Jay Guney - Being a manager is about wanting your team to be better than you.

Welcome to the Recruitment Rollercoaster podcast. My name's Hishem Azzouz. Today I'm joined by Jay Gune who is the Associate Director at Digital Gurus, who are a leading tech and digital recruitment business that are an international recruitment business, recruitment business. They have offices throughout the UK, in Australia and Dubai, and Jay works out of the Manchester office. And currently manages a team of 8. Jay, thank you for joining me.

Thanks for the invite, Hishem.

Yeah, I've been looking forward to it. Um, obviously we're in the— set the scene— nice sunny day, we're indoors recording this podcast remotely.

Yeah, I want to thank you for that, you know, choosing the hottest day of the year, keeping me locked up in the house. That's fine, that's cool.

I won't keep you too long, mate. Um, So look, where I always like to start on this podcast, Jay, is, um, how did Jay Gunneh enter the world of recruitment? Let's start there.

Yeah, um, so I, I would say it was a lot more kind of premeditated or calculated than what, say, most recruiters would say when they get into industry. Like, I don't subscribe to that 'I fell into it.' Like, I knew I wanted to do it, um, and it all kind of started in Cabos.

Yeah, I mean, I did 2 seasons abroad in Magaluf, so I've probably got an idea.

Same level, same level of nastiness, basically. Cabos 2011, there was 5 or 6 of us there and we're all going off to go into our own separate things.

So after uni, you go uni?

Yeah, so I went to uni, but at the end of that, you know, at the end of uni, it was the summer, so that's where we went for 2 weeks and we're there, we're in the pool and then I'm going off to Manchester to go do my master's degree. One of my best mates, Tommy, he's going off to America, to New York to be this, he has a mad title, but he's going to be a headhunter. We had another guy chasing a career, and I'll get into his title, mate, it's mental because he's trying to pick up girls with it, but we'll get into that. But yeah, we had another guy that was going off to do finance, another was joining the army, so we're all going off to do our own separate things, and then just listening to Tommy, because this is where it all come from, listening to him talk about recruitment and what it's about, how much money he's earning, and I was thinking, wow, like, I'm gonna go spend another 2, 3 years in this master's degree I'm gonna probably have 2 or 3 jobs at once, working in KFC, Sports Direct, just try and make ends meet. And this guy's running around Manhattan doing what the hell he wants.

Yeah.

So yeah, we kind of met up around, must be Christmas time later that year. He come back, you know, he's absolutely rolling it, and I'm working in this dungeon bar back home, and I'm just thinking, what is going on in my life? Like, you know, I go back to uni, I'm in a lab coat, goggles on, I've got the pets and thinking, this isn't really me. Like, I love— I mean, it was a genetics degree, just to get that in there. Yeah, but, um, I love all that stuff, but I just thought, this isn't really me, right?

Right.

So it just, you know, listen to Tommy and the sort of things that he was getting up to. I just thought, you're good at it, all right, but the way me and you've been brought up, I've always been better than you at, say, football or whatever. Yeah, you're good at it. I'm also going to be good at it and I'm going to be better. Don't worry, I'm doing it. That was it. So yeah, it kind of come towards the end of my master's and I thought, right, I'm going to go for it now. And then that's when I ended up at Oscar. Okay, my first recruitment job to trainee.

Okay, so obviously had an interesting insight into recruitment, which was all the good stuff, like you can earn loads of cash, I'm smashing it. What was Tommy's title then? Because they got some mad titles in America, man. He's like vice president or something.

I think he's that now, but he started off as a high-frequency, I don't know, high-frequency retained headhunter, presence entry of technology. I don't know, it was some mad, mad title. And I just remember seeing him walking up to people saying, yeah, I'm this, I'm that. And I'm just like, oh God. Although I think you're a dickhead. Yeah, I do admire that because you are something like a nice guy. Yeah.

Okay, so wanted to get into recruitment, I guess. How did you then end up, what, like applying for a rec to rec, or like what, how did you end up at Oscar? Did you have a friend there, or like how did you end up there?

No, so where was I? I was at uni in Manchester at the time, and I bumped into this guy on this night out. He worked at a company called Red Pepper, rec to rec.

Okay.

Just got talking over some beers, and he goes, again selling me the dream of recruitment. Yeah. He goes, right, I know a few businesses, here we go. And it just kind of went Into Oscar and, you know, never really looked back, I guess.

Nice. So just to set up for everyone, you then worked at Oscar for, was it 5 years or just under 5 years?

Yeah, I think it was about 4, just over 4.

Yeah, 4 years. A real, real solid stint for your first job in recruitment. And then obviously more recently been working at Digital Gurus for coming up, obviously 3 years. So just to set the scene. So just quickly on that. So at Oscar, that 4-year journey From what I can see online, it was the typical join as a consultant, talent consultant, whatever, to sort of bidding leader or being manager role by the time you left. Yeah. Okay, cool. So what I always like to sort of uncover is like, so Jay heard about Tommy and his sort of experience. So I'm sure that you backed yourself and you was like, you know what, I'm well up for this. I'm up for earning the cash, paying off the student debt. What was the first year like?

Do you know what? It was easy. I say easy, that's— that— no, it wasn't easy. Like, the money was very good. It come very naturally to me, I should probably say. Don't get me wrong. Apologies, you can hear banging. That's my little boy.

That's okay, no worries. This is part of it. So first year, so it wasn't— obviously you hear all the stories, right? It's difficult.

Of course, of course.

So, but, but— so, okay, let's talk about that then. So why Looking back, so first, was you contract, perm? What was the—

Yep, yep. So, um, I started off as a resource consultant, so just trying to fill jobs that my manager had on contract, complete delivery contracts.

Yeah, yeah.

But you know what, that was such a good insight into recruiting because you know how quick contract recruitment is. Yeah, it was, it was it technology. It was very, very buoyant, very, very quick with lots of clients. And you know, I was being pulled pillar to post. I was busy. You know, I was there, you know, half 7, 8 o'clock in the morning to 10 o'clock at night, probably 3 times a week, 4 times a week. And I loved it because, you know, I was getting the results straight away. Luckily, you know, I know it works a bit different for most of us.

So that first year, was it just as quickly? Was you stay complete delivery? You weren't focused on winning clients or winning projects?

No. So I think it was 3 months in. No, sorry, 2 months in, that manager actually left. I still keep in contact with now, actually. And I joined another manager. I was with him for 4 weeks, and then I think I went consultant, full 360 consultant.

What, what, what was the timeline?

Sorry, just 3 months from being a trainee to a consultant, or 4 months.

Well, and then, so 4 months in, you then had to do BD, get clients?

Yeah, so I mean, the way also do things, they introduce you to the BD side pretty early on, you know, once you've kind of mastered that candidate side. So, and yeah, always be closing, managing people through a process. Once you can kind of document and then evidence that you can do that, they then introduce you into the BD side. And being sat with managers and, you know, 30, 40 other recruiters in the room, you just naturally kind of hear how people do it. You've got a training scheme there as well, so you're doing things in practice. So it's quite, it's quite a good transition.

Yeah, yeah, okay. So looking back then, Jay, why do you think you was able to pick it up quite quickly, or why do you think you was able to be quite effective quite quickly? Do you think, looking back?

My goals were very clear. I needed money, basically.

He was very motivated.

Very, very motivated around money. I knew I needed X amount of money to do X, Y, and Z. And at the time, that was buy a car, that was buy a house. I know these are probably things that people hear and think, oh, I've heard that a million times. And you're right. But if you nail down truly into motivations, like how hard and how much you really want that, that's when you're probably getting the right recruiter in, I suspect. I don't know. But yeah, no, I knew exactly what I wanted. And, you know, luckily I had a very good manager at the time and he broke it down for me. He said, okay, so if you want a house, how much you're gonna spend on the house? Now, live in Manchester, so it's not London prices, right? So I was like, 200K, whatever. Okay, so what does the deposit need to look like for you, Jay? Okay, well, probably 15%. Okay, you need 30 grand, Jay. Right, how do I get 30 grand, Kev? How do I do it? And then you just go from there.

You know, that's really interesting. So very early on, you really reverse engineered what you needed to do.

Absolutely. Yeah, I didn't do it out of my own mind, you know. I had some help in getting to that, you know, how do I achieve that. Absolutely. And it's— and I think it's something that I've laid out to the guys that I've trained.

And yeah, I think that's awesome. I think that's great because it's It's very easy to say that, as you said, Jay, like, yeah, I want a home, I want to buy my first property, blah, blah, blah. But, and then it's the, that next level where, you know, each week or what the actual numbers are, what the actual outputs or activity or actual outcomes that you need that's going to get you there. So what did you end up billing in your first year then? Remember?

Yeah, first year was £200, pretty much on the nose.

Really? Yeah. Not bad, is it?

Yeah, I've never really done much more, to be fair. So yeah, I'm not the world's best recruiter, but £200k, you know, it's a solid number on perm.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I thought that was contract though, that first year.

No, yeah, so for the first month, 2 months, I started off on contract resource and I moved over to perm.

Oh, sorry, sorry, I didn't realize. Sorry.

Yeah, sorry. So, you know, I've always been a perm 360 consultant.

Okay, so that's interesting then, actually. So Just got in the thick of it on the contract side, candidate delivery, and then transitioned to permanent. Okay, cool. I didn't realize that. That's interesting.

Sorry.

Yeah, no, okay. So just quickly before we move on, how much of an impact did your environment have on Jay the recruiter, do you think? Like, what, looking back, anything that maybe you heard that had a big impact on you, or certain advice that you received quite early on that had a big impact on you? I love the fact that sort of you had a manager that actually really broke down what your goals are. I think that's awesome. But anything else looking back? Because I think that's like, I think that's going to be interesting with the time right now. Like, if you think about Jay, Gune, the person that's really motivated, come out of uni, joins a recruitment business tomorrow, it's going to be way more difficult to soak up like everything that's going around from your office at home or in your bedroom, you know what I mean? So like, what, how much of an impact do you think that environment had on you?

I would say it had a big impact. I think, you know, and I appreciate this is why maybe some recruiters right now working remotely are somewhat struggling. In that environment, I was surrounded by people who may be like-minded, maybe had different motivations, but it all centered around getting money to go and enable them to do things. And I think when you have that common goal and there is that team mentality, you're all sat there till 8, 9, 10 o'clock at night thinking, I don't want to be here, I'd rather be in the boozer down there or up the club up there, whatever that looks like. But you know, it's the longer term goal here, so we're doing this for a reason. We're here, we're here Saturday resourcing, getting leads, getting references to go and chase our BD for the following day and the following week, what that looks like. And so yeah, I think there's that commonality. And we— so at Oscar, we did have a training academy, so it wasn't just you that was a trainee.

You probably—

yeah, that's what I mean. So, you know, we probably all end up going down to the boozer at 10 o'clock at night for last orders or whatever that looks like. So that really helped that togetherness.

What was the best piece of advice you think you got early on?

The best piece of advice?

Yeah, in that first year, do you think?

I think it was just, look, things will get difficult, things will get hard, but just, just remember why you're here. And I think that's always kind of stuck with me because, you know, I know what it's like. You could be sat there thinking, sometimes you're working, I'm sure you get it as well, Hishem, where you just think, you hit a bit of a wall and you think, what am I doing? Yeah, you start reconsidering things. Like, we all have that little blip, we think, but I think as long as you kind of think back to why am I in this game, why am I doing this, and what was your why then?

Just, it was as simple as I want to buy a home on these things, that, that were, were they your sort of anchor points?

Yeah, I mean, I'm not going to hit you with a sob story or anything like that, right? It's a bit, that's a bit painful, but I've never had money, you know. We've, my family have always done all right, but we've never had money to go and do things and You know, I've never gone on like even a 3-star holiday, to be honest. But I have been on holiday, so I've not been treated badly. So I wanted to go and do these nice things in life, but I genuinely wanted to and I was willing to work hard for it. And the house goal, you know, I just wanted that under me ASAP. And I think, what was I, 25, 26, 25 when I bought my house? I've always driven bangers as well, like embarrassing bangers. And like, Working in recruitment, yeah, my friends heard, you know, what the sort of money I was earning, and I'd remind them, but then I'd turn up in a Vauxhall Vectra and they're like, what's this, you know? So the next thing, the next goal was, let's get, let's get the car, let's make sure that's at a level. Yeah, yeah, there was always things.

Yeah, yeah, no, I love that. So going into year 2 then, what was the path for Jay? Still very much billing consultant and that was what you was focusing on, or When did you start taking on some leadership responsibilities?

I think, I think maybe 7 months in, into being— or sorry, maybe 6 months into being a consultant. Yeah, so I've been at Oscar maybe 9 months at this point. Okay, I was given an intern, um, just— I'm sure it was just a bit of PR, to be honest with you, but also just, just to get a bit of interest into the recruitment world, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

What do you sort of like mentor them and Absolutely, yeah.

So, um, you know, she said she sat with me every day, um, we put her through her, um, our training academy, um, because, all right, okay, it's recruitment, but there's many more skills that you learn in this game, just general life skills. So yeah, I had her for 3 months, um, I've done a good job with her, so I was then entrusted to have a— my first trainee, my first official trainee.

Really? Yeah. So that happened quite early on then. So is that something that you was you wanted?

Like, I've always known that I've wanted to go into management. Like, really, there's, there's nothing more that pleasures me than seeing someone that I've kind of nurtured and brought through go and do well. There's nothing better.

Yeah, what better than you, Billy?

I would love it if they do better than me. Like, my ideal, yeah, is that we go and hit target. So let's just say 20K a month for me, all right? But then they will go to do 20,100 quid or whatever. Yeah, if they do more than me and I hit target You know, that's it. I'm sleeping well.

It's interesting, isn't it? Why do you think that is? Because like, to get to that, to get to that point, it would— Jay had to focus on Jay, do you know what I mean? But then to sort of really get that— and it's really common thing that you hear— but to get that real buzz from other people when typically it's, yeah, like you're, you're putting in the work and it's sort of and appreciating the work you put in and the results that you get. But it's so common that you say that, so I just think that's interesting.

I guess the way I position it, right? Do you play sport, football, anything? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So let's just say it's the cup final, right? You're injured, you can't play, but your team go out there and they win. Are you sad? Are you upset? Or are you buzzing because we won the cup?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely buzzing.

You're buzzing, you're buzzing. And that's how I apply it to this. You know, if you, if you're not winning, I'm winning. Yeah, that's how— that's okay.

So I think a common challenge that people face then, Jay, is, is this sort of transition or that experience or that learning of, okay, right, I'm, I'm pretty decent, but I back myself to do that, I'm confident with that, but now I've got someone else to be responsible for. My target's still the same.

Yeah.

So what, what was that transition like? How difficult was that?

That wasn't easy, but I would say the naivety. I didn't know anything different, so it was what it was. But yeah, it certainly had its challenges. But again, you know, I think because we did have a training academy, so there was all that theoretical stuff going on in the background that did maybe alleviate some of my time. But don't get wrong, you know, they're sat with you 9 hours a day. So it's hard, so you have to make sure that you've got enough pipeline yourself. I think what helps is initially when you bring on a trainee, well, from my experience, when you bring the trainee, they typically work your roles, so they are actually probably adding benefits to you in the first maybe 2 or 3 weeks.

So yeah, so you get them on obviously delivery and supporting the role, yeah, the roles that you pulled.

And I think what helps is as well from their perspective, so that they're bought in, is they're seeing success very, very quickly. And they think, wow, okay, so like the hype is real, you can earn money very, very quickly. Yeah, brilliant. And this, and this looks easy, and it does, you know, if you look at recruitment from afar, it does look very easy. Looks like a couple of emails, a couple of phone calls, and you know, you're earning some good money. So I think for him to kind of experience that early on, and I must see my old MD always used to say it to me, make sure you get a few deals in early doors, make them feel the love, make them see the dream.

Okay, so then what did you then grow that team further then, or what did the, what did the sort of finished product look like?

Yeah, so, so I bought, I brought my first trainee through, uh, and the kind of model that we had was you dump them onto your patch, your vertical, and then you kind of progress them to something else. Then you bring in another trainee, dump them onto that, and you just keep building. Frustrating.

Just quickly, sorry, just quickly, sorry to buy in. No, because I think that would be a lot of people how they approach it. What was— because I'm sure you got better at this— what was like, what was the things that had to be in place, or where do you have to get to for you to go, right, let's get on to the next place, or let's get someone dedicated to that to then move on to the next thing? Like, did you have to get— have X amount of clients? Do you have to be billing X amount? What was the sort of trigger point or milestone that you had to work towards to go, right, let's get another person in and I'll start focusing on this other sort of vertical that I've already identified? What was the sort of trigger point?

Yes, that's a good question. I don't think there was an official trigger point. I think, you know, as long as you're, you know, at a profitability level that is sustainable for maybe bringing on someone that's going to cost you X amount of money for X amount of time, then you can probably say, right, let's, let's take that associated risk. But I think I think we were well primed for it when we were junior managers, so we knew it was always going to happen that we're going to bring on other people. So when you're considering that, you're always trying to look at other towns, other cities, or whatever's in your vertical to try and build that up. Yeah, yeah.

So like, what in your head, what was you like, right, if I get— like, I don't know if there was anything, but like, I know like there's not been an exact science, but if you're like, right, if I get X amount of clients that we've done X amount of placements with, Like, was you looking for that sort of stuff to, for you to be confident enough to be like, right, let's get someone on, deliver it?

Yeah, there definitely needs to be some sort of confidence that, because we normally, although we try and keep to a tech stack because we do technology recruitment. Yeah, you've done technology recruitment and it was geographically driven as well. So I think, so just to give you some context, I think it makes it easy to answer the question. So I see the Midlands patch now, Midlands is a huge geographic area. You've got Birmingham, you've got Leicester, Derby, Nottingham. Yeah, straight away you can probably split that into 3 just geographically. So I think as long as you have maybe 2 or 3, you know, reliable clients that you know can probably, you know, pigeonhole £20-30k a year out of them, you know that's going to be circa, what, £60-100 grand guaranteed. Yeah. So you know, you know that they're going to be okay sat on that. So I think there's, like I say, there's no official trigger point.

Yeah, yeah, okay.

I think as long as your BD was at that sort of level, yeah, it all made sense.

And then, so then, and then what did it, what did that then get to then? As you built that out before you left? What did it get to?

Yes, so my career was interesting, Oscar. Like, I was very driven to kind of do more and more and more, and what that meant is I kept on saying to my MD, I was like, let me do this patch, let me do that patch, give me more, give me more. And ultimately, you know, we've spoke about this since, ultimately it probably did shoot me a little bit in the foot because I never really got to grow my team to, you know, 10, 20, 30 people because of that.

Why did you always want more? Did Jay just want to be winning business? Is that what— is that what you love doing?

Yeah, yeah, I was a bit of an emotional beast back then.

Really?

I think, you know, in hindsight, was I really truly ready for management? Probably not, because, you know, there was always that feeling of, yeah, I've got to give up half my patch here. What's that about? I'm going to lose X amount of revenue. Like, what a nightmare. But I wasn't seeing the bigger picture. And to be fair, they've done, they've done right by me. They kind of give me a little bit to kind of go out and go do something else. But I did eventually move on to IT support infrastructure and started leading that team. And I think that was about 10 strong at some point, maybe 9 or 10 strong. Um, but that wasn't really organic, that was— I took—

like, that's what you inherited?

Inherited 5 people and then grew it by another 5, really? Yeah.

So what did, um— people always interested in this and always getting messages about this, Jay. So like, I'm assuming before that point, team of 5 or bigger, whatever. So like, did you still have, like, what was your role then? Was it to bring on clients, win business, help feed the team, help that, or was it just, was it, was you non-billing at that point, or were you always billing?

I was that horrible billing manager. It's the hardest role in recruitment. I don't care what anyone says, I don't care if you're the CEO, it's the hardest role in my opinion.

Yeah.

So yeah, I was still a billing manager.

So how— and the question is, sorry to butt in, mate, is just like, how did you maintain— because like, you put— you will put like— clearly you're someone that will put that pressure on yourself. You know what you're capable of, you know what you can do. How did you maintain your billings, or did you maintain your billings when you inherit that team, or you're growing the different patches, whatever? Like, how did you ensure you did that? How do you structure your day? Like, what, what were you doing on on a daily basis, weekly basis to ensure you gave yourself the best possible chance of doing what you needed to do?

[Speaker] Yeah, yeah, so I was on the team every morning, 8 o'clock, okay, I know we start at half 8, guys, but where are we up to, where's business up to? You know, I used to deploy, I think, yeah, I think they did as a business, to be fair, like a tracker system, so okay, so you've got X amount of clients on right now, where you up to with this job, okay, interview, talk to you about the candidates, 'Where are they up to? Talk to me about their other interviews. Why do you think they're going to get a job?' So I'd be all over them from that perspective.

So what, 8 in the morning?

Well, between 8 and half 8, you know, I've got a team of 10, it's going to take a bit of time.

Yeah, so you go through all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And then that will then give me more time to go and do my stuff. But, you know, I think at the time, and, you know, running a team of 9, 10 people, I think I had a trainee beside of me. So yeah, I won't lie, that was very, very difficult. But again, you know, I referred to it at the start, I didn't know any different. I just thought that was it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You had no comparison.

Yeah, so I couldn't sit there and get, you know, get lemon about it or get annoyed. It was just, it's just what you do. So yeah, it wasn't easy, but I enabled to give myself enough time to still do my own things. And luckily, you know, my client portfolio was large enough to help sustain me, I guess.

Did your first, so was your first year your best year then? Oscar?

No, I think second or third, I can't remember. They all stayed around 2, 250.

Yeah, okay. All right, so I guess just quickly before we move on to like more recently, which I'm keen to do, back then— maybe you can obviously refer to this now because you might have applied it or whatever— but what do you wish you knew about management before you got into it?

How to separate yourself from being friends with, you know, your consultants, your colleagues, yeah, into being that person that is, you know, not just kind of trying to drive the guys forward or anything like that, but having to be that asshole at times. And, you know, that was one thing that I really did struggle with, like really did. I've got some very, you know, some of my best mates work at Oscar, still do, So that was very difficult.

So yeah, so yeah, like, so if you were really sort of taught and nailed down on, right, Jay, yes, that's okay, and it's a positive that you can build a good rapport, good relationships with your people, and they know you've got your back, and that may mean that you may be seen as a friend at times. But Jay, make sure that there's people know where the line is, or know that, look, we are friends, but when I do this, or when I say this, blah blah blah, this is like that's the manager in me, that's what needs to be done.

Yeah, absolutely, yeah, that's what I had to learn and I probably learned it the hard way at times, but I know the directors were certainly on my back about that to say you need to start stepping away from it and it, you know, got to the point where, you know, I stopped kind of going on certain nights out and things like that because I, you know, couldn't be seen, you know, to be getting pissed out the head or whatever, so yeah.

Yeah, okay, so you joined Digital Gurus, so obviously good career there. So Digital Gurus then, so you've been there for 2 and a bit years, then did you join them straight as a billing manager again, or what was the— what was it? Yeah, just give me a bit of context.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, so I mean, the reason why I wanted to leave Oscar was just purely because I was bored of contingent recruitment spot business. And I was adamant that I had to go and learn things about MSP, RPO, retain business elsewhere. The reality is I could have done it there, but I just, you know, once you've got something set in your head, I had to get out. And I was big on branding. I thought if you had a better brand, it would be better or easier to win business. You'd be maybe treated a little bit differently. So yeah, so I joined Digital Gurus. It was like the obvious choice for me at the end of it. Yeah, I joined as a bidding manager again, relatively small team at the start.

So just quickly, because I think it's interesting, haven't sort of spoken about this for a little while. I appreciate being honest on the reasons for leaving, I love that. But I guess, like, you know how it is, Jay, like, if you're a recruiter and you've got 2 years, 3 years, even like you had 4 years experience, you are valuable property, mate. And you'd be getting hit up left, right and centre from rec to recs like, "Jay, I got this opportunity for you, blah, blah, blah." Right? So I guess obviously I know you said that the Digital Guru was an obvious choice, but as you said, like it can be really quite difficult to know what's out there, what the other alternatives are, what to compare things to if you just work at one agency, right? It can be really quite daunting to make the right role. And typically, I'm sure you've seen it when you interview people for your team or previously that you see a lot of people on sort of LinkedIn or their CV where they might work at Oscar or whatever business for 2 years, 3 years, leave, end up working there for a couple of months and they're at another agency or whatever because it's not quite what you hoped. So I guess like great position that you're in, nearly 3 years there, so obviously a great choice. But I guess what were some of the things that you really thought about or sort of helped you make a better decision during that period? Because no doubt your head would get turned a lot, do you know what I mean? So like, I don't know, what were some of the things that were really important? So you mentioned there that branding or a business that really sort of focused on retained or whatever, but what, what did you do to, looking back, like what were some of the things that you really looked for or made sure that you were, were the case when you're looking for your next role as you were progressing?

Yeah, so when I, when I left Oscars, but yeah, it was for the right reasons and I think if you are looking at another opportunity, you have to understand what's right for you. Now, sometimes you don't know what that is. Yeah, I fully accept that, but I think you have to try and tune into what's right for you. So what was right for Jay at the time was I wanted to learn more. I wanted to learn different types of recruitment. It wasn't just about contingent spot business. I want to learn about retained business. I want to learn about different solutions and have the, I guess, the freedom and training to kind of go and deliver that. And I think when I looked out to the market, because that was my primary focus, yeah, there was, I think there was 3 businesses that I kind of come across that were really pushing that, yeah. And then I thought, second, yeah, secondarily, like, what else is important to me? And like I say, it's brand. It's, is this an attractive brand? If I was a software developer or a web developer or digital marketer, whatever that looks like, who would I be more inclined to contact or maybe take a call off if I knew who that person works for? And the other brands were, I would maybe call corporate, and that's fine. That's absolutely perfect. You know, the brand I used to work for was a bit more like that, but I just felt for me, the brand was just a bit, it just sat a bit better with me. It made me feel a bit more comfortable, if you will. I think it suited my approach to things.

And just out of interest, how did you then look for that in the interview process? Because like, you like, you know what I mean? Because like you can look at it on the face of it, blah blah blah, but what was some of this? Yeah, you know what I mean? What were some of the important things that you tried to look for or made sure that you understood or whatever, like before you made that decision to leave a job that you obviously knew how to do, you had good, good people around you, like, you know what I mean? Like, what were some of the important things that made you more confident about choosing that?

Yeah, sure, sure. Yeah, so I think I posed a question to the 3 businesses I did interview at. If you was— let's just say I was a client, okay, and I said to you, why should I choose you to work with you? Like, what's different about you compared to every other agency? Like, give me your answer to that. And to be fair, all 3 businesses were, you know, in terms of what they're trying to do, which is a bit different. I was like, okay, right, you all tick that box. So that's the first thing. Get them to select?

Yeah, that's a good question.

Yeah, and I think, you know, if it aligns, fantastic. Like, you can always get sold the dream, can't you?

And yeah, no, I think, I think, yeah, I think that's a great question to ask, isn't it? I think someone, just quickly before you move on, so just because it really resonated, the podcast I did, um, yesterday with, um, fucking, I forgot his name, um, yeah, don't tell him. Yeah, no, but he's the way that, the way that he coined it which I thought was really good is, "Jay, tell me what your unfair advantage is." Yeah, that's a great way to put that in there. I think that was off the house class. Absolutely. Yeah, go on, sorry. So you asked that, that's a great question to ask.

Yeah. And for me at that point, I think the digital guru's answer was, you know, and it's not just words, you know, you can actually substantiate your claim as well. You can say whatever the hell you want really, but you need to substantiate it. And they definitely you could. I think secondarily, well, if primarily, secondary, what you call it, I don't know, it's the people. I left an environment where it was very much raw sales, and that's great, you know, I love that, cool, but do I want to employ people into that environment? It's not everyone's going to do well in that environment, other people do well in other environments, so the people is very much important to me. And, you know, I got to know the guys, the squad at DG, and, you know, they're good guys.

Um, I think that's fair. Like, Jay, the recruiter at the beginning of his career to 4 or 5 years down the line is different, right? And what you want and the environment and people you want to be around is, is different, right? And, and changes. So, okay, the name of that person, like James Blackwell— I've got to put that in there because I feel so bad if I didn't say that— James Blackwell, Unfair Advantage. Fucking love that. Okay, so move to Digital Gurus then. And was it the same sort of market? Was it like, what was the crack with that? Was it, did you then have to learn a new market? Did you have to do a different niche? What was the, what did you end up focusing on there?

Yeah, so different market in terms of geographic. So the Manchester office, we only really do Manchester and Leeds. We just stick to the north.

Yeah, but the same sort of job titles and businesses?

Yeah, yeah, same kind of tech stacks. But you know, when you move businesses, you have covenants coming out your backside. So, you know, I couldn't take anything with me if you were already candidates. So in a way it's a completely different market. So, because it was geographically completely different.

And did you inherit a team then? Was that the—

Yeah. So immediately I think I would get 3 people, I think it was, that were very much— Go on, you're going to say something.

No?

Right. So there's 3 people that kind of, I guess lined up exactly as to what I do, what I recruit for, so it just makes sense.

And how experienced were they?

One was probably 6 months at the time, the other one was probably in tech recruitment, maybe 9 months to a year.

Okay.

And the other lad, probably about the same, for about 9 months.

No, no, what was just coming to mind, Jay, was that what did Jay do when he joined to make sure that you're not that new manager on the block coming into a new bit, do you know what I mean? Because I think that's also something to be— that can be quite daunting as well, isn't it? Like, that you're gonna, um, inherit a team like— because yeah, gone from Austria, everyone knows who I am, mates with most people, blah blah blah. Like, how did you— what was your mindset going into that?

No swagger. I didn't walk in there saying I'm the big man, I can do this, I can do that. And first thing I've done, we now just wanted to prove myself. I'll always give advice if you ask for it. I'm not going to force it on you.

Yeah.

I just go in there showing what I can do initially, even though the job title's there and, you know, officially there's lines of people reporting into me. It doesn't matter. I've seen people come into businesses trying to be the big I am, and, you know, unfortunately that generally doesn't work from what I've seen, from my experience.

Yeah. So your mentality was very much that, right, let's go in there, prove my stripes, not sort of push how I do things on anyone and be open. Because I think that can be a real big challenge from a hiring perspective of, oof, is Jake going to understand how we do it here at Digital Gurus? Is he going to be open-minded to how we do it? Or is he going to turn around to us and go, look, I've done it always like this, Oscar. I know what I'm doing. Do you know what I mean? Did that come quite natural to you then? Yeah.

I mean, I'd say so. Yeah. Yeah. Don't get me wrong. There was things that maybe we'd done at my previous business that was different to what we do here at Digital Gurus. But I only see that as a positive because there's things that we've done at Oscar that are absolutely brilliant. There's things that we've done at DG previously that weren't very good. So I think if you can marry the two up, you get a bit of a sweet middle ground, don't you?

Yeah.

And I think that was kind of my goal there, if you will, just to kind of bring that happy medium.

How did you do that first year then, Jay?

My first year was a strange year.

To be honest with you.

I think, well, firstly, I have my little man. Really? Yeah, I think he was born, what, 4 months after I joined? I can't even remember when I joined now. September, October? Yeah, so he's born about 6 months after I joined. But in the same time period, the regional director who I joined under, she was also heavily pregnant.

Really?

And she went on maternity leave. So I actually moved into this, like, interim regional director role. For 6 months. So all the pipeline I built up, everything kind of, you know, didn't fall through or anything like that, but you kind of, it had to go out the window.

Lost your focus. Yeah, you had to focus on another thing, have different priorities.

17, 18 people there. Yeah, that was something to try and lead and manage and everything else that comes along with that. So that was certainly a learning curve, should we say.

What was most challenging about that?

Sorry, I think I said at the start—

Did you want that role, by the way?

Yeah, yeah, I'm career-driven. Like, you know, some people say, oh, I'm not really asked about titles. I am, of course I am. I'll be the janitor, but give me the MD title, I'll be cool with that. But, um, no, I am career-driven. So to kind of— do I think I was ready to do something like that and do an amazing job? Probably not, you know what, honestly, no. But you know what, I'll give it a good go. Yeah, my potential issue was I was 6 months in. Yeah, I've proved my stripes, I've shown that I can do the job well. I think my team have grown to maybe 6 at the time or something like that, and, you know, people bought into what I could do, but it's very early to say, right, okay, yeah, this guy that's joined, that's, you know, he's now managing the Manchester office.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So I was very, very conscious of that, um, but again, you know, I think Everyone's very, very different, so you can't hit people with the same brush. You can't treat everyone the same. You certainly can't manage them the same. So I think that's where I really built up some strong relationships with people, try to understand what they're really about, what's their drivers, what's their motivators, why you're here, what you want to do, and where do you struggle with your business right now, how can I help you? And yeah, you know, I think that's what kind of really helped me move up the food chain a little bit.

That's awesome, and fair play on you just putting your hat in the ring on that, especially 6 months into a new business as well, right? Absolutely love that. That's no joke. I guess it might have been internally or whatever, but would like, did you seek help when you wanted it or needed it? Like to deal with, like, do you know what I mean?

Yeah, look, you'd never be too proud to ask for help.

Yeah.

You know, I'm not that guy. If you ask me a question, I don't know the answer, I'm not going to blag you most of the time.

Yeah, yeah.

But I'll certainly go and try and find the answer. And I think the best way to find an answer is to to call in someone that has the knowledge. So, you know, there was times when our Birmingham director would come up and, you know, maybe once a week just to kind of help with things, alleviate some of the pressure that was on me. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

So, and then, so then did you end up then going back to the team that you was at after, or what, how did that then sort of end up turning out?

Yeah, so I mean, within a few months of that finishing, once Tony, the regional director, came back, within a few months I was then promoted to what I am now, associate director. So I was about a year into being there, I guess. So yeah, so I think fundamentally, you know, my remit now is to ensure that we hit, you know, 30% EBIT. That's all I have to try and achieve.

So what do you mean by your team?

Yeah, so it's in my division, yeah, so 8 people, but also offer, you know, support and leadership to the other side as well and all the rest of it.

So when you say 30%, you're talking about EBITDA?

Sorry, yeah, yeah, so it's all about profitability, so we have to keep it above the line. There's a few reasons why, but, you know, essentially I was kind of given freedom. Okay, Jay, you can go and bill and do a number and get your team to where they need to be, or embrace them, try and bring them on more, get them to do more, and you win the business, whatever that looks like, and get into that number if not higher. So that was the route that I opted for. Um, I still posted, you know, an all right number last year.

And yeah, why did you opt for that route?

Why? Yeah, because there's no— for me, there's no sustainability in me just going ahead, being a lone wolf, and going to win a business and go fill it all myself. Like, that's great for me, that's great for Jay, but I'm here to grow a team. I'm here to kind of go up the food chain, right? One day I want to be a managing director of a business. If I'm just going to have this single-minded approach as an entrepreneur, okay, that works. But if you're looking at growing a team, for me it doesn't work. Um, okay, so yeah, that's why I opted for it, you know.

How much, how much did it help you understand them? What, like, that's really— I love how they communicate to you, like 'Like, Jay, this is how profitable we want your team to be.' You don't normally hear billing managers say, 'This is what— this is the number we need to hit for our EBITDA.' You don't normally hear that, do you know what I mean? How did that help you?

How did it help? Well, I think it just, it kind of ingrains you in the business, doesn't it? Because you're being— the business being very open with you around numbers, profitability.

Yeah.

So then all of a sudden you feel like you have a real strong allegiance to this business, they're being very open with you. And I think with that, you then accept accountability, which is a very, very powerful word in recruitment, I'm sure you know. Yeah. So yeah, like, I know what our division or our office needs to hit in order to do X, Y, and Z.

So yeah, that's awesome. I think that's really interesting, that. I think because again, it does get you in thinking as a business rather than Jay and my team, do you know what I mean? When you're talking about numbers like that, I think that's really Interesting. So just, just quickly, um, Jay, what I guess what I'd like to sort of just think about for a sec, two things. One, one of the most common things I get asked about, Jay, is business development, um, because that can be one of the areas that's really challenging for a lot of people. Um, obviously you've obviously been leading people and teams for a little while now, so I guess from your perspective, what are the typical sort of pitfalls recruiters make that you see that struggle with business development, do you think?

Good question. So I think there's probably a few elements and again, I'll probably just provide a bit of context to help answer that question because I can just talk about my own pitfalls. I would say, right, earlier on in my career, uh, relationship building, although it was extremely important, wasn't really the emphasis. It was all about slap wallet, bam, pow, get the sale, get the sale, right?

Yeah, get the job.

Um, absolutely. And that's great, but longer term— I'm sure you'll get onto the COVID situation. Yeah, because it relates to this. Um, longer term, if you're not building those relationships, there's no sustainability or longevity. So I would say building relationships were probably the thing that I maybe should have concentrated a bit more earlier on in terms of BD. I think that's where people probably— again, I can't talk for everyone, but just from what I've witnessed, what I've experienced, like if I went onto my phone book now, right, and let's not do this, by the way, but if I just kind of flicked onto someone and I gave that person a call, I could probably tell you the name of their dog or something like like that.

Yeah, okay.

That's, for me, that's the sort of thing you need to try and be getting into because that was gonna be my next question, Jay.

How can you measure if you're gaining and having better relationships with clients and prospects?

How can you measure it? Yeah, well, again, I think we were talking earlier about, um, you know, if you're having a crap day, what can you do? So this, the answer relates to that, right? So the way I measure it is If I'm having a crap day, right, I've got 40 people, so maybe 20 candidates, 20 clients that I can just call, right? I know they'll answer, they'll see Jake Kune ringing, they'll answer it, all right? And we'll just have a great chat, okay? It picks me up no end. So I think hopefully that kind of answer—

yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, that makes sense because it's more than a recruitment relation, like, it's, you know what I mean? It's a bit more than 'Oh, who's this guy calling me just about a job?' I mean, I'm sure they're also thinking that at the same time.

Yeah, they normally are to say, 'What the hell do you want now?

What do you want from me?' And it's like, 'It's not that.' So a common challenge is actually that people can get caught up a bit early on or get caught up in that whack, wallet, bang of, 'Right, I want a job, that's what this is,' rather than thinking long-term longevity, sustainable relationships with clients candidate?

Yeah, potentially. And I think, you know, sometimes people try and overcomplicate what the job is. I don't think you need to do that. There's loads of different approaches into BD, isn't there? And I think you've just got to find the one that doesn't always necessarily feel right initially but works best for you. So I've— I'm a big advocate of the honesty route. I quite like the honesty route, and it's won me lots of clients.

What do you mean by the honesty route?

So I just talk about the reason why they're ringing them. You know, there's the whole references. For me, that kind of comes into the honesty route. So I know you know this person, I know them too, this is what we've done, I'd like to do that with you type thing, however you want to spin it really. It's a very, very strong way.

Honest and direct.

Absolutely. And when it comes to BD calls, I know, you know, 90% of the time people daunt that that BD call, and I get it. Isn't it so much better if you just go and do some sort of warm reference call, something like that, where you just spark a very honest and easy conversation and build out from there?

I was having this conversation today with a business owner saying that even like in the current period right now, like, just think there's just so much opportunity in gaining leads on the referencing side. And I know it's like a proper classic, like, training thing, like, yeah, like, you can get a reference and gain leads or whatever. But like, when you're saying that, Jade, just add a bit of context to that. I know it sounds really simple and basic, but people really like when you talk in a bit more detail on the basic stuff. But when you say gaining leads or successful, be honest on the referencing front, you're just talking about literally you're doing that when you place someone or Do you know what I mean? Like, what's— what— just give it— add a bit of context and a bit of detail to that because I just think people listening will just get quite a bit of value out of that.

Yeah, I think every situation is very different, so I can't give you like a silver bullet answer.

Yeah, yeah.

But I guess kind of a good example is, let's say you're speaking to— it doesn't really matter what your market is, but for me, let's say it's a front-end developer.

Yeah.

So I give that person a call. I would find some sort of commonality. Between me and that person. So maybe it's a business they previously worked for, maybe it's a tech meetup that they go to, maybe they're into football, I don't know. But I find some sort of commonality from that, and from there I will find a link. And it's normally from a business that they worked for previously in that particular example. And then at that point I will say, okay, well, I trust my network to be good enough to know at least someone that's worked there, particularly in Manchester.

Yeah.

And then I'll talk about that person. Yeah, all right, okay, so do you know Hishem? Yeah, yeah, yeah, a bit funny, man. And we'll go down that, we'll go down that.

Yeah, yeah.

And start building that rapport.

Okay.

And I think there's, if there's one thing you should always remember, right, that front-end dev you're talking to right now, all right, that person might be a 7, 8 grand fee and that's it. Okay, cool. But in 3, 4 years' time, maybe less, that person might be a lead front-end dev. They might be a head of development, head of engineering, CTO, start their own company. So that's why it's so important.

That's the relationship part, right? And having that mentality.

Yeah, absolutely.

And then, and then a couple of other things I want to ask before we finish, Jay, but just on this point, you've worked with different people, seen different people, manage different people. Common, common pitfalls in recruiters that you, you think, common pitfalls you see in recruiters that you think prevent them from taking their performance to the next level?

Yeah, so it, it depends what level we're talking about. I think if you're talking at a more junior grad level, um, I think it's whether they truly actually want to do the job.

Yeah.

And what I mean by that is understand the motivations for why they're doing it. So that's sometimes a bit of a pitfall. How many times have you seen it that maybe 3 to 6 months people drop out because they realize they don't actually want to work that hard for that money?

Yeah.

So that's probably the first thing. And I think probably the big thing I've seen in more experienced people is that aptitude or willingness to learn. I have had the pleasure of managing some very, very diverse people in my time, and the commonality or the common trait is normally around that openness to learn. Because they don't like being told they're wrong. I don't like being told I'm wrong, of course not. But I've seen people grow from 100K billers to 3, maybe 400K billers just because they're taking on a little bit of advice, which normally they wouldn't be so much open to. So, I mean, I think I said at the start, you know, when I took that interim role as an RD, I knew that I'm not going to be amazing at this. I know that I need help. And I think as long as you can be accepting that you're not the greatest, you're not the best, you are going to need help, it's going to be beneficial.

Yeah, no, I like that. So just two more things I just wanted to chat to you about, Joe, before we finish. So obviously, back to sort of a big motivator for you being want to learn more about recruitment, retained, these types of things. Have you done that? Have you been winning more retained?

Imagine if I said no. Yeah, no, of course.

Yeah. So, so let's just talk about this for a sec. Going from where you was to getting more involved and learning more about it, winning it, pitching it, what's the sort of main sort of difference that you had to overcome or understand, or do you know what I mean, to start winning more retained work? Because I think, like, I work with someone who helps recruiters win more retained work, and I've got a bit of an insight into the sort of common challenges or misconceptions that recruiters have on going from contingent to win and retain, if that's not fully believing that there's a difference or not fully believing that they can deliver or whatever. So what were some of the things that you learned or had to overcome or change slightly in terms of mentally or the way you thought about things that helped you transition?

Yeah, well, obviously not doing it before, I had to learn that recruiting wasn't just, you know, contingent-based perm stuff. Like, that was—

yeah, because you had nothing else to compare it to.

It's very, very different. Yeah. And so I'd say the key thing is just mindset. You need to change your mindset. You need to be a lot more open to different solutions. You need to know that not one glove fits all. And so I think the key thing is as well, because it's a self-belief thing as well with, with, um, with your mindset, you need to truly value what you bring to the table. Absolutely. Like most, a lot of recruiters I talk to, they don't actually value themselves.

I know what you mean. I know what you mean.

And I've been there, right? I remember, again, early days, if I'm honest with you, maybe even a few years ago, I used to think, if I was a director of a company, would I use an agency? And I used to think, nah, probably not. And that's just ridiculous. Yeah, you have to truly, and I learned that, right? And you have to truly understand the actual value that you're bringing here.

So I'd say that was probably the biggest thing that I had to get your head around.

Yeah, absolutely. And do you know what? Once I've learned these things, I then have to kind of present this to my team. And, you know, there's been quite a few retainers, one, quite a few retainers once since we've started doing this training. So like I say, all it is is mindset. Like, if you don't ask the question, you're never going to get the result. Just ask the question. What's the worst that can happen?

Yeah.

Oh, you get it on a contingent basis. Nightmare. That's what you would have got anyway.

Worst case.

So absolutely.

Okay. Now that's interesting. And then brand. How much has that actually helped Jay Gune? The billing manager?

I mean, how do you evaluate that? I don't know. I think I would say from a psychological perspective, right, when I joined Digital Gurus, I thought I've got this wicked brand behind me. Do you know what? Everyone's going to want to work with me. That was my mindset. Yeah. And it worked. All right. Now, was it down to the brand? I don't know. I think it certainly would have helped. But yeah, I mean, forget what the actual outward-facing branding is, right? If you think you're the bee's knees because of your brand, then that's the most important thing.

Yeah, people can sense that, can't they?

Yeah, absolutely. It's then how you then go and approach people.

Yeah, but did having that company brand and you being confident in it, then, I don't know, did you find it have an impact on opening up accounts or speaking to people or Like, did it help you in that sense?

I felt it did, yeah.

Yeah.

And I can't say for sure that that's the reason why, but it made me feel like it did, absolutely. And, you know, I know a lot of businesses now talk about events as being dead in the recruitment world. Like, oh, that's definitely wrong, mate. It's so wrong. Like, it's such—

did you do events before Oscar?

No, no, it's something— I think it's something we looked into, but it just it didn't really fit with what we were doing.

How has that helped you then? Because you're completely right, I've had quite a few people talk about the impact of running events, hosting events that sort of are valuable to their niche, and I think it'd be— it is really easy for recruiters to go, nah, nah, they've been done, no way.

Like, that's what I hear.

What, what, how did it help you?

So although the name of the brand helps, right, having a meetup group. It's called Digital North, and it's probably one of, if not the most popular, tech meetup groups in Manchester.

Okay.

Now that's an amazing, you know, strapline.

Yeah, that's great.

But I think the beauty behind it is no one really knows, or no one really cares, that we're a recruiting business behind it that's running it. And because we do not talk about recruitment, you know, a lot of people say, oh yeah, events, we use that for BD. No, and that's probably why our event does so well and why we've got such a good name attached to us, because we're not what they think is salesy. So, okay, yeah, I don't know if that answers your question.

I mean, I know it. No, no, no, it does. I think, I mean, for me, the conversations I've had, Jay, and hopefully you agree, you won't disagree, I know what you're saying in terms of we don't talk about recruitment, it's not all about get sort of developers in the room and then we try and get as many business cards as possible. But what it does mean is that you can ring 15 of your target clients and say, look, my name is Jay Goonay, I work for Digital Gurus. I'm not trying to speak to you about your hiring requirements. I want to talk to you about Digital North. All right. Okay. Yeah. Tell me a bit more.

Yeah.

How open would you be to being a speaker? We've got 100 developers, you want to come in the room and talk about diversity in digital? Yeah, I'll be open to that, Jay. Like, I think the main benefit from the conversations I have and why I think it's so powerful is that you can speak to people and build relationships and lead without recruitment.

Yeah, and I think that's a very important point actually. Like, I think we can sometimes look at recruiting in a very kind of like a bit of tunnel vision. Like, recruitment is part of a much, much, much bigger picture.

Yeah.

So I think you have to remember that when you're trying to approach clients in some instances. And, you know, I've absolutely won business off a back of these events. Absolutely. But it's also good from a, I guess, account development perspective because you're also putting your current clients up on the stage, putting them into debates, into situations where they might get absolutely smashed.

Again, back to relationships, back to— Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Okay. So Jay, what's— so all this experience, this journey, what's been the sort of toughest challenge for you over the last 4 to 8 weeks, mate?

In the last 4 to 8 weeks, right?

No, yeah, well, obviously, look, we can obviously— I heard your little man banging on the door. Like, what's been tough for you over the last 4 to 8 weeks, mate, for you personally?

Yeah, me personally, look, I'm a people person at the end of the day, and, you know, I need to be around people. I love my team, I love to see them grow, I love to You know, see them hit their targets.

It's not quite the same through the screen, is it?

It's not. It's not. You know, it's obviously we've already had the relationship before we see each other on the screen.

Yeah.

So that's cool. But yeah, it's— it just takes— it just takes something away from you a little bit, doesn't it? And, you know, sometimes a bit of face time with the client, a bit of face time with the prospect gets things over the line. And I think not being able to do that um, presents some challenges, absolutely. But generally, yeah, it's just getting that face time with people. This is good, you know, video, you know, we do, what, a minimum of 2 team chats a day. We do a kickoff and then the catch-up, and then we do individual Zoom calls as well. So we do get a lot of face time. I think it's very important just from a mental health perspective, but ultimately there's nothing better than you know, air.

Yeah.

And just being able to walk around.

How have you— a big challenge from a management perspective in this period has been like, yeah, keeping their teams motivated. It's just a bit different, isn't it? How have you gone about that? So you just mentioned that you have certain touchpoints per day or every couple of days with your team, but have you done anything that you found being quite effective or found that sort of helped keep the morale or motivation high with your team?

Yeah, I mean, there's only so much you can do, but, you know, we have incentives that run. So I think, was it last Friday, we delivered some pizza to someone that won a quiz. Little, yeah, little things like that. Unfortunately, I can't send you to Nando's at the minute, but, you know, Domino's will, I'm sure, hit the spot. But yeah, I think just things like that, understanding people's situations. Again, I referred to this at the start, everyone's different. So I've got a couple of people that honestly are absolutely fine and they're embracing working from home and they're loving it. I've got other people that are really struggling and it's just you have to treat them a bit differently.

Yeah.

You know, there's always offers of support from me, you know, I'm happy to go out, get their shopping, go deliver it for them, no issues. But yeah, I think you're somewhat limited in terms of what you can and cannot do.

And what, how do you think this period is going to impact recruiters, recruitment as a whole, Jay? What do you think about that? Obviously, you've been in the industry for a while. As we start bouncing back out of this, what, how do you, obviously no one knows, but how, what sort of opportunities or how do you think about the future of Jay the recruiter and what the opportunities are in the industry?

Well, that's a big question. I think for the industry, it's going to become a lot more flexible, but in the right way, because I'm a massive believer in, you know, we all need to be at half 8 for this kickoff meeting, and we've got this incentive running, we all need to be here together to do that. But, you know, we're a relatively flexible business anyway, but I think moving forward, we're going to see a lot more recruiting businesses enable their staff to work more remotely. Yeah, and I know a lot of CEOs and MDs are very kind of, I guess, worried and maybe paranoid about the data on their databases. Yeah, some potential issues. But do you know what, we've had, what, 3 months of it now, 2, 3 months of it. Yeah, I think they might have come around to it. So I think we'll probably see a bit of a difference from that perspective. And again, you alluded it to you know, my little man's just banging on the door like he's the police a minute ago. I think people are going to be a lot more accepting of, you know, you've got things going on at home, you can still have a serious business call. I'm sat here with a shirt that's half open. I mean, I can't believe you've not mentioned my hair yet. But these, I think people are going to become a lot more understanding. So, you know, I think there's definitely a time and a place to wear a three-piece suit, okay? I love putting on a three-piece suit, but I think people and businesses are going to become a lot more relaxed purely because of this. We've all seen each other at our worst now.

That's fine. Yeah, it's going to be interesting. So look, Jay, two last questions. Firstly, what's Jay most excited about sort of after COVID? What are you most excited to do? Most excited to see? I don't know, what are you most excited about after COVID, mate?

Well, you know what, we've been doing quite well during this COVID period. You know, we work in technology, which is still, I won't call it a booming industry, but it's a very, very strong industry right now. So with that, figures are good. So when we come out of this, I dare say there'll be some reinvestment. Let's grow the team. Let's, let's go to different places. Let's check out new markets. So for us, the future is extremely bright. And there's been a lot of things that we've learned about each other in this time. So again, this is going to help with not so much promotions, but understanding where people fit within a business. So I, for me, I've only seen a lot of benefits coming out of this, but I think if you're talking about an industry, I think, you know, contract recruitment is going to go through the roof when people start hiring again. Why? Because I don't think they'll take the risk on maybe taking permanent employees Really? That's, yeah, so it's just what I think. So yeah, I think there'll be a bit of a kick in the contract market initially, but we need your reaction, hopefully, because there's not too much going around right now. But yeah, I think good things are going to happen, and I think just with the whole working from home situation, like, I don't know if you've done tech recruitment, but one of the biggest and most annoying things that you hear from an employing business is, "Sorry, we've got no flexibility, you can't work from home." It's like, how can a developer not work from home?

Yeah, that was one of the biggest frustrations, wasn't it, for a lot of tech professionals? Yeah.

So, so now there's no excuse for it, Mr. or Mrs. Client. You're going to have to adhere to it. So I think, I think now that they've experienced it and they've been forced into it, that's going to now enable us to say, "Look, you need to give a bit more flexibility." Yeah, it's forced people's hands, isn't it?

Last question, you can answer it with a phrase, a word, a sentence, whatever comes up, Jay, but if Jay Gune could communicate to every single recruiter out there, they'd listen, they'd implement your advice, what would you say to the people?

He could have prepped me on that question. I would say, look, times right now are, they're different. Yeah, they present different challenges. Just adapt to it, be open to different ways of working, continue to grow your relationships, and I think that is a recipe for you to come out this other side and be a much better recruiter. Stay motivated, remember why you're doing this job. You're gonna have your shit days, that's fine, we all have them, but remember there are things you can do that can pick you straight back up again. Go and call those 10 clients that you have a laugh with, go and call Hishem, right? Have a laugh with him. Call me, I don't care, right? And then get back on that, get back on that boat and you go again. That's what I say. Always remember that end goal.

Jay, it's been a pleasure, mate. Thank you.

No, thanks for the invite, mate. Pleasure speaking to you.