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
Richard Triggs - Arete Executive | Confessions of a Recruiter #110
Ever wondered how a unique move like a "suicide shot" in Bangkok can shape a career? Join us as Richard Triggs, founder and CEO of Arete Executive, shares his remarkable journey in recruitment and talent management. With over 1,500 executives placed and a bestselling book under his belt, Richard brings an entertaining mix of anecdotes, career milestones, and wisdom on building a strong employer brand. Discover strategies for attracting top talent, creating a culture of love and accountability, and the power of personal branding that extends even to his musical pursuits.
Uncover the hidden gems of writing a book as Richard reveals how his bestseller has not only served as a guide for job seekers but also as a powerful networking tool. His experience with the Key Person of Influence program shines a light on mastering key business areas from pitching to publishing. Although offering free resources comes with its challenges, Richard's insights into perceived value and audience engagement offer a fresh perspective for professionals looking to leverage content for credibility. Additionally, his aspirations in professional speaking underscore his passion for sharing his industry knowledge.
In a candid discussion about the recruitment industry's challenges, Richard tackles common misconceptions and highlights the critical role of personal relationships. He advocates for the human element in recruitment, cautioning against the over-reliance on technology and AI. With a narrative rich in personal anecdotes and industry insights, the conversation covers mentorship, the nuances of internal versus external recruitment, and the evolving dynamics between global and boutique recruitment firms. Whether you're a seasoned recruiter or new to the field, this episode promises a wealth of knowledge and a fresh take on the art of talent management.
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You've been there, you've done that. You've walked the walk, you've talked the talk. You've helped a lot of people go do it. I'm pretty committed to doing a f***ing good job.
Speaker 2:Hello folks, my name is Richard Triggs and I'm the founder and CEO of Arita Executive. You definitely don't want to miss this episode. There'll be lots to learn, not only if you're new to the recruitment industry or if you're an old fossil like me all right, welcome back to another episode of confessions of a recruiter, trigsy.
Speaker 1:This is our third time chatting mate.
Speaker 2:How good is this? Well, it's our second time one-on-one one-on-one yeah, and confessions live. That was an event I was coming in, I was going oh my god, am I gonna have to hit that bloody golf ball into the hole again?
Speaker 1:But fortunately I don't have to do that anymore. We didn't bring that into Season 3? Is that something we should bring back?
Speaker 3:We've actually got a new version of that. It's called the boomerang throw Really, and so what we have to do is go outside on the street and throw a boomerang and catch it again.
Speaker 2:Do you know what I?
Speaker 3:was going to do. You know what I?
Speaker 1:was going to do.
Speaker 2:I was going to come in and challenge you guys to do a suicide shot. Have you ever done a suicide?
Speaker 3:shot. What's?
Speaker 1:that. You've done a tequila shot In the eye snort the thing Right.
Speaker 2:So, instead of licking the salt, drink the tequila and suck the lemon. You snort the salt, you drink tequila and then you squeeze the lemon in your eye. Oh lovely.
Speaker 1:How many tequila shots have you done after 16 years in business?
Speaker 2:A few. But I just went on holidays with 10 of my mates, for a 50th to Bangkok, and there were 10 of us for 10 days and there was no trips to hospital, there was nobody went to jail, nobody got a face tattoo. So I feel that you know it was a win. But I was introduced to the suicide shot while I was there. I'm going to say I like it Really. I'm a bit of a fan now, I think it's going to be my signature move.
Speaker 3:Oh okay, well, maybe we'll have to do a suicide shot after the potty. Yeah, sounds good. Maybe next year we're off the boost. Stay accountable.
Speaker 1:All right. So, mate, I'm just going to pump you up for a bit here. Okay, you happy with that? Sure, sure. So over the last 15 years, richard Triggs and his team have placed over 1,500 executives and board to find their job searches and get better. You're also the best selling author of Uncover the Hidden Job Market how to Find and Win your Next Senior Executive Role, which you created a second edition in 2023. And we're here today because you're releasing Winning the War for Talent and how to Attract and Retain Top Performers. And how to attract and retain top performers. He also hosts the Arate podcast, with over 200 episodes.
Speaker 1:So mate I think me and Blake can learn something off you here, and also winning the War on Talent podcast. Beyond recruitment, you're an accomplished musician. What musical instrument do?
Speaker 2:you play Singer-guitarist If you look on Spotify Richard Triggs. I've got two albums on Spotify and I've just started recording my third one.
Speaker 1:Nice, and then you're a psychotherapist. What is that?
Speaker 3:Oh it just. You know A psychotherapist, does that just mean?
Speaker 2:you've been in recruitment for a long time. Well, I mean.
Speaker 3:Like a psychotic therapist.
Speaker 2:So I'll talk to you more about it offline, all right, all right, but basically I did a four-year training program to be a psychotherapist. So the difference between a psychotherapist and a psychiatrist is a psychiatrist can prescribe drugs. A psychotherapist is like a counsellor, I suppose. They can't prescribe drugs. I did a very specific kind of psychotherapy and I didn't do it because I had any interest in being a psychotherapist. But what I've been able to bring over into my recruitment career has been invaluable.
Speaker 1:Nice, awesome. And then so, mate, there's two massive areas which I did a summary on your book and what I came to is the you're going to present throughout this book a step-by-step mythology for hiring, retaining top talent, but essentially correct me if I'm wrong but it's divided into two sections. So attracting top performers. So this section guides leaders on building their brand as an employer of choice, which I think personal brand is a gateway for that Creating strong hiring briefs, using effective sourcing strategies like referrals, advertising, headhunting. It also covers interviewing techniques, background checks, managing offers to prevent counter offers we all know how much they hurt Making a hiring structured and an easy to follow process.
Speaker 1:And then part two is retaining top performers. It's all well and good to go out there and get them, but you've got to become the person before you can keep them. So this is a section which emphasizes fostering a culture of love and accountability within organizations, starting with leadership. It explores how subconscious behavioral patterns influence performance and introduces the preferred reality framework. So it'd be cool to be able to break that down with you, sure, um, which is a tool that you've personally created? Is that Trigsy's IP?
Speaker 2:uh look, I'd be lying if I said that any of it was really my IP. What I've been able to do over my entire career not just in recruitment is find tools that have worked for me and that I've taught to other people and been able to bring that into a pretty practical methodology that people can implement. So what I make sure I do is each time I use a model or something that I've learned from somebody, I'll reference them and say I learned this from my mate, Colin Clark or Tim Dwyer or whoever it is, but there's really nothing new in the world.
Speaker 1:No, no, you've just got to be a good conduit and be able to get the big information down to the people that look up to you. That's right.
Speaker 2:And you've got to be able to do it in a way that the people who are taking on the information not only can absorb it, but can actually implement it, because what's the point in learning something if you don't do anything?
Speaker 1:Exactly, it's all about who can ask the best questions to get the best answers, and then who can take the massive action and then repeat it. But that's for a whole other topic.
Speaker 3:Sure, I've actually got a question Before we dive any further. One thing that I'd love for people to know is who are you writing the book for?
Speaker 2:Well, okay, so a bit of a. This is not a short story, but I think it will make sense. So back into. So I started my business in 2009, and then in 2014, I went and did a one-year course called Key Person of Influence, which is now called Dent, and basically, to be a key person of influence in your industry, you need to master five P's. So, number one you need to master your pitch. Number two, you need to publish for credibility. One, you need to master your pitch. Number two, you need to publish for credibility. Number three, you need to develop what they call a product architecture so that you can make money from your IP. Number four, you need to build profile, social media profile, blah, blah. And number five develop partnerships so you know people who can refer you, work and vice versa.
Speaker 2:And so, anyway, I did this course and it was awesome. I loved it. And in the publish element, I decided to write a book Uncover the Hidden Job Market for executives and board directors but predominantly executives on how do you actually go about finding a job, because most executives are really, really good at being a CFO or a COO or whatever, but when it comes to looking for a job, they're hopeless. So I wrote this book and it never made any money. Mind you, I've probably sold, or given away, I'd say, 20,000 copies now, wow. And I wrote a new version in 2023, kind of the post-COVID version.
Speaker 1:Why do books not make money? Like Greg Savage said, he makes $1 from his book, the.
Speaker 2:Savage Truth.
Speaker 1:Right. How come books don't make money?
Speaker 2:Well, firstly, I'd be surprised if he makes a dollar. He might make a dollar if it's through a third-party publisher. And you know, by the time they take out their marketing costs and distribution costs and blah, blah, blah, you know he's left with a buck. It's like I'm a musician, right, I've got two albums on Spotify, but I've never made any money from selling music, I mean playing gigs. Sure, you write a book, because a book is like a business card on steroids. So if I am meeting with a senior executive and I go here's my book on how to find a job, then at an intuitive or subconscious level, they go wow, richard must really know what he's on about because he wrote the book right. Wow, richard must really know what he's on about because he wrote the book right. So, anyway, so I wrote this book.
Speaker 2:And then the best thing about that book, right, and one of the things that really pisses candidates off is they ring a recruiter and they go oh, fred, I'd love to come and have a meeting with you because I'm looking for a new job and I want you to. You know, help me to find a new job. And Fred the recruiter, of course, because Fred wants to be a good guy and he wants to be of service, which is wonderful. He meets with the candidate and he says oh, you're such a good candidate, I'm going to place you and you know. And then the candidate never hears from him ever again. He never gets a return phone call, he never gets a reply to an email and the candidate gets pissed off because they go. Well, hang on a second. You know, I went in there, I took the time to go in and have this meeting.
Speaker 2:This recruiter blew all this smoke up my butt and now they've done nothing, whereas what I do is I go, fred, I can't meet you, right, I'm sorry. I get 30 calls a week from people like you wanting to meet with me, and if I was to meet all of you, I would just make no money. So what I'll do instead is I'll send you a copy of my book for free. I'll send you three webinars for free. I'll send you a whole bunch of other resources for free.
Speaker 2:I run a networking drinks event once a month for free. I run breakfast groups. I run this, I run that, I run this, I run that. I do this. So the candidate, instead of going Richard, over-promised and under-delivered, it's like well, richard didn't meet with me but, far out, he gave me so much value that when, hopefully, the candidate gets the job, they go well. One of the only recruiters that actually helped me with Richard. So I need a new chief marketing officer now I'm going to give Richard the job, right. Okay, so that's why I wrote that book. Awesome, and it bought me so much time. Right, you think about how much time you waste.
Speaker 1:Well, perfect topics, because I want to go in on that.
Speaker 2:Just before we do that, just because the question was why did I write that book, right? So, anyway, in 2023, I said, look, I need to write a sort of a post-COVID version of that book. So I went and did an author retreat with a guy named Andrew Griffith in Tasmania who's amazing, and if anybody wants an introduction, I'll happily do that. And then the next stage is about becoming a professional speaker, and I'm thinking to myself well, I really want to do professional speaking, because if you're good, you can make a lot of money, and I don't know if you've already noticed about me, but I love the sound of my own voice, right. But the thing is, candidates won't pay for anything, right? I do this workshop every month. It's called Ask Me Anything, and so it's for candidates to come on and they can literally ask me anything about their job search and I will answer. And so I said it's free, it's once a month, and I would get 180 people subscribe and say they're coming, and then six people would show up because it was free. So I went this is garbage. So I said, all right, I'm going to make it $18 plus GST, so $19.80, but I'm going to donate 100% of the money to charity. So I'm not making any money, I just want you to have some skin in the game, so at least you show up. And it went from 180 people a month subscribing or RSVPing to 12. Now these are $200,000 candidates and they're not even prepared to spend 20 bucks, you know, to have an hour or two hours with me. I mean that's insanity, right.
Speaker 2:So I'm sitting there and I had this blinding flash of the obvious moment. It's like well, who's going to pay me the money? The employer, right. The candidates won't pay me anything. Because candidates God bless you. You know you don't value recruiters, right.
Speaker 2:But so I went okay. Well, if I want to speak at conferences to employers, like if I want to go and do a keynote at the Australian Institute of Company Directors or whatever, then I need to write a book to give me the credibility to be the leading authority on how to attract and retain talent. So instead I went okay, 180-degree pivot. Mind you, at the same time I'm running a recruitment company, I'm doing a podcast, blah, blah, blah. So this wasn't easy. So I did a pivot and I went okay, I'm going to write a book for the employer, right. And now I speak at the CEO Institute. I speak at Vistage. I'm speaking to 200 accountants. Next week, I'm being flown to a conference next month to speak to, you know, 150 people, because I'm speaking to the employer. Yeah, let's. And so that's why so long story short. Why did I write that book? It's a brochure.
Speaker 3:Okay, it's fantastic. So the purpose is to get more leads, more credibility, more authority. More leads get your foot in the door to more business.
Speaker 2:Most employers are terrible at recruiting. So I even say, like the book is called Winning the War for Talent. But I don't actually believe there's a war for talent. I believe there are companies which are really good at recruiting and then most companies are terrible at recruiting. Good at recruiting, and then most companies are terrible at recruiting. So I wrote the book to educate companies on how to recruit themselves much more successfully.
Speaker 2:So I didn't write it from the perspective of you know, you must come and use Arate Executive or you must use third party recruiters, because internal recruitment is never going to go away. But the problem is, you know they're under-trained, they're poorly managed. Often they're working on 40 to 60 jobs at a time. You know one simple thing which I think we've spoken about before they write ads for jobs they don't even put their name or phone number on an ad and it's like these simple things and you go. If only you knew how these minor shifts in what you do will vastly improve your ability to recruit.
Speaker 2:So the book is written for the employer to recruit themselves. But of course there's going to be a time where they go oh, we need a chief marketing officer or we've got this role that we've been trying to fill and we haven't been able to fill it. Hey, I saw Richard speak at this conference. I read Richard's book. He's a leading authority on hiring. So, hey, richard, will you recruit this role? So in a sense it's a lead magnet. Yeah, yeah, love that, but not an in-your-face one.
Speaker 2:It's let me give, give, give. There's this marketing guy. I think his name's Gary Vanderchuck you know that guy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, give twice jab jab hook.
Speaker 2:Yeah, jab jab, jab hook or whatever it is. So he's basically saying you give, give, give, give give. And then you ask Yep, and that's always been my philosophy.
Speaker 1:Love that and recruiters listening they really want to be able to get to that stage. But there is a whole journey that you've had to go through to get there. So, if we peel it all the way back, what was your thought process on thinking I should take on the challenge of writing a book? Like where did this come from? Do you remember the moment in time where you were sitting there and you had this light bulb thought in your head and saying I need to write my first book?
Speaker 2:Well, I think, firstly, like most people, I just fell into recruiting. You know I'd done a business degree, I'd worked in, you know, a commercial business. I was doing an executive MBA. I decided time for a change. I went to see a recruiter at the time Hudson or TMP Worldwide at the time. They were called and his name was Craig Sneasby. And Craig Sneasby said oh, have you ever thought about being a recruiter?
Speaker 1:And I went oh no, Craig Sneasby got you into recruitment and I went oh, no, craig.
Speaker 2:Sneasby got you into recruitment. Well, we can have a very long offline conversation about that. But yeah, craig Sneasby, I joined his team, right, and it was a bit of a funny situation because I think he was 24 and had never managed anybody and I was 36 and came from managing 750 people and I think it would be fair to say that. You know we had a challenging relationship. But now I have the highest respect for Craig and if I ever see him around town we always say g'day. And you know he always looks beautifully polished and immaculate in his suit and I always look like a scruff who just crawled out of a dumpster.
Speaker 2:But anyway, so I joined recruitment and again, long answer to your question I realised like I was there, in the first 12 weeks 14 recruiters resigned. Right, the turnover was massive. And then within three months I realised to be better than nine out of 10 recruiters. You've only got to do one thing return people's phone calls, that's it. So I just said rain, hail or shine, I will not go home until I return everybody's phone call. And even today people go. Oh my God, I can't actually believe that you returned my phone call because recruiters have got such a terrible reputation for that. So I think what it's been for me is it's been okay. How do I make myself more valuable? You know, and one of the ways to make myself more valuable was to actually teach people.
Speaker 1:This is what you need to do if you want to find a job, yeah, but how did you come to the conclusion to value yourself first?
Speaker 2:how did I come to the conclusion to value myself first. Well, I suppose, prior to doing that course Key Person of Influence I had no aspiration to write a book. But what they said was if you want to master these five Ps and be a key person of influence, you've got to publish for credibility. So I thought to myself well, what is a book that I can write that I actually know what I'm talking about, right? So trying to write a book on, you know, being a beekeeper when I've never been a beekeeper would have been, you know, terrible.
Speaker 2:But you know, I was able to write a 35 000 word book about how to find a job and, um, the feedback was fantastic. Um, and even today, to give you one example, I'm sure he won't mind um, I was talking to peter lock the other day, uh, who was the ce CEO of Heritage Bank and he's retired and he wants to get board roles. And I said oh, peter, if you read my book, uncover the Hidden Job Market. He said, nah, so I put a copy of it in the mail to him and he literally emailed me the next week and he went Richard, I've read your book in one sitting and literally within one week I've already got my first board roll. Awesome, you know. So you know I get a bit emotional because it's awesome, mate, the impact.
Speaker 1:Yep, that's what we're all here for.
Speaker 2:My view is, if I'm happy and helpful, the universe will look after me. So all I want to be is happy and helpful. So if you talk about this book, so I'll give you an example. I ran this workshop for CEOs on how to hire more effectively and this one CEO said look, I can't attend, can I send my head of HR and my head of recruitment? And so send these people along? And I went okay. So what's going on for you? What's the pebble in your shoe? And they went we've got 40 mission-critical roles and we can't fill any of them and we don't know what to do. I went okay, well, let's break it down. So you know, I use a particular way of taking a brief called Performance-Based Hiring, which comes from a guy named Lou Adler, who you may or may not have heard of, and it talks about when you're briefing a role. You want to understand what are the key deliverables of the first three, six and 12 months.
Speaker 1:Can we describe this? Say we pick a job. Can we go through this process with you now?
Speaker 3:Let me come back to that right.
Speaker 2:So I say to these people so do you get briefed? And they go no, no, no, no, no. The hiring manager just gives us a PD and says look, can you give me a shortlist by you know, next Friday? Average briefing might be 10 minutes. This is a job I want, an engineering manager. It's 180K, it's based in Bundaberg and I need somebody who's built bridges and go for it, right. So they take a crap brief. Now how can an internal recruiter deliver or any recruiter deliver, a quality shortlist if they don't even know what they're recruiting, right? So then I go okay, great.
Speaker 2:So then when you write your ads, you're writing a very generic ad based on a PD, because they don't know anything about it. Most ads that are written, there's no what's in it. For me it's just oh, we've got this job, and blah, blah, blah. And you should feel honoured honoured that if you apply for it, we might possibly consider interviewing you. And so they write these shit ads. And I go do you put your name and your phone number on the ad? No, why not? Well, we don't. Not that they necessarily say it as bluntly as this. We don't really want candidates to ring us. I go, hang on a second. You've got 40 mission critical roles that you can't fill and you don't put your name and phone number on an ad Like are you a freaking moron, right. And then I go okay, what's the average time between somebody submitting an application and getting a phone call for an interview? Oh, about three weeks, right.
Speaker 2:And so you listen to this and I'm sure you guys have heard all this before and you go these people are so stupid. You know, a company says our greatest asset is our people, and yet their investment in finding quality people is rubbish and they're probably paying an HR manager $150,000 and a talent acquisition person I don't know what they're paid now $100,000, $120,000. Probably combined income, including on-cost and so on, $300,000. They've got 40 mission critical roles. They can't do their job. The CEO is probably going bananas, and yet here are these freaking idiots who don't even know how to recruit a job. So I went I have to write a book. I have to write a book and I mean I say some terrible things. So one of the things that I say and I've said this on your podcast before, because I know, because you did a little thing about it one of the things I say is internal recruitment is where crap recruiters go to die right, we're going to clip that up and we're going to post it on LinkedIn as a poll.
Speaker 2:You're very welcome to.
Speaker 3:Okay. Why do you say that?
Speaker 2:Why? Because if you're a third-party recruiter, I mean, I've got a recruit in my team. She's mid-30s, she works from home. Last year she earned $350,000. Why would she go in-house?
Speaker 3:Maybe she wants to not have to do bd so interesting enough.
Speaker 1:Interesting though, yeah, we, we can have a whole conversation about that team.
Speaker 2:You know so sure. So people go I'm in a third party uh recruitment environment. I work for arate or I work for Hayes or I work for wherever. I don't like doing BD, I don't like the pressure of KPIs and I think it's going to be easier for me to go in-house and work for ADK.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know that's the surface of what we all think, but like we spoke at an ASX-listed company last year down in Sydney and we were discussing personality profiling based off DISC D-I-S-C.
Speaker 2:Yeah, DISC.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we surveyed the entire room. There was about 150 people there.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Recruiters typically are Ds, is and Ss. Sometimes you'll get a C, but not very often True.
Speaker 2:I did it with my team when I was at Davidson's and it was high D, incredibly high. I middling S, no C.
Speaker 1:Exactly so. We went around the entire room and we profiled the entire room. What was the number one most common personality for an internal recruiter? Probably completely the reverse, exactly. So, is there a place in recruitment? Not that they're shit, they're a different personality type that appeals Okay.
Speaker 3:I'm not saying you're shit.
Speaker 1:I know you're not saying they're shit, but it's a different personality type that is required to do a different style of recruitment away from agency work.
Speaker 2:Yes, you're absolutely true. So you're absolutely correct. So, for example, in my business I have senior partners who are client-facing, BD, key account management, and I have associate partners who fill the jobs. Okay. And if you are a senior partner, you go out, you win the job, you bring it in, you give it to an associate partner and very rarely would an associate partner want to be a senior partner or vice versa. Okay. So I agree with you completely.
Speaker 2:So to give more context to what I'm saying, if somebody has been a recruiter and then they choose to go in-house, largely it's because they've been unsuccessful as an external recruiter. So when I say their internal recruitment is where crap recruiters go to die right, I suppose what I'm really saying is that really really great recruiters would never want to go in-house, because why would you go in-house and make $80,000 when you can work externally and make $300,000? It doesn't make sense. The other thing I say is that recruitment is not HR, Recruitment is sales, right? So when companies have early careerist HR professionals and they go oh, come and join, pick a name, any name, Rio Tinto, Come and join Rio Tinto, you can do internal recruitment for a couple of years and then you might move into being an HR business partner or whatever.
Speaker 2:Recruitment is not HR. Recruitment is I have to sell the employer on why I'm the person to recruit the job. I have to sell the candidate on why they want the job, and then I have to sell the employer on why they want to hire the candidate. It's a sales job, Exactly. There's no HR in recruitment other than the fact that you're selling a human body rather than a house.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And that's why sales roles are typically conditioned and done really well by people that work within that genius, that have a certain personality type. That's why if you're a good recruiter, you're likely to be a great recruiter. A great you're more often you're likely to be a great recruiter and have an insane career, like what it's done for all of us in this room. But if your personality doesn't align to that, there is a, I'm for sure if they, if there was a better education within the industry which is hopefully this podcast brings some attention to that but if there was a better education in the industry, where people actually knew what was in our heads and they could link that together, internal talent acquisition teams would feel more confident. Sure, they'd feel more roles, because this, like we're in, like a CEO, what matters to him is return on investment, risk opportunity, the internal talent acquisition team don't understand that so then they can't communicate to the hiring managers.
Speaker 1:That's how you get this huge problem with unfilled roles, because having 40 roles out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I now, as a result of that book, I go to companies and I present to their ELT this is how to run a really good recruitment process. And then they hire me to coach their head of talent acquisition for typically three to four months to actually do a good job, right? But so everything you're saying is absolutely true, understanding that, the non-sales recruiter okay, who pick a title any title talent acquisition really at the end of the day, they're an administrator, they're an admin person. Okay, and you're right.
Speaker 2:But you look at our industry and one of the terrible things about our industry is that there's no qualification, there's no accreditation. There's no qualification, there's no accreditation, there's no barrier to entry. Any idiot can produce a business card that says I'm an executive recruiter and all of a sudden they're wandering around town telling people that's what they are. And you've got companies like, okay, hayes, who a lawyer, will come and say you know what? I hate these six-minute increments, you know I'm so bored of being a lawyer and they go why don't you become a legal recruiter? Honestly, you'll change people's lives, you'll get them jobs. It's so amazing, you'll make so much money and they go. Oh, actually, you know, that sounds really cool. So they come and they be a legal recruiter or an accounting recruiter or an engineering recruiter or whatever it is, and then, as soon as they come in Hayes go.
Speaker 2:Okay, you need to make 50 marketing calls a week, you need to do 12 visits, you need to pick up 20 contingent jobs and suddenly hit them with all of these sales KPIs because it's a sales job and within six months time that person goes. What the freaking hell did I do? Why did I become a recruiter? And I can't remember the statistic specifically, but it is something like 90% of people who enter the career of recruitment leave within two years, never to return. And that is because recruitment companies it's a bit like the old saying plumbers have the worst pipes or the cobbler's kids have no shoes Recruitment companies are the worst at recruiting recruiters, including me. Right, and one of the big issues is recruitment companies. They just tell lies. They lie to the prospective recruiter about what it actually means to be a recruiter.
Speaker 1:They lie or they give their version of their perception of what reality is.
Speaker 2:What's the difference?
Speaker 3:Well, one is based on their truth and one is, being facetious, being misleading on purpose.
Speaker 2:I would say probably. There's a spectrum of some who outright lie through to some who actually believe what they're saying, which is largely crap. How do? You know, that as a candidate.
Speaker 3:No, how do you know that? Recruiters are generally shit at recruiting for themselves. They lie, they pretend it's amazing when someone gets in it's shit and they leave.
Speaker 2:Because I've been in the industry for 20 years and I wouldn't trust 98% of recruiters to walk my dog right Now. There are excellent recruiters to walk my dog right Now. There are excellent recruiters. Excellent, there are people who invest in their ongoing professional development, who do things to stand out above the crowd, crowd who, um, you know, legitimately care and, um, want to be the best version of a recruiter that they can be. But if you were to look at the recruitment industry and say how many people truly are that? Okay, I know you guys are a lot younger than me, so I'm 57 and nearly 57 and old and cynical, but there's not many, right, there's not a lot of.
Speaker 2:You know, I've done a Bachelor of Commerce, I've done an Executive MBA. I did the KPI course. I've written two books. I'm a member of the AICD. I'm a member of the AICD. I'm a member of the Brisbane Club. You know I run. I'm a member of Vistage, which is formerly called Tech. You know, I don't know if you know about that. It's like a mastermind group for business owners. I run my own version of the Brisbane Club. This is the second podcast I've been on today, right, and I'm not saying I'm amazing, but I tell you what I'm pretty committed to doing a fucking good job. Well, do you know why Do?
Speaker 1:I know why yeah.
Speaker 3:Why are you so committed?
Speaker 1:Because I love it, yeah. But Trigsy mate, like you're at the top of the advice pyramid, you've been there, you've done that, you've walked the walk, you've talked the talk, you've helped a lot of people go do it. Having been at the top of an advice pyramid is the most important place to be. Then there's the coaches who've been, you know, helped, mentor other people.
Speaker 2:I hear what you're saying. Okay, so my book Uncover the Hidden Job Market. Basically, the premise is 80% of the best jobs never get advertised, they never get to a recruiter, they're never in the open job market. Okay, employers instead hire through the hidden job market, which means they find somebody who can solve their problems and take away their pain, and they hire them even if they don't have a vacancy right. Okay, so what I preach in that book is what you need to do is identify your employer of choice. Identify, within that organisation, who you would most likely report to, and reach out to them and ask them for a meeting.
Speaker 1:Well, how about we break that down for recruiters, because I'm sure they've Okay.
Speaker 2:So just to finish this point, and we will. Okay so I've had Arate for 16 years. I've sold 20,000 copies of that book. I'm sure you would agree. I have a reasonable reputation in the market.
Speaker 1:That's why I brought up the advice pyramid, because you're at the top, okay right.
Speaker 2:How many recruiters in 16 years have reached out to me and said hey, richard, I really like what you're doing. I'd love to come and work with you and learn from you. 16 years how many?
Speaker 1:None.
Speaker 2:None, and I'll tell you why.
Speaker 1:Because, finishing the advice letter, there's other people around you like you'll have mates in recruitment, like Paul, for example, and his wife. They're obviously doing something similar running a great business, oh, paul Belliger.
Speaker 1:Yeah, with Lime. And then below that there's people who have witnessed other people do what they want to do but they've never actually done it themselves. And then there's friends, family, colleagues who voice their opinions and get advice. And then number six is people on the internet, which we all have experienced. People on the internet right, we don't ever want to.
Speaker 1:People revolve around taking advice from people that are number five and number six on the advice ladder and they wonder why they never get ahead. So, although the missing gap to get recruiters to reach out to you is teach them how to reach out to you, like what you've done with that, like what you've done with these people, I think that would be the missing link for you. If you can break down, this is how you reach out to me as a recruiter, so you can get number one top advice from Richard Triggs on how to become the best recruiter and work at Arate. But everyone hovers around five and six. They read the internet, they read reviews, they get perceptions, I know, and as a result and they never actually get to someone at the top.
Speaker 2:And, as a result, without naming any names-.
Speaker 1:Our industry stays low level with no progression.
Speaker 2:You would go. There are certain recruiters in brisbane that work for a year for davidson's and then a year for manpower, and then a year for this company, and then a year for that company and then a year for that company. It's like, dude, just pick a lane like invest, find somebody that you actually admire and go and work for them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, is that the top of the advice pyramid? But they're floating around chatting to people. Maybe they'll chat to number three, four, five. I'll send it to you after this It'll blow your mind, you probably get it.
Speaker 2:I'm very interested in what you're saying, but then you'd also on the other side of the coin say, well, they're just stupid, aren't they?
Speaker 1:Are they stupid, or they just don't know how?
Speaker 2:Fuck, how hard is it, dude?
Speaker 1:Mate, it's fucking hard. I'm telling you, look at the future of AI. It's right, who's going to get the best results out of AI? Whoever can put the best prompts in gets the best answers. And then whoever can leverage the best out of AI and, with those answers, who can take massive action. That's how you're going to win the next phase of business. No one knows how to ask the right questions. No one knows the answers they need. You can't get the right answers unless you've got the best questions. No one actually knows what questions to ask, how to ask for help. That's why I sit on a mastermind and everyone's there going. I know I need this information, I need to be able to ask this question, but they sit there in silence and then they move on, like the the story with the rusty nail. Yeah, that's life. So like. If we can teach people to ask better questions, have the confidence to do it, we've got the answers. It's our job to be able to give them the answers back, sure?
Speaker 2:and you know, one of the things I love about what you guys are doing is you're actually creating a community of people who want to back themselves. You know, instead of slipping into the old-fashioned, you know, go and get a job at Hayes and wear a black suit, you know, and carry a black compendium and walk up and down Queen Street, and you know there's so much more interesting ways to look at this industry Exactly. Yeah, I mean, look at me.
Speaker 3:okay, I'm a hobo right, you're too hard on yourself, mate.
Speaker 1:Yeah, come on mate. Come to the XR Movement Club every Friday.
Speaker 2:We'll turn it around, but you know people want to do work with people that they know and trust, right and anyway. So we can talk around and around this, but I think you're right and, by the way, I'm not saying if 47 people reach out to me after this podcast and ask me for a job, I can hire you all. But you know, it amazes me, in 16 years, not one single person like the last time I was on your podcast I probably got, I would say, upwards of 40 to 50 connection requests LinkedIn connection requests from recruiters which I accepted Awesome and then nothing happened.
Speaker 1:They didn't know how.
Speaker 2:Really love what you had to say on the podcast. You know, can I buy you a cup of coffee? I'd love to pick your brain Nothing. I mean nothing. You know, can I buy you a cup of coffee? I'd love to pick your brain Nothing.
Speaker 3:Not, I mean nothing. Yeah, I mean, I hear what Declan says around how do you educate them to ask better questions? And I hear what you say. I mean it's pretty basic stuff. So where's the middle ground between educating them to ask better questions and reach out? Maybe it's not an asking better questions thing, maybe it's an effort thing.
Speaker 2:Well, where it's at for me is through, because, of course, we're all limited in time, right? Okay is, how do I educate one to many? Well, I write a book, I run a podcast series, I run lunch and learn events, and so hopefully that encourages people to come in and become part of the community and learn through being part of the community and learn through, you know, being part of the community. But at the end of the day, you know they've got to take the step. It's not up to me to drag the person you know to me, right? It's up to me to drag the employer to me, right? I've got 30,000 LinkedIn connections, or roughly I have about 29,000, so I keep having to cull in order to add new ones.
Speaker 2:Now, I didn't just click my fingers and have 30,000 LinkedIn connections, of which 9,000 are C-suite executives in Brisbane. I sat down there on the weekend, you know, often for an hour or two hours or, as I like to prefer to say, for one or two stubbies, and I sent connection requests. Okay, I have people in my team who have been in my team for five years and have 3,000 connections and they go. Richard, how do you know everybody around town? Because I reach out and say do you want a meeting? Right? I launched that book at the Brisbane Club and I had probably close to 100 people show up, of which close to 80 or 90 of those were CEOs and owners of businesses and a member of my team who I love and I'm pleased I'm not being in any way disparaging. She goes Richard, all these people showed up like I can't believe that they all showed up for your book launch. Why do they all show up?
Speaker 2:I went and I said because I went and met with them in person, because she sits at home, you know, on Teams, and thinks I can form a relationship on Teams. You can't form a team relationship, right, you have to. Our business is about relationship and I might not agree with everything that you say and vice versa, but if we meet and we share and, as a result, we build trust, you can't help but be successful. Exactly, and one of the best things about recruitment, which I say a lot, is that I'm 57. I've been in recruitment for 20 years. So the guys I knew when I was 37 were the sales manager. Now, at 57, they're the C-suite executive. If I stay in recruitment for another 15, 20 years, which I hope to. They'll be the chairman of the board. So as long as I don't under-promise sorry, over-promise and under-deliver as long as I maintain those relationships, then, as their career escalates and they love me and they want to use me, I can only be more successful.
Speaker 1:The compounding affects the business Right, and yet how many?
Speaker 2:recruiters won't even return a phone call I get. My most recent one was the deputy chair of an ASX top 10 company and he rang me up and he said you know what, richard, when I was the CEO of an ASX top 10 company, I could not stop recruiters from bashing down my door. They wanted my work Korn Ferry, russell Reynolds, spencer Stewart, egon Zender, blah, blah, blah. They were bashing down my door. We want your work. Now that I'm looking for a job, nobody will even return my email. I mean, as a recruiter, that is the most stupid thing, isn't it?
Speaker 1:yeah, but I don't think many directors are teaching teaching this stuff. Mate like this is like top one percent information no, is it really?
Speaker 2:it is made.
Speaker 1:otherwise, like I know it, information, is it really? It is mate. Otherwise, like I know, it sounds really silly. It sounds really simple but like no one's teaching, no CEO or recruitment agency manager. Why do you think we have 76% of the industry as a three-person business or less? I think like 64% are one-person businesses, because no one actually knows how to get out of it.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, I'll tell you what. We'll have an offline conversation. Why don't we build a podcast series where we actually teach recruiters? This is how to set up a client meeting. This is how to build a relationship. This is how to take a brief. This is how, to you know, build a relationship. This is how to take a brief. This is how to deliver a short list, because I don't know that there's a resource like that available.
Speaker 1:There is. It's just top secret for XR Partners only Matt Cossons.
Speaker 2:Right If only 1% of recruiters know that they should return people's phone calls. God help our industry. Or?
Speaker 1:praise the people that have worked it out, because they're going to be wildly successful.
Speaker 2:Sure, but it's the other 599 people who are walking around town who are giving us a shit reputation.
Speaker 1:And that's why there'll be a huge, huge divide in months and years to come. It'll be undeniable. We'll see, because I think a career like it'll only like. There's big companies that are offshoring their recruiters. They're moving things to India just to keep account managers here in front of clients and then delivery teams offshore to cut back on costs because they can't retain junior staff. But even that's dumb, exactly so. That's why I'm so passionate about the future of recruitment, because the skill sets that we've learned are going to transcend this entire industry.
Speaker 2:It's like one. I get asked regularly. So, richard, I know that when I write a CV, it gets passed through AI looking for keywords as to whether I should be interviewed. I go every applicant for every job in my business. Their CV is read by a human being Because somebody might be awesome, but they're absolutely terrible at writing a CV. But they're absolutely terrible at writing a CV. So why would you miss out on an excellent applicant because you're trusting AI to read a crap CV written by a fantastic candidate? It's dumb, and yet that's what's happening.
Speaker 1:What do you reckon all the consequences of the recruitment industry will be if we don't make these changes and help everyone level up together? Do you reckon there'll be a divide on my angle? Or do you reckon yeah? What are your thoughts? What do you reckon the consequences would be? Well, I think there's For the ones that don't work this stuff out. Well, they'll just leave, they'll just fizzle out.
Speaker 2:As they always have. You know they'll come, they'll have a look, they'll leave. You know I don't really respect, from a recruitment methodology point of view, a lot of the big global players pick a name any name Hayes but I do respect the fact that they're a very successful business. They make a lot of money. They've been around for a long time. They obviously know what they're doing. It's just that how they choose to do it is not how I choose to do it. So you know there's many ways to skin a cat.
Speaker 2:I also believe one of the true blessings that I had, even though it ended very poorly, was I was mentored by Bruce Davison for five years. He's a beast, I hear At the time. Time it's been, you know, um 17 years since I worked there, but, um, what an amazing boss and taught me so much. So, um, if you are an aspiring recruiter and you truly are committed to being the best that you can possibly be, find somebody excellent and latch onto them like a sucker fish on a shark, and that's how you learn. That's how I learn, you know, and I'm sure, with all the value adds that you offer to the people who are part of your community, you know that's how they learn too.
Speaker 1:What could we do together? Maybe there's something like I know you mentioned the podcast series Maybe we could do an event or something to bring the best of the best together and help Because you want everyone to do well and help because you want everyone to do well. Like, I don't think anyone actually. Yeah, they might have limiting beliefs which cause them to think short-sighted and make decisions which affect people in a negative way, but I don't think anyone actually wants people to fail or do bad.
Speaker 2:Well, there's a couple of people we spoke about before the podcast.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm going to cast that as limiting beliefs.
Speaker 2:But you know, the reality is oh look, I'd love to you know, and I mean you mentioned Greg Savage right Now. Greg Savage has been around for a long time and you know he lives off his reputation and a well-deserved reputation. But you know, the world's moved on and I think there are people who are doing some things a little more innovatively and I'd like to hope Arate Executive is one of those. But there are people who get to a point and they want to give back to industry. And certainly, you know, the great thing is in my space there are five top global search brands. They're called the Shrek brands Spencer Street, hydric Struggles, russell Reynolds, eagle Incender, korn Ferry. I never compete against them, ever. Because they charge 40%, you know, and they recruit the CEO of Rio Tinto, right? And I'm humble enough to know nobody is ever going to ask Richard Triggs to recruit the CEO of Rio Tinto, right? But that's okay, I'm cool, you know, I make enough money, and so on.
Speaker 2:My biggest competitor is internal recruitment. I never compete against, you know. You'd go, oh, you must compete against Robert Walters or Davidsons or you know whoever. All the time, never, never. I compete against internal recruitment. And what happened was when LinkedIn Recruiter License came out, recruiters were like oh boo-hoo, you know, linkedin recruiters ruined our industry. And I went. I don't know if I told you this story previously, but there was an RCSA conference on Hamilton Island and LinkedIn recruiter had just come out and I was really good friends with the people running LinkedIn because I thought LinkedIn was an awesome tool and I'd even written my book Uncover the Hidden Job Market and I'd even written my book Uncover the Hidden Job Market and a lot of that is about how to use LinkedIn to find a job. And I was literally sitting at the dinner table and owners of recruitment companies were coming up and virtually spitting in the face of the people from LinkedIn. Do you know?
Speaker 1:Ed Glover.
Speaker 2:Ed Glover yeah.
Speaker 1:Does that ring a bell?
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:So he was head of he's with the team now at X Recruiter and he's had an awesome career. But he was a head of sales at LinkedIn, right, and so his job was to open the big market and go and sell LinkedIn to end user customers. Right, and he goes. We thought it was going to be like shooting fish in a barrel, and do you know what he said? Most customers said back like who are we going to be held? Who are we holding accountable if we don't fill the role? I can't hold linkedin accountable, but I can hold a recruiter accountable as to why the job's not done yeah, it's interesting and that's what he said was the biggest objection that they had to overcome.
Speaker 1:because, yeah, he thought it was going to be easy like recruitment's's over LinkedIn recruiters. Here I'll teach all the CEOs how to use it and all their hiring teams and then that's the end of recruitment. And they said, mate, respectfully, like it sounds good, but like the opportunity cost of me sitting here using another software and training my team on another software. I'm better off just getting a recruiter that knows the market, knows the fields and says do it for me.
Speaker 2:Okay, and so if you want to dive down into that a little bit, right? So internal recruiter gets given a LinkedIn recruiter licence. Oh, Sally's got an internal recruiter licence, a LinkedIn recruiter licence. Now, Instead of paying $500,000 a year in recruitment fees, we'll just pay her $100,000 plus LinkedIn recruiter $20,000 or whatever, and oh, we're going to save so much money, right?
Speaker 2:Number one Sally's got 40 jobs on. She doesn't have any time to headhunt. Number two she's never been trained how to headhunt and because she's never been trained how to do it, she doesn't want to do it because it's scary. Now, the reality is, headhunting is fun. Headhunting is probably the funnest part of our job, because who doesn't want to get a phone call and be told hey, we think you're awesome, We've got this amazing job, Would you be interested in thinking about it? But the internal recruiter excuse me, because they've not been trained, they're scared.
Speaker 2:But the most important thing is, an internal recruiter cannot headhunt because they have to disclose who they work for. So hi, I'm Sally, I work for Rio Tinto. I'm contacting you, build blogs from BHB, Do you want to come and work for Rio Tinto? Whereas a third-party executive search professional can maintain confidentiality so we can ring up and we can say we're working for one of the top mining companies in the world. You've been identified as somebody that they would be interested in talking to.
Speaker 2:If I could demonstrate that this role is better than your current one, would you be interested in having a conversation about it? And what do they say? Of course, they never say no. They never say no because why not? You know what's it going to cost me Ten-minute phone conversation. I might end up getting $100,000 pay rise or whatever right Internal recruitment again, no slight to them. But LinkedIn recruiter. If you think sending in mails on LinkedIn recruiter is going to get you quality candidates, you're an idiot, because it's no different to putting an ad on Seek right. If I'm really, really busy and I'm in my job and I like it and I like my boss and I'm relatively well-paid and I'm getting 80 in-mails a day and I'm up to my neck in crocodiles and I get this in-mail from you know, an internal recruiter, I just delete it.
Speaker 3:I think, probably to add to that as well, when people are looking for a role, there's much more credibility and authority going to a trusted advisor. As a recruiter being your profession, you can really position yourself as a trusted advisor and get a lot more depth and interest out of the candidate to then be able to advise them on the direction that they need to go, even though you've got a financial interest in doing so. But if a HR manager at Rio Tinto is reaching out to Billy Bob at BHP, she's never going to be seen as the trusted advisor because there's a direct interest in what she's doing Well that's true.
Speaker 2:And the other thing is, how does to use your name, billy Bob? How does Billy Bob trust the confidentiality of his application? Because he doesn't want you know, his boss to find out. He's talking to Rio Tinto if it's a job that he's not even interested in. So he wants to talk to a recruiter who can, you know, essentially, guide and advise him is this actually a job that you want to apply for? And he might go actually like no, and in that instance, rio Tinto never even knew that he was an applicant.
Speaker 3:I'm just thinking out loud here. So this might be true for people not actively looking. Yeah, so this might be true for people not actively looking, but I sense there's probably a higher amount or ratio of people that wouldn't use a recruiter if they're actively looking because there's this perception that the recruiter's going to just use me as a filler. They're going to try and figure out who's got the best fee, that my salary will come down because they're paying the recruiter. You know all of these misconceptions of a candidate might have if they haven't used or understand how recruitment works. So in one reality, when they're not actively looking, it's in their best interest and they like using a recruiter, but when they are looking, it's almost like Well you definitely are seeing that in recruitment industry or specialisation.
Speaker 2:It's like, for example, legal Okay, so there used to be legal recruiters and the lawyer property lawyer, five-year property lawyer would walk in to the legal recruiter and go, oh, my boss is a dickhead, or I want a new job. And the legal recruiter will go, oh, my boss is a dickhead, or I want a new job. And the legal recruiter will go well, I can represent you to Gaydon's and I can represent you to Clayton Ute's and I can represent you to da-da-da-da-da. And, of course, on the basis that it's contingent recruitment and if they make that representation and Gatins choose to hire that lawyer, then they get paid their 20% or whatever they get paid right Now. The active job seeker will go who are the law firms that I would like to work for? And they will go direct. And that is hurting the legal recruitment industry a lot and I would presume that would be very similar for lawyers, accountants, engineers you know, architects, professional services type people.
Speaker 1:What about recruiters? What do you think about? Like the same situation in rec to rec? Like if you're a gun recruiter? Like, do rec to recs place the top 1% of recruiters? Do they mainly focus on junior level staff? Do they have?
Speaker 1:Like, like if you're a rec to rec? Because the only reason I ask? Because when I'm doing BD for ex-recruiter right and I'm calling recruiters and having a rec to rec, because the only reason I ask, because when I'm doing BD for X Recruiter right and I'm calling recruiters and having a chat to them, building pipeline for the future, understanding where they're at, what they want to do, what they want to change, and they're shocked that I call them. They're like, you're calling me, mate, I'm in the office. Whoa, what's going on? Like, mate, I'm in the office, it's gonna have to be a conversation after. And I'm like, why are you so shocked by this? Like you you get, you call people every day, but now you're on the receiving end of the line. You're freaking out because declan from x recruiters called you. So like is, and I can only think that they're not actually getting smashed with calls from rectorex, they're just getting linked in dms okay.
Speaker 2:So I love talking about rectorex. Um, when I joined the recruitment industry, I had a meeting at Hudson or TMP Worldwide and I was offered a job and I accepted the job and after I'd been there for a while, I came to a realization I really enjoy recruitment, but I really don't like working for T&P Worldwide. I'd rather work for a smaller boutique firm. Again, nothing about them so much, just my personality style. So I thought the mistake that I made is I only saw one recruitment company. What I really need to do is I need to go and see six or seven recruitment companies and then make an informed decision about which culture or remuneration structure or whatever I preferred. And I had this thing in my mind if you're a rec to rec and so you're a recruiter who recruits recruiters for recruitment companies, you've got to be the best of the best. You've got to be the best because everybody would be judging you. They are the worst fucking recruiters in the world.
Speaker 2:I think rec to recs are absolutely and utterly appalling and I have often thought and this could be something that you and I could do I could start a rec-to-rec business and within 12 months it would be the best rec-to-rec business in Australia, because I know exactly how to do it. Yeah, and you are spot on. You need to build community. What do recruiters love to do? Get on the piss. So you go, okay, every second Friday of the month we're going to go to the Elephant and Wheelbarrow, or whatever it's called nowadays, and come along and have a free drink and it's open for all recruiters, and you just need to get to know them. Yeah, and you just stay in touch with them and you just watch what they're doing. And how do you find your candidates? Well, you just look at who's advertising on Seek, Like it's the easiest job in the world.
Speaker 1:I think me and Blake have placed more people at our partners' agencies than probably quite a few Rector Racks have placed in the last year.
Speaker 2:I would never spend one cent on a Rector Rack. I've spent 20 grand on a.
Speaker 3:Rector Rack as a retainer, never placed, the role moved on. Let me tell you my favourite Rectorac. I've spent $20,000 on a Rectorac as a retainer, never placed, the role moved on.
Speaker 2:Let me tell you my favourite Rectorac story. How are we going for time? By the way, I think we're up to three hours.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, we're actually a little bit over, so this will be a good segue to Okay.
Speaker 1:I'll tell you my favourite, at least we know who you're not going to have at your Christmas dinner this year it's the Rector X and.
Speaker 2:Intel T8. Do you guys have time? I spoke to the guy. No, Okay, Favorite Rector X story. So I used to have a business partner in my business and anyway, I used to be in business with my wife, Fiona Cochran, who left, became the marketing manager or client services manager for Untalent and has come back to work for me. I think maybe I mentioned that at the beginning, right, but anyway, this is back in the olden days when we were married and we went on a Christmas holiday and my business partner who shall not be named we needed to recruit an operations manager. So he recruited this operations manager through this woman, this rect-rec, who's no longer in the industry, and she places this guy in our business. And not long after that, the guy my business partner left, so this person was meant to be managed by my business partner left. So this person was meant to be managed by my business partner. My business partner left, so this guy is now being managed by me.
Speaker 2:And I said to him look, the reality is, as an operations manager, I don't think it's really working out, but I think you're a very good recruiter and if you want to stay in as a senior partner, I'd love to have you stay in as a senior partner. And if you want to stay in as a senior partner, you know I'd love to have you stay in as a senior partner. Oh, I'd love to stay in as a senior partner. So, but he's never in the office, ever, Always out, never there, always dashing out talking on the phone. So I ring the rec-to-rec that placed him. So I ring the rec to rec that placed him. He was still in probation and I said to her listen, if this guy doesn't want to work here anymore, that's cool, but he's just never here, he's never engaged. Can you ring him up or talk to him and just find out what's going on, because I need to know what's going on. Yeah, Richard, yeah, I'll definitely do that. Never heard from her again.
Speaker 2:So this guy after two weeks I went through his diary and he must have had in that time 20 client meetings. So 19 of those people didn't actually exist and the one person that did exist, he hadn't even met with them. Because I'd know, because I rang them up, and so I call him in and I go dude, I don't know what's going on, but obviously you know you're taking the piss and so see you later. And I ring the rec toc and I say I've just terminated this guy and this is the reason why. And blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 2:Well, a month later he shows up as the general manager of a national recruitment company General Manager, Queensland of a national recruitment company, and I knew his boss. So I rang his boss and I said out of interest, you know, when you employed this person, why did they say that they left Arate? Well, the Rector told us that you were facing financial difficulties so you needed to make him redundant. Wow, Same rec to rec. That's really poor. The same rec to rec placed a guy that I terminated in another company and took another fee by making up a lie about my business, and I just went, I'm done. And took another fee by making up a lie about my business, and I just went, I'm done, that's fair enough.
Speaker 3:Well, we've ended on a really positive note here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think. Coming back to what you were saying, if there's anything that I can do to help to lift the profile of the industry and to help to educate and support people, I'd love to do it. Thank you, triggy, as long as it's not, you know, really onerous.
Speaker 1:As long as it'll be sent out to the masses. But I think the way they can do that is just buy your books, listen to your podcast and invite you for a coffee. Yeah, we'll even put a script in on what you can automatically send to Triggs.
Speaker 3:We'll give them the intro script and they just have to copy and paste.
Speaker 2:All right. So if you want a copy of Uncover the Hidden Job Market, my first book, you can just go to the Arato website and you can download that for free. I'm not yet giving away the new book for free, because I want to at least try and cover the cost of publication winning the War for Talent and, to be frank, I don't do coffees because I just don't have time.
Speaker 2:But if somebody contacts me and says hey, richard, can I have 15 minutes of your time to have a Teams conversation or whatever? Love to? More than happy to do that. Again, not 400 a week. But yeah, look, you know there's a lot of things that I do which are completely stupid, right, and I always say to people you know it's not like I'm amazing. You know I'm 30 kilos overweight. I know exactly what I need to do to lose weight eat less and exercise more but I don't do it right. So there's just shit that people want to do and they don't want to do and I get it. So you know, there's things that I love doing and there's other things, like you know, eating salads, eating less and exercising that you don't like doing.
Speaker 2:I'd much rather go to the Brisbane Club and, you know, eat a yummy meal and drink delicious wine.
Speaker 1:Well, Trigsy, hopefully we can do that with you next time, mate.
Speaker 2:Well, I'd love to, and I really appreciate the opportunity to come back. I like the new digs. Your support crew here, serge and Ryan, are the best. Make you look like superstars. Awesome, which is you know. You're very lucky to have them and I look forward to seeing you again soon. Awesome.
Speaker 3:Thanks, gigi. Well done, brother. See you, mate. 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. Like share and recommend it to a friend till next time.