Danny Cahill’s Meeting of the Minds: The Jeff Kay Visionary Episode

A fireside chat that is actually fire! Danny and Jeff take on the complex issue of Scaling a Search Firm in an AI world!

The questions keep you up at night:

Do I need to FORCE my senior people to accept AI technology? (Spoiler Alert…Jeff says, “you don’t try to teach the old dogs new tricks, you teach the new dogs old tricks!”

Should you specialize or does AI allow you to be a generalist? Do you separate BD from your recruiting workflow, or is that insane? Should I acquire a small firm or try to develop my own practices? Am I a rainmaker? Do I stay a rainmaker? What does the internal structure look like for a firm of the future, and how many tools do I need and what will it all cost? 

Relax, Danny and Jeff are incredibly optimistic about the possibility for a productivity explosion in recruiting…IF you can rewire some thinking!!! Danny and Jeff have not only been there and built what you want to build, they’re STILL there…facing the same challenges and restless nights you do…and they’re incredibly honest about the challenges and potential rewards.

While you demo yet another AI tool you don’t need and won’t use…Elite Recruiters are reviewing their Workflow to see where they can REMOVE automation and add The Human Touch…We discuss tactics and strategies to differentiate yourself from your competition by “going analog” …the best thing about it? Very few are doing it…when technology gets overwhelming…most try to play tech catch up, but some understand that we crave tactility and human warmth.

In this episode the Coaches take on both the Perception and Reality of the Client Procrastination Paradox… they want you to hurry up and find the best people and then they are unresponsive in getting them through their hiring process and even more sedate when getting the official offer!

And when they lose your prized candidate, they blame you!

So we tackle:

·      How to spot a client wired for dawdling early on in the process

·      What to say to get them to realize it is in THEIR best interest to move with alacrity

·      How to manage the expectations…the client’s, the candidate’s…and YOURS!

And the whole episode moves quickly because, you know…practice what you preach!

Don’t be crazy…talking about Fall Outs don’t make them happen…probably…

But that mindset is at the heart of the Coaches’ convo about Fall Outs…yes they’re painful, and yes, some will happen because…humans. But most of the time you can see them coming and STOP them from ruining your revenue goal! The Coaches take on…

• Your Fall Out Approach and Attitude
• Your Awareness Level and how to Uncover Fall Out Risk
• Fall Out Triage and Tourniquet Techniques
• How to Move On When They Happen

The national Fall Out Rate is rising…let’s take this on!

Many recruiters just starting their career don’t have the luxury of a bullpen environment where you hear the live calls of senior recruiters, or, maybe even more valuable, hearing them curse and lament when they make a mistake or lose a deal. You don’t get the “watercooler” effect, and your growth gets stunted. Zoom team meetings are a poor substitute!

So the Coaches become your virtual watercooler:

1) Techniques they wish someone had taught them

2) pipeline principles that withstand good or bad markets

3) the overarching attitudes that sustain them and the top people they have coached and trained.

If you are newish this could accelerate your learning curve exponentially, and if you’re a senior recruiter, you will feel, yes, exposed…but ultimately validated!

“Don’t Judge Me…I know it’s a crap job but it’s all I have!”

…said every recruiter ever…in this episode the Coaches feel your pain and offer some practical ideas on how to

1) Discern between an unworkable crap job and one worth some effort, turns out there’s a spectrum here

2) Qualify upfront so that at least you know it’s a crap job going in and not 2 weeks and 34 resumes submitted later

3) Follow up job postings.

A full pipeline makes every recruiter happy. But a pipeline full of crap jobs and candidates that respond to every posting isn’t a pipeline. That’s a clown car…

Life is short, why not abandon your banal desk of 30K fees and constant struggling with mid-level HR and candidates who have multiple offers and the ghosting capabilities of Beetlejuice and go into the rarefied air of High Level Retained Search. With Big Fees, C Suite conversations and other accoutrements of Bad Assery…Maybe you should, but the Coaches will give you straight talk on what is involved, what is the risk, and what you’re getting into…

So you’re probably among the majority of recruiters getting the week off (we all know it’s more than a week, be real) between Xmas and New Year’s…and your plan is to “rest up and hit it hard next year”.

Oh wait, it was also your plan last year…how’d that go? Oh right, you blanked Jan and Feb…didn’t feel too rested then, did you?

In this episode we talk about what you can do to BOTH rest and do some smart, time efficient, well tested best practices to come into the New Year with 1) a long term goal 2) how to distill that down to action items 3) which of those actions can be done now, which can be done during the break, and which do you do first day back…

We’ve got nothing against the Xmas spirit, we’re in favor of drinking spirits…but only in concert with positioning yourself for success on your desk.

“I have no pipeline, hide the sharp objects. I have a huge pipeline, I am vacationing at my desk, buying things I don’t need.” Great months, bad months…deep appreciation for the biz and then, oops, no… “What a terrible, unstable biz!

It doesn’t have to be that way. The Coaches take on how to build, manage and maintain a pipeline of activity. Minus the drama. We get granular in this episode…what jobs to work, how many at one time, and when to walk away…

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Deliver an offer! Getting a fee agreement or retainer back signed! A client wants to convert your submission to an interview…the good calls are SO MUCH FUN…

But how do you handle the tough calls? Telling a candidate who is dying for a job you sent them on that they’re not getting it? Telling a client you can’t work at their new, low fee terms…or if you’re a manager of recruiters, giving a performance review to an underwhelming but scared stiff employee…the Coaches take on the psychology, logic and most importantly, the verbiage required to handle these, and any difficult conversations you are faced with. As always, the Coaches’ take is disruptive honesty…with a side of fun…