Elliott Milton - Relocating twice, hiring grads, and how to truly scale a business.

Welcome to the Recruitment Mentors Podcast. My name is Hishem Azzouz. Today I'm really excited to be joined by Elliot Milton, who is the VP at Levin Group. The Levin Group have 4 brands under the group: Storm 2, 3, 4, and 5. They all operate in the fintech markets, greentech markets, retail tech, and health tech markets. Elliot kickstarted his recruitment career with Faden in 2013, where he progressed from graduate to executive director within 8 years. In that time, he predominantly worked in Switzerland to start, but then from 2017, he's been based in Dallas, where he then founded the Dallas office and later sat on the US board for Texas and South for Faidam. After a long and successful career with Faidam, Elliot has now joined the Levin Group to spearhead their US footprint as a brand. Just a couple of weeks ago, they launched in the US, where they went from zero on the ground to 70 people in one day, and they now have huge ambitions to continue to grow the US side of business, which Elliot is going to be hugely involved in. So, uh, Elliot, thanks to you for joining us on the pod all the way from the US.

No problem at all.

I'm really excited to unpack this, and I know there will be people, like I said to you in preparing for this, outside looking in going, how the hell is he— how the hell have these guys hired 60 people, and how many of them are actually going to be there in 2 weeks' time, a couple of days' time, all these things, right? But where we'd like to start, which is probably a question that you guys have thought a lot about, with particularly the amount of people you're hiring, is like, what, what, what do you believe are the sort of common characteristics and traits that you really think make up a highly successful recruitment consultant in today's market?

I think it's a good question. I think when we interviewed, or when we set out to interview, I think this was the one thing we had to unpack and really discover, because you waste a lot of time if you hire the wrong people. So I think the cool thing about recruitment is it doesn't really matter what background, what education, or anything you have. It's not based on that at all. So you look at half the office here, you have people with meteorology degrees, law degrees, philosophy degrees, all great recruiters, but look at their resumes, you're like, they don't match at all, they're completely different people. So it does, as you say, come completely down to characteristics. And for me, it's quite commonplace. I watch some of your other podcasts as well, and I think everyone says roughly around the same thing because it makes sense. But I think Number 1 I look for is resilience. So I always need some form of example from someone of a time they failed. And it can be small, it can be huge, but I think what's really important coming into this job is having some muscle memory of failure and then what came after that. So what lessons you learned, how you changed the way you did something, because you and I both know this job is all about failing every single day, learning from it, doing it again, not giving up. So I think Proof of this and an example of this is something I look for in every grad interview that I do. If someone says I've never failed, one, I don't believe them, but two, they're going to have a pretty hard ride joining this type of a career because you start knowing nothing and the only way you really progress is by doing it wrong, being told, hey, change this up, and then just learning by doing. So I think resilience is key because that's what you'll have to contend with in your first couple months and probably year in recruitment is making mistakes and having things go wrong. I think number 2 is emotional intelligence. So this job's all about speaking to people, connecting people. If you don't like speaking to people or talking to different people, understanding one person's very different from the next, you've got to sell in a slightly different way or talk to them in a slightly different way, you're going to struggle with this job. And I think recruitment is slowly like morphing into more of an email writing type thing rather than when I started where it was just like pound the phone, get, get on the phone, just call switchboards. I think now it's in the techie age we're at, it's harder to pound switchboards where most of your clients might not even have a switchboard. So I think maybe it's less important just by selling with your words, but also now on email. But I think emotional intelligence, knowing your audience is also key. I think those are the two main ones I think I actually look for outside of the, are you competitive? Like, this is a sales job. Like, this is not HR. This is not— This is not a form of other consulting. This is sales. You have to want to be number one, hate being number two. But also, do you understand that working together is key to building a business? And for us especially, we can't have a bunch of, like, salespeople who just want to be number one and not help the wider cause. We have to have people that buy into the vision, that want to help each other and grow the company, because they know if they do that, they'll be more successful for it. So I think, yeah, resilience, emotional intelligence, competitiveness, but also just a buy-in to a wider vision and a want to be part of something special. In our case anyway, where we know we're not going to be 60 people for a while. I'm going to hire 20, 30 more people in a month, so these people will only be new for a month or so. So I think those are the things I look for. But apart from that, it's a really cool career where, to be honest, it doesn't matter what the resume or CV says. It's purely based on the personality interview when I speak to them. I'm never going to know if someone's going to be a good recruiter through just looking at their background, which is why I love this sort of thing. I get to work with different people from different backgrounds who all bring different characteristics, but I think, yeah, resilience and emotional intelligence are the key things.

I love it. And then, because I know we'll see Faden obviously typically known for hiring grads, so just curious, obviously you're a graduate yourself. Like, if you look at who Elliot was when you graduated and then the sort of huge amount of people that you saw that are graduates. I know obviously there's nuances here because it's in America. I don't know, any differences you see there? Or because I know like people were, you know, saying X, like people who are this age are more like this, or I don't know, any sort of things that you've noticed or picked up on, would you say?

I think that, so when I started, I can't really remember the segue from, so I did a law degree and I was like, I don't want to be a lawyer. I worked in a law firm for a bit, too slow, too boring, nothing like the degree itself. I then was in that random period where you don't really know what you want to do, but you kind of know what you want out of a career. And I just wanted to make loads of money. Like, if I look back at my main motivations, it was money. And I think that that still rings true now. I think the money-motivated individuals who are commercially aware would tend to do well in recruitment and like it. But I think that it's still similar. When I look at these grads and look at myself, I see a lot of them in me. And I think that Comparing actually different places I've worked has been the most interesting. So Switzerland compared to America or Dallas is the polar opposite of like the grad population or people that you just hire. In Europe, in Switzerland, you tend to get like people who are like 2, 3 jobs in, people with master's degrees, where you wouldn't really tend to look at that in the US. You tend to look at fresh grads, and it's a different type of model. I think in the US, people like tend to look at recruitment as an actual career.

Yeah, yeah, totally. We picked up on that, yeah.

And then, yeah, it's definitely true. The grads here, their family have been in sales, they want to be in sales, they know what recruitment is, their friends do it, which lends to a different population and probably more people to choose from compared to a UK where the rep is pretty bad and a Switzerland where they can get a banking job and earn $100K base straight away, so why would they take the risk on a high commission, lower base job like recruitment? So there's different, there's definitely different populations of grads to go for that I've seen kind of and gone full circle. But for me, the US has been the most successful place to really kind of drive the grad model and really scale fast, just because one, there's loads more people, but two, the career is seen as probably more of a career than just a stopgap just to make some money quickly and then go off and do something they really wanted to do, which is good. And I think that's why I'm still here, because I see the ability to scale is just massively easier in my view when you go for the grad.

So just final thing, again curious, like, because you said resilience, right, which is obviously really common words. Like, would you say, like, there's different words that people use, right? Snowflake generation, these things. Would you say people more soft?

Um, I, I think it's different, right? Like, I, I think the, the way that recruitment is now is not the same as it was when I started in terms of like the skill sets and what's driven on desk and the environment. I think it's changed with the generation. I don't think it's better or worse, I think it's just different. I think that Probably if you go back 20 years and look at how salespeople did their job, it'd be different from my— when I started, then it's different to now. So I think not different in a bad way, like just different. And you have to also think that the clients are changing as well. Like clients are very different now than they were, and candidates than they were when I started. Like you can't sell in the same way. And I think COVID accelerated the fact of like using video calls. Everyone now calls with a video. So you have to be better at that than when I started. No one even thought about doing a video call. It was very, very rare. Like it was all over phone or like face-to-face. So I think I think you just gotta be ready for that change and just understand that the world has changed as well and change with it and not just keep driving what worked 10 years ago now because it won't work. And I think that's the key thing that I've seen is just staying with the times. And if a grad says, hey, we should get a TikTok and start doing some recruitment and like some TikToks, I'm like, I don't really know what, I'm not the generation that's like, that's not really me, but it works now. So you've gotta go with it and make it work. But I just think it's different now. The whole world of recruitment is different. So it's not worse, it's just, Yeah, you can't be stuck in the past now. I think you just have to go.

Yeah, no, yeah, I think different is right. I think the way that I think about— I'm 28, so I was in 1993, right? So I was like on the cusp of like— I grew up knocking for my friends, doing these things, and then I think I had got my first mobile in like year 6 at school. So like I sort of had a bit of both, if you get what I mean, and I've sort of been on the journey. But I feel like I've spoke to this about my friends, like we're talking about resilience and it being different. Like if I went through school now and I had to also deal with social media, like, that is a whole different, like, world of resilience, do you know what I mean? Even though I might be on my phone more, or I'm not spending as much time, like, calling people, da da da, all these things, I just feel like, like you said, it is different. I think we can be very nostalgic around how it used to be and drive that, and this is what it needs to be, and people that aren't like that, they're just softer these days and these things, but I would probably argue that to get through school now, and have to deal with social media. Probably more resilient, I would say, in my opinion, because that would have been fucking difficult.

I agree.

Going through that with all that to deal with as well.

No, I agree. They come, they're thick-skinned. Like, these people, like, these people, although they might not smash the phones every day, they definitely have gone through some stuff that makes them good recruiters. And thick skin is just different, right? Like you said, I, I, I definitely agree, having seen them come in and do well in recruitment in a slightly different way. Like, you, you, it works. Like, you just have to, yeah, roll with the times. And, and it'll be different in 10 years again where there'll be different ways of recruiting. You've just gotta, gotta be, uh, be ready for that change and embrace it.

Yeah, I love it. So look, I wanna, I wanna really dig into how the hell you, you guys have thought about and executed sort of hiring such a, a big group of people and the strategy behind it and what you're excited about. So let's just, let's just sort of focus on Faden for a second. So So I guess the first thing that I'm really curious about, and I know other people listening to this would be like, how the hell did Elliot adapt with moving to Switzerland, recruiting in Switzerland? Like, what was that like?

Very difficult. It wasn't like I came out of university being like, recruitment's fine, it'll be easy. Yeah, well, like, I'm really good. I really didn't do that well in my first 6 months. I I struggled, one, with the culture differences. So like, Switzerland was a very different culture to Aberdeen. So I went to university in Scotland. So like, I went from Scotland to Switzerland in a week and then was flung into a different culture where I had to recruit finance and accounting in the, in kind of Germany, Switzerland region. So very, very different job, very different types of people, which took some time to kind of get to know how to speak to them, how to react, how to live in a different place. So I think, yeah, I'd be lying to say that it was easy, it was great, everything went well day one. I wasn't that recruitment story. I was the one where plenty of times I probably thought, this isn't for me, I'm going to move back to the UK and do something else where my friends are and kind of do a job where I thought I was doing a bit better, or it was a bit easier, or it was a bit more 9-to-5. I had loads of days like that. Any person who's been in recruitment for 9, 10, 11 years plus and he says it's been great the whole time and they never thought about quitting is 100% lying. My first 6 months it was tough, but I look back at that time and that probably made me, made me kind of set me up for what I, what was to come in terms of leadership and moving around the world and things like that. So I look back at it fondly, but it was tough. Like, I think there isn't really a secret sauce to make it work. I think the one thing I didn't do was give up. Spoke to my family a lot about, like, they gave me some, like, good motivational words like, you're good enough, don't give up. Yeah, I think that was, that was definitely key. But really, just me looking around the company and thinking, I'm better than some of these people, it will come. I'm going to keep beating the people around me on the key KPIs, like doing the basics really well. Eventually it will come. And it did eventually. It just took me 6 to 12 months to really get it in a different country. But once I got it, then it starts to get really good and you start to really push on. But it was tough. Like, it was not easy, but 100% worth it. And anyone thinking about shall I take that risk, move to a different country? I've never been there before.

Yeah, yeah.

Just do it. Like, it's 100% worth it. It's tough, but like, if you really want to kind of climb up that ladder quickly, you've got to take those risks. And I look back and it was—

Yeah, because that's extreme, man. Because like you said, went from university in Aberdeen, and I'm assuming like you was leading some sort of uni life. Like, don't know how— like, do you know what I mean? Whatever that looked like, going out with your mates, getting drunk. Watch some telly, not, not, and then just flung yourself straight into a different country and a different mode of work. Um, I guess what, what I'd be interested in just to get a bit practical for the sec, uh, for a second, uh, like I'm, I'm sure you've, you've picked up on this, but I, I'm speaking to multiple recruitment companies now that, that a lot of their, um, business and the most profitable part of their businesses, um, are serving companies outside of the UK. And a lot of them are in Europe and a lot more people are going over to the US. So I guess particularly around, like, as you said, like picking up on the nuances of like culture and these things, for anyone listening to this that actually really is excited with the opportunity of getting into a business and recruiting people in Germany, Berlin, maybe the US, or getting over there, like for the people that might be really concerned of like, what the hell is it gonna, like what am I gonna have to get grips with really quickly around calling Elliot in Germany, the— I don't know, I might annoy him. I don't know, like picking up on like— I don't know, what helps you speed up that process of understanding what flies in Switzerland, what doesn't? I don't know, anything in there that looking in hindsight could help people?

Um, I think it's— it comes back to like how you learn recruitment, making mistakes. I think you kind of pick up quite quickly, like when you, when you say something and then you get shot down, or when you send a type of email or you push too hard, you tend to like realize when you push the boundary, okay, I got to take it back a step. And I think in Europe that was key for me. I think there it's much less of a London or like East Coast US salesy culture where you push, push, push. It's so relationship-driven and you really have to like go for coffees with people, get to know them, like really delve deep into kind of the personal side of your clients and candidates more so than just saying, here's a great job, here's a great candidate, pay me the money, let's go on, let's move on. So relationship-driven. It took me some time to understand that, but I think what working in Switzerland did for me at the start was teach me how to really work well with clients and get to know them a lot better and be way less transactional. I think a lot of recruiters who come from bigger cities who have just done recruitment in those big cities where it is more transactional, they kind of send candidate, get offer, do deal, do it again, and they don't really get to know them, probably struggle then to flip to a more relationship-driven culture, and I'd say the south of the US is that. The south of the US is very much a Switzerland in terms of a getting-to-know-you culture. They want to work with you rather than the company. And I think, yeah, you learn by pushing the boundaries and then kind of walking it back a bit. But I think it's so different in so many different places. But I think Switzerland compared to like a New York, you have to act completely different to clients and candidates to get what you want. So yeah, I don't think there is like a one answer, this is what you do sort of thing. I think it's about like pushing the boundaries all the time. Like don't shy away from trying to prove your worth, do deals. But like when you think that you push too far, maybe you need to back it up and do it in a different way in certain cultures and certain countries, especially as an English person. Like English person doing recruitment anywhere, like they already think you're like a bit pushy salesman because there's so many English recruiters everywhere. So you've got to prove that you're not the same as the rest and you understand the culture and the way of working. Alongside giving them good candidates and good service and things like that.

So when did the US opportunity come on your radar then? Because from what I can see, you went over there in, uh, towards the end of 2017. Like when did that come on your radar?

Yeah. So I, I've been in Switzerland for 4 years or so. I never really planned to be there for that long. It wasn't really my life goal to live in Zurich for the rest of, uh, rest of my time. So I kind of got to the point where I'd gone from graduate to head of the office. And the one thing I didn't see is the scale in Zurich. It's super expensive. No business is going to be 200 people in Zurich. It makes zero sense. So I quickly thought, okay, so if I want to keep growing and progressing, I'm going to have to go somewhere else in the business. And I don't want to go to an office that's already big and already has 100 people. I want to start something myself. And for me, the US was where we were making the most money, the biggest deals, the biggest opportunities. So I asked, okay, where, where are we opening next? What's the next office we're going to open? And I would love to be a part of it. I'd love to go out there and do it. I don't really mind where it is, I'm super flexible. And it just so happened that we didn't have a presence, or Ben didn't have a presence at the time in Texas. So I said, yeah, that sounds good, I'll go there. I'd never been to Texas in my life. It's not like the holiday destination number one for anyone going to the US. So I took the job without having been to Dallas or Texas. I thought that it was going to be, and to be honest, I thought it was going to be way more Texan than it is. I had cowboy hats, I had guns in my head. But then when I'm here, I'm like, you know what, this is just a normal, fast-growing city, multicultural, like easy place to live. If you want cowboys and guns, you can get it, but like that's not what the city is. So yeah, I'd never, never been here, took the job, said, okay, cool, I'll do the Dallas office. Relocated myself to Dallas, opened the office with, I think it was like 6 of us in a room with no windows in a Regus office, as you do in a lot of companies. And that was the start of the story. There wasn't a, like, reason for me really going to Dallas specifically or Texas.

Yeah, you wanted the opportunity.

Opportunity-led thing where I wanted to grow something, and for me it had to be somewhere new so I could prove to myself and others I can build it from scratch and not just be there as the grad who's going into it. Um, and also somewhere I can scale. In the US, for me, was where I saw the most scalability, uh, at the time. So that was really the main, the main reason that I kind of moved.

What do you, what do you think you showcased to— because I'm sure there would have been other— like, I know you said there's a few other people, but I'm sure there would have been a number of people that would have wanted that opportunity. Like, people listening to this probably want opportunities like what you're talking about. What, what do you think you showcased to, to give the people, whoever it was, sort of enough trust to go, you know what, we're going to put Elliot down as one of the first on the ground?

I think one, one thing is, and, and what lots of companies do, well, what we're trying to do here, what Faden definitely, uh, preached, was the organic growth piece. I was very young in quite a big role, and I proved kind of that I could handle it. I didn't give up. Like Zurich didn't go particularly well all the time. It was a, it was a hard business to run. It was a very different culture. So I think showcasing that resilience again and showing that like, look, it didn't go well, but he kept on building it, learned from his mistakes, and then it ended up a positive experience where we made money in Zurich and the office was successful. I think going through that transition of like, again, yeah, failure, learning, and then making it good. Was important. And I think, yeah, that's probably the major thing that I showed is the progression from graduate to director, making mistakes, learning, and then wanting to take a risk in my career to further it. I think that's what all these businesses have grown by, people saying, hey, I'm putting my hand up, let me go over there and I'll prove it to you that it's the right decision. In most cases, the organic growth model does work. So, I think I was just another example of that where I put my hand up after proving it, sorry, and took the risk. And it already been proven with other people moving around that it does work if you back the person internally to go do something like that. So yeah, and it did work in the end. It does definitely, definitely work. But I think proving yourself, going through the tough times and backing yourself was kind of the key thing. I think anyone can do it. There's no, there's no special thing about me. I think I just, I definitely just worked really hard, learned from my mistakes, and took risks, and never got comfortable. 'Cause I'm just the type of person that if it's not difficult and if I'm not learning, then I want to go try something else or do something different and continually push myself. I'm not one for staying in the same position for 5 years because it's comfortable. That's not me. So yeah, just always looking for that next step or next opportunity. That's just who I am.

[Speaker:JAMES] So you mentioned there, like, you was quite young, you was in a big role. What's your experience been like with imposter syndrome? Like, if at all.

Um, I don't think— I don't think there is. I don't think there has been, really, to be honest. I, I, I do not—

would you not think— I don't know, like, looking around, like, fucking hell, 4 years ago I was in Aberdeen, like, doing this. Now I'm here.

You grow up really fast. I think in recruitment, you're like— when you're pushed in the right way in a company where, like, you are push every day to do what, like, my motto is like, if someone says, okay, I want to get 20 interviews, they get 20 interviews. The next question is like, where's 25, where's 30? Like, if you're constantly pushing that way and you see the results and you're a motivated person, like, you tend to forget quite quickly like how old you are and like how long you've been doing it. Like, I feel kind of old in recruitment now, but I've not even like, what, I've got 9, 10 years in my career in general. That's, that's all I've got. And I feel like I'm kind of a little bit old now, but In reality, age is just a number. I think it was, for me, it was just constantly trying to overtake people in the company and proving myself that got me to where I was. So I forgot how old I was. I just purely went on merit. And if I was doing better, I knew I was gonna get the role and just kept growing from that standpoint. So I think I've just always been the person who's like never really thought about age. I don't care about the people here either. Like, if someone comes in and does better than you, then they're gonna get the opportunity first. And I think, yeah, it never really stood out to me. Maybe when I look back at it later, I'll be like, that's crazy, like I just relocated the other side of the world and it worked, but at the time I was just kind of living in the moment and I just kept pushing myself and I didn't really think, oh, I've only got 4 years doing this, like what the hell am I doing? I'm gonna fuck this up. It never came to my mind, like I just backed myself every time and hoped that it would go well.

[Speaker:JAMES] So what did Dallas look like for Faden then before he left? So obviously, like you said, you got there, it was like 60 of you. What did it look like?

Yeah, so I think it was probably between like 30 and 35 people or so, with a few of the brands present in the office, a decent structure of kind of middle layer management and grads coming in. So we got through kind of the first hump of getting it up and running in a new area where we didn't really have a ton of clients. Dallas and Texas in the South wasn't really a very, kind of highly touched market in the US for us because we didn't have loads of people at Baden, but we had enough to do a little bit in Texas. But really my remit was to grow it further, like make it bigger. It's a huge market. So it was tough at the start to get going, but I think once we understood the way of working, target clients and market, and really drilled down, we did really well. We were the best office in the world one year, I think the year before I left, in terms of performance. Performance. So we got up there in terms of a really, really successful office. But yeah, once I left, it was probably about 6 people, and then when I left, mid-30s or so. I'm doing okay.

So what, what were— so a couple of things, then we'll move on to like the past couple of months. So firstly, what were, what were some of the, the sort of challenges that you maybe like— I know it seems like you just went straight into it, backed yourself, but what, what were some of the challenges on, on that journey that maybe you least expected? Out of interest?

I think the— good question. I think the way of working was different. I think coming back—

yeah, the nuances of like how they did business.

Actually coming to terms with like, yeah, Texas versus—

was it more direct? A lot more direct?

It's more direct. Like, it's more direct. You can be a bit more salesy compared to Switzerland. So actually making that transition and understanding how to sell again to the right people and how to talk in the right way and recruit in a slightly different manner was probably the hardest thing. But apart from that, it was all very similar. Like in terms of like the how you do a deal, nothing changed. It was the same process, recruitment's the same. It was more of the nuances of culture and then the nuances of hiring grads because I was amazed as soon as I came to the US how much better the grads were. No offense to the people I hired in Spain. Previous businesses, but I think, like I said, recruitment was front of mind. They wanted to sell, they were fine to get on the phone straight away, they understood things quickly, and there was just a lot more of them to go for. You weren't kind of struggling to find the masses to scale. So I think all those things were different, but yeah, it was what I wanted. The challenge at the time was to do something different, so I went from one side to the other, which I knew it was going to be different because I wanted that, and it was just, yeah, Another learn-by-doing situation, make a few mistakes, don't make them again, keep on moving fast, and that was kind of my motto.

[Speaker] Love it. So, more of a personal question here, and then I'm keen to talk about the last couple of months. Like, I've spoken to a few people on this podcast and personally where, as I sort of highlighted earlier, that like more and more recruitment companies I speak to have America on their business plan. And I think for the ambitious and for people like you and like the journey that you've been on, that's going to be a really exciting opportunity. And I think a lot of people listening to this will have that opportunity and potentially given to them. So the personal question is like, what's your sort of advice for people? It seems like you just sort of jump straight in, but like there definitely are challenges in terms of relocating your life there that maybe people don't anticipate. Like, I've got no fucking friends, I'm not in a relationship, I've gone over here, I literally feel like I'm alone. All I've got is work. It's been hard to integrate into the culture. Anything on that that sort of helps? I don't know, because we've had people on here before who did go to America, it was exciting, and it just didn't quite work out more of the personal side, and it was more challenging than they anticipated. Anything on that that could be helpful for people?

Yeah, I think so. I think actually the burden of this is on the leader of the office. So say they were to relocate to another office and there was already a leader there and a team there, a burden of this is on the leader of that office for sure. One thing I made very, very sure when I hired anyone really, but also the masses that we've just hired right now, was keep it fun and keep things going that are not work-related. So making sure that— and it's not just drinking, socials and stuff, but making sure that you, you have a committee of people at the start. We have something called the culture committee here, which we started from day one, and they are really the drivers of what we do outside of just doing deals. And I think once you give that to the people and they decide what the culture is like, then I think for people moving into that business, they're kind of part of something else. They get to go out and play sport with people or do things, build those social connections. 100%. Yeah, 100%. If you don't build those social connections, you are going to struggle because you're going to have those dark days where you go home, you've just lost a deal or something, and if there's no one to speak to, go to the gym with, go for a drink, like, it will be really, really hard. So I think making a point to both be good at your job but also get out there and speak to people, both colleagues but also like join Facebook groups, like all of that stuff, like sounds basic, but actually do it. [FOREIGN] Commit to it, because if you don't, then it can be a really, really lonely place. I don't think I did that as well as I could have in Switzerland.

Look at that.

I think I could have got myself out there and like stopped worrying just about work every day and actually looked at like my life outside of it. And I think that's led me to now making sure that day one, all of these grads, some of which have never had a proper job before, feel that they're one at work, like professional environment, we work hard, but also they're not alone. Loads of these people have relocated here as well from other states. They know where the shops are, they know where they can go out. Like, that's important stuff that people sometimes forget. So I think less of a burden on the person, more of a burden on the person who's getting this relocated consultant or whoever's joining, but vital. Because if not, people leave. Like, you'll have people who just could be the best recruitment consultant ever, but because you've not made the effort and they feel like they're not at home, they're like, actually, I need to relocate back to my family.

Um, and that's probably more on the manager than what we're saying on the social scene. What was that? How would you describe the social scene and that, like, Dallas and the places you experience for a UK person? Like, how would you describe it?

It's great. Like, I think that, like, the social scene is very different in Dallas compared to other US cities. It's very spread out. Like, there's not, like, one, um, like, main street that you go out every time. Like, there's very much pockets of, like, different types types of, uh, like there's like one place that's probably more edgy, more Shoreditch type place. One place is a bit more like— so it's very spread out. Everyone drives here, so don't come to Dallas if you can't drive because you'll struggle because there's no real public transport. It's all about your car. But I think the social scene's like any other. Like it's an up-and-coming city where there is a ton of people moving here every day. So one, everything's quite new. The nice thing here is that it hasn't been here for 20, 30 years. There's apartment buildings being built, restaurants, everything's coming here. So It's quite clean, it's quite new. But the social scene, some people might think it's not as fun as the bigger New York or the bigger— like, it's as fun for sure. You just have to come here to experience it and not just assume that just because it's newer and in the South it's different. I think everyone that comes here is like, I didn't know Dallas was like this before I came here, but now I want to live here. And that's the standard thing everyone says. Before they're like, nah, not Dallas, I'll go to LA, I'll go somewhere else, because they know it, because they've seen pictures. Dallas is still that kind of hidden gem of a place. And I think I got here before, obviously pre-COVID, before the— what happened, before people started to relocate. And it took me probably a year or so to be like, you know what, why would I live anywhere else? There's no income tax, like I can afford a nice place to live, like it's just an easier life. Um, but it takes a little time to get there. Um, and you definitely have to live it to believe it. Like, I, I can say all this, but like take a trip to an Austin or Dallas or somewhere in Texas and you'll see a big difference in your, in your thoughts of where you want to live in the US if you're thinking about it.

So let's talk about the, the past sort of, um, um, couple of months then. So I think let's just dig into, obviously, yeah, outside looking in, I think, yeah, hiring huge amount of people at once. Like, talk to us and, and sort of break it down a bit because I think this is what's really unique about you guys when preparing for this. On like how, how you're thinking about how we can get people up to speed. And I think just to frame this up, why this is really relevant right now, and I'm sure you picked up on this, but every single recruitment company right now is hiring to keep up with their clients' demands. Now most companies that I speak to are having sort of little or no success getting experienced recruiters through the door, because let's be honest, like with how buoyant the market is right now, you should be making some good money. So why you're leaving has got to be pretty strong, and these things. So most companies that we're speaking to, that we're working with, are really back to hiring that trainee, grad level, these things, right? And for growing companies, and particularly small growing companies, and I'm sure you might have experienced this in sort of pockets in your career, that can be really challenging. These people can take up loads of time. Some of them may not work out, and it can be really difficult. Whereas obviously you guys have gone, well, look, instead of, instead of trying to get 3, 4 here, another 5 here, another 5 there, you're going to get a whole huge sort of nucleus and collective of people from day one, and we're going to get them up to speed. Like, talk to us about the strategy here, like, because there's obviously a strategy.

Yeah, no, for sure. And this was kind of the sell to me when I, when I looked at companies to join before I, I chose this opportunity. This was the, this was the one thing that stood out to me because of my experience of hiring pockets of 5, 10 people. And then like when you thought about it and like decided it wasn't that crazy. Actually, it works by just putting a few process things in place. So I think one, don't underestimate the power of like passive learning and people learning from each other by doing the job. I think that half the stuff that is taught in this office isn't by me or the leaders. It's by someone listening to someone else asking, oh, what happened there? That didn't sound so good. What did you do? And then either doing it themselves or not. So I think doing that times 60 rather than times 10 means it's just a ton more learning going on in the room when you hire the right people. I think it's still comes back to hiring that right person, not just bums on seats. So I think that's one thing. And two, I think the structure that we put in play here with not an emphasis on a VP or a leader doing everything from business development, training, it, like commercial stuff, everything you can think of, but we actually have hired a few different people per pod who take on 3 or 4 tasks every day, and that's all they do. They do they run really, really fast in a small box, let's say. So you have a commercial person who is attached to a Storm who just runs the client side of things. So make sure that we're working jobs with the right firms, we're working jobs in the right area, we're making use of clients that we can do 2, 3, 4 deals with. Because one thing grads don't know is that part that well. They've not really dealt with clients before, so there needs to be some sort of check of, in terms of like, okay, if you're going to spend your time on this, it's right, we've got terms, they're at the right level. And also, is there an opportunity for other businesses to leverage on your work. So we have that person in play. That person's an ex-recruiter. That's someone who understands recruitment but really likes the client side, doesn't really want the delivery, wants the client side. You also have a people operations manager who is really a performance manager. So not an L&D trainer, they're not in classrooms every day, they're not doing that, but they are performance managing those grads, making sure that one, at the start, they know how to use the system. They know like what their area is, what recruitment is like, the whole process. But then once they get going, they're really there to identify trends and analyze performance to make sure that we make the middle tier of people the best and we make the best even better and we help the ones who are not doing well in the right areas. But they are there doing their job day to day in a team of 30, and that's all they do. They don't try and get on clients.

They say team of 30.

Yeah, per brand. So essentially the 60 we hired were split between Storm 2, 30, Storm 3, 30. So you've essentially in my office right now, you've got 2 brands, a team of 30 grads each. So within that brand, you have a VP, a people operations manager, and a commercial. So when you split that down and you think, okay, 30 people, but you have 3 people who are managing that process, that's 10 people per team, per person. Anyone can manage 10 people, but one person can't manage 30 grads at one go. So we put a structure in place to allow for faster growth, and we've hired people who are very motivated by that area, either an ex-recruiter who wants to train, an ex-recruiter who wants to do clients, or an ex-recruiter who knows how to lead a team, knows how to close a candidate, and they just, like I said, run really fast in a small group.

Yeah, I like that.

And then you load the grads in, and then it works a lot faster than saying, 'Cause if I said, if I couldn't do this myself, I couldn't be the one person with 60 grads, it would just, it wouldn't work. But once you put the right people in play and then hire the very best grads, you start to see the whole thing explode and move a lot faster. And that's really, it's not a secret sauce, it's just finding ways to fine-tune what's been done in the past and make it move a whole lot faster so you're not relying on one person to do everything. So that's in a general terms kind of how we manage to hire that many people and that they all actually get the support that they need. 'Cause support is the key thing. And I think that what Levin Group did before I arrived and what we're doing now was fine-tune that and make sure the model and the process was correct before we hire the grads. But that has to be there and set in terms of you have those people in play before you put the grads underneath. But once those people are in play and they're motivated, compensated in the right way, and ready to rock, then it's actually a lot easier than one would expect to see 60 people walk in the door. On one day, which was an awesome experience. But I think I'd say like it wasn't like stressful because I knew the process would work and I knew that the plan was in place in terms of people knew what they were doing, what they were responsible for. It was just difficult because, yeah, you tend to just have— there's a lot of work, like you're flying around, you're walking around all the time. Yeah, I can imagine. But it's fun at the same time. But it works. Like they're all still here and we're already seeing successes. From the amount of people we've hired. So yeah, it's all down to that like prep work and process that you put in beforehand, knowing that everyone is very, very kind of very aware of what their role is every day and they don't try and do someone else's role. They just do their role really well.

The thing that's unique about that is one, the setup, but I think as you all know, in recruitment and growing recruitment companies, it's very common that Elliot might be the commercial person in that setup, But Elliot also is expected to do the training, to do the things. So then all of a sudden, like you said, they're not running really fast in a small box. They're trying to run fast in a really big box, right? So I think that's a unique thing, which I really like. So a couple of things here that I'm just sort of curious about. So very typical for a recruitment company, although it does seem like a shift in right, shift in now where people really have sort of, um, if you want to be like a recruiter in a delivery role, they have sort of career progression plans for that. And just that it's not just 360, like how, how have you set up the, on the actual recruiters themselves? Are they going straight into candidates? Obviously I know you've got that commercial person that's winning business. Like, are they just on the candidate side initially? What does that look like?

So there are 360 consultants. So everyone we hire is not delivery candidate focused. Everyone picks up the phone, emails clients, candidates from day one. We're not going to hire any 180 consultants. The, the commercial person is there really to pick up on work that has already been done by the consultant and make sure it's at the right level, and they're helping out to maintain the right client relationships. And, and, and really kind of consultants get the bites, commercial will convert those bites into jobs, VP will then help consultant to place that job, close candidates, and people ops person will train them to do all those parts really well and use the system properly. So Everyone who comes in is not sharing deals, is not like doing just candidate work or headhunting. They are in an area and specific niche, but they do everything. Like, they're a complete 360 recruiter. They just have different people to go to for help in different ways to help make the whole thing.

Yeah, yeah, got it. And then what have been some of the common trends so far then on the performance side, out of interest, that you might have been surprised by or interested by?

So I think, what, 3 weeks in, I think one thing I've been surprised with is just how these people so far have picked up like what, how one thing connects to the next at volume and doing it really quickly because no one really, no one knew what recruitment was before this, no one does. And I think what I've been surprised is we've gone from 60 people having no idea to 60 people getting interviews. We've had a few retainers signed already with new clients that have been picked up by these graduates who didn't even know what they were doing 3 weeks ago. We've seen some really good successes already, and I think I was probably surprised. Maybe I shouldn't have been, but I was surprised how quickly the graduates picked it up and started to show value really quickly. And they're just really hungry. Like, we have people in there who are super hungry to do well, see the massive opportunity they have because they've joined a company that was zero people when they joined and will be— like, I have plans to— I want to make this US business 1,000 people by the time I leave this company. So If these people are coming in day one, they know the opportunity that they can get to open an office, lead a big team, and really progress if they work hard. So I've been just surprised with how quickly they've really kind of hopped on the train of recruitment and got going. And yeah, like so far, so far so good. I don't want to jinx it. I don't want to walk out and then see some people make mistakes and do stuff and walk out. But so far, touch wood, it's going well. It's gone well and the process has worked exactly how it, how it should.

And then as part of the process here, because I know this is what people be interested in as well. Obviously I know you guys have taken an entire different approach here and more of like a sort of hockey stick growth curve, right? But like, what, like how have you guys thought about, or like what have you not necessarily budgeted for, but like what's the, what are you expecting or what did you plan for the maturity curve to be in terms of like if we get Elliot in tomorrow, we probably suspect if things go well that he should be paying for his desk within 6 months easily. And I don't know, like, I don't know, how have you guys thought— what was the mindset there?

So I think one thing I think, uh, people don't sometimes— or why would they— they don't assume— they assume we're not making any money. They're not— we're losing money because we're growing so quickly. So we're actually not. We're making money. We're— we, we have EBITDA that we're reinvesting into the business. And we are now profitable. So it does work. But yeah, obviously you don't make profit day one if you hire 60 people who don't know what they're doing. Like you're going to, you're going to lose some money before making it. But I think that the kind of first 6 months are key. And then after that 6 months, you have such a critical mass doing well in a good market with good leaders that you hockey stick a whole lot faster than if you do it in 5, 10 people intake. So yeah, one, definitely we're making money as a business globally, which is Awesome, and we're reinvesting it straight away to continue to grow, which shows what we're doing works. Because I think, yeah, sometimes if you hire 60 people, you can lose money pretty quickly with the wrong model. But we're cash positive, and we are just now just repeating the model. Like, you know what works, we just have to get the right people.

Is it 6 months typically that you've got? Is it like the— because that is quite common. Like, is it you're like, this is the— yeah, that's where we're going, they should if we've got the right person in, 6 months they should be paying for themselves and then, and more, and then obviously continue to grow. Is that typically what you budgeted?

I think, yeah, if I look, if I look at a timescale of like grad to successful, I think like the first 6 months are vital. I think the first 2 months or so are learning, like making mistakes, not really making much money. But I think that then you're set up for success in kind of months 3 to 9 to 12 where you start to be more consistent, understand the job, connect the dots. So I would say Within the first 6 months, you see a massive skill increase from not knowing what they're doing to trying to do deals. But in the first, I reckon it's going to be even faster judging on what I've seen so far in terms of opportunity to make money in the right areas, work jobs quickly, sign retainers really quickly as well. So I reckon if I'm going to say, my team is probably going to watch it, I reckon that 3 months is where I want them to start being consistent. I want to see a deal and I want to start to see those dots connected. If you can get to that period, then from there you will make money. The deal sizes, our average fee is probably around $35,000, $38,000. So like once you start doing those consistently, you will make money.

What's the performance output expectation in the first year?

So in terms of like first year?

Yeah, yeah. Like how— yeah, what are you hoping? Like what have you expected of people?

So I think, I think an easy way to say, I think in the first 3 months you're learning, you're not going to make any money. I think from month 3 to 12, what I would be gunning for is 1 deal a month. I'd be consistently trying to do 1 perm deal a month in that area. Some people will end up doing a lot more, some people will struggle for a bit more but then pick it up. But I think consistency is key, and I think after that training period is off and the kind of wheels are off, I think one deal a month is what I would look for. So yeah, one deal a month averaging around $30,000-$35,000 would be what I would expect for kind of the first year over kind of the 9 months or so that I would expect for training.

Wow, okay, fair. Because mate, I know it's different, right? But obviously because I'm in the learning and development conversation every single day, I've sat down with multiple companies where first year expectation is $75,000. Yes, that's why, because again, this is what people are interested in, right? Outside looking in, it's like, well, what are their targets? Like, what— like all these types of things, what they expect. Do you get what I mean? Because like, if I ask you that and you're like, what are we expecting? Yeah, and they're just interesting.

Yeah, I, I think like it depends. Like, it's all a belief system thing. Yeah, like, uh, whatever. Like, I, I think if you say 75 is good, then 75 is good. Like, they don't really know. Yeah. What good looks like, so they'll take whatever you say is that. If you say 500 is good, then some people probably hit 500, some people won't come anywhere near, but at least you kind of keep raising that bar in the right place. Because we're here to grow quickly, do really well. I want people to make a lot of money, so I want to set punchy goals because I've seen, one, it works. I've come through that environment where there was always someone better than me and always somewhere I could, I could, I could improve. But I think, yeah, I think I mean, that's low. If I was to say that to me, I'd push back for sure and be like, look at the people that have been in the business already in London that started who have done 400,000 or 500,000 in their first year with the same amount of tools and experience you have. That's the goal. That's where you need to get to. I think once you start having the belief system shift because some more people have done it and then they come in seeing the numbers already been done, then you just have to hire the right people who take that and just just want to drive it. So it would shift from company to company because $75,000 in one company might be really good for what they want, but for us, we want the— we want people hitting the $500,000, $600,000, $700,000 as quickly as possible in a year. And to get there, we can't start at $75,000. We have to push hard. And I think the people we hire are those want to— want to be the best recruiter in their— in their— in their area, not, not, not average. And I'm one who will always push someone to their absolute limit to get to get to where they need to get to. Because yeah, I want to see future leaders and people change their lives.

No, I love it. You guys are challenging the status quo, right? This is what this is all about. So I guess as we come to an end here, how are we thinking about culture in this cocktail of scale and growth, right? Because yeah, how are you— I know you said you've got the culture committee, which I absolutely love that. So people, I'm assuming, completely dedicated to think, like you said, what we're doing outside of work, What, what are people telling us that they need more help with? What would be great? These things, cuz that, that can also be something that people think a lot about or worry about, right? How can we make sure that we don't become a business or to be known as like we hire these young people and then we spit out 50% of them. And, and that's a big part of why recruitment doesn't get a good name.

Yeah. Right.

So like how are we thinking about culture? Yeah. As, as we grow this company?

I, I think like if I look at my role and what I want to, um, what my, I think there's two things that I have to do really, really well to succeed, one of which we've discussed— hire the very best people who fit the mold of a good recruiter. Number 2 is make sure the culture is set in a way where people work hard, they do well, they hit targets that need to be hit, they come to work to make lots of money, compete, grow their career, but also have fun with it. I'm a big component of like, come into work, laugh, have fun, be open. And so I think the culture of like Competitive but collaborative are the two words. If anyone asks me in an interview, like, what should the culture be? Both those things, not one or the other, because if you have competitive only, then you just have a bunch of individuals wanting to undercut each other. Nobody does well, you can't scale. But if you have collaborative only, you have a bunch of people who don't really care about doing well, and everyone's happy, but like no one's making any money. So I think both of them are important, and I think that my job is to make sure that as we grow, that doesn't dilute. And that's the one challenge that I think I face over the next coming years, is making sure that when this office is 200 people soon, it's still the same as it was day one. Like, the culture is still there in, in, in those collaborative terms. Because if it is, I know that I will succeed. So making it fun is number one. Like, the job is hard. Like, this job is difficult. Like, there's so much rejection. It's not— it's the hardest sales job you do. You're selling you're selling people, people do all sorts of things you don't know about, and so you've got to make it fun, you've got to make sure that it's an open culture where people are not scared to ask questions, not scared to ask their colleague, hey, can you do this? But also, their colleague will always help them out and say, hey, yeah, we're in this together. For me, going on my years before this, that is what I picked from like the different businesses that I'd run or been in that I enjoyed most and what I wanted to put into play here because Yeah, the culture sucks, then it doesn't matter how good you are at hiring or how much money there is in the market or how many clients are hiring, you're not going to do well. There's enough choices for people to have in terms of other companies. So culture is number one in terms of what I've tried to instill over the past 3 or so weeks with these people. And it's extremely, extremely— I'm extremely passionate about that side of it because I've seen it go wrong in different companies. And I don't want to be that person. I want to make sure that people love to work here, one, because they make loads of money and it's successful, but two, they actually just like coming to work. Um, and I'm still a big proponent of in-office working as well, like giving flexibility, but I think learning recruitment—

you guys have to lean and lean in and own— we're at—

we're in—

we're an office-first company, or like, we've invested a lot in our office experience, which is why you'd probably rather work here than at home, like the way that you're doing it. Like, imagine having seen— yeah, imagine having like 70 people join the Zoom, join the, the storm Zoom, like storm Zoom call for day 1. That'd be fucking chaos.

So we've all been there, actually, on the, on the third day. So, um, it's funny you said that. So the third day of operations here, so there was a huge storm in Dallas, um, and like I said at the start, to you, like, when the storm's in Dallas, people forget how to drive to work and stuff. So we have to go full remote for day 3 and 4. With 60 grads who had been, literally had just picked up a laptop and didn't really know what they were doing. So we had to make that work for the first week. And it does work. Like, you can do it, like, again, with the right people doing the right things. But is it the best way to start a business to get the results quickly? I still don't believe it is. But I think I am a believer that once you get over the first hump of understanding what recruitment is, understanding your role, then flexibility is key. Work from home a day to a week, it doesn't really matter. But yeah, when you want to learn recruitment quickly and we want to teach you at scale and make sure that it doesn't fall apart, then yeah, like you have— for me, the in-office experience is key. I also think lots of grads now are like, actually, yeah, yeah, totally. Because like they've done their degree. Yeah, yeah, remote, which is—

so let's, um, let's wrap this up then. Like, where— look, I do— look, I absolutely love your energy, mate. Like, I just can tell how passionate you are. Kudos to you on like just grabbing the opportunity you've had with both hands and making the most out of everything. But like, where's this business going to be in another 18 months then, mate? Where's it going to be?

[Speaker:JAMES] So I think my vision for the US business will be, I reckon, 200 people in Dallas, all 4 brands, a New York office that will launch in the next 3 months, a West Coast office and a Southeast office as well, launched with 50+ people. So what's that? I'd say 300+ at least in the US in 18 months, probably more across 4 offices, would be a good start to the US business and a good goal. So we're not— this is just the start. Like I say to these people, you're going to be new in this business for 2 months, and then people are going to start asking you questions about what you're doing and look to you for advice. So Learn fast, have fun with it, and enjoy. Like, it's all about enjoying. Like, not many companies get to do something like this. Um, not many grads get the opportunity to be part of something like this. So even for me, like, like you said, I'm pretty excited. Well, like, I, I, um, I, I'm enjoying what I'm doing. It's a challenge, but I know and I back the process. So the stress levels are relatively low, but the challenge is high. And that for me makes a good job. If you're not in that job, you're not learning, you're not pushing pushing yourself. So I think that's my vision. And for people coming into the business, like, what an opportunity. Like, you could be a grad one day and two years later you could be a VP leading a team in a different state. And that's what we want. Like, we don't hire senior people outside of that really trio of management. Everyone else is going to grow organically and really their own destiny is in their own hands because we need to push them and get them there. So I'm super excited. It'd be cool to speak in Spanish.

Yeah, I was going to say, we're going to have to get you a— We're gonna have to get—

yeah, we're gonna have—

we'll definitely get you back on and unpick the, uh, the challenges.

Even more, for sure. I'll be grayer with lessons, but, uh, hopefully— yeah, I, I back it for sure. And it's a fun ride, um, and it would be cool to, to do it again and, and see what, uh, see what the next 12-18 months looks like. But that's, that's for me my, my, my vision and what I'm trying to execute and really what I'm living for over the next—

love it. Elliot, it's been an absolute pleasure. Excited to see it from afar and No, we'll absolutely speak over, over the next year or so. Legend.

Thank you. Thanks.