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.

Speaker 2: 0:19

Yeah, I can assure all of our listeners, I do indeed have two ears.

Speaker 1: 0:25

You have to turn your head a little bit more for us to see that.

Speaker 2: 0:28

I do, I do, I do what were you going to say about the cameraman yesterday? Yeah, so we had a day of filming at Lou's yesterday, greg, just like filming some new content and some new ads and bits and bobs. And the cameraman was saying it's really annoying me that there's a reflection in the Marilyn Monroe picture of the window and it's dead distracting, are you?

Speaker 1: 0:45

a fan.

Speaker 3: 0:46

I see what he means now yeah, oh, I didn't realise that what you were talking about, I must admit I didn't know there was even Marilyn Monroe. I thought it was Debbie Harry, actually.

Speaker 1: 0:57

Just look at Debbie Harry. It's actually Marilyn. When the sun shines, you really can't see her, because all you can see is the hedge and my ring light.

Speaker 3: 1:09

There's a lot of people on this call already. I can feel it. A lot of criticism, a lot of feedback already.

Speaker 1: 1:17

He's got one here and I've got questions. What have you got, Greg?

Speaker 3: 1:22

What? Criticising myself? Or do you want me to have?

Speaker 1: 1:25

a go at you.

Speaker 3: 1:32

I can't really. I mean, it looks like, well, my wife tells me I've put a lot of weight lately and I can't honestly say that's not true?

Speaker 2: 1:34

so there you go. I thought I'd just give you that. I thought that mediterranean diet was meant to help I thought you were going to say.

Speaker 3: 1:40

I thought so too. Then I thought that's, that's quite punchy.

Speaker 2: 1:43

I wouldn't say that to your face, greg just wait for a podcast?

Speaker 3: 1:48

uh, no, it doesn't help. It doesn't help because, well, the problem working from home is you just snack, don't you? I heard, I heard, uh, someone say that did I get sunburned from the fridge light? Sort of thought, reasonable assessment and you know what?

Speaker 2: 2:00

we're all very fond of Mallorca, as we we know me, or I think has great snacks. Well, now you're gonna shout me, is it magdalena? It's not like the little, little, tiny cakes, so good yeah. I've had a couple yeah, yeah, I just, I just, I just can't. You can't make a brew without having one of them with is it.

Speaker 1: 2:23

I like those en samadas with cream. They're like big croissants, aren't they? But better than croissants, because they're fluffy and buttery and they just fall apart.

Speaker 3: 2:33

It makes me hungry. I've just had my lunch and I'm flipping starving now. It's all making sense now it's all making sense?

Speaker 2: 2:39

Yeah, it is all making sense.

Speaker 1: 2:40

So, welcome to the Werain third podcast. Greg, nice to have you, thanks for joining us today it's a pleasure.

Speaker 3: 2:47

I appreciate being asked. You're my maiden podcast.

Speaker 2: 2:49

I've never done this before oh well we're on this podcast, cherry in his podcast cherry oh, we're excited.

Speaker 1: 2:58

well, I'm not sure, um, whether it'll be comparable to any other podcast. Hopefully it'll be the first and best podcast that you've ever been on. We have a very relaxed format. We're going to share bits and bobs of what we've been up to and what we've been helping people with and what's going on with people. We're going to find out a bit about things like that from you too what you've been helping people with and what you've got going on. Our going to find out a bit about things like that from you too what you've been helping people with and what you've got going on, and our audience can find out a bit more about you and what you do and why we've brought you in to share you with them all, because you're great and what you do is great. But first you said you had some funny stories, didn't you, george?

Speaker 2: 3:41

Yeah, I've got one. It's very relevant actually because it's New york and themed again. So I was in new york a couple of weeks ago where the weather was pretty bad, and one day we uh, we got the window clean around. This sounds like the start of a joke. It's not a joke. We've got the window clean around.

Speaker 2: 3:56

This guy from new yorker speaks spanish, doesn't speak very good english, and last time we went to new york, a gr our little girl was like a month old maybe, and now she's like seven months old and she was crying when he came around because she was teething really bad. And we said, oh yeah, she's like she's teething. And he went on google, google translate, and basically what he put in googlelate is his little boy is like a year old and there's a Spanish product called Nanny and he said you get it from the pharmacy and we put it on like the dummy or we put it on the tip of the bottle and when our son has it like it soothes him. So you should go and get that. So we went and it wasn't expensive. It was like five euros a pack. So I thought I'll just buy like six or seven packs because if it works I want to take as many of them home with us as possible.

Speaker 2: 4:50

So on the plane on the way home, gia was getting a little bit restless and was crying a bit and clearly in loads of pain with the tea. So we put a little bit of this stuff on the tip of a bottle and 10 minutes later she was like really happy, not in pain, smiling away. We were like what is this stuff? It's genius. So me and my wife said let's put some on.

Speaker 1: 5:11

Let's see what it feels like, honestly, greg.

Speaker 2: 5:14

Five minutes later, we were speaking like this, speaking like this, and my whole mouth was numb.

Speaker 1: 5:25

My tongue was numb.

Speaker 3: 5:30

Yeah strong stuff, strong stuff.

Speaker 2: 5:31

I thought I don't know what's in it, but yeah, spanish medicine's a lot better than ours yeah, you can buy antibiotics in the pharmacy, in the supermarket, didn't you in spain I?

Speaker 3: 5:40

don't think as well. It's like buttons, everything here's like praise, all that. All that stuff's super cheap.

Speaker 1: 5:45

Yeah, we'll do so yeah, are you still living the dream over there, greg?

Speaker 3: 5:50

oh, I hate that. I hate that question. You just sound like a smug. I try and avoid it. I knew you're gonna ask me um if you like 26 degrees and blue skies and all that stuff.

Speaker 1: 6:00

Yeah, it depends what you like, I suppose depends what you're like, fucking hell, yeah, okay, all right, enough of that. So, um, oh, the first thing we do is we share some some good news stories, and that always, um, that always helps to let people see what can be achieved, because recently it has been a little bit slower than normal, and but there's always people out there winning work, and that's why and not only that, but they're out there winning retained work, because a lot of people have this conception that the market's not very good, so therefore people won't come here and you can only work, you know, contingently, and it's just bollocks. Basically, it's not true. So a lot of what we do here is just dispel that. Here's a couple of new wins in the mastermind group from one of our home members, one's a new client and one's a repeat customer.

Speaker 2: 6:59

I didn't even know there was 22 counties. There you go. Another one here oh this is joanna, isn't it? I think yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:09

She says oh, sorry, I'm supposed to read them out on. I have people that can't see the screen. So the first one was um two search wins. We've recently won two new searches, which is awesome.

Speaker 1: 7:17

One with a new client with sites in 22 counties yeah, I didn't know, there's 22 counties either no well, most people don't know, even know where shropshire is, so they don't even know that's a county who manufacture, and one is an sme and repeat customer, and we've also got another pitch with a new client on monday, so there's definitely work out there. This one is I'm so happy, I'm privileged to be in this community. It's the best thing that could happen to me. The people are amazing and you and lou are so real. It must have been a message to you, was that jord?

Speaker 1: 7:47

it was I feel I'm not on my own. We are so real, aren't we so real?

Speaker 2: 7:53

I'll take that as a compliment and and joanna um joined us from listening to our podcast listen to the podcast went and won a retainer and then joined us.

Speaker 1: 8:04

Yes, lots of people win, work, win retainers from listening to the podcast and won a retainer and then joined us. Yes, lots of people win, work, win retainers from listening to the tips that we give here, and then a quick win retainer won yesterday, but only part way through the course, aiming to smash through the whole course and all related materials. Oh, that might be a duplicate. I do apologize. I think we might have shared that one last week. Sorry, george. Um, and this one is new though, isn't it landed? Chief products officer retained search. I just landed my first executive set level retained search. Since going through the training 30 fee. The total fee will be over 100k and this alone makes the training well worth the investment yeah, I mean, like what we charge, 99k, don't, by the way?

Speaker 2: 8:40

we should, but we don't. Um is this?

Speaker 1: 8:51

oh, I think I've shared that one before, haven't we?

Speaker 1: 8:53

yeah, lots of wins oh, this is another one. Yeah, this is um paul in our mastermind multi-hire campaign win. We've just won our second multi-hire campaign. Uh, we beat and he puts the name of the search firm in there, which I'm really pumped about. They've beaten us on a couple of pitches recently, so it's nice to get it back. The searches are for middle management and senior individual contributors, 200 to 250K base salaries. They didn't really buy into the retained fee structure. However, they did want a retained search process to be executed so that they got the best people and exhaust the talent pool. And then there's like a confused looking curious face emoji. Um, the docs that retrained search provide on winning multi-hire work help with our creative thinking around the commercials. The project starting in two weeks with 10 searches to begin with 50k up front and the rest on candidate acceptance. It's a 500k usd project we should charge 99k we should charge 99k.

Speaker 1: 9:48

Happy to share more if anyone wants to chat about this, because paul, of course, is in our mastermind. Um, and who says that multi-hire campaigns can't be won at the executive levels? Uh, because it isn't true. Uh, this is a thank you from Tokyo. Course has been great, recommending to you, to others, wherever possible, and let me know if you're ever in Japan. And funny, he says that because our plan is, if this Australia event goes well, is to come to Japan.

Speaker 2: 10:16

Straight afterwards Tokyo.

Speaker 1: 10:19

Yeah, tokyo next. Ah, yes, and this is Ross. He and I have been formulating this engage model, which actually, weirdly, I was talking about on the podcast last week. And I said to Ross I want you to sell your first engaged search in a week. I want you to do it within five working days. And he said I've had my. They're really bad with feedback scheduling interviews.

Speaker 1: 10:37

So it was agreed that commitment fee will ensure that everyone is invested in the success of the project and it'll be governed by agreed SLAs. And the second is with a new client in France. Excuse me, the role had been live for four months and it's right within our wheelhouse. We could have taken it contingent and filled it, but they bought into this model and agreed into a 25% deposit. So it's right within our wheelhouse. We could have taken it contingent and filled it, but they bought into this model and agreed into a 25% deposit. So it's turned what we would have considered a C job into an A grade job. And he says I can see this being a real game changer for us to offer either as an alternative to a full retained search or when the fee wouldn't warrant a full retained search.

Speaker 1: 11:22

Oh, by the way, the sun is finally shining on the South Coast, which, yeah, got an opportunity. This sorry pitching against a Shrek. These are more mastermind wins for a general management position, which is exactly what she's aiming for. She doesn't think she did it perfectly, but it led to a second meeting. Use everything that you've taught us about pitching against Shreks, I think, is a spec out win C-suite I have two candidates in finals from specs. Thank you everyone for teaching me more about this method. So C-suite speculative introductions work and we teach you all about it in our mastermind. So if you want to-.

Speaker 2: 12:03

There's just so much opportunity out there. I've just had a call with one of our members, alan, and he said makes me laugh when they like just drop it in conversations, that was normal. He said, yeah, he probably didn't join us about two months ago. He started with us. He said, yeah, I've just come off a pitch.

Speaker 1: 12:18

I was like alright, how did that go? He was like yeah, one minute I was like that sounds really positive.

Speaker 2: 12:24

I was like we should be shouting about that, right. And he said yeah, I've pitched five times five different customers and every one of them said yeah yeah it's just and he had no experience.

Speaker 1: 12:38

Did he Alan before he started? And who was one? We shared wins from Alan in the like a few weeks ago, didn't we? Where he was like, oh my god, I did it. I didn't really know what I was doing and I wasn't sure it was going to work and I was really skeptical. And I've just won my first time I mean, you said I was gobsmacked.

Speaker 1: 12:52

I won it gobsmacked yeah so it's funny now we've been doing this podcast a while, like you hear us talk about people that have just started and say this, and then this happens and people start to then realize actually do you know what I? They see themselves in the people and go, like that could be me. I don't need to look at retained and think this is this big, scary thing that I'm never going to be able to do. I could this, I could be one of these people that's on this journey, and so that's our message in that kind of section. And now I want to talk a bit about what we've been helping people with, so that we can come on to what you've been helping people with as well. Greg, um, george, what have you been helping people with recently?

Speaker 2: 13:28

I work on the pitch at the moment and I think that's representative of the market as well. People are pitching more. There's more opportunity out there. Um, one of the things specifically that I find is when people first come to a coaching session with us around pitching, there's like a a complete 180 in their character. So they'll start when we first meet them and they're light-hearted and they're funny and there's loads of personality. And then the first time they come to the pitch, it's like they're applying for a mortgage with the bank manager it's so serious.

Speaker 2: 14:01

It's so serious. I'm so corporate and actually just helping them just relax into it and be themselves, because people buy people. Um, one of our members, for example, told me a great story about they started their business because they'd managed to get themselves in a load of debt and they really weren't sure how they could pay it off. And actually what they thought is there's a model here where I can help everyone. I can help my clients recruit great talent, I can help candidates find amazing opportunities and I can help a family get out of this situation we find ourselves in. And that was 14 years ago and he's managed to achieve all of those things. And I was like that's what you should be saying, like that's the story. Yeah, I hear that and think I want to work with this guy yeah, yeah, I agree, and I have been well.

Speaker 1: 14:52

I was really pleasantly surprised yesterday when we were all together. Not only because not pleasantly surprised, because we had a good day we always have a good day when we're all together but I ended up jumping onto the foundation course a collab call because George was still filming, because you know he has to do like 16 takes to get everything right, because I've got one on here you've got.

Speaker 1: 15:14

Oh no, there you go. Turn the other way. It should be motivation for people listening to the audio. It's like one of these days. Actually watch it, watch the video and see. You can see for yourself whether jordan's got one air or not anyway.

Speaker 1: 15:26

Um, I jumped on this collab call and everybody, every question, there was like five questions back to back from different people and all of them were about project delivery. Um, I jumped on this collab call and everybody, every question, there was like five questions back to back from different people and all of them were about project delivery. Now, I can't remember the last time I was on a collab call and every question was out about delivery. In fact, I can't remember a time when every question wasn't about business development. So for me, like, suddenly I've been hearing for the last I don't know few weeks, maybe a month or so, that things are changing and there's green shoots and there's more activity in the market and suddenly I'm seeing the evidence. There's people actually in the coaching call I've just come off. She's delivering five, she's in the middle of delivering five searches.

Speaker 1: 16:06

For the last I don't know six months that I've been working with her, it's all been about BD, winning meetings, winning projects. I've been working with her. It's all been about BD, winning meetings, winning projects, and so not only is that overwhelmingly nice, but then it takes us into a whole other realm of challenges opportunities, shall we say which is as you and I both know. Jordan and Greg, you know extremely well that winning it is the easy part, actually, and it's delivering it that the challenges come in. But delivery is the key to the future success of everything that you do and getting the execution right, and lots and lots of the questions yesterday were around how do you? In fact, two of them were how do you put parameters on a search to be able to have a talent pool that's manageable, where there are no obvious limits, where the client is saying, well, anywhere in the US?

Speaker 1: 17:02

and any experience, and they could be in what did we say the other week like Manchester or Mongolia yeah, or Mongolia, yeah, and then they think they're being helpful by doing that, but actually that makes life virtually impossible. And, of course, as a search consultant, you can't possibly search through thousands and thousands and thousands of people, and we were explaining how to put parameters on a search. So this is a subject that's close to your heart. I can see you moving in your seat already, greg, getting ready it's just the way I said earlier so I remember one of the questions that you asked me really early on.

Speaker 1: 17:37

We've known each other for a little while now, haven't we? I don't know is it a couple of years, maybe longer than that three years, just over three years three years and one of the questions that you asked me in the very early days and I knew, after you asked me that question, that we were going to be friends and not just friends but work together was do you remember what it is before I tell you what it is?

Speaker 3: 17:58

no, I'm desperately trying to look like I do, but I don't it doesn't matter, that's okay, it was memorable for me.

Speaker 1: 18:03

Um, you said do you believe that research is exhaustive? And I do, I absolutely do. And and I remember that because when somebody who's tackling a search in the way that a search consultant does, you have to be certain that you know the answer to that question and know how to put parameters on a search to make sure that it is exhaustive, because otherwise how can you say you've executed a project? And this is like a topic that you only start to really get into the weeds of once you start getting into retained and delivering projects on a regular basis. So, with that, like as a very vague introduction, greg, please tell us who you are, where you're from and what you do, and then we can start on picking some of the pieces of project delivery.

Speaker 3: 19:00

Sure? No, of course I will, but just before I do can.

Speaker 3: 19:04

I just ask why I asked that question. There's a why behind that, and that was without turning the conversation back to Allied. We wanted to build a business. That was without turning the conversation back to allied. We. We wanted to build a business that was a premium service.

Speaker 3: 19:14

You know the old adage you're only successful if you're the best or the cheapest. It's in between is where all the graveyards are. So. So for me, having come from a kind of an investment banking, data research perspective, with all the kind of in quotes, confidence for that, and then wandering into this, what I thought was an easy world and it turns out it's not I I needed to know that that was. It was was a yes, because that was the promise that I had in my previous life. So, but yeah, no, I do remember asking that and I remember thinking thank goodness, because I only wanted to bring a business and a service that that promised that I didn't want to do the in between or the or the bottom. I don't want to do the in-between or the bottom. I didn't want to do the Walmart, I wanted to do up there. So I just thought I'd give you the wine.

Speaker 1: 19:54

Oh, I like that. That's very good.

Speaker 3: 19:57

And so tell us.

Speaker 1: 19:58

Where have you come from and what do you do and how do you help people like us?

Speaker 3: 20:03

Yeah, sure, so I well, I spent 30-something years in the financial data space, which basically, god it sounds so boring when you say it out loud, but it was a really fun, great industry full of wonderful people. But what that meant was all my clients were investment banks and corporate lawyers, so there was a whole industry called the online industry, as it was then. That's wrapped around providing the most timely, the most comprehensive, the most accurate data, because you were essentially servicing multi-billion dollar deals. So I was in the mergers and acquisition and the capital market space. So we were a classic niche provider, you know, that kind of one inch wide but one mile deep. So we did one thing it was a very small section of data, but we just lived it. It was all about the quality of the work.

Speaker 3: 20:49

So when I do my pitch, I always say it's not glamorous, but it's the missing bit of business which is process systems. It's rigor, it's attention to detail, it's care, and it's not glamorous, is it? It's not glamorous, but if you miss it, you're cooked, you're done. So this is what I describe, ally. It's basically a big part of our culture. Is all that boring bit of business, but just miss it at your peril, and that's one of the things why I love Retrained is when I sell you to my clients the ones that aren't using you I talk about your rigor and your process and you've weaponized that's the language I use the whole process. So if I'm talking about Ally, that's a massive part of us. Um, and the other one is is warmth and kindness. Um, 57 years old, used to work in a really gnarly industry. This was my late life experiment in high levels of professional rigor and not being a knob, to be honest with you, just just being a half decent human, and they're not mutually exclusive. You can be a warm, caring, caring, thoughtful human being and deliver really good work, and I don't know why that isn't the case, because, well, that's another whole, probably podcast. We can get into the psychology. My wife's a therapist so she should probably be on this call. So that's kind of the who.

Speaker 3: 22:06

If I talk about the who of our life and the rest of it is pretty obvious really. I mean you can over complicate the answer. It's, we say, really busy recruiters, tons of time. You know the the enemy of the job, if you like, is the time drain, but the promise is really high quality and that's an overused term these days, I know that, but but that's the reason why I started ally.

Speaker 3: 22:27

As well as half my friends are in search, so I've watched all you guys. You're always the last one to the party, you're always the one in the corner of the restaurant holding a glass of red wine talking to a candidate. So I remember throwing bread rolls at friends of mine, saying come and sit down. And then I went at my later life experiment, as I call this, um. I looked into it and so much of the time was taken hitting keystrokes in LinkedIn. So and it just seemed to me most recruiters didn't go into that, into the business, so they could do that if they're people, people. So we just looked at the three or four things that took very talented people people away from that subject but delivered them at a really high level of quality, using all those processes and professional rigor that we had, keeping M&A Bankers in Singapore happy and and lawyers in Frankfurt, etc sorry long answer to a short question, sorry no, I love it.

Speaker 1: 23:20

It's just making me think of where I want to go. You know, with my kind of questioning with you next, like I so listening to that as a recruiter, I would be interested to find out, like what, as a professional research firm do, what do you actually do and how do you do it and how do you make sure that you make it exhaustive?

Speaker 3: 23:51

um, and you're, I imagine, but I'm not certain actually the majority of the work that you do for firms is for retained projects a lot of it is because that's the kind of the founding, sort of the cornerstone of the business, if you like, but it does, if I can put it like this. It bleeds out to recruiters that don't do retained work but still want to provide a fine, a damn fine service. So they, they touch the edges. Maybe maybe not exhaustive, but that client was for the fee they're paying. They've, you know, they've got a really good service. So where we fail badly is a rapid fire, contingent work, and that's not me putting my nose in the air. There's a lot of very successful people making a lot of money and doing a good service, but we, we just fail completely because of the speed. We're a qualitative house, if you like.

Speaker 2: 24:42

Um but if I was to answer your question is this this there's a.

Speaker 3: 24:47

There's a lot to providing a service. As you know, the big one is the culture piece, so it's a culture of quality and kindness. So when you say quality, it's a really overused term, isn't it? But just to give you an example, our head of learning and development is Exhydric and Struggles, and she brings a ferocious with with a kind heart, a ferocious rigor to all the processes and systems and techniques and methodologies. So we're not just a linkedin house, you know, we're not just the crm system and linkedin house. So we internally call it going down the rabbit hole. And there's, there's a list of, I think, 15 practices and processes and tactics and methodologies you can keep going um which are very, very time consuming, but they get you that last 20% that you can't on LinkedIn. So that's a long discussion, all that stuff.

Speaker 2: 25:36

But the other one is yeah, huge investment in.

Speaker 3: 25:39

L&D processes and systems, not just using LinkedIn. Goodness what else. And I would also say I'd really add into that a very intimate relationship with your client. What is nuts is saying my 25 year old from Mumbai, all bit MBA graduate, well-trained, hard-working, is going to be as good as you are search person who's been doing it for 18 years. It's just, it's just a ridiculous promise. But a big jump to that is being honest with your client and saying you can have fantastic results. I mean exceptional results. Um much way different cost profile than if you hired a local recruiter or researcher. But there is a minimum amount of investment from you client in order to make that happen. It's saying no to a 12 minute instructional feedback call.

Speaker 3: 26:30

They'll add 20 to the, to the feedback process. So leveraging client intel is is a not insignificant part of it, and that's another area where we fail is if the client just doesn't want to do that, that there is a sort of level of investment from the client but I know, because we've been working together a little while now, that in the early days and, yeah, I think you work with a lot of different people, don't you?

Speaker 1: 26:58

when somebody said to me the day when we were at our 90 day meeting, oh, how many are in your team? Was it the camera guy? It was our videography yesterday. How many people are in your team? I'm like that's a difficult one because all of you know you, dave Walson Ho, you know all of the people that that work with us and and supply services, if you like, are kind of that's. That's the team, like the bare bones of who do we actually employ? It's just the. You know the seven, eight of us. But you know and I consider you part of that you know extended team, because at the beginning, when the people that we were teaching how to win retained work were winning and, and even now like and that's why it's carried on and you work with so many of the people that we teach they start winning and then they win, and then they win some more, and then they win some more and then they're like shit, I can't deliver it all.

Speaker 1: 27:49

You're getting that all the time, this problem having not enough, you know, committed work to having all committed work and you've then got to deliver on it yeah, 100, and then you've got brands. How did we actually, how did I? Did we find each other? And for you to be able to help with that it was.

Speaker 3: 28:05

It was a client. He said you need actually actually just to slightly embarrass you. I had to get past you to get to the client. He said if Lou likes you, you're allowed in and if not, no. I was, I was, I was a bit. I felt like Dorothy Wizard of Oz, you know, pulling at the curtain, um. And then the other good story is you and I became friends, you were supportive and, um, we got overconfident and cocked up and you put ally on the naughty step for six months, didn't you remember?

Speaker 3: 28:30

yeah, which I am, and I every time I do this groveling apology every time I see you, which I'll eternally be grateful because not a nice place to be greg it was awful. I don't mind saying it was awful because we were new into the industry. I thought you know, I call you my, my fairy mother, and I was on the naughty step for six months, but but it was the best lesson there's. All you know. It's a cliche, isn't it? Um?

Speaker 1: 28:54

so, but when we're at whatever makes, whatever makes us better, um, feedback's hard to take, isn't it? But it is so. It's like the food of everything that, for those of us with growth mindsets, it's our, it's our dinner, it's what we need to survive and the upside of that, I would say, is we're very, we're very selective with who we recommend to our members yeah, like we only recommend people that we know do a shit hot job, and it all comes kind of from what we hear from our members.

Speaker 2: 29:23

So, um, the fact that we are so positive and proactive about putting your name out there to our members tells me you are well and truly off the naughty step you are.

Speaker 1: 29:35

It wasn't great, but just coming back to your points about doing it properly.

Speaker 3: 29:40

Just just to share a little anecdote I was just thinking you were sharing your, your, your wins and your positive sort of feedback stuff. We we just our newest client actually tried with us 18 months ago and he did your course. You were sharing your wins and your positive feedback stuff. Our newest client actually trialled with us 18 months ago and he did your course and he arrived full of bonhomie and it's a slightly different story where he didn't win.

Speaker 3: 29:58

So we did the trial, the work didn't come in and he didn't go ahead with us and what he essentially fundamentally said was that he didn't follow, he didn't have the courage really to follow the instruction and the process because it's a big jump right. And he literally turned up two weeks ago and went I'm ready, and you know you can tell on a call. When you can tell kindly, almost sort of viscerally, when someone's ready and they're not, yeah, and I just signed up. He said I don't know that. You know, let's just do it. And he's smashing, he's got loads of mandates. I won't say the name just in case you wouldn't want me to. I'll tell you afterwards what was he saying, sorry. What did he tell you to me I can't I work. Just think he might be annoyed with me. I'll definitely tell you afterwards. But what was interesting to me, he was mentally ready to make that jump. And he wants to be a database, retained only business.

Speaker 1: 30:42

He just takes people like John Butler over in Perth and it was a good six months he did it ended up back at contingent and then six months later came back and he's like, right, I know, I should have just listened properly the first time. And now fully, you know, fully retained people like patrick murtaugh. He put a win in. He's been kind of dipping his toe in you, you know, for about a year. And then he's like, yeah, well, I'll just try that little sentence, but it's personality as well, though, isn't it Like everyone's different?

Speaker 2: 31:15

I find I'm extreme right. I did one session with Luke. Honestly, I'm talking like a 30-minute session. Greg, Five years ago, I came out and said that's it, fuck it, I'm never working, ever again. I, five years ago, came out and said that's it, fuck it, I'm never working. Ever again I'm calling everyone to be clients. I'm saying if you want to work with me, you've got to retain me. That's it. Like I'm either going to be in a ditch dead in three weeks or fully retained search consultant. But some people, they want to dip the toe in the water and they want to win one, and then they want to deliver it and they want to dot the i's and cross the t's and go okay, I feel safe now I'm ready to win two and three. And then they fly with it a great expression.

Speaker 3: 31:54

Sorry, karen, sorry expression I heard from one of one of your clients. They said about uh, retained, you can't get a little bit pregnant. And I thought that just maybe you're not supposed to say that anymore. You know grey in the beard, but but I was on the money. You know you've got to do it yeah, it's so true.

Speaker 1: 32:14

It's so true. I think what really helps when people do start to to venture into the stage where they nearly win it is oh, is that saying like I've got it printed on my wall, you know what? People being afraid of failure. But in this case, sometimes they are actually afraid of success, like they kind of want to win it. But do I want to win it? Because am I going to be able to deliver it? There's always that yeah what happens if I do win it?

Speaker 1: 32:40

and a lot of time when we're kind of breaking down the barriers in the mindset module, it's that the main piece that breaks down the barrier in the mindset module.

Speaker 1: 32:46

It's that the main piece that breaks down the barrier in the mindset module is explaining to people how you deliver it and giving them the comfort that it's a process, it's step by step, it is exhaustive and you can't fail, because your job is to execute the search, not to generate a candidate, and and just by doing that they feel more confident to win it.

Speaker 1: 33:04

So the two things are inextricably interlinked, which is why having someone like you around for us, for our members to be able to give them the comfort that there is somebody with you that's experienced, that has got a head of L&D that's come from Hydric and Struggles, that executes the research for search projects day in and day out here to support you if you get overwhelmed, is huge, and I know how many people in our mastermind depend on you and that your team is crucial to them so you've also been doing some other interesting work, as well as the fundamentals of making sure people don't fall over with their search uh work, but I've got a piece of work that I'm I'd like to share on the screen.

Speaker 1: 33:45

If, uh, people, uh, if you'll, if you'll let me you and I were talking about it, and this was partly what prompted me to say will you please come on and, you know, share some of the stuff you've been doing? So will you tell us what you've been doing? Some other work to share data that's been helping with people, people's sales, as well as the delivery. That's right, isn't it?

Speaker 3: 34:06

yeah, absolutely. I mean just to be kind of up front about this. What?

Speaker 2: 34:10

what, what?

Speaker 3: 34:10

everyone's about to see is is kind of work in progress. Um, it's, we're kind of a beta testing stage, but that's obviously based on some almost too positive feedback at the early stages. But I just can, I just share. The genesis of this was because how god god awful last year was Like. So we're three years old, we're 21, 22. Oh, this is just what it's like. This is easy, you know, it's just, and apparently it's not, it's not like that every year, so 23,.

Speaker 3: 34:39

What we realized is there was a gap in our kind of services portfolio, a counter cyclical kind of value proposition you like. So candid research, crm management, brilliant. Our rbd services all right, it's pretty good. I'm not not proud of it, but I'm not super proud of it. Does the job, but it's, and there's probably not a lot to differentiate it against what everyone else does, and it's one third of our kind of value proposition.

Speaker 3: 35:02

So I used to be in a data sort of perspective and I just started chatting to some of the more progressive search firms, not big necessarily, but just you know, you know the sort of people that just want to see if they can get an edge, differentiation, whatever, any, whatever you want to describe it and and then actually it popped out from a Danish listed company. A friend of mine's the head of people there and he said I go to the board once a quarter and I say the three million US dollar investment that I make, um, once a quarter and I say the three million us dollar investment that I make every year is worthwhile. And they say prove it. And said I've got nothing. I've got nothing to prove that. So we generated a report which and there's there's only one commercially going out the long and the short of all of this is what we realized is what, if you're a recruiter and you've got a good network, you're a great guy, good relationship builder, you're good execution and you've got a kind of good pedigree, there's not a lot to separate you from all the other ones with that same sort of pedigree. This this is what I've been told by the sort of clients I can have this conversation with. So what they want to go in, and they said they want to have different conversations with their clients than they've worked before. So we, we've built a prototype, which you're about to share, that allows you to walk into a head of people or a head of HR or even more senior and factually tell them things about the business they didn't know themselves. So if you've got Workday you can run a lot of the stuff you're about to see. But what you can't do easily and cost-effectively is benchmark what we call allied talent analytics against your competition. So I don't want to steal your thunder. Do you want me to get into some of the detail now? Yeah, yeah, well, it's so.

Speaker 3: 36:38

For example, I'll give you two anecdotes, which are the only two I've got, because they're the two that I'm really working closely with. We're about to roll it out to six. One of them basically had a series of meetings in in london with their, their fund manager, clients and I. They said it's like wearing a suit of armor. As a direct result of this report, they were introduced to the dni team and they're helping them solve the problem that they pointed out, which was essentially weren't retaining women of color. Um, is it color or black women? I should know the answer to that, being the industry I'm in, but I don't know.

Speaker 3: 37:10

It depends who you talk to. You can talk to people in America or the UK, but as a direct result of that and he said I could just tell I was being taken more seriously as a result of that conversation, because we had produced for him a deep dive talent analytics benchmark against this particular client's competitors the of Talent Analytics benchmark against this particular client's competitors. The other example was as a US technology recruiter and as a direct result of the report they produced about what they call the brain drain. They've got a meeting with the president of the company and they've been working with that company for four and a half years only met the head of people and it's just transcended their relationship. So listen, in product development they say the first swallow doesn't make a summer. So I can't over-promise this, but I've been doing product development for 30 years and I just know we've got something.

Speaker 3: 37:55

So the next step for us is we're shrinking this report down to a BD-oriented kind of report where recruiters can ask their ally analyst do me a BD report for this company and these two competitors and go and have a meeting that they've never had before with either an existing customer or a new, a new business customer, um, trusted advisor, you know advisory type.

Speaker 1: 38:18

We talk about that a lot. We talk about it a lot. So many of the recruiters that we work with initially, when we start to work with them, are just having transactional supplier master-slave relationships and and find it impossible to break through into being a trusted advisor to the, to the firm, and getting an audience and moving up the value chain has been virtually impossible for them and we know that by solving problems using the retained model that the contingent model isn't solving is one way of starting to move up. But I've always been a fan of going in at the top as well and sharing with them what I'm doing for them lower down in the organization and some of the insights that are coming out of it, being able to take something like this into a meeting like that, which I'll just share on my screen now, so those of the, those people that are watching on the screen can see what we're talking about and for those of you not watching on the screen, you can get in touch with greg. How can they get in touch with you, greg? Just?

Speaker 3: 39:25

just by email is fine, just email. Or you can link in with me and connect with me, and we'll take it from there.

Speaker 1: 39:31

So Greg's a Midian and his firm is Ally A-double-L-Y and you can see on the screen here the report that shows. I would imagine this is the firm that we're approaching versus their biggest competitor.

Speaker 3: 39:46

Yeah, at the moment it's just focusing on that individual company. It's just some kind of basic kind of gender split at the moment and as you move through the report it begins to sort of compare it to its competitors. So this, to be frank, this is all available on work days, kind of a bit of a worm. And now you're beginning to understand, um kind of where you're losing people to. I heard a question by the, the, this danish company. He said greg, what you give me is the what I then go and find out the why. So why am I losing my baby booms? Why am I losing my you know graduates? Why is te I losing my graduates? Why is Texas retaining people? Why is Denver not? You know all that kind of stuff. So now we're getting into the competitor bit. So now you're comparing your, as I say, ethnicity or your D&I. That's the big one, to be frank. The reason I keep bringing it up is that's pretty much all anyone wants to look at is this whole gender piece why are we?

Speaker 1: 40:43

why are we losing females faster than our competitors?

Speaker 3: 40:46

100 and just just even knowing if you are or not yeah, and then, and as explained to me, it's a bit kind of grubby and basic, but walking to the board saying we need to do something about it, we've got a major problem. This is going to affect our talent attraction, um, as well as retention.

Speaker 1: 41:03

We need to-. You'd love to be able to walk into a BD meeting having this in your pocket, wouldn't you? Can you imagine, George, Like I would absolutely love that. I hope you don't mind. I've taken the liberty of doing some initial research before coming and I'd like to share some of the findings with you, like oh, send the invoice what a joy well, this, this is actually the two, the two search firms we're working with.

Speaker 3: 41:24

They're debating whether or not to package this in with all their retained work or potentially charge separately. I'm trying to persuade them saying don't do that, don't, don't charge, just elevate yourself up to the level where I've got, but give me your work. You know, know, retain your work.

Speaker 2: 41:39

Take your pitch. Conversion rate.

Speaker 1: 41:45

We're working on all of your Well. That's why we're not charging for ourselves.

Speaker 3: 41:50

We're just training the analysts to be able to do this work. We've got some wrinkles, you know speed to test around the graphics. We'll find a way of doing that.

Speaker 2: 41:58

And then that way as well, greg. I think the other thing is going back to your comment about providing a great service but being a good person. I think it shows customers that you truly care, that you're actually, you want to look after them, you want to help them, you want to solve problems that other people aren't solving, and that builds partnership and makes you irreplaceable.

Speaker 3: 42:19

Thank you Well.

Speaker 2: 42:20

I hope that does show it's um make me make me blush.

Speaker 1: 42:25

Thank, you, yeah, really good and so we normally wrap up with something controversial, yeah I know and it can be something that we've seen on LinkedIn that we don't agree with or we don't believe or is a myth. Maybe there's something about research or what you do that people think that isn't true. Are there any kind of common misconceptions that you find or mistakes, biggest mistakes, that people make in?

Speaker 3: 43:02

yeah, execution I, I think, well, it's back to if I'm, if I'm honest, what I, what I said earlier is I just gotta be careful because I'm potentially going to be critiquing my customer base and potential customer base here. But what amazes me when some, when we say, look, so you know that we do this free, completely no commitment, free three-week trial, so we put an analyst, a linkedin license, a team lead and a customer success person at the client's exclusive disposal for three weeks and these are bright people as well. And it just amazed me when people just want to throw a jd over the wall as opposed to have a proper, thorough briefing process. So, but you want, you want to do, you want brilliant work, and it's this incongruency between the two and I think I'm I have many failings, but it's not communicating and I think I do a reasonable job of that.

Speaker 3: 43:54

Um, but it's still. It just amazes me of the, the mindset and these are not like a bad person thing, it's just what did you expect? Like you know, it's just, it's an expectations thing, the minimum level, investment and time. So if I could jump in my client's head and make them understand that to me is the biggest frustration that we we experience as a business is. Come on. You know you wouldn't do that with someone you've just employed full-time. There's still a human being.

Speaker 3: 44:20

Nine hours to exclusively yours, so I don't know. It's not controversial. Well, it is what it happens to us.

Speaker 2: 44:25

We're furious. I'll be controversial with that because basically what you've just described is contingent recruitment yeah there you go, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 44:34

I mean, I don't know, but I would imagine that the successful, experienced retained search consultants do that far less often than the contingent recruiters that are having a go at search.

Speaker 3: 44:51

I would agree, and I'll tell you what it's a skill and it's hard work.

Speaker 2: 44:57

Good quality research. Me and Lou took on a search last year and we were like, ah, it's fine, We'll split the research between us. You do some, I'll do some. This is cool, no problem. We jumped on a Zoom call to do some joint research, Greg, and honestly, 10 minutes in, we were like this is hard work, isn't it?

Speaker 3: 45:17

This is hard going-ish. We just had a new director of business development join the company three weeks ago. He's an ex-search great, great guy. He's actually a friend of mine as well and he thinks we do an absolutely god-awful job of sharing with our clients what we do at a molecular level. So when 25 profiles turn up that day which are absolutely on the money, they're like what only 25? But it's a bit like the iceberg model, isn't it? It's like 90%.

Speaker 3: 45:45

And I've always wondered. I was the annoying client for 30 years changing the brief, dropping it. I never, ever, had a search exec. Say to me, do you have any idea, samidian, how much work went into this in the last 10 days before you just dropped it like it was a bad smell? And I just just wonder here's a question rather than saving, I just wonder if all the client ending clients out there really understand the amount of effort and time and care and thought and money ultimately that goes in to this research piece and all the other stuff that does, before they just drop it now and I don't know, maybe that's another topic for you.

Speaker 1: 46:18

Yeah, I mean, it's a big part of what I learn works best in search delivery and is controversial because traditionally classical search firms don't do it which is to be completely transparent with their research. So all of the search consultants that I've worked with that have been traditionally or classically trained will take a brief, will produce a report every week with some numbers, fancy numbers on dni and qualified candidates and a couple of either made up or sample profiles, and then at the end of it, come up with a slate of candidates that they believe should be on the short list and that's it. And I have been bitten by that lots of times and and ultimately ended up with a process that I felt happy with, which was completely transparent, and every week I actually shared all of it, all of the people. I'd reached out to all the people that said no, even if they didn't want to see it, I'd force them to look at it every single week.

Speaker 1: 47:21

And that's exactly what we did with the project that we did last time, and it's the same process that I taught Jordan, it's the same process that I teach now, and we both teach in the program, because most clients don't realize what you get, what you do, unless you put that stuff under their bloody noses and say we've identified 350 people that could be a possible match for this. We've approached all 350 of them. 200 of them have said they are not interested. And here are all the reasons why they've said they're not interested. This one said it's because of location. This one said it because of. And then when you eventually get to the slate of candidates that you believe are suitable for the long list, they're like thank God, okay, great, can we move forward with these? You know, instead of going is that all, yeah?

Speaker 3: 48:04

comfort and respect as well. Just take a look, yeah so that, right there, right.

Speaker 2: 48:10

That is the reason your clients shouldn't just throw a jd over the wall and say get to work we don't know the clients of search firms need to be on steering calls because, actually, sharing that experience, I never went through what lou went through, because lou made that mistake, learned from it and taught me the right way, so I didn't have to make that mistake get it and that shared experience. We're better off if we, if we take it on board. I think everybody does.

Speaker 1: 48:41

Some people will learn from other people's experience and some people, despite being told you know, it's like you know, don't, don't do anything. Some people will still do it. You know, even us, um, but then they'll just learn further down the line and they'll come on to a collab call and say my client's not happy with the shortlist, and then you've got to kind of unpick it and go back. Yeah, did you share all of it? Um, no, we didn't. We have steering calls. It's like okay, well, that's all right, we'll go back then sometimes it's best to trust the experience I'll lend.

Speaker 2: 49:11

We'll end this podcast on one last story for you. I had been in a relationship with my now wife for six months. Uh, my father-in-law owns motorhome dealerships and one of them is in the Lake District in the UK Dealership petrol station right next door, tiny little gap between them. I was helping him out in the summer and he said Jordan, can you take this motorhome and go and put some fuel in it? No problem, he said, but as you go through the gap, don't go in the first row of pumps because the turning circle is not wide enough. You'll never do it. I said I'll show him. Turning circle's not wide enough. Drove the motorhome into the corner of the petrol station. It had to stay there for three weeks because if we removed it the whole petrol station would have fallen down.

Speaker 3: 49:52

Oh my god, I feel sick. Just take the experience.

Speaker 2: 49:58

Don't think you know better.

Speaker 3: 49:59

The moral of the story. Again, you didn't do that again, did you?

Speaker 2: 50:02

I didn't do it again, and now we're 12 years on and married, so he let me off his naughty step after that cheers to that.

Speaker 1: 50:11

Oh, very good um, well, we could sit and chat all day about um research and project execution, all the stuff that um comes with it, and I'm sure there's loads of other stuff we could talk about too. So we'd love to have you back at some point, greg, but in the meantime, thank you very much for taking the time to join us today.

Speaker 3: 50:28

Not at all. Thank you, you're so welcome. Appreciate it. Thank you very much.

Speaker 1: 50:33

Pleasure. Goodbye everyone. We'll see you in the next episode Bye-bye.

Speaker 1: 50:44

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 retrained searchcom. 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: 51:10

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 programmes to protect the integrity of the community. If you want access, just talk to us. Okay, thanks for listening. We'll be back very soon with another episode of Retrain Search the podcast.