Picture the start of a career that no one expected, a tale of rookie recruiters thrown into a world of endless calls and climactic first placements. Our latest episode is a candid stroll down memory lane with the astute Jordan Toyne, Director of Blended Employment, as we chuckle over the raw beginnings and the pivotal moments that have since shaped our professional narratives. We touch on the power of team spirit, the adrenaline of shared victories, and a riotous evening that cemented our alliance
Transitioning to a more meticulous recruitment approach, Jordan shares his initial reservations about the retainer model and how, over time, embracing patience and the art of storytelling became vital in capturing the attention of stellar candidates. We revisit the seismic shifts in the industry brought about by the pandemic and the ingenuity it takes to pivot, as told through Jordan's stint in the wellness industry. His foray into marketing plunge pools during a health craze reveals a wealth of insights on salesmanship and the significance of nurturing client rapport that enriched his return to the recruitment realm.
In a profession renowned for its relentless pace, finding equilibrium between peak performance and personal well-being is often an overlooked art. Jordan lays bare his journey towards this balance, emphasising that true success isn't just measured by financial prosperity but by a lifestyle that prioritises health and happiness. We discuss how self-care practices have propelled our work to greater heights and ponder the evolving landscape of the recruitment industry, where wellness is steadily outshining late night revelries. Join us for an episode that's as much about the evolution of a career as it is about the pivotal shifts towards a healthier, more fulfilling professional life.
· Our Website is: xrecruiter.io
Picture the start of a career that no one expected, a tale of rookie recruiters thrown into a world of endless calls and climactic first placements. Our latest episode is a candid stroll down memory lane with the astute Jordan Toyne, Director of Blended Employment, as we chuckle over the raw beginnings and the pivotal moments that have since shaped our professional narratives. We touch on the power of team spirit, the adrenaline of shared victories, and a riotous evening that cemented our alliance
Transitioning to a more meticulous recruitment approach, Jordan shares his initial reservations about the retainer model and how, over time, embracing patience and the art of storytelling became vital in capturing the attention of stellar candidates. We revisit the seismic shifts in the industry brought about by the pandemic and the ingenuity it takes to pivot, as told through Jordan's stint in the wellness industry. His foray into marketing plunge pools during a health craze reveals a wealth of insights on salesmanship and the significance of nurturing client rapport that enriched his return to the recruitment realm.
In a profession renowned for its relentless pace, finding equilibrium between peak performance and personal well-being is often an overlooked art. Jordan lays bare his journey towards this balance, emphasising that true success isn't just measured by financial prosperity but by a lifestyle that prioritises health and happiness. We discuss how self-care practices have propelled our work to greater heights and ponder the evolving landscape of the recruitment industry, where wellness is steadily outshining late night revelries. Join us for an episode that's as much about the evolution of a career as it is about the pivotal shifts towards a healthier, more fulfilling professional life.
· Our Website is: xrecruiter.io
My name's Jordan Toyne and I'm the Director of Blended Employment. Today I'm on the Confessions of a Recruiter podcast where we sort of dive in on my experience starting a recruitment agency. So listen in, guys, get ready and tune in. This is an epic episode.
Declan:Welcome back to another episode. But it's not just another episode. This is a very special episode. This is the us three is where it all began, back in 2016. So, jordy now from Blended Employment mate, welcome on the pod. Welcome to Confessions.
Jordan:No, thanks for having us here Very, very excited.
Declan:Let's take a trip down memory lane, because I think it's really important that everyone understands where this all began. I forget where we started, but in 2016,. Blake, tell us a story how you brought me and Geordie together.
Blake:So I was working for a recruitment agency and the boss at the time gave an internal incentive that you get an extra five grand on your billings if you refer someone to get the job with us. So basically I just called every person I knew and was like hey, do you want to get into recruitment? And it turns out that Jordan and Declan were the two people that wanted to get into recruitment. Were we the last on the list, or some of the first that you called oh hey, you were the number one, absolutely, and then that's how it all began.
Blake:That's how we all started working together in recruitment very early on.
Declan:Wild and Geordie mate. Do you remember that first month Mate?
Jordan:it was crazy. I always remember when sort of I first started chatting with Blake, I was actually sort of living back in Melbourne and actually sort of resigned from a job I was doing there to actually come for this recruitment gig. And you know, as people say, when you get into recruitment, it was literally like I had no idea what I wanted to do and, yeah, sure enough, I was working with the boys up here in Brizzy. So, yeah, the first sort of 30 days we're sort of going through rigorous training and I was like whoa, what have I got myself?
Declan:into.
Jordan:Oh mate, Still by day 30, had no idea what recruitment was. All I knew is you had to make a shitload of calls and do all these numbers and hopefully someone wants to work with you and give you the opportunity to recruit and you weren't allowed to go to bed until you'd made your hit list, so you had to have 50 people ready every day Mate.
Jordan:I honestly think my google history on the amount of hit lists I'd sort of smashed out in that first 30 days was just crazy you made a placement in your first month yeah I can't remember exactly what it was, but I can say it was probably not the the prettiest of all jobs to actually recruit, wasn't it?
Declan:BTC the guys that do the little things you get at the restaurants. They go bing, bing, bing, bing. Your order's ready.
Jordan:That's right. Yeah, automate or something, no, no, so there's another company that did like a sort of two-way radio, similar to what I'd done, and they sort of had another business that did sort of yeah, restaurant, sort of technology systems which at that time it was pretty new, which you know these days it's.
Jordan:All on an app, yeah it's all on an app and that's all you use. So, yeah, it was cool, did some of that Like obviously, when you first get into recruitment it's like you know why reinvent the wheel. You just go to what you know best and you know companies where you've got a bit of synergy or you know a little bit about that. So, yeah, sort of off to a firing start and then it was pretty cool in the office and the culture that we did. There was around you know doing 50-50 deals, so everyone was sort of you know assisting and helping each other. So, yes, you'd bring on as many sort of you know jobs as you can, but you're also trying to help each other because you know the more we could sort of do as a team was.
Declan:You know it was going to benefit all of us in sort of our overall billings and some good times mate some great memories.
Blake:How old were we? We?
Declan:were 23.
Blake:23.
Declan:Late takes you out for a night out.
Blake:Yeah, 23. We all went for a night out. I wonder if we've got that photo where we can post it. Sergi, Can we post that over this? So we got a photo of us three in my apartment about to go out on a night out. I think we were only what about a month in or something like that, probably even less, and Declan got so drunk we had to get the chaplain to come and help him, oh, mate.
Blake:You know, like the red frogs that go around the valley and help people that are on the gutter because they're so blind. They had to help Declan. He was that drunk and then he went back to my place and he was convinced that I spiked his drink for something, because he's never been that drunk before. And then I don't know what happened with you, mate, but you disappeared as well.
Jordan:Man. I woke up that morning still in my kit from the night before, with shoes on, with vomit all over myself and my bed Same story. I was like what?
Blake:No wallet, no phone.
Jordan:Nothing. I left my phone at GPO.
Declan:Pick that up mid-next week. How did you just go home to bed like nothing happened?
Blake:Mate, I don't go as hard as you boys, so I just like to pull right back when I feel like I'm getting to that point. So you know I'm the responsible one here.
Declan:Bloody hell, mate. What a time. And that was our entry to recruitment. I think we'd found 500 companies in the first month to call and had a night out with Blake, and that's the out of the fry pan into the fire, absolutely.
Blake:So let's give everyone a bit of context on you. You've gone into ROC, our first agency that we all worked at. We worked there for a little while and then we all ended up leaving. I started my own agency, you started your own agency, deck. What did you end up doing, jordy?
Jordan:I actually moved up, oh sorry, down to, to melbourne. Um, so the first sort of when I sort of moved there went to an agency really similar to the agency up there in brisbane. Um, they actually sort of within sort of my first couple of months.
Blake:Wait, was that DeNovo? Yeah, are they still around, dunno?
Jordan:I hope not. But yeah, sort of first couple of months they shut the doors of the Melbourne office and I was like whoa. I thought sort of you know, the recruitment industry was pretty cutthroat and crazy and pretty wild. But come there I was like whoa, where have I gotten myself? That was like full Wolf of Wall Street, real unprofessional and yeah, just like not what I wanted. So ended up sort of finding my feet at a recruitment agency called Selection Partners, which is good, sort of like a bit more of a mature crowd. I was probably sort of one of the youngest there. Again, had a lot of success. Actually my first year was sort of the top biller there at Selection Partners.
Blake:What were you billing?
Jordan:Me Just around about that 400K mark. So it wasn't a high-performing type sort of company. But at that point you know, for me you know less than a year.
Blake:In your first 12 months getting into a new gig. That's pretty good.
Jordan:Yeah, and I was just again, just from, what I'd learned in my previous roles was just those foundations of call, call, call and, you know, fill roles as quickly as possible. So yeah, it was good. And then, obviously, you know, you kind of pick up a couple of things along the way to improve your process and be a little bit more professional. So that was good. Funny enough, that company ended up going into liquidation as well. Really, oh shit.
Blake:Hey, I wonder if we can pull up the stats on how many recruitment agencies pop up overnight and then go into liquidation two, three years later. I reckon it'd be a fair few. We obviously speak to recruiters all the time that start their own agency and we see recruiters not obviously through the ex-recruiter network, but externally go. Oh, you know what? I'm going to give it a crack on my own. I don't need ex-recruiters help and fair enough, everyone needs to do what they need to do. And then three, six months later, and then three, six months later they're working somewhere else again. They delete their agency name off their LinkedIn profile and pretend it never happened and keep moving on. I reckon I've seen that probably six or seven times just in the last 12 months, and obviously we don't know everyone. So if I've seen that six or seven times, it must be a lot that agencies are coming up, they're flying for one or two years and then they're going back down or not even getting anywhere.
Declan:Well, mate, that's business statistics. 60% are over. I think I shared a video this morning 60% fail. Or they say there's like 1,000 people. After three years there'd be 100 left. After another couple of years there's only 10 left.
Blake:Yeah, wild Crazy.
Jordan:Well, the only reason we sort of got there a colleague was just like Geordie, check your super payments. You know I haven't been getting paid super and you know X amount of time that I've been working there. So, sure enough, I checked my super nothing's been paid and sort of the whole time I've been there. And I was just that type of person who's like, hey, where's my super? And yeah, that's what it. Yeah, that sort of was the writing on the wall.
Blake:I remember that and there was a big blow-up and you asked him where your super was and they fucking dipped out at you.
Jordan:Yeah, yeah, he's like went out there and I got in a massive argument. I'm like mate, I've got no issue, but if you're paying my super like yeah, we're cool, like you know, just simple things like that. So then yeah, it went sort of down the train, everyone's looking and you know once everyone knows kind of sort of complained and yeah sure enough, it sort of wrapped up, sort of within a month's time.
Blake:and yeah, it's crazy, jeez. Okay, so selection partners, and then you went to.
Jordan:Yeah, so Millerleith, yeah, that's a good agency.
Jordan:Yeah. So I went to Millerleith. It was. It was kind of uh at that. It was just really comforting. Come to an agency. That nothing that I had actually ever sort of worked for before.
Jordan:You know they were very cool, that sort of you know like, sort of you could say nearly like a marketing agency, really good process. You know all the work that they did was all retained. You know they were partnering with some of the biggest FMCG companies around Australia and everyone wanted to work with them. You know you go to the office, they go to a client meeting and they come back with you know all the product of the clients they're working for for the whole office. So it was just a really good vibe.
Jordan:So doing really sort of good billings as well, where you know, where you sort of see them work in an office, you're like they're not working anywhere near as hard as what we have been in the previous companies that we've worked at, but they're still billing these ridiculous numbers. I'm like how does that happen? But they just had this unreal process that just added so much value to their clients and still to this day it's a process, know a process. I've been running, you know running, and it gets a really good engagement and you know you're giving really good value to your client where they, you know, don't mind paying you between sort of 15% and 20%, you know, retained work.
Declan:What's the most valuable process? If we can break that down, what's the most valuable process you've ever seen in recruitment?
Jordan:Again it's you know selling retainers but not selling a retainer by saying you're selling a retainer.
Jordan:So you know just really talking them through your process, getting a really good brief, getting to know the role, getting to know that company, and then again you pretty much sort of put that sort of brief into your own words and sort of put that into a doc back to that customer as part of you know a very detailed proposal doc and then again sort of doing you know a full market analysis on your search.
Jordan:You know so putting that some graphs around and how many candidates you're talking to. You know market trends that you're seeing, you know why. You know actually even doing a brand analysis on what candidates are saying about their actual brand and then obviously, just like the standard stuff is, you know sort of doing an overview on each of the candidates. The other cool thing I found was you know not just giving an overview of the candidate about sort of their work experiences. Get to know your candidates outside of work. You know are they married, have they got kids, you know what's their dog's name or sort of what sort of dog and when you sort of sell-.
Declan:And that's probably one of the key ones what type of dog they have? Oh, a hundred percent.
Jordan:If you don't have a poodle you're not working here. But yeah, like, and your clients are, you know, so impressed that you know all this information and they're like, oh, we kind of know this person before we've even met them. So you know, you really sort of set you know the stage before that interview for you know any potential candidates, and then obviously just the simple stuff about organizing interviews and the reference checks. But it's selling value in a way. And then part of that sort of proposal doc is, you know it says it's sort of, yes, you're going to pay, you know, a 30 or 40% upfront and then another thing on short list and then a final payment as well. But you know they're like, oh sweet, no worries, sign the doc and away we go and you send your first invoice off and you know, before you know it, you're co-branding and partnering with these guys exclusively and retained and you've got such a good relationship with that person.
Blake:See, it's really interesting. Obviously, we grew up in a very fast-paced transactional recruitment setting. There's no point in meeting clients because you can just get a brief over the phone. There's no point in meeting candidates if you can just see their LinkedIn or Facebook profile photo and know that they exist and it was just super fast, high volume and basically no value over and above the candidate that you sent. And when I first started hearing about people selling retainers and getting $7,000, $8,000, $9,000 upfront from the client before you've even sent them a candidate, I struggled to get my head around that for a little bit. I was like smash the phones from like selection partners maybe DeNovo a little bit and our last agency to then seeing this slower paced or detail orientated process driven more selling the process, it sounds like, than selling a candidate with the right experience. What was the transition like? Was that hard?
Jordan:Oh, certainly, probably at the start was more so around sort of your personality. I've got, you know, really high energy. Sometimes, probably in the earlier days, probably skip past things and probably didn't have that attention to detail. But I really slowed down, used my energy to you know the best that I possibly could, but then just had super attention to detail and sort of formed trust with that client and just again it was just slowing down. It was just slow down and slowing down actually in the end actually worked out to be more than trying to Speed up. Yeah, speed up through the numbers and just sort of the everyday stuff and, you know it, your sort of figures overall actually improve by slowing down, even though you're like, how's that meant to happen?
Declan:So to give that more context, you would use your, your energy and output, say on like a business development sprint or stuff like that. But when it comes to actually you do get a client meeting, slow it down, go through a step-by-step process, unravel everything they want, give them heaps of value up front and then show them through your feet, yes, spot on.
Jordan:So like obviously the the probably the most important things in recruitment is, you know, use your energy for. You know cold calling and trying to get customers and then the other parts you know I, the other parts you know I can probably get through. You know 10 times more. You know candidate sort of. You know I guess sort of map out sort of conversations over the phone to. You know at least get them engaged. And the other thing as well is in the engagement when you are sort of connecting with these candidates and when you do partner with companies properly and you get the full story and you know who the company is, you know where they're trying to go, if they can give me more of that story, on the person in front actually telling that story and on the best person to tell a company's story when it is such a candidate short market, you need that story to engage the best candidates.
Jordan:If you're just calling and saying I've got a job, the best candidates don't want to know about you or go forward for the job. So if you can partner with a company where you get the whole story and where they're trying to go, you've been to the office, you know what the culture's like and you can sort of bring that candidate on that journey and where that company's wanting to go. You then are the recruiter telling that story and I'd say probably nine out of 10 candidates that you chat to would want to go forward and at least have a conversation with that client when, if you just got a high yes, we don't want to use recruiters, but we're having to use recruiters. Here's a basic brief we don't know anything and you're working against each other. You're not going to engage the best candidates in the market.
Jordan:So you get nine out of 10 candidates going ahead with this new process 100%, because if you get everyone on that journey and you're able to tell that story as I always say to people, even if it mightn't be the right role at least just have that conversation. And it may just potentially be another contact in your book for a later date, but when you've got that full story that they're very keen to, at least have that yeah sort of conversation for a first round.
Blake:Nice, interesting and so so. So that was Millerleaf. You went into Millerleaf they. It was the first time you were exposed to a more thorough, detail orientated process. You were really happy with that. But then you got out of the industry.
Jordan:Yeah. So obviously they were going through sort of that COVID period. So in Melbourne it was sort of the most locked-down city in the world at that point. So, yeah, I think a lot of companies were doing it.
Jordan:But I was just obviously caught up with it at Middleleaf I was actually still billing quite well during that period but I was sort of toying with our sort of hours and days to you'd only get paid for three days and I was like you guys are getting the job keeper benefits and all this stuff and you're, you're ditching my hours. And obviously you know I had sort of you know, know, overheads as rent and sort of my family in the background as well. So I was just like come on, guys, and I just, yeah, I was actually at that point about to start my own recruitment agency. So I'd actually sort of done all the work in the background, was really ready to roll out.
Jordan:And, funny enough, I got a, a call from my sort of direct competitor in that Melbourne market, which was Terence, and he was working with sort of like an up and coming sort of plunge pool company called Plungy and I was like Plungy, what's that, what do they do? And sure enough, it was really exciting to me at that time where it was kind of like starting a cold desk from scratch and I was sort of working as a single employee looking after Victoria, south Australia and Tasmania. I was selling no pools at all in that market and I got to treat it like my own little baby. So, yes, I went to Plungy, did that. I just remember in my sort of first month I was like running around like what the hell am I doing? Had to like try and use a recruiter pitch and put it into like a pool pitch and doing small things like that.
Blake:So what is just for clarity, what is Plungy?
Jordan:So they're a precast pool manufacturer, concrete pool manufacturer, so all prefabricated. So they service sort of like all builders, developers and architects and essentially, yeah, deliver a pool on a truck like a fiberglass pool would do. But you've got sort of that premium you know pool, which you know everyone looks to have, which is just at you know a more cost effective rate. Obviously, times have changed and it ends up being sort of apples for apples with the traditional pool market now. But yeah, it was just a different way of doing things and yeah, we at sort of the peak ended up sort of driving it from zero pools a month to, at its peak, just over 60 pools a month down in that southern region.
Blake:Who would want to go swimming in a pool in Victoria? It's way too cold, Mate I was the exact same thing.
Jordan:I was like who the hell is buying pools?
Blake:down here.
Jordan:But you know everyone's sort of getting into that wellness piece and you know the most searched term on sort of domain is pools and same with realestatecom. So, you know, you add a certain percentage to your overall sort of house price. So, yes, it makes your house look better in a photo.
Blake:But yeah, it also adds value to the overall sort of cost of the home. So that was the pitch. It was like hey, you want to. You want to pull the ROI is you'll get a better price on your house.
Jordan:Well, correct, but we were actually selling direct to builders predominantly.
Jordan:So, builders were our sort of you know, go to market strategy. So we were essentially pitching to builders, you know, if you want to, you know, engage a bigger, bigger, bigger target audience. You, you want to, you know, engage a bigger target audience. You've got to, you know, procure pools and also do pools as well as the house. And that was sort of like our big pitch. And yeah, it sort of went gangbusters, especially around that COVID period. It was like, you know, everyone's stuck at home, they can't do anything, so everyone's, you know, adding a deck to the back of the house or you chucking a pool in the back as well didn't everyone get some sort of like superannuation, like you could pull your super out to do something?
Declan:with your house or something.
Blake:40 grand, 20 grand yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, did you get many of them like not so much.
Declan:I didn't really see that jet skis mate, they wouldn't be buying hey, I saw the guy on the news.
Blake:He was buying go-karts. I'm like, mate, don't pull $40,000 out of your super to buy a go-kart. What did you buy? I didn't buy anything. I didn't do it.
Blake:You would have had all the toys Blanco. I've got no toys anymore, mate, just a big mower. That's it, okay. So if there are any recruiters out there that are interested to find out what it's like to have a VA support them in their role whether that be to bill more, reduce tasks that they don't enjoy doing or be a more effective recruiter in their niche then we definitely recommend reaching out to the outsource people or top. Reach out to them, inquire on how they can implement a VA in your agency and to support you, and if you mention ex-recruiter or confessions of a recruiter, they will give you a 13% discount off your bill per month on this VA. That will allow you to scale your business, scale your desk and to bill more and make more money. So go reach out to the outsource people, say confession, sent you, get your discount and see what is possible.
Jordan:One of the biggest things that really sort of lured me to Plungy was sort of the leadership there at the time. Probably, you know, reminds me a bit of you know both of you boys. There's a guy under there, james Murphy and Ben Peterson, and they were the most hungry entrepreneurial guys that were. Just they were the leaders and you're like you just wanted to do well, because they've done so well, and come on that journey with them and I. We were sort of getting 400% growth year on year in that company, which is just so unheard of Like it's. You'd have these huge targets and you're like, oh, how are we going to hit those? And you just did it, you just put in the work, do it. And you know you weren't afraid to sort of put in. You know ridiculous hours, you know outside of work or on weekends or just any time. It was just you're on this journey and when you're all getting this, you know success along the way.
Blake:It was just you just do it. Yeah, that's, that's awesome. So you did that for what like three years.
Jordan:Yeah, so just shy of four years in the end. And then, yeah, so pretty much just got to a point where sort of like a new management came and sort of really bottlenecked my sort of progression in the company. And, yeah, me and Decker caught up for lunch and then you got sucked back into recruitment.
Blake:Oh yeah, oh no. What have you done to yourself?
Jordan:Oh, man, don't worry, mate, it's been tough.
Blake:So tell us about that. So you've taken over the torch from Blended Employment. You're now looking after Blended Employment as the director. You've been able to take over some of Declan's existing relationships, yep. So that's obviously you're in a good spot there, mate. You've been, you've got the silver spoon in this in this instance. But the the hardest part would be having four years off recruitment and then getting back into recruitment and trying to find your groove again, com only, you know, by yourself, down in victoria out of your home office trying to figure it all out. How was your first couple of months?
Jordan:Mate, it was one of those things you're like oh yeah, like I've done this before, I can sort of jump back into it, and it is not that easy. It's like again, as I said before you know you try and go from pitching pools to from recruitment sorry to pools Same thing, it's like going from pools back to recruitment, it's just not the same. The only thing that gets you past is you know your sales is sales. If it's recruitment or selling pools, it's all the same. So you know it's just all about, you know, getting meetings, building relationships, and you know time, time goes by, where it sort of, you know, picks up slowly. I just was, you know, very lucky that, yeah, declan had you know really good loyal customers that were coming back to him and I could actually just get on the tools of recruitment straight away and actually recruit roles and you know, the candidates essentially educated me back up on recruitment.
Blake:So, but don't get me wrong, like what was your first screening of a candidate like Quick?
Jordan:Very, very quick.
Jordan:But I was like oh so where you worked, oh yeah, how long, and then you just skip question after question. I was like I really needed to sort of dive into sort of my filing cabinet and get like the basic sort of interview, little questionnaire thing out and just sort of get back to basics. So I literally got back to basics and again it just everything started falling back into place. But yeah, like my process was so loose and not tight whatsoever and you know it was. I remember the first time I got my first offer through and when did you get your first?
Jordan:offer through so I probably got my first offer in, I think probably maybe a month after sort of really sort of kicking off.
Blake:Wow. So you took four years off recruitment, came back in and did a deal in your first month again.
Declan:Correct Awesome. He 4X'd his income in his first month of business Did you yeah, like it was crazy, like I did that.
Jordan:But yeah, this candidate, one candidate, it was just like I was like mate. So you know, it looks like you're going to get an offer at this rate and I'm like you know, will you accept this job? And he's like yeah, yeah, no worries, he goes. Oh, but I just got to talk to the wife tonight, call him back in the morning thinking yeah, job's done, deal done.
Jordan:And oh, mate, yes, sorry, I spoke to my wife and I don't think I want to go forward for the role. I was like you're kidding, you're kidding me so pretty much, mate. I was like my ego was too big. I was like I found another candidate, had him interview a day later, had the job offered at more money and I was like now we're on, so it's just like it just probably made my process and me as a person. I just probably needed that to happen. Everything was happening too easily.
Blake:You needed to knock yourself down a peg and go all right, I need to tighten up this process.
Jordan:Oh, spot on, because everything was just falling in my lap. You know, the same as you say.
Blake:You just said it was really hard.
Jordan:And now, you're saying everything is falling in your lap. But again, as I was saying, it was like I probably wasn't doing the foundation stuff at the beginning, right until you know you fill a couple of roles and you're like, oh, I've got nothing on my desk and it's like all, right, now we need to really sort of batten down, have a routine, have a structure and and set out your day properly.
Declan:But mate four placements, couple of retainers, like that's a huge first six weeks into business yeah, mate, again like I'll probably sort of blow myself away a little bit.
Jordan:Like you know, uh, you know sort of, yeah, as you say, sort of, uh, I think sort of last month around about sort of three placements and you know, looking this month around, sort of four. So, um, again, all I can probably say is you know, uh, it's natural for me just to go back to my old network and you know those guys had trusted me in the past. Don't get me wrong. When you leave them high and dry and you're not in the industry, of course it's natural they're going to have to use another provider. But you know my tenacities and sort of my sort of the way I work. A lot of sort of clients said to me they are Jordan. Since you left we haven't been able to get the results. We've tried multiple agencies to try and fill some of these roles and we haven't been able to do it. There's one in particular I just did recently and I've been able to get two candidates out of that one role where they haven't been able to fill that role for nearly sort of two years.
Blake:Wow, and then you found two people that they hired, both Correct. Yep Jeez, it's the magic touch, jordy, oh mate.
Declan:The industry's glad you're back, mate, yeah.
Jordan:No, but it's good mate. I feel like, you know, I kind of call myself the journeyman, so you kind of just sort of learn heaps of different things from heaps of different places and you know putting it all together now where I feel like I've got that edge.
Blake:So what are you?
Jordan:recruiting. What are you specializing in? What are the positions? So in a perfect world I'm sort of recruiting, you know, all sort of packaging, building materials and sort of construction roles. But don't get me wrong. You know when you first sort of start in business, it's you know, take what, anything you can get a win on essentially. So you know I'm here to make money and be successful. So you know, if I can't sort of get out of my sort of key areas what I need, I'll recruit anything and you know it's not hard to. But yeah, but I feel now I'm able to sort of work within my parameters of my specialised areas because I'm meeting, you know, three or four candidates a day.
Jordan:I've got a you know a big sort of you know database of candidates. I know by a name basis, know their background. So you know, from a speed to market I can, as soon as I get a brief or you know I want to, you know sort of send a candidate off to float a candidate off to a potential client. I can do that very quickly now where when you first start and you don't have that database of candidates that you know and kind of know what they're looking for sort of salaries and experience. You just can't do that. But you just got to put in the time and interview. Essentially you got to be sort of interviewing.
Declan:I find at least four interviews three to four interviews a day, to be successful in this space. Some people think they need to do for a week. So, like you know this mentality that you've got you, you had it intrinsically with you when we first started in recruitment. How do you maintain it? Because you know, I think now, with ex-recruiter in the community of recruit like everyone's seeing what high performance looks like and many of us have never experienced it until this came about for all of us, a lot of it was like, hey, if you're Bill 400K, you're a G, like you're a gun. So is it just numbers or is it a combination of both running a really tight process, making sure it's retained, making sure you're spending your time with your candidates and then just adding volume to that?
Jordan:I probably got high performance drummed into my blood at a very early age, from when I used to sort of do cycling at a higher level. So it's all about sort of routine and obviously the hours and training or, you know, the time you put into something is what you actually get out of it. So for me I live by my calendar. My memory's terrible, but I'll set my week out, or my weeks out probably about three weeks in advance, of client meetings, candidate meetings and then little times for sourcing or whatever it may be. So you just have to live religiously by that calendar, because I get distracted so easy. So, for instance, if I don't have something in my calendar and I go off track, I'm going to let myself down and that's where the performance starts to fall away from me.
Blake:Talk to me about the fear and uncertainty that you had getting back into recruitment after three or four years off. I don't know if this was the case, but a lot of conversations that we have, recruiters that are recruiting right now have a lot of fear and uncertainty of starting their own business and working for themselves under their own brand. I could only imagine there would be a pretty high level of uncertainty, doubt, fear, insecurity, going from not actually being in the industry for almost four years to then just going the polar opposite and starting an agency. Have you got rocks in your head?
Jordan:Pretty much, mate. I would even say when I was 20 I I found it more of a scarce to go and jump comm only and and do it all myself. But I've got, you know, a family now mortgage everything under the sun, but that would stop a lot of people from making that jump, though, but geordie didn't.
Blake:So is it? What were you going through? Were there any internal battles that you had to try and justify to yourself internally and convince yourself internally to be confident enough to actually make that move? What was going through your head?
Jordan:I just backed myself. I just backed myself 3,000% that I know anything I do, I'll be successful. That I know anything I do, I'll be successful. And if at the time I'm not being successful, I'll work harder than anyone else to be successful. So I just know that I'm just I'd rather have pressure than no pressure, I feel as soon as I get comfy. That's just when things start sort of falling down. So I actually just much prefer to kind of be in that sink or swim type mentality, opposed to you know. Yeah, just being in that sort of groove. That's sort of what happened to me at Plungy. I was doing it sort of with my eyes closed, the role, so, without having that stimulation of doing something a little bit more, I just cruised by.
Blake:And are you happy with your decision? Yeah, 100%, percent.
Jordan:No, mate, I'm loving it. Um again, just, you know, I'm a people's person, so just the interaction with both candidates, clients, you know, and and chatting all day long, it's uh, mate, I couldn't think of anything better to be doing, to be honest.
Blake:Well, you could be recruiting for salespeople selling pools.
Jordan:Mate, it's not off the cards. Mate, have you thought about?
Blake:that? Have you hit plungy up and said hey, I can replace my role if you like.
Jordan:Oh, mate, it has been on the cards.
Blake:But I thought why?
Jordan:not sort of call all the other pool companies as well, which I've already sort of started doing.
Blake:So you know, I've got there. You go, recruiters back off on the pool companies.
Jordan:You've got Geordie coming in Exactly, but no, so it's mate. I've been loving every minute of it since. Don't get me wrong. The hardest thing I've found is, you know you take for granted working in an office full of other recruiters, especially recruiters who are, you know, a better recruiter than yourself. I've been sort of banging it out in a home office, not having any recruiter lingo whatsoever, to sort of piggyback off. Now we've just sort of signed a lease in an office in Melbourne I can be back around recruiters. So I'm thinking being around these really good recruiters there in Melbourne in this office. I don't see why my billing should probably sort of you know quadruple in the coming months, because I'm just going to be sort of you know, learning the, I guess, the art of recruitment again and not having to just wing it.
Declan:Essentially, yeah, 100%. It's awesome that, like recruiters are worried about clients transitioning with them just to moving from one job to another or starting their own agency. And you've proven you can be out of an industry for four years, but if you're worth your weight in gold, they'll still follow you and be glad to hear from you that you're back in the game. But that's the thing.
Jordan:I think a lot of recruiters just kind of do things half-assed and if you do things properly and just provide a really good service, of course they're going to come back to you every time. I feel that's probably the biggest difference I've felt coming back as a sole trader running my own recruitment business, is when you don't have that sort of backing of a company paying your salary each week, that sort of backing of a company paying your salary each week. You're just so determined to provide the most ultimate service possible to purely just get repeat business back to you and they will tell their friends. The candidates remember you Most of the time they actually stay in their roles for a long period of time. It's incredible.
Blake:That's a really good point. You bring up around working for yourself, having no salary. When you engage a client, it means so much more to you than if you're just a recruiter working at some random agency on a salary trying to hit KPIs. And I was going through some training and some onboarding with a new member of Venditto recently, and we were talking about the difference between a candidate going for a job directly or the same candidate going for a job through a recruiter, and who is more probable to get the job. Which candidate candidate one or candidate two is more probable to get the job? If they had the exact same experience, if a recruiter represented one and one just went directly, of course the candidate that's getting represented by the recruiter is always miles ahead on getting the job than the one that doesn't. They got someone that's financially invested in making sure they get offered the job. They know the client, they can prep the candidate on what the client's like, give them all this insight, et cetera, et cetera, and they're so much more invested. Same kind of thing.
Blake:If you're a recruiter, though, and you're just on a salary and you've got no buy-in in your agency, the level of service is far less than if you're competing against a recruiter who represents their own brand, and it actually means a lot more to them, that client. So it'd be, from a competitive edge standpoint, someone working for themselves under their own brand you under Blended and then Joe Smith as just a normal recruiter under ABC recruitment you're going to be, from a competitive standpoint, so much more invested in delivering an outcome which, in turn, will get you more business. Which a competitive standpoint, so much more invested in delivering an outcome which, in turn, will get you more business, which will actually allow you to build more. So the fact that you're just running your own desk like that, just by nature, means that you will probably build more than you would have if you were just a recruiter at someone else's agency. Was that a really long-winded way of saying that?
Declan:Yeah, and I think there's a huge shift happening, like there's a lot of sales are down across all major agencies at the moment, dramatically dropped 17, 19% on average from last year. So, and I think there's a huge market shift happening. There's a lot more obviously smaller agencies coming to the market, people that have a lot more care as opposed to just, you know, plugging a deal or thinking that deals will come in forever. That tenacity, the business development, the client relationship is lost in many recruitment agencies and I think that's why a lot of the big ones are finding it hard and that's been. You know it's on shortlist, there's multiple articles, industry bodies are talking about it and they go on. How is you know multiple people at X Recruiter or people that work for themselves having so many wins?
Jordan:And I think it's that level of care that naturally gets in you know, put in you or instilled in you when your name's on the line. Man, I literally use it all to my advantage. Like all this stuff, like being a small boutique agency is the best thing possible. Like I will literally go.
Jordan:I've worked at some larger agencies where their biggest thing is just bringing head count on and what the directors will do. They'll bring all this work in and get their most junior sort of recruiter to do the role. So you're paying you know a top fee but you've got the most junior recruiter in the office filling all these roles for you. So I can hand on heart tell you that I'm not just the person out here sort of you know getting the brief and getting the role, I'm the actual person also on the tools, recruiting the role, and I'm putting every amp of energy and time into this until I actually deliver a result. Where you have a you know a bigger agency, you know that person might sort of leave halfway through that recruitment process and then it's on to the next sort of you know recruiter. So you just you can't guarantee on a relationship to be long-term with an agency with you know A big agency.
Blake:Yeah, correct Big agency.
Blake:Yeah, I find a lot of the feedback that I get from clients that are used to dealing with big agencies is they'll have a relationship with one person, let's say in Brisbane, and then they'll have a role come up in Sydney and then they've got to get passed on to another recruiter because that original relationship that they had isn't allowed to recruit in Sydney and then all of a sudden it just makes the whole experience really shitty for that client. But you understand why big agencies have to do it, because you need to have like rules and boundaries. But that's one of the biggest value adds as a boutique. If your client is a national client, they want you to recruit in six different locations. They only have to brief you once and you can recruit in six different locations and fill the jobs for them. So massive competitive advantage than a big agency that they'll take a brief, they'll pass it on to one guy, then they'll pass it on to the next guy and it just creates this recruitment mess. That probably is why a lot of clients typically would avoid recruiters, if they could, from big agency, because of that sloppy getting passed around to all these different recruiters.
Blake:Some are going, some are coming, all that kind of stuff. So that's a really good point that you bring up. So so what? What? What's blended doing at the moment? Where? Where's the next 12 months, 24 months? You're a new agency owner. What are your thoughts for the future right now, like, what's your plan of attack? Are you just going to stay by yourself? You're going to grow a team.
Jordan:Yeah, like there's at the moment I'm just sort of finding my groove still so, um, you know I am ambitious, but I'm also I I'm happy just being a sort of like a sole sort of you know operator. Maybe over time I might get someone to sort of help with sort of sourcing or something like that. So you know, I can sort of bring on more work, but but I'm happy just providing a high-level service to an X amount of clients. I don't want to be too big and to the point that I lose that sort of high value, but that's how I'm able to then pitch it back to be able to sort of get the fees that I'm sort of charging back as well, because I only have X amount of bandwidth. If you want to try and drill me down on price, I just don't have the time, or I've got people who are willing to pay a better fee and I'm doing that so I can provide a high level sort of service.
Declan:Because, mate, I think doing it like we say it all the time, sometimes employing a team isn't the best way to go.
Jordan:If you can be a top performer, be smart with your money, you can really set yourself up seriously well over the next five years well, if you're averaging sort of 20 to 25k a role and you can do sort of you know four to six roles a month, that's not too bad, right? Um, don't get me wrong, you can always do more like, but you know that's always build two mil instead of one. No, exactly, but you know what I mean. Um, I feel like if, if you can do that and you know what I mean, you're comfortable, you still got you know a life outside of work as well. That's probably over the last few years what's actually probably um sort of changed for me.
Jordan:I used to be extremely money driven, um, still am to to some degree, but you know it's lifestyle actually, you know comes, comes in and means a lot more to you. So I spend a lot of time sort of with my health and fitness and kind of you know separate my days into sort of you know three segments. So you know you do the morning walk or surf in the morning and then at lunchtime you're either sort of got the sneakers on, going for a run um, or you're sort of doing a gym session session and vice versa in the evening. So that way you're looking so good Nah bro?
Declan:Is that why your paddle fitness is up so high?
Jordan:He's blushing, Nah but like that's, that's a so much. More important to me now is just kind of yeah, you can work so hard and do all this time, but if you're not sort of looking after yourself outside of work, you know everything else sort of goes bad behind doors. So that's been a huge thing that I feel that I've been able to, you know, get probably another sort of 10 to 15 sort of you know percent high performance into my sort of days.
Blake:From looking after yourself.
Jordan:Yeah.
Blake:Moving your body, getting the blood pumping. Yeah, 100%.
Declan:One of the worst bit of advice I ever got when I started my agency was to ditch all that.
Blake:Who told you to do that?
Declan:Scroggs. Really, he's like mate, don't go to the gym, don't go to the gym, you should be in the office. It's a waste of time. Just work, work, work. Don't worry about going. You know spending too much time with your family. You don't attend events. You've got to be working all the time you're here to build a business and it's the biggest, worst bit of advice ever. I reckon it put me back for two years because you have no enjoyment. You're just plugging away. You're like what's the point of this? And like I valued my health so much before getting into business and it was in great shape and then just let it all go.
Jordan:And it's such a hard, climb back 100 and even like um. You know I feel like the recruitment industry in particular sort of changed over the last sort of five years, where you know, when we sort of first got into recruitment it was all about, you know, finish a crazy month and go get on the drink and you know, have this big night and celebrate, where now everyone's you know doing things, you know some wellness things.
Blake:Ice baths and yeah.
Jordan:Yeah, and it's completely changed where it's a lot more about you know your health and looking after you, where don't have that group of 10 to 15 people going for drinks after work anymore. More times than not, there's only like one or two people who are sort of their young whippersnappers that sort of are actually going out. So it's completely changing. I think that's in probably.
Blake:Do you reckon that's changing though? Because you're changing, because we're getting old.
Blake:Yeah, you know, we had this funny story when we were in Perth, I think, when we were launching a couple of agencies, and we went for a gym session at like 4 am, went and got a coffee and there was like cops in the city I don't know, maybe from like a night out or something, they're getting a coffee as well like wrapping up their shift, and they asked us about brisbane and they're like, oh, what's the brisbane nightlife like? And decker goes oh, mate, fucking, no one goes out anymore. All the all the clubs are basically shut. And I was like deckland, that's not the case. He's like, oh, really. I was like yeah, mate, it's just because you don't go out anymore.
Blake:But like, obviously brisbane's pumping and you know there's a big nightlife in in brisbane. But it's just funny that our, our lives transition and everyone grows up and I never knew when that moment would be. But it's a gradual thing where you just stop going out and then all of a sudden your friends all get into different things, whether it be looking after their health, going on on walks, going to the gym and the whole. The scene essentially just kind of takes a back seat and then you forget it even exists.
Jordan:I guess a lot, a lot of people I guess, as you grow older is you know you've got families and things to sort of go and look after outside of hours as well. So you know your priorities change to different things over time, opposed to you know, when you're sort of younger you don't have the. I guess you've got no priorities, it's just yeah, no worries, we'll see you out.
Blake:Yeah, yeah, 100%. No, that's awesome. So you're happy doing what you're doing right now. You're ripping in in Torquay, Geelong.
Jordan:Yeah, so sort of based down in Torquay now. No, we love every bit of it At first we didn't know, mate, it's the best.
Declan:I would love to live there.
Blake:Mate, it's a little cold, but yeah, it's good.
Jordan:Blake likes it, because there's only four streets to go down.
Blake:Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's really easy to get around town 100%, and so you're going into the office now with all the ex-recruiter partners being around. Other recruiters will obviously help with getting the lingo right, tightening up the process and continue to refine your craft. So how are you getting in there? You're going to do two, three days a week. What's your plan of attack there?
Jordan:Yeah, exactly, sort of. The plan is probably to begin just a couple of days a week, purely just. I don't want to burn myself out. You know it is an hour sort of door to door from sort of toolkit to the CBD. That's not that long though it isn't too long. But you know you get up early, you cruise into the city. By the time you're fatigued of all the travel and then sort of coming home it probably takes a lot greater toll than you know. Sort of here in sort of Newstead, sort of Tenerife, and just rolling down to the office Five minutes, yeah, exactly, so we know what a day to the Gold Coast does to us?
Declan:Yeah true.
Jordan:And then it also pushes back other things. You know, like you can't sort of do your normal sort of exercise routine unless you get up at like 3am and something ridiculous. So you know it does sort of cut out a couple of things. But you know my sort of plan is to potentially sort of, you know, do my exercise after I finish work in the city and then you know sort of cruise back to Torquay so I miss all the traffic. So you know, sort of just doing it in a way that I'm, you know, super efficient and then, yeah, same thing as sort of lunchtimes and things as well, but, yeah, super excited to work in the office with some, you know, sort of masters of their craft.
Blake:Love that.
Declan:Mate, that's awesome. Who'd have thought, Was it a? Did you already have this premeditated in your head or did you just see me working and juggling everything and you're like, mate, what are you going to do with Blended? I'm like I don't know. And you're like I'll take it over, and then a month later or two months later, it's all happened. Yeah, exactly, Is that just by chance that it was for me?
Jordan:Mate, I just remember you were just like I'm shutting the doors down on Blended and I was like bruh, you cannot do that on blended. And I was like bruh, you can, you cannot do that. And I was just like you know you probably share a lot of the same values and sort of drive as I do and I was like you know what a perfect way to sort of pick up you know some, some slack there and, if I can you know, add value to those clients where you know you don't sort of have that time, mate, it's probably the best sort of entry to get back into it and it has been so because, yeah, if I was to go and start an agency tomorrow without probably having sort of those I guess warm sort of leads to some of your stuff, oh boy, that would be super difficult. It would have been tough 100%.
Blake:No, that's awesome.
Declan:At least there's plenty of reasons now to come to Melbourne more 100%, so I'm expecting to see you guys monthly now right. Well, maybe One request, mate If we do come back, can we upgrade the bed a bit? Yeah, mate.
Jordan:It was a full house on the weekend, wasn't it? It was mate. There was a lot of people there, though.
Blake:That wasn't too bad, mate. You just got to not get in and out all the time On an air mattress.
Declan:Blake getting up and down all the time.
Jordan:Mate, you were getting up and down all the time. Don't worry, guys, I'll get you your own little bed for when you're coming down.
Declan:Perfect. But, mate, it's a great lifestyle you got. I couldn't envision, once you live there, it's like living in Byron of Victoria.
Jordan:No, it's awesome. Yeah, it's its own sort of small community. Yeah, no, we love it there. It's good to kind of be not in a fast-paced environment, and when you are home you are relaxing and feel like you're on holiday. So it just really takes off that edge opposed to go, go, go, go, go all the time.
Blake:Yeah, and just lastly, geordie for anyone that's listening, who's a recruiter? They're thinking about traveling your path and potentially looking at starting their own brand. They're a bit confused, they're a bit scared, they're a bit unsure, as naturally they would be. What would you be? What would your advice be for them?
Jordan:um, don't overthink it. Um, just, you know, if you've obviously got the experience, just back yourself. You know, um, worst case, like, what have you got to lose? Um, that's sort of in my head. I'm like, you know, worst case. You know I'm very employable, I could get a job tomorrow if it all didn't work out. But you know, I back myself, I'm not going to let myself sort of, you know, go backwards or, you know, go sort of belly up. So, yeah, just just back yourself, don't overthink it.
Jordan:And yeah, you, obviously the cool thing with x recruiter which I've just seen super amounts of value is you don't realize how much is actually involved in starting a business. You know the organising of all your different subscriptions, the finance side, invoicing, and then at the same time you've got to also recruit. So the ex-recruiter model is they just pretty much take care of all of that sort of stuff that you don't even know about. But once you're kind of like, oh, what do I do here or what do I got to do there? It's all taking care of you. So, yeah, just do your job, work hard. And you know it's all sort of taking care of you in the background. So, yeah, don't overthink it. Work hard and you know, reap the rewards Boom.
Blake:Nice Geordie. Thanks, geordie, appreciate you coming on mate and sharing your story and I look forward to celebrating the first birthday of Blended.
Declan:Yeah, what is that?
Blake:Seventh.
Declan:Sixth, yeah, sixth birthday, sixth birthday.
Jordan:Well.
Declan:Geordie's first birthday, geordie's first birthday, his first birthday anniversary.
Jordan:Yep.
Declan:Thanks, Gey, Thanks brother. Thank you Appreciate it.
Blake:Thanks for tuning in to another Confessions of a Recruiter podcast with Blake and Declan. We hope you enjoyed and got a lot of value and insights out of this episode. If you do have any questions or you would like to recommend someone to come on the Confessions podcast, we would love any introductions and remember the rule of the podcast like share, share and recommend it to a friend until next time.