Scale from Here | Business Growth & Scaling Strategies for Small Business Owners

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If you are chasing new leads while leaving money on the table with the customers you already have, this episode will change how you look at your pipeline.

This is episode one of Scale From Here, the new format of the podcast. Corey Harlock breaks down what is changing: four-month seasons, each built around a loose theme, with a round table of favorite guests closing out every season. Season one’s theme is revenue generation, and the timing is deliberate. Interest rates are up, money is expensive to borrow, tariffs and trade wars are in play, there is conflict in the Gulf, and fuel costs are punishing. The question for every small business owner right now is how to stay focused on generating revenue when the ground keeps moving.

To open the season, Corey sits down with Dr. Jeffrey Magee, one of the leading voices in human capital development, author of more than 30 bestselling books, and a speaker who has addressed audiences across five continents. Jeff’s whole focus is unleashing talent at three levels: yourself, the people around you, and the organization. But the core of this conversation is a deceptively simple sales concept he has carried since his frontline selling days in a Fortune 100 company: 100% of 100%.

Here is the premise. Every morning, until you have engaged 100% of your customers about 100% of what you have to offer, nothing else you do matters as much. Most businesses sell one or two products deep into an account while seven or eight others sit on the shelf gathering dust. That is 70% of your available market opportunity, already qualified, already trusting you, completely untouched.

Jeff pushes the idea further, and Corey reframes it on the spot as the 100% cube. Are your customers buying 100% of your product line? Are you talking to 100% of the buyers inside that organization, not just the one contact you inherited? And are you winning 100% of each project, or quoting on 10% while someone else takes the other 90%? Jeff separates market share, the fight over the same pie, from market potential, the work of finding and creating buyers who did not exist yesterday.

Then there is the inactive customer list. Jeff shares a story about a billion-dollar client where one question to the credit manager surfaced a list of national name-brand accounts that had quietly gone dormant, simply because people changed on both sides and the relationship fell through the cracks. That list came back before lunch.

The conversation also covers competitive strategy, attacking a competitor’s gaps rather than their strengths, why business owners get addicted to chaos and confuse hard work with value, and what Walmart, Amazon, DoorDash, and the highest-volume restaurant in America can teach you about anticipating what a customer needs before they ask.

Jeff closes with three things you can do this week: build the spreadsheet, set a Monday reminder for outbound, and run a Friday five-at-five report. He also has a two-day Sales Mastery Boot Camp coming up in Houston.

If you are a small business owner looking for revenue growth without a bigger ad budget, start here. The only question left is, how do you scale from here?

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Start with the customers you already have: until you have engaged 100% of your active customers about 100% of what you offer, prospecting is the less valuable use of your morning.

Most of your product line is invisible to your buyers: if you sell ten things and a customer buys three, 70% of your ready-to-go market opportunity is sitting on the shelf gathering dust.

Your inactive list is a revenue goldmine: relationships go dormant because two or three people change on each side, not because anyone decided to leave, and that list can often be produced by lunch.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Jeffrey Magee on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drjeffspeaks/

Learn more about Jeffrey Magee: https://JeffreyMagee.com

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about Scale From Here: https://www.scalefromhere.com

Join the Member’s Area for Free: https://www.scalefromhere.com/members

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/scale-from-here-business-growth-scaling-strategies/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 - Introduction: the new format and season one’s revenue focus 

4:04 - Meet Dr. Jeffrey Magee and unleashing talent at three levels 

6:34 - What 100% of 100% actually means 

7:46 - Working your active customers product by product 

14:17 - Percent of wallet: how much of the project are you winning? 

15:22 - Market share versus market potential 

16:30 - Corey’s reframe: the 100% cube 

18:14 - Attack the competitor’s gaps, not their strengths 

20:05 - When your contact leaves and nobody knows you anymore

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On Tuesday, October 6, The KeyHire Small Business Podcast becomes Scale From Here. Your subscription carries over automatically. The same feed, a new name, and a broader focus on the conversations that help business owners grow.

Visit scalefromhere.com to become a free member and get access to bonus conversations, practical tools, and resources.

If your business has thrown money at Facebook or Google ads and watched it disappear with nothing to show for it, this episode is for you.

This is also a milestone: the final episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast. After years of conversations about hiring, leadership, and growth, Corey Harlock is evolving the show into Scale From Here, launching next week in the same feed. Listeners do not need to change a thing, resubscribe, or search for anything new. It will simply show up with a new name, a new format, and a lineup of guests built to help small business owners scale with more clarity and confidence.

To close out the KeyHire era, Corey revisits one of the most practical marketing conversations the show has produced: his episode with Heather Manes of Savage Brands. It is a throwback worth hearing again, especially for owners heading into a new year wondering where their marketing budget should actually go.

Heather starts where most business owners never do: the budget. She explains the common benchmark of spending roughly seven to eight percent of gross revenue on marketing, all in, and why that number shifts based on growth stage, competitive pressure, and industry-specific factors. Her core point is that there is no blanket approach. The right marketing strategy is tied directly to business goals, not to whatever channel happens to be trending.

From there, she walks through the terms small business owners keep hearing but rarely get explained clearly. Digital transformation. Multimodal search, and why buyers are no longer just Googling, but also searching across Gemini, ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude, which means companies need to be found and trained across all of those platforms. Personalization and list segmentation, and why sending bridge-builder content to a utilities buyer is a fast way to lose a lead. Brand differentiation and storytelling through case studies and video. Demand generation through webinars, ebooks, industry publications, and account-based marketing.

Corey also pushes Heather on the mistakes, and this is where the episode earns its keep. The biggest one is spending without a strategy tied to business goals. The second is skipping the foundation: a CRM and marketing automation system that lets you actually track where money went and whether sales followed up on the leads marketing generated. Heather shares an example of a company that spent heavily to drive more than one hundred thousand visitors to a website and captured almost nothing, because there was no compelling offer, no call to action, and no form to convert traffic into first-party data.

Corey adds a framing worth remembering: an email address is currency. People have become far more selective about who they give it to, which means your content has to be worth the price. Heather’s practical advice for owners starting from scratch is refreshingly doable. Set your budget against your goals, audit and build a clean opted-in email list, get your website fast and mobile-friendly, build a real content calendar, and then bring in professionals to map the paid strategy.

If you are a small business owner tired of marketing that feels like a burden and a money pit, this one delivers. Thank you for listening to The KeyHire Small Business Podcast. We will see you next week on Scale From Here.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Start with the budget, tied to your goals: a common benchmark is roughly 7 to 8 percent of gross revenue, all in, but the right number shifts with your growth stage, competitive pressure, and industry, so there is no blanket approach.

Buyers now search everywhere, so train every platform: people no longer just Google, they also ask Gemini, ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude, and multimodal search means you need to be found and cited across all of them.

A CRM and marketing automation are the non-negotiable foundation: without them you spend money and never know where it went or whether sales followed up on the leads marketing generated.

Traffic without an offer is wasted money: one company drove more than 100,000 visitors and captured almost nothing because there was no compelling offer, no call to action, and no form to convert them into first-party data.

An email address is currency: people are far more selective about who they give it to, so your content has to be worth the price, and a clean opted-in list is the one channel you truly own.

Personalize and segment, or lose the lead: sending utilities content to a bridge buyer is a fast way to get unsubscribed, so match the message to each segment and nurture people over repeat visits.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Heather Manes on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heathermanes/

Learn more about Savage Brands: https://savagebrands.com

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 - Introduction: the final KeyHire episode and the move to Scale From Here

3:46 - A near-death Kilimanjaro story and why preparation matters

5:32 - Why marketing feels overwhelming, and starting with definitions

8:33 - Budgeting first: the 7-8% of revenue benchmark and what shifts it

10:13 - Digital transformation now: AI tools and multimodal search

11:30 - CRM and marketing automation: owning your first-party data

13:17 - Personalization and segmenting your list the right way

15:33 - Brand differentiation: storytelling, video, and sustainability

16:50 - Demand generation: webinars, ebooks, and account-based marketing

19:29 - The most common marketing mistakes owners make

23:44 - The cautionary tale: 100,000 visitors, almost zero leads

24:55 - Offers, calls to action, and why an email is currency

26:28 - Conversion rates and the art of nurturing

29:42 - Advice from scratch: budget, then build an opted-in list

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

Meet Scale From Here.

The KeyHire Small Business Podcast is becoming Scale From Here—a weekly show focused on business growth and scaling strategies for small-business owners.

The first episode arrives October 6. Subscribe now, watch the trailer, and visit scalefromhere.com to learn more.

If rising interest rates, stubborn inflation, and constant economic headlines have you wondering what comes next for your business, this episode is for you.

On this special episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Shannon Willems, Managing Director of New Edge Capital Group, recently ranked the number two RIA in the country by Barron’s. They talk about what’s really happening in the economy and what it means for small business owners.

This is a milestone episode, too. It’s the final show under the KeyHire Small Business Podcast name before the show becomes Scale From Here on October 6th, with the same practical conversations and even stronger resources to help small business owners grow and scale.

The conversation starts with the latest CPI report. Shannon explains, in plain language, why the markets were watching it so closely. With a new Fed chair in place, pressure from the administration to lower rates, and oil prices climbing because of the conflict overseas, the inflation numbers came in slightly hot. Shannon breaks down why the market is now pricing in a better than 90 percent chance of a quarter-point Fed rate hike. He also explains the Federal Reserve’s two mandates, full employment and stable inflation, and why tariffs are showing up less in the year-over-year numbers even though their impact hasn’t gone away.

One of the most useful parts of this episode is Shannon’s explanation of why small and mid-sized businesses feel higher interest rates more than anyone else. Variable-rate lines of credit, real estate debt, diesel over six dollars a gallon, and rising input costs all squeeze margins. With the 10-year Treasury above 5 percent, business valuations come under pressure too. That matters for any owner thinking about mergers and acquisitions, selling, or growing through acquisition.

Corey brings the discussion back to what owners are living through every day: uncertainty. When you don’t know what your costs, tax rates, or wages will look like next quarter, it’s hard to invest in a new product line, build a facility, or put together a recruiting plan. Many businesses are choosing to sit tight, and the result is often burned-out teams covering for roles that never got filled.

But this episode is not all doom and gloom. Shannon shares why he thinks the long-term outlook is getting brighter. AI-driven capital spending, including roughly $780 billion from the Magnificent Seven this year, is pushing corporate earnings growth far beyond expectations. He also explains why reshoring and new manufacturing take time to reach the wider economy. Along the way, Corey and Shannon make the case for the skilled trades, where electricians and other tradespeople are in huge demand.

The episode wraps with a practical look at personal finance in a volatile market. Shannon covers diversification, today’s cash and bond yields, and the mortgage refinance problem facing homeowners coming off historically low rates. He also offers a helpful reminder: 6 to 7 percent mortgage rates are not crazy. They reflect a healthier economy.

If you’re a small business owner, entrepreneur, or leader trying to make smart decisions in an uncertain economy, this episode is a must-listen. Tune in for a clear, grounded conversation about interest rates, inflation, AI, and how to plan for what’s ahead. And make sure you’re subscribed so you don’t miss the launch of Scale From Here.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Slightly hot inflation opened the door to a hike: Friday’s CPI report came in a touch strong, and the market is pricing in a better than 90 percent chance the Fed raises the federal funds rate by a quarter point.

Small and mid-sized businesses feel rate increases first: variable lines of credit, real estate debt, diesel over six dollars a gallon, and rising input costs squeeze margins, and a 10-year Treasury above 5 percent pulls business valuations down.

Uncertainty is the real tax on growth: when owners can’t predict costs, wages, or tax rates, they sit tight instead of investing or hiring, which leaves existing teams stretched and burned out.

The long-term outlook is brighter than the headlines: AI-driven capital spending, including roughly $780 billion from the Magnificent Seven this year, has pushed S&P 500 earnings growth to 34 percent, far past the mid-teens expected at the start of the year.

The skilled trades are a rare growth lane: electricians and other tradespeople are in heavy demand with a small competition pool, and that work can’t be offshored or automated away.

In a volatile market, diversify and reset your rate expectations: don’t bet everything on one name, take advantage of higher cash and bond yields, and remember that 6 to 7 percent mortgage rates are normal for a healthy economy.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Learn more about NewEdge Wealth: https://www.newedgewealth.com

Email Shannon Willems: [email protected]

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

9:31 - Administration pressure, a likely hike, and the Fed’s two mandates

12:10 - A “beige” economy: M&A, housing, and tariff math

14:11 - Why small and mid-sized businesses feel higher rates most

17:08 - Not all doom and gloom: the AI capex tailwind

18:12 - How uncertainty freezes decisions and burns out teams

20:48 - The long view: AI-driven earnings growth and $780B in spend

22:58 - When reshoring and new plants actually hit the economy

24:44 - The trades boom: why electricians are in demand

26:33 - The AI debate: early innings, doom, and sensible guardrails

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

We share what’s next tomorrow.

The KeyHire Small Business Podcast is evolving. We’ve been building something designed to bring you broader conversations, practical ideas, and more resources to help you grow. Look for our announcement tomorrow.

In a soft market you get to ask a candidate why they want to work for you. At 4.1% unemployment, they get to ask you the same question.

In this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock breaks down the August jobs report and explains what three straight months of positive job growth really mean for small business owners who need to hire.

The headlines sound encouraging. The economy added 162,000 jobs, unemployment held steady at 4.1 percent for the second month in a row, and the labor force grew by more than 600,000 people. But as Corey explains, a stronger jobs report does not automatically make hiring easier. Some industries are adding jobs while others are shedding them, and the people leaving information and financial services are not necessarily the candidates a manufacturing, construction, or food service business is trying to hire. Understanding where the jobs are actually coming from matters more than the top-line number.

Corey walks through what different unemployment rates signal for hiring, from an extremely tight market below 3.5 percent to a soft market above 6.5 percent where applicants outnumber jobs. At 4.1 percent, small business owners are sitting in a tight, nearly full employment market. The key takeaway is one every owner needs to remember: strong candidates have options and are usually already employed. If you are excited about a candidate, at least one other company is too. In this market, you are competing, and the question is not why the candidate wants to work for you, it is why you would want to work for them.

That reality leads into the heart of the episode: hiring is a discipline, not something you squeeze in when you have a gap in your calendar. Corey lays out the three things small business owners struggle with most, time, process, and priority, and shows how solving for all three creates a hiring process and candidate experience that lands transformational talent. He shares the statistics that prove candidate experience is your number one recruiting tool, including how many excited candidates walk away after a slow, informal, or disorganized hiring process.

From there, Corey delivers a practical blueprint. He explains why one person should own the process and screen every candidate with a consistent scorecard, why generating candidates is the easy part and not worth a 30 percent recruiter fee, and why the hiring manager should conduct the first interview instead of sitting at the end. He covers how to run an efficient on-site interview with your best people asking different questions, why the best candidates are off the market within two weeks, and why the first and best offer usually wins when paired with a great experience.

This episode is especially valuable for small business owners hiring in a tight labor market, competing for employed candidates, or trying to build a repeatable hiring process that actually works. Corey also offers a free small business hiring playbook, the four C’s of hiring, available by text through the show notes.

If you want to read the jobs report correctly, avoid costly hiring mistakes, and build a process that helps you win great people, this episode is a must-listen. As Corey says, stop grinding, start growing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

The jobs report is encouraging and the hiring market is still tight: 162,000 jobs added, unemployment unchanged at 4.1% for two months running, a labor force up 683,000, and July revised from a loss of 31,000 to a gain of 21,000. Three months of growth in a row means the pendulum is not swinging back toward employers any time soon.

Layoffs in one industry do not help you hire in another: information lost 23,000 and financial activities lost 11,000, while the growth landed in food service, local government education, construction, manufacturing, and healthcare. The people leaving a finance job are not your manufacturing candidates. You are competing with the industries that are adding, not benefiting from the ones that are cutting.

Know what your unemployment rate actually means: below 3.5% is peak warm body syndrome and wage wars, 3.5% to 4.5% is tight and nearly full employment, 4.5% to 5.5% is balanced with real applicant flow, 5.5% to 6.5% is softening and you can start getting picky, and above 6.5% the problem becomes sorting volume. At 4.1% we are squarely in the band where strong candidates have options and are already employed.

If you are excited about a candidate, so is someone else: in this market the question is not why do you want to work for us, it is why would I want to work for you. You are in sales mode, and the interview is as much your pitch as theirs.

Hiring is a discipline, not a task you fit into a gap: if you have ever called someone to push an interview because something came up, that tells you where hiring really ranks. Solve for three things and the rest follows: time, a process, and someone who owns it.

Speed is the whole game at the top of the funnel: generating candidates is the easy part now, with job boards and AI sourcing tools running around $49 a month rather than the 30% a recruiter charges to hand you a database you already have. What separates you is reaching out immediately, and by text rather than a call that puts them on the spot at work. Wait 48 hours and someone else has them.

One person pre screens every candidate for every role: same person, same questions, same order, 15 minutes against a scorecard with an 80% threshold. It is not a culture conversation or a resume walkthrough, it is do you have what we need. Over time that person learns what good looks like in your company and builds a real baseline.

Put the hiring manager first, not last: if your team spends three hours per candidate and the decision maker cuts half of them at the end, that is fifteen wasted hours for every ten candidates. Worse, when the decision maker sits at the end, the team starts throwing volume at the wall. When they go first, the message becomes I like this person, I think we could hire them, and everyone downstream interviews differently.

Design the on site round like a progression, not a repeat: only your best people, two or three of them, never substituted in or out, each assigned a specific topic. A peer opening with can you walk me through your resume, after the pre screen and the hiring manager already covered it, tells the candidate nobody is paying attention.

Move on the clock the candidate is on: ten days from first interview to offer, an offer within 24 to 48 hours of the debrief, and a check in from your process owner if it slips even a day. The best candidates are off the market in two weeks start to finish, so pushing someone a week is effectively deciding not to hire them.

First and best offer wins, but experience breaks the tie: a candidate who was treated well will take less money to go somewhere that made them feel like a priority. The candidate experience is the number one recruiting tool a small business has.

Volume is not skill: Corey compares it to hitting 10,000 balls at the driving range and still being a bad golfer. If you hired ten people last year and two are still there, that is not being good at hiring. Doubling your hit rate means hiring five people instead of ten, and spending the difference on running the business instead of refilling seats.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Get the KeyHire small business hiring playbook, built on the four C's of hiring: text the show using the link in the show notes and ask Corey to send it over, free and no strings

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 – Introduction: three months of job growth and what it means for your hiring

1:45 – Big news coming for the podcast, and where to watch for it

2:49 – Looking back at Barry Moline on influence and Bill Hammett on benefits

4:52 – The August jobs report: 162,000 jobs, 4.1% unemployment, a labor force up 683,000

6:16 – Where the jobs are: food service, education, construction, manufacturing, healthcare

7:00 – Where the losses are, and why they do not help you hire

7:42 – What each unemployment band actually means for an employer

9:52 – Where 4.1% puts you: strong candidates have options and already have jobs

10:24 – If you are excited about a candidate, so is someone else

12:53 – The three things to solve for: time, process, and priority

16:49 – Generating candidates is the easy part, and why not to pay 30% for it

19:00 – Why the first outreach should be a text, not a call

19:44 – One person pre screens everyone: the scorecard and the 80% threshold

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

Something new is coming.
We’re building the next chapter of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast. More practical conversations, new perspectives, and more ways to help business owners grow. Keep an eye on this space. We’ll share more soon.

You might be in the widget business, the plumbing business, or the car business. You are also in the health insurance business, whether you like it or not.

If benefits feel like a giant expense you shop for once a year, hand off, and hope your people appreciate, this episode will change how you think about it. On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Bill Hammett, owner of Hammett Health Insurance Services and a certified healthcare reform specialist with over 20 years of experience, to talk about how small business owners can turn employee benefits from a painful line item into a powerful investment.

Early on, Bill makes a point that reframes the entire conversation: since World War II, Americans get their health insurance through their employers, which means every business owner, whether they sell widgets, plumbing, or cars, is also in the health insurance business whether they like it or not. From there, Corey and Bill dig into what actually moves the needle on cost, coverage, and employee loyalty.

One of the biggest ideas in this episode is that you are not really shopping for health insurance, you are shopping for brokers. Bill explains that the underlying product is largely a commodity, so the real difference comes from the broker's strategy, process, and advocacy. He walks through how larger companies can move beyond fully insured plans into level funding or self funding, taking on some risk in exchange for real savings, and why prescription drug costs have exploded from three percent of premiums in the late 90s to roughly 25 percent today.

What makes this conversation especially valuable is the shift from buying more benefits to understanding the benefits you already have. Bill and Corey explore practical, low cost strategies any owner can use: mail order pharmacy programs that deliver a three month supply for the price of two, generic drugs, telehealth, urgent care versus the emergency room, and asking for pre authorizations to stay in network. As Bill puts it, before you buy the 17th line of coverage, make sure your people understand benefits one through 16.

The most powerful takeaway may be treating benefits as compensation, not an HR expense. If you pay someone $80,000 and spend another $15,000 to $20,000 on benefits, you do not have an $80,000 employee, you have a six figure investment. Corey and Bill discuss how communicating that investment, even building an incentive around keeping premiums low, can boost retention, help you win candidates, and turn employees into educated healthcare consumers who assign real value to what you provide. For small business owners weighing the seven candidate drivers during hiring, benefits have moved to the top of the list post COVID.

This episode is a must listen for small business owners, entrepreneurs, and HR leaders who feel stuck with rising premiums, confused by open enrollment, or unsure whether their broker is truly working for them. Bill also shares how to pressure test your current broker and offers to share his Leave No Stone Unturned presentation with listeners.

If you want to lower benefits costs, keep more money in your business, and make your team feel genuinely taken care of, tune in for a clear, surprisingly engaging conversation that proves benefits do not have to be shackles you are simply stuck with.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

You are not shopping for health insurance, you are shopping for brokers: the product itself is a commodity, and a dozen agents can quote you the same plan at the same price. The difference is the broker's process, their opinion, and the strategy behind how they bring it to your employees.

Above about 50 employees in California, and in some places down to two, the funding model becomes a lever: level funding and self funding let employers take on some of the risk the carriers have been profiting from for decades. The upside is real, and so is the downside, so the cash question comes first: if two major claims hit in January and you are out $150,000 on two people, can the business absorb it?

Prescription drugs went from roughly 3% of premium in the late 90s to about 25% today: it is the fastest escalating piece of the medical premium, and it is where a lot of the recoverable dollars are hiding for employers who look, from rebates to sourcing medication differently.

There should always be a second set of eyes on your benefits: a strategy your broker believes in will stand up to questioning and alternate quotes. If your broker is your brother-in-law, your neighbor, or your buddy from college and nothing has changed in years, the likely reason is that nobody is shopping it, because moving a policy is far more work than telling you everything looks good.

Benefits are compensation, not an HR expense: if you pay $80,000 and spend another $15,000 to $20,000 on benefits, you do not have an $80,000 employee, you have a six figure investment. Two companies offering $90,000 are not making the same offer when one can show another $18,000 going into that person's family, and most employees only ever see the $200 coming out of their check, not the $1,000 the employer puts in on top of it.

Sometimes the answer is not better benefits, it is better understanding of the benefits you already bought: mail order pharmacy that delivers a three month supply for the price of two, generic drugs, telehealth including telehealth for mental health, knowing where the nearest urgent care is instead of defaulting to the emergency room, and asking the doctor for pre authorization to stay in network. Before you buy the 17th line of coverage, make sure your people understand benefits one through 16.

An educated healthcare consumer behaves differently: they pick a plan that actually fits, they know where to go when something goes wrong, and they assign a higher value to what you are paying for. Same plan, same price, but the educated employee is healthier, happier, and more appreciative than the one down the street who got no education at all.

Corey floats an incentive line around benefits: tell the team what the company spent last year, and if next year comes in flat, everyone shares in the savings. If premiums had climbed 10% instead, that money was going out the door anyway, and now your people are working the problem with you instead of resenting the deduction.

Confusion has a hard cost: unnecessary ER visits, avoided care that was actually necessary, the wrong plan selected at enrollment. It costs the employer, the employee, time, and health. And after you spend all that effort winning a candidate over, handing them a 47 page booklet is not onboarding, it is homework.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Bill Hammett on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/billhammett/

Learn more about Hammett Health Insurance Services: https://www.hammetthealth.com

Follow Bill on Instagram for his Monday benefit breakdowns and Friday healthcare policy recaps: @healthcarebill

Ask Bill for his Leave No Stone Unturned presentation: text the show using the link in the show notes and we will connect you

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 – Introduction: do your people know what you actually invest in their benefits?

1:42 – A teaser about what is coming for the podcast, plus Tony Manganiello and Barry Moline recaps

4:33 – Meet Bill Hammett: owner of Hammett Health Insurance Services and certified healthcare reform specialist

5:30 – Every business is in the health insurance business, whether they like it or not

6:44 – The product is a commodity, so you are really shopping for brokers

7:35 – Fully insured versus level funded and self funded, and where strategy moves cost

8:55 – Prescription drugs: from 3% of premium in the late 90s to 25% today

10:15 – What happens if a catastrophic claim hits a self funded plan

11:27 – The loyal team that got older, got sick, and could not get quoted

13:43 – Negotiating hospital bills and becoming a consumer of your own healthcare

15:23 – When your broker is your buddy and nobody is shopping the policy

16:47 – The seven candidate drivers, benefit stipends, and why benefits now lead the list

19:15 – Benefits as compensation: the six figure employee nobody talks about

20:34 – Put the benefits number in your all hands meeting, and the dentist goodie bag story

22:33 – Making it a quarterly conversation about our investment in you

23:50 – Mail order pharmacy, education, and benefits one through 16

25:33 – Building an incentive line around keeping premiums flat

26:35 – Why an educated healthcare consumer behaves differently

28:12 – The real cost of healthcare confusion

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

Influence is happening to you all day long. The only question is whether you can see it, and whether you are willing to use it honestly.

If you have ever tried to move someone toward a decision and hit nothing but pushback, this episode is for you. On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Barry Moline, CEO of BJM Solutions and author of Connect! How to Quickly Collaborate for Success in Business and Life, to unpack the science of influence and persuasion and how small business owners can use it to sell more, lead better, and build stronger teams.

This is not a conversation about manipulation or gimmicks. Barry, a certified trainer in Dr. Robert Cialdini's method of ethical influence, sets one clear ground rule early: everything discussed has to be true, has to make sense to the other person, and has to be wise enough that you would recommend it to your own family. That standard separates real persuasion from the snake oil salesman who makes the sale today and is long gone when it stops working tomorrow.

From there, Barry walks through three practical elements of ethical influence that any business owner can start using immediately. The first is enhancing relationships. He explains why liking begins with curiosity, asking questions and making people feel seen instead of trying to impress them. He covers unity, or finding common ground, and why simply calling your people a team can build loyalty. And he breaks down reciprocity, the chocolate shop and Costco effect, where giving something away, even information or a compliment, creates goodwill that comes back later.

The second element is reducing uncertainty. Here Barry shows how authority and social proof help customers feel confident enough to say yes. He shares why you should never read your own bio, how a simple introduction as our expert can lift sales, and why testimonials, reviews, and award-winning credentials matter so much. Corey and Barry also offer a practical tip for business owners: if you want customer testimonials, write a draft for your happy clients and let them edit it, because most people will never write one from scratch.

The third element is motivating people to act. Barry explains ethical scarcity and how it differs from the endless fake sales that train buyers to wait. He covers consistency, the power of getting a small yes first, and ties it back to Chris Voss and the art of the strategic no. Finally, he explains reducing friction, using a furniture store that boosted couch sales simply by offering to haul away the old one, and why understanding why customers say no is one of the most valuable things you can learn.

What makes this episode work is how usable it is. Corey keeps bringing the ideas back to the small business owner who wears too many hats, and every concept comes with a real-world example you can apply to your sales team, your leadership, your marketing, and even your everyday conversations.

If you are a business owner, sales leader, consultant, or entrepreneur who wants to communicate more effectively, build trust, and move people toward yes without feeling salesy, this episode is a must-listen. Tune in for a smart, engaging conversation on behavioral economics, ethical influence, and the persuasion techniques that quietly shape every decision around us.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Ethical influence has three tests: it has to be true, it has to make sense to the person you are talking to, and it has to be wise enough that you would recommend it to your own kids, spouse, or colleagues. If what you are moving someone toward fails any of those, you are not persuading, you are manipulating, and you will see that person again tomorrow.

Liking starts with curiosity, not credentials: people do not walk away impressed by your background, they walk away liking you because you asked about theirs. Barry describes it as a volleyball rally rather than an interrogation, and Corey points out it is the same skill that separates the best leaders, who ask questions and make people feel seen, from the ones who just talk.

Unity is built by naming it: find common ground and then say it out loud. Call the group a team, whether that is team sales, team IT, or team plumbers, and put people in logo shirts. It sounds hokey the first time a leader says it, but people want to belong to something, and they notice the leader who gives them that.

Reciprocity is targeted karma: the chocolate shop that hands out samples sees sales climb 50% to 150%, and the farmers market vendor who has someone handing fruit to passersby outsells the booth with a bowl on the table. A bowl is not a gift; a person giving it to you is. The same applies to information, a heads up, or a compliment, and none of it is one for one, so do not expect the return today.

Never read your own bio: reciting your background is bragging, but the same words coming from someone else confer authority. A London real estate firm lifted rentals by over 15% by having the receptionist say let me introduce you to our expert in the Chelsea area instead of just transferring the call. Hang the diplomas, the certificates, and the awards, because authority works even when nobody says a word about it.

When people cannot find an expert, they go to the crowd: that is why reviews, award-winning credentials, and testimonials carry so much weight. If you want testimonials, do not just ask, because roughly nine out of ten happy customers will never write one. Draft it for them and let them edit it, and most will say yes.

Scarcity only works when it is real: the endless President's Day, Fourth of July, and Labor Day sale trains buyers to wait for the next one. A limited run of 25 pieces, an early bird conference rate tied to a real planning deadline, or 17 seats actually left is honest scarcity, and honest scarcity is the only kind that keeps working.

Get the small yes first, or use the strategic no: a police department could not get anyone to put a two foot lawn sign up, so they asked for a three by five postcard in the window instead. Everyone said yes, and weeks later most of those same people took the sign. The flip side is Chris Voss territory, where asking are you against this lets people say no and feel in control, which clears the way for the real conversation.

Reducing friction is the one most owners skip: a furniture store was losing couch sales over one unanswered question, what do we do with the old one. They started hauling old couches away and sales took off. When someone says no, ask why, because you may be able to fix it for them, and if not, you have just learned something for the next customer.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Barry Moline on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/barry-moline-29b99a53/

Learn more about Barry Moline and BJM Solutions: https://barrymoline.com

Email Barry directly: [email protected]

Get the book, Connect! How to Quickly Collaborate for Success in Business and Life: https://www.amazon.com/Connect-Quickly-Collaborate-Success-Business/dp/1977209084

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 – Introduction: there is a science to moving people toward yes

1:50 – Looking back at Stefan Boehmer on incentive plans and Tony Manganiello on employee cash flow

4:33 – Meet Barry Moline: CEO of BJM Solutions and author of Connect!

5:23 – What behavioral economics actually means

6:38 – Chris Voss and the power of a no oriented question

7:47 – The ethics umbrella: true, makes sense, and wise

11:26 – The snake oil salesman and why trust outlasts the sale

12:15 – The three elements: relationships, uncertainty, and action

13:51 – Learning the method from Dr. Robert Cialdini, and why liking starts with questions

16:27 – The high school experiment and what it taught Corey about curiosity

20:15 – Unity, common ground, and the Calgary Flames jersey in Nashville

22:27 – Call yourselves a team, and why logo shirts work

24:46 – Reciprocity: the chocolate shop, the fruit vendor, and the Costco effect

29:17 – Targeted karma: giving information, a heads up, or a compliment

30:18 – Reducing uncertainty: authority, uniforms, and never reading your own bio

31:44 – The Chelsea rental study and the power of our expert

34:30 – Social proof, reviews, and the award-winning label

36:20 – How to actually get testimonials: write the draft for them

36:48 – Motivating action and the problem with fake scarcity

39:19 – Consistency, the small yes, and the lawn sign study

40:19 – Letting people say no so they feel in control

43:31 – Reducing friction: hauling away the old couch

45:48 – Barry recaps all three elements

46:47 – Where to find Barry and the book

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

If your best people are getting called with an offer of a dollar an hour more, you do not have to win that bidding war. You just have to help them keep more of the money they already earn.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Inc. Magazine contributing columnist, keynote speaker, and author Tony Manganiello to reveal something that sounds too good to be true: how to give every one of your employees the equivalent of up to a 40% raise without touching payroll or your bottom line.

If you are a small business owner losing sleep over retention, watching competitors call your best people and dangle an extra dollar an hour, this conversation offers a different path. Instead of getting pulled into an expensive bidding war for talent, Tony explains how helping employees manage cash flow, not just spending, can build loyalty, reduce turnover, and give your team more of the money they already earn.

At the center of the episode is Tony's Cash Flow Mastery System, developed while helping an Inc. 500 company hit that list three times in four years. He introduces a simple but powerful idea: your income is a shovel, and most people are using it to dig a hole instead of fill one. When you get a raise, the shovel just gets bigger, and lifestyle inflation swallows the difference. Corey and Tony connect this to the real cost of financial stress in the workplace, citing research that 59% of employees are financially stressed, 56% say it hurts their work, and stressed employees can waste up to 7.3 hours a week on the clock.

Tony breaks down what he calls the 50-50 drain: many people must gross 40% or more of their income just to cover debt payments, and roughly half of those payments are pure interest. He uses a striking mortgage example, showing how a homeowner can pay about $163,000 over seven years and reduce the balance by only about $30,000. Once employees see these numbers, Tony says, they experience a clarity moment, realizing their struggle was never a personal failure but the result of a system, what he calls the payment matrix, designed to benefit lenders.

The conversation reframes how business owners think about their largest line item. Payroll is often automated and forgotten, but Tony argues it deserves the same scrutiny as any major investment. He shares his forgotten customer concept: if a customer is anyone who exchanges value with you, then your employees, who trade time for money, are your first customers and deserve to be treated like it. Corey ties this directly to KeyHire's philosophy that your candidate and employee experience is your best recruiting and retention tool.

For owners wondering about time and cost, Tony explains that implementation is straightforward. After due diligence, his team does the work, pricing on a per employee basis so it never becomes a barrier to entry.

This episode is especially valuable for small business owners focused on employee retention, team engagement, and reducing turnover in a tough economy without inflating payroll. Corey also references his August 10th solo episode on candidate experience and last week's conversation with Stefan Boehmer on incentive programs.

If you want to take better care of your people, strengthen loyalty, and give your team a raise that costs you nothing, this episode is a must-listen.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Teach cash flow management, not spending management: most workplace financial wellness programs stop at budgeting and trimming expenses, which keeps people shoveling in the same direction. Tony's Cash Flow Mastery System changes the direction of the shovel, and the equivalent of a 40% raise surfaces on its own out of the same income.

Your income is a shovel and you are either digging a hole or filling it: when the raise comes, the shovel just gets bigger, lifestyle inflation absorbs it, and payday stops feeling like progress. That is why the stress shows up at every income level, including people earning six figures and people approaching what Tony calls the retirement cliff, where you do not fall off and die, you just work until you do.

Financial stress is a productivity line item: 59% of employees are financially stressed, 56% say it negatively affects their work, 80% of HR leaders see it hurting productivity, 78% of business leaders connect it to turnover, and a stressed employee can waste up to 7.3 hours a week on the clock, close to 15% of the week.

A healthy debt to income ratio is healthy for the lender, not the borrower: nobody stops to ask how much you have to gross to bring home enough to cover your payments. For most people that is 40% or more of gross income, and 48% to 53% of those payments are pure interest. Tony calls it the 50-50 drain: half your income is spoken for before it arrives, and half of what you pay out disappears into interest.

The mortgage math nobody runs: a $300,000 home at 6.7% carries a payment of about $1,945 a month. Over seven years, which is roughly how often people move or refinance, that is about $163,000 in payments and only about $30,000 off the balance. As Tony puts it, if someone asked you for $1,900 a month for seven years and promised to hand back $30,000 at the end, you would tell them where to go. Call it a mortgage and people ask where to sign.

Payroll is the biggest line item on the P&L and the one nobody scrutinizes: it is automated, paid out, and forgotten. Tony compares it to spending $100,000 a month on a click through campaign where the landing page fails half the time and the opt in form fails the rest. You would fix the page. Most owners never look at what happens to the money after the check hits the account.

Your employees are your forgotten customer: if a customer is anyone who exchanges value with you, then the person trading time for your money is your first customer. Corey connects it to the point from his August 10th solo episode, that your candidate and employee experience is your sales process for talent, and you already know how to run a sales process.

Clarity starts with two numbers: how much you have to gross to cover your debt payments, and how much of each monthly payment is actual interest, which the APR will not tell you. When employees run those two numbers they hit the clarity moment, and Tony says the motivation problem solves itself because they immediately want to know what to do next.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Tony Manganiello on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tonymags

Learn more about Tony Manganiello: https://tonymags.com

Read The Payday Blindspot: https://speakerhub.com/cta/nGHkcn

Email Tony directly: [email protected] (mention the KeyHire podcast in the subject line)

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

5:10 – Meet Tony Manganiello: Inc. columnist, keynote speaker, and author

6:17 – The Cash Flow Mastery System and where the 40% comes from

7:18 – Two payday expectations and the real cost of financial stress at work

9:28 – Your income is a shovel: digging the hole versus filling it

10:28 – The retirement cliff and why stress hits every income level

11:21 – Who a healthy debt to income ratio is actually healthy for

13:51 – Retention, bidding wars, and the dollar an hour problem

16:05 – The forgotten customer: your employees are your first customers

18:45 – Payroll is automated, forgotten, and never scrutinized

19:44 – The click through campaign analogy and the 50-50 drain

22:09 – Deferred interest, the payment matrix, and where this system came from

28:31 – Rehiring your current employees and taking care of the whole team

30:48 – The two numbers every employee should calculate first

33:44 – The mortgage example: $163,000 in payments, $30,000 off the balance

35:52 – What implementation actually costs an owner in time and money

37:11 – How to reach Tony and the free book for listeners

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

If your best salesperson is out-earning you, that is not a problem to fix. That is the plan working.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with Stefan Boehmer, Managing Director and Fractional CFO of Texas Advisory Services, to tackle one of the trickiest parts of building a sales team: the compensation plan. If you have ever struggled to land those big killer salespeople who love to close and make money, the comp plan is often the make-or-break piece. And as this conversation shows, getting it right does not have to be complicated.

Stefan brings a CFO’s discipline to a topic that gives many small business owners heartburn. Early on, he lays out the foundation: SMART goals that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. Just as important, he argues, the goals should be personal and something the individual can actually influence. If your operations person cannot impact a company-wide number, it does not make sense to tie their incentive to it.

A big part of the episode is the distinction between business development and account management. Corey and Stefan break down why these are two very different roles that attract two very different people. Some salespeople love the hunt and the adrenaline of landing new business. Others thrive on relationships, upselling, and nurturing accounts over time. They also explore how the length of the sales cycle matters, and why a fast transactional seller can fail in a long-tail relationship role, and vice versa.

From there, the conversation gets practical. Stefan walks through the KPIs he would incentivize for each role, from number of leads and conversion rates for BD to order intake, gross margin, and expanding the footprint for account managers. One of the most surprising takeaways is that he weights account managers more heavily than business development, because relationships are future-oriented and difficult to duplicate if that person leaves. He even shares a story of an account manager who worked a deal for nine years and walked away with a million-dollar payout, and why that check should be honored, not resented.

Corey drives home a principle he repeats often: there should be no voodoo in the math. Every salesperson should be able to calculate to the penny what they earned, and it should match exactly what the owner pays out. The two also dig into when incentives should kick in, why quarterly payouts with an 80 percent achievement threshold protect the business, and how unit-based incentives can jumpstart new products or services.

Perhaps the most valuable message is for owners who feel the sting of writing big commission checks. If you have a well-designed plan and someone is maximizing it while injecting real money into your business, do not scale it back just because they are making more than you. Stefan and Corey also call out the discretionary bonus as a trap, using a memorable story about a “generous” plan that left a top performer confused and underwhelmed.

If you are a small business owner, sales leader, or entrepreneur trying to build a comp plan that attracts and retains top talent, this episode is a must-listen. Tune in for a clear, practical conversation on sales compensation, incentive plans, KPIs, and building a team that keeps growing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Make the goals SMART and make them personal: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-bound, and tied to something the individual can actually move. If a goal is company-wide only, it does not matter how well that person performs, so the incentive stops changing behavior.

Business development and account management are two different jobs for two different people: hunters chase new relationships and cold calls, account managers nurture, upsell, and expand what is already there, and people always default to the one they are most comfortable with.

Give each seat its own KPIs: BD gets number of leads and conversion rate with a minimum margin requirement, while account managers get order intake, gross margin, and expanding the footprint into new departments and add-on services.

Weight account managers more heavily than BD: cold calling can be handed to a new employee, but a relationship built over years cannot be rebuilt, which is why the account manager who worked one deal for nine years and walked away with a million-dollar check earned every penny of it.

No voodoo in the math: every salesperson should be able to calculate their payout to the penny and land on the same number the owner has, which is why Stefan avoids complicated or interlinked KPIs like cash flow that nobody can trace back to their own work.

Pay quarterly, but not in Q1: an 80 percent achievement threshold before the first payout protects the business and keeps people hungry, with unpaid quarters accumulating forward, while unit-based add-ons for new products or services can pay out right away.

Do not punish a plan that is working: adjust for a bigger territory or goals that were set wrong, but if someone is maximizing a well-built plan and injecting real money into the business, take a deep breath and write the check. And skip the discretionary bonus, which feels generous to the owner and underwhelming to the employee.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Connect with Stefan Boehmer on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stefanboehmer/

Learn more about Texas Advisory Services: https://www.texas-advisory.com/

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 – Introduction: why the comp plan makes or breaks your sales hire

5:05 – Stefan’s background and what Texas Advisory Services does

6:50 – SMART goals and why an incentive has to be personal

7:52 – Business development vs account management: two roles, two people

10:17 – Why the length of the sales cycle decides who succeeds

12:08 – No voodoo in the math

13:08 – The KPIs to incentivize on the business development side

15:36 – Behaviors, outcomes, and watching the early warning indicators

18:53 – Capping BD commission, and how high the cap should go

21:06 – Building the account manager plan: order intake, margin, footprint

23:16 – Why account managers get weighted more heavily than BD

24:32 – The nine-year deal and the million-dollar payout

28:06 – When incentives kick in: quarterly payouts and the 80 percent threshold

30:50 – Unit-based incentives for launching new products and services

33:20 – When your salesperson out-earns you, do not scale the plan back

38:48 – Why the discretionary bonus is a trap

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock breaks down why so many small business owners take great candidates through their process only to watch them ghost before the final interview or the offer, and why candidate experience may be the most underused advantage a small business has.

Corey’s core message is simple but often overlooked: candidates are customers too. Generating candidates has never been easier, between job boards and a thousand AI sourcing tools. What happens after you find them is what decides whether you land them. And as a small business, you are not Google. The people applying to your job have never heard of you, they are interviewing at several other companies, and they are there to be educated on you as much as you are there to evaluate them. If you are excited about a candidate, at least one other company is too, which means you are already on the clock.

The episode focuses on three challenges. The first is hiring speed. Corey makes an important distinction: speed to hire is not about rushing, it is about using the correct process for the role and then holding the timeline. A CNC operator who walks in, passes a shop floor test, and shows they know the machine should have an offer before they leave the building. A manager or director role should move from first contact to offer within about ten business days. He explains why entry level candidates come off the market almost immediately, and why rescheduling an interview because you are busy tells a great candidate they are an inconvenience. If a client asked for time tomorrow, would you push them to next week?

The second challenge is the hiring system. Corey emphasizes consistency, the same people asking the same questions in the same order, and shares the one question that tells you whether someone belongs in the process at all: if you love the candidate and they do not, will you hire the candidate anyway? He also gives a sharp warning about C players, toxic high performers, and anyone who hates accountability, because they will either scare a candidate off or sabotage the interview outright. From there he walks through the peer to peer conversation that is a problem solving discussion rather than an interrogation, the owner interview that focuses on culture, and the power of giving candidates the good, the bad, and the ugly. Selling a future culture you have not built yet breaks trust on day one. Honesty gets you a hell yes or a hell no, and keeps you away from the amber flag maybe.

The third challenge is ownership. Corey argues that screening resumes should not fall on the business owner, especially now that AI tools make nearly every resume look polished and every phone screen look worth taking. He shows how to hand screening to a trusted team member armed with ten or twelve clear non-negotiables and a scoring threshold, so owners protect their time while the process keeps moving. Once a candidate is on site, though, nobody gets to say they are busy this week.

This episode is especially valuable for small business owners, entrepreneurs, and hiring managers who are competing for high quality talent, losing candidates late in the process, or trying to build a repeatable hiring system. Corey also points listeners to a free hiring assessment in the show notes, a 15 question tool that takes about three minutes and reports back where your process is strong and where it is costing you.

Your sales process is designed to close business. Your hiring process should be designed to close people. Tune in for a practical, numbers backed conversation on candidate experience, hiring speed, interview systems, and how to stop losing the people your business needs. Stop grinding, start growing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Candidates are customers too: 83% of talent says a negative experience can change their mind about a company they liked, 87% say a positive one can win them over to a company they doubted, and 66% say it directly influences whether they accept an offer.

Generating candidates is the easy part: job boards and AI sourcing tools will find people for you. Nothing about your process after that point is automated, and that is where great candidates are won or lost.

They have never heard of you: in a market with more jobs than people, it is not the candidate’s job to research you. It is your job to make the case, and to assume that anyone you are excited about is excited by someone else too.

Speed to hire is not rush, rush, rush: it is picking the correct process for the role and then staying on the timeline. Entry level gets an offer before they walk out the door. Manager and director level is ten business days from first contact.

Every reschedule sends a message: pushing an interview because you are busy tells a candidate they are an inconvenience, and it previews what working there will feel like. If you have to move it, offer them something better, not a slot next week.

Same people, same questions, same order, and only your A players: if you would hire the candidate over someone’s objection, that person does not belong in the process. Never put a C player, a toxic high performer, or anyone who hates accountability in front of a candidate you want.

Give them the good, the bad, and the ugly: selling a culture you are still building breaks trust on day one. Every job is perfect for someone, so put everything on the table and aim for a hell yes or a hell no. The amber flag maybe is the worst outcome in hiring.

Screening is not the owner’s job: AI written resumes make everyone look qualified, so screening costs more time than it ever has. Hand it to someone you trust with ten or twelve non-negotiables and a scoring threshold, and protect your calendar for the interviews that matter.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Free hiring assessment, 15 questions in about three minutes: https://www.keyhire.solutions/scorecard

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 - Why great candidates ghost you

0:35 - Show intro

1:23 - Housekeeping, and two episodes worth going back for

2:34 - Candidates are customers too: 83%, 87%, 66%

3:27 - Generating candidates is the easy part

5:29 - You are not Google, and they have never heard of you

6:49 - They are on a recon mission, not there to sell you

7:58 - Challenge one: hiring speed

8:23 - The correct process for an entry level role

10:21 - Manager and director: ten business days

11:29 - Every reschedule burns your clock

12:09 - Would you push a client to next week?

13:34 - How to move a meeting without losing the candidate

14:17 - Speed is not rush, rush, rush

14:35 - Challenge two: the hiring system

15:31 - Who to include, and the question that decides it

17:00 - Never put a C player in front of a candidate

18:51 - Same people, same questions, same order

20:16 - The peer conversation, not an interrogation

20:44 - The owner interview is about culture

21:15 - Do not sell a culture you have not built yet

22:35 - The good, the bad, and the ugly

24:16 - Every job is perfect for someone

24:59 - The amber flag maybe

25:53 - Challenge three: who owns the process

26:17 - AI resumes mean everyone looks good

26:37 - Non-negotiables and a scoring threshold

28:22 - Everyone makes time, especially for the on site

30:15 - Your process is a preview of what it is like to work there

31:00 - Close candidates the way you close deals

31:16 - The free 15 question hiring assessment

31:58 - If 80% of a process was wasted, would you keep it?

33:03 - Closing thoughts

Text us your comments or topic ideas for future shows.

One in four US employers are now using AI in their hiring. And one in three job posts are not real jobs at all.

On this episode of The KeyHire Small Business Podcast, Corey Harlock sits down with keynote speaker, LinkedIn Top Voice, and bestselling author Kat Kibben to unpack why AI recruiting is really a math problem that most companies are getting wrong.

Kat has spent more than 15 years helping organizations like Zoom, Monster, and Olly write better job posts and navigate hiring with confidence, with work featured in the New York Times, NPR, and Forbes. Kat's core message is simple but powerful: AI cannot find what you cannot define. And most businesses, especially small businesses, have a definition problem. When you never clearly outline what you are looking for, every step that follows, from interview questions to scorecards to the first ninety days, is built on a shaky foundation.

Early in the conversation, Corey and Kat find instant common ground on the number one mistake business owners make when they hire. They do not define the role. Instead, they build what Corey calls a wish list, a job description packed with responsibilities no single person could ever handle. Kat explains that a strong job post is not about industry or seniority. It comes down to four categories of information: aptitude and the tools you use, teamwork and who you work with, who you present ideas to, and autonomy or whether you can do the work on your own. Both admit their own hiring record proves the point, with Kat noting that even as a recruiting expert running a recruiting business, only one in four early hires was the right one.

From there, the discussion moves into how AI is reshaping recruiting and hiring, for better and for worse. Kat ran a head to head test of the major large language models, feeding each one identical information and asking for a job post. The results hallucinated a location that did not exist, invented an inaccurate pay range, and exaggerated requirements back into old school formats, because these tools are trained on decades of flawed job postings. Kat warns that AI is a tone thief, and explains why prioritizing speed over results leads to biased screening, rejection loops, and lawsuits.

The episode also takes a fascinating and slightly alarming turn into candidate harvesting, fake job posts, and the rise of fraudulent candidates. Kat walks through activity now being investigated by the FBI and CIA, where foreign agencies mirror the job postings of well known American companies to collect resumes, then send AI backed candidates into interviews at large organizations to steal entire code bases and client lists. Corey shares his own firsthand experience interviewing three separate candidates who all listed the same three companies, every one of which turned out to be a fake website.

What makes this conversation so valuable is how practical it stays. Kat and Corey agree that great hiring is a discipline, not a gut decision, and that most owners get it right only one in three or one in four times. They dig into how to build interview scorecards from a well defined job post, why you have to define what a good answer sounds like before you ever ask the question, why communication and timeline transparency keep top candidates engaged, and how findable job titles help the right people discover your role.

If you are a small business owner, entrepreneur, or leader trying to use AI in your hiring process without falling into expensive traps, this episode is a must listen. Tune in for a smart, data backed conversation on job postings, AI recruiting, candidate screening, and why defining what you want is still the most important hiring decision you will ever make. Stop grinding, start growing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

AI cannot find what you cannot define: the job post sits at the bottom of everything, and if you get it wrong, your interview questions, your screening decisions, and your six month performance benchmarks are all built on nothing.

You are writing a wish list, not a job post: a job post exists so that anyone reading it can say a clear yes or a clear no, and if unqualified people keep applying, the post was never clear enough to let them decide.

Four categories make a job post work: the tools you use and how you use them, who you work with, who you present ideas to, and whether you can do the work autonomously. Not years of experience, not degrees, not detail oriented.

AI is a tone thief trained on bad data: in a head to head test of the major models with identical inputs, one invented a location that did not exist, one added an inaccurate pay range, and all of them reformatted requirements back into the old templates they were trained on.

Speed is not a benchmark of success: time to fill measures things you do not control, and when you anchor people to time, they start rejecting anyone scored below an eight. That checkbox looks like efficiency and can get you sued.

Your job post is an attack surface: one in three postings are not real jobs, foreign agencies mirror well known company postings to harvest resumes, and fraudulent candidates have used deepfake video to get hired and walk out with code bases and client lists.

Define what a good answer sounds like before you ask the question: if you skip that step, you will default to whoever communicates most comfortably, which is bias, not assessment.

Findability is free and almost nobody does it: Google your job title alongside the word resume. If the resumes you would hire do not come up, nobody is going to find your role.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Kat Kibben's company, Three Ears Media: https://threeearsmedia.com/

Connect with Kat Kibben on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katrinakibben/

Connect with Corey Harlock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyharlock/

Learn more about KeyHire Solutions: https://www.keyhire.solutions

Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-keyhire-small-business-podcast/id1643962763

Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1FT9oqXSek3jMfiKrZPLQs

EPISODE CHAPTERS

0:00 - Introduction: one in four employers use AI, one in three job posts are fake

1:06 - Housekeeping and today's guest

2:34 - Kat's background and how job posts became the whole problem

4:34 - The number one mistake: you never defined the role

5:10 - What a job post is actually for

6:12 - The four categories every job post needs

7:48 - Hiring is a discipline, and the experience gap owners never close

9:07 - Even a hiring expert gets it wrong three out of four times

9:54 - Why using AI to recruit is a math problem

10:33 - AI cannot find what you cannot define

12:49 - Hiring for current revenue instead of future revenue

14:01 - AI is a tone thief: the battle of the LLMs

15:55 - Speed over results, and the screening checkbox that gets you sued

18:05 - Losing good candidates to your own calendar

19:12 - Publish your timeline before you post the job

21:14 - Why owners freeze on the final decision

22:02 - Define it up front so you know it when you see it

23:11 - Turning the job post into your interview scorecard

24:10 - What happens when you wing the interview

25:09 - Define what a good answer sounds like

26:42 - 37% quit in the first 90 days

27:42 - Using AI on interview questions means going line by line

27:56 - LLMs are not smart, they are word predictors

30:05 - Talk back to the tool

30:34 - The good enough culture that sunk hiring

31:30 - AI optimized resumes and the easy apply problem

32:32 - When 90% of your applicants look great

33:41 - Fake jobs, fake candidates, and the FBI investigation

36:08 - Corey's story: three candidates, three fake companies

37:38 - The deepfake test: turn your head to the left

38:21 - Indeed's agents and the monolithic algorithm problem

40:10 - Rejection loops that follow candidates across companies

41:35 - Actionable advice: spend your time on the job post

42:53 - Findability, and why made up job titles hurt you

43:48 - Results over speed

46:36 - Where to find Kat

47:25 - Corey's closing thoughts on how long hiring actually takes