Blaine Daws - How to win retained, taking control of client relationships & having a healthy mindset

Welcome to the Recruitment Mentors Podcast. My name is Hishem Azzouz. Today I'm very excited to be joined by Blaine Dawes, who is the co-founder of Wanted, who are a professional search partner that operate in the technology space, which he launched in April this year with his business partner Carl. Before this, Blaine has worked in the industry for over a decade, working his way up consultant to head of division position, and along the way has achieved several top biller of the year achievements before launching his very own agency this year. Blaine, thank you for joining me.

No, no, it's good, good to be part of the podcast. I've been a subscriber for a while now, so it's good to finally be here.

Oh yeah, we are from subscriber to guest. So where I always like to start is In your opinion, what characteristics and traits do you think make up a highly successful recruitment consultant?

Yeah, I think there's two key ones for me. The first one is every morning having a healthy mind, and the second thing is being resilient because the job's tough at times and you've just got to keep knocking away, um, with it. So they're the two key things for me.

So tell me more about this healthy mind. That's interesting. I'm curious.

Yeah, yeah. So healthy mind being just to start the day fresh with coming into the office, leaving any worries with you at home. I always say to all of my team or even myself, just, I get up in the morning, look in the mirror, say, look, what do I want to achieve today? And just walk out the door with just a clean mind because if you bring things into work with you, everyone gets stressed at times, job, family, everything else. Especially with the times that we're having at the moment, it can really distract you and I'm just a big believer in, you know, healthy mind is key and just leaving all that stuff behind you, just starting fresh because every day is a new day.

Being present, love that.

Exactly, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Where, just, let's just focus on this for a second because I love the fact that you've got, that's one of your core attributes that you think for successful recruiting. So I guess, where's this come from, Blaine? Because I'm sure this— you haven't always had the healthy mind, right? So where have you cultivated that from, or why has that become so important for you?

Yeah, for me, I mean, I went through challenging times through my life, and you know, there's different things, you know, being a young dad and a dad, you know, that I was never planning to have a child or anything like that. So, you know, how old is he? So I was 24 because my son is 5 now. So yeah, it was early and me and my wife, we just wasn't planning that. And then it was when I was like pretty much just starting my career properly in search and we didn't have, you know, a property, we were renting and having a child was so unexpected. And I learned early on is, you know, there was lots of financial challenges, lots of other challenges that every young person goes through. And for me, it was about, you know, tracking my success, but just making sure that my mind at all times was in a clear state. And that was the key. And, you know, I'd done really well from having that. And that's been a rule now that I literally just put into my book that You know, it's so important just to, just have a clear mind because you can be so distracted nowadays by the media or anything going on. And the problem is you can easily get down by that and it's easier said than done. But you've really got to be disciplined and just keep your mind healthy, whether that's exercising in the morning. So I get up in the morning and go for a long run or a bike ride, or maybe it's, you know, watching something because everyone has different drivers. For me, it's just about getting up and getting out the door and running and taking my mind off of stuff.

And Ru, just last thing on this because I find this really interesting is, so if I'm listening right now and I know that's maybe a weakness of mine or I do find it hard to have that clarity of mind or I am easily distracted or I don't have a sort of, I don't have that mindset towards starting a new day, Yeah, as you said, yeah, distractions or external influences that I can't control that might be affecting me. If that's family, if that's obviously life, what's going on right now. Yeah, it's if I'm feeling really— if I feel like my mind's more, more cluttered and I'm finding it difficult to be present, like, what would your advice— maybe 3 best bits of advice for me to get closer to having more of the mindset that you're talking about?

That— clearly, yeah, sure. I think the first thing is, and it might sound stupid, is just take a breath, you know, take a deep breath and just evaluate things around you. You know, what's positive? Focus on the positives. If you can train the brain to just get the negatives away and just have the positives and breathe, you know, because a lot of people get panicked and anxiety and stuff like that. And most of it is down to breathing. Just take a deep breath, think of positive things. But also, you know, sometimes just, just look around you and just be grateful for kind of what you have. So many people just want more, want more, want more, and there's pressures in work. But also, I think it's so important to have two people around you that you can talk to at any time, whether that's professional or family, but just have two key people that you can just pick the phone up to and just if you need to just literally just get everything out of you, they're there as a sounding board. And if you've got that, then it really does help. If you haven't, again, you know, just try and find someone. There's always people out there, and I'm always open to being one of them, them people as well. If someone needs a sounding board that's listening, that can't get that healthy mind.

Yeah, I love that. Do you meditate?

I, I haven't done the meditation thing. Um, I've got friends that do do it.

Um, I'm just interested because you went to the breath, which obviously—

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. I know. Um, I haven't done it massively. Um, I've done different training exercises with breathing, which you could say is a form of meditation.

Oh, for sure.

Um, but, um, yeah, no, I haven't got deep into it because, uh, but I know that can really help as well. But maybe that's, uh, on the to-do list next year.

I love that. That's awesome. Okay, so let's start on unpacking this journey then, Blaine, because obviously, so you launched the recruitment business, your own recruitment business in April this year.

Yeah.

So obviously in challenging times and strange times.

Yeah.

But obviously there's a lot of things that you achieved before then, right? So I'm definitely keen to talk to you about what gave you the confidence to take the leap in these things. Sure. Very quickly, like how would you describe the beginning of your recruitment career?

Rocky.

Yeah?

Yeah. I mean, I didn't know what to expect. I mean, I came from like a new business background within technology, but I was selling to different infrastructure companies. So I had an understanding of technology, but I didn't know how to put bums on seats, for example, in recruitment. So I had to learn that from scratch and I had to learn that really quickly because, like I say, I was told I was going to be a dad about 6 months into my recruitment career. So it was like I needed to learn fast. But I learned the thing with recruitment was you can easily overcomplicate the process and it's just about sticking to, you know, a methodology. That, that you think works and just sticking to it, not going off course because recruitment's quite simple if you stick to just the things that is important. You can easily get sidetracked with different technology tools these days and different things, but if you just stick to the process, I'm a big believer, stick to a process that works and you'll get the results you want. And don't deviate from the process. Sometimes create new processes in it, but it's not just a one or two-trick pony in recruitment. I think you've got to have different ways of working with different clients.

So what if you could go back and speak to Blaine, who just found out he's going to be a dad, first year in recruitment?

Yeah.

What would you say to him?

Breathe. Yeah. No, I think the key thing was I was surrounded by good billers in my last company. Everyone was a lot older, a lot mature than me. So, average age within that business was about 30 years old, which is obviously quite old. And it was very much a traditional search business. So, for me, I don't think I would have done much differently because I progressed really quickly. But I think the reason why I progressed quickly is that I surrounded myself by good people. They had a good process that I learned and I stuck to. And I think it's just all about being sort of disciplined and really just, you know, understanding, you know, what drives candidates, what drives clients, really getting into the needs of those candidates and clients and really qualifying and not being afraid to lose business because I think a lot of consultants, they just want to win everything and sometimes anything. And I think sometimes it's better if you're more selective in the types of clients, the types of candidates you work with, and just being open and honest. If you can't help someone, just let them know. And feedback's critical. I just make sure that every candidate that I'm working with, I'm always feeding back to them and also giving them guidance about what went wrong in the process. Now I know that's harder for maybe if you're doing mass recruitment at scale, that's probably difficult. Where a lot of my work is retained or exclusive, I can easily sit here and say, well, you know, that's what I do with my candidates. I can understand if you're running 20 jobs and it's one consultant, then you can be overworked and it's hard to do that.

Okay. So just to frame this up a bit then, so from what I saw online, so you've worked before you set up Wanted, you worked at 2 companies.

Yes.

Right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So before you set up your own agency, you progressed to being a head of division, and was it like 8 people you had on your team before you left?

Yeah, yeah, so when I left, there was around 8 people, and I was a shareholder within the business as well. Okay. It was the best performing practice for 3 years running, and it was the practice that had the least amount of experience as well. Because I was running it, because the people that did work in the business, they were great guys, but they'd been there for over 10 years, each of the practice leads. So they had pretty much triple the amount of recruitment experience that I had.

And you managed them?

No, no. So they were— so there was— so we done— so I run the data centre and AI division, another guy run the site—

Oh, sorry, the other—

other practice leads. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, okay, but we were the best performing practice for 3 years, right?

So let's just, let's just unpack that a bit and then we'll, we'll dig into the, um, you being a business owner and what you've learned.

Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah, sure.

So firstly, so obviously, like, it's just interesting the words that you use, right? Calling it practice. And, and obviously a lot of the things that you do is, is mainly search, it's retained. So like, for anyone listening, right, there'll be a lot of agency recruiters that listen to this, and, and there will be people that listen to this that do work retained, or it might just be exclusive, but there'll definitely be people that may want to do more retained as well. So I haven't had many recruiters on here that sort of articulate or say, yeah, I worked for a search practice, right? It's a recruitment agency. That's what people call it, right? So in your own words then, like, how— what is the main difference of you going, I work for a search practice, rather than me saying I work for a recruitment agency?

Yeah, it's a really good question and it's borderline because they are very similar. It's just the level you operate at. So typically I'm working with C-suite, so, you know, CIO, CIO, VP of sales, etc. Most of them people aren't actively looking for a job. Some of them don't even have LinkedIn, believe it or not. And, you know, it's just about really, really going deep undercover. The client necessarily who's looking, it's probably normally that they're replacing someone that don't know they're getting replaced at a senior level. They cannot advertise the role directly. They cannot be seen to even be doing this. So you're like a very, very good detective. And you're kind of just going under the radar, normally under a non-disclosure agreement, and they will expect, because of the fees that you charge, typically is anywhere between 20% and 30% of total package, they expect a very good service for that. And you would get a shortlist of, say, 10 people, and you would narrow that down to 5. You'd meet all of those candidates face-to-face, you'd take them through an interview briefing session before presenting them to the client. Normally that's done either face-to-face or virtually nowadays on Teams. And then from there, you know, you're getting a payment. So normally, typically the way a retainer would work is obviously it's a third upfront, you know, a third on shortlist of the 5 candidates. And a third on the candidate starting. And that's typically how it works. Now, I suppose the language of people that work in search and work in recruitment is quite different as well. And that's probably just down to the level you're operating at, the people you're speaking with, but also the level of service you're providing. Sometimes, you know, in my old business and even with Wanted, We do psychometric testing on certain leadership roles if it's needed and the client wants that. And typically when we go out to market or there's a bid that comes up, say for example, I don't know, X is looking for a CEO or VP of Sales, you know, we're going to be coming up against management consultancies, Russell Reynolds, Korn Ferry, some of these other smaller boutique search businesses as well. We're not coming up against, say, Michael Page or Reed, for example. So I suppose it is very different in that sense because we're not just in a big pool full of sort of PSLs. Typically, the client will have a PSL, but then they have an exec search partner and that PSL do a lot of the volume work. The search partners may only do 4 or 5 hires.

Yeah, interesting. So the next thing I want to ask you about is, is the retain piece. But very, very quickly, Blaine. Yeah, there'll be a lot of people that listen to this that, that do want to do more senior appointments because they recognize— I guess it's not, it's not just, oh yeah, it means I can earn more money. It's actually the things that you're talking about that actually there's that perception of service, right? That there's something that comes up with that, that the client expects it. And, and as a, as a good recruiter, that's what you want to go above and beyond on, on that service, rather than, yeah, maybe always being involved in that sort of lower level end where it is more transactional on these things, right? So how, how did Blaine, late 20s, whatever age you were, deal with, I guess, the potential self-doubt of dealing with C-suite, dealing with these old, typic— they're always going to be older, obviously. But I think that, that's a really interesting thing. If you think of, uh, typically recruiters— and I was one of these people at the beginning of their career— put clients on the pedestal, let alone going into a search firm and dealing only with the C-suite and the senior people. It'd be so easy, I guess, to fall into that. So I guess, how did young Blaine deal with that? Did you have to deal with the self-doubt on that? How was that journey? Because I feel like that is something that people have to overcome when they want to sort of transition to the more senior appointments in their space?

Yeah, sure. I did it by really gaining a knowledge of the client's business. I always said that to do a good job for my clients, I need to kind of be like a candidate that would get a job in with that client. So I'd always like read their latest press releases, look at their financial reports, look at the change that's happened within their business and talk about that change. I very rarely talk about recruitment. It's really interesting. I just typically talk about how their business is going, you know, what their growth plans are, you know, what sort of product lines they're looking to launch, if I can be of any assistance. So I try and be a partner to all of these companies, and I think that was the key thing for me. And you probably noticed, yeah, I'm going to do Data Center World next year in Frankfurt. I've spoken at a lot of like tech conferences, where the subject isn't really recruitment, it's normally like tackling the skill shortage. How can we get more talent into the sector, for example? It's not about, you know, okay, well, this is how I can help you recruit. Off the back of them shows, you don't normally get much recruitment business from it either, but what you do get is a name to be known in the industry, and I think that's what I did really well, was being that sort of go-to person within the data centre market, but you've got to find a niche, and you've need to be a specialist within it, and you've got to have references to back you up. So I see a lot of people coming through the ranks, and I look on their LinkedIn, and, you know, they don't hardly have any recommendations or anything like that. And, but I think definitely in exec search, you've got to have C-level references visible, because it gets to a stage as well where the industry is a little bit biased. You know, it's not what you know, it's who you know. Eventually.

So basically what helped you, I guess it was you being really curious then and sort of, yeah, not going into these calls or relationships feeling like you have to know everything because you don't. It's your job to be curious, ask the right questions and find out what their actual business problems are. And okay, so, so, okay, let's just talk about the— because let's just talk about the retained piece really quick. Yeah, because like, what was, what was the average deal size for you then? It must be quite big.

So average deal size at the moment, I was just doing my stats for the year, is £40K this year. Really?

Wow. Yeah. Because what's been— because obviously, yeah, what obviously you said, practice 3 times a year and the biggest performing, whatever. But what's been your best year then as a search consultant billing-wise?

So billing-wise, my best year, just me personally, was without any resource or anything underneath me was, uh, 385, right? Um, and that was placing 8 people.

That's, that's a crazy thing, I think. Yeah, 8 deals in a year.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was 8 deals, um, obviously large, large deals. Um, but again, you know, when you're charging 30%, that was what it typically was, of package. And these packages, 300,000, 400,000. It's not too hard to do. In the search world as well, that's not that big. I'll make you laugh. I won't say the name, but I actually was going to go and join a big search business. And I was in interview with a guy from Italy and he'd been there for 22 years. He was a really great guy, and I told him what I billed, and he said to me, "Yeah, that's not very good." I said, I thought it was amazing, right, coming from where I was, but it wasn't very good in his world, and he said, "Look, you know, well, our average search consultant bills, you know, $1.2 million, and our top performing biller in the US is doing $4.2 million," it was, and I was like, wow, and then I just, I was like, wow, I'm a bit of a little fish now. I thought it was a lot, but it wasn't.

Like, for me, like, just— so, like, what's the average, like, process length then of that? Because that must be long as well.

Yeah, I mean, the longest deal I'd done was— it was about 4 and a half months from start to finish.

But what typically, how long How long might the process take?

Typically it's about 3 months, right, a search should take. And so we— I did a retain— retainer in April and the candidates sort of started around August time, and that was sort of like a very senior.

So I think that's a, that's a, that's a whole— that's a sort of just different dynamic, isn't it? Like sort of doing all the things that you need to do during that time and it's just typically longer and stuff like that, right? I think that could be challenging.

However, I must say I was a, you know, and I still am an out-and-out sort of search guy, you could say, but I've learned the contract recruitment model and that was from Carl and I absolutely love it and just this year has been incredible because I kind of got my contract book up to £40,000 a month.

Really?

Yeah, during COVID And that's like, we've got quite a number of runners out. And I loved it because it was a breath of fresh air. I was like, right, ring the guy.

It's way more like, yeah, yeah, more fast-paced.

Get him on site. Obviously, Carl is a, you know, contract recruiter, entrepreneurial guy, done serious amount of contract work. But, and I've learned so much from Karl for the contract piece, and I absolutely love it because, you know, I've just done 2 deals like this week. I mean, normally, like, I'm doing 8 deals in a whole year. It's like, wow, I've done 2 deals. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I definitely love it as well, the contract stuff. Yeah.

So really quickly then. So a lot of people, maybe through this period or whatever, but there will be recruiters that listen to this that do want to transition into retained. Yeah, right. So, um, like, have you had people come into your team before that has never done retain before and then they have to do retained? Have you— has that happened before or not? Yeah. So yeah, really quickly then, let's like, what are the main challenges that you see that recruiters, I don't know, may perceive themselves or assume or find difficult to go from not doing retain to doing retain? Like, why, why do people find that difficult to do that transition? So like, from your perspective, like Why do you think recruiters find that challenging and what do people need to overcome?

Yeah, it's a great question. I think that the first thing is, if you peel back the onion skin, it's do they actually ask the client, can they be retained?

And that's number one, like, that's number one. By asking, you'll have even way more opportunities than you think. Yeah, first actually ask the question.

'Cause a lot of good contingent recruiters, they've got a great relationship with the client, but they don't know they do retain. So if you don't ask, you don't know. So ask the question. The second thing is, is you need to be perceived as being niche. A lot of recruitment companies, it's quite broad in what they do. And if you're broad, then why would the client retain you? That's the key thing. If you generally are just doing one market, that's the market you operate in, then I would say that the only challenge not to do retained is just not by asking the question. Because that's the main thing that I see with people coming in and I say, well, look, did you actually ask the client? Oh, no, no, no. Well, our company don't do that. But would your company take the business? Yeah, yeah, of course. Well, ask the question.

Yeah, so just quickly on this, because the common thing that I hear from recruiters when on this conversation is, okay, Blaine, yeah, I can ask, but what's the difference between retained and me just doing it contingent? Um, I'm worried about if I don't deliver and these things, right? So what, like, if I say to you, well, okay, yeah, Blaine, I didn't ask, but what's the difference?

Yeah, yeah, sure. Um, I mean, you've got to back yourself 100%. You've got to have that mindset that you're going to deliver. 'Cause if you don't deliver, then there'll be big problems and challenges for that client relationship moving forwards. Because when you're obviously pitching for a retained business, you know, you're the go-to partner for that role, you're gonna fill it, you'll do whatever you take to fill it. I'd say, so you've gotta back yourself 100% on the retainer. You've also, I think the key thing is, is you've really gotta understand the brief from the client. So the vacancy, you know, does it exist? I use the phrase purple squirrel to people all the time, you know, because a lot of clients, they just are looking for something that doesn't exist, or it's two skill sets bought into one for obviously just one salary. And I always say to them, listen, I can't find this, you know, it's like me going to Richmond Park and looking for a purple squirrel. And they laugh, but it's a great analogy because a lot of the time clients always want something that doesn't exist. So you've got to be known as that market specialist that can educate them on what they need. The other thing is, I'd say you've got to be able to justify why you should be retained and you've got to use like technology around you. So, you know, there's tooling like, which isn't cheap, you know, like LinkedIn Talent Insights, is a great tool. There's obviously HaulxFly as well, which is another tool that you can use that basically takes all the data of the role that you need, puts it all into a very nice glossy PDF and tells you where the candidate might come from, where the company, how hard it is to find that person.

And that's part of the service?

Yeah, I would say you've got to offer a service. If you're going to be retained, especially at a board level, because otherwise the problem is, is it's probably going to be quite challenging to win it.

Yeah. So, so only thing on this and then we'll move on.

Yeah.

You just said if you don't deliver, there'll be big problems.

Yeah. So, well, you'd lose the client relationship.

Yeah, exactly. So let's just talk about that for a sec, because I think that this sort of potentially happening is what stops a lot of people asking. Right?

Yeah.

So like, have you had that happen before and how did you resolve it or how did you overcome that? Like, talk to us a bit about a time that maybe that happened and what actually happened.

Yeah, yeah. So I had it once before, um, it was the second year into my recruitment career, um, I was working on a role in Germany and, um, we found, we found the lady, um, for it She was going to do around a 2-hour drive every day to Frankfurt. She was totally, you know, sold it to me and the client that it was possible to do. And then in the end, what happened was is that for some sort of strange reason, she sort of said that she wasn't able to do it. It was like within the first month. And what happened was the client was like, well, you know, you told me she could do it. Obviously she's told me she could do it, but you know, she's gonna have to let— she's gonna have to go, right? And then instantly the client says, you know, look, we've paid all this money, you know, we understand from the terms and conditions, you know, that that's sort of like the end of the road. And he said, if that was the case, you know, I get it, it's not just your fault, but your qualification should have been much better. He was a German guy, very senior, and they're very process-driven, right? And I said to him, okay, well, look, from a company point of view, yes, you're correct, we can't do anything, but from a personal point of view, I'll backfill the role. I'm not going to get any reward for it, 'But I will backfill the role.' And yeah, what I did do was I went to my CEO, my last company, and he says, 'Yeah, no, definitely, you know, go and do it, you know, fill the position.' And then 8 weeks later, I found a replacement candidate, but it wasn't easy because it was a really, really niche role and there wasn't many people in the area. And that's— you've got to go the extra mile. If you're not prepared to go the extra mile, don't do retained work because it's not fair for your clients. Also, it's not fair for whether it's your own company or you're working for a company because you can lose business quite quickly if you don't deliver.

Yeah, no, thanks for sharing that. That's super interesting. So what I'd love to just get your thoughts on, Blaine, before we talk about Blaine, the business owner, is what people love to find out and know about on this podcast, Blaine, is what does Blaine's typical day look like?

Right?

And that might be slightly different now when obviously you're a business owner, there's just way more hats to wear. So maybe do it when you was someone that was just reliable for your own billings, right? So when you had your best year, just yourself, the typical question that people want me to ask is, What did Blaine's day— what did Blaine's typical day look like? How did he structure his day when he was billing half that, $150K or less than that, compared to how it looked when he was billing $300K, $350K? What would you say were the main differences?

Well, so I think it was at the start I was like a sort of go in the office at half 8 and, you know, leave, leave at half 5. Um, I was at the start of my career, I wanted to be in, then I wanted to be in the pub or the bar with my mates, right? I didn't want to stick around.

Yeah.

And I would bill, you know, €150, €180, you know, without really, you know, breaking too much of a sweat.

Yeah.

And then when I, you know, got more responsibility, for example, um, you know, I would be sort of pretty much the first one into the office and the last one out.

Uh, right, so let's break down that day then.

Give it a try. So, so I used to work literally 20 minutes from my, my house. Um, so I used to get up at 6 AM. I used to go to the gym. I had a personal trainer at that point, so I'd go and train with him in the morning for an hour. He'd like make me vomit and everything else at the start, do loads of HIIT workouts. And then literally swim, sauna, shave in the office, yeah, by sort of half past 8. Half past 8 to 11 o'clock, it was business development. You know, it was literally calling clients, seeing what business is out there, speaking to them about, you know, their future plans, future growth, etc. Then I would then, at 11 o'clock, I'd have an admin session. Of like half an hour. Then I would go outside, normally walk across to the Costa Coffee, grab myself a latte, come back, literally candidate market, market candidates out to these clients. That was like, you know, 12 till 1, then go on lunch, 1 till 2, 2 till 5, business development again, back on speaking to clients, speaking to clients. Then from about 5 to literally, my wife used to kill me until about 8 PM at night, I'd be marketing candidates out. Because what I normally found was, is that most recruiters are like postmen, raw mail, you know, you don't know when they're going to come unless you've got like a time slot. But normally, you know, your postman, oh, okay, send an email of a CV. Oh, well, I sent a CV out. Yeah, okay, but, you know, was it when the client was expecting it? No, I just sent the CV out. Okay, great, well, I don't know where that email's gone, you don't even know if he's got it, he probably hasn't, he gets 100 emails a day. I didn't want to be the postman, I wanted to be the FedEx, yeah, that you get 15-minute time slot, show your ID, signature, they know when you come, you know, you are there with your ID, otherwise you ain't getting that parcel. And I would just make sure that I was known to be tying clients down. So I'd always say to my clients, 'When is good for me to send CVs to you? You know, when are you going to be online? When can you give me 5 minutes just to look through 2 or 3 profiles? When can you give me 3 slots of half an hour telephone calls so I could pre-book them in your diary?' Yeah, trust me, go with me, the candidates are good, I'm your trusted partner, we're going to work in this together. And I think that was the difference. That's what took me from 180K biller to 3 years running billing over 300K individually and a practice billing over a million. That was the key thing. You know, don't be raw mail postman. I've got nothing against raw mail, by the way.

Yeah, no, it's a good analogy. It's a great analogy. It's really good. I love that.

But that's what took me to where I am today. Just be that go-to person, you know, live and breathe your sector, speak at events. I used to be so nervous of like talking in crowds or anything.

I want to ask you about that. Yeah, I will ask you that. So just final thing on that because I love that insight. I think people will get a lot of value from that. So let me ask you this question, which is the final thing on this is, I think this is such an interesting question, but the question is that I get some from people or got from a couple of people is, is like when you get a high performing biller on, they'd be really interested to know what you think is the most important action or KPI that you think contributed to your success.

Yeah. Just one.

Yeah. Or like just what comes up for you. What do you think are the most important action or 1, 2, 3 actions that you think really contribute to your success?

Yeah. So you've got to plan your day. Yeah. That's so important.

Organisation.

Organisation is so key. So if you plan your day and then also get, you know, a little whiteboard or notes in your phone or something like that, but have 3 things that you want to achieve for that day. So planning and 3 goals, and that could be little steps, you know, it could be kind of, you know, speak to this client, or speak to this candidate, or do a video, you know, on LinkedIn. It could be anything, but business-related of course. But get 3 things that you want to achieve in a day and be planned. And then I think if you, if you do that and you stick to that, you, you'll go far. Love that.

So let me ask you then, because you were talking about— it was one of the questions that I sort of put down to prepare for this. Like, yeah, I saw that obviously you've spoken at a number of industry events And look, I think, see, a lot of people that listen to this podcast will hear people talking about the importance of branding and these things, right? And you said the word go-to a lot of the time, which is obviously what recruiters want to achieve, that go-to status. And yeah, obviously, yeah, being able to speak, gaining credibility through the actual industry and your industry peers will definitely help you do that. So I guess if I'm someone listening to this where I'm like, I do want to have that opportunity to speak at industry events or be invited or whatever, What do you think you did that gave you that actual opportunity or to actually get invited to speak? How did that happen?

So I actively approached a number of shows. At the first, you know, I was trying to call the event organisers and I was getting fobbed off. They just wasn't interested, you know, who's Blaine Dawes, you know, we don't know you, you work for a recruitment company. I'm not the typical sweet spot for them. Then I actually sent an email to the sort of event owner and, you know, it was along the lines of, look, give me a shot, you know, give me a slot that isn't, you know, in prime time. Just give me a shot, let me deliver my message. There's a huge shortfall of talent. I'm not here to sort of promote my business or my brand. I'm there to generally talk about the industry. And then in the end, I broke the ice and I literally got my first one at the Excel. It was Data Center World. It was like a really not great slot. It was at the back of the room, I remember, and the audience was fairly— I mean, because it's at the Excel, it's fairly large. You could probably say, you know, maybe 40 people, for example, there. But considering, you know, you've got hundreds in the main arena, um, it was very small. But after that, for some reason, um, I, I don't know what it was, but loads of people after the event, um, was coming up to me saying, you know, Blaine, look, do you want really interesting point, you know, we're really struggling with diversity, you know, within the workforce, we're really struggling with getting young people, you know, like yourself into the sector, you know, what do you recommend? What do you do? And the event organisers instantly were like all over me like a rash, they're like, can you do Singapore? Can you do Frankfurt? Can you do Abu Dhabi? Can you do that? And I was like, wow, you know, for For someone that basically was almost rejected from a lot of these events, now it's like they're approaching me saying, 'Look, please, like, speak at the event.' Yeah, I love that.

You know, that's great. Great story.

That's how I got in.

So, so just real quick on this, I think people listening, yeah, they may see industry, see events that they want to attend and stuff. So if I, if I'm sort of saying to you, Blaine, right, so I've mapped out 10 events that I'd love to speak at. Obviously I'm a recruiter, there's a good chance I might get rejected. What would you, how would you encourage me to approach it? Like, what would my angle be? So it seems like what you said was like, look, I'm not there to sell. So that's rule number one, obviously, right? You're not there to promote your services, right? So what was the angle? Because obviously you're not the data center expert, you don't get paid to do that, right? You're never going to be as confident as those people. So to think that you can talk about something as technical as them, you're going to be worried about that, probably won't be that. So what was the angle then? Was it like, hey, I speak to people all the time and I know this is a problem, I think a bit like, yeah, how would you encourage me to approach it? What would the angle be?

Yeah, well, for me, I mean, in the data centre world, it's known to be an older industry. There isn't much young talent coming into it because, you know, A, most people think data centres are not important, you know, and B, they don't even know what they are. You know, they think cloud and they look in the sky, for example. But it's like, it's about really, you know, finding— there's always a shortfall in every single sector. Yeah. And it's just about finding what's the shortfall and, you know, can you add value to their show? If you can, then they'll have you on board. The key thing is, is just you've got to know what you're speaking about. So I had a nice little glossy deck, one-pager, sent it to them, this is what I'm going to cover, this is what I'm going to do, here I am. And, you know, have a good shop window as well. I mean, social selling is big now. You know, I've been big on LinkedIn for a while in terms of not like big influence or anything like that, but I just use LinkedIn a lot. I publish content I think is relevant for my target audience and You know, I think the event organizers look at that as well, you know, and recommendations help. Recommendations have really, really helped me throughout my recruitment career.

Yeah, I think that's a really good point. I think just the only point that I would add is like, yeah, as a recruiter, if you listen to this and want to have that opportunity to speak and be more involved in your industry, then yeah, don't forget the amount of people that you speak to in that industry compared to the actual people in it. So like, if you think exactly how many sort of C-level people you speak to over a year compared to how many CEOs speak to other CEOs in that year, it's going to be double, triple, quadruple that. So actually, the value that you bring is those insights, right? It's that, well, actually, yeah, you're the fifth CEO that I've spoken to this week that also shared this challenge. Oh, really? That's interesting. I thought I was the only person, right? And it's those insights that you can bring to the table and be the facilitator. Exactly. And sort of bring that out. So, okay. So last question on, in terms of before you started this business, just because when you shared your daily plan, there was a lot of time for business development. So for you personally, what's been the most effective method for you to grow your client base?

For the business development side, yeah?

Yeah, like you can obviously refer to how you do it now, whatever, but in your experience, in your journey so far, what's been the most effective method for Blaine to drum up business, to grow your client base?

Yeah, sure. Meeting people face to face before COVID I was known, even if I wasn't booking a client, I would always meet everyone face to face. I think it really helped me because you can look people in the eye, you know, and you can they really get to know Blaine as well. Not just— so easy to fob people off on an email or a phone call.

But what was the— what was the— what was the— this is why you should sit down with me even though I've got no jobs to talk to you about or anything like that? Like, why— how did you get them to actually sit down with you?

I think, yes, it was the work I've done in the sector. So obviously I was known for doing a lot of projects. I was very active on, like I say, social media, LinkedIn, you know, events, shows, also speaking to multiple people daily because I enabled— my reach was huge because I would do so much business development. So I was like, you know, the information gatherer, and I found out about things that they didn't even know was going on in the sector. So when I'd speak to someone, I'd say, look, you know, you should speak to me. You know, I know what's going on in the industry. I know these projects are coming up, and this is like real information. It's not made up. And they would instantly sit back and think, wow, you know, you really do know your subject. Look, let's have, you know, a half-hour meeting, sure. And that was the key thing to me. Just know your industry and the business will come.

Yeah, okay. So what's been the most unexpected thing for Blaine then since having your own recruitment business that's happened so far?

Staff.

Staff. Talk to me, what do you mean?

Just trying to find the right staff is really, really challenging because, look, you know, we're a startup recruitment business, haven't been around long, haven't got a track record like, you know, some of the bigger businesses, especially where we are in Monument. You know, there's lots of other big recruitment companies around, and that's just been the real challenge, just, you know, trying to grow the recruitment business. And just, you know, consultants work very differently to maybe how I've worked in the past, and it's just kind of just seeing who culturally fits for the business because we're still very small, and that's been our biggest challenge so far. And I think it's everyone's challenge, just finding good staff and people that genuinely want to do recruitment as well, because we've even been speaking to some graduates, and it's quite refreshing actually You know, some, some of these individuals that I met, I was like really wowed by them. You know, it was that they were bringing something different and, and new ways and new ideas, um, and not just going for the traditional, um, Rolexes, fast cars, and lots of incentive trips that recruitment is known for.

So what, what is it like? And you can obviously refer to your time being a leader and these things, but also even more so now, like, what is it that you actually look for in— I don't know, you're probably working this out still, but like, in terms of like, what are the sort of non-negotiables for you when thinking about the sort of recipe for the, the culture that you want to build, but most importantly, the recipe you're looking for in people that you think can, um, have the best possible chance of being successful in, in the environment that you have?

Yeah, I think it— the key thing is, is just people that are open to new ideas. There are certain individuals that think that, you know, this way that they've done it is the only way and they're not, they're not just not open to change and we found that a lot, you know, well, look, you know, okay, well, I've worked at this brand, this is how we do it and, you know, this is the only way it should be done and it's just really just trying to just find consultants that are open and want to learn new things. So many people I speak to, you know, just because they've built $250K or $300K, you know, they feel that, you know, they're the sort of daddy now, you know, there is no other way and this is my way and no other way. We've found that a lot. There's a lot of arrogance. Yeah, just exactly, just being open. You know, I love learning new things. I think it's so important, you know, just keep an open mind. You know, I'm not the best recruiter out there. It's so important. I could learn stuff from some of my delivery team. And, you know, I'm still very much on the dance floor, right? You know, I'm not like on the balconies looking down at everyone. You know, I'm there. You know, I want to be part of it. And it's about finding people like that as well, because the level we're hiring at, we're trying to hire practice leads and, you know, a lot of them you know, it's about, okay, well, I want to, you know, I want a team of 5, 6 people, you know, I want this, I want that. It's like a bucket list that they expect.

Yeah. And why? So obviously through Recruitment Mentors, one of our values is always be learning. It's the first one on there. And like, it's interesting because a lot of— so I guess it's because of the people that I end up speaking to, but a lot of people really resonate with what you're saying, like and generally have the open-mindedness to always be willing to learn. It's not everyone, obviously, but I think— why do you think people are closed-minded or even, yeah, prepared to learn new things?

I think what it is is that some, you know, if an individual's been in recruitment for a certain amount of time, obviously they get their own way of working. And they feel that, well, this is working, so why change it? You know, why fix it? Because it works. But it might have worked in their last company because that's how they worked. But then in a startup environment, it's really important to just be entrepreneurial, but also be, you know, like a big family, right? You know, and not just be sort of sitting on the balcony all day. And just looking down. I think, yeah, right, you've got to lead by example. It's pivotal.

Well, I think having the open— having the open mind is— typically there would be some humility that comes with that, right? Like, if you're someone that has— is open, there's a good chance that you'll sort of have a bit of humility to be like, actually, yeah, Blaine has 3 years less experience than me, but actually, yeah, he's got a really good idea there. Or even be open to that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. I mean, it's a mindset thing, isn't it? You know, it's like with anything, it's just, you know, if you can just adjust and just be open and, you know, just try and learn new things, then you might achieve stuff that you never even knew that you could achieve before.

Yeah. What's been the biggest positive so far since taking this leap? Because obviously you've been in an employed environment for over a decade, right?

Yeah.

Obviously, you've done well, but still, it's still a leap of faith that's required. So, like, what's been the biggest positive so far this year?

Biggest positive was we hired an individual. He was from a big agency before. He's come in, he's already done 2 deals in about 5 weeks. And both of them deals were— Yeah, yeah. Both of them deals were with a client I knew. And I'd been working with, I just wasn't working in that division of the technical side, I was doing the sales side. And the feedback was, you know, we really like him and we can trust him. And it was them words, we can trust him. For me, I just was like, take a step back and think, wow, that's great because if I can build a a search business, an agency, whatever people would like to call it, if I can build it on trust, then that would be a huge milestone for me because trust is, uh, not, not the most used word in recruitment.

Yeah, for sure. So I've got 5 questions for you to finish this, but before I do, we're just talking a bit about mindset there. Like, for you personally, what, what's been the sort of best piece of advice that you've received? That's impacted your mindset or has helped you mentally?

Oh, best, best one I've got. I think, I think the best, the best piece was a client said to me before, you know, be open for change. And that was the best piece of advice that I ever had. It was a really senior exec at Google. And that was really, really— it hit me and I thought, yeah, this is, this is so important.

I think I just— that just sort of clicked with me actually. Like, actually one of the benefits out of working in the markets that you do that I didn't think of actually is that you probably get to speak to some pretty impressive, like, successful people, but not just around the success, but people that are self-aware, people that have been on their own journeys that actually you could probably learn a lot from, which is what you just said, right?

Yeah, I mean, I've got about 10 different mentors from that are all between 50 and 70, and I've all run global businesses, um, and I speak to them once a quarter, um, and I take 45 minutes of their time, and it's absolutely amazing. Um, it's been great.

I love that. So I have to ask you about this because this is something that I get asked a lot, and then I'll ask you these 5 questions, but for anyone that wants to be in that position, maybe not 10, but 1 or whatever, but like, how did you get yourself in that position to get that time in with these people? A lot of people don't know how. They know they want a mentor but have no idea how to approach a mentor. How did you go about that?

Yeah, I mean, I know again, it just sounds like I said the same thing, but just ask people because most people would be open to it, you know, literally half hour, 45 minutes of their time.

How did you approach it though? I think it's the how, how did, it's like, how do I ask is the challenge.

So all of those were clients that I've delivered on projects for. So they're all industry people that I know. And, you know, I've just asked them for advice, you know, look, I'm a young, young guy, you know, hopefully up and coming. And, you know, I want to learn new things. 'And also, you know, I would like some guidance.' And they say, 'Any time, Blaine.' You know, I've never been rejected to say, 'Well, look, I can't do that.' Generally, people will give you time.

Yeah, especially if it's coming from the right— like, seems like that was just actually really genuine, right? If it's coming from the right place, I think a lot of people would say yes.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's, you know, all it is, is, you know, half an hour, it could be 15 minutes, you know, um, and it could be about anything. It doesn't just have to be work-related.

Yeah, no, I love that. That's awesome. I've got 5 questions for you.

All right, brilliant.

First one is, if you could change the industry, what would you improve?

Uh, I would improve the trust of recruitment in general. I think recruitment has a bad name, or it certainly did have a bad name. It's getting much better now. But yeah, I would just improve the trust in the industry, you know, because we're not all bad people and I think we get slaughtered sometimes.

Yeah, I love that. So this can—

this—

so the next question, like, this could be an audio, it could be something you watch or whatever, but the question is like, what book have you read that has had the biggest impact on you, but that could be a, could be a podcast, it could be something you've watched, but like, what, what have you sort of consumed that's had the biggest impact on you?

Yeah, so I, I, um, I watch a lot of Tony Robbins, um, I've watched a lot of these clips and seminars and stuff like that, um, I actually want to do the, the one where he was in the Excel where you sort of walk across the fire I've done that one. Have you done it? Okay, yeah, yeah, so I want to do that. Yeah, so Tony Robbins has been a big one for me. Um, have you read— I love it.

I don't know if you read or anything, but— or audiobook, but I would def— I read, um, when I sort of started on this whole sort of self-improvement development journey, one of the books I read quite early on was his book called Awaken the Giant Within, and that's a great book. And it's actually a lot of the things that he talks about, like the live event. So I would definitely recommend that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll get that. I'm not a huge reader, but if it's on audio—

Yeah, you'll be able to get it on audio, but for sure.

Yeah, fine. Nice.

So next question: if you could write a LinkedIn post that could be seen by every single recruitment consultant across the world, what would you want it to say?

Oh, that's a tough one. What would I want it to say? I think if I was— so if it was just targeted for recruitment consultants, I would typically say to them, all of them, to, you know, back themselves 100%. 'Cause I speak to so many people that have so much self-doubt and it would be along the lines of that healthy mind one, you know, get up in the morning, healthy mind and back yourself. You know, you're good at what you do. So many people hide behind a big company and sometimes all the brand takes all the credit, but it's all about the individuals and that's why we've built Wanted on, you know, individual, Individuality is our strength. And yeah, that's what I would say, you know, back yourself.

Love that. What did you spend your first biggest commission paycheck on?

Yeah, my ex-CEO would laugh at this. It was a Rolex watch. Ah, here he is.

What Rolex did you get?

It was a Rolex watch. It— I'd done quite well because it was actually a stainless steel Rolex Daytona, um, that I actually, um, before I get robbed after this podcast, I actually sold, sold it, um, about a year and a half ago. And, um, I think at the time I paid around £9,000 and I sold it for £22,000.

Oh, decent. That's obviously the good thing about those watches, isn't it, that they actually Can grow in value, can't they?

But my wife at the time when I was buying that watch, she was not so happy.

Wasn't pleased.

But she was pleased because it got the funding, got some of the funding we wanted, so it was good.

Last question, what is the ultimate goal for your recruitment career, Blaine?

So I would, I would love to just build an agency full of open and trusted consultants. For me, that's the, the, the most important goal. Um, I just want a really good agency that people trust and really value. Um, however big or however small it is, I just think it's so important to do a good job. Love that.

Blaine, it's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you.

No, no, great, great.