Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to Retrained Search, the podcast where we lift the lid on what it's really like to work retained, Discuss the stories we've gathered along the way and give you all a peek behind the scenes of our amazing community and how they're getting ahead. Hello everyone. Sorry, Jordan's making me laugh already. We've not even started yet.

Speaker 2: 0:28

Don't do it normally there. It's like what have you just been saying to me, george?

Speaker 1: 0:31

No, let's not, I'll do that. Okay. So welcome to 10? No, I way past that. It's like 13. How was it 13? Yeah, episode 13 of Retrained Search, the podcast. Let's go with that.

Speaker 2: 0:54

Just to start, before I have to apologize. I've got my dog in the room with me.

Speaker 1: 0:58

Oh Jordan.

Speaker 2: 0:59

Becker's out, I know, and I was really torn between I'm best like kicking him out of the room, but I've got no control over him then. But if he's in the room I can send him when he's about to go and I can mute him and kick him, do you swear? Everyone listening, we would never kick our dogs, we just joke.

Speaker 1: 1:17

RSPCA, that is not true, we would never actually do that, but if the window cleaner turns up, then we're in trouble. You might have to mute yourself and I'll have to do it on my own.

Speaker 2: 1:25

Not this time, yeah, but good it's fine, All right.

Speaker 1: 1:28

Good, how are you George?

Speaker 2: 1:30

I'm good. Yeah, I'm good. Yeah, nice and busy. Yeah, everything's good Now.

Speaker 1: 1:38

I've got the baby being sick on you today.

Speaker 2: 1:40

No, no, not today, yesterday, right, I was saying that was like proper dad life yesterday, yesterday, with us having a team call whilst I held my baby and fed my baby. But that is the beauty of flexible work, that's flexible work and it's finest right.

Speaker 1: 1:57

It's finest. It was so nice to see you. It was. It was lovely. I'm not so okay today, george.

Speaker 2: 2:03

God, oh God, that scares me why.

Speaker 1: 2:07

Often I'm normally like yeah, we're cool with this, with that. This morning I've just had a bit of a not a good morning. The first thing that happened was I woke up thinking it feels very light in this room. Why is it so light? Because normally when you wake up, of course, by six, it's pitch black. Right at the moment, and it wasn't pitch black, and I looked at my phone, which was flashing and saying alarm on it, but not actually making any fucking noise, and so my alarm normally goes off at quarter past six. It was quarter to eight when I woke up this morning.

Speaker 2: 2:50

Yeah, I don't know. I just feel like you like to live life on the edge.

Speaker 1: 2:55

What do you mean?

Speaker 2: 2:58

We'll say, oh great, we've got a webinar to 12,000 people next Wednesday. It's 10am and then I'll be in the webinar at 10 to 10, thinking okay, I'm not too early, but I'm prompt. And then it'll get to like one minute to 10 and I'll be like, okay, where's Lou? And I'll call you and you'll be like, oh yeah, I'm just walking up the driveway with the dog I'll just put some lippy on and then I'll be on and I'm like I know, yeah, I know, but I didn't like that.

Speaker 1: 3:30

It wasn't a good thing. It wasn't a good thing and the worst thing was like maybe Harry just took advantage of it and, just because I didn't go in with the cup of tea, just didn't get up. But he didn't get up either. So we both. But then, like a minute after my alarm went off, he walks in and went and he pulled his school uniform, is tired with sideways, I've just woken up and I was like I've just woken up, so we missed the bus.

Speaker 2: 3:51

Maybe you needed it, maybe you needed to sleep in, and you'll have a more productive afternoon as a result.

Speaker 1: 3:56

Yeah Well, and then I tried to join this Chamber of Commerce thing which we've just joined. It's actually quite good and the stuff that you get is really good, but it wasn't straightforward to join so I couldn't join, so I had to do a separate session. So I'm just feeling like all out of, haven't got my shit together properly today.

Speaker 2: 4:12

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 4:12

Yeah, but I mean, yeah, no massive drama, everything's, everything's still all right, the wheels are still on.

Speaker 2: 4:18

Thank God you boil the fridge. You've got heat in again.

Speaker 1: 4:20

I've got a heating. I'm not freezing cold. Yeah God, that was awful. It's not nice being out here in the winter and no heating. It's really really, really cold and not nice, but it's not as cold as a lot of places.

Speaker 2: 4:32

So I shouldn't you remove to a remote farmhouse and kind of can't help but feel like you're asking for it.

Speaker 1: 4:39

No, no, no, no, no. I bring it all on myself, I don't disagree. Okay, I have got some good news to share with you, even though I'm not in, you know all together. I've just been looking at what's been going on since I saw you guys, absolutely tons has been going on and I can't believe it.

Speaker 1: 5:00

It's not even the end of January yet, so I wanted to share with everybody what's been going on. We have a member who is living the dream with what he calls debriefing. Call them like what you want retrospectives. They're often called, aren't they in tech? Nit.

Speaker 2: 5:23

Yeah, feedback meetings yeah.

Speaker 1: 5:26

A retrospectives is engineering, I think is it, I can't remember. I'm getting Lessons learned is engineering, retrospectives is tech, but it's basically a feedback debriefing after the search is complete. So he says we've just got off and it's something that we teach our members to do religiously as part of their process. We've just got off a post-search feedback debriefing call with the clients and have to say it was well worth doing. I mean, that's a bit of an understatement. The feedback from the client was extremely positive. They didn't suggest any improvements on our parts and, interestingly for us, gave us two names of senior HR executives. In response to the question who else in the business can benefit from our approach, which is a question we give you to ask, they are going to introduce us and have promised that we will be given the opportunity going forward to pitch for any executive level searches. Woohoo, these calls are well worth doing, even for those clients who cause constant headaches, which I agree, even if it's been an absolute nightmare.

Speaker 1: 6:27

It's worth having this conversation afterwards, not only in terms of the opportunity to learn from feedback, but also to unlock potential opportunities across an organisation. And he goes on to give the questions, specific questions that he asked to help others.

Speaker 2: 6:44

And it, you know, it isn't just at the end of assignments. I'd be having those conversations, but I'd be having those conversations consistently. Any opportunity to diagnose, to dig a little bit, to find out what's going on in an organisation, like now, is a great time. Start of the year. What are the plans for this year? What did you like about what we did last year? What didn't you like? What could we improve? Yeah, that's great. I love it. I absolutely love it.

Speaker 1: 7:10

Even I got into the habit with the consultants that I was working with and going out with, of going to do like post placement reviews with the candidates as well, if they were senior candidates, and that was brilliant as well. Like getting what their plans are, what they're going to be doing with their team, like straight in there before anyone else does, not just on the phone, not just on email, but actually going out to see them and doing a debrief of the search. What could have gone better for them. It just comes across so well when you're actively pursuing feedback and they have so much respect for you.

Speaker 2: 7:45

Yeah, and it's another thing that often differentiates you from the volunteers or the recruiters that they'll speak to every week.

Speaker 1: 7:53

We do the same in our business, and it works beautifully for us too. More news this is a delivery win. So is this, Alan? I think?

Speaker 2: 8:06

Mark.

Speaker 1: 8:07

Mark. Yes, it is sorry. Yeah, of course, hi guys delivered the recent search win in around six weeks from start to signing. Here's a reference from the clients. We recently engaged on a retained basis this firm to help us fill a senior position. It's fair to say the service they provided exceeded our expectations, both in terms of the number of exceptionally high caliber candidates they were able to introduce us to and the short time frame in which they did so.

Speaker 1: 8:39

The speed mark in the team worked out on the flexible, tailored approach they offered is highly beneficial to those like ourselves who have real-time constraints. They also provided great market insights. We will certainly use them again. He also goes on to say the pipeline for the next assignment is looking great, so we'll update once it's in. So that's a really nice story of how I'm. Not only winning the work is the win, but delivering the work is going to produce more wins. We talk a lot about sales and business development, but so much of your business development activity comes from your search work. Once you start winning work and actually delivery is your best tool for business development.

Speaker 2: 9:21

We'd like pushing water uphill if you're not delivering.

Speaker 1: 9:24

Yeah, it is.

Speaker 2: 9:25

It's just sustainable.

Speaker 1: 9:26

it's not scalable, yeah, and it's horrible as well, isn't it? It's just horrible.

Speaker 2: 9:33

Yeah, it is. I love the bit about that that it was six weeks. That's standard like this doesn't need to take three months, four months, it shouldn't ever.

Speaker 1: 9:44

No.

Speaker 2: 9:44

No.

Speaker 1: 9:45

Agreed. What do we got next A week in, he says first, retained assignment meeting this morning, terms signed this afternoon. Alan.

Speaker 2: 10:03

Alan, yeah, that's right yeah got it right this time.

Speaker 1: 10:06

My presentation wasn't great. Only managed to finalise my pitch two hours before the meeting. Practised on the hour long journey to the client's office.

Speaker 2: 10:15

We've been there and done that, haven't we look?

Speaker 1: 10:17

We've been there and done that as well. The client is great but goes off on tangents. Also wanted me to cut to the chase, which I managed to keep him on track, just which can be hard. It can be hard pushing back and just allowing them to give you the space to talk it through. I didn't quite get the fee I really wanted. And then he says I only officially start in brackets. As a caveat, I only officially started the course last week and haven't done any objection handling videos. Yet he says I'm gobsmacked.

Speaker 2: 10:46

You wait till we whip you into shape, alan, you wait.

Speaker 1: 10:49

I know, yeah, yeah, you'll be at 30% before you know it. I'm gobsmacked that I won it, and I'm also amazed at my mindset shift since signing up to the course. I can't wait to get polished and comfortable at this, which is just a joy, isn't it? What a nice thing to happen first week or second week.

Speaker 2: 11:06

It happens a lot, though, doesn't it? One of the questions that I often get from people who are looking to join us is how long will this take? I think sometimes they don't believe me when I say lots of people go and win retained in their first week or two, because when they go through the mindset piece with other people and they start to understand what it is and when it should be applied, they go. Oh my God, like there's three or four conversations I've had in the past two weeks. This is perfect for them.

Speaker 1: 11:38

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 11:39

And the opportunity to stare at them in the face.

Speaker 1: 11:41

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 11:43

Yeah, agree.

Speaker 1: 11:44

I completely agree. It can happen very, very quickly. And then I just got a WhatsApp this morning from one of our mastermind members who just gone past 100K, fully retained, just gone past 100K for 2024. Invoiced, the pipeline is yeah, it's good, 400k to go. So he's already done a fifth of his annual target in one month, which is pretty good.

Speaker 2: 12:17

I've been building in some stretch. I've been saying it's under grand down 1.1 million to go.

Speaker 1: 12:24

Yeah, I know that?

Speaker 2: 12:25

Well, I know that I sit, isn't it?

Speaker 1: 12:27

Yeah, we'll just have that every month. Thanks very much. That's 1.2. Bosh and I'm bearing in mind this chap, as we know because we know him well was 100% contingent. When we met him, had never done any retained work, and now he never, ever works on a contingent basis and he's knocking out 100K months, even in January. Yeah, oh, this is a lovely one. Not that they're not all lovely, they're all a joy to receive, but a really nice email from a team that recently did the course. It says hi, claire, hope you're well. It's been a very busy start to the year, but I'm happy to announce that we've already secured three retained searches. So this team finished the program in December, if I'm not mistaken.

Speaker 2: 13:14

What was it? I don't know if they've finished it.

Speaker 1: 13:19

Oh really, they're still midway through.

Speaker 2: 13:22

Yeah, I think they might have one more session.

Speaker 1: 13:23

I'd be like three quarters of the way through and then he details the fees 185,000 of fees with milestones paid in thirds, 150,000 pounds with the fees with milestones paid in thirds and a 90,000 pound retainer and success fee.

Speaker 2: 13:45

I wonder if they'll be okay with that third one.

Speaker 1: 13:48

I mean Jesus Christ. That's not so bad. So we're really, really pleased with the group. I never know quite whether to share the companies, because I don't.

Speaker 2: 14:01

I knew. I remember the first time I spoke with that particular customer a member of ours I knew that be so successful. There's a real trend with how decisive people are, like when they know this is the direction for the business. When they know this is something that they need to do, they typically commit, they make the decisions they need to make, they're all in and that pays them back in.

Speaker 1: 14:28

They just do it. They don't question it or doodle or dally or mess about, they just get on with it and do it.

Speaker 2: 14:37

Yeah, yeah, so good.

Speaker 1: 14:39

Well, and I wanted to share this and I and Paul's put it publicly in the community, so I'm sure he'll be happy for me to share it with our listeners. Paul Press, who again recruits, have come through the foundation course. Now in the mastermind he has set up a fabulous search firm called Press and Associates and his news is and he says for those of you who don't know, my firm's been acquired by Roo partners. So he's worked through a transaction there and Roo partners have acquired his search firm, which is fantastic, fantastic news for Paul and what an incredible journey he's been on. As part of our growth plans, we're looking to hire a new partner by the end of Q1. He puts below a link to the job posting. He's sharing this in the mastermind group. If anyone knows any Rockstar BD people who just want to sell, we have a search delivery team for the candidate side of the journey.

Speaker 2: 15:35

From two people that know Paul very well. You could do much worse if you were in your opportunity.

Speaker 1: 15:43

Yeah, I mean God phenomenally successful and so smart. Another one that came to us knew what he wanted head down, did the course, weren't fully retained. Head down into the mastermind, straight up to the C-suite. Like what are we talking? Two years, something like that. That he's done all that in maybe nearly three tops.

Speaker 2: 16:04

Yeah, I was so humble with it.

Speaker 1: 16:06

And now sold his firm. The other thing I really liked was straight away nice reply from one of our search expert members hire 72 profiles this morning of a million plus and a two million plus billet I'd hire in a heartbeat in the right kind of wheelhouse for you. So some nice, really lovely activity across all spectrums, from beginners just coming into the foundation program and I really experienced mastermind members oh dear my remarkable scones asleep.

Speaker 2: 16:39

Well, let's go on to what we've been helping people with.

Speaker 1: 16:42

Yes, that's what we do, isn't it? Thanks, george. Well, I was asking you before, like, what have you been helping people with? But then you said, well, I haven't, because you've been doing all the co-lab course which is true.

Speaker 2: 16:54

I've not, like I've not had my feet up, like doing nothing, by the way, for everyone. My diary's been that busy. I've not. I've it lose out to save me.

Speaker 1: 17:03

I have. I've saved Jordan. I've been doing the co-lab course, which has been great. There's been so much going on to give you some things that I've been helping people with. I had a really good chat with one of our members who is choosing a niche and he was trying to decide niche.

Speaker 2: 17:20

We've got a global audience, though you've got a WR in the world.

Speaker 1: 17:24

And here is trying to decide do I focus on an industry and provide generalist support across all functions and disciplines so, for example, do I focus on logistics and provide HR, finance, sales engineering into logistics or do I focus on a discipline, into a market, so like engineering into supply chain and logistics, for example? Right, and so it took me a little while to get my head around what I've done and how it's been organized and what's worked and what I've seen not work, and I'd be keen to know what you think, george. But for me, I've always liked not saying yeah, I can do all of that. I've always liked saying you know, if you're looking for sales and finance and this and this and this, then I'm not, that's, I'm not. I can't do everything, but I'm a specialist and I'm a niche specialist in, specifically, engineering or HR or whatever it might be, and that's what I've always really liked. What have you preferred? What have you liked? The complete opposite, oh, really.

Speaker 2: 18:53

Yeah, so I've always been. I specialize in industrial technology. Whether you're looking for a salesperson, for someone to lead a finance department, Right and the reason that I've done that is just because I get bored recruiting the same profile. It's really I didn't notice one way or the other that, like it, benefited me in terms of billions. Actually, for me it was just I just I just can't spend every day recruiting the same person.

Speaker 1: 19:24

I like it. I like it, you get a diversity I like.

Speaker 2: 19:26

All this is a new, excited role and all you want me to do this now to open this new site in Silicon Valley. That sounds cool and that's exciting and I just always did it for diversity. But we had Jess Biller on last week, didn't we? And we know I get excited by new shiny things and it keeps me engaged and happy, so maybe it's just because of that.

Speaker 1: 19:47

Maybe it's just your personality. I quite liked having like a disciplined focus but then being able to work in different areas of the market, Like I liked being a specialist in engineering, for example, but being able to go into chemicals, petrochem or renewables or yeah, yeah, I get that.

Speaker 2: 20:08

I think the only thing I did find where it benefited me, especially from a BD approach when I started working across different functions but within the same space is it became much easier to navigate and get repeat business from existing customers in different departments and functions.

Speaker 1: 20:26

Yeah, yes. Well, it sounds like there's pros and cons to both, and that was kind of where we landed using everybody else, but I do think you need to have clarity.

Speaker 2: 20:37

I do, I do think you need to be able to verbalise to a prospect who you are, what you do and, importantly, the problems that you solve for customers.

Speaker 1: 20:48

Definitely, yeah, definitely. We also talked about timelines on a typical search. I get asked that quite a lot and I was asked that on a call the other day. What does an executive search timeline look like? How long does it actually take? And I pulled up a few Shrek proposal examples just to show the evidence and they were all 12 weeks to offer generally. That was the pretty easy answer. And then, lastly, one of the other things that stood out was somebody with quite a wide talent pool, a wide brief, and that meant that there was potentially thousands of people that could do the job.

Speaker 1: 21:41

How do you actually carry out a search where you turn over every stone when there's thousands of people? And we talked about how to put parameters on the search and how it isn't realistic to search the world through thousands and thousands and no firm would be able to do it. It's not commercially viable to do that. But then how to decide what those parameters are, whether it's target companies, whether it's qualifications from a specific university that you've got to kind of get the client to. Okay, there are thousands of people that could potentially land on your desk. Rather than us identifying X number that you think a mediocre, why don't we go to the absolute best case scenario and work backwards from there. Who do they work for? What qualifications have they got?

Speaker 2: 22:33

Because loads of ways you can do it. I remember one of my biggest clients their headquarters were in St Louis in the US and I remember saying where do you need this VP sales to be anywhere? I was like, well, I can't search everywhere. So, actually, okay, well, would it be fair to say if they lived in St Louis, that would be a benefit. Well, yeah, of course it would be like on our doorstep, aren't they? Okay, well, let's start there and then we'll work out from there. Right, exactly, yeah, I think often with those searches, when you've got huge, huge talent pools, it's easy to get frustrated with the client. But I've always found well, I say always, the vast majority of the time I've found that the client are actually trying to help. They think that by saying, oh well, it can be anywhere, it can be from any industry, and actually they could have one year experience or 51.

Speaker 1: 23:33

Like they think they're helping you by broadening the talent pool, but it reaches a critical mass, so it's just too big and I agree, and I think a lot of people are scared of saying that you don't need to be scared to say I can't search thousands of people, it's not possible. So let's agree on the parameters. And that's the bit that, as a frustrated contingent recruiter, you don't say. You just think, oh fuck sake, give me a bit more to go off. And so we were having the conversation of how you actually say that and how you articulate that to get to a common ground where you're both helping each other.

Speaker 2: 24:09

Well, I mean, we've talked a lot about this, haven't we? When you look at delivery and I found this because it's exactly how I felt when I moved from contingent to retained I thought it was gonna be that mystical process we talk about. I thought it was gonna be totally, totally different. Actually, what I see a lot is, when people go through the delivery module, a lot of the components, the kind of doing already in some shape or form, it's about polishing and tightening up and getting better and controlling the process.

Speaker 1: 24:43

Most of it is management and control, isn't it? Yeah? And having a timeline setting out what you're gonna be doing each week and when you're gonna get to this stage, this is what's gonna happen. When you get to this stage, this is what's gonna happen. But making sure you've done the thorough, full search so that when you get to this stage, that's it. All of the people that you're gonna be choosing from are here now in front of us.

Speaker 2: 25:05

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean the challenges that you can sometimes face in delivery. Often you can't prevent them, and what I mean by that is, if the candidate doesn't exist, they don't exist, right. You can't prevent that happening, but what you can do is prevent it becoming a problem by managing the post process, by being proactive, by working with your client to drive them to a result.

Speaker 1: 25:31

Exactly. Very nice, and now we move on to some controversy.

Speaker 2: 25:40

Really controversy we try and think about. Have we seen anything on LinkedIn that's controversial? I'm just gonna fight my corner. So I did a post this week about a sales call that happened, right, and this was a true sales call, right. I got on the phone with the guy and the guy says to me tell me what you did.

Speaker 1: 25:59

And I thought, well, you've got to call me mate, it's a bit weird Said oh, I'll tell you.

Speaker 2: 26:03

though like we help recruitment businesses when they're working on a retain basis. What does that mean? Well, it means that you get financial commitment from your customer and that allows you to go further and do more and solve problems that often can't be solved on a contingent basis.

Speaker 1: 26:20

So the customer pays you upfront.

Speaker 2: 26:23

Yeah, don't believe you're lying. Well honestly.

Speaker 1: 26:30

I'm not lying.

Speaker 2: 26:31

Like I did it myself. Louise has done it. Look here in our win section on our, you know, on the community, there's like full of people winning. It does happen. No, you're lying to me. So I said, huh, think we're done here. He said, yeah, so do I.

Speaker 2: 26:47

Okay, bye, and that was it right Last about a minute. So I put that story on just as I thought it was. It amused me. And then this guy says to me well, this is top of the list of things that didn't happen. And I just want to reassure everyone that all content On my profile is legitimate. I would not make it up. It did happen, yeah. And then I got a bit mature because the guy's surname was had it. So I said I can assure you there is nothing fishy going on here. This guy is just you know, nothing going on, nothing, you know.

Speaker 1: 27:26

Couldn't help myself. Like couldn't help myself. Oh, that's so funny. And what's funny is I read that post an, because that is very similar to what happened to me the other day. Okay, I mean, that's quite common. We get that all the time, don't we? Everyone's got that preconception, haven't they? So I'm breaking it down. Just okay, can you tell me a bit about the market that you're in?

Speaker 1: 28:01

Yeah, I'm in finance, financial services, banking, inter-professional services and accounting and management accounting. So I know because I've sat next to the finance practice in a very reputable search firm, a significant-sized finance practice, all working on a retained basis with a lot of the companies he was mentioning. And I know they do retain, right. So he says, yeah, they just don't, they just don't, they just never do, they never do. I've been in us all of them and they've said, no, we never retain.

Speaker 1: 28:33

So I'm taking a deep breath and say, okay, well, what if I were to tell you that this was my situation, this company that I worked for, and this was the finance team and the practice I sat next to, and these were the contracts that they won with those companies? Yeah, I don't believe you. And he did the same thing. So I said well, I don't know where to go with this conversation, really, because if you don't want to believe that retained is something that your clients will do, or you don't want to believe me when I'm sharing from my experience that they do, then I'm not sure where you want this conversation to go.

Speaker 2: 29:11

You know what it's difficult though right, because on one hand I laugh at it and I go. Why are you having a call? But on the other hand right.

Speaker 2: 29:20

I would really encourage anyone out here, anyone listening to us, that's thinking about investing in training for whatever it is, to question and to do your due diligence right. Because let me tell you, I've not told you about this call and I'm not going to name any names, but I had a call with somebody last night, right, they had paid quite a bit of money for some training in retained over the past couple of years with someone we know. I'd say I won't mention any names, you haven't told me about it, say, and I haven't told you this. No, no, no, I haven't. No, it was at nine o'clock last night, I just haven't got around to telling you. And he said it was the worst thing he ever did.

Speaker 2: 30:07

He got absolutely nothing from it. What he was promised in the way of support and guidance he didn't get, and you know, you can tell that's made him a little more hesitant next time to make sure he invest in the right and in a way, maybe that's a good thing. But at the same time although I laugh at people questioning us and saying that's not true- yeah you're probably better doing that and making sure you do dot your eyes and cross your T's.

Speaker 1: 30:38

It did spend more than 60 seconds trying to convince him. In fact, I was on the phone for about an hour explaining and even bringing up documents, because I still have case studies and documents of firms that I've worked with.

Speaker 2: 30:53

in that sense, we're lucky, aren't we as well? We've got lovely community members that are always more than happy to speak to people on our behalf. Exactly, yeah, that's probably the best reference point, whether it's all that you do training with, whether it's anybody else.

Speaker 1: 31:08

It is important, but it is all. It is important. Of course it's important to do due diligence, and I always say that too, and the best, the best references that you can get on trainers is people that they've trained. So if you can speak to the people that they've trained and then do that and I did exactly the same for this chap and put him in touch with several people. But also I heard on the radio the day I know you get tired of me saying I heard things on the radio. I do hear.

Speaker 2: 31:38

Was it Chris Evans? By any chance.

Speaker 1: 31:40

I do like Chris Evans. I know I think he shares some very good stuff. And did you know that having a growth mindset is the highest human value that you can have?

Speaker 2: 31:52

Really. No, that's what I heard Really? Did you know that Chris Evans is from Warrenton?

Speaker 1: 31:57

I did, of course I did. I've read his book. We're kind of a big deal.

Speaker 2: 32:02

Kind of a big deal. We just thought Warrenton without growth mindsets.

Speaker 1: 32:08

Yeah, you do. It was a guy called Adam Grant. He had on as a guest and I'm now going to go out and read all his books and listen to all his podcasts because he was phenomenal. But yes, growth mindset is the highest common value that you can have, according to Chris Evans and Adam Grant and I'm sure other people too, and that's all. That's what we're looking for in people that have the potential to be able to move to a different model and adapt to different ways of working, which is what retained is. It's a different way of working, but without that growth mindset, no training is going to get in. You do need to be able to be receptive, to listen and take on any way of the other and, yes, do you do diligence, but be receptive to learning something new.

Speaker 2: 32:51

Yeah, I had that because I said to someone the other day often that there are a lot of people we don't let in. We have lots of cause and we turn people away.

Speaker 1: 33:00

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:01

Interesting. Tell me why would you turn me away? And I just said, normally for me it's ego.

Speaker 1: 33:08

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:09

Normally it's like you can tell they're not receptive to change. They think they know it all already. They know it all.

Speaker 1: 33:15

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:16

They're not willing to be vulnerable and say this is where I struggle and this is where I need help.

Speaker 1: 33:21

Yeah, soon as someone says to me, I just know that I can be better, or I want to continue to develop and learn new things, and I've been making it up as I go along and I know there are better ways. I'm thinking this is someone that acknowledges that there are constantly things to learn and they're the people that take new stuff on, aren't they? And so that brings us nicely, actually, to what we were going to finish on our minute on mindset and how we have been getting better and better at not just working with individuals and selecting the individuals that do best with our program, but also working with teams, which can be more challenging, because you're an individual, you're a solo business owner or you're a small business owner. You want to learn, you make an investment, you're going to get your damn money worth out of it.

Speaker 1: 34:22

So you're going to actually follow it, because otherwise what's the point? I mean, some people don't, but it's normally because something else gets in the way and then we help with that and we can overcome it.

Speaker 1: 34:33

But with teams it's different, isn't it? Because the business owner or the lead or somebody has actually paid or instructed a team of people to go on the training rather than them doing it themselves, and quite often we're given people to put through it, and that's very different, isn't it? Being told to do training and actually voluntarily investing in your own training are two really different things.

Speaker 2: 34:55

Yeah, I mean, when I get asked and I do get asked a lot who doesn't this work for? My impulse answer is normally the people that don't do it. That sounds quite flippant, but what I mean by that is it's very similar to if you go to the gym, right, you could go to the gym every day for the next six months, but if you stop at McDonald's on the way home every day, you're not going to lose any weight. Right, and it's the same here. You can give those people and say train them, but unless they want to do it and it's more than just the course, it's more than just knowledge, it's everything that kind of wraps around that. It's the culture and the business.

Speaker 1: 35:37

It's encouraging them to make different decisions.

Speaker 2: 35:41

It's all of that, and we're going to continue to provide even more support to teams in that implementation, aren't we?

Speaker 1: 35:51

Well, we're getting better and better and we've been measuring our success with teams and different things that we're doing. That is making teams win and, following several recent really, really successful teams, we're now building a module for implementers that are running a team that's going through the course on your side.

Speaker 2: 36:11

We were saying at that point. The premise around that module is I look back to when I did this course and how fortunate I was to actually because Retrain was in more of its infancy at that point how lucky I was to have Lou right beside me to help me implement what I've been learning.

Speaker 1: 36:29

And so that's why we're doing that now with Teams, and so, if you're listening to this and you have a team, we are providing bespoke one-to-one coaching for your implementer, for the team. So and that is helping us form and develop the journey and the path for the module for implementers. So we'd really like to hear from you and we'd like to work with you and the implementer from both sides.

Speaker 2: 37:03

That could be the business owner, it could be the team leader, it could be one of the four people going through the actual course.

Speaker 1: 37:08

It's the ops manager it can be one of the leads. It can be a senior recruiter that's on the course, just somebody that's dedicated as someone that's going to take ownership of making sure everyone's doing what they said they're going to do, being where they are supposed to be, understand what's expected of them and supporting it and making sure, internally, they've got the room to be able to actually implement what they're learning.

Speaker 2: 37:29

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 37:32

So that's what we'll leave you with. It's a bit of a shout out, really, and some mindset on Teams, like sometimes it can feel like you can't shift the direction of a whole team, but you can, you absolutely can, and we'd like to help you do that.

Speaker 2: 37:46

It happens organically. It really does like just nudge them. And then it starts with one and the other, and then everyone goes shit they're doing well, I want to do the same thing.

Speaker 1: 37:58

Yeah, exactly exactly, and it's a joy. All right, thank you, Jordan.

Speaker 2: 38:04

Thanks, luke, thank you Welcome. Milo, no barking winning and you are.

Speaker 1: 38:10

Oh, do we need to ask them to do anything? No, we don't need to ask them to do anything on the podcast.

Speaker 2: 38:17

Keep listening to the podcast we love having you here We've got some new webinars. We launched our new webinar series, didn't we? We did the first one last week. I think the next one is coming up next week.

Speaker 1: 38:30

Yeah, go to our website. We've got a funny night in my head Webinars. It depends when they're listening to this. Though, they could be listening to this in months time, couldn't they? So they might be gone.

Speaker 2: 38:39

But if you have a look on our company LinkedIn page and on our website, you'll find all the links to the webinars. There's some good tips coming up as always.

Speaker 1: 38:48

our diary is on the website too, so just book in, have a chat if you want to have a talk to us.

Speaker 2: 38:53

Yeah, nice.

Speaker 1: 38:54

It's nice to see you. Thanks, George, Thanks everyone.

Speaker 2: 38:56

Thanks Lou.

Speaker 1: 38:57

Thanks for listening. Well, that's another episode of Retrained Search the podcast in the bag. Thanks for listening to our wild tales, linkedin controversies and our top tips on how to sell and deliver Retained Search. Get involved in our next episode. Send in your questions and share your experiences with us by emailing podcast at retrainedsearchcom. And don't be shy. Connect with us on LinkedIn and come and say hi, we don't bite, unless you're a Shrek firm, that is.

Speaker 1: 39:28

We want to say a special thank you to our retrained members for sharing what's working for them right now and innovating new ways to grow and evolve. It's an incredible community. If you're wondering what exactly we mean when we mention our communities, well, we have two separate programs. Our search foundations program is for recruiters who want to learn how to sell and deliver Retained Search solutions consistently, and we have our search mastery program. That's for business leaders or owners already at 50% retained or more and looking to scale and grow and structure their search firm. We cap memberships to these programs to protect the integrity of the community. If you want access, just talk to us. Ok, thanks for listening. We'll be back very soon with another episode of Retrained Search the podcast.