The Secrets for Finding Employees Who Love to Work For You

Welcome to Ali and you'd. The business success and lifestyle show. My name is Ali, and you are in the right place if you want to grow your business. I'm a serial entrepreneur and I help entrepreneurs move from entrepreneur to enterprise. And today, if you're really wanting to scale your business, you need to stay tuned because I have the most amazing expert guest that's going to talk about his rise in building his business, but also about recruiting, because that's what his business is all about. And one of the biggest challenges that business owners have is finding those right people to help you grow your vision. So we're going to give you some insight and some tips and some strategies on that right here on Allie and you'd. Well, I am so excited to introduce to you our guest today on Allie and you. So, Chris Egan is the founder of Solaritus Associates. He founded this company in 2011, and his company specializes in recruiting, and it's a search firm that serves the legal and professional services community. And so you're going to learn a lot about recruiting and how to find those right people. And I know for some of you, that's the biggest challenge that you have as you grow your business. So, Chris, welcome.

Allie, thanks for having me.

Yeah, I'm really excited that you're here.

I am as well.

Yeah. So Chris and I actually work out at the gym together just down the road, and that's how we met. So some of you know that physical fitness is a big part of my life and actually one of the, you know, probably the biggest success secret that I have. So I'm sure that plays a big part in your success, too.

It does. I try to find time, you know, at least every other day to get there.

Yeah. Well, good. So tell us about your backstory. And, you know, I always like to hear the stories of people and their journey. How did you. Did you wake up one day and say, I want to be a business owner? Or is it something you've always longed to do?

Sure. Well, as far as I can remember, my family, as a side business, sold Christmas trees this time of year.

Oh, okay.

Back in New York and New Jersey. And so my earliest memories were working on the lot and in the beginning, tying up trees on top of the car and then ultimately selling Christmas trees. And I did that from age 3 till probably 25. So I think that set the hook for starting my own business.

Yeah, that's very cool. Well, as a side story, I'm actually going Christmas tree shopping today. But here's the twist for my Very first time.

Really?

Yeah, because I'm Jewish and my husband's Catholic. And so he always goes and gets the tree because that's really important to him. And he's like, honey, this year you're coming with me. Okay, so we're actually going to go do that today.

Where are you going to go?

Just right down, let's see, Rancho Santa Fe Road and Encinitas Boulevard over there.

Okay.

There's a lot over there. Is there somewhere else?

There is, I would say, I would recommend Ted's, which is on Santa Fe Drive, just between. Right across from San Diego High School.

Oh, okay.

He's the local guy who's been around for a long time. He's got great trees.

Okay, you. You heard it here. Right on Ally. And you so segue back to so. So started with that business. So you learned a lot just from that in sales?

I did, I did. I think that's also where I started to understand overcoming objections. Right. So buying Christmas tree, people always had an objection. It's not the right size, the price is too much. 1. The wife might like if it was often couples or families. And the wife might like a certain type of tree and the husband like a certain. So it was important to identify what was important to each of them and try to find something that they would agree upon.

Yeah. And you know, that's interesting because it doesn't matter what business that you have, there's objections. Correct. And so when you're selling, you have to be prepared for those objections. And you need. Because if you can overcome someone's objections, you have a customer.

Correct, Correct. And that's really been helpful in the recruiting business. You know, for my clients who I work closely with and I like to think I'm an extension of their organization. Often when I reach out to the market to recruit gainfully employed employee candidates from typically their competitors, there's objections about that organization, you know, preconceived notions. So oftentimes I'm overcoming one or two objections. Often if you can overcome the third, then people will listen.

So they're objecting to the company that you're actually recruiting for. They might have a misconceived idea.

Misconceived notion about the organization. Or they just may have a mis. They just may not be ill informed. They may not be informed about them.

Right.

So part of it is just explaining to them the opportunity to. And why it's worth their time.

Yeah. So I just find this so fascinating about recruiting and so forth. And so I want to get into all of that and how that actually works and what are some ideas we can glean for our viewers. But just I want to back up a little bit to. So you had a business before?

I had a company in, back in New York, which was an electronic discovery company that I started in 2001 and ultimately sold in 2008 and stayed within that business until 2011 and left to start this.

So that's a huge process. So you had that company for eight years and then you sold it, but you stayed on?

I did, I stayed on. And it was, it was, it was a great opportunity. We, it was a sale, but in some ways it was a merger. We took over their operation in New York City. At the time that wasn't doing very well. We were able to grow nationally and even internationally. So it was great learning. And at that same time, I was doing a lot of recruiting. So I'd been doing a lot of recruiting for the business nationally, hiring sales, project managers, database specialists, people that were specific to my business and I enjoyed it. And so it was time to leave and I was not sure what I wanted to do next, but I really did enjoy the recruiting part. And I had talked to some of my relationships in the market who at the time were competitors, and I shared with them that I was thinking about leaving and starting a recruiting firm. And I did my business plan on the back of an envelope and I talked to a handful of people and they said, yeah, we'd love to work with you. And all right, there we go. Yeah.

So you did an envelope instead of a napkin?

I did an envelope a little more.

Sturdy, maybe just a little more, a.

Little more space to write, a little.

More space to work with. So, yeah, it's interesting because I think a lot of times when people come to us for business coaching, they're wanting that sort of old fashioned business plan, which is great if you're going for investors and things like that. But I think that business is changing all of the time. I mean, you need to have a plan and where you want to go and all of that, but it's, it's definitely a little different than it used to be.

Correct. And even when I started Solaritus, I had thought about the recruiting aspect of it, but I also thought about doing events as part of the, as part of the company. And even the third component could have been software sales that were all tied to the same industry. But what I learned quickly was the recruiting was a, was a 24 hour commitment and I didn't have time for the other areas, and I genuinely enjoyed it. So I decided to focus in that area.

Yeah. And so there's a couple things with that, and I think that's actually a really important point. I think that entrepreneurs in generally have that shiny object syndrome. And you're like, we have so many ideas. And sometimes I'll meet business owners and I'll say, so tell me about what you do. And they'll tell me, like, five different things. And then they've completely lost me. Which generally means that they're confused too, you know, and it's tough. But even for myself, I've learned that when you stay with one thing for a long period of time and you can really dive deeply with that, you're going to have much more success than being divided in several areas.

Agreed. Agreed.

And at the same time, there might be other revenue opportunities. Once you really get this and you're scaling, then you can look at some other things that are related for revenue.

100% agree. When we started, and it's still, I'd say, about 50% of what we do, but I have the recruiting business focused on my old industry. But about three years ago, I wanted to diversify, and so we started to focus in law firm marketing and business development. And that is now steadily growing. I'd say this year, the third area that we'll look to add and continue to expand is our cybersecurity practice. And all of these may look separate to an outsider, but there's a common thread of the customers and law firms who we do a lot of our work with, they tend to work with people they trust and know. It's not easy to get in and to get an audience and to get them to listen.

Okay, interesting. Well, so the recruiting business is really about matching people to people. Right. People's needs and then bringing those Right. Matches together. It's like you're. It's like you're a matchmaker.

It's like a matchmaker.

You're a matchmaker. Right. And so you've got to be really good at reading people, wouldn't you say?

Agreed. Yeah. I think reading people is probably the biggest. One of the biggest aspects of the job and understanding what's their motivations are both for the. The client, the company who we work with, as well as the candidate who's going to fill that role.

Right.

And typically, what we see, and when I. When I talk to my clients, we tend to work with candidates that are gainfully employed at our client's competitor. Right. And they're somewhat happy doing what they're doing. They're not on job boards. They're not actively looking, but they'll listen to an opportunity if it's presented to them properly. And what we see, you know, people look for will change jobs. And this is helpful, I think, for business owners. They change for several reasons, but what we typically see is an opportunity for more responsibility, an opportunity for increased income, and possibly just an opportunity for a different organization.

Right. Just for a change.

Just for a change.

Yeah. Or. Yeah. The type of company that they're running. I mean, so on both sides, I see it as a business owner where this is really interesting because, one, you want to keep your team members, especially, you know, the ones that are really bringing value, and you. You respect and have a good relationship with. You invest a lot in your people and training and all of those things. So you don't want people that are just kind of a revolving door.

Correct.

So I think the key here is how can we keep our team members happy and challenged and feeling like they're growing so that they want to stay. Right.

Sure. I mean, I think one of the biggest challenges but opportunities is for companies to be very clear on what the expectation is, what are the goalposts, what is success? And not every organization can articulate that very well, especially for each position. So for our clients who we see that are very successful, the job responsibilities are very clear. But there's also opportunity to grow within the organization. Those companies are typically growing themselves.

Mm. Mm. I find that from my experience in talking to people, yes, the money is important, but for many people, it's an opportunity to grow as an individual, that they're going to be working on things that are challenging and that they'll have a sense of accomplishment and, you know, whatever, to maybe be in a leadership role and things like that that they will sometimes value even more than, let's say, making more money at a company. But not challenged, bored, and, you know.

Maybe sort of stagnant. Yeah, yeah. And that's. And I only see that changing. I mean, even. Even employees that historically maybe had worked at one or, you know, would have been one or two companies in their careers.

Right.

The average employee is changing jobs now every 28 to 30. You know, 28 months, 36 months. And I, you know, that that millennial factor is only going to accelerate.

Yeah. That's so interesting, because when we're looking at resumes, you're often looking at. That is. And so when you see someone that's been somewhere five, six years, you're like, okay, here's someone that can hang in there through the ups and the downs.

Correct.

You know what I mean? And you have more. You feel a little sense of security, that this person has some stick to itness, you know, but maybe, maybe that's changing. Maybe if you see someone two or three years at a company and you're saying that that's generally more.

I'm saying what I'm seeing for, you know, that for people that are 30 and under, it's much more common.

Right.

And. But I do think it's gonna. I think that transition is gonna permeate even to older you.

Do you workers?

I do.

I do, yeah. Because, you know, definitely it's a challenge that employers are having with millennials. Now I have a daughter that is a millennial. And, you know, I definitely see that as part of her personality. She's amazing young lady. But there's different things with that generation that drives them, that, that drives my generation. So I think, you know, that's a whole other conversation. It's kind of getting into their head and so forth. So. But business owners do struggle with finding the right fit employees. They'll maybe hire someone because, you know, someone had to leave or they had to let someone go. They have a hole to fill. They're like, oh, my God, we just need to get somebody in here. And then they often find the, you know, a person that is not a fit. And, you know, there's all kinds of things where it can be very costly and frustrating for the person too, because if it's not a right fit for them, it's, you know, it's definitely not a win win situation. So.

Agreed. I mean, my recommendation to business owners is if you, if you can find a recruiter who's an expert in your business and develop a relationship with them, because they know who, they know who the talent is. Right. And they know where to go when you have an opening. My other recommendation would be you should always be recruiting. You shouldn't be looking for people just when you have an opening. You should be looking for people on a consistent, regular basis. LinkedIn is a great resource for a business owner. You can identify your competitors or companies that you want to be like, and you can look to see their employees and you can look at their profiles. And if you see if someone's been there in a position for a certain amount of time and you have a position that's open, that may be a step up for them, they. That's a great opportunity for you to call them.

Right. So this, I think I Want to touch a little bit more on this, because I think a lot of business owners and, you know, we coach business owners and, you know, it's like, oh, we have an opening, let's put a job, let's put an ad together first. Maybe they might even do that before they're really thinking through what is the role. So, and then they put an ad. But you're reaching towards people that are unemployed, which, you know, they might just be in between opportunities. You can find really good people that way. And I have. But what you're saying is, well, find somebody that's already doing what you want and is succeeding at it.

Correct. And that's what we refer to as passive candidates. Right. They're heads down, they're doing their job, they're generally happy, and they're not necessarily looking in the market. And to connect with those individuals. They said LinkedIn's a great place to search to look for people that you can identify in just really in a minute or less if someone looks like, at least on paper, that they're a fit for your role. So I would always suggest, instead of just posting a job to Craigslist, or indeed, I would proactively go out and look for people that fit the profile of what you're looking for and engage with them. When I say engage with them, don't just give up maybe on one contact or one conversation. You know, we have candidates and clients that we. It's taken two and three years to build the rapport with, to ultimately convert them to a client.

Right. Yeah. So. And again, if you have that, you know that that is your practice, that you're recruiting all the time, you always have your eyes open, then you know that at that point you're going to need someone then, too. But what, what would you do? So, like, if you were me and, or, you know, if you were giving me advice, let's say, and I have a position that I, you know, want to fill for, let's say a marketing director.

Sure. So, I mean, simple thing would be just to go into again, LinkedIn today, search marketing director, and assuming they want them in San Diego and see what shows up. What are your results? Now, your results may. You may have 10 profiles, you may have 100 profiles, and then from there you can start to sift through and identify people that you think fit the background that you're looking for and the experience. That's just a simple way to do it.

Right. And then just email them on LinkedIn.

Yeah, you can send an email on LinkedIn and just, and just say, hey, you know, looking at your background, you appear to be someone with similar skills at what we do. I'd love to have a chance to connect and talk to you about what your career goals are, you know, for this year and beyond. You know, again, planting a seed.

Right.

So.

Yeah, well, I think, you know, sometimes people are a little intimidated.

True. And that's where. That's where. And that's where working with a recruiter is really valuable because it is awkward. And in a lot of instances, someone who's at a competitor isn't going to necessarily talk to a competitor.

Right.

But a recruiter, a good recruiter is really viewed as an advisor.

Right.

And they're able to open up the door and they're able to connect the individuals and also shepherd them through the process. You know, increasingly, what we're seeing, and I'm sure your business owners have seen this, we're seeing a lot of companies counter now to keep their good employees.

Yeah.

So counteroffers are something that we prep and work on with our candidates from really well before the offer comes and we remind them why they started to look in the first place. And when the offer does come, we talk with the candidates. Okay, you're going to sit down with your manager, you're going to give notice. What are you going to do when they counter? And a lot of times say, oh, no, they're not going to counter. Say, okay, but let's say they do. What if they offer you 10% increase? What if they offer you 20% increase? What if they offer you the title that you weren't given? And most people say, no, no, I'm. That won't make a difference, but in our experience it can. And I'd say 20 or 35% of the candidates receiving counters are staying.

Really? And do they end up staying long term? Do you see?

Well, it's interesting what we see and what sort of the historical data said is someone who accepts a counter is typically out of that job within six months. Right. That again, doesn't always happen.

Why would that be?

Well, because I think for two things, the company doesn't want to lose that individual right away.

Right.

So. So it's important for them to maintain them. But now that individuals just told their company, okay, I'm looking.

Right.

So now they're going to pull back some of their responsibilities.

There's a trust factor.

And the trust factors changed. Yeah, not in every case, but often enough the data has been pretty consistent.

Yeah.

Within six months, you're probably out of that position.

Yeah. Interesting. I had, when I was. When I had my ad agency in my 20s and early 30s, I had a recruiter contact me to come work because one of our biggest clients was Charlotte Russe, the clothing chain. And so one of their competitors, Wet Seal, who is no longer in business, guess, because I didn't work for them, but they did come and make me this offer to come and be their marketing director. But, you know, I actually have never had a job before. I've only had my own company, so I would. I don't know what I would do. But they obviously saw some value. It was interesting that they, I guess they must have looked and researched the kind of clients that we, you know, we're marketing for and so forth. So.

Yeah. Well, I think an entrepreneur can be very valuable to a company because they understand challenges. They know how to overcome those challenges.

Right.

You know, they have. They're able to take something from nothing and create a business.

Yeah. And really thinking it through. And how are we going to grow the company? How does this. How does this relate to the bottom line?

Correct. And the profitability factor. Exactly.

Yeah, exactly. Very interesting. So let's back up a little bit. And some people are thinking, well, I've never thought of working with a recruiter before, and maybe that is the way to do it. So. Because, you know, interviewing people and it takes so much time. And that's why a lot of times people will keep on the wrong fit employee way longer than they would want to, because the thought of going through that process, they're like, how can I do it? I don't have time.

Correct. So what a good recruiter will do is they'll send you three candidates and you'll like all three. Two will be really close, and one of them you'll hire.

Yeah.

And so that's going to save you an inordinate amount of time. And so that in itself is very valuable. But a lot of people don't understand how to work a recruiter and understand their value oftentimes as a business owner, too, I would suggest recruiting sometimes gets pushed hr. And I would say HR has a place in order of organizing schedules, writing the job description. But it's really important for the principal or the department head to work directly with the recruiter because they understand what you're looking for and they're able to articulate that to the candidates.

Great. And so how does. How do generally recruiters work as far as how they're compensated?

There's different models. There's retained search, where a Company will go to a recruiting agency and they'll pay them a certain amount up front. There's contingent, we do a lot of contingent searches where we get paid only if they hire a candidate. That candidate stays for a certain period of time, typically between 30 and 90 days. And then there's also temp to perm, which we historically have done a little bit. And I think in the, in the coming years we'll grow that practice.

So hire someone as a temp and then try them out.

Try them out and you can convert them, right?

Yeah.

So that's a safe. That's a safe.

That would be a great thing for a business owner to just, you know, to be able to take someone for a test drive and see for both people, for the candidate and for the business if this is a good fit. Right?

It is. But if you're working in an industry where some industries especially like it, for example, that's very common and very typical. But if you're working in an industry where there's a shortage of really strong talent, most people are full time employed. So they're not going to necessarily take a temp position.

Right.

Unless there's a change event in their life, maybe they relocated their current company, just went through a downsizing where they lost their position. So that's possible. But for us, where we see our success, if we're approaching someone who's gainfully put at our client, at a competitor of our clients, they're not typically going to take attempt to perm position.

Right, of course. And that makes a lot of sense. So backing up just a little bit, if you were, let's say you weren't going to use a recruiter. And again, I think that sometimes the, when you're posting an ad or you're interviewing, you're not really clear on what you're looking for. Maybe you hire someone and the expectations aren't correct. So what are some things that some business owners can do to help them out in the hiring process to be successful?

Sure. I think it's important that they have a clearly defined job description and it doesn't have to be more than five or six bullet points, but it's, hey, what's important to this role? Right? What's the title? Do you know the compensation? Now you're not always going to post the compensation in the job description, but you should know what the compensation range is and then what are the three or four key components of the job. And then also what I ask my clients and what we try to articulate to the Candidate is what does success look like? Success in 30 days, 60 days, a year later, three years later. So I think those points are critical.

So determining what those benchmarks are, sometimes that's not always easy. I mean, sales we know because it's often tied to revenue. And so how do you determine that in other areas?

Sure. So from a project management standpoint, we talked about what we see is the applications that they're using, the experiences that they have, how the clients are reacting to them, the quality of their service, and even in sales, besides revenue, obviously revenue trumps everything else for our clients. And we do a lot of sales positions. I advise looking at not just the revenue number, because in the industry I'm in now, that that revenue could take a year or longer to transfer. Really? Look at how many meetings you're having, what access you're getting to new accounts that maybe you weren't able to before. How many proposals are you getting? What are the results of those proposals? Those are the key indicators about success, that the revenue will eventually come. But if it's solely revenue and sales, it may not be the only factor.

Right, right. And it may take someone a little time to get that ramp up. Although I think, you know, there's a fine line because sometimes you can go, okay, you know, like, when's it going to happen here?

Well, it does. And I think for a business owner, you have to budget that accordingly and you have to know your industry.

Right.

So if in business, to business sales area that we cover, you know, I know that it can take up to a year or a year and a half. So. And I. But in consumer sales or other, or in retail, it may be very different.

Right.

Where a salesperson on the floor can have an immediate impact.

Exactly. Or selling Christmas trees.

Or selling Christmas trees.

Yeah. So. But I do know that, and in working and having a B2B company in the past myself, and then also with many of our clients, it can be, you know, definitely a long sales cycle for, you know, a year or more. And so on the other side of the hiring and, you know, holding people accountable and having benchmarks, I would say running a business, the number one thing that's probably the worst thing that you, you know, I don't know anyone except maybe Donald Trump that likes firing people. So I know that's really relative today. But you know, what is. What are some tips about letting people go too? Because I think, you know, you have to learn to kind of rip the band aid off, which is really hard to do. But you know, what do you see, True.

Well, for one thing, it shouldn't be a surprise, right. If you're managing the employee correctly, they know how they're doing. That's where I think like a 30, 60 regular check in is important. And so they should know. And then ideally too, you know, you want that employee to leave. Right. But if that's not available, then obviously you have to have a conversation. My advice is to try and have someone else in the room, keep the conversation short and let them know that it's not going to work. But what I would say, what I think is helpful is make sure you stick to any agreements that you have and be over generous. And lastly, don't underestimate the impact it can have on the team both positively and negatively. So you need to communicate that exit with your team and be prepared to answer hard questions.

Yeah, yeah, definitely. Because you know, it definitely shake can shake people up. People are connected to one another. And I remember when with my dad ran a big company and so there were a lot of employees and I used to see people coming out of his office in tears and I thought he was just the meanest person ever that he could do that. And now, you know, having to do that myself, it is one of the things that I absolutely dread most because I care so much about the people. But you know, you have to run a business. Right. And so one of the things, you know, we, you have to hire slowly and fire fast. But what I also know is that if somebody is not a right fit for you, generally it's not a right fit for them either. Because we want people to feel like they're successful. We want people to feel like that they're accomplishing. And if they're not a right fit, then you're always going to feel like I'm not doing enough, I'm not doing right or I'm, you know what I mean?

Agreed. And that's why I said started off with my biggest tip is it shouldn't be a surprise.

Yeah.

People typically know.

Right, right. This is true. This is true. Well, this has been so interesting and helpful and beneficial and all of that. So what is. What's on the horizon for you? We're moving into 2017. You know, it's always a fresh start. What, what are you looking.

Sure. So we're, you know, we're looking to expand our business. We had about 30% growth this year. I expect that'll be the same next year as I've been planning between 25 and 30% growth each year because I feel like it's sustainable. I've been involved in years where we've had previously 80, 90% growth and ultimately, if it doesn't continue, it's not sustainable. So for us, we've been trying to build a sustainable business. We're looking to expand our contract business, our temp to perm business. Our third practice area we're looking to expand is cybersecurity, which we've been working now for the last 24 months and I think is ready to really mature, which is very relevant in today's world.

Oh, my goodness. Extremely. And so, yeah, that's interesting and that's actually a really good point because a company that can, and I see this all the time, is when a company grows too fast and you don't really have that foundation under you that things can, you know, implode.

Correct.

You know, because we don't have enough support to handle all of the growth.

Correct. And typically, I think you have to anticipate there's going to be a downturn, whether it's for a quarter or, you know, two quarters. But at some point it can't, you know, there. You have to be prepared for that.

Right, Right. So that's very smart. Well, great. So thank you, Ali.

Thank you very much.

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