Kevin Dieny: 00:00:00

Hello, welcome to the Close The Loop podcast.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:03

Today, we're going to be talking about how to make the whole hiring process

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:07

easier, quicker, faster, stronger, for all businesses that are hiring.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:11

This is a very interesting topic for businesses that are growing.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:15

Everyone's going to hire at some point, hopefully, your

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:18

business grows to that point.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:19

So, today I'm also joined by Matt Widmyer.

Matt Widmyer: 00:00:23

Hey guys.

Matt Widmyer: 00:00:24

Thanks for having me back.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:26

And a very special guest is here with us.

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His name is Jeremy Tolan.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:30

He is the partnerships manager at Spark Hire.

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He's responsible for cultivating and maintaining relationships among

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:37

Spark Hire strategic partners.

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He has helped hundreds of leading organizations successfully implement

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video interviewing for hiring purposes.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:45

Jeremy loves practicing Kung Fu and seeing his 20 month old

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:49

nephew who's growing up so fast.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:51

So welcome, Jeremy!

Jeremy Tolan: 00:00:52

Thanks for including me.

Matt Widmyer: 00:00:54

Good to have you, Jeremy,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:00:55

Thanks.

Kevin Dieny: 00:00:56

We are really excited to jump into this topic because

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this impacts a lot of businesses.

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Every business that's like, oh man, I have to go through hiring

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:05

again or recruitment again.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:07

A business is trying to fill a role that's really important for

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:10

that business to fill that role.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:11

They've decided, okay, we need help with this.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:14

We need someone dedicated to this.

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We need help doing X, Y, Z, because that's going to help our company.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:20

The longer that goes on unfilled for a business, the more painful

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it is, the more they're not getting their projects completed.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:27

The longer it goes, the more people aren't getting the extra

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support and they're having to carry that role on their shoulders.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:33

Usually the manager of whatever that role is, is having to do that

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role while that role is unfulfilled.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:38

So it's really important to find the candidates, but really what we're going

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:42

to get into a bit is finding the right candidates because if we make the hiring

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:47

process faster, but you find worse candidates, that's not helping anybody.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:51

So we're really going to be talking about all of that.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:54

So kick this off, Jeremy, a question for you.

Kevin Dieny: 00:01:57

So why is hiring such a painful process for business leaders today?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:04

Sure.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:04

And I think you did a really good job explaining how painful it can

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:07

be just having that open position, that vacant role, where people are

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:11

taking on more responsibility or just maybe no one's taking on that

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:14

responsibility and tasks and important priorities are falling by the wayside.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:19

But as far as the hiring process being so painful for business leaders,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:23

I think it, it requires obviously a lot of work and time to source,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:27

interview, and onboard new employees.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:29

And in a lot of cases, business leaders have so many other important

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:33

priorities outside of just hiring.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:35

Even though hiring is incredibly important.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:38

It can also just be taking away time from these other high priority

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:42

activities from a business leader.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:44

And one of the biggest challenges with having a poor interview process is how

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:48

much a final run interview can cost.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:50

Because when you think about it, most businesses will have HR, a recruiter

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:55

or some type of manager that needs to collaborate with other leaders at

Jeremy Tolan: 00:02:58

the company to make hiring decisions.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:00

So that final round interview might have various hiring stakeholders,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:04

all meeting for at least an hour to connect with that candidate.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:07

They needed a brief with each other following the interview and ultimately

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:10

make a decision to communicate that decision to the candidate.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:13

So all of that really begins to add up, even as I'm saying it out loud, I can

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:17

kind of just like, feel it adding up.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:19

These final round interviews that don't end up resulting in a hire

Jeremy Tolan: 00:03:23

it could be a huge time, money and resource drain for a company.

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:27

Yeah.

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:28

I figured that this is a really good transition to asking Matt, you're going

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:33

through the hiring process right now.

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:34

I feel like you're constantly going through the hiring process.

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:36

You've had the hiring process work out really well for you.

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:39

You've had the hiring process not work out for you very well.

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:41

Can you talk about the painful parts of the hiring process that you've

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:46

experienced before and why maybe other business leaders might be

Kevin Dieny: 00:03:49

like, yeah, hiring is such a pain.

Matt Widmyer: 00:03:51

Yeah, I think the pain that I've suffered is a little bit

Matt Widmyer: 00:03:55

different now than it was initially when I was first trying to grow a team.

Matt Widmyer: 00:03:59

And I think that, obviously now we have the challenge of COVID

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:03

and trying to get people to apply.

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:05

It seems like there's a talent shortage that's going on right now.

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:08

When resumes are coming in, more than you can actually

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:11

sift through and look through.

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:14

It's a little bit challenging because you have to select the best resumes.

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:18

It is a huge time suck.

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:19

And then when you do schedule a phone call with them to talk to them, sometimes, you

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:25

can tell whether you want to go further with the person or not within the first

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:28

couple of minutes of the phone call.

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:30

That's why I love.

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:31

Jeremy is probably kinda smiling right now because, this one way video

Matt Widmyer: 00:04:35

interviewing has made it, significantly easier on me, at least that piece of it.

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:40

The pain is always around, the time it takes.

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:42

So Matt described how you alluded to it Jeremy, the process takes you

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:46

away from what you're normally doing.

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:48

And sometimes there's a committee involved.

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:49

Sometimes there's other people who have to be involved.

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:51

There are sign-offs from HR or making sure we can afford this role and

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:55

what the parameters of it are going to be and how this is going to fit.

Kevin Dieny: 00:04:58

But the time itself is also pretty significant.

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:01

Do you have any ideas around how long hiring can take or usually

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:05

takes and then that toll Jeremy?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:08

Yeah.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:08

When, when I've been looking into this, as recently as a few months ago,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:12

I saw that the, I think it was 23.8 days on average, is the length of the

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:18

interview process in the United States.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:20

So about 24 days.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:22

Obviously that can vary from company to company or even just from role

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:26

to role that a company's hiring for.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:05:28

So pretty much like a full month, as the average right now.

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:31

Gosh.

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:32

So, it makes sense, you want to hire the right person.

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:35

And so there's an element of culture involved.

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:39

We want them to fit for the role itself, but we want also them to fit with the

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:42

team that we're bringing them into.

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:44

Matt, do you have any stories or things involved around what can go right

Kevin Dieny: 00:05:49

and what can go wrong in the hiring process that you'd want to share?

Matt Widmyer: 00:05:52

I think bringing in the wrong people is, always

Matt Widmyer: 00:05:55

something that can go wrong.

Matt Widmyer: 00:05:57

It's a time commitment, not only going through the whole hiring process but

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:01

having to spend our resources, company, resources, time, money, energy, trying

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:09

to get someone up to speed when, they're not the right person for the job.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:12

Conversely, somebody who's going to come in here and kick butt from day

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:15

one, hit the ground running, those really look good on paper, right?

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:19

Self-starters are great.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:20

As long as you give them the tools and training and

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:22

everything, involved with that.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:23

We've had rockstars.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:25

One of my best people that we hired, started two days of

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:28

training and he was just out running, broke records, everything.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:31

And then you have people who are so awesome in the whole interview process.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:36

They come in, you're thinking to yourself, wow, this person's

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:38

just like a professional interviewer or something like that.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:41

It's a mixed bag.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:42

I'm hiring for the SDR role.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:44

So, it is a mixed bag.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:46

It's more of an entry-level role.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:47

So we get a pretty wide spectrum, but I have learned to not judge a book by

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:53

its cover, give everybody a chance I am sure they're safer bets than others.

Matt Widmyer: 00:06:57

But you never really know until they get here.

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:00

Yeah, that's some good stories and

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:02

experiences to go off on there.

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:04

I think something that you brought up that takes me back to the

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:08

beginning here is, when to know that you need to hire someone?

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:12

You're constantly trying to fill roles, for a specific position right now for

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:17

the sales development representatives.

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:20

And that role is constantly not vacant, but it's a place where people come in

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:26

and then they can go on or the team can come in there and people can get

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:30

really good experience and they can figure out a good fit for themselves.

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:33

But how does a business know when they should hire for a new role?

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:37

I think that's a question that a business leader might be thinking about.

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:41

When is it going to be time that I need to take this off my plate, put a role

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:46

there, or get someone to do that for me?

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:48

Questions a manager should be thinking about if they should

Kevin Dieny: 00:07:52

be hiring for a new role?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:07:54

There's a number of situations that they might

Jeremy Tolan: 00:07:56

find themselves in or questions that they should be assessing.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:07:59

And to Matt's point when you're hiring someone like a SDR or any type of entry

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:04

level position, I think there's an increased level of challenge with that

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:07

because it is entry level in nature.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:09

So the candidates that you're interviewing considering they probably don't have much

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:13

experience sometimes not any at all right.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:15

It can be harder to make a decision.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:17

You really want to structure your process to make sure that candidates have

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:20

these skills that you're looking for.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:22

Through an interviewing process and not as much from just like

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:24

reviewing someone's resume, that has a lot of limited information.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:27

But, how would, you know, if you need to start hiring for a new role?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:30

I think if you're noticing that team members aren't really finishing their

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:34

day or their week, and they have too many unfinished tasks at the end of the day

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:38

or a week that are high priority tasks.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:41

You definitely should be looking for more employees.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:43

I think if you're finding that your employees aren't able to spend time

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:48

on their highest priority activities, or in some cases, revenue generating

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:51

activities definitely need to start searching to make some hires.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:08:55

And if you're noticing that someone's quality of work is suffering, you know,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:00

they're capable of doing better work, but they're just so busy that they can't...

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:04

They can't really put their best work forward.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:06

I think that's a good indicator that you should be looking in and

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:09

start hiring to fill more positions.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:11

And I think what's super important is that you're consistently having transparent

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:16

conversations with your employees to really understand their workloads and

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:21

make sure that there's a culture of them feeling comfortable, opening up to you

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:24

and letting you know, and making sure you're aware if they feel like they are

Jeremy Tolan: 00:09:27

taking on too much responsibility so that you can adjust for these types of events.

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:32

Yeah, that's some really good advice.

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:34

And those are pretty much the bullet for bullet things I was thinking of.

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:37

When would it be a good time to hire for this?

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:40

A lot of times it can go a little past just because of the way financials are.

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:46

But in that case, what suffers?

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:47

Whatever the priorities are, whatever main things need to get

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:50

done that are not getting done.

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:51

Now can I put a price on the things that are being lost?

Kevin Dieny: 00:09:55

Like you mentioned, and does that sort of sum up to a part-time person, a full-time

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:00

person, temporary, what does that mean?

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:02

Is this like a seasonal thing for me?

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:03

I think there's a lot of different ways that employers are trying to

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:06

figure out how can I solve this need without getting fully into the

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:11

full-time employee kind of a situation.

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:13

Which then some of the things you said, I think lead perfectly

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:16

into the next question.

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:17

So I'll throw it right back to you Jeremy, how can you determine if a

Kevin Dieny: 00:10:20

candidate is an ideal fit for a role?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:23

It's definitely not easy.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:24

And I think the ideal fit is definitely gonna vary from company to company.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:28

And even within that company, it might vary a little bit from role

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:32

the role that you're recruiting for.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:34

So I think that's why it's super important to really talk about with

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:38

the other leaders and really map out the skills that you're seeking for that

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:41

role so that you can figure out what are the best interview questions that

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:45

are going to help you identify if a candidate actually has those skills.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:48

A few things that I find really important when I'm hiring are someone's

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:53

overall problem solving skills.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:54

So I'd like to learn more about how they approach problems and try to solve them.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:10:58

I like to learn more about a candidate's self-awareness and what type of commitment

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:02

do they have to actually improving and bettering themselves consistently?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:06

A few questions that help with identifying these things, when

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:09

I'm trying to learn more about a candidate's problem solving skills.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:11

I'd like to ask about one of the toughest problems that they were able to solve

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:15

and how did they go about solving it?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:17

So I'd love to hear about their problem solving process that way.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:20

Or I might flip that question where I might outline a certain scenario or

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:24

a challenge that I would expect them to have to overcome in the role that

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:28

they're applying for and just hear about how would they try to overcome that?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:32

And hear about their problem solving process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:34

So I think that's a great way to learn more about their problem solving

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:36

skills, which I find super important.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:39

When I'm thinking about a candidate self-awareness, I'd like to learn more

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:42

about what are the three things that are most important to them about a job or

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:46

about a company that they want to work at.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:47

And why are those things important to them?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:50

And to take it a step further?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:51

To, to learn more about their self-awareness and their

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:54

overall commitment to improving.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:11:56

I like to ask about what's a skill that they want to improve upon, and

Jeremy Tolan: 00:12:00

if they don't address this, then I'll probe a little further and ask about

Jeremy Tolan: 00:12:03

like, what steps have they already taken to try to improve on that?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:12:06

What steps are they open to taking that they've thought about, but

Jeremy Tolan: 00:12:09

haven't taken yet and just really see how willing they are to, to just

Jeremy Tolan: 00:12:12

to consistently better themselves.

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:15

Wow.

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:15

That's some really good ideas.

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:16

I love the idea about asking the questions and probing and figuring out

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:21

what questions are important that are going to create answers that are going

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:25

to help me really narrow this down.

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:26

I'm going to put it on the, it's almost impossible for a hiring person to know

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:31

perfectly well if someone's an ideal fit?

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:34

I think you get close enough, getting to that territory, where it's not just a

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:38

total guess and a total flip of a coin.

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:41

But I think it's really hard.

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:43

Cause like Matt had mentioned maybe someone is a perfect interviewer

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:46

but it's so hard to get that right.

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:48

So Matt, do you have any questions or things that you've done to make

Kevin Dieny: 00:12:52

finding a better fit in a candidate?

Matt Widmyer: 00:12:55

The main things I look at is, I look for a positive attitude.

Matt Widmyer: 00:12:59

I look for a strong work ethic and I look for a student mentality,

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:02

someone who's coachable.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:04

Most of the questions that I'm asking during the video, we do one way video

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:08

interviewing, through Spark Hire, but most of the questions that are asked

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:13

through that, are gauging those things.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:15

You're basically reverse engineering to find out where

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:18

they fall along those spectrums.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:20

Another thing I think about when I'm interviewing somebody is, what do they

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:24

bring to the table when it comes to the culture and the morale of the team?

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:27

They seem like they would be a kinda like a negative Nancy or

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:30

they seem like someone who's a cheerleader type person for the team.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:33

Those are some of the things that I think about, there again, mixed bag.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:37

You never know what you're going to get because, like you said, the

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:39

interview process a little bit different than when they actually get here.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:43

But, those are the things that have made it a little bit easier for me.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:46

And then, when we do get the interviews back in video format, I

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:50

do share, all of those with my team.

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:53

The recordings, cause I want everybody's buy-in I feel like the last couple of

Matt Widmyer: 00:13:57

times have been unanimous, Hey, let's do let's get this person or let's not bring

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:01

this person in for an in-person interview.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:03

I also like giving my team a voice and because they're going to be ultimately

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:08

sitting beside them and helping with the coaching and the training and everything.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:11

This is a democracy over here, right?

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:13

I have the final say, but I do like, other people weighing in.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:17

Because they might notice something that I don't or they might

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:20

miss something that I noticed.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:21

At some point they're going to be doing the hiring, maybe even without me.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:24

So I want everyone to be on the same page.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:27

We're still figuring out the magic formula though.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:29

If I had it down, I would probably be a recruiter myself,

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:32

but we're still figuring it out.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:34

It's a never ending thing.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:14:36

I think that's an awesome point.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:14:38

When you're thinking about how to identify a good fit, get multiple

Jeremy Tolan: 00:14:41

opinions from different members of your team to help you identify if they're

Jeremy Tolan: 00:14:45

going to be a good fit, because yeah.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:14:46

They might notice things that you don't, and everyone's going to be

Jeremy Tolan: 00:14:49

able to collaborate with each other to really understand if someone's

Jeremy Tolan: 00:14:52

a good fit from just evaluating from all these different angles.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:55

Right.

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:56

And what I don't want is I don't want, you know, if I'm asking

Matt Widmyer: 00:14:59

somebody to tell me a little bit about themselves, I don't want to hear

Matt Widmyer: 00:15:03

everything I just read on their resume.

Matt Widmyer: 00:15:05

Right.

Matt Widmyer: 00:15:06

I'm kind of looking for beyond the resume things.

Matt Widmyer: 00:15:08

But.

Matt Widmyer: 00:15:10

Yeah, it's pretty, it's a strange world out there.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:13

Okay.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:13

So let's pivot a little bit.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:15

We've been talking a little bit about man, hiring could be painful,

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:18

some tips around making that a lot more manageable, easier to getting

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:22

to the right fit of a candidate.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:24

So let's flip it on its head a little.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:27

So as the candidate, as someone who's looking for a job, hiring is tedious.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:32

It's brutal being told no, all the time is demoralizing.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:36

It is, it feels terrible.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:38

Chasing after a job, after job, after job can wear you down.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:41

It's not a fun process, job hunting, and it is, a big

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:46

influence on the rest of your life.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:47

So finding the right job as a candidate, it's also important finding the right

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:51

fit and finding a right manager, finding the right company with the

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:55

right role that you're looking for.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:56

Maybe that will give you a leg to your career.

Kevin Dieny: 00:15:59

It's super important.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:00

And as the candidates out there who are just getting their feet wet in this.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:03

It's confusing.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:05

It's all over the place.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:06

There's tons of sites.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:07

There's what do I do?

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:08

Do I throw cover letters?

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:09

Do I, this one's asking me to solve these questions, this puzzle, this one

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:13

wants me to come in, this one's remote.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:15

There's so much there to tackle.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:17

This will be a question for you, Jeremy, in terms of how to improve

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:20

the hiring process so that it improves it both for the business and for the

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:24

candidate who are going through this.

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:26

Do you have any ideas for how to improve the hiring process?

Kevin Dieny: 00:16:30

For both teams, for both people who are both trying to find the right fit?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:34

Yeah, no, I'm glad you asked this because we talked about

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:37

the pain points for business leaders, but it can be just as painful for

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:41

candidates if you don't have a well put together hiring process too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:45

I think it definitely goes both ways.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:47

It goes both ways.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:48

These pain points go both ways, too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:49

When you're thinking about both perspectives, as a business leader,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:53

make sure you're putting together a highly structured hiring process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:56

So think about mapping out the different stages of your process and

Jeremy Tolan: 00:16:59

within each stage, what are the tasks that actually need to be executed?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:03

Set realistic deadlines for these tasks so that you can hold yourself and your

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:07

team accountable to these and make sure you're clearly defining who's going

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:11

to be responsible for each task too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:13

So just maybe as a quick example, when a candidate applies, the first

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:17

task might be to review the resume and application and then communicate back to

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:21

them whether or not they're going to be advanced to the next step of the process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:25

So that might be the task that's being done.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:27

And in maybe you want to say, 24 business hours to follow up with the

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:33

candidate on their application like that.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:35

And then which member of your team is going to be responsible for

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:38

that task for whichever position.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:40

So really identify those things and add structure to your process because

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:44

that's going to keep your process running efficiently and help you avoid

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:48

some of the pain points we talked about for business leaders earlier.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:51

But it's also going to make your process better for candidates where

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:54

you're going to be following up with them in a very quick time period.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:57

They're going to feel encouraged to continue to move forward

Jeremy Tolan: 00:17:59

with your hiring process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:01

You're not going to miss out on them because they're probably interviewing

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:04

for other companies and you don't want someone to get an offer out

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:06

in front of them before you do.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:07

And then they just accept that offer instead of continuing to

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:10

pursue your role so make sure you have a highly structured process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:13

And when you are going about structuring your process, make sure that you're

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:17

keeping your candidates top of mind, too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:20

Things to think about is, keep them as informed as possible.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:24

Make sure they know exactly what to expect throughout your process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:27

Maybe outline the steps of your hiring process from the outset when

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:30

they first apply, make sure they understand the general timelines

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:34

for when you're going to get back to them at different stages of your

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:36

process, how long this should all take.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:38

And a good exercise to do is try going through your own hiring

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:41

process as if you're a candidate.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:43

So you can really understand what they're going through.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:45

Truly put yourself in their shoes and identify, maybe there's areas for

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:49

improvement or things that you're doing really well, that you can double down on.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:52

But try going through that process yourself as if you're a candidate

Jeremy Tolan: 00:18:55

and really see what it's like.

Kevin Dieny: 00:18:58

Wow.

Kevin Dieny: 00:18:58

I'd like to just reiterate some of those incredibly important things you just said.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:03

So number one, responding to people in a quickly timely manner is huge.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:09

I would say that as someone who has applied to places and fought for trying

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:14

to get jobs and stuff, a company that got back quicker, you feel really good about.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:18

A company that takes six months and they're like, Hey, you still looking?

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:21

It's like, man, that was, I don't even remember you anymore.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:24

It's a big deal to get back to people, as well.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:28

I can't tell you how many times you apply to a place you get along

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:30

the process, not just off the first resume, but you get along the

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:33

process and you don't hear anything.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:34

They've just ghosted you.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:35

And that can feel kinda rough.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:37

For the manager, it's like, look, I'm just trying to get the right person.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:40

But if you create a good process, you may actually create a pipeline.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:44

Let's call it a pipeline of potential hires that even if you are only gonna

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:49

hire one or two people, there might be other suitable candidates that could be

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:54

in there that really liked the process.

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:56

And then later on, if they want to apply again, they have the trust

Kevin Dieny: 00:19:59

that, okay, here's a process, a company that knows what they're doing,

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:02

that has its head on its shoulders and they know what they're doing.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:06

And their not just stumbling around and then whatever paper lands on

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:09

the desk is the one that gets hired.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:11

They like knowing that there's a good process there as a candidate

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:13

who went through this is like one of the things I thought about.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:15

So those are really good things you've mentioned, Jeremy.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:18

The next thing I was going to ask about was referrals.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:23

When you do bring in good employees and you have a good process and

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:26

you know where everybody's at along the way, you can, don't have to

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:30

dedicate as much mind space to it.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:32

And then as the candidate who has a good experience, they may think,

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:36

oh, wow, I'll put my friend through this, I'll put my cousin through this.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:39

I know someone who's a good fit.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:40

And this is a good company.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:42

The process is not so crazy that they're gonna pull their hair out.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:45

So Matt, this will be a question for you.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:47

How do you create a process where, it also includes the ability to

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:52

get referrals, employee referrals.

Kevin Dieny: 00:20:53

Meaning someone says, oh, I have a friend who could be really good fit for this job.

Matt Widmyer: 00:20:58

Yeah.

Matt Widmyer: 00:20:58

I mean, referrals are hands down the best kind of candidates you can get.

Matt Widmyer: 00:21:03

I think they would probably the lowest risk because you have a

Matt Widmyer: 00:21:05

current employee vouching for them.

Matt Widmyer: 00:21:08

Internally, we offer we offer a sum of money if they make it for the three month

Matt Widmyer: 00:21:13

mark and they're still in good standing.

Matt Widmyer: 00:21:16

They get a cash bonus paid out on the following paycheck.

Matt Widmyer: 00:21:21

Seems to have worked out so well, we're probably two for three, doing it that way.

Matt Widmyer: 00:21:25

So it's still, more data needed, but, so far it's working out pretty well.

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:31

Yeah I like the idea of referrals.

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:32

It can create a little bit of an interesting relationship involved

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:35

there, but I think most of the time people come to work and, as

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:38

long as the process is decent.

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:40

I think making shortcuts, cutting around things, being like, oh yeah,

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:43

this person knows this person, so they must be a perfect fit and not

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:46

following up with any of the hiring process and just jumping straight to go.

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:50

There might be some issues there.

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:51

But, I think at the end of the day, a referral is a good place to at

Kevin Dieny: 00:21:55

least get in the door, cause there's a lot of places to promote a job.

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:00

I guess that'll bring me right to the next question, Jeremy.

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:02

So how important is it to be, detailed, specific, accurate with the

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:07

job that you're trying to hire for?

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:09

Should you try to get a whole bunch of candidates in the door

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:12

and then bait and switch them?

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:13

How important is it to be very honest, transparent, accurate with the job

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:17

that you're trying to get people for?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:20

Yeah.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:21

I mean, it's incredibly important for both the candidate to have a good

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:25

experience, but also for the employer to, to understand that they are going to be

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:29

hiring a suitable candidate for the role.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:32

So it's so important.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:33

It's crucial.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:34

It's all about setting the right expectations for what

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:36

you're seeking from candidates.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:38

And that's going to help you validate that the candidates are actually going

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:40

to be able to perform well in the role.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:42

And, um, just so important that a candidate can understand if they're

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:46

actually interested in the role or if they feel like they're capable of

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:49

being able to perform well on the role.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:22:51

So setting clear and accurate expectations for, for a role is incredibly important.

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:57

Yeah, I agree.

Kevin Dieny: 00:22:58

I've experienced the this job sounds right.

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:02

And get in and then realize it's something totally different and been like, man, this

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:06

burned my time, my gas coming down here.

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:09

It's a big deal.

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:10

So, Matt, what are some places that employees or that managers could

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:17

put their resumes, they could put their jobs out there, that you've

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:20

had good experiences with in terms of sourcing out and getting the hires.

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:24

Do you have any thoughts on places that businesses should go

Kevin Dieny: 00:23:27

or can go to get the word out?

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:30

I've recently, most of our resumes will come from indeed, you

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:34

know, just recruiting sites, Indeed, Monster we've used, um, ZipRecruiter.

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:38

Indeed I think is one of the big players right now in terms of like

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:41

actually getting their resumes.

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:43

As we said, referrals we've been doing, I've also been recently connecting with

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:47

some of the college campuses in this area.

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:49

Just setting up a little network, I'm planting seeds.

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:53

It's summertime currently there right now, so no one's in school and

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:56

definitely no one's looking for work.

Matt Widmyer: 00:23:57

But when the school year starts back up, we will be looking for alumni,

Matt Widmyer: 00:24:01

as this is a pretty good landing spot right out of graduate system.

Matt Widmyer: 00:24:05

But I think that one's a little too early to tell, but that's something

Matt Widmyer: 00:24:07

we just started recently doing.

Matt Widmyer: 00:24:09

I'm canvassing a radius of probably 15, 20 miles from where we are physically.

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:15

Okay.

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:15

So that brings up a good question, and so Jeremy, how does a

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:20

company hire when there's a very limited supply of candidates?

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:25

Like how do they stand out?

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:27

How do they attract the right people for the job when there's

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:32

hardly anyone, like right now, there might be a lull in hiring.

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:35

It's a candidates market.

Kevin Dieny: 00:24:36

How do businesses succeed in times or in areas like that?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:24:41

Yeah to you, to your point, it's all about standing out.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:24:44

And I don't think it's any secret that if a candidate is applying for one

Jeremy Tolan: 00:24:47

position, they're probably applying for other positions at other companies, too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:24:50

They want to stack the deck for themselves and get the best position that makes

Jeremy Tolan: 00:24:54

sense for themselves and evaluate other companies, other positions.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:24:58

So to your point, it's all about standing out.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:01

One of the biggest things I could recommend is to leverage

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:03

your employer branded content.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:05

So when I think about that, I'm thinking about things like team pictures.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:09

I think it actually goes a long way.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:10

When a candidate could see a picture of the potential team

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:13

that they would be joining.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:14

Maybe you have pictures, like on the careers page of your website, you might

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:18

be linking to a corporate Instagram account, at some point throughout

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:21

your hiring process so that candidates can learn more about your company.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:24

Get excited about and kind of picture themselves fitting in

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:28

with the team and working there.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:29

Thinking about getting articles out on external websites, one that's been really

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:33

effective for us is called built-in.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:36

You might also just have leaders at your organization that are putting out

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:39

thought leadership articles, different pieces that they've written, and you

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:42

can incorporate those at different points in your hiring process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:44

Maybe you're sharing them with a candidate, in email at some point.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:47

And telling them to check it out to learn a little bit more about what it's like

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:50

to work at the organization and think about things like reviews from your own

Jeremy Tolan: 00:25:55

employees, a popular place that candidates are going to do research about a company

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:00

would be Glassdoor is a popular website.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:03

So make sure that you're putting your best foot forward on sites like Glassdoor.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:06

Something that I found really effective was sharing customer

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:09

reviews with candidates too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:11

At some point in your process, when you send an email to a candidate, maybe

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:14

you're scheduling an interview with them.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:15

At the end of the email, PS, check out a few reviews from some happy customers.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:19

I think you'd find these pretty cool.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:21

And then when I would meet with them for that interview in person, they

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:25

would talk about how they got even more interested in working at spark hire.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:28

After they read a few really good reviews from customers that got them

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:31

really excited and thinking about what it would be like to work there.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:34

And then.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:35

I'm also a huge proponent of using videos and emails too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:40

And I think they're usually most effective if they're created by your employees.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:43

Like in Matt's case, if you're hiring for SDRs, I think it could go a long

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:46

way if you asked one of your SDRs to record a quick video, talking about

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:50

why they love working at your company, what do they like about the role?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:54

Share that with your candidates at different points in the process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:56

Maybe you're just including that in email.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:26:59

Maybe you have a video from a team event that you guys had, that kind of shows

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:03

the relationships that you guys build.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:04

How much fun you you guys have together?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:06

How this is more than just a place that you guys come through to work.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:09

So having this different types of content that you can share with

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:12

candidates and emails throughout your hiring process, I think really

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:15

helps you stand out as an employer.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:17

And just going back to something that I talked about earlier, when

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:20

I was talking about improving the candidate experience, just keep your

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:23

candidates updated consistently on where they stand in your process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:26

And if maybe you told them that you're going to get back to them about next

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:30

steps next week, next week comes around and you actually haven't made a decision.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:34

Still keep in touch with them and just let them know, like,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:36

Hey, I need a few more days.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:38

We'll be back in touch in a moment here.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:39

Just give me a few more days on this, but still give them that update and keeping

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:43

consistent contact with their candidates too, because, I think that's going to

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:46

help you stand out also versus another company who is maybe staying in more

Jeremy Tolan: 00:27:50

frequent contact with the candidate too.

Kevin Dieny: 00:27:54

Wow.

Kevin Dieny: 00:27:54

Yeah, that's some really good advice.

Kevin Dieny: 00:27:56

The suggesting of the emails with the video is a really cool idea.

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:00

I really liked that.

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:01

And going off of that, Jeremy, do you have any ideas that you may want to

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:06

recommend to business leaders of small, medium, even the enterprise, larger

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:10

companies of third-party services, tools, things that can do to either

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:16

help get the job description right, the job posting right, things that they

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:20

can do to get the most resumes back?

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:23

Things that they can do to help the actual interviewing process, which I know

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:28

you have something to talk about there.

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:30

Is there any third party or anything that could offset and help leaders

Kevin Dieny: 00:28:35

make the process easier for them?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:37

Yeah.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:38

I this probably isn't a surprise.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:40

I'm a huge proponent of using one way video interviews considering

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:43

I work at Spark Hire and that's pretty much just what we do.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:46

The one way video interviews, Matt alluded to it a couple of times you

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:48

could set up questions in advance.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:50

And then candidates can record video responses to them on their own.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:54

So that way you and any other hiring stakeholders can review the responses

Jeremy Tolan: 00:28:57

at your own convenience, work together and decide which candidates you want to

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:01

advance to the next stage of the process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:02

So it's ultimately going to save you a ton of time.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:05

It's going to help you avoid scheduling challenges because candidates can

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:08

just do these interviews on their own before the deadline you set for them.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:11

You get to review it when it's convenient for you.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:13

And you're ultimately going to learn a lot more about the candidates

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:17

versus just talking to them over the phone or reviewing their resumes.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:20

So you're going to make better decisions about which ones you're

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:22

going to actually meet with for a more final round interview.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:25

And overall, you're going to be able to improve how you're

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:28

collaborating with different team members throughout the process.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:30

Like the story that Matt told earlier about how he gets a lot of his team

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:34

members involved to weigh in on candidates by reviewing the recordings that way.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:38

Another thing that I would definitely recommend too, is using

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:41

an applicant tracking system.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:42

That's going to help you keep your candidate information organized in one

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:45

space and also help automate certain tasks in your hiring process too.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:49

And then if you're just thinking about your process and trying to

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:52

implement process improvements, really map out the different stages

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:55

of your process, identify the ones.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:29:58

Where you see the greatest areas for improvement and determined like where

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:02

what are the most important ones?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:04

Because those are the ones that you're going to want to tackle first, maybe

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:07

your lowest hanging fruit, the things that you see, the greatest areas for

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:11

improvement, what's most important.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:12

Where are you suffering the most right now in your process

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:15

and tackle those things first.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:17

You're not going to be able to, to make all these improvements in a day, in a

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:20

week, in a month in a quarter, maybe not even an entire year, but you want to

Jeremy Tolan: 00:30:24

figure out a way to prioritize the changes that you are able to afford to make.

Kevin Dieny: 00:30:28

Those are some really good ideas.

Kevin Dieny: 00:30:30

Matt, did you have anything to add to that about, ideas or suggestions or

Kevin Dieny: 00:30:34

your experience using the one-way video?

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:36

Yeah, I would say I was just going to say I'm a huge fan

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:39

of the one way video interviewing through Spark Hire specifically,

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:42

just a very easy platform to use.

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:45

It's been a game changer, honestly, and at one point a few years back,

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:50

I threw my hands up and said, okay, how do I build this team up?

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:53

Right.

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:53

Because as we've talked about, if you're trying to fill a role.

Matt Widmyer: 00:30:58

It's basically a full-time job in itself.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:01

So I went I went out networking with other SDR managers and, one of the things

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:06

that fell out of the sky from one of them was one way video interviewing.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:09

So I looked into different services, picked Spark Hire, and

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:12

it was, it's been a game changer.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:14

It's allowing me to cast a wider net on some people where I would just kind

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:18

of scoot their resume over the side.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:20

One of the things that I'm struggling with right now, actually, I was going

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:24

to ask Jeremy if he maybe had any tips outside of, I guess what was mentioned,

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:29

obviously it's a weird time right now.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:31

We have the hiring process dialed in.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:33

I love your idea about, documenting the fun you're having.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:37

We have a lot of fun over here.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:38

We don't document a lot of it.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:40

So we'd love to share that with other candidates.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:42

But, the resumes, I know a lot of places are hiring right now.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:47

Not a lot of people are applying and I don't know if this is a temporary thing.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:50

It's pandemic related a hundred percent.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:53

It's an across the board thing.

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:54

Particularly it looks like it's affecting entry-level positions,

Matt Widmyer: 00:31:59

like the one I'm hiring for.

Matt Widmyer: 00:32:00

Do you have any suggestions?

Matt Widmyer: 00:32:02

On how to find the right kind of candidates.

Matt Widmyer: 00:32:05

And even through Indeed, seeing the hashtag ready to work and it doesn't seem

Matt Widmyer: 00:32:10

like anyone's really that ready to work.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:14

Yeah, I think I could have a suggestion.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:16

And I think to your point too, it's like a lot of these companies,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:20

they are doing a lot of things that to foster a really good culture.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:23

People are having a lot of fun and enjoy the relationships they build

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:26

with each other, but they don't think about documenting and taking

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:29

selfies or videos and stuff like that.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:31

It's no different than our personal lives.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:33

We go out with our friends and family have a great time.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:36

I forgot to take any pictures or anything like that to remember,

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:39

everything that we were up to, but yeah.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:41

Definitely remember to take a step back and do these things.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:44

I think when you are recording videos of your employees, just talking about

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:48

why they love to work at your company, what they love about the position I

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:52

encourage you to get those videos recorded and share them on social media, like

Jeremy Tolan: 00:32:56

LinkedIn and ask your network to share it.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:00

Or to tag people that they might know that they think would be interested in working

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:04

there or even working in that position.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:06

And I think that's a good way just to informally get

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:08

external referrals from people.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:11

I think people are very engaged by LinkedIn.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:12

They're very engaged by videos on LinkedIn and if they saw a cool video

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:16

and they're like, oh yeah, I know someone I'm just going to type in

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:19

the comments and tag them in here.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:21

Then you could go ahead and send them a message and see if they want to

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:23

talk to you more about the position.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:24

I think that's an out of the box way, try to source more candidates that way.

Matt Widmyer: 00:33:30

Yeah.

Matt Widmyer: 00:33:31

It's either that, or kind of cross my fingers.

Matt Widmyer: 00:33:32

Right.

Matt Widmyer: 00:33:35

Yeah, it's good stuff though.

Matt Widmyer: 00:33:36

I appreciate that.

Kevin Dieny: 00:33:37

So Jeremy, was there anything that we didn't talk about or anything

Kevin Dieny: 00:33:41

that you thought of that was worth mentioning that we just didn't get to?

Kevin Dieny: 00:33:44

Is there anything like that?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:46

I'm sure we could go on for a lot longer and chop it up

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:49

about a lot of other, challenges, process improvements, things like that.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:53

I think, some of the most important takeaways from today, might've

Jeremy Tolan: 00:33:57

been about really finding ways to stand out to candidates, thinking

Jeremy Tolan: 00:34:00

about generating these referrals.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:34:02

How do you make your process as efficient as possible?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:34:04

So not only is it benefiting you as a business leader, but also your

Jeremy Tolan: 00:34:09

candidates and providing them with an awesome experience too, where

Jeremy Tolan: 00:34:11

they're just really enthusiastic about working for your organization.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:34:15

But, yeah, I don't think so.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:34:17

I think we hit on a lot of really awesome points today.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:20

Yeah.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:20

Thanks Jeremy.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:21

I think that's a really good summary there.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:23

I was going to add that.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:26

Putting yourself in the candidate's shoes is really important.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:28

Especially if you've been working in the business, thinking about it, like, man,

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:32

I need to find a candidate just like me.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:33

That's going to work just as hard as me.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:35

And he's going to put in 200% every day.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:37

But at the same time, this isn't their business.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:40

It makes hiring tough.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:41

It makes it hard.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:42

We really spend a good amount of time in the beginning talking about

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:45

how hard this is for businesses.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:47

So yeah, it's so tough.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:48

It's so hard for businesses to get it right.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:50

A vacant job.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:51

Can just sit there and it's weighing on the managers, weighing on the company.

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:55

It's something that everyone's like, oh, but you can

Kevin Dieny: 00:34:58

incorporate it into your process.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:00

You can have something that you can lean on where you're

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:01

like, okay, this is my process.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:03

This is how we're going to do it.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:05

I can leave it there.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:06

I don't have to be dreading it or worrying about it.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:08

It's gonna work out.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:09

It's gonna get me the right candidates.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:10

It's gonna get me the right people.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:12

I may not have control over how many people are looking for the role.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:15

I can do things to try to improve that.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:17

Having that strong process I think is so important, responding to people quickly,

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:21

getting back to people is things that improve the candidates experience.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:26

I think you, man, you've touched on all the things that I was thinking about

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:30

when we were going into this topic.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:32

So I really appreciate it, Jeremy, thank you for coming on

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:34

and speaking to us about this.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:37

Oh, wait, Jeremy one last little thing.

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:39

Can you share with everyone how they can connect with you, find out more about

Kevin Dieny: 00:35:43

your company or anything like that?

Jeremy Tolan: 00:35:45

Yeah, definitely reach out to me.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:35:47

Connect with me on LinkedIn.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:35:49

My name is Jeremy Tolan, J E R E M Y T O L A N.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:35:54

If you're interested in learning more about spark hire, go to this site

Jeremy Tolan: 00:35:58

here, go.sparkhire.com/callsource.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:36:03

Spark Hire is spelled S P A R K H I R E.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:36:07

And definitely connect with me on LinkedIn.

Jeremy Tolan: 00:36:08

And let me know if you, if you tuned into the cast.

Kevin Dieny: 00:36:11

Great.

Kevin Dieny: 00:36:11

Yeah.

Kevin Dieny: 00:36:12

Thank you, Jeremy.

Matt Widmyer: 00:36:13

Yeah, it's been great.

Matt Widmyer: 00:36:13

Appreciate all your advice.

Matt Widmyer: 00:36:15

It's all definitely gold stuff.

Matt Widmyer: 00:36:17

I've actually been taking notes while, while we're doing this on a couple