is a source that many companies spend time on, but that’s not it right? It’s not just job boards, it’s your own internal website. Is that working? That’s free. So if you have a big enough brand, your own internal website can be a really powerful source. Social media, employee referrals and then third party recruiters are a very popular source.

That’s a data point that you should also measure and say, okay, we filled 10 positions with this level or this title last year. Here are the different methods and sources that we used. Which ones created the right level of efficiency, quality and then cost. So if you only measure one thing, you’re not going to get the full picture, so you really do need to, in addition to measuring the time to hire and factoring that it right.

So that’s also what the source Did. We fill the position using a third party recruiter in two days, where it took us two months posting on LinkedIn, right? So even though that is the less expensive option and now that you said $15, no one’s going to hear anything else I’m not going to let that one go.

Even though it may seem cheaper to post on LinkedIn although that would still be $50,000 over two months But if you can fill the position in a week using a third party recruiter, even though you’re paying more, that may end up being better for the organization as a whole and saving money and increasing efficiency in a significant way. So you do have to measure all these things and then tie them together to really get the full picture.

Ricky Baez: 17:57
And also not just So. I would venture I would push people to go above and beyond that as well. Not just focus on how much it costs to bring somebody in, but the costs have to be built in to make sure people do their due diligence. The amount of time being spent on making sure that you’ve got the right person for the role, not just the right person to fill the role at that time, the right person for the role who’s going to stick around for a while, that takes time. So that takes time. So that has to be built in there as well.

We can’t just be looking to hiring as quickly as possible. We have to look at hiring as quickly, hiring the best person for the job as quickly as possible, that little sense of things to be in there to make sure, because otherwise you’re going to have a high 30-day turnover rate.

Pete Newsome: 18:43
Yeah, i mean, if you want that holistic view, you start with employees who last versus employees who quickly turnover. Now there’s a point and some period of time maybe it’s six months, maybe it’s even a few months of saying, okay, turnover is no longer tied to our hiring process. Retention is now in a different bucket, don’t you agree where I agree, there’s a point where the recruiting process can only impact that so much.

But you can impact short-term turnover in improving how you recruit. So that data point needs to be measured The number of candidates it takes to interview in order to select one. Because now, if you’re taking the time of your hiring team, it may involve executives, it may involve multiple hiring managers, multiple rounds of interviews, even at times. So now it’s okay. Do we have a breakdown in our selection process?

Are we interviewing too many of the wrong candidates? Are we screening too many bad applications for this job? Maybe your job, the way you’ve posted your job, isn’t really leading to the right results, and that’s once again. Maybe a third-party recruiter is in the mix. Are they delivering? How close to a one-to-one ratio?

Are they delivering from interviews or candidates they submit to those you choose to interview and of those you interview you choose to hire, so all of these come in. So, in addition to time to hire cost per hire source, we need to talk about the. You need to make sure you’re measuring the job acceptance rate as well as the short-term turnover, and I think that pains the picture.

Ricky Baez: 20:28
It would it would. So the job acceptance rate. can we talk about that for a second, because that one baffles me, pete. So job, how long it takes for somebody to accept a job, to me that’s a telltale sign, because to me, if you as a recruiter or you as the hiring authority, you got the person to be pay attention enough to stay through the entire process, what’s happening at the job offer that’s causing them to stop and think about it?

Aside from the number, because the number they get is different than the experience they got. They can get an amazing experience, but if it’s not the number they want, they’re not going to accept the job. So from my perspective, i guess my question is what happens in an interview process when you get somebody to interview all the way through, but now they kind of slow down during the acceptance process, and why is that so important?

Pete Newsome: 21:25
Okay, so there’s. I have to approach that from a couple of different ways. But first let’s just say that you can have all the analysis and gather all the data and try to improve it as best you can, but if your position is unattractive, you can’t fix that right. So if the organization, if you find that no one wants your job, you can’t fool the market. So you may have to consider whether you are paying too low, whether your expectations are unrealistic, whether your organization or the job within the organization is so unattractive that no one wants it, or your hiring process is too complex or lengthy.

All of these things could go into why you’re not getting a higher acceptance rate. So that’s one aspect of it. So make sure that if that is happening, you’re looking at really what the root of the problem is. Now I will also say that and by the way, i’ll say this time to hire is a huge factor in that If you’re dragging it out and the recruiting team internally is doing their job and then the hiring manager sits on the resume for a week or two, good luck, right.

There’s no recruiting organization that can fix that. So that’s something that I think you have to go up the chain with internally and make sure. But again, that’s where the data has to tell the story. So if you are that internal recruiting team and you’re getting heat for too many positions going unfilled and you have the data to show, yes, but we’ve sent 10 candidates and it took a week for the hiring manager to review and then another week to schedule and then another week to have that interview process carried out and then another week to have the offers being made.

We just had a month to it. And that is not uncommon and it happens a lot and there’s no reason for it, right? I mean there’s reasons, but they’re bad, so the excuse isn’t going to justify the outcome. The last thing I’ll say on that is if you are the third party recruiter, this is where you can really have an impact of understanding. If I’m doing my job as a third party recruiter, i’ve qualified the candidate through all of these things up front. I understand. Let’s say, there is a lengthy recruiting process.

Now I have to decide whether that’s something the market will bear and whether this is a job that I should take on, because if I don’t intend to work on any job, i won’t work on a job unless I will fill it as a third party recruiter. I can’t say I’m business. That way I can’t be effective. So I have to consider what is the interview process? Is it going to take a month? Alright. Well, now if it’s a great brand, a great job. Maybe that works.

If it’s a so-so brand and a so-so job, that probably isn’t going to work, not in a competitive market. And then I have to consider whether the candidate that I’m screening and qualifying I want to screen them all the way through the job offer up front. So if I’ve done my job, by the time I submit the candidate to you as my client, i already know that they’re a good fit. I already know that they’re going to interview.

Well, i already know that they’re interested and intend to accept the offer, provided something out of the blue doesn’t happen. So that’s where the value of a third party recruiter really comes in, where I’ve done all that up front before you ever see a resume from me.

Ricky Baez: 25:06
No, and it’s true. And another great reason why organizations should really pay attention to this kind of data is to help them realize, as me as a business owner, am I willing to spend so much time and effort on this as a recruiter versus I could just save some money, lend an expert handle of this and let me go with a third party agency who can take care of that.

Pete Newsome: 25:31
It all depends. Again, you have to know your organization, you have to know your skills and available resources and strengths and where you’re willing to spend time, and someone has to spend it somewhere. It’s just a matter of whether you want to do it or you want to pay someone else to do it. Take this oil change analogy. I could change the oil in my car right. I think I’m intelligent enough to do it, but I’m going to get greasy, i’m going to get my hands dirty, i’m not going to do it efficiently, i’m probably going to make a mess in the process. Or I could take it to someone who does this all day, every day. They’re really good at it.

Ricky Baez: 26:09
They’re efficient.

Pete Newsome: 26:11
They’re going to do it right and they’re going to identify problems, if there are any, of course I’m going to do that right. I mean, of course I don’t want to be pennywise and pound foolish when making these kind of decisions.

Ricky Baez: 26:21
That’s a great analogy right there. I like the oil change because, look, i can change my own oil in my own car. It’s going to be dirty. I’m going to feel crappy afterwards. Now I got to take the oil back to this place, so it’s me saving money. worth that kind of an aggravation, i guess.

Pete Newsome: 26:39
Well, and I would argue from that perspective, the data comes in right. I would argue you’re not saving money. So not to go too far with this analogy, but if you know your value, what is an hour of your time worth To go to the store to order the oil, to look up how to do it, if you don’t already know, to go through the process of doing it, and you add that up and then you compare that to the cost of going to you know, a I don’t know if it’s called retail, but a jiffy lube a place that changes your oil. I bet most people would be surprised or realize they’re not actually saving money doing it themselves.

Ricky Baez: 27:18
They’re not right. So, that works. Same thing here, then right. If you’re a business owner and you’re like, you know what? I just want to get the right candidate here and right now. And then I got my own people here that I can justify their payroll doing something for the business right now. Why not go that route?

Pete Newsome: 27:36
But if you and here’s the answer to that, and I think this is the most important point we can make today If you don’t know the data behind it and you’re just making a gut decision on this and you think, without knowing the numbers, i assume that $20,000 fee that the third party recruiter is charging is going to cost me more money.

But you may be very wrong, you may find out, and the $20,000 you’d spend is the savings over what you’re losing in revenue, over what you’re going to pay in internal resources and paying for your own job boards and all the inefficiencies that come with how you do it versus how that third party would do it. So don’t just look at the number on the surface, measure the data that goes into the number and then you’ll be equipped to make a smart financial decision.

There you go, but most won’t do it right. But there’s a way to do it. So how would you do it? Well, it starts with your applicant tracking system, so we’d be remiss if we didn’t talk about that. The ATS is the method, the software tool that you use to collect the data on your candidates, and today’s applicant tracking systems are equipped to measure everything we’ve talked about today, and then some. I mean they’re probably overkill in many respects. We’ll talk about ATSs on a different episode. Which ones have you used, by the way?

Ricky Baez: 28:59
I’ve used Brass Ring. Brass Ring is the one that I’ve used the most Brass Ring I think there was another one called TAS years ago, but Brass Ring is the one that has all those bills and whistles that you say that sometimes you’re like why, what are the might discovered that was great. I wasn’t using it for a while. Pete and people listening might love this.

So there was a measuring tool in Brass Ring that kind of told me how long people took to apply. I loved that. I ignored that for years and I loved that because I was able to pull information and get data on how long where in the process the people stop applying, came back later and, on average, how long they spend on it. Love Story short, i was able to figure out people would spend no more than 15 minutes in a job application. No more on on the data that I pull. Now This was 2018. I mean, i don’t know what it would, what it is now, since $15 per hire was $15 per hire, so I’m gonna think about the rest of that.

That is good information to grab, because if you have people that start your application and don’t finish, you’re missing out on great talent, because these are people who who have the skills that you’re looking for. They looked at your job but they didn’t want to waste any more of your time. You know who’s actually gonna see that through, people who are not horrible anywhere else, right there, because they know they don’t have any other options, so they’re gonna go through with it.

So that gave me a lot of good informations for us to redo our application process, to bring it down from 45 minutes to five, and That changed that whole product. It was amazing, amazing. So, folks, i’m telling you, your applicant tracking system. If you’re able to see time to apply in there, use that data. It will give you a lot of information but otherwise will not be In front of you the best.

Pete Newsome: 30:55
The best candidates have the lowest tolerance for those things.

Ricky Baez: 30:58
Oh There it is, the best candidates has the lowest tolerance for those things. They do it’s a hundred percent true, that’s and then you wonder why the people who apply they don’t, they don’t turn out to be good employees, because they’re the only ones Who apply you. You have built an invisible barrier where great people go somewhere else. Great people repellent, that’s what I’m gonna call it. There you go.

Pete Newsome: 31:23
It’s like like right like raid for It’s like raid for good candidates right or was that old Batman episode where they were like it’s Batman had the shark Repel.

Ricky Baez: 31:34
it’s our career, that’s right candidate repellent way off Great candidate repellent.

Pete Newsome: 31:41
There’s two. There’s two things you can count on. Every podcast We do, ricky, they coming up, food and superheroes have to be, have to be brought up. You got that right, but before before. So I think we’ve. I think we’ve covered this for the most part right. So just to recap What you need to do, you know the best thing you can do is start with An applicant tracking system where you can have a dashboard.

You identify what you need to measure, you commit to actually measuring it, find opportunities to improve and, you know, compare. That’s how you do it right. Here’s, here’s what we’re doing now And if you haven’t done this already, then start right. Of course, the best time to do it is yesterday Or five years ago, rather. What’s the, what’s the line? the best time is ten years ago. Whatever it is, the next best time is today.

So that’s right. Research your applicant tracking systems, figure out, talk to your peers if you’re in, if you’re in third-party recruiting, of course, lots, of, lots of resources and advice there. Maybe we’ll bring out on some, some ATS vendors to the podcast and let them. Let them pitch their own products. But Start with that. Create your dashboard and, once you start measuring your, your, your numbers, compare them to the past, look for opportunities, improve, to improve and share with relevant people. I mean, you can’t just give this to the recruiting team and say, look how you’re doing.

You have to use this to tell a story internally, to get buy-in for spending money, to get buy-in for making changes, and the leadership at the top. You may have trouble in between right mid-management Management struggles with these things because they’re busy, they’re consumed with other things. It may not have the same impact. But if you get this data to the top and you find out you know the chief executive or a CFO, whoever it is finds out that These positions are staying open just because you’re you’re not willing to spend money to fill them.

Okay, i mean, i’ll go back to what I always say if you’re content with the position remaining open it never should have been open in the first place That’s right. You don’t really need to fill that job. So one or the other you need to be there, be efficient and motivated to do it quickly, or Yeah, could reconsider whether the job was even needed.

Ricky Baez: 33:57
That’s right, and and if you continue to do this because I’ve seen that so many times, pete And you know how much money you’re wasting just continuing to recruit for position That’s not even needed right now. It’s that’s all of the show, sorry.

Pete Newsome: 34:09
So we won’t do that today. We won’t do that wrap up. Thank you for listening, ricky. This weekend You know what I’m doing It’s transformers weekend, so trans new transformers is opening. That’s this weekend It opens. So I’ll be there tomorrow night because the NBA’s tonight, so can’t go on my normal Friday.

Ricky Baez: 34:26
That’s it.

Pete Newsome: 34:27
But that’s it. That’s what I’m doing.

Ricky Baez: 34:30
I’m waiting for the, for the flash to follow a weekend and that looks good too, i’ll be there as well.

Pete Newsome: 34:35
So You know me, i have to go to my movies, so huh and you know me with with my state.

Ricky Baez: 34:41
So Pete is going to be back with an amazing review from transformers and I’m gonna let you know what kind of rabbi I had.

Pete Newsome: 34:47
That’s it. That’s it So predictable. Superheroes and movies. All right, ricky, have a great weekend and we’ll talk soon. Have a good one, bye.

How to Set Up an Effective Executive Recruitment Process

• Set expectations up front for everyone involved. Think through everything in advance, from when you are defining the ideal candidate to the new hire announcement.
• Establish your priorities and expectations for the role. Be meticulous and really clear on who you’re looking for. Determine what they will be doing, how success will be measured, what their day-to-day will look like, what their span of control is, and who their direct reports will be.
• Don’t forget about the “who” part of it. Identify the desired soft skills, leadership styles, approaches, past successes, and experiences you want as well. You must ensure these qualifications exist, as executive candidates will have a deeper, more widespread impact on your organization. The higher the role, the more influential a candidate needs to be in order to motivate people.
• Cast a wide net. Regarding senior leadership positions, fewer candidates will be qualified and a good fit. You must assess as many things as possible to paint the fullest picture possible.
• Consider a third-party firm. Executive roles require an intensive search, which takes a lot of time. You need the right network in the industry and may not have the resources to explore that. It won’t be as simple as posting a job ad on Indeed, this search will need to be performed in a much more proactive way.

Additional resources

• Executive Search Staffing Services
• Reasons Why You Should Hire an Executive Recruiter
• What is a Retained Search?
• Key Skills to Look for When Hiring a CEO
• Leadership Hiring Techniques to Build a Stronger Management Team

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome  00:01
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast, your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. 

Pete Newsome  00:06
I’m Pete Newsome with Ricky Baez again today, Ricky, how are you?

Ricky Baez  00:10
Pete? We should make a habit of this.

Pete Newsome  00:13
We should make a habit of this. We don’t already have a habit of this.

Ricky Baez  00:17
Oh, we do have a habit. But you know what? The first step is admitting we got a recording.

Pete Newsome  00:25
I think we’re there. I think we’re there. We can’t hide from it anymore. How are you today Ricky?

Ricky Baez  00:29
Doing good man doing really good.

Pete Newsome  00:31
You should be doing good. You’re about to head to Barcelona for vacation. 

Ricky Baez  00:35
I cannot wait to head to Barcelona. Hop on a Royal Caribbean ship be there for seven days, then I spent a couple of days in Barcelona. Come on back.

Pete Newsome  00:44
Oh, man, I am envious and look forward to hearing about it and hopefully see some pics while you’re there.

Ricky Baez  00:50
You’re gonna get millions of them to watch great.

Pete Newsome  00:52
Gonna rub it in and make me feel even worse being here grinding away.

Ricky Baez  00:57
Awesome. But that’s what I’m here for?

Pete Newsome  01:00
Well, let’s do what we can while we can to help anyone listening with today’s topic, which is how to conduct an executive search. 

Pete Newsome  01:10
So let’s talk about that. Are you ready?

Ricky Baez  01:12
Let’s do it. Let’s dive in.

Pete Newsome  01:14
So the executive recruiting process is not altogether different than searching for any other role. 

Pete Newsome  01:22
But there are some unique things when because when we’re, we’re talking about a position that is more unique.

Pete Newsome  01:28
The candidate pool is not as vast, you have to approach it a little bit differently, don’t you think?

Ricky Baez  01:35
I would you know, at first, when I was thinking about this, I thought what is the same thing because you had to identify who you’re looking for. 

Ricky Baez  01:41
You have to do all these things that resonate with the regular recruitment process. 

Ricky Baez  01:46
But then, as I thought about it more and more, Pete Yes, you do have to approach it differently. 

Ricky Baez  01:51
Because if you’re looking for an executive, this person is going to have a deeper, more widespread impact on the organization than somebody who’s not an executive. 

Ricky Baez  02:01
So you do have to be more particular about who you bring on board.

Pete Newsome  02:04
Yes, absolutely. So when we’re talking about executive search, we’re talking about senior leadership positions. 

Pete Newsome  02:09
And you know, there’s kind of fall into two categories. One is a new position that has been created from scratch, that happens a lot. 

Pete Newsome  02:18
growing companies times are evolving. I mean, let’s just look at AI right now. Right? I can see chief AI officer being up the position that exists in the not-too-distant future, can’t you?

Ricky Baez  02:30
Oh, absolutely. 15-20 years ago, a social media marketing specialist exist. So yeah, this could definitely be set in the near future. I’d say two years.

Pete Newsome  02:41
That’s right, I was actually asked by a chief marketing officer somewhere between 10 and 15 years ago to create an I don’t remember the exact title.

Pete Newsome  02:51
But it was a senior leadership position that reported directly to the CMO for digital content and social media. 

Pete Newsome  03:00
And that’s 15 years ago, somewhere between 10 and 15 years ago. 

Pete Newsome  03:04
And what was interesting about that role for us as a staffing company, a recruiting firm that we did not have, there was no job description that existed. 

Pete Newsome  03:13
So we had to write one from scratch. So that is the kind of thing that we get asked to do on a semi-regular basis. 

Pete Newsome  03:19
But the point is not all executive roles have a predecessor when they do. What’s also highly unique about executive roles is there’s often a big degree of confidentiality that needs to be considered. 

Pete Newsome  03:34
Because a lot of times these executive searches will take place while the person is still in the role. 

Pete Newsome  03:42
Who doesn’t know they’re being replaced, right? Or the organization for whatever reason may not want to communicate the message to the team.

Pete Newsome  03:50
If they know that a senior person is leaving either retiring or choosing to separate, mutual or otherwise from the company.

Pete Newsome  03:59
You may want to be able to announce the replacement at the same time you announce a departure that’s also very common.

Ricky Baez  04:08
Correct. It’s in me really, I’m curious about going down the creating the position route.

Ricky Baez  04:15
Because I love to talk, I love to take a deep dive into the reason why a team decides we need another executive here, or we need an executive here. 

Ricky Baez  04:27
So some of the things we’re going to talk about today. Yes. How do we find how do we conduct that executive search? 

Ricky Baez  04:32
But I’m really curious to find out what some of the are of the not robots but indicators that would tell an organization we need an executive we need another position in here and let’s get a company like 4 Corner Resources to do this for us.

Pete Newsome  04:47
Yeah, well, that look, those are the answers are, are limitless, I think depending on the organization. 

Pete Newsome  04:56
But let’s kind of back up before we get there and talk about it. Yeah, this process, what are some of the traits and characteristics that make it different than a regular search? 

Pete Newsome  05:05
And one of them, of course, is the length of time and level of effort, right? So those are two, let’s start with the length of time. 

Pete Newsome  05:13
On the surface, do think you think it takes longer than can conduct a search for a staff-level position,

Ricky Baez  05:21
I think it would take longer. And it will cost more money. Because if you, if you’re searching for a regular staff person.

Ricky Baez  05:28
I would venture to guess 80% of the search would happen in the local area, and 20% will happen outside.

Ricky Baez  05:35
Whereas executive search is more outside of the local area than not because you’re looking for a more specific niche skill set that the organization is going to need. 

Ricky Baez  05:44
And chances are, it’s going to be away from you. Yeah, you’re gonna have to cast a wide net.

Pete Newsome  05:50
You said, 8020, I think it’s probably more 95, you know, five when it comes to staff level roles, and every industry and company has its own. 

Pete Newsome  06:01
There are unique things, we know that but generally speaking, you’re 100% Correct. 

Pete Newsome  06:07
And once you get up as you go higher up the chain, there are fewer candidates who are qualified and a good fit. 

Pete Newsome  06:16
So I separate those because you can be qualified on paper, you can be qualified technically, from an experience standpoint, an education standpoint. 

Pete Newsome  06:24
But when you’re talking about an executive role, then then you have to make sure that the qualification exists in terms of who the person is soft skills, and a culture fit. 

Pete Newsome  06:34
That’s its own challenge when hiring an executive, but I’m 100% in agreement that you have to plan more time. 

Pete Newsome  06:44
And with that comes expense. Now, where does that expense come from? Let’s talk through that a little bit.

Ricky Baez  06:51
Well, I mean, before in the planning phase of any type of executive search effort, yeah, there has to be a budget, right? 

Ricky Baez  07:00
And that budget has to include, what markets are you going to advertise in and who you interview.

Ricky Baez  07:03
Are you going to fly them in to meet the rest of the staff, I mean, there’s a lot and you have to pay for that you as the organization. 

Ricky Baez  07:12
So that money has to be budgeted. And it’s you need a recruitment team that really knows how to be efficient in their processes so that we stay within budget.

Ricky Baez  07:21
Because the last thing you want to do is tell the executive leadership who’s leading this, this, this initiative, to say, Hey, boss, we’re out of budget, can we get some more money, nobody wants to hear that?

Pete Newsome  07:31
Oh, Ricky, you’re hurting my heart a little bit with that, because you didn’t even acknowledge that the organization may need to hire a third-party firm, like 4 Corner Resources or others, to conduct that search for them. 

Pete Newsome  07:46
And there’s, there’s, I think we know your stance that you’re the HR guy, that’s what you’re here for, to figure out how to hire those positions internally. 

Pete Newsome  07:57
But in reality, when it comes to an executive position, we know that in a lot of cases, it will make sense to hire a headhunter, a professional recruiting firm, that operates in many cases on a retained search agreement. And we’ll touch on that briefly. 

Pete Newsome  08:17
But the reason for that third party is that it is an intensive search, and it does take a lot of time. 

Pete Newsome  08:24
And depending on the size of your HR team, you may not have the resources to expand on that, because you’re really diving into a situation where you have to explore the industry.

Pete Newsome  08:40
You have to have the right network in the industry is not going to be as simple as posting a job ad on Indeed, that’s not how executive searches are typically conducted, you have to commit to going after it in a much more proactive way. 

Pete Newsome  08:56
And that’s what a third party can do. For a number of reasons. I mentioned the network in the industry knowledge and experience, but also a third party can be a lot more aggressive. 

Pete Newsome  09:07
And, and subtle. Where if confidentiality is an issue, and it often is, it’s hard to maintain confidentiality. 

Pete Newsome  09:17
When ABC Company is calling others to perform a search, you’re kinda gonna know who it is, if you’re if you are ABC Company, hiring for ABC company where the third party can maintain that confidentiality.

Pete Newsome  09:33
And a much more effective way that I convince you that I convince you that the value that we bring

Ricky Baez  09:41
with you there. So let me ask you this then because I know I’ve done a few of these and this was for local government, right? 

Ricky Baez  09:48
So for local government, we have to find a fire chief. Obviously, you cannot find a fire chief in the general area that’s looking for a desk so you got to go elsewhere. 

Ricky Baez  09:59
But I’m asking you directly peed. In your opinion, when conducting an executive search. 

Ricky Baez  10:07
The people are the candidates that the recruiter or the or search team is connecting to, what percentage of them the candidates already have a job versus people who are looking for a job? It’s very high.

Pete Newsome  10:21
Right? Yeah, 90% plus maybe maybe higher, I would assume that they almost that almost all of them will have a job. So the

Ricky Baez  10:33
skill set that the recruiting team needs to have, they need to have a really, really keen salesmanship strategy, to be able to talk somebody away from somewhere where they’re happier.

Ricky Baez  10:47
Because here’s what’s gonna happen, I’m eventually going to guess a recruiter would reach out to executives who are currently working somewhere else to see if they have any interest.

Ricky Baez  10:56
Whereas a regular staff, you put something out on LinkedIn, or, or, or indeed, and people who are unhappy with their job, I don’t have a job, I’m gonna jump on it. So it’s two different skill sets, I’m assuming

Pete Newsome  11:08
what you’re just you’re describing the post-and-prey approach to recruiting where you post a job ad and just wait for applicants to come in. 

Pete Newsome  11:17
And to your point, that is not a great way to approach executive recruiting, for many reasons. 

Pete Newsome  11:26
So, confidentiality is certainly out the window. Once you do that, too, you have to question who you’re going to attract that way for this executive role. 

Pete Newsome  11:36
Because if do you want passive candidates who were gainfully employed, not looking to thrive? Where they are? 

Pete Newsome  11:45
Ideally, yes, you do for an executive position. I mean, for any position, let’s be, let’s be honest. 

Pete Newsome  11:51
But we also know that that becomes it becomes a matter of practicality at some level, so you can’t recruit all your staff positions, just relying on passive candidates. 

Pete Newsome  12:04
That’s, that’s, I wouldn’t recommend that to anyone. But when it comes to your executives, you want to start there by default. Alright. 

Pete Newsome  12:11
I mean, you want to go steal for lack of a better way to put it from from others. 

Pete Newsome  12:17
And that’s another reason why a third party is often valuable in this scenario you don’t have the same considerations for professional courtesy. 

Pete Newsome  12:28
That company in the industry, even though they’re a competitor, there are certain things that you just ideally won’t do. And so pillaging your competitors. 

Pete Newsome  12:40
Executives may be bad form in some industries, some it’s not where they truly are true enemies, maybe in the way they go to market and conduct business. 

Pete Newsome  12:49
But it’s not subtle when you do it that way, that’s for sure. And it potentially shows signs of weakness or vulnerability within the organization. 

Pete Newsome  13:00
If your HR department is calling executives, at your competitors trying to recruit them, that maybe now maybe it’s a sign of growth and prosperity, but maybe it’s a sign of trouble on the homefront.

Ricky Baez  13:13
I mean, the way I look at it is if I call somebody, and I’m able to convince that person to come over to this side, then something wasn’t right with it to begin with. 

Ricky Baez  13:22
So what I tell people is make sure your employees are happy, because somebody else might dangle leaving, an even prettier carrot.

Pete Newsome  13:28
That’s right. 

Pete Newsome  13:29
Well, lucky you and I think our agreement on this is from the candidate’s perspective.

Pete Newsome  13:34
Every candidate every employee, other than those who have a contractual agreement that locks him into a period of time, you’re kind of a free agent, right? 

Pete Newsome  13:44
I mean, for all intents and purposes, you are all the time on the market. Right now. 

Pete Newsome  13:50
Some people will say I’m happy, not looking. And that’s great. We want those candidates, but I’m convinced, and I always I forever will be until proven otherwise that everyone will leave for something. 

Pete Newsome  14:04
Yeah, there is a job that everyone will leave for. So I even as the president and owner of my company, you know, I always say Bill Belichick calls and offers me the starring role. 

Pete Newsome  14:18
I’m out I’m comfy and I’ll be in Boston tomorrow.

Ricky Baez  14:25
I’ll he’s leaving to be a patriot.

Pete Newsome  14:27
Well, well, New England patriot, not just a patriot, but the starting quarterback for the Patriots.

Ricky Baez  14:32
I mean, let’s be frank. So the alarm goes off, and I gotta go to work.

Pete Newsome  14:36
That’s right. That’s right. So we don’t I don’t anticipate that call coming. I’ve given up on it. 

Pete Newsome  14:41
However, the point being we all have, we all have a dream job, and if we’re in it great, but, boy, I mean, you can always improve. 

Pete Newsome  14:51
So that’s a conversation maybe for a different show. But we know that proactive recruiting of gainfully happily ployed candidates is part of the executive search process. 

Pete Newsome  15:03
We know that. So that’s where the third party often comes into play, I said I’d touch on it. 

Pete Newsome  15:09
So just briefly, when it comes to retained search.

Pete Newsome  15:12
What we mean by that is engaging an organization to conduct a search on your behalf, were part you essentially pay them part of the fee, at the inception of the search, right to begin conducting the search. 

Pete Newsome  15:27
And the reason why you do that, for a senior level role, is because of the time that has to be invested in it. 

Pete Newsome  15:34
And so to initiate that search, it shows a deep commitment by the employer and a commitment by the third-party recruiter, the headhunter, if you will.

Pete Newsome  15:46
Who’s going to conduct that search, by having a true partnership on that not loose, contingency-based search where there’s really no obligation or commitment on either side? 

Pete Newsome  16:02
The retained agreement takes that to a different level and is often a very appropriate and effective way to conduct an executive search.

Ricky Baez  16:12
So I’m, I’m with you 100%, as well, with that piece, in the best way I can describe it because what I’m thinking about is what why would you if you could do it in-house, why would you go outside, here’s the best way I can describe it. 

Ricky Baez  16:27
Over the weekend, on Saturday, I was over at my in-law’s house trying to fix a light trying to replace some light bulbs. 

Ricky Baez  16:34
And I can do that, right? I’m a recruiter, I can do that I can fix these light bulbs. 

Ricky Baez  16:38
But as soon as the transformer that brings the electricity into the house goes away, I’m hiring a professional, because I don’t know the first thing about that, and I’m not gonna spend hours on YouTube trying to be a certified electrician. 

Ricky Baez  16:51
And I don’t want people to come to my funeral and say, wow, he was dabbling in something he shouldn’t have. 

Ricky Baez  16:58
You want to bring in an expert who’s done this and do this for a living, they are established in the industry, and they’re able to bring this to solve this problem for you in the most efficient way possible. 

Ricky Baez  17:13
So yeah, you have to draw that line and say, You know what, we can’t do that. Let’s bring somebody else in. 

Ricky Baez  17:18
Because quite frankly, again, it is a different beast thing, you know, this to recruit for an executive than that is for a regular employee just because of the effects they have on the organization.

Pete Newsome  17:29
Correct. So let’s talk about that recruiting process a little bit more, right? 

Pete Newsome  17:34
So what happens, is that whether you’re doing it in-house, or you engage with a third party, the effort is relatively the same. 

Pete Newsome  17:42
You know, the first thing you have to do is establish what your priorities are, what the expectations are for the role, and for the search. 

Pete Newsome  17:51
It’s a different consideration. If there’s, if it’s a replacement, maybe you already have an existing job description and detail, you know, what the role entails fully, perhaps you want to reconsider making some changes. 

Pete Newsome  18:07
But that’s, that’s the first step is fully understand the responsibilities of the role, who you’re looking for what they’re going to be doing. 

Pete Newsome  18:16
And, you know, get on the same page with anyone involved in the hiring and the recruiting process. That is, to me a must. 

Pete Newsome  18:24
And by the way, that applies to all recruiting efforts. You know, too often, the person, or group that creates the job description is not the same as the recruiter.

Pete Newsome  18:37
And is not the same as the hiring manager, and isn’t often not the same as the person who comes in at the end, and makes a final approval. Right? 

Pete Newsome  18:47
I mean, what a mess, it times like that. And that’s pretty common. 

Pete Newsome  18:52
And while you want to avoid that, always, you certainly want to make sure you cover all of that upfront with the executive’s search process.

Pete Newsome  19:02
Because the last thing you want to do is have someone in a senior role, realize that you are sloppy and unprepared in your recruiting effort.

Pete Newsome  19:13
They will lose confidence very quickly, and you’re going to lose great candidates through that.

Ricky Baez  19:16
No, that’s right. And so what you need to really think about from a recruiting perspective, right? 

Ricky Baez  19:23
It’s actually not from a client’s perspective, looking to hire an organization to do this is to be meticulous and be really, really, really clear on who you’re looking for. 

Ricky Baez  19:36
And that’s easier. 

Ricky Baez  19:37
That’s way easier to replace than it is to create a new position because if you if you’re replacing the JDS already done, Dr. Christian is already there. 

Ricky Baez  19:45
You can just have a conversation with the people who work with this person. But if you’re creating a position from scratch, that’s a whole different monster, right? 

Ricky Baez  19:54
Because a client can say, you know what, I need somebody to help me, but they may haven’t really figured out how they can help. 

Ricky Baez  20:02
So you just got to sit down and just write, like at the end of the day is this, if you’re the CEO trying to bring in a second in command, you got to sit down and write down all those things that you want. 

Ricky Baez  20:13
You don’t want to do as a CEO, that you can farm off to somebody else as an executive, so they can execute the strategies that you’re putting in place. 

Ricky Baez  20:20
But that’s a whole different monster. So, Pete, my question to you is, because I believe you have some experience in that, how do you what questions you ask a client? 

Ricky Baez  20:30
What kind of questions should a client be ready for? If they say, Pete, I need a secondary command. But I don’t have a job description.

Pete Newsome  20:38
Well, yeah, it’s a long conversation, right? I mean, that would be its own podcast episode, probably. 

Pete Newsome  20:46
But you, you want to know a lot of things, you want to know what the person is going to be doing, how success will be measured in the role.

Pete Newsome  20:58
What their day-to-day is going to be like, what their span of control is, with who their direct reports are. 

Pete Newsome  21:06
So everything, you know, a lot of what’s right, and then you need to look at the background that’s needed for that and make sure you’re on the same page with that. 

Pete Newsome  21:16
So it looks, look past it and look forward, right, and then understand how success will be measured. 

Pete Newsome  21:24
And the role that is a huge component of it. And then you really need to get deep with the WHO part of it. 

Pete Newsome  21:31
And that’s where you get into the soft skills, the leadership styles, the approach, the success and experience the person’s had. 

Pete Newsome  21:40
And where they had it in the type of environment they were in if they had only been with small organizations and moving to a big one, or vice versa. 

Pete Newsome  21:48
We see that a lot with commercial companies versus DoD companies, they don’t necessarily translate at times. 

Pete Newsome  21:57
So you have to consider as many things as you can to paint the fullest picture that you possibly can. 

Pete Newsome  22:06
And only then should you go forward in that search. And I’ll say one more time that that is really no different than a staff-level role. 

Pete Newsome  22:17
In a perfect world, there’s just more depth to it, when when it’s an executive position.

Pete Newsome  22:22
Because you really want to cover every possible detail and know that if you cover 100 points, there’s going to be 101 that you haven’t covered. 

Pete Newsome  22:31
So you have to be prepared for that, too. We know that, Ricky that you can never really cover everything up front.

Ricky Baez  22:39
No, you can. 

Ricky Baez  22:41
And you know what, and now that we’re talking because cuz you said it’s somewhat similar through staff, but when it comes to interviewing, I think that’s a little bit different, right? 

Ricky Baez  22:50
Because if you interview somebody coming in, and they’re the bottom, I hate to say it this way, the bottom of the totem pole right there at the beginning of their career.

Ricky Baez  22:59
You’re going to focus more on their skill set than anything else. Whereas the higher up you go in the chain of command that you’re interviewing for. 

Ricky Baez  23:08
So for example, now you got to see me directly you got a VP, you got executives, you as a recruiter are going to be less lot less focused on their skill set, their their technical skill set.

Ricky Baez  23:19
But more focused on their influence. Because the higher up you go, the more influential you need to be because you got to motivate people, right? 

Ricky Baez  23:28
You let the people deal with the technical stuff, you got to be able to resonate with them, you got to be able to motivate them, you got to ask completely different questions.

Pete Newsome  23:37
That’s right. 

Pete Newsome  23:37
And that’s where you get into it, again, the how they think how they operate their leadership style, where you’re not going to be as focused on those things, or even at all with staff level junior positions. 

Pete Newsome  23:50
So it really is about what you expect of the role. And making sure that the interviewing and screening are focused on those things as important as what’s on their resume. 

Pete Newsome  24:02
If not, I mean, I guess more important is really the better way to phrase it. Because you have to get to know the individual at a deep level. 

Pete Newsome  24:12
And so a lot of this is really what we’re talking about is setting expect expectations up front by all the people involved. 

Pete Newsome  24:18
I mean, that’s been it’s very consistent as we talk about executive search. And that then goes to once you define the role and who you’re looking for, then you need a recruiting plan for it. 

Pete Newsome  24:32
And where are you going to find this person, how you’re going to approach it? Those are their own considerations that require some in-depth, thought and consideration. 

Pete Newsome  24:45
And once again, making sure that everyone’s on the same page. And you don’t just go about this blindly. You take a very targeted approach to executive recruiting.

Ricky Baez  24:56
And this is why it’s crucial for all recruiters or leaders, and teachers. I always network, I know people get tired of us talking about this feed. 

Ricky Baez  25:04
But always, always network because if you’re working with an agency that has a wide network that has solid relationships.

Ricky Baez  25:12
You’re gonna end up betting on a much better client and easier process and getting that client, then either doing it on your own or working for an agency that just lollygags. 

Ricky Baez  25:21
So, yes, this is very crucial, because you really want to make it you can tell when somebody’s prepared when an agency is prepared, they got all the stuff together by what kind of questions they ask and how.

Ricky Baez  25:33
Because I’ve seen an agency that just here applies here, let me get this enough to find somebody for you. 

Ricky Baez  25:39
How we do here is different. We have conversations almost like we’re, you know what? We’re matched.com. They are Pete? 

Ricky Baez  25:47
That’s why we are trying to make people happy and match them together. What is eHarmony? 

Ricky Baez  25:52
The 12 different characteristics of getting people together? Do we have some of those, we got some characteristics. 

Pete Newsome  25:59
Ricky? I’ve been married for 26 years, I missed that. I missed that that whole boat, I’m not sure how those things work. 

Pete Newsome  26:09
And so I don’t know that I can buy off, I can sign off the on the comparison. 

Pete Newsome  26:15
So I’ll have to take it off, and take a pass on that. But okay, so we’ve set you know, you stablish it says a lot of work that has to be done before you make the first phone call. 

Pete Newsome  26:28
But then you go through it and you know you, you have to have a very well thought out strategy for then qualifying your candidate to and then knowing how to move them forward. 

Pete Newsome  26:42
So you don’t want to make up this interview process the screening and interviewing process as you go, you need to establish that very clearly up front and communicate that timeline to the candidate. 

Pete Newsome  26:53
And that is something that I recommend to every employer for every role that often gets looked past and ignored, which is to communicate all of this upfront to the candidate and set yourself up for success. 

Pete Newsome  27:08
Why? Well, if you have a fast time frame, and the candidate assumes it’s going to be longer, the timing may not work out, and you could lose a great candidate. 

Pete Newsome  27:18
Similarly, if you have a lengthy process, as you often will, with executive recruiting, you need to make sure the candidate knows so you don’t want to get any surprises along the way. 

Pete Newsome  27:28
That’s just one on one to me. But it’s often missed. It’s missed often. No. 

Ricky Baez  27:34
I see that all the time. That’s why I tell people, you’ve got to get a GPS for the candidate. 

Ricky Baez  27:39
There’s nothing worse than a candidate not knowing what to expect in the whole process. But if you as the recruiter can be the GPS for that person, let them know how many interviews are they going to do. 

Ricky Baez  27:48
What is the expected timeframe for this to be complete? And what happens if you don’t make it? 

Ricky Baez  27:54
What happens if you never select? What’s the process for that, that sends a huge message to all parties has been like, wow, this organization is prepared. 

Ricky Baez  28:03
And they’re professional. So that’s the message you want to send. So I agree with you 100%.

Pete Newsome  28:07
I’m really glad you brought that up because that is all also an often overlooked part of the recruiting process, which is you’re not going to hire all the candidates. 

Pete Newsome  28:16
So you need to give them the message. Let them down. We’ve talked about a lot that a lot on the podcast about how candidates should reply, or I’m sorry, react in that situation. 

Pete Newsome  28:26
But how the employer handles that situation is equally important. Because we have to be willing to take the time, especially with executives, to let them know why they’re, they’re not gonna be moving forward in the process. 

Pete Newsome  28:42
We’re not selected. Because it’s around the world, we know that things will come back. And just because you don’t hire someone today doesn’t mean they may not be a fit for a different position tomorrow. 

Pete Newsome  28:54
We know that too. So I’m glad you brought that up. It’s a key step in the process for sure. So then it comes to so let’s talk about drawn-out interview processes. Just real quick. 

Pete Newsome  29:06
I just want to touch on that. 60 seconds. Okay. Why do companies do that? 

Pete Newsome  29:10
Why did the company I just read an article yesterday that I think was in the Wall Street Journal, maybe it was on LinkedIn that was talking about how a candidate wasn’t selected after nine interviews. 

Pete Newsome  29:23
First of all, know who the hell is doing nine interviews, and what’s wrong with you? Right. I mean, that’s inexcusable. 

Pete Newsome  29:31
You should be you shouldn’t be allowed to be involved in the hiring process. If you need nine interviews, what is the max number you think is acceptable to put a candidate through?

Ricky Baez  29:41
Wow. On average, on average, it should take two buttons, no more than three, no more than three. 

Ricky Baez  29:53
I’ve been employed by organizations that take six interviews. And my question to them is what can You possibly find out in interview six that you couldn’t get out of interview three? 

Ricky Baez  30:04
I mean, you’re wasting everybody’s time here. 

Ricky Baez  30:07
But they still wanted it that way. I think two, three, the max no more than three anything outside of that somebody’s doing something wrong in the process because how could you not make a decision by that point?

Pete Newsome  30:18
Yeah. And if you if, for whatever reason you’ve decided you have to have a lot of people involved in the decision, then do it at once.

Pete Newsome  30:27
Get the candidate together, get them, get them all in the same room, and get them on the same Zoom if you’re doing some of these virtually. 

Pete Newsome  30:34
But don’t, don’t put someone through that kind of time. And don’t spend your own time and resources. 

Pete Newsome  30:39
Go back and figure out why you need it. Why do you think you need it, and then reconsider? And you’ll probably find out to your point, you’re asking the same things over and over again, this is not a jury trial. 

Pete Newsome  30:51
It is an interview. Don’t grill someone don’t make don’t waste time. Stop wasting so much time. That’s ridiculous. Yeah, on

Ricky Baez  30:59
the Wall Street Journal article. The person went through nine.

Pete Newsome  31:03
I think it was on LinkedIn yesterday. I think that’s where I saw it. Yeah. I’ll, we’ll link it. We’ll link it in the show notes. 

Ricky Baez  31:11
That’s interesting. Yeah, no, three, three should be the max anything above and beyond that, to me is a red flag. 

Ricky Baez  31:19
Now it’s I get it, I get it from corporate America side, you may have some other people who are prudent to this comp to this interview that may not have the time. 

Ricky Baez  31:28
So my pushback is, okay, how important this is for you? We don’t want to lose this candidate. 

Ricky Baez  31:34
I would love for you to be involved in the interview panel early enough, especially if this is a great candidate because we don’t want to call this candidate and say, hey, well, it. 

Ricky Baez  31:46
Congratulations, you made it to the next step. Here is your ninth interview. Now they say you know what, I’m tired of this, and they will leave, you’re going to lose great candidates.

Ricky Baez  31:54
Because the candidates with the awesome credentials, you’re going to want are not going to have the patience for that, you know, who will have the patience for that the candidates who nobody wants. That’s right.

Pete Newsome  32:04
That’s exactly it. That’s exactly it. And they’re gonna harbor bad feelings about you, for sure. If they’re not selected, and even if they are, they’re gonna, they’re going to grow skeptical of you along the way. 

Pete Newsome  32:15
I mean, that’s not going to probably make anyone feel better and more confident about your organization. 

Pete Newsome  32:21
If you keep calling them back, I mean, just it’s a bad idea. But if you insist on doing that, and you think that nine or are necessary, or even four or five, be sure to communicate that upfront.

Pete Newsome  32:34
Set the expectation, that’s, that’s the most important thing. And then go back and review your processes.

Ricky Baez  32:41
Eject themselves before you started. That’s right. That’s right. Yeah, pretty much.

Pete Newsome  32:46
So you extend the offer. Every organization has its own way of doing that. And then you announce it to your team. 

Pete Newsome  32:54
And that’s that is something to be celebrated and done unconsciously with foresight, when you’re bringing on an executive, you want to set that person up for success to be brought in the best possible way. 

Pete Newsome  33:09
Depending on the situation, it may shake up some things within the organization, but it often does. Any tips or thoughts that you have on announcing a new executive hire,

Ricky Baez  33:19
I do, there are two different types of announcements, right? 

Ricky Baez  33:22
Because if you’re replacing someone, not now remember, we’re not talking like just an average employee, we’re talking about somebody a VIP, per se, who has a lot of visibility, and will have a lot of impact in the organization. 

Ricky Baez  33:34
So how you deliver this message is crucial, especially if you’re a publicly traded company.

Ricky Baez  33:39
If you mess up the communication with the employees, if you do it wrong, if you make a mistake, you could send some vibes out there to Wall Street about instability and leadership. 

Ricky Baez  33:50
So you got to be careful with that. It’s so number one, if you are replacing somebody, let’s make sure we talk about the exit story of one person wishing them well. 

Ricky Baez  33:59
And including this new person and how the organization is going to change. It’s got to be positive. 

Ricky Baez  34:05
The second one is, if this is a brand new position, you might want to start talking about the exciting news of adding this new person to this new role that’s going to make the world just that much better. 

Ricky Baez  34:17
You’ve got to be able to have a positive tone to it. I’m not gonna say spin, but a positive tone to it so people can welcome this person with open arms, especially somebody high up there.

Pete Newsome  34:28
I love it. Yeah, I think I think that’s perfect, Ricky and that’s, that’s a great way to wrap this up. 

Pete Newsome  34:35
In all of this, I think if there’s a theme to what we’ve talked about, think through everything in advance from beginning to end from the time you are defining who and what this person is going to be doing. 

Pete Newsome  34:49
All the way through the announcement. If you do that you’re setting yourself up for a successful executive search process and when you need help, ask for it. 4 Corner Resources. 

Pete Newsome  35:00
And if we’re not the right fit for you, we’ll point you in the right direction and tell you who it is. Because look, I mean, we don’t want to take on jobs that we’re not a good fit for either. 

Pete Newsome  35:10
And depending on the industry and the role there, there may be someone who is better qualified, not in how they go about recruiting. 

Pete Newsome  35:20
Of course, I would never say that but in that particular niche, so ask for help if you need it. executive positions, just like any recruiting is not easy. 

Pete Newsome  35:30
It requires its own special skills and experience. So don’t hesitate to reach out if we can help guide you in the right direction. Otherwise, Ricky, that’s all I have for today.

Ricky Baez  35:40
Excellent. Well, thank you very much, Pete. I hope you have an awesome week.

Pete Newsome  35:45
I hope you do too, ending in Barcelona. Before we are live again or recording again. So look forward to hearing all about it next time, Ricky. Thanks so much.

Ricky Baez  35:55
Have a good one, folks. Ride safe. Good night.

Tips for Remote Workforce Management

• Embrace technology. Pay attention to the tools available and incorporate them into your workflow. Utilize tools like Slack to increase efficient and effective communication. 
• Take the time to communicate about things that aren’t work-related. Do it appropriately, but have a little fun with it on occasion. If it’s all business all the time, that would be depressing.
• Recognize accomplishments. Call out wins and give feedback when necessary. Make employees feel like they belong as part of the team and let them know that they matter.
• Create policies and share them. Communicate dress code and office environment expectations, don’t make assumptions.
• Pull all the stops during onboarding. Make sure you’ve got the right processes in place to do it virtually, and make it as humanistic as possible. Ensuring new employees get off to a good start is key.

Additional resources

• Tips for Building a High-Performing Remote Team
• How to Engage Employees When Working Remotely
• Tools and Resources You Can Use to Manage a Remote Workforce
• Everything You Need to Know About Virtual Team Building
• Remote Staffing Services

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome  00:01
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast, your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. 

Pete Newsome  00:06
I’m Pete Newsome joined again by Ricky Baez. Ricky, how are you on this beautiful morning?

Ricky Baez  00:11
Halfway through 2023. Pete, is your Christmas tree still up?

Pete Newsome  00:15
No, it’s not yours I hope not.

Ricky Baez  00:20
Okay, here’s the secret. You’re ready. I took mine down. About a month ago. I bought it a month ago. That’s it.

Pete Newsome  00:28
I’m sorry for your neighbors. Their Christmas lights up, too. Are you that? Are you that guy? You’re that one?

Ricky Baez  00:34
No, no, no. So here’s the thing, like the lights that come off around the beginning of February. I’m Puerto Rican, we celebrate Three Kings Day. 

Ricky Baez  00:42
So but inside my house, as I’ve been to Tennessee, there’s this place that just celebrates Christmas all year round. I love Christmas. 

Ricky Baez  00:50
So it was really a hard time to take that tree down. So yeah, last month is when we did.

Pete Newsome  00:54
Christmas in May. Okay, fair enough. We’re not quite July, you’re off the hook.

Pete Newsome  01:00
But today, Ricky, we are talking about the best practices for managing a remote workforce, something that is on a lot of companies’ minds these days. Pretty big deal. In 2023.

Ricky Baez  01:13
Yeah, well, I mean, three years into it. It’s the remote workforce management aspect is nothing new for us. 

Ricky Baez  01:21
But it is something new for everybody came, you know, come 2020 In March, in March of 2020. 

Ricky Baez  01:29
So this is something that whether people were ready or not, they were thrust into that. So it’s good that we’re talking about this right now.

Pete Newsome  01:36
They were thrust into it. And they’re to stay right. You can’t get out of it, whether you want to or not. 

Pete Newsome  01:43
And that is a different show, of course, because we know that. 

Pete Newsome  01:47
That’s also a big struggle right now, where companies are, I think companies if they felt it would it was working well, and that they could manage their workforce effectively. 

Pete Newsome  01:59
And productively. Right. That’s a big, big piece of this, you think they’d be inclined to stick with it? 

Pete Newsome  02:05
Because there are inherent cost savings as we know. 

Pete Newsome  02:09
And employee satisfaction increases, which we also know.

Pete Newsome  02:12
I just read a study a couple of days ago, that is saying that the majority of college students now coming out into the workforce, expect to be able to work from home. 

Pete Newsome  02:23
And that’s shocking, really, I mean, it’s not shocking given where we are in this evolution. 

Pete Newsome  02:30
But imagine that three years ago, well, four years ago, imagine that stat it wouldn’t know a college student would have expected to work at home that it had been less than 1%. Probably.

Ricky Baez  02:43
I agree with that. 

Ricky Baez  02:44
Now, even before I was an HR, I did have a job where I did work from home, we had a work-from-home process.

Ricky Baez  02:51
But that was I like you said, I made up a small percentage of the US population that actually worked from home versus right now. 

Ricky Baez  03:00
Exactly. Look, I’m a professor as well, you know, part-time at night. 

Ricky Baez  03:03
And I do see some college students that have that, that that expectation, and you should think Pete, I feel bad for people who have that expectation. 

Ricky Baez  03:12
This is just me. I feel bad. Because Don’t you miss the whole office environment?

Pete Newsome  03:19
Um, we’re recording this. So I’m going to say yes, I miss it a lot. Um, no, I don’t I don’t I miss some aspects of it. But as a whole? 

Pete Newsome  03:36
No, I think there are so many conveniences that come with working at home. I just enjoy it. I have to, I have to be transparent with that. 

Pete Newsome  03:47
And I do see that there are pros and cons to it. And as I’ve expressed to you before, I’m concerned about young professionals, who don’t get the chance to build their own networks and learn from more senior people. 

Pete Newsome  04:03
And there’s a downside to that as well as being isolated at home. For those who may live alone or just with a roommate. 

Pete Newsome  04:12
You need human interaction, I get a lot of human interaction. already. I do have a large network. 

Pete Newsome  04:19
I’ve been in the professional workforce for more than two decades, and I have a very full house with four kids. 

Pete Newsome  04:26
They’re not all here anymore, unfortunately. But I’m not someone who needs to go find a human interaction. It comes to me whether I want it or not. 

Pete Newsome  04:37
So that is one thing. But for those who are younger, I do worry about it. Do you think that’s a valid concern?

Ricky Baez  04:49
I do because it’s we just prove that it’s we’re two different individuals and we have different points of view on it. 

Ricky Baez  04:55
And there’s a huge chance that organizations today are going to hire this This exact type of employees that we’re talking about right now, some people who do light work from home some people who do not like rift, who do not like to work from home. 

Ricky Baez  05:09
So that’s why I’m glad we’re talking about this because from a leadership perspective, how do you manage that? 

Ricky Baez  05:14
Because if you pick one over the other, you run the risk of alienating an entire side, an entire percentage of the workforce. 

Ricky Baez  05:21
So from a management perspective, how do you make everybody happy?

Pete Newsome  05:25
Well, you can’t, right? We know that that’s an issue that probably shouldn’t be anyone’s objective or goal because you’re going to fail. 

Pete Newsome  05:34
And if you took a poll, just by asking the question, I think you’re getting yourself in trouble, right? 

Pete Newsome  05:41
Because if it and that’s something I’ve learned over the years with good intentions.

Pete Newsome  05:45
And we know what happens with good intentions, were those lead, if you ask if those who answer one way and don’t get their way, right, they say I want to work at home and you say, well, everyone’s coming back to the office there, they’re not going to be happy in that scenario. 

Pete Newsome  06:00
So better not to ask at all. But you do want to consider all of the pros and cons. So let’s talk about those for a little bit. 

Pete Newsome  06:08
So from a management perspective, let’s focus on that I can go I think we everyone talks about the employees, and we know where employees stand with us. 

Pete Newsome  06:16
But from a management perspective, what are the pros of a remote workforce, I’ll start with cost savings. 

Pete Newsome  06:23
Okay, enormous cost savings in terms of physical office space, which is expensive for many companies, that is their second largest expense after they’re after payroll that can go away, can go away. I mean, that’s a big, that’s a big pro.

Ricky Baez  06:43
Yeah, so I agree with that. 100%. 

Ricky Baez  06:47
Another pro, that I see from a management perspective is now this is just from my point of view, I like the idea of giving employees, the flexibility, of war of picking where they can work with they’re comfortable, right? 

Ricky Baez  07:05
So that’s just from my perspective because I get, I get the cost-saving piece, right? 

Ricky Baez  07:11
And I also understand that I want to make sure that my employees have everything they need, so they can be successful in their roles. 

Ricky Baez  07:17
So I think this is part of it, if you give somebody that kind of flexibility, and that kind of trust because, at the end of the day, it does involve some kind of trust. 

Ricky Baez  07:27
I like the idea of giving the employees that kind of environment so they can thrive. 

Ricky Baez  07:32
And now understandably so, that is something that not every employee likes, because a con to this, Pete, a con is that if you as a leader, are managing an entire team that’s virtual, the risk you run is there is a loss of humanity. 

Ricky Baez  07:51
There’s a loss of human touch out there, that I think leaders have to make up, make up in some other form or fashion that where the employee feels like they’re part of a team. 

Ricky Baez  08:01
What do you think?

Pete Newsome  08:02
Are they I think that is a must, you need to do that. That’s part of the so that’s a con. Right? 

Pete Newsome  08:11
That has to be considered, you have to think about it. And that’s hard, right? Because we’re creating, or having to create new habits that didn’t previously exist. 

Pete Newsome  08:22
But let’s stick with the pros for Matt, because you, you you touched on the ability to work anywhere, I think. 

Pete Newsome  08:28
And so we know the benefit of that again, for the employee. But from a management perspective, there are real concerns that come with that. 

Pete Newsome  08:37
So while it’s a pro, in I think of it as a pro or to expand your workforce, or I’m sorry, your candidate pool, right? 

Pete Newsome  08:47
You can now you’re no longer limited to hiring from your local geography, you can hire potentially, any corner of the globe. 

Pete Newsome  08:55
An interesting phrase, since a globe is round unless you’re, you’re not a flat earther. Are you? 

Ricky Baez  09:05
No. Okay. Would have been an interesting turn of events for this podcast. If I would have said yes.

Pete Newsome  09:10
We’d have to create a new one entirely new podcast. But, you know, if you so that is that’s a great thing. 

Pete Newsome  09:20
I mean, indisputably I think, but where are your employees actually going to sit brings up a potential con along with it. 

Pete Newsome  09:30
Now, I’ll say I don’t know if I’ve told you about this, but 4 Corner Resources has a relationship that we’ve established with a company called active comply. 

Pete Newsome  09:42
And what they do is a remote employee assessment that allows employers to know where they’re to confirm where their remote employees are sitting, right based on their IP address and their geolocation. 

Pete Newsome  09:58
They have the ability to Put all of about seven different things in a custom report. Internet speeds, even the ability to ensure that your employee is, is working in a private location with your camera, right? 

Pete Newsome  10:14
They have active compliance gives employers an extra level of security and confidence that their remote employees are where they’re supposed to be working in a safe environment. 

Pete Newsome  10:28
If you just think about the potential risk, right? If I tell my employee, you can work anywhere, and we do tell our employees that.

Pete Newsome  10:36
But if you’re in an industry where employees type in confidential information onto their, onto their computer, and they’re sitting in a Starbucks doing it was thinking about that, right?

Pete Newsome  10:48
Someone needs to be well, that’s the solution that active compliance, has created. 

Pete Newsome  10:53
So it can be used for pre-employment, where the only staffing company for corner resources, the only staffing company in the country, that is offering that with pre-employment.

Pete Newsome  11:03
Just like a drug test, or a background check, where we can verify that the remote employee is where they say they are and in a location that is, is safe and private. 

Pete Newsome  11:16
So those kinds of considerations weren’t something that wasn’t something anyone’s thinking about in the not-too-distant past. And now it’s a must. 

Pete Newsome  11:24
So really excited to have the partnership with Active Compliance, because these guys are yeah, they’re trailblazers in this space. So would you have thought of something like that even a couple of years ago?

Ricky Baez  11:39
Absolutely. As a matter of fact, once we’re done here, I’m gonna look them up, I want to see the existing pre-pandemic, this seems like something that was spawned. 

Ricky Baez  11:47
Now, obviously, there are organizations that always had people working from home even before the pandemic. 

Ricky Baez  11:53
But now that that happened, it must have come like Zoom and mostly shot up their stock like 3,000%. 

Pete Newsome  12:02
Let’s just say the company hasn’t been around that long, right? So this is, you know, they’re innovators in this space. 

Pete Newsome  12:08
And they are, it’s not a coincidence that they’ve come to market recently. But I love the solution. I’m really excited that we’re able to offer it but back on track back on track to the remote employee. 

Pete Newsome  12:22
So that is something that does have to be considered as a potential risk for you as a business. 

Pete Newsome  12:29
But what are the other pros, can you think of any, other so expanded candidate pool cost savings?

Pete Newsome  12:37
And by the way, I meant I said rent, I didn’t even talk about furniture, and the other things that go along with being in an office, I mean, that’s expenses really add up, and trust me, I’m paying for an empty office right now. I know.

Ricky Baez  12:49
And I’m sure that hurts, I get it. 

Ricky Baez  12:54
But you know what, you’re doing it right p because you’re letting people pick where they get to work so long as they perform and that’s what you know, it’s that’s an expectation across any for-profit organization in the nation. 

Ricky Baez  13:06
So, let me throw this one in there. Because you said something earlier about it expanding from a recruitment perspective. 

Ricky Baez  13:13
It expands your recruiting canvas, and I agree with that, that’s a pro now it can easily become a con if I gotta throw my HR stuff in there, man. 

Ricky Baez  13:25
If HR does not partner with these initiatives, you can’t just open up the border. 

Pete Newsome  13:35
Hey, now I need a little we need a little laugh track with that right now. Ricky? Hold on. 

Pete Newsome  13:43
Okay, did you beat me to it? Okay. I was gonna play. I was gonna go with this one. Oh, mine’s not working. Alright, you’re the pro there.

Ricky Baez  13:56
It’s if you open up that recruiting Canvas, you got to be strategic about it, right? 

Ricky Baez  14:02
Because you don’t want to have all your employees. All of a sudden they moved to San Francisco, California, nothing against San Francisco, California. 

Ricky Baez  14:09
But if you’re in HR, you know, California is a beast of his own. 

Pete Newsome  14:13
Okay, Ricky, first of all, no one’s moving to San Francisco, California. And secondly, yes, you’re right. 

Pete Newsome  14:19
That is a great consideration to bring up given. I want to interrupt. I’ll let you finish your thought. But I’m really glad you brought that you’re bringing this up.

Ricky Baez  14:29
Right, you’re right, wherever they happen over there. I got I’m sorry, San Francisco ins. Is that what they call San Francisco let’s just go with that. 

Ricky Baez  14:36
Yeah, San Francisco. It does not look, it’s you want to partner with HR because you want to make sure from a business perspective that are you doing. You’re being fiscally responsible with your recruiting efforts. 

Ricky Baez  14:49
You want to go into a state that does not have a lot of burden on the employer sick pay all those things. 

Ricky Baez  14:54
If you’re in the restaurant business, if you go to Washington State, their minimum wage for service is like For $13 An hour plus the tips versus everywhere else 13. 

Pete Newsome  15:04
I didn’t know that. So it’s an entirely different model than the rest of the country on how servers are paid for it.

Ricky Baez  15:09
And I know that because I used to work for DOD and restaurants. And we had a lot of issues with that. And that created some PML of concerns for the leadership over there. 

Ricky Baez  15:18
But yeah, it’s, it’s crazy, but everywhere else, it’s you can’t just blindly say, Yeah, I’m just gonna move over to New York, or Connecticut, or that tri-state area, or the highest tax state in the land, Pennsylvania. 

Ricky Baez  15:34
So from a from a work, it’s come from a fiscal perspective, let’s be strategic about when you open up that recruiting landscape.

Pete Newsome  15:42
And you think that companies find this out very quickly. 

Pete Newsome  15:47
But I don’t know if companies who operate just in a single state realize how, how different the laws are from state to state in terms of employer obligations for what they have to provide employees. 

Pete Newsome  16:04
And California I think, is the worst by far. In terms of, we’re in Florida, and so different, so different. So your employer burden, your cost of payroll is infinitely higher? 

Pete Newsome  16:22
Well, it’s not infinitely higher. It’s it, there is a limit to it. But it’s a high limit. And it like you mentioned with the Washington State, restaurant, payroll, the way that that’s different. It’s, it’s an entirely different list of considerations. 

Pete Newsome  16:40
So, I’m glad you brought it up, because that can be a pro, but it can also be a con. 

Pete Newsome  16:46
And I think it’ll be interesting to see how that affects state laws over the years to come because companies aren’t stupid. 

Pete Newsome  16:56
I mean, if it’s costing you 25% more to have an employee on your payroll in one state versus another. 

Pete Newsome  17:03
Why would you do it, then? Now, let me ask you an HR question on this. Is there any? You know, that’s clearly the state you live in is not a protected class? Right. 

Pete Newsome  17:14
So could that be considered discrimination? Have there been has that been challenged in court where an employee could say, they didn’t hire me because of where I live?

Ricky Baez  17:26
from a state perspective, I’ve never seen one. I’ve, I have never seen one so I would not venture to guess that there will be any kind of a lawsuit. I mean, again, I don’t know what I don’t know. 

Ricky Baez  17:38
But where somebody claimed discrimination because of a state. Now, a zip code, that’s different zip code that’s different. 

Ricky Baez  17:46
Because if you say, I do not want to recruit from this specific zip code, and that specific zip code has a protected class that’s predominantly more than another class, then you might run into an unintended discrimination issue there, which can get you. Again, that’s just zip codes. 

Ricky Baez  18:06
When it comes to the state. I mean, that cities are different towns or counties in a state? 

Ricky Baez  18:10
I don’t think that that’s a possibility. But if you say, I’m not going to recruit out of that area that can come back and bite you. Yeah, of course. Different micro level, not a macro level. 

Ricky Baez  18:22
Okay, so I’m selling attorney, by the way, one everybody to know, I am not an attorney. And everything I’m saying it’s just based on my experience alone. How to throw that out there? 

Pete Newsome  18:32
Got it. Fair enough. Alright. Not an attorney, not financial advice. Okay. So any other pros you can think of for removing one?

Ricky Baez  18:43
There, they’re all the pros I can think of, to be honest, for the employee. I don’t know why I can’t think of a pro for the manager above and beyond.

Pete Newsome  18:53
Well, look, I mean, the cost savings alone is huge. I mean, that’s, that’s big enough. 

Pete Newsome  18:58
And the candidate pool, I mean, those two things. That’s plenty. Those are enough pros, because those are, those are historical, big struggles that companies deal with that can’t find the candidates they need. 

Pete Newsome  19:11
And they have a limited candidate pool, depending on the specialty and in the business that they’re in. 

Pete Newsome  19:16
And then, of course, expenses, right? Every company wants to lower expenses. Now the cons. If we move on to those now, you have to start something real quick.

Ricky Baez  19:25
I’m about to ask you a question that I don’t think you’re gonna see coming. 

Ricky Baez  19:31
If a pro is it’s cost savings, and that is music to the ears of CFOs of profile for-profit organizations. 

Ricky Baez  19:44
Why are we having so many issues with leaders wanting to bring people back into the office? 

Pete Newsome  19:52
Now we’re on to the cons, right? You have to balance you have to balance that you know, and so the cons are employee pride. activity. 

Pete Newsome  20:01
And it’s kind of funny to me that you see studies talking about how productivity is increased. Yeah, well, they’re all produced by the employees. 

Ricky Baez  20:16
We know that’s not relevant.

Pete Newsome  20:18
But it can, right, I’m not necessarily going to take a stance on that, because I think it is so much about the individual. But that’s part of the consideration. 

Pete Newsome  20:28
My experience has taught me that for one individual, there are almost two types of workers, right, there are those who need supervision, they need direction, and they need to be in a structured environment. 

Pete Newsome  20:43
And then there are those who don’t. And so the ones who don’t are going to thrive remotely just as if they would thrive in the office, but the ones who do are going to be fish out of water.

Pete Newsome  20:54
And that situation, and that is not an indictment on those individuals. It’s just about human nature, and, and their personality type who they are. 

Pete Newsome  21:04
And it’s just, I don’t think anyone would dispute that it sounds like a knock on those individuals, but it’s true. 

Pete Newsome  21:11
And so there are competent depending on your workforce, you may find that your employees aren’t as productive in the office.

Pete Newsome  21:20
You may find things like communication, and training, there was a guy, how Gosh, he was an executive, in some large organization, I just saw a quick video clip on Twitter a couple of days ago, where he was making the case that creative creativity is going to lack right.

Pete Newsome  21:37
You’re not going to have good business ideas that just materialized with people sitting around the same conference table. Now I challenged and questioned that. 

Pete Newsome  21:47
Because I think creative creativity generally comes in moments where you have time to think not where a bunch of people are talking together. 

Pete Newsome  21:58
I mean, that’s just not where I’m most creative. But maybe that’s again, maybe that’s just me. 

Pete Newsome  22:04
So the cons are, is your business going to suffer? Because you have a remote workforce? And if and that’s going to be yes, in some cases, I think.

Ricky Baez  22:16
I think it depends on the business, though, right? It really depends on the business and what kind of plan and structure you put in place to be ready for it. 

Ricky Baez  22:25
You can’t just wake up one day and say I everybody’s remote out. That’s what happened in March 2020. 

Ricky Baez  22:30
But the companies who transition from working in an office to a remote workforce back in March of 2020, the companies who plan appropriately and did it right, laid out a really good fun this year. 

Ricky Baez  22:37
So the organization that is still thriving with that model today. I mean, that that, that that’s a no-brainer.

Pete Newsome  22:50
So let’s talk about that. Yeah, but one more con for me is training and development. I think that that is something that’s better done in person in a perfect scenario.

Ricky Baez  23:01
I agree with that. Although although they are it’s every month that goes by there’s a new app.

Ricky Baez  23:07
There’s a new widget that comes out that makes training virtually just that much more exciting. 

Ricky Baez  23:14
I mean, look it. We talked about this a few years ago, the metaverse is going to be big in training here in about 10 years, right?

Ricky Baez  23:22
 Because we haven’t talked about the metaverse in a while. But that that was happening right now it’s going to set the stage to have a virtual reality type of training like we’ve never seen before. 

Ricky Baez  23:32
And I know that’s not what we’re talking about right now. But when it comes to virtual reality, when it comes to AI, I know we’re going to talk about that later on. 

Ricky Baez  23:40
That’s going to change a lot of things that are going to make working remotely, that much more comfortable than what it was 5-10 years ago. 

Ricky Baez  23:50
But how we get there, organizations just need to make sure that they set up the right process in place because otherwise, that cost is going to be a big one than training and development. Pete, I’m the first one to tell you, I hate boring training programs. 

Ricky Baez  24:05
And if you tell me I gotta go to training. And the person kind of talks like this, like Siri, you lost me before.

Pete Newsome  24:12
So yeah. It’s interesting that you would say that because I agree. I think everyone would most people would, you know, sitting it sounds like if it feels like school, then who likes that? 

Pete Newsome  24:24
Right? No one likes school. Yeah, no way. 

Pete Newsome  24:26
So but I think of training more of just proximity to seeing your experience people where our employee doesn’t get the benefit of overhearing a conversation or having someone overhear their conversation and jump in and say, Hey, here’s a better way to say it. 

Pete Newsome  24:47
Here’s a different way to approach this scenario. Those things happen all day, every day in the office. 

Pete Newsome  24:53
And now those are taken out of the equation and I do see that as a detriment for both the business and The individual and their development because it everything now has to be planned and done with a purpose in mind versus just happening. 

Pete Newsome  25:12
And while I, so that’s the segue into this, is let’s talk about how to plan, but you can’t plan for it, everything, you can’t account for those little hallway conversations. 

Pete Newsome  25:25
And like I said, overheard conversations that are going to happen, someone dropping in I mean, our new employees, now I don’t have the chance to build rapport with them.

Pete Newsome  25:36
I don’t have the chance to develop a relationship with them to run into them and in the hallway, so to speak, and just get to know them individually, and vice versa. 

Pete Newsome  25:45
So I can guarantee that the perspective that they have about me is different than the perspective they would have. If we were in the office, and vice versa. So that’s you, I don’t think you can replicate it. 

Ricky Baez  26:03
But yeah, you can Yeah, you can and I cannot agree with you more, Pete that camaraderie is big. That’s a human aspect. That’s a human connection. And that is my biggest con of a remote workforce. Right? 

Ricky Baez  26:19
That one is right there. Just because again, I rather work in an office, right? Unlike how you said, you know, that you rather work at home. I like I get my energy by talking to other people. 

Ricky Baez  26:31
I get creative and more creative. I have a hard time starting an idea. Once I have the idea. 

Ricky Baez  26:37
I am a machine it rolls through I work best when I’m around other people and somebody shoots an idea that I can work off of. I don’t get that at home. 

Ricky Baez  26:46
I mean, what do I have? I got my son when he was out of school. Right? You know, I got maybe the sopranos playing on TV on mute. Right? 

Ricky Baez  26:54
I don’t want to get any ideas from Tony Soprano when it comes to HR. Right? I’m not there yet. So yeah, it’s I need I need some human connection. Pete.

Pete Newsome  27:02
Well, so back to the planning right? There. Well, let me ask, Do you not feel that right now, do not feel that through online interactions, I do.

Ricky Baez  27:14
Not as much because as soon as we’re done here, I mean, normally, if I if, if we’re having this conversation at the office, normally we’d go get some coffee, we go, you know, walk around.

Ricky Baez  27:24
We go talk to somebody who we see, you know, just impromptu conversations, where this is structured, not that structured is a bad thing. But somebody who’s a free spirit structure is a headache. 

Ricky Baez  27:37
And that’s me, if I don’t like structure, and I know that’s not what people want to hear, I like to talk about it as proof of this podcast at this very moment because we’re not going on task, we’re making the left here real quick, I work best, when I’m able to address a topic at hand and ideas that come up in hand.

Pete Newsome  27:57
Well, we’re gonna, we’re gonna put you on the couch after and we’ll do your counseling session separately.

Ricky Baez  28:05
So there you go. 

Pete Newsome  28:07
the, but you do have to plan and you do have to account for the different individuals in planning takes technology into consideration, we use Slack heavily. Now, it’s not something we use previously.

Pete Newsome  28:21
And I love it for the reasons you just described, you can just kind of pop it on someone if they’re available. And people can choose to make themselves accessible that way or not at any given time. 

Pete Newsome  28:35
And if they are, then you can have those chats on the fly, you can do it on video. 

Pete Newsome  28:39
So I think the technology has to be embraced and thought out as well as part of this plan and understand how you’re going to use it and embrace it as an organization. 

Pete Newsome  28:52
Because it can make a difference in those scenarios like you just described. 

Pete Newsome  28:58
And I feel, in a weird way, even more connected to individuals than I did before because we’ve brought in our vendors and to Slack who we work with regularly. 

Pete Newsome  29:09
And so I don’t have to schedule a meeting with them. So it’s not it’s true. Yeah, there’s, it’s evolving, right? 

Pete Newsome  29:17
It’s evolving, but you have to pay attention to the tools that are available to you. Try them, see what works, and then incorporate them into your workflow.

Ricky Baez  29:28
And that’s the key. That’s the key right there. Because I love Slack. It’s you know, how I feel about it. 

Ricky Baez  29:34
But you got to communicate differently. Because now in Slack versus in person, it’s very easy to take things out of context, right? 

Ricky Baez  29:44
So for example, if I say, oh my god, I can’t believe this happened in all caps on Slack. 

Ricky Baez  29:50
How do you take that message? It really depends on the contents of the conversation or what else happened and what kind of emoji I use, right? 

Ricky Baez  29:59
If I’m using them What do people think of screaming? If I use a happy emoji? Do people think I’m excited? Yeah, right. If you don’t use those tools, your message can be completely misunderstood.

Pete Newsome  30:09
So it is right so and yes. 

Pete Newsome  30:11
And to that point make sure that you’re taking the time to communicate about things that aren’t work-related, have a little fun with it on occasion, and do it appropriately, every company is going to handle that differently. 

Pete Newsome  30:25
But if it’s all business all the time, that will be depressing. 

Pete Newsome  30:29
And, as we’ve talked about now, those just those interactions that don’t happen on Monday morning, where you get to talk about the weekend, we don’t get to do that but use Slack for that. 

Pete Newsome  30:40
There’s there you create channels for different purposes, and have a little fun with it to what other considerations are there for managing your remote workforce. 

Pete Newsome  30:55
One thing we haven’t talked about is recognizing accomplishments with just about to say that that’s something that you, can’t forget to do those things just because you’re not all together.

Ricky Baez  31:08
And let me give you an agreed example for everybody listening out there from an employee’s perspective, right? 

Ricky Baez  31:13
Because from a manager’s perspective, it’s difficult, it’s different from what he or she has been doing prior to the pandemic, but from an employee’s perspective, you already feel disconnected. Right? 

Ricky Baez  31:26
You just got to do the work. And that’s it. There isn’t any popping over I almost call it assault via cubicle hanging on some coffee. No, that doesn’t exist anymore. It’s work, work work. 

Ricky Baez  31:38
That’s all you have to do. So, yes, from any an employee’s perspective, when they’re this a win, as a leader, call that out, recognizing given them some feedback, do whatever you need to do. 

Ricky Baez  31:53
Because I know you can never replicate the human connection, but do whatever you need to do to make the employee feel like they belong as part of the team and let them know, whatever means you are able to do this to let them know that they still matter. 

Ricky Baez  32:06
I know that’s kind of sound cliche, but what they’re doing for this organization affects the bottom line, if you as a leader are able to connect the goal of the organization.

Ricky Baez  32:17
The reason the organization exists, down to how this employee makes a widget and how that affects it, you’ve done your job there, you’ll be able to do that online as well, you just need a little bit more creativity, more elbow grease for that.

Pete Newsome  32:30
So with everything else we’re talking about plan ahead for that. Don’t just assume it will happen. 

Pete Newsome  32:36
Make a point and have a plan for it. So the last thing I want to add on this for today is that I think all of this is about we keep talking about planning and the need for that.

Pete Newsome  32:50
But share your create policies and share them we have to create new policies for this dress code being one that of course comes to the top of mind, right I mean, how you dress should be something you communicate to your team don’t don’t make assumptions. 

Pete Newsome  33:08
What other policies need to be in place?

Ricky Baez  33:12
I think the other policy that needs to be in place, yes, it’s a dress, but how your space looks? 

Ricky Baez  33:20
Make sure that your space looks appropriate for work. Right? Yeah, it’s I mean, I can come up with a lot of different examples. 

Ricky Baez  33:27
But make sure that your background, at the end of the day, what you have to do, folks is whatever vision comes on the other end, from this, this online environment needs to be as close to what your office will look like as possible. Right? 

Ricky Baez  33:42
I’m not saying you have to have a teamwork picture up there with the people rolling with it.

Pete Newsome  33:48
We can all picture immediately when you say that, yes,

Ricky Baez  33:52
of course. Right? Like, why is that doing in your bedroom? That’s not what I’m saying. 

Ricky Baez  33:56
All I’m saying is that because I saw this when the pandemic first started that I’m talking to some people and Pete There’s like a mountain of laundry in the back. Right? 

Ricky Baez  34:06
And it was so big and I’m like, do I have to go over there and help you? I hate laundry. But that’s distracting. Let me go over there to help you with that. That’s a really nice way of saying, oh, I need to blur my background.

Pete Newsome  34:19
Well and yes, and you know, credit to Zoom for figuring out how to give people options to have other pictures in their background. Right?

Ricky Baez  34:27
Absolutely. And some of them are really good. And I’m like God, how much am I paying you over you got a corner office over there? 

Ricky Baez  34:33
Because it looks really good. Those backgrounds, but um, no, it’s you’ve got to share those policies, right? 

Ricky Baez  34:39
Because you can’t just let it out. Be out there like the Wild Wild West, create those policies, make sure those policies have fair, and share them and share them. 

Ricky Baez  34:49
Can I add one more to that Pete? If people thought it was hard to onboard people the right way before, imagine virtually.

Ricky Baez  34:58
You’ve got to pull all the stops to let a new employee know that they belong to the organization, you can’t just do a virtual onboarding orientation for an hour. 

Ricky Baez  35:11
So you’ve got to make a spectacle of a spectacle. 

Ricky Baez  35:16
Oh my god, I can’t talk right right now, you’ve got to be able to set up meetings in person with people that are local, make sure that you pull out all the stops to make sure that person feels like they’re part of the team. 

Ricky Baez  35:25
Because if you start that person, firstly, on the wrong foot, they’re not going to last very long. They’re not hungry. 

Ricky Baez  35:32
Now, make sure you’ve got the right processes in place to do that virtually, that it makes it as humanistic as possible.

Pete Newsome  35:39
I like it. That’s a great way to finish. Make sure people get off to a good start. And that is as important if not more important, virtually than it would be if you were in the office. 

Ricky Baez  35:51
I’m going to go ahead and go on eBay right now to get you one of those team posters. 

Pete Newsome  35:55
You are in the back. I mean, I you know, I wasn’t gonna go here. But you’re talking about your background and your environment, and I’m staring at yours. 

Pete Newsome  36:04
And you used to have the Martha Stewart look behind and now you’ve got all kinds of stuff going on. Now. 

Pete Newsome  36:12
I’m trying to figure out you’ve got the kid, the kid from the Christmas story. You know, so I don’t know. I don’t know what’s going on. Ricky. You got it. 

Ricky Baez  36:21
You got to do things that made me comfortable with Star Wars to Return the Jedi.

Pete Newsome  36:25
Ralphie. Thank you.

Ricky Baez  36:28
How do you not know Ralphie?

Pete Newsome  36:30
It’s okay. I don’t like the movie. I’m not a fan. I know. I know. I didn’t want to tell you that. I’ve never said that out loud to you. Not a fan. Nope. I’m a Christmas vacation guy. 

Ricky Baez  36:49
I think you’re the first person I’ve ever heard say they do not like a Christmas story.

Pete Newsome  36:54
Okay, well, I’ll own it. I mean, I’ve I it does nothing for me, folks. 

Ricky Baez  37:00
You heard it here first. Pete hates me. Yeah, you heard it here first. Is it because I said I’m gonna buy you the teamwork poster? I was just kidding.

Pete Newsome  37:08
Yeah, no, no, it’s it trust me that movie does not is not in the rotation during Christmas at my house it’s not I mean if my kids have ever seen it it’s not because I watched it with them. 

Ricky Baez  37:24
Every year TBS 24 hours of A Christmas Story. Never miss it. All right. Well, now streaming service has ruined it for me because now I got an HBO plus I avoided this until Christmas Eve.

Pete Newsome  37:35
This is what makes the world go round. So for everyone out there, you know you can be on different sides of any issue and still be friends. It’s okay. 

Pete Newsome  37:47
I don’t I don’t I don’t. Hopefully, you don’t think I’m awful for that. 

Ricky Baez  37:51
So are you gonna tell me you hate Star Wars? 

Pete Newsome  37:54
Okay, so that will wrap up today’s podcast. I don’t hate it. I don’t hate it. I don’t hate it. It’s just you know?

Ricky Baez  38:06
It’s because we’re aligning. We’re having a couple of beers. I doubt you will hate it so much.

Pete Newsome  38:10
I don’t hate it. I don’t hate it. My wife hates Star Wars. I don’t hate Star Wars. So thank you for listening today. 

Pete Newsome  38:17
Ricky and I are you going to debate movies offline now? We’d love we’d love feedback. If there’s a topic you’d like to hear us talk about please email us at hirecalling@4cornerresources.com.

Pete Newsome  38:24
If you’ve gotten this far, please rate and review us and check out active compliance if you haven’t already. We are. We’re excited to be working with them. But you could of course work with them directly as well because the world is you know, we don’t want to keep that secret.

Pete Newsome  38:36
The world needs to know what’s going on over there. So great, great stuff for remote employees and you’re going to close with Ralphie. So I think that that is goodbye for today.

Ricky Baez  38:56
Have a good one folks. Drive safe. Thank you.

Tips for Conducting Onboarding

• Communicate everything your organization has to offer. People have bills to pay but also want to feel warm and fuzzy inside. Share your vision, capture their emotion, and personalize their core values to yours.
• Stay in contact throughout the entire process. Get them involved and excited to come to work. Let them know what to expect on their first day and answer any questions they may have along the way.
• Be their mentor. As their point of contact, introduce them to their new co-workers and help them out with all their paperwork. Get them through orientation.

Advice for Conducting Orientation

• Expect new employees to show up. Be ready to receive them and orient them properly. Make an effort to ensure they feel welcomed on their first day.
• Prepare in advance. Make sure they have everything they need to get started. Set up their login credentials and workstations, and gather any other materials they might need. 
• Bring the same energy. Employees want meaningful connections with their employers, so continue showing them the same enthusiasm that got them through the door.

Additional resources

• How to Use Employee Orientation to Set New Hires Up for Success
• New Hire Checklist
• How to Conduct Virtual Onboarding
• New Employee Welcome Letter Template and Tips

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome  00:01
Let’s go live on Facebook and LinkedIn this Friday morning.

Ricky Baez  00:07
It’s Cinco de Mayo by the way. 

Pete Newsome  00:21
The description is required on Facebook well.

Ricky Baez  00:59
Now let me put myself on do not disturb.

Ricky Baez  01:12
Right?

Pete Newsome  01:16
Okay, let’s see if that makes. Okay, I think we’re live. At least we’re live on LinkedIn and recording. So Ricky, welcome to the Hire Calling Podcast. 

Pete Newsome  01:30
All things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. It’s Friday morning. We’re in Florida. life’s pretty good. How are you today?

Ricky Baez  01:37
I’m excited. Today’s Cinco de Mayo the repeat what are you doing for the event? Anything?

Pete Newsome  01:42
Well, Rick, it’s Friday night, which means I’m going to the movies because that’s what I do on Friday nights. And this is a big one because the new Guardians of the Galaxy come out.

Ricky Baez  01:52
So I am looking forward to your review. I might check that out tomorrow, Sunday. But that one’s going to be I cannot wait for that.

Pete Newsome  01:59
The expectations are high. And as I often tell you when these conversations have come up over the last few weeks, hopefully, it’s not a big disappointment like Batman was which still is at the bottom of the list of 2023 movies so far.

Ricky Baez  02:17
Disappointment, a bunch of RAID. It was awful. 

Pete Newsome  02:22
What about you? What do you have planned?

Ricky Baez  02:24
Now? Well, well, you know tonight, which is doing Movie Night, because this weekend, we’re looking to go to Vero Beach. And we’re excited about that. 

Ricky Baez  02:32
But tonight, which is going to watch something we haven’t seen my mom staying with us right now. And we haven’t had a movie night in a long time. So they’re going to decide. 

Ricky Baez  02:40
So we’ll go from there. I’m excited. But again, I want to see your review. Because I saw the one get different app man I saw you want two different Mario, which had this agreement that was a little bit more than that.

Pete Newsome  02:51
Yeah, okay. Well, my reviews are a little controversial. I like it, it’s obligated to do them now. So this will be reviewed as number 13. For 2023. Hopefully not unlucky 13 We’ll see. 

Pete Newsome  03:05
But on today’s Hire Calling Podcast, which we know will get rave reviews. We are talking about an HR person’s dream. And as our resident HR person in this scenario, this is right up your alley. 

Pete Newsome  03:18
Employee Orientation versus onboarding. Oh, this is ours, and why there’s a need for both. What do you think is that up your alley or what?

Ricky Baez  03:28
That’s up my alley. But you said an HR person’s dream. I thought it was some payday Friday, and I don’t get a phone call. I mean faster dream. Calls after four o’clock, maybe Friday? That’s right. 

Ricky Baez  03:42
But yeah, no, this is definitely as well. Yeah, this is definitely up my alley. I love talking about this. Because if if business leaders get this, right, they’re going to severely affect in a good way. 

Ricky Baez  03:55
The tenure of a candidate who’s turning into an employee, so yes, I love this subject.

Pete Newsome  04:00
I don’t think this is these are terms that everyone necessarily understands the difference when they use them. 

Pete Newsome  04:07
I think they’re probably used interchangeably a whole lot. 

Pete Newsome  04:10
So let’s start by defining the two and what just from a high level how let’s go ahead and start with orientation. 

Pete Newsome  04:19
Well, no, I’ll start with the onboarding because that is the first step right after after an employee hiring decision has been made, is it not?

Ricky Baez  04:27
It is whenever I do any kind of HR class or webinar. I always ask the audience this question. When this onboarding started and I hear all kinds of different answers. 

Ricky Baez  04:40
It’s, they see it starts as soon as they set foot on a new employee orientation, or they set foot or they accept the offer letter. But I will. I’ll ask you, Pete, When this onboarding starts, in your from your point of view.

Pete Newsome  04:53
I would say from the moment the hiring decision has been made, as I said a few minutes ago, I feel, I feel like from your glare from those who aren’t watching on video that I probably didn’t hit that mark 100%. 

Pete Newsome  05:08
But that’s where I would say it begins.

Ricky Baez  05:14
Onboarding starts, as soon as the candidate applies for the job, okay, as soon as they apply for the job, if you know this more than anybody else, recruiters have a hard time these days, I mean, they can still do the job. 

Ricky Baez  05:30
But it’s becoming more difficult right to not just only bring people in, but to keep them on as well. 

Ricky Baez  05:36
So when I say starts as soon as they apply, that means that the recruiter who’s also a salesperson, by the way, needs to be on their A-game to communicate the opportunities that they can that the candidate can get in the organization, and how wonderful that is to work in the organization. That’s when it starts to me. 

Pete Newsome  05:55
I’m going to challenge you a little bit, okay, on this, the recruiter as a salesperson. Why?

Ricky Baez  06:05
Why? Because to me, in my opinion, when somebody decides how to apply or continue with the application process in an old foreign organization.

Ricky Baez  06:19
In my opinion, it’s a lot of that lies on the recruiter, or how well or not well, the recruiter communicated how well how awesome it is to work for the organization, they have to be a salesperson, you can’t just sit there at a job fair, and just be planning your phone. 

Ricky Baez  06:35
Because I’ve seen that before. Let’s just play on the phone all day and expect people to show up and give their resumes. 

Ricky Baez  06:41
Now you’ve got to get out, but you got to be in front street, you got to be the appetizer of the great meal to show what you’re what’s coming next. You know, so they have to be that cheerleader for the organization so people can get excited.

Pete Newsome  06:53
So I don’t disagree with you. But I also want to caution that salespeople at times have bad reputations for a reason I can say this as someone who believes that they have been a career salesperson. 

Pete Newsome  07:06
So I know this firsthand. And the reason is at times, salespeople look to oversell and that’s where I would just want to point out that a recruiter’s job should never be to overstate the attractiveness of a job or really overstate anything associated with the job. 

Pete Newsome  07:27
Because the goal of a recruiter the ultimate goal is not just to attract the candidates, but to attract the candidates who will stay and remain happy as employees for as long as possible for you indefinitely. 

Pete Newsome  07:43
So I just you know, I always interject that where I believe you’re right, and I support the statement, but to a limit, right? 

Pete Newsome  07:52
You’re not supposed to be you’re only supposed to be a salesperson in the sense of being pleasant and communicative and accessible and enthusiastic, all of that. But don’t be a salesperson. Don’t be a snake oil salesperson.

Ricky Baez  08:10
Well, that’s with anything right? But everything you just described, it’s exactly what I would want and you will want a recruiter to be. 

Ricky Baez  08:17
We know Yeah, I mean, it’s obviously there’s that 10% That gives the other 90% a bad name, right, you know, trying to sell somebody your bridge or, you know, because I remember back in the day back in the 80s. 

Ricky Baez  08:28
We bought Encyclopedia Britannica, from a door-to-door salesperson. So I think it’s one of those.

Pete Newsome  08:35
Well, we are all dead, right? 

Ricky Baez  08:37
How were our Google kids? That was our Google. 

Pete Newsome  08:40
Yes, I mean, that is Yeah, many, many homework reports. Were done using that right? Because otherwise, you had to go to the library crazy. That to think that that’s, that’s wasn’t that long.

Ricky Baez  08:54
So to you, to you, a recruiter shouldn’t be too salesy, but they should be salesy enough to be authentic in their communication about coming to work for the organization. Alright.

Pete Newsome  09:06
Maybe I can sum it up with a phrase that I’ve used more times than I can count and anyone around me at work has probably heard it more times than they would like, which is no recruiter should not.

Ricky Baez  09:17
And man sucks. Because I heard you say that a couple of times.

Pete Newsome  09:21
That recruiters should not be in the round hole square peg business, meaning your goal is to find the right fit mutually that always and as a good salesperson would do, you would approach it that way and really try to find the winning solution on both sides. 

Pete Newsome  09:39
Okay, so good. We got that out of the way back to the issue at hand. And that is when onboarding begins and you say it begins right from the moment. 

Pete Newsome  09:49
The line yeah, candidate applies. Are you engaged with the candidate on any level? Okay, so walk us through it. Then. Give us an overview of onboarding if you wouldn’t mind And then switch over to orientation.

Ricky Baez  10:03
So let me give you a short synopsis of what onboarding looks like to me. So somebody is at a new, not a new employer, I’m sorry, somebody’s at a job fair, right? 

Ricky Baez  10:10
They have the whole setup, they have a whole setup that tells the story of the organization. 

Ricky Baez  10:16
We don’t just want employees, we want people to come in and share our vision, we want people to come in and understand what our core values are, and make them their own personalize their core values to ours. 

Ricky Baez  10:27
And then we can have a really good work-employee relationship. So if you’re able to capture their emotion, their heart, and I know this sounds hokey, I completely get it. 

Ricky Baez  10:35
Because people don’t want to a job fair because they want to, they want to feel warm and fuzzy inside it, let’s be honest, they got bills to pay, the right, we got bills to pay, and less than let be honest about that. 

Ricky Baez  10:47
But there are other things out there in an organization that can be valuable for an employee that maybe they don’t know what’s valuable to them. So communicate everything that the organization can offer. 

Ricky Baez  10:59
Now, let’s say they apply, right, and they you the recruiter, give them a call, Hey, we liked your application, let me explain to you a little bit more about the organization, again, the cheerleader for the organization, the advocate for the organization, and how their skill set can work in the overall picture. 

Ricky Baez  11:19
As soon as a candidate feels that they fit perfectly, they’re going to continue with the interview process. 

Ricky Baez  11:25
And then if they go to the next step, you have a conversation with them, again, to let them know what they can expect the entire process, as the recruiter, you’re going to be that person’s mentor, that person’s first point, an only point of contact, and that person is a GPS, that works a lot better Pete.

Ricky Baez  11:43
And it retains a lot more candidates to continue on with the recruitment process than getting an email that says, hey, thank you for your resume. 

Ricky Baez  11:52
Either you’re going to the next step or you don’t you got to put the human touch to it and get them involved and really touch that emotion that gets them excited to come to work. So that’s the first part of it.

Pete Newsome  12:03
I know. I do because I don’t mean to take us in this direction again. But I think this is me as someone who’s been a third-party recruiter my whole career, where at what point, do you interject the not-so-good news? 

Pete Newsome  12:21
Now that is Do you consider that part of onboarding because by my definition or perspective on onboarding begins a little bit later, once the hiring decision has been made? 

Pete Newsome  12:33
But in the recruiting process, I always want to interject the downside of a job to a candidate in my philosophy on that being. Let’s get all the bad out if we do that correctly. 

Pete Newsome  12:50
And we’re honest and open and thorough about it, we’re only going to be left with good. So where do you suggest that being brought? And is that just that doesn’t sound like onboarding to you? 

Ricky Baez  13:01
Because not only does it, because you want to onboard the right person who’s going to stick around, right? A recruiter who thinks long-term is a recruiter who has the best interest of the organization at heart, right? 

Ricky Baez  13:12
And what does that mean? 

Ricky Baez  13:13
If the recruiter is worried about making numbers, a smart recruiter wouldn’t focus on the numbers who just come in, they’re going to focus on the people who are going to come in and be the best fit for the organization to stick around for the long haul where the organization can make a good return on investment, right at the end of the day. 

Ricky Baez  13:28
That’s why the organization is in business. Right? But you say a phrase that I believe in, and I’ve heard this a long time ago. But good news early, no bad news early is good news. Right? 

Ricky Baez  13:40
So get it out, you know, it says look, if you’re going to work at a call center, look, this is our call center. Here’s where we work, say, put out there all the things that the nitty-gritty of the organization. 

Ricky Baez  13:51
I mean, that’s everything, right? Because you get your 5% of employees who hate working wherever they are, but communicate what the good aspects and the aspects that might not be so, so desirable. 

Ricky Baez  14:02
So here’s a good example. In a conversation, let’s say I see a resume and I’m like, wow, this person used to work at a call center, and I’m recruiting for a call center. 

Ricky Baez  14:11
I think this person is great for this position to have a conversation about it at the very least. 

Ricky Baez  14:16
But the person tells me when I asked him, Why did you leave your last job? Oh, I hate working in call centers. All right. That’s a good example, the use of flagging the player, right?

Ricky Baez  14:24
Let’s have a conversation about that and say, Well, this is a call center. So I don’t think this is the right opportunity for you. And then go from there. So yes, communicate that information early.

Pete Newsome  14:34
Okay, I like it. So now we’ve done that. Employees getting ready to start, you know, keep going. And again, let us know when orientation kicks in. 

Ricky Baez  14:45
Well, they haven’t started yet. Right. So this is also part of onboarding, right? 

Ricky Baez  14:48
And then you let them know if they go to the next interview, what’s going to happen if they’re a second interview or a third interview? Right? You always keep in contact with them. 

Ricky Baez  14:57
Now here’s something that my previous organization did that I love. 

Ricky Baez  15:02
If we get to the point where we were down to three people, right, and you only need one, you’re gonna have to make three phone calls, one of them is happy to them, I’m not going to be as happy. Right? 

Ricky Baez  15:13
So that’s what you call the person who got the job first and you let them know, congratulations, blah, blah, blah, blah, here’s what’s happening, and you let them know what to expect. 

Ricky Baez  15:22
You’re going to start in two weeks, and I’m a bouquet of flowers, send them some nice wine glasses. 

Ricky Baez  15:27
Welcome to the team. If through the entire interview process, they mentioned the love, I don’t know, a Chick Fil A’s and then the Chick-fil-A plan or something to really personalize that experience. 

Ricky Baez  15:38
Now, I know this part may not be considered onboarding, but follow me here. You also should have a conversation with the other two people who didn’t get it. 

Ricky Baez  15:47
And let them know why to give them some feedback, right? But you got to give them the bad news early. 

Ricky Baez  15:53
Hey, want to give you a call wanted to let you know you were not selected, but I got some really good feedback for you. Are you open to that and send them a bouquet of flowers? 

Pete Newsome  16:01
Or are they’re gonna say send them to me? Ricky? 

Pete Newsome  16:07
Okay, that’s that is an extremely generous thing, in my opinion, which I’d be how many companies if you had to a percentage will send something of that nature to employees who didn’t who weren’t selected for CME phenomenal if they do, right? I mean, that would be I mean, what an amazing gesture. 

Pete Newsome  16:30
But how often does that happen? Well, I’m not familiar with that happening, really ever.

Ricky Baez  16:35
I know an organization that did that quite a bit, I was part of the process to implement that. Because here’s what happens instead, instead of having somebody to people feel bad that they didn’t get the position? 

Ricky Baez  16:49
Let’s make him feel some kind of way that because at dinner that night, what do you think they’re going to talk about? 

Pete Newsome  16:55
I mean, that would be it. As I said, a phenomenal amount. Sure. However, I don’t know how practical it is. 

Pete Newsome  17:01
I don’t know how common it is, is very rare, I mean, but what a great differentiator if you’re looking to build your reputation, and in a way that most will not be willing to do. 

Pete Newsome  17:15
But nonetheless, that’s a great thing. So that’s what you recommend to your clients to do. I suspect most don’t take you up on it.

Ricky Baez  17:23
They don’t, some don’t. Some don’t, some do. Some do. But the ones that do. 

Ricky Baez  17:27
Here’s what I tell them, because obviously, they’re worried about practicality, they’re worried about, you know, God, how much money is this going to cause not to not to market in dollars, people are going to talk about that experience. And people are going to remember that experience. 

Ricky Baez  17:42
And if you got people who advocate on your behalf on social media, that’s great publicity. It really is. 

Ricky Baez  17:48
And for the two clients that are actually doing it is working out pretty well, because that’s some people that apply because they heard from somebody else they know the process. So okay, so we’re there, we made an offer. 

Ricky Baez  17:59
Okay, now, this is all part of onboarding still. Right, you give those two-week notice to the person who gives those two-week notice. 

Ricky Baez  18:07
And you still keep in contact with that person to start giving them little pieces of information about what to expect for new employee orientation on your first day. 

Ricky Baez  18:16
Or maybe give them some homework, right? Give them a couple of videos to let them know where the organization is. It’s all about from an employee’s perspective, that way they know how do you know what to expect. 

Ricky Baez  18:26
Boom, come day one. There’s your orientation. That is when you come in on the first day. 

Ricky Baez  18:33
Now, from a recruiter’s perspective or company’s perspective, you should not start prepping for an under day the employee shows up, you should start prepping for it about a week early to make sure you get their login credentials to make sure they have everything they need, their workstation is set up, be ready for this person to come in.

Pete Newsome  18:51
I will I want to jump in on that because it’s such an important thing and it happens. 

Pete Newsome  18:57
That happens surprisingly with the surprising frequency when employees will start and the organization is not prepared to receive them properly to orient them properly, if you will. 

Pete Newsome  19:13
And we see that in our world of contract staffing because we have people placed in what where often HR is not involved. 

Pete Newsome  19:23
And that’s probably why it happens in contract staffing because we don’t have a lot of time for someone like you with your perspective and experience and way of looking at things to properly prepare to receive that new contract employee but here’s the reality the contract employee wants to feel that they’re treated well. 

Pete Newsome  19:40
Of course, everyone does. And to whatever as much of a degree as possible. They want to feel as if they’re treated the same as a direct employee meaning welcomed and anticipated and I’m just brought into the family so to speak. 

Pete Newsome  20:03
But it’s easy to see why it doesn’t happen always on contract staffing. 

Pete Newsome  20:06
So make the effort if you can, if you’re a hiring manager who maybe is not inclined to think like an HR person does, a professional does reach out to your HR team, and ask for some tips on that to make sure that your first day your employee walks in, there felt welcomed. 

Pete Newsome  20:26
And I mean, we have lots and lots of stories of this if I don’t have to order them a computer or a badge or even tell them how to get in the building. 

Pete Newsome  20:34
So a lot of the things that I think HR covers and takes you can take for granted because of that fall by the wayside. 

Ricky Baez  20:43
Sometimes the world of contracts does include Pete, I know, I know some of the rationale behind not having everything ready. Because there has been a history of you know, some candidates, ghosting employers, right? 

Ricky Baez  20:55
And they just wasted all these resources, all the sun, people with their HRIS system or their payroll system, get charged monthly by how many accounts they have open. 

Ricky Baez  21:06
So if they open three accounts, and three people don’t show up, that’s money that they’re wasting. I get that I completely get that. But the opposite is worse. 

Ricky Baez  21:16
No, I’m sorry, the opposite is better. Because here’s what happens. 

Ricky Baez  21:20
If you are not ready for this employee, this employee when they accept that job, Pete, you and I have had this conversation, they have a little voice in the back of their head that says God, I don’t know, if I made the right decision. I don’t know if this is the right thing for me to do. 

Ricky Baez  21:34
The evil I know is better than the evil I don’t know. And if they show up unprepared, you know if they show up and you’re not prepared for them, the organization has given credibility to those words, they’re giving credibility to those voices. 

Ricky Baez  21:49
So what I tell my clients it is our job to shut those voices up in that person’s head, make them feel welcome, and make them feel like the decision they made was 100%. 

Ricky Baez  21:59
The right one, I’ve seen people show up to the organization where the organization was unprepared, they just left their career with the organization was a whopping 18 minutes, 18 minutes, it wasn’t happening,

Pete Newsome  22:11
it happens a lot. And it’s easy to see why it’s understandable, especially in contract, staffing, image, and HR system, a lot of things are preset in there. 

Pete Newsome  22:20
So it will follow a process prompts will happen. 

Pete Newsome  22:23
So people are reminded to write, and take whatever steps they need, whether it’s ordering a badge, putting them in their ERP system, ordering equipment, having a workstation, whatever it might be, but on contract staffing in particular.

Pete Newsome  22:36
Because of course, that’s where so much of my thought often goes, it’s easy to see why since they’re never in the HR system in the first place, none of those triggers will naturally happen. 

Pete Newsome  22:46
So something to think about in that world. So they’re, but they’re but they arrive and we’re ready for them. Now what now, again, I’m going to keep pressing until you define it for us. What’s the difference? 

Pete Newsome  22:59
Or we’ve been talking about onboarding and then you said, well, now they’re ready for orientation. So where what’s Where’s where’s that different slide. 

Ricky Baez  23:07
So onboarding, remember, starts when they apply all the way into training. Orientation is one maybe two days, that’s its orientation. 

Ricky Baez  23:15
The only thing the whole purpose of orientation is to orient obviously, the brand new employee to the culture of the organization, and let them know about the handbook.

Ricky Baez  23:25
Let them know other benefits, and the most important thing of all their pay, make sure they know when they get paid what they need to do, they get all the faculties together all the tools together to get them started on the right foot for training right now. 

Ricky Baez  23:40
So orientation is that one day on day one when they get all this information? Right? 

Ricky Baez  23:46
That’s orientation the very next day, if it’s a, you know, just regular organization, they start training, onboarding is still going, right, because part of onboarding is to make sure we assigned somebody to that organization. 

Ricky Baez  24:01
I’m sorry, that part of onboarding is that, sorry, we have to make sure we assign like a big brother, big sister, and mentor to that employee because that employee is not going to know everybody right away, that employees not going to wait. 

Ricky Baez  24:15
So they need that one person above and beyond that recruiter to make sure that they can go to like a big brother or sister that helps so much.

Pete Newsome  24:24
Oh, for sure. Right. It all leads to the new employee’s comfort and having access to information knowing who to turn to I mean, what a great thing. It seems like a no-brainer probably doesn’t happen all the time. But it should. It should.

Ricky Baez  24:42
Can we talk about something why it doesn’t happen all the time? Because I think it’s important for us to address that. 

Ricky Baez  24:49
So a lot of people a lot of organizations say Ricky we just don’t have resources resource staff as it is right? We got other people pulling two or three different jobs because people have left and I get all I get it. 

Ricky Baez  25:01
But if you knew the value of making sure onboarding and orientation is done, right, you will make time for it. The value is immense. 

Ricky Baez  25:10
Because if you calculate how much time money and effort is spent on marketing, hiring, interviewing, and then paying this person while they’re in training, not getting a return on investment, and having that person leave within 30 days of starting. That’s not that that’s not the PnL the p&l. 

Ricky Baez  25:33
So, yeah, so so so yes, there’s a lot of organizations out there that are spread out thin. All I’m saying is to get creative and make sure you make the employee feel welcome.

Pete Newsome  25:44
Perfect. Okay, so orientation. The first day, right, one day, man, you’ve been pre-board, and is that a phrase? Do you use pre-boarding? 

Ricky Baez  25:54
I used Freeboard. When when we used to do this oh, actually, we still do a pre-boarding to me is when it we start getting everything ready. 

Ricky Baez  26:05
Like if I hear this person likes, Reese’s peanut butter cups or Mountain Dew, I’m going to have that waiting for me at that person’s desk. Right To me, that is rolling out the red carpet, and welcome that. To me. That’s pre-boarding.

Pete Newsome  26:19
Okay, so so so that’s, so that’s part of the onboarding process person gets there, they go through orientation, they meet the new co-workers who fill out paperwork, they are given a tour, these all sound like orientation things to me, right?

Ricky Baez  26:32
Given the tour. Yeah, I mean, yes, that we they know where finances, they know where their desk know where the bathroom.

Pete Newsome  26:37
So I need to know that we all have to know that it’s a way again, that’s all part of orientation, right? 

Ricky Baez  26:41
Orientation is still specific things. But onboarding is a much longer process that goes through training. 

Pete Newsome  26:53
So as long how long can it last? And so we’ve said orientation today or two, Max. But what about onboarding? What’s a normal timeframe?

Ricky Baez  27:00
It depends on the organization. I’ve seen onboarding that lasts a week, and I’ve seen onboarding the last two months, it depends on on on the organization, and how deep-rooted it is, with all different types of satellite offices. 

Ricky Baez  27:13
And it depends on the job as well.

Pete Newsome  27:15
I would say it is even longer, right as provided, the training program lasts longer. And that’s really the point where you, when you’re out of training, whatever that means to you as an individual organization. 

Pete Newsome  27:30
To me, that is the point where onboarding ends, where the new hire, the day they’re sitting at their desk, or workstation, wherever it might be then be led out into the world pushed out of the nest to behave autonomously. 

Pete Newsome  27:45
That is the point where I think it’s over. Is that fair? That’s fair.

Ricky Baez  27:49
That’s fair. Because again, it’s when I started my and I share with you how I started in HR, I got there by mistake. And when and when I told you, it associates, hey, I don’t know anything about HR, they said they’re going to train me. 

Ricky Baez  28:01
They trained me for three months, p three months, I didn’t know a thing about benefits. 

Ricky Baez  28:06
I didn’t know what an HMO was. Right? But they trained me they had an amazing onboarding process because they made sure I was never lost especially somebody who does have a background in it, the Asami, a mentor to make sure I was comfortable. 

Ricky Baez  28:19
And if at any moment in time, I didn’t like let’s have a conversation. 

Ricky Baez  28:23
Now, let’s go back real quick. I think we’ve talked about this before this is a company out there called Zappos, you’ve heard of it, right? Yes, they got bought out by Amazon about 10-15, about 10 years ago. 

Ricky Baez  28:36
But before they were bought by Amazon, there was a big story out there. 

Ricky Baez  28:40
And I’ve seen this firsthand, where when somebody wants to start at Zappos, at the end of orientation at the end of the training, they say if you don’t want to start, I will give you $3,000 right now to just walk away. 

Ricky Baez  28:57
And at first, you’re like what in the world, we just spent all this money on this, but it is a genius move, genius move. 

Ricky Baez  29:03
Because if the employee finds that $3,000 is more valuable, they’ll leave and they’ll save the organization money because they probably will stick around for six months to a year getting paid that salary that’s going to be way more than $3,000. It’s a genius move. I’m not saying we should do that.

Pete Newsome  29:21
No, I love the plan. It’s great foresight and an understanding of what you’re really looking for and a successful employee. I love the idea. I’m surprised it’s not more prevalent. 

Pete Newsome  29:35
As has been so obvious. So it’s a great organization. Know that it’s great specifically for that reason I still use them. I didn’t even realize they were bought by Amazon. So this brand and website haven’t changed.

Ricky Baez  29:49
No, it has not been owned by Amazon. Okay, well, remember I remember when it first happened. 

Ricky Baez  29:57
I was reading a story about this in the Wall Street Journal, everybody that was already a Zappos employee that became an Amazon employee, got stock, which they’re probably millionaires by now, because this was back a while back, and they got Kindles a Kindle Fire.

Pete Newsome  30:11
Well, okay, well, they got stuck.

Ricky Baez  30:16
I’m not making fun of you guys, but I bet.

Pete Newsome  30:19
Okay, so I think we’ve covered it. I think we’ve done a good job of defining, and you have done a good job of defining and explaining the differences. I appreciate that. 

Pete Newsome  30:30
Anything else you’d like to add parting? parting thought on?

Ricky Baez  30:33
Yes, parting thoughts. So So here’s one more thing, right? 

Ricky Baez  30:36
We bring the person on board, whatever energy, the organization had to bring the person on board, you’ve got to have that same energy, that same planning to make sure we retain the person less, get less, make sure that we put that person’s skill set in the right positions, right.

Ricky Baez  30:55
Let’s make sure we give them one, let’s not push them in any direction, just like the recruiter needs to be that GPS, that person’s manager needs to be the career GPS for that employee. 

Ricky Baez  31:06
That way they feel fulfilled. Employees today, employees today want to have a more meaningful connection with their employees bigger than before because a lot of Gen Z’s are out there. Yeah, Gen Z.

Pete Newsome  31:17
Employees with their employers, right? Yes, yes. I knew what you meant. I just want to clarify, what did I say? I’m sorry, what did I say? You probably set right. Got it? 

Pete Newsome  31:29
Yes. But the point is a is a great one. 

Pete Newsome  31:32
And so true, from my experience, and everything that I see, which is yes, employers have to portray themselves differently, to attract a large number, of young people in the workforce today where they want to find more meaning from that relationship than have it be just a job. 

Pete Newsome  31:53
So I think that that is something to be well aware of, for sure. And because it’s not going to change anytime soon.

Ricky Baez  32:03
And then what happens is you end up if you do everything, right, you end up with an environment that is that it is mutually beneficial. Right? 

Ricky Baez  32:12
The employer is happy and always has a goal. And the employees are happy and then you get up and you start recording podcasts, not knowing there was a memo for great T-shirts and look at that. Look at what happened.

Pete Newsome  32:23
It happens naturally.

Ricky Baez  32:24
So that’s, that’s perfect.

Pete Newsome  32:26
Awesome. Well, Ricky, thank you so much as always today. That was That was wonderful. You delivered what was asked, I appreciate it. So if you’ve been listening to this far. 

Pete Newsome  32:37
Please follow us on all our social channels. And give us a like, give us a review. Five stars only Of course, we would appreciate that. But if you have questions or comments for future topics, we love to hear that too. Respond to us on any of our channels. We do monitor all of that and thank you again.

Ricky Baez  32:55
Happy Cinco de Mayo folks have a good one.

Tips for becoming a good mentor

• Set expectations upfront. Determine how often you will get together and what you each look to get out of the relationship. Setting these expectations early on is imperative to begin in the best way possible.
• Be genuine in your interest. If you’re taking this step to become a mentor, you mean it and plan to deliver along the way, even if that means helping your mentee surpass you. You have to love helping people.
• Commit to building trust. Share your experiences, and be willing to reveal your success secrets at all costs. Ensure the relationship is built on a solid foundation of trust and that it exists on both sides. Always be honest and open with all that you’re sharing.
• Don’t always try to direct the path. Let your mentee ask for the help and advice they need, and avoid setting too many directions. Open your connections to the mentee and share your network with them.
• Celebrate their achievements. Be present for that along the way, in both their work and personal life.

Additional resources

• How to Start a Workplace Mentorship Program
• Strategies for Upskilling and Reskilling Your Workforce
• Empowerment in the Workplace: What it is and Why it Matters
• Ways to Invest in Employee Development

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome  00:14
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast, your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. I’m Pete Newsome and I’m joined by Ricky Baez once again today, Ricky, how are you?

Ricky Baez  00:24
I’m doing good Pete. How are you doing, sir?

Pete Newsome  00:26
I’m doing wonderful. It’s a beautiful Monday morning in Florida. How bad could life be?

Ricky Baez  00:31
It? Not bad. Here’s how good life is. Guess what I did Friday.

Pete Newsome  00:37
What did you do?

Ricky Baez  00:38
I got to go to the Jacksonville Jaguars threat on Thursday. Jacksonville Jaguars draft party. That was awesome. I just gotta say, that was awesome that big. I’m about to get beat up here.

Ricky Baez  00:50
I’m not a big Jaguars fan. I’m more of a Tampa Bay Buffalo Bills Giants fan. But let me tell you man that that whole Duval thing.

Pete Newsome  01:01
you have to embrace it while you’re there. You know, I was at the Jag’s home playoff win last year where they were down. I think Lauren started with four interceptions, I believe in the first half and then they came back in one, and let’s just say the Duvall chats were plentiful.

Ricky Baez  01:19
Oh, yeah. They were trust me. So that’s a new thing. So I’m embracing it. I’m embracing a great weekend.

Pete Newsome  01:26
Good. Well, well, today we’re here to talk about how to be a good mentor. This is something that from your HR, heart, and profession, you know quite a bit about I think, and probably have some thoughts on.

Ricky Baez  01:41
I do. I was actually talking about this at the Jacksonville Sherm annual conference on Thursday.

Ricky Baez  01:46
I was talking to them on how to revamp their employee lifecycle and how you and I were talking just before we went live, you know, its organizations tend to spend so much time on attracting and recruiting talent, and then nearly enough time to cultivate that talent to keep the talent in.

Ricky Baez  02:05
So a mentor, a good mentorship program is a great way to start your employee off on the right foot.

Pete Newsome  02:11
So let’s just start at the top with that, and what is a mentor in the professional world.

Ricky Baez  02:19
So a mentor does the same thing as a leader is supposed to be doing with their employees, but a little bit more personal, right?

Ricky Baez  02:28
Because a leader is supposed to make sure that the person’s work is up to par and make sure that they give the proper motivation to the employee.

Ricky Baez  02:37
What a mentor does, is focuses more on the employee than the work and it makes sure he or she makes sure that the employee has everything they need to be successful internally right within themselves and make sure to do good within the organization.

Ricky Baez  02:51
It’s a more personal touch.

Pete Newsome  02:53
Understood. And so yeah, when you you’re talking about it from the perspective of an employer, and employee relationship, but a mentor relationship really supersedes that, doesn’t it?

Pete Newsome  03:03
It doesn’t have to be, you can have a mentor from a different organization, or you can have a mentor that isn’t tied even tied to your industry. And in some cases, right?

Ricky Baez  03:14
That is true. Actually, I just took on a mentee a couple of weeks ago when she was in the finance industry. You know, she just wants to get to know more about human resources.

Ricky Baez  03:24
So you’re right, the relationship does not have to be within the same four walls of the organization. It can be just any other relationship that the people might have outside of those walls.

Ricky Baez  03:36
And they have not understood goals. So yes.

Pete Newsome  03:38
So it’s a that’s a commitment to take on the right, especially when it’s not part of your job description, so to speak. So let’s kind of go through what your responsibilities are in that role.

Pete Newsome  03:51
As a mentor, what do you look to deliver to that person who needs your help and advice?

Ricky Baez  03:57
Well, just what I did with this other person a couple of weeks ago, we went to lunch and had a great conversation, I just asked her, where do you want to be in a year? What is it that you want to do in 12 months from now?

Ricky Baez  04:10
Because we’re going to meet once a month? Where do you want to be in exactly 12 months from now that this whole relationship is going to help you get there?

Ricky Baez  04:19
And then I work myself backward? Right, I reverse engineer to see what kind of sessions we need to have up. That was she was on the right path to be to hit that goal in 12 months.

Ricky Baez  04:29
So I started off with a meeting, just laying out what the goals are, what the main goal is going to be, and then each milestone every month what those are going to be so we could track it pretty well.

Pete Newsome  04:41
Okay, nice. And then so those traits that to be a good mentor, let’s go through some of those.

Pete Newsome  04:48
So, one of the things that you should feel responsible for is to offer insight from your own personal and professional experience. Right. And that’s sort of the basis of the relationship is it not?

Ricky Baez  05:00
You know, correct? I mean, if somebody’s looking for a mentor, that means that you’re looking for somebody that has the breadth, of knowledge and experience that you don’t have that you’re looking to gain for yourself. Right.

Ricky Baez  05:11
So it’s so you’re looking to learn from that tree? Or eat from that tree? Ah, I’m gonna put that on a T-shirt. So, but yeah, you know, there has to be that experience there.

Ricky Baez  05:23
I have yet to see a mentor in any industry that has less than a year of experience in that specific industry.

Pete Newsome  05:35
You’re not gonna recommend someone who goes to a mentor who is a junior in their profession, right? Are relatively new, you want to go after someone who has, has some number of years and has done a lot and seen a lot, hopefully, right?

Pete Newsome  05:50
And so we hate to put a number on something like that.

Pete Newsome  05:53
But there has to be enough seniority for it to really count or you’re or you’re not going to get much value from that relationship.

Ricky Baez  06:01
Oh, absolutely. And be well respected in their field. Right?

Ricky Baez  06:05
You, as a mentee, or a mentee-to-be, should spend just as enough time trying to find the agreed mentor, a mentor, thus to a mentee, right, same thing with a candidate looking for a job.

Ricky Baez  06:18
There’s that interview process where you get to know each other pretty well. And you decide whether this is the right relationship to go forward with? Yeah, there’s a lot.

Pete Newsome  06:25
Back to the responsibility of being that mentor, you’re not only going to have to share your advice and experience and but it needs to go beyond that you’re going to be in a role where you’re encouraging and supporting and giving, giving tips for how to go forward, right?

Pete Newsome  06:44
I mean, it’s a lot more than just, hey, Ricky, tell me what you’ve done. If the relationship is going to count, you need to help provides some guidance for that mentee going forward.

Ricky Baez  06:57
100% Spot on.

Ricky Baez  06:58
But also you have to be really, really authentic and honest with the person because if the person is making a mistake, or he or she is going down that wrong route, you’ve got to have that backbone of the people skills to pull him back and saying, What are you doing?

Ricky Baez  07:13
Don’t go that route. Don’t do this. Don’t do that.

Ricky Baez  07:15
And it may be information that the mentee is not going to like, right, but you have to have that backbone to let them know what they’re doing because that’s valuable information.

Ricky Baez  07:25
Can we step back real quick, I think we’re forgetting one thing, or mentioned that Pete and I think I gloss over. And I apologize for that is the time commitment, you have to agree to that time commitment.

Ricky Baez  07:39
Because this is just that same conversation I had I told her lip, I am willing to carve out an hour and a half of my time every month to sit here with you, I’m not going to have any other distractions, we’re going to have a conversation to help you get to your goal, I need the same from you.

Ricky Baez  07:54
So if I hear oh, I can’t because of this, I can’t.

Ricky Baez  07:57
Because of that, I’m done. I’m not going to continue with this relationship. Because it’s I’m carving time out of my day and time to make sure that I meet with you. I would appreciate the same thing now that she’s going to do that. But you got to have that conversation.

Pete Newsome  08:13
It makes sense.

Pete Newsome  08:14
I mean, you need to set some ground rules up front, right? And that is been a benefit to both sides, where if those expectations aren’t aligned, someone could easily get frustrated or disappointed and have something that should end up being a very good thing.

Pete Newsome  08:30
And I believe there’s a lot of reward for the mentor as well. I mean, we generally as humans like to help people and it makes us feel good. And we learn while helping in many cases.

Pete Newsome  08:39
But so the upside on both sides of this is in theory, that there’s potential for it to go wrong if you don’t set those expectations accordingly.

Pete Newsome  08:48
So that’s a good point to bring up for sure. You know, when you’re going through this, this commitment, do you have any advice on what it is?

Pete Newsome  09:01
How often should someone someone meet a really should it be specific to the situation itself? Whether it’s weekly, monthly, or more often? Less, less frequently? What do you recommend there?

Ricky Baez  09:13
So it depends, on the experience and the time commitment of both people involved, right? Because, in my situation, this person was one of my students.

Ricky Baez  09:23
So she has some experience in HR, but she wants to get more experience.

Ricky Baez  09:27
So we decided one time a month is perfect. That’s perfect for this relationship.

Ricky Baez  09:33
But let’s say that experiences aren’t there on the mentee side that you may want to meet more often and have a more consistent cadence maybe once a week or every other week.

Ricky Baez  09:44
Because if, if the HR foundation from my perspective is not there, right, and if I’m meeting once a month, chances are that person is going to forget whatever information we talk about from month to month, so we may have to meet more often.

Ricky Baez  09:59
So really depends on the spirits of both. And the kind commitment, the time commitment of both to be able to decide how often you should meet, but you need to get to hash those out at the very beginning of that relationship.

Pete Newsome  10:12
And you said something that, I think is as important as anything else in this where you have to be willing to share the information that you believe needs to be heard, not necessarily wants to be heard in Ricky, I think that comes up in almost every conversation we have these days, where you and I are giving advice.

Pete Newsome  10:34
Most of the time, but not always. But most of the time, we’re talking to a younger audience, people who are newer in their careers, and we want to be sure to give that real-world advice.

Pete Newsome  10:49
And it’s not always popular, it’s not always taken well. But it’s an absolute necessity to be effective. And I think we’re very much on the same page with that.

Ricky Baez  10:59
No, we are, you know, it makes no sense.

Ricky Baez  11:02
Or it doesn’t help anybody, if you sugarcoat everything in that conversation, because again, the goal is not to be personal not to attack the person personally.

Ricky Baez  11:11
But the goal is to hit your milestones every month, which moves your bigger goal to your annual goals.

Ricky Baez  11:17
So yeah, you have to be okay with Nick. I don’t want to say negative information, you have to be okay with information you don’t like.

Ricky Baez  11:24
And you have to do what I like to call having conversations with yourself. When you feel like you’re upset because somebody told you something, go to the bathroom.

Ricky Baez  11:33
Look in the mirror, what are you really upset at? What are you really upset about? Or you’re setting yourself? Because this is something you should have thought of before?

Ricky Baez  11:42
Are you upset at the person or how she he or she delivered that message? Take a look at yourself and don’t take things too seriously.

Pete Newsome  11:49
Well, we’re talking about professional advice. Generally speaking, I think the line probably crosses sometimes into personal advice, or these things blend together often in the conversation that you would have as a mentor.

Pete Newsome  12:07
How do you what do you think the biggest challenges are right now for younger people who are hearing from those who are seasoned veterans, so to speak?

Pete Newsome  12:19
Because we know that society continues to evolve and that there have been generational changes this is also what comes up often during our conversations on subjects like this.

Pete Newsome  12:30
So do you have anything in particular that comes to mind in your role as a mentor? Student, I don’t, I probably shouldn’t make this assumption, but I will that it’s a younger person who has a lot a long way to go in their profession, what are the challenging things you think you’ll have to deliver in terms of this price?

Ricky Baez  12:49
So this person is in the middle, right? So here’s what I found, Pete, what I found is, I find the easier this is going to come out that I find it easier to mentor a younger person that doesn’t have any other responsibilities outside of work.

Ricky Baez  13:07
Because I have found that it’s difficult to mentor not difficult, but it will Yeah, you know, I’ll say that it’s difficult to sit to mentor somebody who’s a little bit more established in their personal life.

Ricky Baez  13:18
Because you as a mentor, don’t only have to deal with what’s happening in their work, you have to deal with what’s happening at home as well.

Ricky Baez  13:27
And then sometimes you have to communicate, you know what, the reason you’re not excelling at work is that x, y, and z is happening at home.

Ricky Baez  13:34
So sometimes you got to put on that psychological therapy, and then have that conversation.

Pete Newsome  13:41
There are a lot of considerations that come with that.

Pete Newsome  13:44
So let’s go through a list we have a few points that we think makeup you know if you answered how to be a good mentor, what would be at the top of that list for you?

Pete Newsome  13:55
And we’ve covered some of these broadly. But let’s get a little more narrow.

Ricky Baez  14:00
How to be good you have to meet the things that stand out to me. You have to be a good mentor. You have to love to help people.

Ricky Baez  14:11
And I know to some people that that that comes across with Da Ricky VESA given Pete, you know how many people I’ve met that hate helping people.

Ricky Baez  14:19
And you know, how many of those are in the healthcare industry? I’ve met some nurses that should not be nurses. But I’ve also met some nurses that are amazing, and they love to care for people.

Ricky Baez  14:29
So all I’m saying is, is that you have to have a genuine interest in truly helping that mentee. Even if that mentee a couple of years later surpasses you in your career. I’ve seen that happen too. And then some people get upset at that.

Pete Newsome  14:45
Even though that shouldn’t be the goal, right? If you’re forced into this role, then that should be what you strive for. Is it to help that person ultimately be better than you are?

Pete Newsome  14:56
But I can see where that would depend on the situation if it worked for the same company and a senior and junior role that started if that flipped. Yeah, I could see that.

Ricky Baez  15:08
We’ll be happy though I will be happy if my employee, if because of how I helped my employee, and they got a promotion somewhere else, their VP? And I’m a director, I’d be happy with that. You wouldn’t?

Pete Newsome  15:19
I hope I would, right? But I can see that you know, that that may not always be could hurt. That’s easier said than done at times. I’ll say it. Again, human nature to some degree.

Pete Newsome  15:32
You want to you we all should we all shouldn’t be so noble. Right. But I don’t know that that’s always possible.

Ricky Baez  15:44
So we are human. So yeah, you’re right, I get it.

Pete Newsome  15:46
But I think that plays into it, it’s a good segue into one of the other points that we believe, make a good mentor, which is you have to be genuine in your approach, right?

Pete Newsome  15:59
So if you’re holding back information for that reason, then that’s not genuine at all. You’re not being a good mentor, you really have to be willing to share all your secrets, so to speak, don’t you? It is all your secrets and your connections, your connections as well.

Ricky Baez  16:16
This reminds me of that one scene in The Godfather when the guy comes over to buy his political influences, right? He wants to buy the politicians that the Godfather has in his pockets. I mean, at least that’s how it comes back to me.

Ricky Baez  16:30
From a mentor’s perspective, obviously, if you have that much experience, you have a wide network, you have to be able to share that network, and you have to be able to introduce your mentee to everybody in that network. And here’s why you should do that. Right?

Ricky Baez  16:45
Maybe we should have led off with this, Pete. If you’re going to take on a mentee, you’re going to be a mentor, you have to understand that that mentee now is a representative of you, they’re going to represent you. So you have to be able to pick the right mentee.

Ricky Baez  17:04
And you have to be able to pick somebody that represents you in the light in which you want to be seen out there. So yes, you’ve got to be able to pick somebody not only who’s really witty, who’s really smart and has a hunger for the field, but somebody who carries themselves with the same goals with the same core values as you want to be seen out there as well.

Pete Newsome  17:25
A little bit of a change here of direction.

Pete Newsome  17:28
But what happens in a relationship where you realize those values don’t align? What because that’s a real situation that I’m sure occurs where the mentor and mentee at some point, it’s all looks.

Pete Newsome  17:43
It looks great on the surface, right when you’re coming into a new relationship with someone the honeymoon period, if you will.

Pete Newsome  17:49
But once you start to go down the road a little bit, you may realize that you’re not in alignment with your ideals and beliefs.

Pete Newsome  17:56
And that is, is it okay to acknowledge that or is it necessary to acknowledge that and just say this, let’s stop the journey before it continues too far?

Ricky Baez  18:08
As soon as you realize there’s a misalignment, stop, have a meeting, and recalibrate.

Ricky Baez  18:15
And it’s important to understand, actually, it’s important to never assume the reason for the misalignment, right? Maybe the person is doing something different.

Ricky Baez  18:25
And they didn’t realize that the core values are misaligned. But you got to stop it as soon as you find out about it, and just have a conversation to recalibrate.

Ricky Baez  18:34
Because if you don’t do that you get you’re going to continue to go the opposite way. And then people are going to start to wonder, are they really a mentor-mentee relationship there?

Ricky Baez  18:43
Because they’re, they’re talking very differently from one another. So yeah, you should stop immediately and then recalibrate, to see if continuing is the best option or not.

Pete Newsome  18:53
Okay, and I know you’re a Star Wars fan. So of course this this reminds me, of how you know how these relationships start off great, right may not may not always end up. Well, you haven’t seen you know, you’re right. Later along the way.

Ricky Baez  19:13
Oh, hold on. I didn’t even think about that. Could you imagine if you and I had a mentee, and they ended up being really successful, and they end up being the one that completely disrupts the business in a negative way?

Pete Newsome  19:28
Well, I mean, I think again, it’s, I don’t want to equate it to raising a child. But that is there are some similarities there. Of course, not nearly the same depth and closest but you know, sometimes children stray.

Pete Newsome  19:41
Sometimes they take information and interpret it differently than intended and go off in a different direction. And I think that’s a natural thing to happen in life.

Pete Newsome  19:51
And again, there’s the generational changes are so real in a situation like this and the different perspectives where it’s I think for a young person, to or less experienced person, I don’t mean to associate with age.

Pete Newsome  20:05
So a less experienced person to hear advice from someone who’s, who’s done a lot of whatever there is, or sharing advice on.

Pete Newsome  20:13
But they did it in a different era, they did it in a different time and place in the world. So it’s not always going to be perfectly in sync. And that’s okay.

Pete Newsome  20:24
But it doesn’t mean learning from the past and learning from someone who has experience, from a different perspective isn’t equally valuable. It just means it may not always be as relevant today as Right, right.

Pete Newsome  20:38
I mean, trust me, my kids remind me of that all the time, when I’m giving them advice. that no longer exists. And I get that.

Ricky Baez  20:47
I cannot wait for my nine-year-old to start talking back to me that way. There’s another thing p here that really, it’s hitting me right in the chest and it’s perfect. celebrate their achievements.

Ricky Baez  20:59
So this is from a mentor’s perspective, this is crucial, right?

Ricky Baez  21:03
Because the mentee has something going on in their life they have something going on at the end, at their work life that you may not be able to see or even attend when I’m saying this is that, although that’s not in your radar, as a mentor, you have to show up for those things.

Ricky Baez  21:19
If they got a promotion at their job, you got to be there to celebrate, if something happened at their job, or even at home, you have to be there to separate, separate, celebrate, and to separate to actually celebrate.

Ricky Baez  21:35
So you know what else Pete? Especially for people with families, this is a bonus tip that I want to give people. If you’re mentoring somebody that already has a family, chances are you’re going to enter and the mentoring the entire family. You’re because you’re gonna get to know them. Right.

Ricky Baez  21:53
And you have to get to know their families because you have to know what’s happening at home as well. Right? And also, this helps, because, look, you you’re gonna want to know, where your spouse who your spouse is hanging out with, right after hours.

Ricky Baez  22:08
Holy sighs right? So you have to be around the family as well.

Ricky Baez  22:12
That way, when you’re no longer there, give them advice, that you want your mentee to go home and have a support system who believes in that relationship enough to be able to support them at home so that way they can hit their goals. Right.

Ricky Baez  22:28
So you’re not mentoring just one person. You’re almost mentoring an entire marriage.

Pete Newsome  22:33
That’s a deep commitment, though. That’s, you know, you’re so yeah, this is not something you should take on lightly is what you’re saying?

Pete Newsome  22:42
Because that’s a commitment, not many people will be willing to make it half-time to make it. It’s, it’s a big deal.

Ricky Baez  22:51
I had to do just one a year if that.

Ricky Baez  22:53
And this mentee that I just started with met her husband and her son, and we had a good conversation to make sure that he is fully aware of what we’re working on and that we he knows how to support us at home as well. So yeah, it is a huge commitment. But you know what Pete? I love it.

Pete Newsome  23:13
so one of the other important points, I think it’s absolutely necessary based on everything you just said is to make sure the relationship is built on a solid foundation of trust.

Pete Newsome  23:24
Oh, yeah, absolutely. That has to be in place on both sides. So be honest and open with all that you’re sharing. Which, again, is also a huge commitment to make to someone. Because we don’t always do that in our relationships in business or in life.

Ricky Baez  23:42
You know, it’s weird because it’s free, nobody pays for this right? This is a time that you’re both investing in that you both deem valuable. So yeah, it’s now that I’m thinking about it, it’s a lot.

Pete Newsome  23:59
It is a lot you should consider carefully.

Ricky Baez  24:03
You’re talking me out of it.

Pete Newsome  24:06
It’s a great thing to do. There are benefits as we’ve established on both sides. But what we haven’t talked about are some things not to do. What do you what should you avoid in this relationship?

Pete Newsome  24:21
And what are the things to just not do ever?

Ricky Baez  24:24
I learned this one early on, and I’m just going to come out and say it is assumed you are the problem solver.

Ricky Baez  24:33
I learned this one a long time ago, a long time ago where if somebody was to come to me with you know, in a meeting and they bring an issue I incorrectly assume that they wanted me to solve it.

Ricky Baez  24:44
And what I’ve learned throughout the years is you know, sometimes you should be the problem solver. Sometimes you just need to be the soundboard. Just take a step back, and listen to what they have to say.

Ricky Baez  24:55
Do not be judgmental. That is the biggest way to transform Barry off it to be judgmental. Now, there’s a big difference between being judgmental and recalibrating. Right?

Ricky Baez  25:08
So recalibrating is just hey, let’s come back, let’s meet again to make sure that our priorities are still the same judgmental as talking down to somebody because they did or didn’t do something that it’s that’s not going to help that relationship at all.

Ricky Baez  25:23
So, again, the biggest mistake you can do is to assume that you have to solve everything and be judgmental, from my perspective.

Pete Newsome  25:30
Okay. That makes sense, right?

Pete Newsome  25:34
I think one of the most important things if you make this commitment, after all, we’ve talked about as you have to be accessible, oh, yeah, if you’re going to make that commitment, you need to pick up your phone, when it rings, you need to answer the text when it comes.

Pete Newsome  25:48
And because if someone is going to rely on another person for help, and advice, you can’t forecast or predict when the needs are going to arise. And just look at a parent with a child your phone’s always on, right? And so have to be accessible always.

Ricky Baez  26:06
Here’s my problem. Pete, I answered every call, whether it was pre-girl is how late it is. And you know, and I know, this is my problem, I have to draw boundaries.

Ricky Baez  26:17
Because even if a call comes in at 1 am, I’m looking at it and I’m like, okay, is if I ignore it, this person knows not to call me this late. This is an emergency and I answer it.

Ricky Baez  26:29
But this is that’s a line I have to draw. I’m not saying that happens all the time. But you do have to draw a line to make sure when it’s appropriate to call them out to call.

Pete Newsome  26:39
Ricky, I think I think you just gave the equivalent of answering in an interview, what are your biggest weaknesses? And you just said, I’m too good at what I do. I’m too much of a perfectionist.

Ricky Baez  26:48
I think I think I think that’s why I have a hard time saying no.

Pete Newsome  26:54
I go above and beyond constantly, and I can never stop.

Ricky Baez  26:57
Right, we need to do alive about all of those answers. What are the worst ways to answer that question?

Pete Newsome  27:04
Well, so that’s great. I think the last point thing not to do is don’t try to steer the direction too much. If you are volunteering to help someone you need to help where they need it. And not make assumptions there. Either you agree with that point?

Ricky Baez  27:23
Agreed. 100%, you need to be the employee’s GPS system, a GPS system on your phone or in your car has a lot of information have a lot of different addresses.

Ricky Baez  27:34
But somebody has to point where they want to go, and you have to create that path for them. That’s what a mentor is.

Pete Newsome  27:43
I like that. I like that. That’s a good visual for us.

Ricky Baez  27:47
I’m gonna, I’m gonna write that down too. For a T-shirt. Yeah, yeah, multiple T-Shirt Days. I’m gonna start a business and watch a t-shirt business.

Pete Newsome  27:55
So last question on this? Do you think that it makes more sense to have a mentor in your same organization? Or does it make sense to seek one? externally?

Ricky Baez  28:11
Good question. And woof, you caught me off guard with them when they repeat. So here’s, here’s how I’m going to answer that.

Ricky Baez  28:22
If you are looking to move up in your organization, if you’re looking to stay in your organization, it would be a good idea to find a mentor, who’s a couple of level on level up the new, more experienced than you, obviously, but more senior than you in that organization, because that person is going to have keys to a lot of doors you’re not going to have.

Ricky Baez  28:44
So I think if you’re looking to move up in a specific organization, I think it’s a good idea to find a mentor in that organization. Now, remember what I said about going home and having a conversation with yourself?

Ricky Baez  28:56
Okay? Go home, look in the mirror, and I am, I’m being serious here. But ask yourself, do people like you? Because if people don’t like you, nobody’s gonna pick nobody’s gonna mentor you. Right?

Ricky Baez  29:12
I’m just being serious. And if you go up there, and everybody tells you, no, you’re gonna have to have another conversation about why doesn’t anybody want to mentor you.

Ricky Baez  29:21
So you have to take a look at your own toolbox and how you’re coming across to see what you need to tweak to be mentored. Will. I just made that up. Right? Because you’ve got to be measurable. And if you’re not doing that, it’s just not gonna happen.

Pete Newsome  29:36
Alright. So be likable. That is, that is a trade.

Ricky Baez  29:41
That is now if you’re looking to just improve yourself and move up elsewhere go somewhere else, but I would do I would find a mentor in an organization or in a position you want to be in. Right.

Ricky Baez  29:56
And that is when the quality of your relationships really relationships on LinkedIn and social media are such great tools for that.

Ricky Baez  30:03
Because if you build that relationship with somebody, let’s say if you want to work for Apple, and you want to be an HR director of Apple, you build up a relationship with a recruiter there is somebody there senior director there to the point that, hey, they’ll take you as, as a mentee, go for it.

Ricky Baez  30:19
Absolutely go for it. So it really depends on where you want to go in your career.

Pete Newsome  30:23
You responded nicely to that one, I put you on the spot. And so I think they’re off the hook for the rest of this episode. But let’s wrap this so not day. Not today.

Pete Newsome  30:35
Now the day is not even 11 am. But let’s summarize what we talked about in terms of how to be a good mentor.

Pete Newsome  30:44
Number one, set expectations up front, in terms of how often you’re going to get together what you each look to, to get out of the relationship that is imperative to begin in the best possible way.

Pete Newsome  30:57
Number two, be genuine in your interest.

Pete Newsome  31:00
Make sure if you’re taking this step, and you’re making the commitment that you mean it and you plan to deliver along the way, even if that means helping your mentee surpass you.

Pete Newsome  31:10
And the role in the profession. I like that you brought that up because it is something that we all can’t do easily but should consider if we’re truly trying to help in the best possible way, right?

Pete Newsome  31:24
It’s an important thing to commit to building trust. That’s huge. Share your experiences, share, and be willing to share your secrets of success at all costs, right? That’s another one.

Ricky Baez  31:40
And failures and your failures. That is something people do not do constantly because they’re ashamed of it. And yes or no feels that because I’ve made my mistakes, I’m sure you have, we’ve all have.

Ricky Baez  31:53
But one of the best ways I learned Pete is by picking up a biography of somebody it because you’ll be able to see that that person has some of the same failures, as you’ve experienced, and next to you know, you’re more relatable.

Ricky Baez  32:07
And they see that you’re not such a big machine a superstar. So you got to be good enough with yourself to share the good and the bad that way you can have somebody else with it.

Pete Newsome  32:15
I love it. And also, I believe very strongly that learning comes from failures, much more so than from success. Because when you succeed, you can make incorrect assumptions that you’re doing things in the best way or in the right way, when realistically, you may just be getting lucky.

Pete Newsome  32:36
So when you fail, you learn from it, and you improve from it. Well, that’s, that’s more meaningful, right? Especially to someone who you’re trying to help MIT to avoid those pitfalls and mistakes himself.

Pete Newsome  32:50
So that’s a great point to bring up. The other highlights from this are, don’t always try, to direct the path, right? Let your mentee ask for the help that they need the advice that they need.

Pete Newsome  33:07
Don’t always try to set too many directions. Open your connections to your mentee, that’s one that you have to be willing to commit to upfront. And then the last one is to celebrate their achievements.

Pete Newsome  33:22
That’s right. Be present for that along the way. And you know, because you never know, maybe no one else is for that individual. So commit to playing that role as well. Did we leave anything out? Ricky?

Ricky Baez  33:34
No, I don’t think we did. I’m looking on here and Oh, teach them how to cook the perfect ribeye steak. That’s, you know how to throw that in there. That was in my notes really big and bold.

Pete Newsome  33:48
Alright, well, we have to cover all the bases and I think we have now.

Ricky Baez  33:54
Absolutely. We get your request.

Pete Newsome  33:56
Thank you for your time. As always, thank you for listening to this episode of The Hire Calling Podcast. Rate us review us give us feedback and also, we love taking requests for new episodes.

Pete Newsome  34:07
So if you have anything to share, we’d love to hear from you. Ricky, thank you have a great rest of the day.

Ricky Baez  34:12
Thank you. You too. Have a good one folks. Drive safe!

Advice on How to Handle Employee Complaints

• Have a plan. Never send someone away until you fully understand what’s going on. Determine the severity of the issue and spend those first five minutes trying to decide what kind of situation you’re dealing with. From there, determine whether or not you need to get involved.
• Listen carefully. It may not seem important to you, but it’s important to the employee who’s telling you about it. Don’t interrupt them, no matter how often you’ve heard a similar story. Most times, these people just want to be heard.
• Explain the open-door policy. Start the conversation by letting them know you will listen to their concerns and keep this confidential. Never turn anyone away, and don’t go off script if you have a policy in place. 
• Be available and accessible. Listen to both sides of the story and avoid picking sides. And don’t break anyone’s confidentiality or make promises you can’t keep.

Additional Resources

• How to Manage Workplace Conflict
• How Employers Can Reduce Stress in the Workplace
• How to Build and Maintain a Positive Work Culture
• Strategies for Supporting Employees in the Workplace

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome  00:00
You’re listening to the Hire Calling Podcast. I’m Pete Newsome. And this is your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. 

Pete Newsome  00:07
I’m joined with Ricky Baez on a beautiful Friday morning, Ricky, how are you today?

Ricky Baez  00:10
I’m doing great Pete. How about you?

Pete Newsome  00:12
I’m doing alright, man. I’m doing alright. It is. It’s a beautiful day in Florida.

Ricky Baez  00:16
Right? What? Isn’t that a beautiful day in Florida for everybody else listening? That’s not in Florida.

Pete Newsome  00:23
When it’s a hurricane, I think I think that’s it, I think.

Ricky Baez  00:26
Yeah, but we see those common. So yeah, we have Florida man. But we also have beautiful weather. So I’ll take it.

Pete Newsome  00:31
Do you have your Star Wars shirt on? You’re ready. You’re ready to go.

Ricky Baez  00:35
That’s right. That’s right. I got to start with a meeting later on today. I am not kidding. That’s a real thing. With a client and I cannot wait. It’s gonna be awesome.

Pete Newsome  00:42
Wonderful. I look forward to hearing more about that later. 

Pete Newsome  00:45
But today, we are talking about employee complaints. And HR professionals dream, right? 

Pete Newsome  00:53
This is your time to shine. Ricky is when you’re needed most right how to handle employee complaints. 

Pete Newsome  01:01
Employees never complain. Oh, do they?

Ricky Baez  01:04
That’s rare. I don’t know what kind of Amazon wishlist you have over there, Pete. But yeah, employees complain quite a bit in, you know, HR. 

Ricky Baez  01:19
I think HR professionals would really kill it out there. If we almost all had some kind of a psychology degree, any degree of psychology, even a psychiatrist. 

Ricky Baez  01:31
We kill it out there. Because that’s, that’s almost 90% of our job, just listening to people and hearing them out and then helping them along the way. 

Ricky Baez  01:38
But yeah, we get a lot of HR complaints from employees and leaders too.

Pete Newsome  01:42
Isn’t that it’s such an interesting statement? 

Pete Newsome  01:45
And I am not surprised that you would make it but I think it’s unfortunate that you need to make it which is 90% of your job is complaints. 

Pete Newsome  01:54
Right? I mean, if you had to break that down, put a pie chart of the nature of those complaints.

Pete Newsome  02:01
What would they be attributed to complaints about the company peers getting a raise and having the opportunity at work hours, what do you think would be the top hit list of employee complaints?

Ricky Baez  02:18
The top one that I have seen in my 20 years is always that people feel that they’re being punished or treated differently. 

Ricky Baez  02:27
And because of managers holding them accountable, right? 

Ricky Baez  02:31
So if somebody comes in now, I’m going to paint you an awesome scenario here Pete because this happens quite a bit. 

Ricky Baez  02:38
I’m in my office, and somebody comes in and says, I need to talk to you because my manager is discriminating against me. All right, come on and have a seat. 

Ricky Baez  02:45
Now, the first thing I do, I listen, I don’t care how many times I’ve heard this same story from other people in the back of my head. 

Ricky Baez  02:53
My conscience is finding to say, okay, you know what, this is going to speed it up. Now. I’m quiet, I listened to what they had to say. 

Ricky Baez  03:00
What that does is it lets them talk, you get to hear exactly what’s happening, what’s going on. 

Ricky Baez  03:06
And Pete nine times out of 10, at the end of that conversation I asked, so how can I help you? 

Ricky Baez  03:13
And you know what they say? But you know what? Nothing, I just, I just mean it to say it out loud. 

Ricky Baez  03:18
And then I go back to the leader. Why is this person coming to me listening to this, right? 

Ricky Baez  03:22
But anyway, to talk about that number one complaint? 

Ricky Baez  03:26
The number one complaint is people come in and they think my manager is treating me differently. Because he’s now writing me up. 

Ricky Baez  03:33
And okay, so I ask why is he writing you up? Well, because I didn’t do what he told me to do. 

Ricky Baez  03:38
Like, okay, alright. It’s a why is he writing Brittany up? I’m like, is Brittany doing her job? Yeah, that’s why your managers not discriminating against you. 

Ricky Baez  03:48
Your manager is just holding you accountable for the job you agree to do this is a big difference between discrimination and being held to the fire. So that happens quite a bit.

Pete Newsome  03:57
Did you happen to see this week’s South Park episode I have to ask? No, I haven’t. I’ll just leave it there. 

Pete Newsome  04:04
It is. It has to do with this very topic. I’ll just say. 

Pete Newsome  04:08
I’ll just say it for anyone who’s a South Park fan Eric Cartman gets a job and I’ll just gotta help so that you know South Park at all, you’ll know that that is probably it probably didn’t go well. 

Pete Newsome  04:26
I’ll leave it at that. Yeah, but it does touch on a lot of these types of things in you know, in a humorous way, of course, and I look forward to your review of oh, I’m checking that out of South Park. 

Pete Newsome  04:39
I give you my movie reviews. You give me your view on that. Yes. John Wick four by tonight, by the way. 

Ricky Baez  04:47
I expect to hear 20 out of 10 I keep hearing a lot of greetings.

Pete Newsome  04:51
Well, you know, expectations are high but they were high for Ant-Man as well. And that boy was that it was at a bust. So we’ll say okay. 

Pete Newsome  05:02
So on these discussion points, before we get going, Ricky, I, I have had a theory and I don’t know if I’ve even ever shared this with you being in staffing for a long time.

Pete Newsome  05:13
We place employees of course with our clients who mutually agree to, to be to take a job, you know, to offer someone a job, it is a mutual agreement, and it’s harmonious and everyone’s happy at the beginning of the relationship, right? 

Pete Newsome  05:29
That is how these things go during the honeymoon period if you will. And I find that things generally stay good. 

Pete Newsome  05:37
I mean, there are anomalies and outliers, of course, but for the most part, if I’m interviewing with you, and you choose to offer me a role, working, reporting to you and I accept that role, we have to get along at some level, right? 

Pete Newsome  05:53
You like me enough to make the offer, I like you enough to accept it, and we move forward. 

Pete Newsome  05:58
What I’ve noticed over the years, a trend is when management responsibilities shift when reporting responsibilities shift. 

Pete Newsome  06:08
So it let’s say I move into a different department, or you as my manager leaves the organization or you move on and I’m suddenly reporting to someone else, I find that that’s when most of these may employee manager conflicts happen to you. 

Pete Newsome  06:21
Have you ever had that thought? 

Pete Newsome  06:23
Because I’ve really noticed it so many times over the years. And I think that’s usually the source of these employee-manager conflicts.

Ricky Baez  06:33
That happens almost every time there’s a new leader when somebody gets promoted.

Ricky Baez  06:38
Because, you know, especially if you have a leader that’s stepping into a role that that role has had the same previous leader for the past 5-10 years those employees already set in their ways that leader already has those rules set.

Ricky Baez  06:52
And this is what I call the new sheriff complex, right, a new sheriff is in town next to you know, it disrupts the applecart. 

Ricky Baez  06:59
What people need to understand about leaders, employees, and HR pros is whenever there’s a new leader in place, always expect the applecart to be upset. Yep. 

Ricky Baez  07:08
And you just have to know how to mitigate that right. 

Ricky Baez  07:10
And you, you have to expect it because contrary to popular belief, people don’t like change, right? 

Ricky Baez  07:16
And when you start changing things, you as a leader, have to go in there understanding that the changes you’re looking to make are going to be impactful in your job as a leader is to make sure that you make those changes as least impactful as possible. 

Ricky Baez  07:31
But still, it’s impactful.

Pete Newsome  07:33
Well, I think it’s, it’s human nature, it’s natural. 

Pete Newsome  07:37
If I’m in a relationship with you, let’s say you’re the person I go to lunch with every day.

Pete Newsome  07:44
And I go to lunch with you, you’re my work, buddy, we go to lunch every day, because we enjoy each other’s company, we have common interests, we like each other, whatever the bond is based on and you leave, I’m not going in, I randomly have to start going to lunch with someone else, because that’s what we’re talking about right? 

Pete Newsome  08:02
To choose to, if you inherit, a manager or manager inherits an employee that they didn’t get to interview. It’s the same thing and what a crapshoot that is right? Suddenly, I go from going to lunch with Ricky every day. 

Pete Newsome  08:17
Now Bob, who I’ve never met before, is hopping in the car with me every day at noon to go to lunch. Man, that’s, that’s gonna, that’s gonna fail a high percentage of the time, don’t you think?

Ricky Baez  08:28
It is. And like, Pete, that’s because we’re human beings, right? 

Ricky Baez  08:32
And look, and I said this in class, and I shared this with you, HR, IT, and the healthcare industry are the only industries that I know that we furiously work hard to put ourselves out of business. Right? 

Ricky Baez  08:47
If you work really hard, hear me out, if you work really hard to make sure nobody has any IT issues. Their industry doesn’t exist. In the medical industry, if you work really hard to make sure nobody gets sick. 

Ricky Baez  09:00
There isn’t a medical industry, HR if I work really hard, so everybody gets along. 

Ricky Baez  09:06
There’s no reason to have me around. But guess what, Pete, as long as you have one human being working with another, this is going to be attitude is going to be an issue, and you’re going to need me. 

Ricky Baez  09:15
So I have had job security for years, years. So that’s why I love my job to be honest because I get to intervene in people’s issues. And I help them get to their aha moment. 

Ricky Baez  09:27
I don’t want to prove them wrong. I don’t want to prove them. Right. I want to help them get the aha moment and understand. You may not have to like each other. 

Ricky Baez  09:34
But the respect has to be there because each and every one of you has a paycheck that’s waiting on you at the end of the week, right and that’s what should be on top. 

Ricky Baez  09:42
But some people don’t think that Pete I got stories for days about incredible HR stories that will blow your mind. It will blow your mind.

Pete Newsome  09:50
Well, I don’t think we’re going to solve all of this right then you just said it as long as two people have to work together. 

Pete Newsome  09:56
Conflict is inevitable I can write but So let’s instead focus on what you can do about it. 

Pete Newsome  10:02
Right, and we have, some points that we think will be helpful in that regard. 

Pete Newsome  10:07
So let’s just start at it, start at the top, the first thing you need to do is have a plan, right of how to handle employee complaints. 

Pete Newsome  10:18
What’s your procedure for that? If you’re the expert on this, I may be the expert on causing employee complaints. That’s probably, you know, unintentionally, right? 

Pete Newsome  10:32
But it happens if they’re gonna complain about someone, often the complaint goes to go the top right, I’m not perfect. I maybe I deserve it. Sometimes. 

Pete Newsome  10:43
Maybe I don’t, who knows, but we’re not gonna focus on this is not a counseling therapy session for me. But where, where do you start in terms of creating processes and procedures to handle complaints?

Ricky Baez  10:56
What I tell my students Pete is that never ever shoo anybody away until you fully understand what’s going on. Right? What you have to understand as an HR professional is it’s at any time anybody can come in and say, I have an issue. 

Ricky Baez  11:11
And you have to make a determination whether you need to stop what you’re doing right there and listen to that issue. 

Ricky Baez  11:15
Or just say, You know what, go back to your manager, maybe they can help you out, blah, blah, blah, but you still need the first five minutes to fully understand that issue. 

Ricky Baez  11:23
So the first and foremost is understanding the issue that’s in front of you understand that issue. 

Ricky Baez  11:28
And although the issue may not be important to you, it is apparently very important to the employee who’s in your office right now telling you what’s going on. 

Ricky Baez  11:37
Right. And what I tell my team, there are two issues. Two issues always jump to the front of the line. 

Ricky Baez  11:44
Always, if anybody was what was touched, you know, sexually harassed or anything like that, that’s, that’s, that’s really bad, or pay. 

Ricky Baez  11:53
Well, for those things automatically go to the front of the line, everything else is on a first come first serve basis. So you have to spend the first five minutes trying to decide what kind of a situation am I looking at here?

Pete Newsome  12:04
So let me ask you about that. So that so the first thing you mentioned, that’s obvious, right? That’s a very serious thing in any part of life. 

Pete Newsome  12:13
Where there’s harassment involved, especially physical contact, no brainer there. But pay seems like it would be a very common complaint. I don’t think there’s an employee. 

Pete Newsome  12:24
Anywhere. If you asked, Would you like to be paid more? Do you think you should be paid more? Yeah, maybe some would? Would say No, I don’t think I should be. 

Pete Newsome  12:31
But everyone would like to be. Right. I mean, that goes without saying. So isn’t pay almost constant, I’m surprised to some degree that you would put that at the same level or, or above potential other things.

Ricky Baez  12:44
So let me be more specific, not necessarily somebody complaining that they’re getting paid too little, but complaining that their paycheck is wrong.

Pete Newsome  12:52
Ah, okay. That’s, that’s an important distinction. And I am now with you 1,000%. Because being in staffing, that is the number one thing we absolutely have to get, right? 

Pete Newsome  13:06
No ifs, ands, or buts. And we cannot let someone go into a weekend not having a paycheck and we place hundreds and hundreds of people a year, as you know. 

Pete Newsome  13:17
And it is not completely uncommon. I think it’s becoming less common as we can scan these things. And it’s all digital. 

Pete Newsome  13:23
But for years having people have to write down their bank account number and the routing number for direct deposit. 

Pete Newsome  13:31
And those are numbers. We’re not used to writing down every day and they’re long. There’s some percentage of the time that they don’t translate correctly and or transcribed correctly and a direct deposit doesn’t hit. 

Pete Newsome  13:45
And you know that that has happened over the years. And it’s easy to say you could say, well, it’s the employee’s fault. Look, they clearly wrote the thing down the number down wrong, but I look at it and say thanks. 

Pete Newsome  13:58
Yeah, that’s part you know, we all make mistakes. That’s part of it. We’ve written manual checks when those happen, and you know, FedEx checks overnight. I mean, I’m with you. 

Pete Newsome  14:09
Because as a staffing company, that is the number one thing I could never have anyone say about us is that they didn’t deliver my paycheck, right? I mean, that is the kiss of death, and I would never let that happen. 

Pete Newsome  14:20
So, okay, thank you for the clarification. I’m like, pick complaints about pay.

Ricky Baez  14:26
So let’s talk about the let’s say, somebody comes in and says, You know what, my pay is too little blah, blah, blah, blah. 

Ricky Baez  14:32
The first thing I say is all right, let’s set up some time to discuss but have you talked to your manager first? 

Ricky Baez  14:40
You have to talk to your leader about this because all I know is what you’ve been paid before what you’re being paid right now. 

Ricky Baez  14:45
But your leader knows how you work. Your leader knows how you perform, he or she is the best person to talk about this. Now. 

Ricky Baez  14:54
Here’s what I would do. Pete, I would coach the person to go back to their leader with some ammo right I’ll tell him, don’t just say, hey, I need a pay raise because of inflation. That’s not a good way. 

Ricky Baez  15:07
Let a business case together, what admits his case together showing how you have gone above and beyond the normal call of duty and why that is worth more than what you’re currently being paid right now.

Pete Newsome  15:17
So So let me ask you to clarify something else on that point. And when in this and this applies beyond pay, but you mentioned going to their manager first, to talk about pay. 

Pete Newsome  15:30
Now, in many cases, I think the larger the company, the less managers don’t have a whole lot of flexibility there. 

Pete Newsome  15:37
When I talk about when to ask for a raise, for example, my first recommendation to anyone is to understand how your organization handles those things. Is it done annually? Is it done based on merit on the fly? 

Pete Newsome  15:50
Maybe in that case? What you’re talking about right now would make sense, right, go to your manager and make your case. But the first thing is to understand that right, I think you’d agree with that. 

Pete Newsome  16:00
But just talking about complaints as a whole, when should HR get involved? Like, when should what point in how soon? Or is it a matter of what the topic is? 

Pete Newsome  16:15
Where does HR get involved versus a first-line manager, for example?

Ricky Baez  16:21
HR? So I’m, I’m speaking holistically here, right? HR should only get involved if the situation is serious enough that a legal issue might come out of it. Okay. Right.

Pete Newsome  16:36
Is that now is that a general rule for HR as a whole? Like, you know, how do I know when HR is involved? Well, when it’s When, when, when it’s legal, right? 

Pete Newsome  16:46
When a legal issue may arise? I mean, that makes sense.

Ricky Baez  16:50
Yeah, well then, when the situation can get complex enough that it would hurt the organization financially later on. 

Ricky Baez  16:58
Okay, now that’s the business case of it. 

Ricky Baez  17:03
Now, what I do is, I’m really careful in how I talk to employees and how I help them because I don’t want the employees to see me as that leader, they should see their leader as that leader. 

Ricky Baez  17:17
I’m here to help the employees, whether it’s a manager or the actual employee, the bottom of the totem pole, you know, navigate these issues, but I’m like the referee at a UFC match. Right? 

Ricky Baez  17:26
Well, no, that’s, that’s a bad description, employee.

Pete Newsome  17:30
irreverent, you’re you only stopped the fight when the person that risk of death. That’s not what you imagine that is not the right analogy. As a UFC fan, I can tell you that

Ricky Baez  17:42
will make if we charge people, for leaders and employees are fighting each other man will make a lot of money. Don’t do that, folks. I’m kidding. I’m kidding. 

Ricky Baez  17:49
No. So So when So a great example, Pete, somebody comes to me with a concern about their schedule, somebody comes to me with a concern about attendance, right? 

Ricky Baez  17:59
I tell them to go through their leader, what did their leader say? If they rent to their leader, they didn’t like what they say that I’m going to listen to them. 

Ricky Baez  18:06
I’m going to process that information, then have a conversation with their leader just to let everybody know what was happening, what’s going on. 

Ricky Baez  18:13
Now, if the complaint is against that leader, then I get involved, and I take over that investigation. And I partner with that leader one over to say, Hey, just wanted to let you know, this is the concern that came in. 

Ricky Baez  18:26
Let me pause real quick because I think it’s important that I’m making this point right here. Do you remember the first time you had a complaint filed against you? Pete?

Pete Newsome  18:37
I don’t you mean, I don’t know what you mean? complaint filed against me? 

Ricky Baez  18:42
I’m nervous. I do. I do. I’ve had a cup. Here’s, here’s why I asked that. 

Ricky Baez  18:47
When a brand new leader comes into it into a position, right, they’re gonna have to make some calls that people are not going to like, right? 

Ricky Baez  18:58
So when they make the calls that people are not going to like people are going to file a complaint?

Pete Newsome  19:03
Oh, well, I mean, so when you declare right when you say filed against it, that sounds very formal, right? 

Pete Newsome  19:09
I mean, I hope, to the best of my knowledge, that’s not happened. 

Pete Newsome  19:13
But when, when I was first promoted, I was in two from my first management job, I would. 

Pete Newsome  19:23
And this is, we could talk for days about this too because I think this is very common. I was on a team of about 10. 

Pete Newsome  19:30
And we all got along, everyone was friendly. 

Pete Newsome  19:34
And then when there was an opportunity for a promotion to manage that group, the person who would manage the group moved on I don’t even remember the exact scenario off the top of my head. But I was one of the people up for the role. 

Pete Newsome  19:46
There were a few others in the group who were as well and I was the one who was given the opportunity to manage the team and someone who had been a very close friend of mine.

Pete Newsome  19:55
I thought there was not happiness about that outcome and suddenly went From an ally to you know, an enemy not to be dramatic, but you know complained about me constantly. 

Pete Newsome  20:07
So, yeah, I remember that vividly. It was all it was painful.

Ricky Baez  20:12
It was horrible in, I bring that up because that’s important too to talk about. I remember years ago, one of my employees, and I’ll tell her today I’m talking about her. 

Ricky Baez  20:23
Because I’ve talked about this before in the past when she became an HR leader, she had a complaint filed against her because she held somebody accountable, she was freaking out because up until that point in her career, she’s never had anybody file a complaint. 

Ricky Baez  20:40
And I just gave her a hug. And I’m like, welcome to The Club. Welcome to the club. Like she’s freaking out. But Ricky, I don’t have I have a clean record on my Candida. Did you do everything? Right? 

Ricky Baez  20:52
He’s like, Absolutely. Do you follow the book? The policy? Absolutely. 

Ricky Baez  20:56
You have nothing to worry about. Just when the investigator comes in, answer the questions, honestly, you’ve got nothing to worry about the truth will come out in the end. 

Ricky Baez  21:07
And then it took her a few times, right? Because let me tell you, an HR person who spends their entire career without one complaint filed against them there have not been doing their job. 

Ricky Baez  21:17
They have not been doing their job. And that’s not just SRP, leaders, leaders as well.

Ricky Baez  21:24
So that’s why I’m saying from an age from a leader perspective, right, you’re gonna make some calls that people are not going to like so expect a complaint filed against you? 

Ricky Baez  21:33
That’s perfectly okay. Okay, so

Pete Newsome  21:35
All right. So how do you establish that process? So we didn’t really get to that yet? As an organization, what do you recommend in that regard? 

Pete Newsome  21:46
Should we hear a lot about the open door policy? Where that seems to be sort of the default thing, everyone who doesn’t have an open-door policy? I don’t think we all do, right?

Ricky Baez  21:59
Let’s talk about that open-door policy. What does that mean? 

Ricky Baez  22:01
Open Door policy means that you can come to me with any concern that you like, and we will look into it. 

Ricky Baez  22:08
What did this not mean is that after we look into it, we’re going to side with whatever outcome you want to see. 

Ricky Baez  22:15
That’s not what that means, right? Now, this is, again, for HR leaders out there. 

Ricky Baez  22:20
If you say you have an open door policy, right, and people come in and say I have a concern, you should start your conversation with this. 

Ricky Baez  22:29
And I say this to everybody. But before we begin wanted to let you know that I’m going to listen to what you have to say and listen to your concerns. 

Ricky Baez  22:36
And we are going to keep this as confidential as possible. I cannot promise you 100% confidentiality, because if you tell me something that by law, I have to investigate, I do have to involve other people above and beyond us. 

Ricky Baez  22:50
That tells the person because I’ve been told Ricky don’t tell people that because then people are going to be afraid to say anything. If they’re afraid to say something because of what I said that it’s not an issue. 

Ricky Baez  23:00
It’s not an issue. Right? So that means you don’t see this as dire enough for me to look into it. 

Ricky Baez  23:07
So we’re so we’re good. Now, if they continue going down this list, listen to those investigation claims carefully. 

Ricky Baez  23:17
Do not interrupt, and I don’t care how many times you think you heard that story. 

Ricky Baez  23:22
You keep quiet and you listen, and just turn everything off your iPhone, everything does not move, too, because a lot of these times people just want to be heard. He just wants to be heard. 

Ricky Baez  23:33
So that’s why I started, I would explain the open door policy, I will listen to what they have to say, then I’ll make a determination whether I get involved or not. Okay.

Pete Newsome  23:44
That makes sense. I like it. So is there anyone you’re a company you’re aware of that has a closed-door policy? What would that look like? I don’t know what the alternate option is there. 

Ricky Baez  23:59
So let me give an example of what a closed-door policy looks like. Because this happened to me. I was sorry, I was working in Lake Mary. 

Ricky Baez  24:08
And for those of you listening late, Mary is a town you know, just 10 minutes north of Orlando. 

Ricky Baez  24:13
I was working there and there’s this new back then there was this new thing called a SunRail system where I lived in Lake Nona.

Ricky Baez  24:20
And I take the SunRail to Lake Mary and then I wasn’t scheduled right that means that if I missed my 634 train back home, right, I was gonna be stuck there for three hours.

Ricky Baez  24:31
And I didn’t want to so I was on my way out one day, I lock in the door of my office still in the still in the building. 

Ricky Baez  24:38
Somebody came to me crying her eyes out. 

Ricky Baez  24:41
This call center was open almost 24/7 So just so you know, she just started her shift. Right? 

Ricky Baez  24:46
So I’m about to leave she comes in crying her eyes I should like Miss Ricky, Ricky, I gotta talk to you so and so was touching me. He took some pictures, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I’m on my way out. 

Ricky Baez  24:56
Here’s what an eye-closed-door policy looks like. Hey, He’s like, Oh, man, I’m sorry. Hey, can we talk about this tomorrow? I’m about to miss my train. Right? What do they show her? 

Ricky Baez  25:08
So I’m like, You know what, in the back of my head, I’m like, I’m gonna miss my train. 

Ricky Baez  25:11
But I’m like, You know what, come on, let’s talk. I was there for two and a half hours. Wow. Okay, two and a half hours. And then I had to call my wife to come to pick me up. But still, that’s why I stopped taking the train. 

Ricky Baez  25:23
I that was a true story. By the way. I’m saying that to say that an open-door policy is exactly that you do not turn anybody away. You don’t turn anybody away. 

Ricky Baez  25:35
And depending on the information that they’re telling you, you don’t use it against them. Now, there’s an asterix there. Right? 

Ricky Baez  25:41
If they tell you Look, and because I was being discriminated against, I stole some stuff from the cafeteria, you can’t ignore that. 

Ricky Baez  25:48
Right? Right. I still have to address that issue. So I want people to understand an open door policy is a policy where you can come in and have a good discussion about what your current concerns are. 

Ricky Baez  26:01
That’s what it is at any time possible.

Pete Newsome  26:03
But you’re not a priest, and you’re not an attorney.

Ricky Baez  26:06
I am not. I am neither one of those. Is there a priest’s attorney? That will be an amazing exercise. I’m

Pete Newsome  26:10
sure there, I’m sure there’s a fair share. There are a few. 

Pete Newsome  26:14
Alright, so I think we’ve set that stage. Well, I know that the last thing I want to ask you about is before we get into some do’s and don’ts, and we’ll go through those quickly. 

Pete Newsome  26:25
You are a big fan of having regular check-ins doing employee surveys so you can find 
out and, I think it was as the leader of a business. One of the things I know I’ve shared this with you on more than one occasion. 

Pete Newsome  26:40
But the thing that’s probably caused me the most frustration over the years is that I am the last to know about some complaints. 

Pete Newsome  26:50
You know, and to your point earlier, some are valid, some are not right, we still have work that needs to be done, we still have a job to do, and we still have to be profitable as a business. 

Pete Newsome  27:00
So those are things that, you know, we can’t ignore. But there are a lot of times, I will find out that someone had a complaint that I didn’t even know, wasn’t even on my radar screen far from it. 

Pete Newsome  27:14
And I wish I had a way to find out about potential problems before they become real problems and or big problems or a reason for an employee to be frustrated and decide to move on without things that we didn’t even know they were unhappy about. And you know, I have a few scenarios that come to mind when I think of this. 

Pete Newsome  27:34
And it easily could have been avoided if we knew in advance. And so for that reason, I love that you’re in support of surveys and finding these things out. Now, let’s ask before we know before we have a reason to write, is that a fair way to look at it?

Ricky Baez  27:54
Absolutely. Because if you do an exit survey, you’re gonna get really good information. 

Ricky Baez  27:58
But it’s true for that person giving you the information. If you do a pulse survey, and this great relationship between the employees and leadership and HR, you’re gonna get some good information as well. 

Ricky Baez  28:09
And the reason I’m emphasizing that relationship is that if you do a pulse survey, the employees don’t trust that we’re going to do anything with the information, and we’re not going to get good credible data. 

Ricky Baez  28:19
We’re gonna get everybody’s great, Ricky, everybody’s awesome, right? So so that’s the information I would get. 

Ricky Baez  28:24
So I’m a big fan of pulse surveys. But I think how you validate the credibility or the value of a pulse survey is an everyday thing. 

Ricky Baez  28:35
And that validation is connecting with the employees listening to what they have to say, and actually helping them in what is the best way you possibly can you build that trust. 

Ricky Baez  28:45
If you have to build that trust every day, JJ Watt said it when he said that rents do every day, something like that. So yeah, it’s every day you had I got the last part of that. 

Ricky Baez  28:56
Every day, you have to work on building that trusts that when that pulse survey comes up, they believe in it, and they give you good information and they’re not going to feel like they’re going to be battened down if they say something that I may not like, right? 

Ricky Baez  29:09
So that’s important to work on every single day because he dude, HR, let me tell you, it’s really like the police department. 

Ricky Baez  29:19
Almost every interaction is negative, except somebody’s leaving voluntarily. Somebody’s being promoted, somebody being hired. 

Ricky Baez  29:27
Anything outside of that it’s negative. So that’s why I like to get out there, talk to the folks take some hands, kiss some babies, metaphorically, I don’t know why those babies at work, but still, you know what I mean? And actually, it’s building those relationships.

Pete Newsome  29:40
Excellent. Alright. Thank you. That’s great, that’s a great answer. And now let’s turn to some do’s and don’ts. Use do’s and don’ts. So, do’s for responding to employee complaints. You know, you’ve covered him write some listen. What else? Be available, be accessible.

Ricky Baez  30:00
All be assessable like it’s, again, paychecks being wrong, and things that can get us in trouble is the only thing that you can continue working on as an HR hourly person without any approval for overtime. 

Ricky Baez  30:14
Right, I will be perfectly okay paying that over time if you had to stay late to handle one of those issues because you got to do it on time.

Pete Newsome  30:20
Yeah, timing is key. So discrimination, missing pay, no question about that. What else? 

Pete Newsome  30:29
What are the things that else you need to do? I mean, what about? Follow up? So so we have this situation, I think is probably a common challenge, I think where you, you have a complaint, you think you’ve resolved it? 

Pete Newsome  30:44
And we all go on about our day? 

Pete Newsome  30:46
Because of course, the objective is to solve this as quickly as possible and move on. Have everyone be able to move on the manager, the employee who HR you know, you have your next issue to tackle. 

Pete Newsome  31:02
But you have to follow up and make sure the fix worked. 

Pete Newsome  31:05
Right. And that’s hard. I mean, you have to have a system for that. 

Ricky Baez  31:10
I think you do you do. And my system for this is always this, once I get the complaint, I’ll let them know what I’m going to do with this information, who I’m going to investigate what I’m going to do. 

Ricky Baez  31:21
And then later on, let you know when I’m done. Here’s where people kind of make mistakes here from the complaint inside. When I go back and tell them that hey, I investigated. 

Ricky Baez  31:34
Thank you very much. But everything has been handled. And the person is like then why are they still working? Like, well, what do you mean, they’re still working? They’re not fired? So how could it be handled? If they’re not fired? 

Ricky Baez  31:46
I’m like, well, is handled because the appropriate action was taken. Just because the action you want it to happen didn’t happen. It doesn’t mean the appropriate action did not happen. Right? appropriate action was taken, right? 

Ricky Baez  31:59
And all you did was brought the information to me and I took care of it. My guarantee to you is whatever happened is not going to happen again. 

Ricky Baez  32:07
Back if that’s what you want, right? You wanted to push somebody fired is something different than you wanting the harassment to stop. 

Ricky Baez  32:14
you want this to stop and I stopped it. So no, go ahead. 

Pete Newsome  32:18
I was just they have because this is fresh in my mind this South Park episode from last night, where I don’t want to spoil it for you or anyone else, but I didn’t get to see it. 

Pete Newsome  32:27
So don’t spoil it. All right. I won’t say and I won’t say but I think that at times an employee is so one of the words that we hear a lot have for the past few years toxic work environment, right? This is a toxic work environment. 

Pete Newsome  32:40
And you’ve meant I want to just clarify what you just said, I guarantee you this won’t happen again. Well, it may be you didn’t say the word guarantee, but because you can’t really do that. 

Pete Newsome  32:51
But okay, this won’t happen, but what if what’s happening is fine? The employee doesn’t like it, but it’s just part of the job. It’s part of the deal. I mean, how do you? How do you follow up on that? 

Pete Newsome  33:04
Because I think you have to, you wouldn’t say it won’t happen again. In that case, you would say what? Well, this is the deal. You can accept it or not. But I’m trying to think of a good example. 

Pete Newsome  33:18
None immediately comes to mind. But when you have that if you have a complaint, and you have to say to the employee, hey, this is just part of the job, you know, you have to suck it up. 

Pete Newsome  33:29
But once a person has complained about it and expressed to you that they’re dissatisfied with that situation, how do you handle that? Because they’re gonna go back to work, but you know, that they’re, they’re not happy? 

Pete Newsome  33:41
How do you reconcile that? And I’m putting you on the spot with this question because I don’t.

Ricky Baez  33:47
I can give you a good answer. It’s, I have a great example that I think I’ve I’ve used before, when I worked at the county, though, the person who kept calling the soda pop, remember me? 

Ricky Baez  33:58
Yeah, same situation in that one, right? The person person wanted to happen was so unreasonable. So I just told the person look, that’s not an issue, right? The prudent person is not going to have an issue with that. 

Ricky Baez  34:12
She’s going to continue saying it, you have to make a decision on whether you want to continue working here. Under those circumstances or not. Please understand, this is the last time I’m going to hear this complaint. 

Ricky Baez  34:25
And if you keep complaining about this over and over and over again, to the point that it becomes a disruption to operations in HR and operations in the field. You are going to be held accountable. 

Ricky Baez  34:36
We have done that in the past. Okay, so but like over and over and over again. Now it’s frivolous, and now you’re wasting resources. 

Pete Newsome  34:46
We’re not going to hear you anymore, but it’s it seems less than ideal to send an employee back out knowing they’re dissatisfied. Right. I mean, that’s what I wonder.

Pete Newsome  34:57
You know how to handle that because it If a person’s like well, okay, you said it and but you know, they’re just not accepting of the outcome. 

Pete Newsome  35:07
That seems like it’s, well, you’re set up for an unhealthy situation moving forward.

Ricky Baez  35:15
I hear you, but I don’t know what else we could do in that situation. That’s why I’m asking for his satisfaction, the unreasonable satisfaction. 

Ricky Baez  35:25
I’m not, I’m not going to entertain. Okay. Right.

Ricky Baez  35:29
Because unreasonable satisfaction may seem reasonable for that one person, but unreasonable for everybody else in the organization. 

Ricky Baez  35:36
And that’s just not worth it. But we have to be clear, right? Let’s go back record to what you said about somebody where nothing was wrong, right? Look, I investigated. 

Ricky Baez  35:47
Here’s what I got evidence on paper, here’s what I gotta agree with. Your claims are not substantiated. I’m not saying it didn’t happen. 

Ricky Baez  35:56
What I’m seeing is there isn’t enough evidence for me to move forward. Right? 

Ricky Baez  36:00
Now I can talk to the person and say, look, here’s a complaint, be careful, but I can’t do anything else with it, because nothing was substantiated. 

Ricky Baez  36:09
And the person has to accept it and be okay with it and go back to the floor. 

Ricky Baez  36:12
If they keep creating issues and they’re labeled a troublemaker, then that’s another employer religious issue that we would have to address for the employee.

Pete Newsome  36:19
I think what I’m, what I would hope for is to, if it’s somebody that can’t be resolved that honesty and openness and it’s hard, I mean, it’s way easier said than done, right? 

Pete Newsome  36:33
But is, say, hey, let’s, let’s make sure we can all live with the outcome, right? And be happy with it or not, or decide we can’t be and then figure out what we need to do next. 

Pete Newsome  36:46
But that’s, that’s, yeah, you’re back to needing a psychology degree to diagnose. And maybe a Ph.D., right to figure that out.

Ricky Baez  36:57
It happens inlet, and I see one here, 1111 point here that really, I’m really passionate about taking sides. Let’s talk about taking sides. Right?

Pete Newsome  37:08
So this is an hour, let’s go to the don’ts, right, because we’re in wrap-up with that. No. And so. So I want to say, Look, don’t you know, don’t go off script if you have a policy in place, right? 

Pete Newsome  37:20
Don’t break anyone’s confidence in SEO, confidentiality is huge. 

Pete Newsome  37:25
When you’re in HR, right with these things, to some point, right? Again, back to not being a priest or an attorney. Don’t make promises you can’t keep that. That’s, that’s, that’s a big one. 

Pete Newsome  37:37
And then let’s get to it. And I think I want to conclude with this where you’re going right now is don’t take sides. Right? That’s big. 

Pete Newsome  37:46
And that’s where trust comes in. And skepticism comes in. But don’t take sides, you have to walk that line. And I can say, you, I know you do that because sometimes you’ll tell me that the company is wrong, right? 

Pete Newsome  38:05
That we need to make a change that we’re not doing, we need to be we need to consider, you know, other options from what the path we were on, for example. 

Pete Newsome  38:17
So and I know you do that, but that’s a big one.

Ricky Baez  38:22
It’s huge. This is where I am the foundation of my philosophy for what I do. 

Ricky Baez  38:29
Best right here, right? Because I hate when people say, Oh, HR just takes the side of management, side further management. No, we don’t well, at least me, I take the side of fairness. 

Ricky Baez  38:43
And fairness means if you act in fear, whether the employee messed up, or the company messed up, if you hold both of them accountable, at the end of the day, that action on its own, it’s siding with management is siding with the organization.

Ricky Baez  39:00
Because maybe we have a leader that’s not doing right by the employees, we got to get rid of that leader, maybe we have an employee that’s not doing right by the business, we got to get rid of that business. 

Ricky Baez  39:08
So that’s why I tell all of my students over at Rollins College, to listen to both sides of the story. 

Ricky Baez  39:14
But whatever you decide to do, do not be afraid to let either side know, the options they have or how they messed up and help them with it. Right? Because Pete, I will not be of any value to you at all. 

Ricky Baez  39:27
If I always sided with you and say, You know what? That person’s crazy. And then we get sued. Right? I’m not doing you any favors for that. No, you’re not I’m not saying that. 

Ricky Baez  39:36
I don’t want that. No, absolutely not. That’s why I’m really big on that one. Because I want to make sure people understand a good HR department always sides with with with what’s fair, and they do what’s right. 

Ricky Baez  39:49
And that entire thing is cited with the best interests of the organization.

Pete Newsome  39:54
That’s it, I think that’s it. So in concluding Is there conclusion is there anything else that helps regularly we cover it all through we did I know, I know, despite our other podcasts about violent language in the workplace, and we have beaten the horse enough.

Ricky Baez  40:10
Do you know what I like? Let’s do one more real quick, real quick one more. All right. Can we talk about how to handle complaints about other employees versus leadership?

Pete Newsome  40:22
Sure.

Ricky Baez  40:25
Sure, sure, Rick, no look, because we it’s looked from an HR point of view, if you had if somebody comes to me, right, and they say, Hey, Ricky, your business partner is doing ABC blah, blah, blah, blah, here’s what’s happening, right? 

Ricky Baez  40:42
What I do, is I go to the person above that business, my business partner, and say, Hey, just wanted to let you know, there’s a concern. Here’s a complaint. 

Ricky Baez  40:53
How do you want to handle this, I don’t automatically insert myself into that situation, because now this is my business partner. 

Ricky Baez  40:59
They’re almost my peer. Right? And I want this investigation to be as fair as possible. 

Ricky Baez  41:06
Because precession is key. If people see that we’re boys, and I’m investigating you, come on, how’s that gonna look like, right? 

Ricky Baez  41:13
But if I if my business partners, a VP of Operations, I’m gonna go to the CEO and say, Hey, just wanted to let you know, this is here. If you want, I can handle this, or you can handle this and I guide you with it. 

Ricky Baez  41:25
But I wanted to let you know this concern came into play. 

Ricky Baez  41:28
And the best thing to do is for me, or your boss had come to let you know, there’s a complaint that has been filed against you, we’re going to do an investigation and that should not be received as an ego hit or a stab in the back. 

Ricky Baez  41:41
That’s just the way the business works.

Pete Newsome  41:43
Well, it’s impossible not to take those things personally, I think correct?

Ricky Baez  41:47
No, correct. It really is impossible because the first few times I was hurt Pete I’m not gonna lie. I was hurt in my how can they not like me? 

Ricky Baez  41:56
And then I was like, God, they’re being unreasonable whatever. I’ve done everything right.

Pete Newsome  41:59
Well posted on social media a few times you’ll find out how they don’t like you. Why? So we know. That’s alright.

Ricky Baez  42:08
Yeah, but they complain and I just gave the information here you go. I’ve got so many complaints. It’s not even funny, man. So not one of them is stuck.

Pete Newsome  42:14
So later the same thing, what’s different about when the complaint is about.

Ricky Baez  42:22
No, no, well, well, that’s what I’m saying. 

Ricky Baez  42:24
That was the one about the leader. But if the employee is coming to me, as I said earlier about their leader, I go to their one over and have that conversation, but it’s fair to let the leader know what is being said about them. 

Ricky Baez  42:41
I never want I never not want to because again, I still have that business relationship. 

Ricky Baez  42:46
And I want to make sure you know how I work here. 

Ricky Baez  42:48
So I’m going to investigate this as not personal. Here are the questions give me the information and we’ll go from there. And then we’ll go have coffee later on.

Pete Newsome  42:55
Perfect. Alright, I think I think I think that’s a perfect way to sum this up. 

Pete Newsome  43:05
So we love questions. We haven’t done a q&a in a while or if we need to probably do one soon, hirecalling@4cornerresources.com

Pete Newsome  43:18
So if you’ve listened this far, you ask us something I’ve been rating us in review we should say that at the beginning Ricky, we should say rate and review us while we still have you because I know we lose people as we go on. 

Pete Newsome  43:30
No one skips ahead to the end, the dramatic end we are at this point. Likely just talking to each other and that is fine. That’s so fun. Right? 

Pete Newsome  43:40
We could keep going off air and we will probably but yeah, higher calling it four quarter resource.com We’d love to hear from you. Thank you and drive safe Ricky. Thank you as always have a good rest of your day.

Ricky Baez  43:52
Thank you have an awesome weekend, folks. Goodnight!

Pros of Partnering With Recruiting Firm to Hire Freelancers

• Cost-effective and saves you time
• Less hiring risk due to pre-vetted talent
• They will help you craft a job description
• They will do all the heavy lifting when it comes to sourcing and screening

Considerations For Freelance Hiring

• Start putting a value on your time. And a very high value at that. Once you start applying this logic, it really will tell you a different story of how your time is spent. Consider your priorities and think hard about what your time and money are worth.
• Sourcing and screening candidates is so time-consuming and at the end of the day, unless you’re an HR person, recruiting and staffing is not your core business. It’s a perfect thing to outsource to a business partner that you trust, will understand your business, and really have your back. You’ll receive that extra level of service that wouldn’t otherwise exist when hiring a freelancer.
• It’s a trajectory. Learning how to trust and manage an outsourced relationship starts with tactics and gradually moving up the scale to more strategic work. Get a feel for what skill sets could be valuable through freelance work and start doing some searches. Be as concise as possible and see how other people position themselves for work. 
• It all boils down to the vetting process when determining whether or not to invest in freelance work. Sometimes a freelancer just isn’t the right choice. Depending on the scope of capabilities you are looking for, a small agency may be the better option. 

Additional resources

• ResultsResourcing
• Best Freelance Websites to Find Top Talent
• How to Find a Freelancer That’s Right For Your Business
• The Benefits of Hiring Freelancers

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

Transcript

Pete Newsome  00:00
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast. Your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. I’m Pete Newsome. And my guest today is Elizabeth Eiss from Results Resourcing. Elizabeth, welcome. It’s great to have you today.

Elizabeth Eiss  00:12
Oh, Pete, thank you so much. I’m really glad to be here today.

Pete Newsome  00:16
Well, we’ve had a fun time talking off-camera and off prior to recording. 

Pete Newsome  00:21
So now we just have to keep that going. Now that we’re recording, we had to stop and say, alright, we’re going to miss all the good stuff if we don’t get this going right here when the world.

Pete Newsome  00:29
Yeah, well introduce yourself and your organization because you’re going to do a better job than I can. So why don’t we just start there? So everyone knows, you know, what you and your company are all about?

Elizabeth Eiss  00:42
Okay, great. Well, thank you so much, I really excited to be talking to folks in the staffing world when people were hiring, because I have become a really strong convert to the value of hiring freelancers. 

Elizabeth Eiss  00:57
And I think it’s really a wonderful solution to businesses that are looking to scale, the ability to get flexible freelance talent. And that’s been my focus for the past 10 years. 

Elizabeth Eiss  01:07
I was in the corporate world for a long time and up and joined my first startup 15-20 years ago, and I was hiring a lot of freelancers. 

Elizabeth Eiss  01:16
And I found they just added tremendous value to the businesses that I was consulting with and working with. And so I basically decided to become a staffing platform that focuses on freelancers. 

Elizabeth Eiss  01:30
And I help small and mid-sized businesses, including solopreneurs, hire vetted virtual freelancers that can help them scale and take all the admin stuff off their desk, or the specialization they might need using social media, or CRM, so they can get back to what they do best, and outsource the rest. 

Elizabeth Eiss  01:50
And I should say, I kind of stole that quote from Peter Drucker who said that and I think the 1950s. So he was way ahead of his time, in a way.

Pete Newsome  01:57
But it, you know, rings very true today, right? 

Pete Newsome  02:00
And we see that and anyone in the staffing world better believe that too, right? 

Pete Newsome  02:06
And I’ve said so many times over the years, there’s, there’s a reason I don’t change the oil in my car, I could. But there’s a reason I don’t do it because someone else is going to do a much better job than I can. 

Pete Newsome  02:16
There’s got to be efficiency and expertise that I just don’t have. So why would you have to outsource? If you want to be efficient? And it just makes sense, right? I mean, that’s, that’s how I think of freelancing, it just makes sense.

Elizabeth Eiss  02:29
Well, you know, it really does. And people think freelancing, or gig workers are this thing. But really, gig work has been around forever. 

Elizabeth Eiss  02:38
I mean, you don’t think about your attorney or your accountant as being a freelancer or a gig worker, but he’s contract work, your contracting work that you need to be done out to an expert, and it’s really no different. 

Elizabeth Eiss  02:51
There’s just a plethora of people who have specializations. Whether it’s virtual assistants, graphic designers, programmers, or whatever it might be, people are finding new ways to deliver value to others. 

Elizabeth Eiss  03:07
And technology has made a huge difference because now there’s this marketplace. Some are formalized, and others are just general marketplaces because we’re on the internet every day. 

Elizabeth Eiss  03:18
And of course, one of the upsides or downsides to COVID, depending on how you look at it, is the fact that people got comfortable with Zoom, just like we’re doing today. 

Elizabeth Eiss  03:26
Right? And, you know, there’s, it’s possible to really build amazing relationships on a virtual basis if you’re open to it.

Pete Newsome  03:33
If you’re open to it, and yeah, it’d be almost crazy not to be right now, because it’s very limiting if you’re not, and that’s something that we see. 

Pete Newsome  03:42
And think about a lot being in staffing with employers, if you’re not open to change, right now, it’s going to be a competitive disadvantage. 

Pete Newsome  03:50
In terms of how you can hire who you can hire retention, you know, all of that is no reason not to be open to change, and those who are, are going to be better as a result. 

Pete Newsome  04:02
So let’s back up a little bit and tell you when we first met and we bonded over freelancing because I’m such a fan of edit. Anyone who spends any time around me talking about staffing knows that I’m gonna bring it up. 

Pete Newsome  04:14
Yeah, I think you said you kind of fell into the role of becoming a power user or a super user at your, at your former employer that is that accurate?

Elizabeth Eiss  04:22
In a way I became. When I was working in my first startups and consulting for these startups. I was hiring freelancers from a lot of the name brand platforms. 

Elizabeth Eiss  04:34
And really, they’re just wonderful repositories of people that have great skills that are looking to get hired by people that need them. 

Elizabeth Eiss  04:43
The problem with the big platforms is they’re all doing it yourself. And it is a if you’re not great at writing a job description. Do you know what you asked for? is maybe not what you need. 

Pete Newsome  04:56
Wait a minute. Are you saying the job descriptions. Hold on. Are you saying job descriptions aren’t enough? accurate representation of the job because I didn’t.

Elizabeth Eiss  05:05
Well, not everybody’s equally gifted in writing them as you are. 

Pete Newsome  05:08
I’m sure you know, but we do know you need to carry 50 pounds right? We do know if anyone has seen a job description know that that’s part of the requirements sorry. 

Pete Newsome  05:17
But it’s a, it’s something that I always laugh at because job descriptions are notoriously awful they just are how they’re written and approved by someone who either wrote it a long time ago or doesn’t even fully understand the job. So, so I fully agree, but keep going. Sorry to interrupt. 

Elizabeth Eiss  05:34
Yeah well, no, no, it’s totally true. 

Elizabeth Eiss  05:36
And there’s an there’s frankly, an art, to writing them in a way that’s going to communicate clearly, and have the people that are best qualified and most motivated to deliver value to you to propose. 

Elizabeth Eiss  05:48
And so, you know, I really think that job descriptions aren’t so much of a defensive tool as an offensive tool. How do you get the message out of what you’re looking to deliver to the market and how someone could contribute to that? 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:01
So they’re motivated to join your team? 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:04
You know, freelancers, are not necessarily in between jobs, they’re professional freelancers. Today, many freelancers are small business owners, yes. 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:14
And they’re not looking to be an employee, they want to run their own business, be their own boss, and do the work they love. 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:20
And if it matches your job description, the value you need from them. 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:25
And it’s, then it’s perfect that many, many relationships between hirers and freelancers go on for years, they’re just not full-time, they’re just zeroing in on the work that needs to be done. 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:38
And so you know, to me, it’s, it’s a lot of work using those platforms starting with the job descriptions. 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:44
But then, once you put some keywords into these platforms, you might be matched with 5,000 profiles, right, who has the time or the where with all to look at that? 

Elizabeth Eiss  06:56
And there are always filters, which reduce the number of profiles, but it’s still labor intensive. And going back to what we said a moment ago about doing what you do best and outsourcing the rest. 

Elizabeth Eiss  07:08
Unless you’re in the staffing business, that’s not what you do best. 

Elizabeth Eiss  07:11
So it’s not a great use of a business owner’s time to do that work. 

Elizabeth Eiss  07:15
So to make a long story short, that prompted me to build results resourcing, which is a technology staffing platform focused on the business owner that wants to hire great freelancers but doesn’t want to do it themselves. 

Elizabeth Eiss  07:30
So we’re a staffing agency with a staffing platform, uniquely focused on finding vetting, interviewing, and curating freelancers to make great matches for small and mid-sized businesses.

Pete Newsome  07:42
I think the market has become so big, and I’ll let you I’ve seen 60 million freelancers in the US and 70 million what’s the stat that you’ve seen recently on that?

Elizabeth Eiss  07:55
Well, it really depends on your source. I heard LinkedIn talk about some 900 million users. But because we are LinkedIn recruiters, because that’s one of our main sources of finding freelancers. 

Elizabeth Eiss  08:09
There are innumerable people that list open to contract work Sure, behind the scenes. 

Elizabeth Eiss  08:15
And so what we really see are people that have moved professionally to become small business owners and fruit freelance full-time as contract workers. But we also see tons of people that have side hustles. 

Elizabeth Eiss  08:29
Right now, they may never fully migrate to being full-time, freelancers, maybe it’s a passion project, but they’re great at something. 

Elizabeth Eiss  08:36
But a lot of people are starting businesses on the side with the desire to move from being an employee to being a business owner. And this is particularly true of younger workers. So I want to ask you younger workers start businesses and college.

Pete Newsome  08:50
I want to get you to define the difference because the gig job versus freelance gets used interchangeably. And I tend to think of them as different paths, right? 

Pete Newsome  09:03
Or even though it is it is all under the freelance umbrella. But you mentioned that there are people who do this as their career choice and stay there as independent freelancers. 

Pete Newsome  09:19
But that’s different than someone who has a side gig in my mind. Right? It is almost, you know, different types of jobs, kind of right? 

Pete Newsome  09:29
But then you see a blend there to where there are so many people who drive Uber, for example, on the side, but then there’s a very large group of people, I don’t know what the numbers are, who have who now do that as their full-time job. 

Pete Newsome  09:41
So I think of it differently, but it all kinds of kind of gets blended together now to how do you separate that or do you separate?

Elizabeth Eiss  09:49
You know, I actually don’t separate it anymore, because I don’t know where to draw the line. 

Elizabeth Eiss  09:54
But what I do is when we’re working with clients who want to hire Have we gotten clear on what their likely need is going to be? How much dedication? How many hours? 

Elizabeth Eiss  10:08
Just what is the difficulty of the work that they might have? Because some freelance work is quite complicated, project management or whatever it might be. 

Elizabeth Eiss  10:17
And so to me, it’s more a matter of what time are they going to dedicate to a client, and how many other clients they have because someone might have a side hustle. 

Elizabeth Eiss  10:26
But if they have a full-time job, they don’t have the capacity to be responsive or give a lot of hours to one or more clients. And so to me, it’s more, it’s more about the volume and complexity of the work and the need to be responsive. 

Elizabeth Eiss  10:43
That is a driver to me and people that have become professional in there, their individual business owners now, you know, they’re building frankly, they’re hiring freelancers, they’re building systems and processes to run a business, right, just like anybody else. 

Elizabeth Eiss  11:00
And so, to me, it’s that kind of continuum. And it’s when, when people are really focusing on that contract work is their primary driver of income or fulfillment, and they’re dedicated more and more hours. 

Elizabeth Eiss  11:14
So that can be responsive to the company that hires them,

Pete Newsome  11:18
and even freelancers, hiring freelancers, right, I mean, I consider my SEO consultant of both in many ways a partner in the business a year she’s certainly a freelancer, but she has others who work for them to do other tasks. 

Pete Newsome  11:36
And I think what a cool, what a cool thing because the rules are changing, I guess they have changed, right? Not everyone realizes they’ve changed yet. 

Pete Newsome  11:44
But they have where there’s really, there really are no rules anymore. It’s about doing what makes sense in any specific situation. 

Pete Newsome  11:52
And that, to me, is what’s so exciting about this marketplace, because it is just about doing what makes sense. And that’s often hard to achieve in traditional corporate settings.

Elizabeth Eiss  12:05
It is there are so many structures in place in corporate settings. 

Elizabeth Eiss  12:09
And it’s one of the most fun things of being about being an entrepreneur, I mean, the buck stops here, but at the same time, it’s very creative, and it’s flexible.

Elizabeth Eiss  12:17
And you know, that reminds me of the business evolution that the journey we’ve been on. 

Elizabeth Eiss  12:23
I mean, when we started the platform and the service, we were all about custom talent tools, because I believed that our clients needed to have the best talent for whatever it was they did. 

Elizabeth Eiss  12:34
And that should have choices. And so we would, and we still do curate custom talent pools, we work with the client to describe what they need. And then we go find it proactively go find three candidates. 

Elizabeth Eiss  12:47
And it takes us about three weeks to do it. 

Elizabeth Eiss  12:49
But it’s not because it takes us as long it’s because the best freelancers don’t apply right away, they’re busy, right? 

Elizabeth Eiss  12:55
You know, they’re and they’re going to be picky, they’re going to choose their client, just like, you know, full-time employees are doing these days more and more. 

Elizabeth Eiss  13:02
And so that’s a chunk of our business. But increasingly, I found from people that they actually didn’t want custom, and they didn’t want a choice. 

Elizabeth Eiss  13:12
They wanted somebody that was skillful, reliable, and nice. Those were the three things. 

Elizabeth Eiss  13:19
And so we built a whole other set of programs that we call on-demand jobs, which we have prevented relationships with lead people in different functions like a virtual assistant or executive assistant or bookkeeper or social media, whatever. 

Elizabeth Eiss  13:36
And we basically just pre-assign people, we assign our clients to those people, depending on their needs. 

Elizabeth Eiss  13:42
And those people all have teams. 

Elizabeth Eiss  13:44
So there might be a point person, but most of them have 510 people in their quality control, the main point versus quality control is the single interface with the client, but manages the workload and parcels that out to people behind them, bringing it all back together, you know, on that in that one to one relationship with the client. 

Elizabeth Eiss  14:03
So it’s, it’s really interesting to pay attention to what’s important to people. And we can get those on-demand jobs up and 24 to 40 to 48 hours.

Pete Newsome  14:13
Right away in that scenario, if I need an executive assistant, Do I even have to interview or am I just, you know, basically engaging you to deliver not as much the person but the results that I need, right? 

Pete Newsome  14:30
Because the person not to say the person is insignificant, far from it. 

Pete Newsome  14:33
But if I’m having to get deeply involved with the individual, that’s a different level of effort. 

Pete Newsome  14:38
For me as someone who I know what needs to be done. 

Pete Newsome  14:42
I want the work done I’ll go back to the world change analogy, right? I’m not too worried about who the individual is doing it as much as it is the quality and the service and expertise that’s behind it. 

Pete Newsome  14:54
And I assume if I go to a recognizable brand or one that I’ve used in the past that they’re going to have vetted that person, right? I mean, is that a fair analogy?

Elizabeth Eiss  15:05
Yes, it really is. 

Elizabeth Eiss  15:06
The only distinction I would make is that we’re the matchmaker, and then ultimately, as a platform where the payment processor, and that’s how we get paid, you know, and that’s how we also unify our process and make it efficient. 

Elizabeth Eiss  15:22
So people don’t pay a lot of money for manual recruiting processes. 

Elizabeth Eiss  15:26
We’re very automated, but our processes insert the human or the human counts. 

Elizabeth Eiss  15:31
So the human is interviewing the client to make sure we get the requirements, right, interviewing the freelancers. 

Elizabeth Eiss  15:37
So we’re doing all that vetting behind the scenes. But when we do the match, the client may want to talk to the person ahead of time but may not. 

Elizabeth Eiss  15:45
But ultimately, they’re matched with an independent contractor. No, it does not result resourcing anymore, it’s contractor ABC or D. But we guarantee our matches. 

Elizabeth Eiss  15:57
So at the end of the day, I named the company results resourcing, because just as you mentioned, I want to deliver results. So somebody else does it on a contract basis. 

Elizabeth Eiss  16:06
But it’s very important to me that the freelancers that we match with clients deliver.

Pete Newsome  16:13
Which is ultimately what matters, right? I mean, that’s the only thing, not the only thing, but yeah, maybe it is the only thing that ultimately matters is it or get it completed, as expected was the quality there. 

Pete Newsome  16:26
And I kind of laugh in a way that when the freelancing market has become so big, and some of the platforms have become so big, that there’s this incorrect assumption that if you go to the freelance market, you can cut a staffing company out of the equation, right? 

Pete Newsome  16:42
And you think, Well, I’m gonna save money I’m gonna go directly to the source. Well, as we know,, anyone in staffing knows that the sourcing the vetting, if you will, the, what I call qualifying, that is where we earn our keep, right? 

Pete Newsome  16:56
It is, that’s where the heavy lifting is done. It’s not in the putting in a keyword search, getting a lot of names as a result. And if it were that easy, there would be no staffing companies, right?

Elizabeth Eiss  17:07
 I mean, I totally agree with you. 

Elizabeth Eiss  17:08
I mean, it’s, you really remind me, you know, back to do what you do best and outsource the rest is, you know, staffing and recruiting, you know, is a highly skilled profession, you know, and you know, all of us have access to tools that just regular business people don’t have. 

Elizabeth Eiss  17:27
So our ability to find better candidates and know how to qualify them, you know, just operates at a different level, it’s just not what they do best. 

Elizabeth Eiss  17:37
And one of the first questions that I actually end up talking to clients about when they call to set up a free consult with us, is what should I outsource? 

Elizabeth Eiss  17:46
And so we have a conversation about what that is because so many times business owners are in the weeds. 

Elizabeth Eiss  17:52
You know, they’re, what’s that phrase, they’re working in the business, not on the business, and not spending as much time on the things that really drive client value. 

Elizabeth Eiss  17:59
So we built this cool little survey tool that takes three minutes to do. 

Elizabeth Eiss  18:03
But it’s kind of like, what’s an hour of your time worth? 

Elizabeth Eiss  18:06
And then what’s the core business value you deliver to clients? And how many hours a week do you spend doing that, and it’s, then you multiply, and you see the investment in your core business that you’re making of your time on a day to day basis. 

Elizabeth Eiss  18:19
And then below that, it’s okay, well, how many hours you do admin, billing, customer service, copywriting, social media, all the stuff that we all know we do. 

Elizabeth Eiss  18:29
It’s not delivering value to the client. And so in essence, is noncore work. It’s a cost to the business, it’s needed to run a business. But if you apply the hours you do that that work with the same hourly rate. I mean, that’s, that’s the opportunity cost there.

Pete Newsome  18:46
Oh, so true. So true. I mean, Pennywise and pound foolish come to mind, right? 

Pete Newsome  18:52
And there’s, I’m not sure if you’re familiar with Naval Raava Khan, who is someone that I guess he consider himself a philosopher, he’s a bit of a, you know, someone who is just he founded angels list. 

Pete Newsome  19:07
And, and I’m a big fan of his, I mean, the way he looks at the world. 

Pete Newsome  19:11
And one of the things that I heard him say, quite a few years ago, which I’ve applied is to put a value on your time and put a very high value on your time. 

Pete Newsome  19:21
And it was something that he claims that once he started doing his outlook change and his level of success, it started to really climb and so I’ve started doing that. 

Pete Newsome  19:30
And it’s fascinating to see if you buy something at the store, you know, let’s say for $20 And that’s a number that no one wants to throw out something brand new for $20. 

Pete Newsome  19:42
But if the trip to the store took 30 minutes it was right there and back or there and then you had to come in at the very back, you know, is your hourly rate expenditure of time worth more than $20 in almost every case is going to be yes. Therefore, you shouldn’t go back. 

Pete Newsome  19:57
You shouldn’t return it you should consider just By dropping it off somewhere and giving it away, whatever. But once you start applying that logic, it really does tell a different story of how your time is spent. 

Pete Newsome  20:11
And we know, as we kind of allude to now that you’re sourcing and screening candidates is so time-consuming. 

Pete Newsome  20:22
I mean, if you’re going to do it right, and so that is something that I think people from the outside who, who haven’t recruited don’t really appreciate, you know, that it is all mean, you either get that part right, or you or you suffer the consequences. Finding candidates is relatively easy by comparison.

Elizabeth Eiss  20:40
Yeah, no, it’s very, almost everyone we talked to, it has some sort of a horror story about, you know, using a bad hire, you know, in lessons that they learned. 

Elizabeth Eiss  20:50
And to your point about the hourly rate on the survey that, you know, we just keep collecting data, we don’t use it for marketing purposes, or anything like that we’re just interested in knowing, but no one ever puts $10 an hour down hourly rate no one ever does. 

Elizabeth Eiss  21:07
And we see people because we do track the IP addresses to, you know, just for different, you know, individuals that are doing this, and we see people taking it multiple times at different rates and different allocations of time. 

Elizabeth Eiss  21:21
So you can see the wheels are turning interesting as they start to think about how they use their time differently. 

Elizabeth Eiss  21:28
But, you know, at the end of the day, unless you’re an HR person, recruiting and staffing is not your core business. 

Elizabeth Eiss  21:38
You know, it’s a perfect thing to outsource this to a business partner that you trust, will understand your business, and really have your back, you know, in helping your staff with the right kind of people, whether they’re full-time, you know, or freelance, it’s really the gamut these days.

Pete Newsome  21:53
And have someone to know who you’re working with, right, which you don’t get on, on the on these massive platforms where you’re just kind of on your own right, you’re providing that extra level of service that wouldn’t otherwise exist when hiring a freelancer. And that’s, that’s huge.

Elizabeth Eiss  22:12
Well, a lot of those platforms have those services, but they reserved them for enterprise clients.

Pete Newsome  22:17
Right? Well, so okay, I’ve been a pretty big user of freelancers for the past few years. I didn’t even know that. So if they have them as you said, you have to they’re not readily available.

Elizabeth Eiss  22:28
Perhaps no, the only reason I know is in probably not all platforms have them. But when I was a power user of platforms in the early days, I actually had a subscription. 

Elizabeth Eiss  22:38
Okay, but then I was deemed too small, and they kicked me off the program. Oh, that’s okay. Because it inspired me and said, Oh, well, I think I can build a platform that automates everything but inserts the human. So small, and midsize businesses can get the help they need. 

Elizabeth Eiss  22:56
Absolutely, I love it. That was really and that’s what inspired me to build the platform the way I did.

Pete Newsome  23:02
It’s such a necessary thing. 

Pete Newsome  23:04
And at such a necessary at the right time, because of where this market is heading. 

Pete Newsome  23:09
Now, I shared this with you, when we first met, I’m gonna say it again, maybe put you on the spot a little bit, that because I think of freelancing as taking all of the bad out of the employee-employer relationship, which I think is come to just cloudy, you know.

Pete Newsome  23:32
Make cloudy, the nature of that relationship today, where there are so many more expectations put on both the employee and the employer than just simply performing a service based on having a skill set, placing a value on that skill set, you know, combining that with a business need, or a need for a certain amount of work at a certain level. 

Pete Newsome  23:55
Like that’s the basis for the working relationship. 

Pete Newsome  24:01
But now there’s so much more to it that, you know, I do record a lot with an HR consultant who actually works for me and my staffing business. 

Pete Newsome  24:12
And I laugh and make fun of him all the time and say, That’s why HR departments are so big is because of all the extra stuff that has absolutely nothing to do with the work that needs to be done and the person needs to do the work. 

Pete Newsome  24:24
Now, do you think that is a fair assessment, that freelancing is just a healthier way to work?

Elizabeth Eiss  24:31
Well, I’m biased, but yes, I do. 

Elizabeth Eiss  24:34
But I also have to say that it’s not for everybody. I mean, people that are successful, frankly, business owners, you know, are motivated by some passion and they have some organizational ability. They have something unique to offer to the market. 

Elizabeth Eiss  24:49
And I think successful freelancers are similar, but it’s just something different. It could be as you know, an administrative assistant, you know, seems Like a generalist, but it’s a high-level skill set from accurate data entry to understanding how to set up CRM systems, there’s really quite a bit to it. 

Elizabeth Eiss  25:08
And, I think that people who are successful freelancers have figured out how to run a business. And they know that they’re they, they need to really satisfy their clients, in some of that time satisfying clients is helping that client get organized. 

Elizabeth Eiss  25:25
And so they need to provide structure, you know, to the relationship. 

Elizabeth Eiss  25:29
So I, I think that one of the problems in corporate America having spent decades in it is, you know, there’s so much structure and procedure and protocol that people get dependent on that. 

Elizabeth Eiss  25:40
And sometimes the practical needs of the moment, get shunted aside because the process wasn’t followed, or it’s there’s an exception, or it might not be deemed fair, or there’s just a lot of complexity when you’re talking about big corporations with lots of staff and perceived equity issues and things like that. 

Elizabeth Eiss  26:01
So I think that freelancing certainly has the ability to cut through all that, for the business owner that you know, it is organized and willing to hire a freelancer in for the freelancer to step up and provide not only that specialization value but also the organizational value.

Pete Newsome  26:21
Well, it’s almost a necessary trait for the individual to have today, now that so much of the workforce is virtual, and I’ve noticed that I agree with you 100%, that not everyone is naturally inclined to show that kind of discipline. 

Pete Newsome  26:37
And it’s hard. I mean, you know, and we’ve all known people throughout our lives that we think you need structure, right? As we say, this is someone who requires structure, it’s a nice way of saying they’re a disorganized mess, perhaps right. 

Pete Newsome  26:52
But, but but but it’s not uncommon either. 

Pete Newsome  26:55
I think a lot of people are struggling right now, this is a little off-topic, of course, but with being virtual, and this is a common topic for anyone and in our space, where, what’s happening right now with employers? 

Pete Newsome  27:09
Are they making employees come back to the office? Who is it pros and cons, all of that. 

Pete Newsome  27:15
And I ultimately think it’s more about the individual than it is about the work function, where there are some people and hopefully they can recognize this in themselves, who just wouldn’t be who aren’t as good if they’re not in that structured environment. 

Pete Newsome  27:29
And I think those are the same people who wouldn’t probably really be inclined or, or thrive in a freelance mark because that’s even more exacerbated. 

Pete Newsome  27:38
Right? If you quite literally don’t have anyone setting your schedule or anyone to be accountable to. I mean, that’s, I don’t know what the statistics are, or why most businesses fail. 

Pete Newsome  27:49
But I think as a business owner, first of all, you better have that right, you better have that discipline and an ability to not just goof off when you should be working. 

Pete Newsome  28:01
But freelancers, the same thing? I don’t know. I think there’s a lot of there’s a lot. There’s a lot of crossovers there right now between just working remotely and being freelance.

Elizabeth Eiss  28:11
Yeah, no, no, absolutely. And I think about people that are kind of navigating remote work successfully. It’s like they’re  just figuring out how to make things happen, even when they’re remote. 

Elizabeth Eiss  28:27
And, you know, not that I’m the example of this. But, you know, one point early in my career was long before we had the internet and web conferencing, nothing like that. 

Elizabeth Eiss  28:38
I had a territory with three offices. 

Elizabeth Eiss  28:41
And I didn’t think twice that that was a problem. It was like, Okay, there are phones, I get in a car. It’s just okay, how am I going to build bonds with the people in the other offices, I just made it happen, right? It wasn’t some huge problem. 

Elizabeth Eiss  28:57
It was just alright, how do I handle this? And you know, even my lead developer with my results, resourcing platform, we’ve been physically together in the past eight years, maybe 20 days, he lives in Europe. 

Elizabeth Eiss  29:12
You know, we built the entire platform, you know, apart from the Atlantic Ocean between us. 

Elizabeth Eiss  29:18
And you know, so it’s just it’s to me, it’s a mindset, you know, and I think that people get comfortable, whether they’re leaders in business managers, or they’re the employers and the doers in the business, you know, you can kind of rest on the process, or you can just figure out how to find ways to get things to get results done. 

Elizabeth Eiss  29:38
And I think unfortunately, and I think it’s going to take some time to sort that out but people that take initiative have more options now. 

Pete Newsome  29:48
But haven’t they always, I mean, really, you know, the, if you’re motivated to achieve if you’re motivated to reach the finish line and whatever it is you’re doing. 

Pete Newsome  29:57
I’ve noticed that as a kid every salesperson who’s it struggled at times to train other salespeople. 

Pete Newsome  30:05
I think there are certain things I like I can’t tell you why I was successful in sales, I just have stubbornness. Intuition, at times creativity, every situation calls for something a little bit different. 

Pete Newsome  30:18
But what was always ever present was that I had to reach the goal, right, I had to achieve the same goal. So how I got there was less important. And I think of that often now that we’re remote. 

Pete Newsome  30:32
If you’re inclined to be successful, if you’re inclined to get the job done, whatever the job is, you know, we have plenty of tools. Right? 

Pete Newsome  30:40
So now you don’t walk down the hall to talk to someone you know, you ping them on Slack, and you send them a text message. I think it’s inherently more efficient. 

Pete Newsome  30:51
But I also acknowledge that it’s, very different, very different. I mean, I like the differences personally. But I also acknowledge that not everyone will. 

Pete Newsome  31:02
And that’s where I think what you’re doing is only going to become more popular. Because it’s the right option. 

Pete Newsome  31:12
As we talked about earlier at the right time, where, maybe 10 years ago, the market wasn’t as inclined I can tell you, we weren’t as inclined to it let everyone work remotely. 

Pete Newsome  31:22
It just seemed foreign to us. We were giving it as a reward for our younger professionals, the more you’ve achieved certain milestones, you earn remote days now everyone’s remote. And I still say Not everyone’s in caught. Yeah. Not everyone is suited to be remote.

Elizabeth Eiss  31:39
Yeah, no, that is really true. 

Elizabeth Eiss  31:42
You know, when fairly recent things that we’ve introduced to our on-demand programs, it’s really made a difference is I think people are worried about hiring freelancers when they’re not sure exactly of the work that needs to be done, or how much time it’s supposed to take. 

Elizabeth Eiss  31:58
And, so we’ve structured these new programs, really, with no minimum time commitments, and hire a VA firm, you know, for extra hours a month, but you’re making a capital commitment in off sometimes the hours don’t roll over if you don’t use them. 

Elizabeth Eiss  32:13
So I think also, the secret is finding flexible ways to help business owners that maybe they don’t know how to get get started, and it’s intimidating, or they’re not sure how many hours. 

Elizabeth Eiss  32:24
So the minimum level that you can require to get them to take that first step is I find really beneficial because it’s it, people get the hang of it quickly.

Elizabeth Eiss  32:37
Once they start, they dip their toe in the water, of working with a freelancer, and then all of a sudden, it’s like, I only want to commit to two hours a week, and then all of a sudden, it’s 10 hours is there, you get the suddenly they get in the habit of Oh, like if you can do this, maybe you could do that. 

Elizabeth Eiss  32:52
And then it’s a conversation with someone that you’re building trust with, and you get confident in that person, and then that Freelancer is committed more and more committed to you. 

Elizabeth Eiss  33:01
It’s just a really nice, but virtual virtuous circle, or in my case, virtual circle as well. You know, to see people growing together to deliver value to a business.

Pete Newsome  33:13
It’s funny that you would say this just last night, I had a conversation with someone I’m considering hiring who has branding expertise. 

Pete Newsome  33:22
And it’s something that we’re considering getting some outside help with. And he said, just you can hire me for an hour a week. And it says sounds like nothing right? 

Pete Newsome  33:32
But there’s a lot of value that can be packed into that. And he said, Look, you know, I asked for a certain amount of time to commit to starting, but it’s only an hour a week. 

Pete Newsome  33:42
And at the point you decide you don’t need me anymore, then you don’t need me. I kind of laughed when he said it.

Pete Newsome  33:48
Because that’s effectively how my relationship began with my SEO consultant. And she said, Hey, I’m here until you don’t need me anymore. 

Pete Newsome  33:56
Well, that was a couple of years ago. Now I’m constantly asking for more time. And so your point is, is very well taken and timely for me because I know how those relationships can grow. 

Pete Newsome  34:07
But it also makes sense to know at times to start off slowly, right? Because you don’t know if you’re going to jive with everyone. You don’t know if it’s going to be a great just natural comfortable fit. 

Pete Newsome  34:17
And, but I agree with you 100% there to that. Yeah, once you start you realize how effective and beneficial it can be. It just grows from there.

Elizabeth Eiss  34:27
Well, it’s funny, but isn’t that true of almost every human relationship? 

Elizabeth Eiss  34:31
Yes. Whether you join a new unit or a new company, or whatever it might be or you’re a new leader. I mean, there’s just a certain amount of time it just takes to kind of get familiar and get to know one another. 

Elizabeth Eiss  34:43
And I also kind of feel that employers have this bright long line like oh, if I hire a freelancer, then it has to be zero to 60 the very first day without really thinking about the fact that it takes a lot of little time to gel. 

Elizabeth Eiss  35:01
And I think some of that is because they’re afraid of spending hours, money on hours, they’re not getting some value of value from so I think that you’re trying to provide like, like, your people are just an hour work until an hour week till you don’t need me anymore. 

Elizabeth Eiss  35:18
It helps people go, okay, no one’s gonna take advantage of me. You know, let’s just trust this relationship, see how it’s gonna go,  and kind of let it happen.

Pete Newsome  35:28
Well, I’m sure there are lots of memes that I know, there are lots of memes about this and funny kinds of jokes that could send around. 

Pete Newsome  35:34
But I, I’m sure there are studies to that show, you know, for any, you know, the average corporate job, how much time is spent doing the actual work versus doing corporate off stuff, right, going to company meetings and town halls, and, ah, sorry, for HR. 

Pete Newsome  35:54
I always end up doing this unintentionally, but things that just are necessary and required either because the government says it’s required or some corporate person somewhere along the way decided that it was necessary, that has nothing to do with the actual job. 

Pete Newsome  36:13
And there’s a balance, I think, when it comes to job satisfaction, people who want the community and the culture that comes from being part of an organization, but many people don’t, right, many people want to just come in, check in check out. 

Pete Newsome  36:29
And you don’t really have that option in a corporate setting, right? 

Pete Newsome  36:32
If anything, it may damage your ability to thrive, or how your reputation would be in that organization. But, you know, freelance to me, is all about efficiency. 

Pete Newsome  36:43
So yes, there may be of course, there’s gonna some warmup time, there’s gonna be some training time that comes in and anything new. But after that, it’s all gasp, no brakes, which I think is because I just love it. 

Pete Newsome  36:56
I mean, I just think it’s such a great way to work in almost every case.

Elizabeth Eiss  37:01
No, I think so. 

Elizabeth Eiss  37:02
And since most freelancers are virtual, you know,, it adds to the pressure to deliver because the visibility is going to be in what you deliver.

Elizabeth Eiss  37:12
They’re not just walking around, you’re not going to, you’re not going to see somebody walking around to kind of give them mental credit for being here. 

Elizabeth Eiss  37:21
I mean, it’s like, at the end of the day, you want people to reach out through slack or whatever tools there are, but not to waste anybody’s time, but just to move the ball forward. 

Elizabeth Eiss  37:31
At the end of the day, you know, you want to put points on the board. And that’s, that’s really what freelancers are good at.

Pete Newsome  37:37
And put points where it counts, right? I mean, when I think of my first corporate job where I was in, you know, cube, cube farm, and the staff would level folks would pop up like groundhogs and see if their manager was there. 

Pete Newsome  37:53
And once the manager Yeah, then the managers, once I became a manager, you’d pop up to see if your director was there, they the VP was there, I just go along. 

Pete Newsome  38:01
And so once the VP left, the directors could leave. And then the managers and nobody was working at that point, right? Everyone was watching the clock waiting to go home. 

Pete Newsome  38:09
And so those sort of just wasted things really get taken off the table on both sides. 

Pete Newsome  38:15
I mean, that’s the thing that I always go back to what I think of freelancers, that it’s a, it’s a win on both sides, right, that whoever’s paying for the skill that needs to be delivered, isn’t really wasting any money, and then the person doesn’t have to waste their time, unless they want to, right. 

Pete Newsome  38:33
And again, if you want to be part of a big, kind of kumbaya culture every day, that’s rather than be independent and on your own. Okay, that’s, that’s fine. 

Pete Newsome  38:43
Yeah, but I don’t think most people do. I think most people would rather be anywhere in the world. They wanted to be where they could work. 

Pete Newsome  38:50
And that’s another I think, incredibly cool aspect of what freelancing has offered. Is that you like you said, your developer can be in Europe. Okay. Cool. Like, you know, who cares? Yeah. I love it.


Elizabeth Eiss  39:08
We’ll go see him once a year.

Pete Newsome  39:10
Yeah. Good excuse, right? Well, tell you this. So what could you kind of name just some of the most popular roles you think of if someone is new to freelancing? 

Pete Newsome  39:20
What would be the sort of the easy on-ramp SEO that you would recommend for someone to consider starting with just common and popular roles?

Elizabeth Eiss  39:29
Um, you know, that’s a hard question. 

Elizabeth Eiss  39:33
And there are studies that are published regularly on the most popular jobs and I would probably actually encourage people to, search, because it depends on whether you’re delivering a business skill or a creative skill, or a technical development skill. 

Elizabeth Eiss  39:50
You know, it’s just keeping with the technical technology, the software analogy. 

Elizabeth Eiss  39:57
There are so many new technology G languages and or apps or whatever it is coming out that I think I would do a disservice to say it’s one particular thing. 

Elizabeth Eiss  40:09
So I would encourage people to do some searches, you know, for free, you know, what are most popular jobs and the big platforms all post that kind of research statistics, what’s being asked for most, then, in fact, I think that’s also a good thing to do is to go to the big platforms and type your preferred skill in as concisely as possible.

Elizabeth Eiss  40:32
And see what shows up, you’ll see all the other people that are supposedly similarly skilled in how they’re basically positioning themselves for work. 

Elizabeth Eiss  40:43
And so you know, that that, to me is the best way to kind of get a feel for what of your skill set could be valuable, sure, is freelance work. 

Elizabeth Eiss  40:54
But I would say that as a general rule, what I see clients coming for is more is kind of like Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, if you will, and I what I see least solopreneurs and smaller businesses coming first, for very tactical things, they needed an admin, they need bookkeeper, they need, you know, it’s really the the nuts and bolts of making the business run that they need help with. 

Elizabeth Eiss  41:24
And, of course, not, if you’re a brick and mortar, not everything can be outsourced to a virtual worker, you know, you gonna have to, you know, sort that out. 

Elizabeth Eiss  41:32
But once they get that done, the next thing they come to is what I would call social media, in marketing kind of roles. They got the tactics down now, it’s like, how do I spread the message to get more business then? 

Elizabeth Eiss  41:44
And then only after that, do I really see clients looking for more strategic roles, or certain business consultants, who would almost be the next level, you know, we’re fractional, CFO, CFO type roles. 

Elizabeth Eiss  42:00
So it’s, you know, I think of it just kind of the mature I think of it as kind of a projection of maturity, people dip their toe in was technical things they can measure was bookkeeping done, right? 

Elizabeth Eiss  42:14
When you get to social media and marketing, there’s a bit of a black box a leap of faith, you know, I don’t, I don’t really understand all these algorithms and how they work if somebody really.

Elizabeth Eiss  42:24
And it takes time, you know, minimum six months investment to get some of the stuff done, to really work, you know, your website, not be may not be set up for SEO properly, you know, there’s just so much to it. 

Elizabeth Eiss  42:35
So you really have to trust that social media marketing kind of person at the next level. 

Elizabeth Eiss  42:40
So I really see it kind of as a trajectory, learning how to outsource learning how to trust and manage an outsourced relationship, but it’s starting with tactics and gradually moving up the scale to more strategic

Pete Newsome  42:52
work. Alright, so I’m going to have to get your opinion on our 4 Corner Resources website, we have somewhere around 500 job descriptions, and on each job description, we have different ways to hire Of course, we often recommend using us. 

Pete Newsome  43:08
But we also say if you want to hire directly should do this. But based on the position, we’ve recommended freelancing as an option. 

Pete Newsome  43:15
And so we think we’ve picked the ones the jobs that we think we could and it’s interesting going through that thought process because I was then on those decisions of saying, is this a job we think would be good for Freelancer yes or no? And then why? 

Pete Newsome  43:29
And most jobs have that potential. 

Pete Newsome  43:32
And it’s Yeah, yeah, the other thing that I was just thinking of while you’re talking as, as I’ve developed more knowledge of in marketing over the years.

Pete Newsome  43:42
And my peers and friends and staffing have come to me for insight on their, websites and their success or lack thereof with search engine optimization, and I have all the tools I can to analyze their sites, I’ve realized how many are paying for marketing agencies because they think that’s the safe option, right? 

Pete Newsome  44:02
Hiring an agency versus a freelancer where they’re, they’re not getting a bet. 

Pete Newsome  44:10
The Freelancer is almost more motivated to earn their keep. Right, but the agency I found the agencies do a worse job of delivering results. I’ll just say that. 

Pete Newsome  44:20
And that’s been interesting I hadn’t thought of that until you I was just listening to you talk and thinking of my experiences where I’ve looked at probably 10 different websites of friends and business associates over the last few months. 

Pete Newsome  44:34
And there’s a lot of big dollars go into agencies because there’s an assumption and incorrect one that the agencies were doing right by them and they weren’t so I don’t

Elizabeth Eiss  44:45
know I think that’s a really interesting observation. 

Elizabeth Eiss  44:49
You know, I think that up to a certain level, you can get a lot of skill concentrated in an individual freelance professional in social media and marketing at some point Need your companies start to need specialization, but not 100% of the time, maybe they have some video editing or some, you know, unique thing that that an agency can provide. 

Elizabeth Eiss  45:13
But to me, the big thing to think about is, whatever you’re paying that agency, you’re paying for the overhead of that agency organization. 

Elizabeth Eiss  45:23
And if they’re, you know, in any kind of thing, you know, you should be looking for, show me the results you’ve produced for other people. 

Elizabeth Eiss  45:31
Yes, you know, but if, you know, if you if they pass that just, you know, you have to factor in the fact that they’ve got a team of 15 people, even if they’re remote, there’s some management, there’s some overhead, you know, for being that agency, versus a freelancer, that might be a single person with a heck of a lot of overhead. 

Elizabeth Eiss  45:50
And it’s a balancing act that, you know, it all is going to depend on the circumstances. And there are some fabulous agencies out there. 

Elizabeth Eiss  45:56
And, you know, there are some not-so-great freelancers out there too. 

Elizabeth Eiss  45:59
But it kind of boils down, to that vetting process. And in fact, you know, we really circling back to the very beginning about contractors that might be your attorney firm, or the CPA, we ended up vetting agencies to, okay, sometimes a freelancer just isn’t the right choice. 

Elizabeth Eiss  46:20
They don’t have the scope of capabilities that the client might need. So you know, to me, it’s a salt contract, whether it’s an individual or a small agency.

Pete Newsome  46:30
Sure. And as I said, the best way to do it is to look at their past performance or work to see what they’ve done. In the past. I just have been surprised, I guess, by what certain companies and agencies are willing to sell and put their name on when there’s been complete void of results, right? 

Pete Newsome  46:54
But I think generally speaking, there’s an assumption that you place upon having, an incorrect one like, again, as an established organization to think it’s safer, and I don’t think it is at all.

Pete Newsome  47:07
In fact, I could argue, and I have that an individual who’s willing to put themselves out there and only eat what they kill, so to speak. You know, that’s a motivated individual who has to perform. 

Pete Newsome  47:20
So again, I think there’s a lot of benefit to choosing a freelancer first over a big organization.

Elizabeth Eiss  47:32
Yeah, no, I think there’s some truth to that. And, and I think that I’ve seen it more with creative agencies, but sometimes you have to think about how did that agency come together? 

Elizabeth Eiss  47:43
And sometimes it’s a group of people that simply like to work together, right? Not necessarily, that they’re, that they’re all equally top-line skilled. But they enjoy working together. 

Elizabeth Eiss  47:54
And, you know, so there’s pros and cons there, too, you might have a group that you get along with, but they’re not equally talented. And, you know, so I think it is, you have to be a little tougher, you know, in your evaluation of the capacity of an agency to deliver.

Pete Newsome  48:11
And you know, you don’t know who you’re working with to I mean, this is a little bit off. 

Pete Newsome  48:17
But I years ago, as I was really becoming enamored with digital marketing, and learning about it, there was someone who was very prevalent on YouTube and on social media, and I would listen to this person’s advice and ended up hiring their firm. 

Pete Newsome  48:35
And needless to say, I was not working with the person in the videos. 

Pete Newsome  48:39
And it was an awful experience. I mean, it was a very quick end to this relationship, because it was almost like the public success forced them to grow, probably too fast. 

Pete Newsome  48:52
And so like, it was almost like they out-kick their coverage, so to speak, use a sports analogy, and it was a shockingly bad experience. 

Pete Newsome  49:01
And so, again, with the freelancer, I’m working with the, I’m working with the leader of the team, because that is, right, and so I know who I’m getting. 

Pete Newsome  49:10
And so I don’t I’ve never really thought about it until this particular moment, but there’s a lot of benefit and value to that to where you don’t want someone to pass off pass a buck. 

Pete Newsome  49:21
You know, you want the best person you can find for the job, but whatever that job is.

Elizabeth Eiss  49:26
So true. And it’s partly why we set up our on-demand programs the way we did, where you get you get a person that is responsible to you and for the results. 

Elizabeth Eiss  49:36
So even if they might hand off something to a spreadsheet specialist or something like that, that’s coming back through that person that’s accountable to the client. 

Elizabeth Eiss  49:46
You know, there’s any one person who only has so many hours in the day. 

Elizabeth Eiss  49:49
So how do you expand the capacity of someone that’s gifted in client relationships and getting things done and organized?

Elizabeth Eiss  49:56
And having a team is valuable but at the end of the day the buck stops. With the person that’s working with the client.

Pete Newsome  50:02
You have to have someone to hold accountable. And this makes so much sense. Well, well, Elizabeth, this has been a great promise I wouldn’t keep you all day. How can everyone get a hold? Yeah.

Elizabeth Eiss  50:13
It’s been awesome. It’s been very fun. 

Pete Newsome  50:14
Well, you so much for your time. We’ll put this in the show notes too. But how can someone get a hold to reach out to your site, and give us a URL for it, so they know where to find you?

Elizabeth Eiss  50:24
Okay, it’s Resultsresourcing.net. And that’s it, just think about we resource results. So that, you know, that’s, what the company is called because that’s what we’re all about. 

Elizabeth Eiss  50:36
And you can find me on LinkedIn, Elizabeth Eiss. And you know that that would just it’d be great to hear from anybody that wants to chat. And we do start our roles, and all of our engagements with a free job consult. 

Elizabeth Eiss  50:52
And so we’re not about selling I’m about making sure we’re a fit for you, and you’re fit for us. And so I ended up having a number of conversations with people just about what’s going on in their world. 

Elizabeth Eiss  51:03
And just like today, you know, where does freelance How does a freelancer fit into your organization?

Elizabeth Eiss  51:09
And if what we do and the freelance options were for you great. If not, then you’re walking away with more knowledge about how to operate in a very dynamic talent world. 

Elizabeth Eiss  51:20
So we’d love to chat with people that are curious to learn more. 

Pete Newsome  51:25
Perfect well thank you again so much. And if you have any questions for me, of course, we always appreciate it if you will review and, and rate us highly, of course, but you have reached out anytime at Hirecalling@4cornerresources.com.

Pete Newsome  51:38
And thank you for listening and look forward to being back on the air again soon. 

Examples of Nonviolent Communication in the Workplace Swaps

• “I’ll bite the bullet” to “I won’t avoid it any longer”
• “We can soften the blow by…” to “We can make it a little easier by…”
• “I was blown away by that presentation” to “I was impressed by that presentation”
• “I was kicking around the idea” to “I was thinking through an idea”
• “That was overkill” to “That was a bit excessive”
• “That’ll kill two birds with one stone” to “That’ll feed two birds with one scone”
• “Did we jump the gun?” to “Did we start too soon?”
• “Can you shoot me an email” to “Can you send me an email”
• “I’ll take a stab at it” to “l’ll take the first pass”

Our Thoughts on Remote Communication With Your Team

Miscommunication is bound to happen when working remotely. Tone and inflection are missed, and it’s unfortunately easy to send an unintended message. Businesses are struggling with this part of the evolution of remote work, and it’s challenging for an employer to decide what’s perfect, right, and best.

Whatever tools you have, make a good and honest effort to make sure you’re there for your team. Make sure you give them every tool they need and be genuine with them. If they’re performing, give them praise. If they’re not performing, let them know about it. These communication tools exist; it’s just a matter of how they are used.

Additional resources

• Communication Styles in the Workplace and How to Manage Them
• How to Engage Employees When Working Remotely
• Strategies for Supporting Employees in the Workplace
• How Employers Can Reduce Stress in the Workplace

About Pete Newsome

Pete Newsome is the president of 4 Corner Resources, the nationally acclaimed staffing and recruiting firm he founded in 2005. His mission back then was the same as it is today: to do business in a personal way, while building an organization with boundless opportunities for ingenuity and advancement. When not managing 4 Corner’s growth or spending time with his family of six, you can find Pete sharing his sales and business expertise through public speaking, writing, and as the host of the Hire Calling podcast.

About Rick Baez

Efrain “Ricky” Baez Jr. is a published human resources professional specializing in strategically aligning HR competencies to business goals with a down to earth, common sense approach. Ricky is a four- year veteran of the United States Marine Corps and holds a Masters degree in Human Resources (MHR) from Rollins College and an SPHR certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute. Ricky is also a faculty member for the Master of Human Resources program at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

Transcript

Pete Newsome  00:00
You’re listening to The Hire Calling Podcast, your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting. 

Pete Newsome  00:06
I’m Pete Newsome. And I’m joined by Ricky Baez today, Ricky, how in the world are you?

Ricky Baez  00:12
I don’t think people truly understand what it takes to do a podcast.

Pete Newsome  00:17
 What it takes to do an intro based on the few false starts I just had. Ricky, you couldn’t be referring to that, could you?

Ricky Baez  00:23
No, no, all I’m saying is when the DVD comes out, watch the blooper reel, it’s gonna be awesome.

Pete Newsome  00:28
Yes, we are your source for all things hiring, staffing, and recruiting not your horse for it as we just discovered.

Ricky Baez  00:36
Throat clearing all kinds of things. 

Pete Newsome  00:41
But here we are, nonetheless. 

Pete Newsome  00:42
And we have a few things to talk about in the job world. We decided, however, that we’re not going to do more layoff talk, because we know that’s happening. 

Pete Newsome  00:53
And well, that gets sort of old to talk about the week in and week out, doesn’t it?

Ricky Baez  00:59
It does it? There’s just too much of it. And we’re doing it, aren’t we? 

Pete Newsome  01:04
Well, let’s change the subject. Let’s go to one that, you know, is certainly going to be different. 

Pete Newsome  01:11
And as the world continues to evolve, we have to evolve with it, and the question at a time like this, with a topic like this, becomes how much we really need to evolve can you go too far? 

Pete Newsome  01:26
And specifically, what I’m referring to here is some of the languages that we’ve used for a long, long time that in certain areas are now being considered offensive or even violent. 

Pete Newsome  01:39
That’s such a serious way to put violent language in the workplace and things we should cut out. 

Pete Newsome  01:45
Do you have any immediate thoughts on that? 

Pete Newsome  01:48
Before we get into some specifics, an article that was published a couple of days ago about violent language? 

Pete Newsome  01:57
What are your thoughts on that?

Ricky Baez  01:58
Let’s jump right in because I know the article that you’re talking about. 

Ricky Baez  02:02
And I think you and I are going to be in the same sheet of music on this one, because I read this and I’m like, I cannot wait to go live.

Pete Newsome  02:08
So what so there’s a company we’re not going to name names. 

Pete Newsome  02:11
But then as the article goes, there was a company that who was recently put out a list of phrases that they don’t think should be used anymore, and offered alternate suggestions for these phrases. 

Pete Newsome  02:27
And these are things that have been used throughout my lifetime. For sure. They may I don’t know how far back are the I don’t know the specific origin a lot or a lot of these phrases. 

Pete Newsome  02:38
But I do know that we take them for granted in terms of not having a violent meaning, I thought, but yet, I think what this article is trying to say is that there’s danger in doing that. 

Pete Newsome  02:53
Is that fair to say?

Ricky Baez  02:55
The name of the article is woke tech company seeks to replace violent language. 

Ricky Baez  03:00
This is by Steve Watson from summit.news.com. 

Ricky Baez  03:05
So yeah, so there’s this, this organization that put out this guideline, apparently this a guideline that talks about words that were that we have come accustomed to seeing in the office. 

Ricky Baez  03:18
And let’s not use those words anymore. And let’s change them to other nonviolent words. 

Ricky Baez  03:25
And it sounds weird to say that that’s what they mentioned on the article about nonviolent words. 

Ricky Baez  03:30
But, Pete, I’m sure as soon as we started talking about these a lot of our audience, they’re going to agree these are not that bad.

Pete Newsome  03:36
Well, first of all, do you know Do you know the history of Summit news? 

Pete Newsome  03:40
Because I do not. I know that they’re a news website, it looks like I don’t know if they’re sensational in nature, and in what they typically print, but I think we don’t know who I want to. 

Pete Newsome  03:52
I want to caveat this by saying that we’re taking also for granted that this is accurate reporting, and there’s a company that is really saying this and it’s not just you know, to provoke conversation or outrage, which seems to happen a lot today. 

Pete Newsome  04:10
You know, anytime you hear the word woke, or anytime I hear the word woke, it’s usually associated with something polarizing that is sometimes used almost in an antagonistic way. 

Pete Newsome  04:23
And so I confessed months ago on air that I don’t necessarily even know what the word means. 

Pete Newsome  04:32
And I still don’t know if it has to do with what I just associated with the change of rules that I don’t necessarily feel like I’m keeping up with and in this particular example, is as good as anywhere. 

Pete Newsome  04:47
We’re being told that these phrases are no longer safe. So you want to just talk about them but I did want to put that caveat out there because who knows I don’t know anything about somebody.

Ricky Baez  05:00
If it’s luck, I mean, I know, I know, we are a world-famous podcast, but even our top-notch research team couldn’t find any information on that. 

Ricky Baez  05:08
So we’re gonna put them on their p but let’s just jump right in. So this is, so I’m gonna name a few. 

Ricky Baez  05:14
I’m going to name a few, let me know how you feel about it. Right? So this is an actual guy, this is from the guide that the public. 

Ricky Baez  05:21
So instead of using the phrase, we’re going to pull the trigger, they want to change that to, we’re going to launch. 

Ricky Baez  05:32
Now I’m pausing there for a second because they’re saying, we’re going to pull the trigger that phrase is violence, or if it lives in a violent type of world, and we should stop using that. 

Ricky Baez  05:47
I mean, I get I mean, a gun has a trigger. I understand that. But everybody knows. That’s not what it means. Right? I don’t know if anybody will get into a fizzy because somebody said, we’re going to pull the trigger. I mean, do you?

Pete Newsome  06:02
Well, perhaps there is someone who would maybe there are multiple someones and I think whenever I hear whenever a topic like this comes up.

Pete Newsome  06:12
And it seems to come up with increasing frequency lately, I think, is it our job? 

Pete Newsome  06:19
Or should we strive to not offend anyone, which seems almost impossible today? 

Pete Newsome  06:26
And so how someone chooses to interpret it is, I think, the question, and then what’s realistic? 

Pete Newsome  06:35
You know, in terms of, okay, someone may associate that with a gun, and I could see why. But is one? 

Pete Newsome  06:47
I mean, some number of people, right? And then how do you determine who should be the arbiter of whether that is offensive or not? Right? It’s not offensive to me. It’s not offensive to you. 

Pete Newsome  07:01
It’s offensive to someone. I generally think that you know, you choose what to be offended by, right? 

Pete Newsome  07:08
I mean, but yeah, I don’t I don’t we’re, we’re going to pull the trigger. I don’t I’ve never thought about it as violent. 

Pete Newsome  07:22
I don’t know what’s your take on that. Because it’s a slippery slope, right? I mean, I think we could all agree on that. 

Pete Newsome  07:28
This has a pretty long list of similar phrases. We’ll read some more, but what’s your take on it?

Ricky Baez  07:35
I’ll give you an example. Because I have a perfect example of something and actually went through with something similar to this, where this question would come up. 

Ricky Baez  07:42
And I don’t know if I shared this with you on the show before. But a long time ago, a long time ago, I was working for an organization. 

Ricky Baez  07:48
And okay, so you’re from Florida, and it’s a here in Florida, they call soda. Pepsi, right? And I think you and I talked about this scenario.

Pete Newsome  07:57
No, no, no, no, no, no, Coke was a coke. Oh, no, it’s coke by default, because we’re in the South.

Ricky Baez  08:02
Got it? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. See, I was wrong. I’m sorry. I you know what, we need to change that language. Pete? 

Ricky Baez  08:07
That was very violent towards me. Oh, no. No. So so check it okay? So you correct him? Because in the south, we call it code. So but what do they call an Ohio?

Pete Newsome  08:20
I don’t know. I know, a pop right pop is use soda. Okay.

Ricky Baez  08:24
So we had a situation where I had an employee who is from Florida, who was reporting to a manager who was from Ohio, and the manager kept referring to soda as pop. 

Ricky Baez  08:35
And it drove this employee nuts. This employee came to my office and HR in downtown Orlando, to file a complaint. 

Ricky Baez  08:44
And I’m like, Oh, my God, what’s the complaint and I’m listening to what she has to say. 

Ricky Baez  08:48
And she is saying, You need to stop Susan from using the word pop. It is not pop. We are in Florida.

Ricky Baez  08:56
This is what it is blah, blah. He was as serious as a heart attack. So regardless of how passionate she is about how that word offends her, she is the exception, right? She is the outlier. 

Ricky Baez  09:10
I’m not going to force this manager to stop using a regular word that’s called Pop well, from where she’s from. That’s what it’s called. 

Ricky Baez  09:19
And I’m not going to change her way of talking just because this one employee feels like they’re harassing us in a hostile environment. 

Ricky Baez  09:27
In the legal world. That’s called the prudent person rule. 

Ricky Baez  09:30
And the prudent person rule says, what would the reasonable person think and what would the reasonable person feel the reasonable person would not think pop is a derogatory term? 

Ricky Baez  09:42
Just what I would think the reasonable person wouldn’t believe that we’re going to pull the trigger is going to be a violent term. 

Ricky Baez  09:49
Now, I agree with what you’re saying, as far as maybe somebody has PTSD, but look at the replacement, we’re going to launch. I wasn’t a Marine. Right? 

Ricky Baez  09:58
I worked exactly on The line with our artillery cannon, maybe I got PTSD for that, do we have to change that term? Now? 

Ricky Baez  10:06
It is I agree with you, it is a huge, slippery slope. So, to me, the prudent person rule should always apply when we’re about to make a decision.

Pete Newsome  10:14
Well, you know, language is being been in the spotlight a lot these days in terms of drilling into intent and meaning and the definition of words, you know, we have, of course, there’s a lot. 

Pete Newsome  10:32
There’s been a lot of talk about the use of pronouns lately and changing, you know, what I consider to be traditional definitions, right people, they, and then being one of those where that’s a plural phrase. 

Pete Newsome  10:45
That now is, individuals have chosen to want to be referred to that generically right, I think tonight associated with them with a specific gender. 

Pete Newsome  10:57
And so it’s changing the language as we’ve used it, right? And so there’s a lot of sensitivity around that right now, we know that they know their gender, in general. 

Pete Newsome  11:12
And I don’t know if this is just like I said, once you go down this path of saying, I want you to use a different phrase because I don’t like the phrase, right? Not not, it should be an individual. 

Pete Newsome  11:27
Not not, I’m taking the choice away from you, Ricky, and I’m going to tell you which phrases to use. 

Pete Newsome  11:32
I think that’s dangerous, it’s a dangerous thing to do. And it’s also at some level, I think, you know, it’s hard to, it’s hard to take it seriously. 

Pete Newsome  11:50
It’s hard to want to spend with all the challenges of all the difficult things we’re facing and our economy and our society and life as a whole in the year 2023. 

Pete Newsome  12:04
To worry about whether we’re going to pull the trigger is a bothersome phrase. 

Pete Newsome  12:09
I mean, you have to have your life. It’s gotta be pretty good, where you’re, you have time to focus on that, right? I mean, like you don’t have pity.

Ricky Baez  12:17
Oh, hey, Pete, you want to see how much time this person has? There’s more? Are you ready for this? All right. I’ll take a stab at it. Right. 

Ricky Baez  12:25
Instead of seeing that, I’ll take the first pass at it. So taking a stab at an idea that’s going to be an issue. Here’s another one. 

Ricky Baez  12:33
Do we jump the gun? Right so that we jumped the gun? Don’t say that, you got to say that we start too soon.

Pete Newsome  12:39
Now, I don’t know this to be definitively true. But I assume jumping the gun is a phrase from the track where there’s actually a gun that’s fired to start a race. 

Pete Newsome  12:51
And there’s it’s the sense well, I mean, I don’t know if the I don’t know if it predates that. 

Pete Newsome  12:56
But you know, the track and field, but that is what happens. 

Pete Newsome  13:00
I mean, the starter’s pistol is a thing right there actually is a gun that shot I mean, there are no bullets in it. But it makes a noise. 

Pete Newsome  13:09
It’s used in middle school track meets all around the country in high school. So you quite literally do get penalized for jumping the gun in a track and field event and it makes sense. 

Pete Newsome  13:22
So I don’t so did we start too soon now? Does it mean the same thing? Yes, it does. It means you started too soon. 

Pete Newsome  13:31
But I don’t know that. I don’t you know, I’ll bite the bullet as another one. Right. I’ll bite the bullet. 

Pete Newsome  13:38
Okay, bullets so you know, are inherently bad. I think I know where that one comes from. 

Ricky Baez  13:48
I think that it is like Kung Fu from the old kung fu movies back in the day.

Pete Newsome  13:51
I’m gonna make this up and I may sound may be foolish as a result but I associated with gold western movies. 

Pete Newsome  13:58
Where you bite the bullet if you this is probably a student completely wrong. I shouldn’t even say it. I’m not going to say it. 

Ricky Baez  14:08
I pulled back to go ahead and see what you say. We got it from the summit news.

Pete Newsome  14:11
No, I’m gonna look it up. 

Pete Newsome  14:12
Now while we’re talking. I am. But I did notice one of our freight favorite phrases on here, Ricky and that’s and that’s not beat a dead horse. 

Pete Newsome  14:22
That’s the one that really caught my attention. 

Pete Newsome  14:24
Because you and I as we’re doing now, we’re quickly getting to that point where we’re beating a horse on this topic. 

Pete Newsome  14:31
It’s weird to think about why would anyone beat a dead horse. I think that’s the point. 

Pete Newsome  14:35
You wouldn’t do that. So I could argue that’s maybe nonviolence, right? We’re saying let’s not beat the dead horse.

Ricky Baez  14:41
And I’m like, if Pete and I work for that company, we will not only be fired we will be prohibited from returning on premises. 

Ricky Baez  14:48
I was gonna I saw that one too. And I’m like, that’s our phrase. But Pete here is the funniest one. Are you ready for this? I love this one. 

Ricky Baez  14:56
kill two birds with one stone. Don’t say that anymore. What you have to see now is that’ll feed two birds with one stone. That’s hilarious. 

Pete Newsome  15:12
You can’t say that’ll kill that. So now they just wanted to rhyme is that only much?

Ricky Baez  15:15
I mean, okay, so what you can see. So when he ordered a $20 Uber from Popeyes chicken, what do you think those birds come from? Right? 

Ricky Baez  15:23
Somebody killed them. That’s something that happened. That’s not a big issue. 

Ricky Baez  15:29
All I’m saying is if you and I are in a meeting, please never ever say that we’ll feed two birds with one stone. Please don’t say that. 

Pete Newsome  15:37
Yeah, there’s a problem, right? As much as anything else is it that someone decided to make us less than you? 

Pete Newsome  15:44
And I could argue you probably agree that someone’s, this, this would be considered first-world problems, right? 

Pete Newsome  15:52
Where do you have enough time to be bothered by this? 

Pete Newsome  15:56
And I actually saw there was something over the weekend, it was spread around on social media a lot, I won’t talk about it too much. 

Pete Newsome  16:02
But it was someone who’s popular, I think, and think it’s a popular YouTuber. 

Pete Newsome  16:09
My kids know who this person is, is when I start to feel like I’m out of the loop with some of this stuff. 

Pete Newsome  16:14
But he was talking about just different changes and phrases and terminology. And I’m worried I don’t keep up. 

Pete Newsome  16:24
I can’t I don’t, I’m not necessarily exposed to some of these phrases. 

Pete Newsome  16:29
And that is supposed to be used today, right? To not hurt someone’s feelings. And I just think there’s, like, the rules are changing too rapidly. 

Pete Newsome  16:41
You know, for this where I’m, I’m man, I’m just turned 52, I’m not going to be able to pull the I’m not going to be able to say stop beating the dead horse. 

Pete Newsome  16:51
I can’t, it’s too much of a habit at this point.

Ricky Baez  16:54
So here’s what I’ve learned. I’ve learned that is because I’m noticing that too, right? Um, I’m about to be 46. 

Ricky Baez  17:01
So I’m, I’m learning that there are some things out there that I gonna be just don’t make sense to me. And I was confused for a while. 

Ricky Baez  17:08
And I’m like, you know, this is exactly what my parents were with me growing up. Right? At some point, they were at their prime. 

Ricky Baez  17:16
And now this is their ideals are set, and they cement them in their foundation. And now they’re starting to see a different generation with the same thing. 

Ricky Baez  17:23
And that’s why I and my parents clash, and a lot of people clash with their parents. 

Ricky Baez  17:27
Were there, right? We used to be the kids to be yelled off the lawn now we’re the ones yelling off the lawn. Pete.

Pete Newsome  17:35
Yeah, I think and I wonder if that’s what the says right? 

Pete Newsome  17:37
I mean, is this a lot of these YouTubers over the weekend, what they did that I saw interviewed was saying how all this was a product of being bored. 

Pete Newsome  17:48
During COVID People had too much time on their hands and started coming out with all of these new rules and, and things you can say and can’t say, and it does kind of line up, right? 

Pete Newsome  18:00
Yeah, with the timing. So all right. So this so we can look at this and say, you, you may have gone too far with us. Right? 

Pete Newsome  18:10
Like, it seems like it’s gone too far. 

Pete Newsome  18:13
To identify these words is is is being violent in nature. You know, by the way, bite the bullet does come it is what I thought I should have gone with it because I would have looked like I was a little more sure of myself. 

Pete Newsome  18:29
It was a phrase that was from you know, old battlefields. 

Pete Newsome  18:33
When they’re pre-anesthesia, you would, would literally bite a bullet if you had to be sutured or stitched up. 

Pete Newsome  18:41
And so it was a way of just like you bite a stick, you know, to prevent seizure. You bite a bullet if someone’s going to cut it to operate or something like that. 

Ricky Baez  18:53
Yeah, no thanks around. He just got ammunition across the US. He was giving me money now.

Pete Newsome  18:57
Well, I mean, I think you can probably still use the bullet if you don’t bite through it. But so yes, so bite the bullet. Let’s move on.

Ricky Baez  19:06
I think we’ve beaten a dead horse. Let’s move on.

Pete Newsome  19:09
We have. 

Pete Newsome  19:10
So here’s another topic for today that once again, seems to be common, you know, right and talked about every, every time we turn around lately, but I was at a client meeting last week. 

Pete Newsome  19:28
And they were talking about their staff coming back to the office and how nobody wants to go back even though they now see some business benefits to coming back. 

Pete Newsome  19:40
And they’re dealing with that issue where we want you to give freedom of that nature and it’s hard to take back. 

Pete Newsome  19:52
It’s hard to tell the analogy that I always use because I’m a father of four and always, you know, I think I’ve coached A lot of sports and I, over the years, and I, of course, have four kids.

Pete Newsome  20:04
So I’m always using analogies from parenting and sports because they all seem to really resonate, and with things that happen in the workforce.

Pete Newsome  20:14
And the one that comes to mind here is if you tell your child that, hey, your bedtime is now 10 pm, instead of 8 pm, everyone’s happy, right? 

Pete Newsome  20:23
That’s to say, Hey, you don’t have to come to the office anymore. 

Pete Newsome  20:25
You can go home. But then if you say, hey, bad, bad news, your bedtime has been 10 pm. Now it’s 8 pm. 

Pete Newsome  20:32
That’s not gonna go, well, that’s gonna you’re not gonna have fun with that, so you can do it. But it’s gonna be ugly. 

Pete Newsome  20:42
So what do you think about that? Is that a good analogy?

Ricky Baez  20:46
It’s a great analogy. But I’m wondering because I do have obviously, I wish I would have known this back then. 

Ricky Baez  20:51
But let’s continue on with that analogy. What if you told your kids hey, you’re now your, your bedtime is no longer eight. 

Ricky Baez  21:00
It’s gonna be 10. Yay, for a few months. And you set that expectation? And then you’re like, on this day, we got to come back. Are we good? 

Ricky Baez  21:07
Do you think the kids would be more receptive when that time comes? If they know this was coming?

Pete Newsome  21:14
Why don’t they Yeah, I mean, in theory, but if they could go next door and the bedtime till 10 pm.

Ricky Baez  21:25
Then I mean, true. Right? 

Pete Newsome  21:27
It means you’re the movers. Yeah. That’s, that’s the reality, right? You’re not the only game in town, you know, with work. 

Pete Newsome  21:35
So, no, yeah. But it’s interesting to point out, right? If you had said, Hey, we’re doing this temporarily. Well, that was two years ago. 

Pete Newsome  21:44
That was the shoe that was three years ago. Now. It’s not possible. Yeah. That was three years ago. 

Pete Newsome  21:53
Wow. Which, which seems impossible. March 2020.

Ricky Baez  22:00
That means next year, we’re going to see the first college graduates from when the pandemic started. 

Pete Newsome  22:09
Well, that would be my eldest son who’s a junior in college. Now, he was a senior in high school, when this all kicked out. 

Pete Newsome  22:18
And yeah, it was his last semester. And like many, it was a really interesting thing to witness as off-topic.

Pete Newsome  22:27
But because he was a freshman, living away in a dorm for the first time, we heard from lots of parents in those situations that it was a huge shift for children. 

Pete Newsome  22:38
Now, he was fortunate where he was, he was involved in he was playing football at the time, so he didn’t have to be in the dorm. 

Pete Newsome  22:46
But otherwise, you didn’t go to class, you didn’t really have social events you can go to. So that was a whole different, different deal.

Ricky Baez  22:54
No different for the workforce. No different at all. It’s people. And okay, I’m, I’m, I’m gonna say this right. It’s easy to Monday morning quarterback. 

Ricky Baez  23:03
That is the easiest thing to do. We should have could have would have done. But you know, three years later, now, we’re looking back. 

Ricky Baez  23:11
Yeah, I think I think maybe if we would assess and expectations, but you know, what, we were building the sailboat as we were sailing in it. 

Ricky Baez  23:21
That’s what we were doing. We didn’t have a playbook, the last playbook for something like this to happen. What was it the Spanish flu? Right back in the early 1900s. 

Ricky Baez  23:30
So we didn’t have a playbook for this for our workforce today. There’s a playbook. But it hasn’t been updated in 100 years. 

Ricky Baez  23:39
So I guess what I’m saying is, is, you know, for all the employees that are being asked to come back into the office, I see I’m on the fence on that. 

Ricky Baez  23:50
Because my question is, if the employees are working, they’re performing right now. What is the reason to bring them back into the office? 

Ricky Baez  24:00
Now, if you have shown that their performance is dropping, nothing is happening, and you’re trending the opposite way. 

Ricky Baez  24:07
I would definitely understand what you want to bring them back into the office right to make sure you’re managing that process, make sure you are the captain of that ship. 

Ricky Baez  24:15
But what if it’s not? Why bring them back to the product don’t understand.

Pete Newsome  24:20
I am almost without exception. When I speak with people about this, it’s not one. There’s not one simple answer to it. 

Pete Newsome  24:29
There are there pros and cons and just there were having to weigh things differently than we did in the past where I can just use our own staffing company as an example.

Pete Newsome  24:42
Where we were given the ability to work at home is sort of a rewarding thing, because it was it’s a given that people who would like to be remote would like to be virtual.

Pete Newsome  24:55
So we were experimenting with it.

Pete Newsome  24:56
And we were working towards potentially giving it to senior employees, senior staff who’ve really earned, I guess, earned the not trust of not being in the office, but earned the ability to function autonomously and independently remotely.