Confessions of a Recruiter
The show is hosted by Blake Thompson and Declan Kluver who respectively own Vendito Consulting and Blended Employment. Both have been in Sales & Marketing Recruitment for over 5 years. The podcast is about opening the door to the recruitment world and creating a community of recruiters who can share funny stories, educate and have honest conversations about the industry and their experience. All episodes are powered by xrecruiter.
Confessions of a Recruiter
Tom Hunter - Edward Mann | Confessions of a Recruiter #108
Uncover the secrets of the recruitment world with our guest, Tom Hunter from Edward Mann, as he shares his transformative journey from country Victoria to becoming an influential figure in the accounting and finance recruitment sector. Discover how listening to recruitment podcasts and leveraging LinkedIn strategies, bolstered by insights from Sean Anderson and Inika McMahon, propelled Tom's career to new heights. Tom's story is a testament to the power of discipline and creative content in overcoming the challenges of the recruitment industry.
Join us as we delve into Tom's transition from a background in psychology and teaching to the fast-paced London recruitment scene, where he mastered the art of niche specialization in accounting and finance. Tom reveals the benefits of focusing on specific sectors like manufacturing and distribution, which not only boosts client engagement but also enhances credibility. The evolving dynamics with Edward Mann's London head office highlight a journey from guidance to a strong, independent partnership, celebrating mutual growth and shared expertise between international teams.
Finally, explore the ambitious growth plans at Edward Mann, including strategic hiring and training initiatives aimed at tackling the global market's complexities. From streamlining visa processes to targeting key geographical regions, the conversation uncovers the firm's drive to strengthen its presence in the UK's East Coast and Australia's financial hubs. In this episode, we also spotlight the importance of effective onboarding and warming up professional connections via LinkedIn, all to ensure a seamless recruitment process and reduce turnover rates. Don't miss Tom's expert insights into refining recruitment strategies and optimizing team performance.
· Our Website is: xrecruiter.io
Hey guys, Tom from Edward Mann, we're accounting and finance recruitment across Australia. Today on the podcast, we'll be covering my personal journey with recruitment across London and then here to Australia and then next steps and what we're doing for 2025.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to another episode of Confessions of a Recruiter. Today we're with Tom Hunter from Edward Mann Mate. It's been an incredible story Eight years now in the industry, coming from country Victoria, going overseas becoming a teacher, finding that recruitment's one of the best paid gigs you can find without a degree, and now being equity owner of Edward Mann Mate. What a journey.
Speaker 1:Thanks for coming on. Yeah, absolutely, I'm a big fan of the show, so I'm pumped as to be here Looking forward to it.
Speaker 2:Awesome mate, appreciate it. How many episodes have you listened to? All of them, all of them.
Speaker 1:All of them Apart from those. There's a couple more recently. So the early days was like prime time, so you know the Simpsons, like that was the peak period for confession.
Speaker 3:Was it? Yeah, okay, what's your favorite app?
Speaker 1:Oh, there's a few, so the one that I really liked is the one with Inika McMahon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah yeah, Like that story where she was saying about how she called the guy every week for a year or something and then she said I'm going to keep calling for a year until you pick it up, until you answer the phone, and then on the 52nd or whatever, the guy answered and said all right, I'll use you. So that was awesome, but I guess the ones that I've got the most out of it was probably Sean Sean Anderson, Philip Mpoxo and then the stuff that Matty Cossons does is just awesome. He's a weapon, isn't he?
Speaker 2:Yeah, awesome he's a weapon, isn't he? Yeah, yeah, what do you mainly listen to it for, like? Is it education? How to you know, find out the next thing you don't know, or is it?
Speaker 1:yeah, so I, um, I listen to a lot of recruitment pods. Um, I don't know what triggered it at first. I think it might have just been you guys on linkedin just seeing it heave. So I should listen to it definitely should and then heard a few like this is awesome. So mostly educational. Yeah, just taking little tidbits from it, stuff that I can action and use. And then it just got into a bit of a habit and then, before you know it, I was just listening to it almost every day and I listen to it when I'm at the gym or if I'm cooking or anything that I'm just already doing something that's playing in the background Nice, and then I'll. There's something quite good, I'll. So I use OneNote quite a lot on my phone or the computer. I'm just right now episode X at so-and-so time, just so I can come back to it and write it down or whatever, and what's probably been the most impactful thing that you've implemented since listening to.
Speaker 2:you know all the guests that were that on LinkedIn.
Speaker 1:definitely Content on LinkedIn by far. So I don't know when you had him on the show, but I would have listened to the pod with Sean, yeah.
Speaker 2:Sean, he had it on early, like in 2023.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, cool, so I would have listened to it. I was on a train out to Campbelltown, just for context Would have been December 2023, I reckon, and I was just listening to it. Holy shit, I'm leaving money on the table. I need to get involved. So good, fomo got me for sure.
Speaker 1:And then, just since January start of January last year posting three times a week for about six, seven-ish months, and I was getting a fair bit of engagement and getting a fair bit of candidate stuff back, a little bit of client stuff, but not a huge amount.
Speaker 1:So they do a bit of free content on their website, so the 20-10-5 method. And then I was getting a little bit going on that from there, but it was probably more candidate-focused than client stuff. And then I just ended up pulling the trigger and doing the actual paid. And then it's been awesome since and doing the actual paid, and then it's been awesome since it's just a lot more focus, there's a lot more strategy about how to go about it and what to do and just like template stuff, and that's been really actionable. And so, yeah, since it's been awesome getting pretty consistent engagement, having people speak to me about seeing content when I've never spoken to them before. Having clients reach out to me that I've never spoken before. Hey, I'm recruiting for this job, can you help? And then that turns into exclusive work and just yeah, it's been awesome.
Speaker 3:So the paid, fascinating the paid content course that you did through Hoxo. I've heard good things about it. Yep, what actually is it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's a I think it's an eight-week course and then you're part of their community forever, indefinitely or whatever. So there's an online community I think the app's called Circle or something. So everyone that's ever done the program is in that community and are asking questions and whatever. And then each week for the first eight weeks you'll have a session on, say, the Tuesday, with Sean and that's a group one, and then they normally do two, depending on time zones, in the one day. So one will be like Australia 4pm and the other one will be UK 4pm. And then on the Thursday you'll have a smaller group session with one of their support. What do you learn? What are they telling you?
Speaker 1:So, setting up your profile, to be a bit of a funnel, and setting it up so that as soon as someone goes on to your profile, they see what you do, services you provide, how to go about it and just approaching you as the person to go to Yep. And then there's week by week. One is content, valuable, so a valuable piece of content, credible content, so what you piece of content, credible content, so what you can do. And then personal. And then there's a couple of other points in between. I can't remember exactly what the other weeks were, but they're the four main weeks and at the start is the 20-10-5 method, so connecting with 20, commenting and liking, so engagement 10, and then five voice notes or messages reach out.
Speaker 2:So what has more impact doing 2010 five or doing the actual posting?
Speaker 1:I think you got to do both so funnily enough so for the first.
Speaker 1:So I did Sean's free thing on his website at the start of the year and for whatever reason, I didn't listen to it all the way through. I was like, oh yeah, this looks sick, I'm just going to jump into it. And for whatever reason, I assumed that 20 was connections, 10 was likes and 5 was comments, and so I wasn't doing the reach outs. I obviously didn't get as much coming back as a result of that, but because it's kind of linked to the content. So the people that you're going to be reaching out to is the people that are engaging with your content, because they're the most warm. And then it might be people that have viewed your profile and then people that have just connected with you. But you're going to get way more interaction and they're more likely to book in a meeting with you or at least have a phone call if they've seen your content. So if your content is good enough and it's consistent enough and they've seen it, then they're way more likely to accept that call.
Speaker 3:So what are you saying? I find this really interesting because you know I think me and Declan have a more than average profile on LinkedIn. You know we post quite a lot. I probably dropped the ball with engaging a little bit, if I must say so myself. So what are you saying in these voice notes? Are you just like someone likes a post and you go? Oh hey, declan, thanks for liking my posts, appreciate you. If you ever want to look for a new job, let me know what do you say? Exactly.
Speaker 1:So I guess there's two ways you want to go about it, whether it's a candidate reach out or a client reach out, and it really depends on your market. So for most markets it's going to be client-led. Unless you're recruiting for accounting practices because they're crazy candidate short, then you're probably going to be more that focus. So you're introducing yourself, because on the voice notes you can only do for about a minute is the max, yeah. So you kind of need to keep it relatively short and sharp, and so it might be introducing yourself, saying something about why you're reaching out, and you kind of want to do it with a little bit of a pump up at first because you're saying about them being I've noticed your profile, I've noticed the business.
Speaker 1:If you've got something that you can introduce, them being great or whatever. And then you might recognize at the start thanks for engaging or thanks for connecting with me, thanks for viewing my profile, and you might. There's a few different ways to go about it. You can talk about market insights you're seeing, talking about salaries, talking about any changes that are coming up. You could do a little bit of FOMO. So if this is coming up, you need to get ahead of it or this needs to happen.
Speaker 3:And then just trying to book in a meeting or trying to book in a call, okay, okay, interesting. So I'm just trying to see how I can relate that to Venditto, my recruitment agency. So someone likes a post of mine, whatever it's. You know, average salary in sales is 75,000. Someone likes it. I go to Billy Bob. Hey, billy Bob, I appreciate you liking the posts. Saw your background. You've got some great experience at Coca-Cola and McDonald's. Look, we recruit quite heavily in those industries. So maybe, if it's worth jumping on a call, we'd love to have a chat to you about further information that I can give, over and above the salary insights. Cheers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, something like that would work pretty well. I'd probably put before there a little bit of intrigue. So I've noticed this in the market, I'm seeing this happening or something that's happening in your space, and then there's a reason for them to need to call you back because you're giving them some value, because, at the end of the day, you want to get them on the phone to you, but you need to give them something first and foremost. Yeah, okay, people are much keener to give you something if they've received something first. Yeah, the reciprocal stuff right.
Speaker 3:So what has that done? What are the outcomes of you implementing this LinkedIn strategy?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so from a billing perspective definitely increased and the acceptance of meetings and just the familiarity and credibility that just comes so quickly. I don't think I've made a legitimate cold call where no one. Oh, I'm going to reach out to them and they're already engaged with me, first and foremost. So it's not saying that everyone knows me. But I wouldn't have made a cold cold call for months because I would have engaged with them first and then booked in a call and then chatting with them first and getting enough activity, that going just off that method.
Speaker 2:Was it hard to create the discipline? Yeah, big time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So really hard at first and the first six months you're getting fuck all engagement and it takes ages to come through. There would have been weeks where you might get one, two likes and then this is a bit shit, but looking back now, some of the content was pretty fucking great, yeah.
Speaker 3:So what's the difference when you first started to now For the content For the content way more structured.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. And headlining headlining is super important, like the hook. Yeah, the hook. Yeah, I'm still not great at it and I don't love it, because I just hate being a bit daily mail-y, and you just got to get over that. You just got to create a good enough hook that people come in, because newspapers make millions of dollars for a reason right, because of the headlines. Yeah, so you just got to bite the bullet and do it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and does the whole team in Edward man over in the UK? Do they all get around Hoxo and doing it?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So UK guys did it. They're getting around it. I think it is hard to maintain the consistency of it. So I would say they probably don't do it as rigorously and consistently as myself, because you kind of need to enjoy it a little bit and kind of need to make it more of the daily task, because I do all my content on a Sunday because it's just too busy during the week to do it properly. So I'll spend a couple of hours on a Sunday, schedule all five, and then I don't really have to think about it during the week other than a little bit of engagement. But not everyone wants to commit two or three hours on a Sunday to write content for your job. So it takes a fair bit of discipline to do that.
Speaker 2:Awesome and mate. What's London recruitment like?
Speaker 1:Oh, full on, yeah, really full on. So I think is it like 10,000 agencies in Australia? Yeah, I think there's like 45,000 in London.
Speaker 3:Just in the city. Yeah, just in the city.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just in the city it's wild, so super, super full on cutthroat as just got to be really, really urgent.
Speaker 2:You've recruited across multiple countries, though. Hey, like some people in the UK, People do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we didn't, but people do. We did ad hoc roles in for, like European businesses that were based in London, but I wouldn't say it was often like the odd odd one in Luxembourg or Germany or something, but it was primarily London. But yeah, it's full on and I did temp recruitment in London, so it's even more urgent, right, and you'd have a job call in and you need to get CVs across that day, otherwise Robert Half's getting six across and you're missing out. And it was good fun, great fun. And the best learning training ground you will get is in london, in either temp recruitment or a high pace recruitment space, because it's fun. What?
Speaker 2:was it like going from teaching where it's like so different to recruit and just explain how you got the job?
Speaker 1:yeah, so I um, so I went over to London in 2016,. Yeah, started 2016 and I did. I was working in a school, and school teaching in London is different. It's so contrasting because you'll have little pockets where really affluent, and you'll have really gifted kids coming into school, and then you'll have really gifted kids coming into school and then you'll have other other areas, also the same area, where there's disadvantaged people, and so they might be coming in, they might have had might not have had breakfast that morning a really big, just all in the same school, in the same classroom. Okay, yeah, and so that that was tough and so, um, it's just really, really difficult. You get to the point where I wasn't enjoying it. I'm just yelling at six-year-olds how long did you do that? For Six months, not very long, yeah, not very long at all. And then I, because my degree was useless, I basically Googled how to make money without a degree, and then recruitment comes up.
Speaker 3:That's such a good story because most recruiters are probably in that boat where either one they are degree qualified but they don't use the degree. Like I know, lawyers, accountants, psychologists, all of these degree qualified professionals go. I don't even want this degree, this is not what I'm interested in. And then they get into recruitment and do really really well. What was the degree you had?
Speaker 1:I did a Bachelor of Psychology and then I did a. Master's of Teaching.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, okay. So you Googled how to make money without a degree.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then recruitment came up and then I was like, oh okay, well, this is overwhelming. So I was like trying to understand it. I went to interviews and I probably didn't really know what was going on at first and how it even worked. And then I got the job eventually, after interviewing for a little bit At Edward Mann, at Edward Mann, yeah, and it was a steep learning curve because I what did? You recruit Mechanic finance.
Speaker 2:Oh, still, yeah, yeah, yeah, so same the whole way through, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so I like to think I'm relatively personable, but I was not good on the phone to begin with, like that takes a while to get used to.
Speaker 2:And I envision, like Wolf of Wall Street, vibes. A little bit Everyone's in suits, everyone's high pace on the phone, heaps of phone calls, phones ringing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I know a lot of the larger firms are like that. We were still pretty full on, but nothing compared to what the stories you hear. But it's still a little bit like that. And so high volume, super high volume is on the phone and you've got to rinse it. So you learn pretty quickly. And it took me a while to get the hang of it properly. And it was maybe two or three months in and I'm thinking, oh, I'm struggling here, I'm not good at this and it's taking a little bit of time. But then all of a sudden it clicks and I hang on taking a little bit of time, but then all of a sudden it clicks. Hang on. I made a placement last week. I'm working on one now.
Speaker 3:I've got this coming up next week, there you go, happy days. Awesome. What's the difference between the UK and Australia? Is it just more fast-paced, is it? The billings are better there. Is it worse there?
Speaker 1:The billings are better here. Billings are way better here because salaries are higher, the surplus and the volume of agencies. That makes it a little bit harder in terms of competition. But then the urgency of how quickly you've got to move and the feeling towards recruiters in the UK is not great. Most companies don't really like them. I don't think lots of businesses love recruiters anyway, yeah, but the feeling towards recruiters is much more. There's a stronger rapport here and I think there's a greater value of the work here. Really, yeah, so I've found introducing yourself and building credibility and building rapport was way easier here than in London. But it teaches you just you've got to be consistent, you've just got to make the activity and you've just got to be resilient because the amount of times they just get hung up on and all that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:They hang up on you.
Speaker 1:I can do yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah true, one of the guys that I used to work with, on his very first day I think it might have been like the first handful of calls a client told him that he was the worst recruiter she'd ever spoken to. It was his first day.
Speaker 2:He's like oh yeah, you're probably wrong. Yeah, you're not wrong.
Speaker 1:So I wasn't there at the time that was before I started, but that sort of shit happened so what field of temp was it for accounting and finance?
Speaker 2:Was it like high tier big day rates or was it like business?
Speaker 1:So my core market was qualified but a year or two post-qualified. So funnily enough, my key candidate pool was Aussies and Kiwis and it worked out quite well because it kind of just perpetuated a little bit because I had gone through the same stuff that they did in terms of getting your visa sorted, getting your NHS stuff sorted. There's this biometric residence permit it's like a little card thing that you've got to get and getting all the nuances of getting set up. So I was basically just chatting to them about getting set up because you have a two or three-year visa over there. They've just changed the three now, but it was two back then and so just helping them navigate that and then I would pick up jobs where they would want. An Aussie or a Kiwi or South African is another one that goes well over there and I just ended up setting shortlists of six people that I know that were on the visas and that's exactly what they're looking for.
Speaker 2:Happy days.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was great because I made so many mates just doing that, because you see them out on the town, because you're just moving pockets in London. There's so many Aussie pockets. You'll see them out on a night out in the town and you bump into them and try not to connect with them too much Whatever. But yeah, it was great because you have the same similarities, same interests, so you end up just building really good connections. And then, because I was adding a lot of value on top of just finding them a job, I was able to chat to them about what travel might be coming up or what to do here or what nuances might be happening for this and that, and just perpetuate it because referrals are coming out of nowhere.
Speaker 3:From a Canada perspective, so how long were you there for? And then you decided to come back to Australia.
Speaker 1:So I was there for two and a half years and so my visa was expiring and so I didn't want to leave the company. They didn't want to lose me, so I got to set up the Australian office, which was awesome.
Speaker 3:How was that?
Speaker 1:experience? Oh, terrifying. Yeah, so I came back December 2019. So it was what? Two and a-.
Speaker 2:Just before COVID.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we were eight weeks in for COVID so I came back then. So two and a half years into my recruitment career, I kind of think I know what I'm doing. But in terms of a business sense I was so green and then we made a couple of placements. In our first month I was like, hey, good to see you, this is sick, awesome. And then COVID hits and it's like fuck, pretty full on. I lent a lot on the guys in the UK. So my bosses, the two founders, what did you do?
Speaker 1:what did?
Speaker 3:I do so we was it just you at this point?
Speaker 1:nah, so it was me and another guy, james, so he's still working with us. So that was good, yeah, and we didn't know, we were just trying to figure it out. So obviously, worked from home for ages. We had a contract still I think we I'm trying to remember back now because it's a while now I think we did have a contract with our office space. We were in a shared office space but I think it might have been like six months at the time and we're able to be a bit creative with what that looked like and extended and all that kind of thing. So we did manage through it because costs weren't too high. It was pretty manageable, but didn't really know what we were doing Just trying to figure out and chasing leads and just chatting to clients and just talking and just trying to create some sort of level of relationship and rapport, because no one was really recruiting right.
Speaker 2:And no one knew what they were doing.
Speaker 1:So everyone was figuring it out. So I wasn't as big of a disadvantage compared to the other bigger agencies, I suppose, because no one knew what they were doing.
Speaker 3:So we're just figuring it out Well, I suppose, because no one knew what they were doing, so we're just figuring it out. Well, I guess the benefit you had was you were just starting up, so you didn't actually know any different from an income standpoint. I mean, we share this sometimes on the potty, where I think March 2020 or April 2020 was like the first time my business ever did a $6,000 revenue month and I had like 11 staff on salaries, and so when you've only brought in 6,000 revenue for the month and you've got a hundred grand worth of salaries, it's pretty challenging and scary because you're like I'm used to this much income Now I've got this much income and my expenses are here, but for you it seems like it was almost the perfect time, where at least you were still getting up and running anyway. So you just I don't know if it was perfect timing.
Speaker 1:It was fine and it worked out, and we're still standing. Not every business did and not every business made it through, so the fact that we're still here is must be doing something right.
Speaker 2:How did the UK go? Like what were your business partners founders? What were they saying? Like what were your business partners?
Speaker 1:founders. What were they saying? That you were like. The UK handled it slightly different in terms of like shutdowns and lockdowns and all that kind of thing. So the way the government approached it is a little bit different because they opened it up a lot earlier and they had cases that were like crazy per day, whereas ours is slightly different. So we were a little bit delayed behind what their bounce back was, but it was relatively similar. Companies weren't hiring. Then they started hiring, but remotely, and then they were doing this and doing this.
Speaker 2:So incrementally but yeah funny time and do you have a niche within accounting and finance or do you recruit any accounting and finance role within any type of business?
Speaker 1:Yeah so um. So me personally, I focus more on the qualified level. Um, that was more, more in the last six months I've started focusing on that. Prior was a bit more split, so that's another thing that took from the pod. Uh so um. Mick Donaghy yeah, yeah, so he's hyper niche, right, and after listening to that one I was like, okay, we need to focus in, yeah, and so leaned into that a fair bit. So one of the guys has quite an interest in manufacturing and production and distribution. So he does accounting and finance recruitment for those industries. So it's quite a niche spot and getting a lot of buyback from that because it's from an accounting perspective. It's very focused around stock and inventory and cost accounting and that kind of thing. So it helps to have that niche. And the other guy, james, so he's more Sydney focused, whereas I'm Australia wide.
Speaker 2:Yeah, true, and was it hard, like because how long has the other guy been with you that does the warehouse distribution?
Speaker 3:Three years.
Speaker 2:Three years, yeah, warehouse distribution three years. Three years, yeah, was did he go like? How? How did how did he build his niche? Because sometimes and what I always struggle with was like saying no to existing business in the prospect of building your niche, yep, and then, until you actually fully commit, you're in like this gray area where you're like you still accept stuff and you lie to yourself and you're like, yeah, no, I'm a niche recru, a niche recruiter, but you're still accepting, you know, generalist work, yeah.
Speaker 1:So we made the call start of January last year. So it was a bit of a quieter period but it made it a little bit easier and because there was still the team here that could take work that might not have been his space, it made it a little bit of a transition and just work out a split of some kind. But we just mapped it out from linkedin and just used a few different scraping tools and created a list and then you start um digital marketing and tapping them up there and then you go go from there. So it's been. It's been pretty successful and I think it helps having insights and knowledge of that space and it makes it a lot easy to build credibility because then you can start saying all the keywords and all the nuances to that space that are quite specific. You get a lot of engagement back from clients for sure.
Speaker 3:What kind of support? I've always wondered what the relationship is like from different organizations that are in different areas. So the head office of Edward Mann is in London. You're working from Australia. What is the support like from a company that's in London? How much could they possibly support you from there, if at all? What is the relationship like? Do you report back to them once a month and do a bit of a board meeting? Walk us through that relationship.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so early days, because I had no idea what I was doing. It was a lot more frequent, so we'd be catching up almost every day I'm just having a chat talking about this, cause I get them really well with my bosses, so quite friendly. So it'd be just catching up about how things are going and so then we'd have a bit more of a formal discussion about how things are going, maybe once a week and then, over a period of time that's transitioned less and less and I've become more comfortable in what I'm doing and all operational and knowing what to do, when to do it.
Speaker 1:They're much more hands-off now, so I would say that fairly infrequent, and it's just a WhatsApp chat text how things are going. I might do like a weekly email blast to say oh, this is what's happening, this is where we're at. So I do like a weekly email blast to say oh, this is what's happening, this is where we're at. So a lot less. It's pretty independent now.
Speaker 3:Are there expectations on you to do certain numbers growth Like what are the metrics that they're looking at?
Speaker 1:I think so we sit down at the start of the year and discuss what we want to achieve and where we want to be and set goals and all that kind of thing and set up a forecast of where we're at from a cost perspective, what we wanted to be doing from a billing perspective and all that kind of thing. But it's been a little bit less hands-on from their end.
Speaker 3:Do you ever get feedback from them around what they're doing as well? I'm just going to throw a scenario out for the moment. They come to you and go all right, mate, how's business? What's the? You know? What's the billings like? What's the profit like? Okay, looks good. Do you ever turn the tables and go, all right, well, tell me how London's going. How many consultants have you got? What's your profit like? Less so more. Just, I don't know if that's possible. I want to know that you're hitting your targets.
Speaker 1:You need to tell me how you're going, mate. Why should I still be here? You could, but it was more more information sharing. So this is what we're doing. That's working quite well. How are you guys going with that? Is that working for you? What? What are we doing here? What are we doing there? So I would say it's been less of a manager relationship in the last year and a bit and more of like an equal-equal partner style engagement.
Speaker 2:So it's been really good. Anything in the UK that they do that we're missing here, like is there any secret sauce, any processes, the pace in which they operate, the in-depth knowledge they have of their clients, like comparing what they do, that makes them successful compared to like Aussie recruiters. Here that we really are just missing.
Speaker 1:I don't think so. I think it's just the training volume. So when you're there it's just go, go, go from day one. And it isn't always the case here. I think that the lifestyle here lends itself to it a little bit, because when it's sunny and it's enjoyable to go outside and you can have a good time and all that kind of thing, it's a little bit harder to push that. But in London in January, february, march, it's grim, there's not much to do, it's just dark, so it's like I might as well just work and just crack into it. That sounds really depressing it can be.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't know how or why, but every single person I speak to who talks about the UK, they say the same thing. It is absolutely depressing. For those number of months you don't want to go outside and I just sit there and wonder why would you want to be there?
Speaker 1:London's awesome, though I love London. If you're going there for a short period of time, like your visa, and you're in your early 20s, you just want to have a good time. You can travel. It's phenomenal.
Speaker 2:It's very connected to all areas of the world.
Speaker 1:Get a train to Paris in 90 minutes Wow really yeah, yeah yeah, and you get from city center to city center, that kind of thing. But so December is awesome in London. They're so festive, everyone's in the pubs having a great time and all that stuff's going on. As soon as it flicks that switch to the new year, it's wet, it's cold, it's rainy and all that kind of stuff. It's pretty miserable for a couple of months, but then, once the sun starts coming out, there is no better place than London in summer. Everyone's in the parks, champagne, corks, popping, barbecues, everyone's having a great time. Summer in London is awesome. And then you've got summer in Europe, which is, depending on where you go. It can go forever, because you can go to the southern point of France and Italy and Greece. Did you travel much when you were over there? Not as much as I would have liked to. Yeah, I did, but just wish I did more. You look back now should have done this, should have done this, but you can't operate like that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so do you reckon those like grim months? Those three grim months improve productivity because there's nothing else to do?
Speaker 1:I don't know, maybe. Yeah, I'd say so, I'd say there's an element to it, there's a thousand other agencies out there.
Speaker 2:mate, you have to fight.
Speaker 1:Yeah, fight for everything. It's dog, eat dog. What were your work hours? Um seven, seven, 30 to six and then sometimes till seven. It depends what I was doing. Like during the world cup in 2018, was it 2019? Like the soccer world cup, I remember the cause England were playing quite well and they made it to the semis or something. I remember I had a job to fill and I was like I'm filling this and I've getting fine candidates, while England were playing on the screen over there and just looking at Hyde Park, just going nuts because this guy just kicked this massive free kick. Oh well, just crack.
Speaker 1:It didn't mean as much to me as compared to because England go off when you have to notice, yeah, yeah and so, yeah, I just had to do it, because if you don't, someone else will, you've just got to get yourself up for it and push through. But If you don't, someone else will, you've just got to get yourself up for it and push through. But it breeds a really strong work ethic and really strong habits.
Speaker 2:I think that's why UK Scottish Irish recruiters are held in such high regard here, because they're Well, they come over here and they absolutely crush it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, books it's an easy market. It is an easy market. Yeah, it's definitely an easy market, but it's a slightly different market. It an easy market, but it's a slightly different market. It's very relationship-based here, whereas I think timing and volume work way better over there, so it's a much more process-driven recruitment over there. Yeah, relationships are going to mean a lot, because if you're selling into someone and they like you and all that, it helps. But I think the relationship stuff and knowing your market are way better is a bit more important here.
Speaker 3:Do you have any formal strategy? I'm just thinking about Edward Mann as a business right now, and so you've got you. You've got another guy that's been there for a long time Five, five years, five years and then one other, yeah, three years, three years. So good longevity out of those consultants all in Sydney, yep, do they work remotely or from the?
Speaker 1:office, so we're three days in and then two from home. I like getting in the office, so I'm in Monday to Thursday.
Speaker 3:So how do you have this relationship between the UK and Australia? Surely you can poach some of like the good UK recruiters who want to come to Australia and like beef up Australian numbers or vice versa, if someone from Australia wants to go to the UK, like there's a really good link there. Do you leverage that much? Not as much as we should.
Speaker 1:So we'll probably look to do something similar the next time we hire. 2024 was a bit of a tough year for a lot of people, but we'll look to hire at some point this year. Just got to figure out, get our ducks in a row and decide what we're doing. But that will be something to consider. But we'll look to hire at some point this year. Just got to figure out, get our ducks in a row and decide what we're doing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but that will be something to consider. There's the visa requirements and all that kind of thing you need to play out, but I think it's a lot easier now than it had been in the past, so we'll work through that. How many?
Speaker 3:consultants are in the UK.
Speaker 1:So there's four in the London office and then the two founders and there's a guy that does the US.
Speaker 3:Nice. Okay, so you've got the US as well.
Speaker 1:Us from London, oh wow, and the two founders tap in quite a lot to the US. That's kind of three of them.
Speaker 2:US yeah, yeah, yeah To service from London.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so they do mostly East Coast, that's New York East Coast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so yeah.
Speaker 1:I think that makes it a little bit easier, because the time difference is a little bit better. I don't really know, I don't ask too much.
Speaker 3:Maybe the takeaway from this Pody is you flip the switch when you have your next executive meeting. You go all right, guys, you're hitting your targets. What's your profitability? Yeah?
Speaker 2:We get into the US and what's on a national basis. What's sort of the busiest market Like do you get? Like, is Melbourne and Sydney the best for finance or have you ever got any untapped little treasures like out of line?
Speaker 1:So it really depends on the industry. So Perth is really resources focused, so they're typically busy always. It never really stops. And then you might have little hubs around the country that are mining specific. The same way Newcastle and the Hunter Valley up north, like Gladstone, rockhampton, all that kind of thing, but Melbourne and Sydney are the biggest, just population size, for just general financial services and accounting industries. So yeah, they're all relatively similar in their own little way. There's no real differences between the two other than like time differences or industry focus or that kind of thing. So pretty consistent Nice.
Speaker 3:Are there any growth plans in Australia Like what does the future look like for you guys this year, next year, is it? Maybe it's not growth in headcount, maybe it's growth in billings, maybe it's reducing costs. What are, like, the main things you're focused on?
Speaker 1:Yeah, profitability and pushing that as high as possible and investing in the guys. Now I'm trying to get the most out of them. I've tried since the last 12 months just really reflecting on what we need to do better and what we need to bring more of. It's focusing on on our own personal growth and being just better at the craft.
Speaker 3:How do you do that? What are you doing to invest in you? Investing in training?
Speaker 1:The pod has gotten a fair bit of referral, so using that getting actual recruitment traders in. So Laura Hopes is awesome, so I don't know if you yeah yeah, yeah, laura's great.
Speaker 2:What does? So I don't know if you, yeah, yeah, yeah, laura's great. What does she teach? That's, like you know, helps the penny drop or reinforce any patterns, behaviors, processes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so she does it all bespoke. So sat down and we did a three-hour session with her on BD. It's different approaches, so mapping out first 14 days quarterly cycle what the first call should look like, objection handling and just manage that. We had to have five or six topics that we worked through in three hours and that was awesome. It was really good. She's great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, nice. And how does she say to approach the first call?
Speaker 1:So she's similar to how I do it, where warming up via LinkedIn, so connections, and then you might be introducing a bit of value or something that you've got a middle point or the connection point, and then working from there and then sent might be a salary guide, might be like a little value doc about what you're doing, insights to the market, a news article, and then off the back of that then you alternate it via product versus service. So product being candidate, it's a really good candidate. They can do X, be good for your business for reasons one, two, three. This is what they've achieved and then the next cycle might be an article or a value doc. So we started doing a lot more of that in the last six months. So it might be candidate experience checklist, onboarding guide, interview guide, things like that that they can use for their own recruitment process.
Speaker 3:Oh, interesting. Okay, so you're developing digital products, an interview guide, for example, for hiring managers to become better at interviews. And then you're just saying hey, just thought I'd reach out, we've developed an interview guide, we'll help. Next time you're interviewing someone here, it is yeah, and just super soft.
Speaker 1:So, hey, this is something we've been working on. Don't know if it's helpful, but a lot of companies have got a value out of it. Let me know what you think. Use it if you want to. If you don't, that's okay too. Let me know if you have any questions.
Speaker 3:What's the like. How do people receive it? Really well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, the one that's got the most action has been the onboarding checklist. Yeah, so I mapped it out. I think it was like four points, so resignation and contract signing and then saying okay, hiring managers to reach out and say hi and congratulations, thanks for coming to the team, and then maybe two weeks out will be an organiser, coffee organiser, catch up, da da da. Next one will be day before. Let them know what to expect on the first day and give them a buddy, or just organise what the first day is going to look like, and then the first day just show them around that kind of thing, just like a checklist. Four things to do. Because a month out, because that period between resignation to start date, can be an absolute horror show if you don't do it right. And it helps when you've got someone internally that's an advocate and is working with you to make that happen. So you kind of it's for your own benefit, but it feels they feel like you're just giving them something for free.
Speaker 2:For sure, because I think a lot of companies they don't even register on that stuff. They're like oh, I've just done a deal with Tom and the candidate will show up on the date. I'll just expect for him to come in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and because everyone's busy, right, everyone's got their own stuff, their business as usual that they need to deal with and sort out. So they don't really think about it because they're paying for a service and they think that you're going to deal with it all and, yeah, it is our job. But it helps when you've got buyback and someone managing it from the other end and when you're working with a client that does do it. Wow, it's smooth, it works so much easier and you know that you're in safe hands and you're not going to take your foot off the pedal as much. But you feel a little bit more confident that they're probably going to last the journey as well, because you know that they're going to get the appropriate support, appropriate guidance to. Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's like 40% of staff leave if the onboarding's poor. Is that right? Yeah, I believe that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I used to create branded. Like I would white label it, like get the client logo on it, like an onboarding document as well, get them to go through their goals. Like client implementation, it wasn't as easy to implement as what you've created. But like they just don't do anything. Like some clients, like maybe I didn't recruit for always the best clients, but sometimes they would rock up and they'd be like oh mate, there's no computer here and you're like oh sorry, mate, I've been traveling, I'll get it done.
Speaker 1:And yeah, little stuff like that that just gives everyone the ear and it happens, but it makes it easier when the company's on your side and doing all the things that help for sure.
Speaker 2:Yep, 100%. And is there a lot of reverse marketing? Yeah?
Speaker 1:So post-COVID, that was just gold right. You'd send a candidate and you'd almost get a placement. Most times is just gold right you send a candidate and you almost get a placement. Most times that's become less and less, because everyone just has done it and it's kind of been rinsed and done with, but doing it in a way that you're much more targeted. So it might be a specific industry or it might be a specific skill set or a niche that you know do well.
Speaker 1:So in accounting dealership accounting what's that? So a car dealership? Right, the accounting in a dealership is very, very specific and it's very nuanced in terms of the systems and how they do accounting. So that's one that works really well. It might be like mining and cost accounting that works really well. It could be food production and similar. But if it's really targeted and you've done the work prior and you know exact achievements or something that works really well or what that candidate's done really well, then it makes it a lot easier. But if you just spray and pray and this guy's an accountant and you're in Sydney, what do you think? Yeah, that's not the same.
Speaker 3:No, no, it's going to work, because in accounting are you doing public practice Less, so so we're mostly commerce and industry.
Speaker 1:We do do accounting practice, but less so. It's more commerce and industry.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, because you've got to be all in if you're doing public practice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a hard space, it's a really hard space.
Speaker 2:People are not wanting to become accountants anymore.
Speaker 1:So the pickup for accounting has dropped. I don't know what the stats are, but there's a bit of an attraction issue from the unis and so, funnily enough I'm actually speaking to a guy that runs his accounting firm that we're trying to pull together a website to try and build a bit more engagement for the accounting industry. So that'll happen over the next few months. Okay, yeah, so that'd be quite cool. He's really funny. He's got this make accounting great again slogan and he's got all of the hats and all this kind of stuff.
Speaker 3:Maga, maga.
Speaker 1:MAGA hats. I don't love that, but he's really into it.
Speaker 2:Does he actually just get make accounting great like MAGA hats?
Speaker 1:It's a little bit different. It's a little bit different.
Speaker 2:It actually works perfectly, make recruitment great again. Just doesn't really work the same.
Speaker 1:Not the same. So, yeah, there's a bit of that Just trying to make it a bit more attractive, because I think people coming into accounting just think it's accounting firms or you think it's just reporting. But there's so much outside of that. There's so much commercial elements to accounting that, aside from just punching out month-end reporting, and it's so closely linked to technology now, which is a new dynamic Yep.
Speaker 2:So both of those parallels are like the spine, so to speak, in a business.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's really. It's a great base to. If, at some point, you wanted to start your own business, understanding accounting is a great leverage point and if you want to progress to, like you're saying, systems or data analytics or operational, to be a CEO one day, having an accounting background is super helpful.
Speaker 2:A hundred percent, and then so are you just going to stay with Edward Mann long term and continue doing what you do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's hard to say at this point, I think, if just pushing on growing, pushing on building out the team, trying to become as profitable as possible, what that looks like over the next couple of months, I mean so a couple of years, how we build out, whether it's Sydney and then do another office or do.
Speaker 2:Really you think of another office. Where would you go? I?
Speaker 1:don't know yet. We could probably do the East Coast all from Melbourne yeah, I mean from Sydney, sorry Whether we would do a Perth office, maybe, maybe not. Or whether you'd do Perth, Perth's bad man.
Speaker 3:It's too far away it is too far away, you may as well just do the whole London thing.
Speaker 1:Whether it's something like Singapore. Yeah okay, that's cool. So, yeah, big plans, but just got to knuckle down and get the job done first of all and get to a really good profitability point and then building out the team here. We wouldn't go to Singapore until we've got a really, really solid team here.
Speaker 3:What's that like? 5, 10 people, 5, 10, yeah.
Speaker 2:What's the drawcard for Singapore?
Speaker 1:A bit of an Asian hub.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, is that far from Malaysia? Yeah, it is pretty far.
Speaker 1:And the accounting standard's really good. It's mostly English speaking. There's a lot of expats there, so it's way more transferable than you think.
Speaker 2:And the fees are way bigger, aren't they? Or are they about 20%, 15%, 20%?
Speaker 1:Can be. I know they're quite high in Japan, aren't they?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think Japan's like 40% 50%.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's wild Cash to be made. Yeah, yeah Now, singapore is really, really expensive. You get really big salaries over in Singapore. There's a lot of execs over in Singapore.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of execs over in Singapore.
Speaker 3:Executive recruitment over there is huge because it's a really corporate country. There's not as much blue collar, so to speak, as most other countries.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so my conversations have been very, very early days because we'd be five class years off, maybe doing that, maybe sooner, depending on how things kick on. So you probably know more about it than I do.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, so how are you seeing this year? Do you feel the sentiment is changing this year? You made a couple of comments before that last year was a bit of a bad year, I think, for a lot of recruiters. How are you seeing things this year? I think it's going to kick off.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so last week was the most job ads I've ever seen for the first week of Jan and they've all been ads directly posted from hiring managers on LinkedIn. So that's a really good sign because generally it's what end of Jan, early Feb, before it kicks off properly with the new year, new me, resignation, and so to get that much activity this early on is a really really good sign because it's only going to improve, so it's not going to get worse. Yeah, yeah. So that's really good. And even prior to that, I was having conversations in October, november, with clients that have started putting in place some level of commitment or some plan to hire for February, march and to get that level of commitment four months out, and all of them had been brand new roles and commercial roles, so forward-thinking style roles, not just compliance reporting stuff. So to have that level of commitment with a brand new role and a forward-thinking role that far out is a really really good sign.
Speaker 3:So I think it's going to blow up 100%. Yeah, I'm looking forward to it as well. Hopefully this year is going to be a cracker. I think just anecdotally. Obviously every recruiter I've spoken to has got a really good sentiment for this year, probably coming off a little bit of exhaustion from last year. So hopefully any uptick is going to be welcomed. But, mate, we really appreciate you coming on sharing your journey jumping on the pod, since you've been following for a while and it's been really good, absolutely. Dream come true. Thanks, mate, thanks guys, cheers. 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 and recommend it to a friend. Until next time.