Neil & Nicole - Our mission has always been to change the perception of recruitment and sales!

This is the Recruitment Rollercoaster podcast. My name is Hishem Azzouz, and today I'm joined by the co-founders of This Is Prime. I've got Neil Clough to the right of me and Nicole Plinston to the right of me as well. Just practice that about 3 times. You got that?

She got that right.

Nailed it.

Amazing.

That's a good start.

Yeah, that is a good start. So look, as I was just saying, guys, where I always, always like to start with this podcast is how the hell the both of you entered the, uh, world of recruitment. Let's start there and then we'll, uh, uncover the This Is Prime story.

Sure. Do you want to go first?

No, you can.

You sure?

Yeah.

Okay, excellent. Um, so, um, my journey into recruitment's a little bit, uh, different. Um, I did 10 months of it, um, quite a number of years ago, and, um, gotta be honest, didn't really enjoy it.

Yeah.

Um, and then, yeah, I wouldn't call it failure. I would just call it a learning period of my career. Uh, no, I did 10 months of it, uh, and I got an opportunity to go into kind of like a management position, which is what I was wanting to do in the leisure industry, which I'd always been in. And then my kind of weird journey took me onto the BBC Apprentice, which saw me fail again, actually. So unfortunately didn't quite win, but what it did was make me learn about what I should do and what I wanted to do in terms of a business. It was actually Lord Sugar that gave the advice was stick to what you know and not what you want to know.

Nice.

And that was sales. That's all I'd ever done for 20 years.

Yeah.

And getting young people into sales, that's why recruitment came about for me, really.

Okay, cool.

Yeah, slightly different. So for myself, I started off my career, I didn't go to uni, went straight into telesales and then went into recruitment like the usual people fell into it. Did high street recruitment, started off with Manpower, Kelly's, then went into more niche recruitment.

How many jobs did you have?

A few.

Were they looking for 10 months?

They were.

My CV was not jumpy. And then eventually I moved more into training and then followed a sort of sales training career before then setting up my own training company where most of my client base quickly became recruitment.

Okay, cool. So then just to frame it up for everyone, just to make it clear, so Neil, for you, after The Apprentice, how soon after that did you then start This Is Prime?

Um, about a year.

A year?

Yeah. I set up, um, like a consultancy/training business for about 6 months, to be honest, just to make some money, um, on the back of doing The Apprentice, which was great. Um, and then realized that it wasn't scalable. It was more about, um, people wanting to be trained off a guy who got fired from The Apprentice, weirdly. Um, so I wanted to create something where I could do something different, where people wanted to work, and we could make a different impact and getting, you know, people into sales, which is a career that people still look down upon. And I was really keen to change that stigma. And I met Nicole because she was training at the time, and similar vision for her. She wanted to do something different. She wanted to change the stigma that's attached to sales.

How did you meet each other?

Training, really.

Well, in fact, no, do you train now?

Tell the true story around it. Nicole was following me on Twitter, sent me a tweet. Is that right?

I wasn't actually, I was following Lord Sugar on Twitter. Don't beat yourself up. Yeah, sorry, that's true.

And Ben actually had a go at me because I'd written an ebook and told me how bad it was. And there's loads of—

Oh, and it was about Cell Trending?

Absolutely. So to be fair, that's how it came about.

You asked for honest feedback, so I gave you honest feedback.

Yeah. There was quite a lot of people that downloaded an ebook that I'd written only because Lord Sugar tweeted that my right man now has the right plan. Do you know what I mean? As cheesy as it sounds, but shows the power of social media.

Yeah, for sure.

There was 18,000 hits on the website within half an hour.

Really?

Off his Twitter, basically. So I'd written this ebook. I thought it was brilliant. Pretty good. My spelling is absolutely terrible.

Yeah.

And I asked for some feedback on it. I don't know why I did that because I don't like feedback. I thought like that's the in thing, you know, everyone asks for feedback. Yeah. And I did. And 99 of them was like, you know, this is amazing. Obviously didn't read it. And one of them was like, you know, a spelling mistake on page 18, 19, 20, and 21. So when I checked out who it was, it was Nicole and started a good relationship. Pretty much. Yeah. And just sound that we both were really passionate about training young people, educating them on sales and trying to get more people into the industry. And, you know, that's what we've been all about now for the last 5 years.

Okay. And then for yourself then, Nicole, just for everyone. Yeah, obviously, obviously you took a different path where— so you was a sales trainer in recruitment businesses.

Yeah.

For how long?

So I literally, I'd worked in a number of corporate businesses. My last one was Virgin. Yeah, sales trainer there for 7 years. And then I decided to set up my own business. So I set it up and I had it from about 2011, and that's when I really found that my niche market was recruitment because of my network. The amazing thing with recruitment, you never lose your network no matter how long you're out of it. So it was a really good opportunity to start to build that. And I think at that point the training was going really well, but what you tend to find when you're doing sales training is all your clients always say to you, who do you know that might be looking for a job? Who do you know? So you're kind of missing out on a fee. So you're always recommending people and not really benefiting. Yes, and I think that's pretty much where we got to. We were like, everyone's asking us all the time, but also when you're training people like, oh, who's going to be really good? Who are the superstars in the session? And 9 times out of 10, you pretty much nail it and you know who's going to do well and who isn't. But you always know that somebody is looking for someone. So yeah.

I mean, that's not a bad way to start a business, is it? When people telling you, we need this help, can you solve this problem? And you start a business around that. Do you know what I mean? I think so many people in today's world now start a business say it's the best idea, but then have no idea if people are actually going to engage with it or anything beforehand, you know what I mean? So just for everyone listening then who may not know Prime, so what is the actual— from what I understand, you train people on sales, or obviously you'll be able to explain that, and then you take them to recruitment businesses. Is that right? Yeah, yeah, pretty much. So you run training academies, and is it always people without sales experience? Is it people with sales experience?

Um, we— our target audience is graduate training market. So, okay, we work with anyone that's looking to get a career, not a job, and we have a really thorough process. So the whole purpose of Prime was to change the perception of sales, but make recruitment and sales a career of choice rather than a career that everyone just falls into. It's not promoted as a career when people go to uni. People don't go in going, I really want to come out being a recruiter. Yeah, but actually it's an amazing career if you're given the tools and the skills to be successful.

Okay.

Um, so I think the gap in the market we we saw was a lot of people fail in recruitment their first year, often because they either don't understand the role in the first place or they haven't been given the training to be successful. Um, so we kind of tried to take that away and go, let's offer a quality service. Don't be one of those businesses that just spams out CVs. Let's invest the time. So we're not a volume recruiter, um, we're much more quality-led, and we train our candidates before we place them. And then a lot of our clients use our training post-placement too.

Yeah, that was a real nice question, just for my benefit. Where does the training stop? So do you get involved involved with training, actually helping training actual people who have got their years experience or whatever? Do you get involved with that, or is it more of the junior end?

A lot of our clients use our training services separate as well, so we offer recruitment and training as an option, or individually. The reason I think our clients buy into it is because we do bespoke training rather than off the shelf, so we tailor it to what they're looking for, so there's more value to it.

Okay.

Um, so we'll have clients that will perhaps put a group together where they'll have their directors in it, their managers in it, their trainees in it, because they want a consistency there that everyone's working towards the same thing. So they all know what each other's expectations are.

Okay, that's good to know. So, um, obviously the both of you sort of have had— so did you ever have your own business before now?

Just, just after the Apprentice, to be honest.

Really?

Um, which is when I had, I suppose, the courage to go out there and do it on my own. And prior to that, I'd always been working in sales all my career. Yeah, yeah. And obviously, Nicole, you already had an experience starting your own That's cool.

And so I guess, how was, how was the first year then? I always like to talk about that because obviously you had this amazing idea. Seems like everyone's going to pay money for it. But how was actually that first year of now going to your clients? Look, we can actually help you. How, how was that journey?

This is probably going to be a bit of a curveball for people out there. But for me, the first year is the easiest.

Really?

Because you're not up against growth. So everything you do is, is growth at the end of the day, you know, it's all about scalability. Everything is fresh, everything is new. You are going to have more passion than you've ever had before to make it work because, you know, you've just left your job or you've done something to make it happen. And usually there's only one or in our case, two of you. So it's so exciting. The challenge comes like now when you're 5 years in, you've got 20 employees and kind of it's a lot harder to manage. So for me, the most enjoyment is, is the first year.

Yeah, I like that.

People think it's great. Well, you'll know because— what?

Yeah, well, yeah, 6 months in. I think the bit that I would just add to that is that I— it was always sort of my plan, but I love the fact that the complete responsibility is on me to deliver what I sell to my clients.

Yeah.

Do you know what I mean? Right now, obviously you have 19, 20 heads. Obviously that's sort of out of your control a bit more now, isn't it, then, in terms of what can be delivered to your clients in the end results? That's what I've realized in the last 6 months, that if it isn't as good as I said it was, well that's on me, and I'm actually quite comfortable with that. It's true. And I'm in control of that at the end of the day.

Yeah.

Um, so no, I think I love the way that you put that. I guess, what about yourself, Nicole? Do you agree with that, or—

Yeah, um, I think what was interesting that first year was we're both really competitive people.

Really?

Yeah. And we hate failure. We like to succeed. So I think our first year, we didn't really have a plan. It was more about let's just hit targets, make money, make it happen. And then got to the end of it, we're like, right, okay, we've done that, but what we're actually trying to do. Um, did you have Did you have a business plan? We thought we had until we got to the end of year 1 and then realised that we didn't.

I'm known for not planning, to be honest, but I think that was the biggest learning curve we had. We've got a non-exec director involved who is, you know, not a recruiter but proven entrepreneur. And to be fair, you know, the biggest advice we got probably going into year 2 stroke year 3 was, you know, you need to, you need to put a plan.

Instead of just make it happen.

And we did. And we put a plan in place which we've just come to the end of it for 5 years. Years. Uh, and because of that, we've gone on and overachieved on everything that we said.

How has that helped then, having a plan? Because I think there'll be a lot of people listening who maybe think about starting their own recruitment business or whatever. And I've probably had this conversation quite a few times because a lot of people I've spoken to who are now sort of where you're at, maybe 15 heads, 10 heads, 20 heads, or whatever, did start the business not knowing exactly what it looks like. Because it can be quite hard to visualize, especially in the mindset that you have. And I've had the exact same mindset, like let's just start, get money in the bank and we'll see what happens. Yeah. I guess like how, if obviously, so it seems like if you were to go back and start again, you would think about, okay, how would we want this to look a year from now, 2 years from now? Would that be beneficial for people thinking about that?

Yeah, I think it does. But at the same time, a plan's good if it's achievable and it's realistic. And I think when you start a business, I think the biggest issue, you know, we had was if we're really honest, it was like, right, first year we're going to do a million quid. And it was like, actually, no, it's going to take a couple of years to get to that point.

A million sounds good though.

And I think that's the difference. And then what you do, and this is the biggest advice I would give starting, you put these targets together and you put, you're always, recruiters and salespeople are confident people, right? It's what we do. So actually we're always going to think we can go through and smash every single target. As soon as you put that target in place and then you don't start achieving it one month and then the next month, and then you're like, oh my, we're doing really bad here. Then the reality is you're not. It's just that you've probably been so optimistic in your targets that they weren't achievable in the first place.

In place.

So I think plans are good, absolutely. And I think now the stage we're in, you have to have a business plan in place for sure. But for the first year, it's about enjoying it. It's about going out there and making a difference and doing what you can.

I think, yeah, I think there is an element of that. But I think also one thing we learned was if you're going into business with someone you don't really know as well without a plan, you have two very different perspectives on what success looks like, what you're trying to achieve. And I think that's what our biggest— well, one of them was in the first year was that we thought we were on the same page and we got into the end, completely different views on what we were trying to achieve.

So how did you— how have you both got better at that then? Because there'll be a lot of people listening that, one, don't like the idea of starting their own, two, like the idea of starting with someone else. Has it been communicating better, or I don't know, what do you do now? Do you have like monthly catch-ups, or I don't know?

Well, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll give the positives and then Nicole can give the negatives.

So it won't take you long then.

Yeah, no, I think the positive— and again, I get asked quite a bit about, um, when they're doing talks or whatever it is about, you know, what advice would you give to someone trying to start a business? And one of the bits of advice I'd always give is you should partner up with somebody and you should partner up with somebody that's got different skillset to you, which gives you a more rounded skillset as a business. We are different in the way that we look at things, but that means that we usually get to the right conclusion at the end. So for me, partnering up is great. Listened to one of your podcasts recently and the gentleman was on his own and I think his advice was if he had his time again, he'd partner up. 'Cause imagine when things are great, who do you celebrate with? When things aren't so good, who do you go to? Which is probably the toughest time. So I do think having a partner is important, but having somebody that has a different skillset to you is equally important to give you a better skillset overall.

So I think just to round that off, it's like also make sure you know your strengths as well.

Absolutely.

Do you know what I mean? Yeah.

Now onto the negatives.

I don't think we've got all day. I don't know, I think it's challenging, really challenging. I think we are both quite strong characters Stubborn as well. I think we both think we're both right all the time. So it is good in the fact that you come with so many different ideas and you will always get to an end result. But actually sometimes the end result isn't what either of you came up with.

Yeah.

But you have to battle that out to get to the end result. And I think it's just trying to keep things focused and not think you're always right.

Are we doing the Dubai office then or?

And don't run before you can walk.

Yeah, I think board meetings are interesting. To be honest, that's why I think it's worked really well having Because the two of us may disagree or agree on certain things, on some things. But having a non-exec there, you've got that person to go listen, you know, let's go this way, go that way.

When did you engage in a non-exec?

At the start.

Yeah, right at the very start.

There's been three of us involved from day one.

And was that intentional?

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

Again, I think that's pretty good advice as well, isn't it? And I think also as well, I like the idea of having someone not in the recruitment world because I think that's— obviously there's pros and cons to that as well, but But I think having someone that may not have worked in recruitment but has a good business acumen is beneficial. It's quite easy to get obviously someone that obviously only lives and breathes recruitment but did it 50 million years ago. Do you know what I mean? I think that's—

You've got to know your skill set and we'll both openly admit, scaling a business isn't what we've done before. I've been in, I'm a salesman. Nicole had been a trainer for a number of years, had great businesses, but we'd never scaled a business. So having someone there that can give us that guidance, i.e., you need to make sure the plan's in place, you need to execute it. Different advice has helped us grow. So yeah, I'd strongly recommend it. But again, it's, again, it's about having the right person.

Yeah, I think when you're in recruitment as well though, there, it's the most networked industry. So if you want to get advice or information or guidance from people, you'll always find someone in recruitment that's willing to have a chat or get like, just, there's like so many groups and networks. Whereas getting outside perspective on a business rather than it just being about recruitment has been massively beneficial for us. Yeah.

Okay. First year then, was it just you two at the end of the year still? No.

Um, 5.

Really?

Yeah, 5.

And how was that then?

Well, interestingly, our process, um, is quite unique. So we do a training day, uh, which in graduate recruitment for your own business. Yeah. So we, we obviously, for our, uh, for our clients, we run training days where clients come and observe people being trained and they select who they'd like from the process. It's a It's kind of bringing the traditional assessment centre into the modern era is the way I look at it by training people. Yeah, we did our own training day in the first kind of few weeks of setting up. We hired Kyle, who's the Prestwich Prince, part Manchester if you're listening. He came to our training day at the time. It was on. It was quite interesting things on the back of doing the BBC Apprentice, wasn't it? So we had quite a lot of people like coming in and there was like a guy from Bulgaria who came over. There was like this guy who could speak Mandarin. There was an ex-professional man city footballer, and then there was Kyle from Prestwich. And to be fair, that was a difference. That's where we knew we had to recruit on our values, on our culture. And we recruited Kyle, who now is 5 years in, he's a sales manager, he's going on to be a director in the business.

Did you know your culture at year 1 though? Do you know what I mean?

It's probably an amazing piece of advice we were given, again from our mindset, was you start a business with your values. So what is it you're trying to create? Um, so our first real challenge was was what is the vision? Like, what do you want to create? And, and we established we wanted to create a business where people wanted to work. Like, people wanted to join our business. Everyone wanted to work there. Um, and then we looked at what were the values that would make that happen, both for internal perspective but worked externally as well with clients. And I think from that, everything we did was always underpinned with the values. So anything we make a decision on, we're always told, does it fit with the values? Is it aligned? And if it isn't, don't do it.

I think values can be quite like just a bit overlooked now and just a bit like, yeah, like you you sort of need them, but then, do you know what I mean? I just think like people can very easily end up with values that are like professional integrity, honest, all the normal stuff.

One of them's ours.

But I think at the end of the day, the most important thing is like, are you someone that lives and breathes by them? Are you someone that, as you said, makes business decisions on those values? And that's why they're there and that's why they're so important.

It's knowing what they mean. And I think it's the education piece around it of, do you actually know what the values mean and why they're there? And as long as people know what they mean and how to deliver on them, then you always have alignment, even if people don't agree. They pull each other on the values.

Yeah.

And will feedback on that.

I think when you do as well, I remember the first time we had the meeting with the Nogasaki's, right? The first thing we do with this business is you set a vision and your values. And we did this 3-hour exercise with them about it. And at the time I'm thinking, this is just cheesy, right?

Yeah.

Values, what, whatever. And now if I'm completely honest, everything we do is around values and vision. It was the best thing we ever did. So I'd advise people do it at the very start.

Yeah, that's wicked. And don't just do it for doing its sake. Like, as you said, you've got to believe it. Yeah, really commit to it. So you gave yourself, you had, you wanted to do a million quid revenue. How did you do in the first year?

We did about 250K.

Really?

Absolutely. From a standing start. It's what we wanted to do.

And had it all been recruitment clients? Yeah.

Or?

First year, rec to rec, all graduate rec to rec. It's now year 5 that we're kind of 50/50 rec to rec and sales recruitment, which was always the plan.

And what's the, um, just to give me some context, the sales piece, what, what types of work is it like? Financial sales or tech sales, or is it just sales?

Yeah, predominantly, um, tech sales, um, but everything that every company we partner with is companies that are going to invest in young talent but develop them through. Uh, there has to be training structures in place because the retention rates, generally the reason why we set this business up, are so poor in graduate recruitment going into sales because of the pressurized environment. So yeah, we wanted to change that. And last last year, you know, I think our proudest moment of all is although we smashed our financial targets, 90% of our placements last year have passed their probation. And that, to be, to us, is the biggest advice. We set it all 5 years ago to make a difference and a change, and last year, and they're going up even though the volume of placement's going up.

Yeah, yeah, it's cool. Okay, um, right, so with that in mind then as well, Or did you start in Manchester and have your office here? Because we're in London today. So then when did you open the London office?

And then year 3. So we did first 3 years in Manchester. London's just finished its second year.

Really? Okay, cool. So year 2 to year 3, what was that like?

Um, year 2 to year 3, um, I think that's when you know you've got something good. Uh, you've proven it, you've tested it, and that's where the pressure comes because then, like I said, you're up against growth. It's expected. Yeah. And for for me, that's when I think the pressure really started to come in. That, you know, you then got employees, you go to, you know, 8, 9, 10 people, you've got responsibilities. And no matter where you look at business, you know, your business is built on your people, but at the same time, your biggest challenges are your people. So, uh, things have changed for us dramatically at that time, I would say.

Really? What, um, grads, what's their perception of recruitment?

Well, probably, I'm sure that's true, probably mine when I left after 10 months, to be honest. Uh, no training, these people, obviously.

Yeah, obviously still deal with them now, but yeah, what— I'm sure it's changed. Like, has it changed from that year one, if you think of the people that you have in those training, um, days, to now? What, what's the typical perception of a grad of recruitment?

Initially, not great.

Yeah.

Um, it's an education piece, isn't it? Everyone has a perception until you change that perception.

Yeah.

Our whole process is about identifying what they want from a career, identifying what their characteristics and traits are as an individual, and then going, does that match this industry. And if it does, then educate them on what the industry is all about, what the challenges are, but also what the rewards are if you're good at it. Um, and then bringing through a process that allows them to get to see that firsthand.

What are the traits, characteristics, in your opinion?

Um, I— my number one, um, someone asked me this the other day, hands down, is work ethic.

Really?

Yeah, without a doubt.

It's come up a lot recently.

Yeah, I think people underestimate how hard you have to work to be successful in that first year to 2 years. Yeah. Um, and that's where people struggle.

I always bring this up because I love getting people's different opinion on it. Work ethic now in 2019, 2020. I don't know, for me, I just feel like in today's world, my mind, and I feel like other people's mind, just go straight to like late hours, no flexible working. Yeah. No dogs in the office.

Plenty of dogs in the office.

And then you walk outside, there's two dogs. People are sleeping in the booths. Yeah.

But do you know what I mean? When you say work work ethic to a grad now, or do you know what I mean, a young person in today's world? I don't know, I just feel like they're the things that are attached to work ethic, I think.

I don't know, like, I think a lot has changed. There's a lot of stigma around graduates, isn't there? I think the reality is the society that they've grown up in is very different to what recruitment used to be like 20 years ago.

Yeah.

So they don't have the same outlook on certain things. So if, if a graduate wants to learn something or know something, they can know it straight away. You ask Google, you ask Siri, you ask Alexa, things are instant. If you order something, it comes next day. Recruitment's not like that. It doesn't happen overnight. It's not that quick. So patience is a big thing, and it's making me recognize that, you know what, you're not going to see an instant return. You're not going to see a quick return. You're not going to see a quick win. It's about longevity. So our education piece, when we do our training session, a lot of it is around mindset and going— it's an amazing career, but you've got to work hard that first year. You're going to have to make sacrifices if you want to be really successful. But it's about being smart with your time as well. Like, you could work less hours than somebody else, but if you're literally working those hours and not getting distracted and losing focus, you'll be far more productive. So it's your choice at the end of the day how many hours really you're going to have to put in based on what you do with the hours.

And I think part of that as well, it's so easy in today's world to— like, I could sort of be someone outside looking into your business and go, oh, Primer doing all right, aren't they? Do you know, like, it's just so easy to see where you are 5 years now. Are they opening an office here? Doing well, whereas it's, it's way more difficult now to see, or people aren't willing to share all the stuff that leads up to that and the challenges.

Absolutely.

The graft and the work effort, you know what I mean? It's so easy just to see the finished result.

Yeah.

And not see that. Um, how do you sell recruitment to these, uh, people? Because I love the way that you're talking about it. I think I, I've always been open around my story. It was always sold to me around just the good parts, right? And I think a lot of people, um, are sold just the good parts of recruitment. Um, how— obviously you're talking about patience, you're talking about work ethic, you're talking about mindset, which is brilliant. What— how do you— what— how would you say you sort of sell recruitment to these people?

We sell them out of it.

Really?

Yeah, absolutely. Um, so, you know, we're not about— obviously we're about volumes of placements because we want to grow. We'd rather make good placements. Our biggest— we don't, we don't work to KPIs, it's not what we do, but obviously we work to some targets, but we don't make the guys do X amount of calls or meet X amount of people because it drives the wrong mentality. What we do, work on quality, because that 90% success rate is what we want to continue to grow. So for us, what we want is people— the 50% of people that fall out of recruitment didn't want it in the first place. So what we try and do is work that out in the interview process, so we put them off. Yeah, I was speaking to one of the— the—

well, that's a good trick.

Yeah, we've moved on from that. Um, what we, uh, what we do is we're, we're more honest probably with our job adverts for a start. I spoke to one of the really, you know, market-leading job boards not so long ago and they were like, you know how you need to get more applications? What you need to do is put, you know, the bracket range from £18K, which is a base, you know, to like £40K or £50K because you're going to get more people that apply. And I'm like, well, that's not what they're going to earn. Well, yeah, well, that's the OTE. Whoever does that in the first year is probably the top 10% of people that have ever done recruitment. You're not going to earn that. You're going to earn mid-20s if you're doing well. And that's being realistic because you've got to work hard. So we're more honest from where it starts. We're more honest about the fact of, you know, the hours you have to put in and everything else. And if you're honest at the start and put people off and they still come back and want it, and then they come to the training event and then they do another interview, they're more likely to go into that job thinking, actually, this is for me. And that's what we do at the start, really. So rather than sell them in, we sell them out. And of course we've got to do our job, but you want to place people that are going to be successful. And we're all about changing that perception and making careers of people, not people that go and have 3 jobs in a year.

A year.

So if we sell them into it too much, we're not doing the right thing. So, you know, that's, that's what we tend to do.

Yeah, because you— I mean, I've, um, I've had a couple of people on this podcast share their sort of grad assessment centre experience, and it sounds pretty grim. Yeah, quite a lot of them. Some of them just sound really bad. Yeah, yeah, it's tough. It's sell the person, sell the person next to you. It's you see everyone that gets cut and all that. I never end up there.

It's brutal. It's absolutely brutal. And we, we set this up and we looked at the well-known competitors that do it, and don't get me wrong, they do some things amazingly well, And they probably make more placements than some of the market leaders. But what they don't do is have that retention rate. And that retention rate is purely there because of the training, development and taking care and showing people the downsides as well as the upsides of the industry. Because it's not for everyone, is it? You know what I mean? People, people don't go to uni wanting to be a recruiter. At the end of it, they fall into it. But for us, if they knew more about it before going to uni and saw it as a career, and for me, it's given me entrepreneurial skills. So help me set up a business, then people may choose it.

Use it.

And we're just about trying to get more people actually looking at it as a career rather than kind of thinking, oh God, I can't get anything else, I'll fall into recruitment.

So what— just, just to sort of finalize that, you can talk about what it's like now and stuff, but as I think you just mentioned in the car round, there definitely is a misconception of grads, isn't there, in terms of— yeah, I mean, you can talk about they're not as willing to work as hard, or instant gratification, wherever it may be. What, what do you think is the sort of biggest misconception from your point of view from working with a lot of grads?

I think they're all just put under the same bracket, aren't they? And we've got a really strong team, and what we've identified is that they don't fit that mold of don't want to work hard or don't want to do the long hours. There's a lot of people that do. It just comes down to what people want and what they're prepared to do to achieve it. So it's what you're looking for in individuals. It is a bit cliché to say, but you're looking for those driven, those ambitious people, those people that that don't want to fail. They want to be successful, but they also have not just a money motivation but a success desire as well. So it's finding the right characteristics, because I genuinely think it's, it's a perception that's put across the majority, but it's probably the minority. Um, the candidates we speak to, our process is so thorough that it's all about getting to know them as individuals and then looking for the right traits that we, we all know what makes a great recruiter great. It's finding those traits within those individuals. So we've got a team where they're not afraid to work long hours, they're not afraid to pick up the phone in the evening, get on the phone at the weekend if they have to, because they want to be successful. We're not saying you've got to do it, they're choosing to do it because success is important to them.

Um, so do you think it's just about that? You tend to find people, and from doing what we do, and this is probably a tip for people interviewing outside of what we do, so, um, is people who've made a sacrifice to further their themselves or their career. It doesn't have to be career. For example, people that are moving to London because they feel that's what the, the hub of the world where they're going to make the best impact. Yeah, they've got more fire in the belly, they're moving away from the friends. People who've made a sacrifice for their career tend to make great recruiters because so driven on the end goal, uh, rather than people that might want an easy life. And that's fine if you do, but recruitment is tough. You've got to be willing to make sacrifices and put the hours in, particularly in your this year.

Um, and I think, um, no, that, that is interesting that I love what you said there. I think, um, so back to the business then, year 2, year 3, because you're in year 5 now.

Yeah.

So if we talk about year 2 to year 4, so you just finished your 5th year, is that right?

Yeah.

Year 2 to year 4, obviously, yeah, as you said, real proof of concept that, I mean, yeah, done great in terms of revenue, in terms of for the year 21, what then went on over those, the last couple of years then? Because like, how many competitors do you have? Because I feel like once I've learned a bit about you guys, it's like, fucking how great are they? You know what I mean? Train people and then send them to recruitment businesses. Like, it just makes sense. Do you know what I mean? So I guess, how did those years go and what were some of the sort of ups and downs there?

Wow. I think we touched on it before. I think the You know, it's different now. We're at, you know, 20 heads, and that is a great and amazing thing to have, you know, so many people that are working in your business that are passionate about what we're about, about changing that perception of sales and doing something a bit differently. But at the same time, you know, we, we've also got a team of millennials like Nicole was mentioning, impatient, want to progress quickly. So I think managing people is, is probably been the, the biggest challenge.

And you take, you take grads. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, okay, so let's talk about that then, because I think it falls into why a recruitment agency is so bad at recruiting for themselves. Yeah, do you know what I mean? That's, that's the problem that you're aiming to solve as well as changing the perception of recruiting, these types of things. And yeah, like, let's talk a bit about some of the learnings of that. I mean, I, I haven't sat down with many people on this podcast, I don't think, who solely just hire grads. I think I always end up having a conversation with people that have not sure on experienced hires 'cause they feel like they come potentially with bad habits or whatever. People love the thought of taking someone that's, yeah, a grad or some sales experience 'cause they can mold them to whatever that is, whatever they have. So I guess for yourself and your own business then, what have been some of the learnings of managing people if that's been a challenge?

Do you wanna start?

I think it's an interesting one 'cause obviously we work in recruitment and most of our clients will always say if you've got Anyone experienced, let us know about them. But good recruiters are hard to come by because if they're great, they're being looked after really well. So they're few and far between. And I think the view of a business owner is like, if I bring in someone with experience, yes, there's a risk they've got bad habits, they might have burnt out, but there's also the advantage that they know what they're doing, they can hit the ground running, they can start making money fast. Whereas bringing in a trainee, they've got no proven track record, you don't know if they're gonna work out or not, you've got to invest a huge amount of time in training them, developing them, and you're not guaranteed a return. Return. So I think there's that massive concern of, is it, is it going to work or isn't it? But I think my view is, if you're taking a trainee and you give them the right development, you can make it work. Um, our results have proven that it can work, and I think getting it right is never easy. But one thing that we've learned with that graduate sort of market is progression and development are probably two of the most important things to them. But everyone thinks it's money and success. Yes, they're important, but they've just come out of learning for 3 or 4 years and they're in that learning mentality. And if they go into a role and then they just go, right, here's the product, this is what we do, this is our market, but they're not shown or taught how to sell it, they very quickly go, right, well, I know what it is but I don't know how to do the job. Then that's when they start to go, well, it's not working for me. And then people go, all right, recruiting graduates just doesn't work, it's not, it's not the right way forwards. But I think our biggest learn has— if you invest in them, and I'm not talking about classroom training all the time, the best learning happens on the job, um, giving Giving your management team the skills to be able to coach and feedback on the job really well will make them really effective really quickly because they don't want to sit in a classroom all day. They want to be doing the job. They want to learn by doing, but feedback real time is probably the most critical tool you can have.

So is it fair to say then one of the key, the key learnings are for you guys then is having a bit of a sort of clear career progression structure, communicating, okay, this is where you are today, this is where we'd like you to be, this is what you can be, blah, blah, blah.

Blah, blah, blah. I think making that sort of crystal clear for the people you bring in your business, to back that up, I believe, and I can only go from my own goals, uh, but at the same time, more and more for millennials anyway, that progression is probably more important than money. Um, and I think actually when you get asked that question, progression or money, really it's the same thing, right? Yeah. But, uh, for me, progression works really well. Uh, one thing that we did, uh, which I think was a big step change in the business, was change the promotional criteria. And again, it's probably another bit of advice for people that are going from maybe 10, trying to grow to 20.

How did you have it before then?

Well, it took probably a year to get promoted to the next level.

What would you measure that on typically?

Billings.

Just billings?

Well, no, values.

And like, yeah, how they— Yeah, absolutely.

But one thing we did was, so you've got to put yourself into the mindset of a millennial. Like we've mentioned before, you know, if you need some new earphones, you can get them ordered from Amazon on the day. You know, you can either swipe left or right on Tinder. Don't know which way it is, but get good.

Don't lie.

But the point is you can get everything straight away. Any business now that has progression for a millennial that's gonna take 12 months minimum, for me, are gonna lose people.

Really?

Because they're gonna be disengaged. They're gonna want it sooner than that. So a big thing that we did was put a step change role in the middle. So give them a promotion, give them a title, maybe just give them an extra grand. Doesn't have to be a massive amount financially, but give them something to work towards for 6 months. And then in another 6 months, they've achieved what they would've done over 12, but they feel like they've been promoted twice. And that's one big thing that I would say if you're going to hire graduates, give them shorter objectives to work towards, because a month— sorry, a year is probably like 10 years in a graduate's eyes.

And that's the reality, especially in the world of a recruiter, right? Or someone that's early on, because those first 12 months can feel like fucking 5 years. Do you know what I mean? Like, it can be really difficult, really unforgiving in that first year. So I think that's such a great point there. And it's— so you've typically done on billings, but then also sort of, um, them demonstrating the values and living and breathing them and these types of things.

Nicole's probably about— yeah, I think definitely there's more than just the billings for sure.

Yeah, I'd say we start everyone as a resourcer, um, and so it's all about placements for them, but there's so many different things they've got to deliver on, um, and what we're looking for is, is conversion rates more than anything else. So getting candidates to the training day and being picked out. So we're working on have we invested into the right people, so it's all about quality. So value Values is probably the big one. We've actually had people where we've promoted based on the fact that they've actually delivered on all of those things, but not necessarily on the billings, but ticked all the others, but went way and beyond in all the other areas. So for us, the value that they're contributing to the business is far greater than just a revenue target.

And is that because, you know, if they keep working at those metrics and those conversions, that the bit— the billing is going to come?

100%.

Yeah.

And also it's just setting a good example. I think we're, we're in a team where people look to other people as to where shall I go next, and I think if I've got someone who's setting a great example example of what, what we're looking for is a great recruiter in our business, then you want people to look to them and go, actually, they've been promoted. Why have they been promoted? What is it they're doing that I need to replicate?

There's also a piece on this, and this is, um, again, I think I had on a previous podcast, um, you know, people that, because they're billing really well, it means they can mentor or manage resources, or they get them for the team. For me, that's completely the wrong move. What, uh, what we've created is— and a lot of businesses have this, so it's not unique— but, you know, you can go down the individual bill as much and make as much money as a one route, or you can go down the team leader route. But there's a key difference here, that the team leader route means that your objectives aren't just based on billings. Yeah, because if you create somebody that's going to be a team leader that all their focus about is their own billings, then are they going to be the right person to inspire the team? So values, you know, the way that they mentor other people, you know, help out other people, the team is probably as important as their billings if they're going to go into management.

But I think it's the point that you made, like, if you don't have the option in your recruitment business right now, then that's something you should definitely think about. 100%.

Not everybody's a good manager, are they? We kind of laugh and joke about this. I quite like management, you know, hence why I came out of recruitment after 10 months because I got an opportunity to manage. That's all I've ever wanted to do. And Nicole's the flip side of that. She doesn't like the management side. So it's kind of like you've got to find people, what they're good at, where their goals, where they're going to get to. We could all be successful doing either side of things we don't like, but you're going to be more successful and reach your potential if you do what you like.

Yeah. What would be good to get both your opinions on is, 'cause I mean, there'll definitely be so many people listening that either hire for their business or hire for their team or whatever and hire the type of people that you speak to. Where do recruitment agencies really get it wrong when hiring grads? Do you know what I mean? Where do they get it really wrong where you can really just sort of communicate some of the things that you know grads don't really, really don't appreciate. I don't know, just some of the common mistakes that you hear and see recruitment agencies make when it comes to hiring a lot of young talent without any experience.

Yeah, yeah.

All of a sudden all our clients are no longer clients anymore. Thanks for that, Hishem.

That's it.

No, um, being really honest, very carefully. No, being really honest with it, it comes down to training development. Um, and I know that's, that's our USP, but I'm not pitching for us. What it really needs to have is, if you want to take on a graduate, you are going to have to train and develop them, okay? And that means that you can't expect in the first year you're going to get a return. You can't expect that they're going to be great at BD within a year. You can't expect that they're going to be smashing the candidate piece. You've got to give them training and development, particularly for that first year of employment. Every recruitment business may say we've got great training, but if we're really honest with ourselves and look at our business, have we got great training? Have we got the support? I think You're going to recruit somebody that you back because they smash their interviews. But if you don't support them and train them, they're never going to be great at it. So for me, whether you use external providers or you have a dedicated trainer or you've got somebody who can really mentor, that's not just applicable for billing all the time, then that for me is a great start. And unfortunately, it's a challenge because a lot of our businesses, you know, predominantly we work with SMEs, right?

Recruitment businesses, you know, tend to be, you know, Yeah, the large majority are employed under 10 staff.

Absolutely. So, you know, we're really helping develop them and we'll always give them advice is don't take a punt on someone that you can't support, you know, get the support in place and they'll be more likely to be successful.

How long should—

how— I know, obviously, like, you can't just sort of give a blanket answer, but like, how long should these people expect to— like, if I'm serious about hiring for my business and I'm up for hiring grads or people with just some sales experience, whatever. How long should I give these people? Do you know what I mean?

Well, it depends, doesn't it? If you're— I mean, someone with a sales experience, uh, again, it depends what type of sales experience it is, right? Um, so firstly, I suppose if someone with experience, you're going to expect things from sooner, obviously. Um, a graduate, you're gonna have to be really realistic. Um, this is about long-term planning, you know. It's only now that we're kind of— I suppose more so from Manchester's point of view, uh, you know, London's absolutely smashing it at the moment and will overtake Manchester naturally because of the, uh, because the fees generated here and higher salaries. But Manchester's, you know, so established now that, you know, it's an expectation now that targets are smashed and delivered on. Um, but we also need to continue to develop people at the same time, and I think that's the biggest challenge. No matter if you're a 1 employee, 10, 20, or 50, the training support has to be there.

Yeah, I think what's really interesting at that point though, and I think you've probably done podcasts with so many people that have said the same thing, they don't build— they let some of the most successful recruiters have the worst 'best 6 months ever' or the 'worst first year ever.' Yet they've ended up— they ended up literally being best performers, top billers, managing directors. And I think that's what people have to remember, is that not everyone's going to hit the ground running from day one. Um, you've got to give them a bit of time. We had a conversation with a client a few months ago, and a couple of the candidates were a couple of months in, and they were like, 'Well, I'm not sure, I'm not sure.' And I'm like, 'Think back to why you hired them in the first What can you be doing differently to ensure that they can perform? And now they're doing great. But it's sometimes you panic, don't you? Not seeing anything quick enough and you go, right, they're not performing, get them out, get someone else in.

That's what I mean, I guess on the flip side then from the context that you're talking about there, what are some, so that's some really good advice. Make sure you remember why you hired these people, what you saw in them, et cetera. 'Cause you can quite easily forget that when they don't put anything on the board for 3 months. But then on top of that as well, what my own personal experience when I was in the business of 8 people and sat directly next to the owner of the business, was demonstrating the right activity and stuff like that. Yeah, what should they— what are key things that they should be looking out for? Yeah, is it— yeah, what—

just, I think we, we talk about this a lot, especially when we're training, and we train graduates, change— train managers as well, is that we all know there's two things: there's will and there's skill. And I don't expect them to have that skill for the first 6-12 months, but I expect them to have the will. So if they're demonstrating the right work ethic, the right attitude, the right focus, they're going outside the day to try and learn about the market. They're showing all the right traits, then I know and I'm confident we can develop them.

Yeah.

If they're not showing that, then I, I'd be concerned.

Then that's when you should definitely be concerned and have a conversation.

That's fair. You know, we've, um, certainly not going to name names, but we've, we've got a couple of really strong people that probably wasn't hitting where we want them to hit, but 12 months in now, by a little bit more support, a bit more development, just because they were working harder, that they're now successful. So you've got to be willing to give time. And don't get me wrong, we manage a business, so, you know, we're like no other business. There's got to be a point, you know, we work to targets, there has to be a return because that's what recruitment's about. But be realistic for the first year, just be realistic and give training support, and you'll be amazed the retention rates will improve. But training support has to be given, and it can't just be, you know, he's great recruitment, so sit with him. It's got to be a structured training program, and you will see your retention rates improve.

So fifth year prime then, on the mission to change perception of recruitment sales.

Yeah.

Obviously you won an award this year as well that I know you're really proud of. How do you think you're doing against this mission of yours to change the perception?

Okay. I think, well, we've trained 3,500 3,000 graduates now, um, on recruitment and sales. So, uh, that's 3,500 people that have gone away with some skills they didn't have when we met them. So I think that's a massive, massive leap forward.

Um, it's recruitment and sales.

Don't get Nicole started.

She wrote a blog on it.

You should check it out, actually. Yeah, we actually wrote a blog on it after not winning the award we won 3 years ago.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Because that was one That was one of the questions that came up that first year round. It's like, it's recruitment, it's not sales. And I was like, recruitment is sales. So I wrote a blog on it afterwards and everyone's like, no, recruitment is sales.

Being someone that's worked in sales more so than recruitment, I would honestly say recruitment is sales.

It's really interesting though. So you may or may not have seen, did a live event not too long ago and this came up because I think we spoke a lot around recruitment becoming a profession and it's definitely going that way and that's what we want for the industry. Industry, but a lot was spoken about being consultative, adding value, these types of things. And I think when we did talk about selling is sales, it did get quite a bit of pushback that, well, no, it's being consulted, these types of things. Do you know what I mean? So I personally really think recruitment is sales, and I don't know, I just don't understand how you cannot say that. I I think if you think sales is then just pushing people in a corner to take a job that they don't want, then yeah, mate, that definitely isn't how it should be. But for me, it was all why I got into it was I wanted to expand on my sales skills, which it definitely helped me to do. And that was because I went from a real transactional environment to a sort of more consultative environment in recruitment. But I don't know, I think there is a real conversation there around, 'cause I'm sure you see it a lot now, it's we add value, we're consultative, it's, it's sales is less used, but that's still selling. Yeah, I agree.

And I think that's the thing, it's, it's easy to, to put a label on sales and go, that's selling. But ultimately, fact-finding, solution selling, all those things is still part of the process. It's still part of a sales process. You uncover a requirement, you find out what's going on, you question a lot, you're really inquisitive, and then you're going to know what we can help you with that. So you're influencing, you're negotiating, You're— it's everything is selling, but in the right way.

It's a different form of selling. Um, so, you know, I'm, I'm a salesman. I've got to be honest, my biggest challenge going into recruitment was the length of the process.

Yeah.

Uh, being someone who likes the same repetitive kind of pitch, being more transactional was, was for me what sales is. It's a lot more transactional, it's quicker, it's kind of deal, deal, deal. Recruitment, probably the more senior you get into it as well, is a lot slower paced. So you've got to be more patient and consultative. Consultative. So I do believe it is different, but if anything, and I would say it's probably the most challenging of all sales roles because you are dealing with both sides, yeah, candidate and client. So you're actually doing more selling than anyone else. You just have to be a bit more consultative in your approach.

So why do you think you won this award? What's the name of the award? Because I'm not— I'm clueless. Apologies. But it's It's an award to be proud of, right?

Yeah, so the award is the Basement Awards, which is supported by the ISM, so the Institute of Sales Management. It's probably the most prestigious sales awards. So it is sales, not recruitment. Yeah, and it's sales training provider of the year. So yeah, it was—

What do you think are the cool things that contribute to that? Obviously some amazing stats of the amount of people you've impacted.

Yeah.

What contributes to that? Why do you think you won that award?

I'll take that because Nicole doesn't like bigging herself up. I think there's two key things. Firstly, we've got a unique concept. The ISM this year really bought into it. Usually recruitment businesses won't win any form of sales award. So to win that as a recruitment business, and as a business that's doing something different, they backed. And that's all about getting young people into sales and recruitment as a career. So I think our concept of training candidates before and after they get the job and the 90% success rate is key. However, the biggest factor of it, and Nicole won't like to admit it, is Nicole. So 3 years of trying to win the award, and if people want to talk about resilience, being told 3 times that, you know, recruitment isn't sales, or being put back because maybe you're dealing at the graduate end and actually, you know, we want to talk about people, you know, training senior leaders of the industry, and being told that and then still going back 3 times over and winning the award, I think is true testament to her, and all our training concepts, our models, are written by Nicole. So obviously the 90% success rate is down to the training we deliver, but the training's only good as the content that you have.

Yeah, of course.

Um, so Nicole is a massive factor in that, as well as the unique concept that we're really proud of.

That's wicked.

Nicole?

Well, um, yeah, I think, um, I think it was a different year this year. Obviously we've got 5 years behind us and we're proven now. Um, I think the challenge the last few years, you're competing meeting. We're probably in the wrong awards, to be honest. We're in an award where it's all about businesses that are sales training businesses, and we're different because we're a recruitment and training company. So we were the only business that came along where we are not 100% sales training, we are 50/50. And this year, I think being able to get across the fact that actually we're at a point now where we've changed so many people's career options to get them successful in a career that perhaps they hadn't even considered, and getting more people into the industry, and I think being able to highlight that probably the biggest challenges this industry faces is attracting and then retaining the best talent.

Totally.

And being able to do what we do and add that little bit of value that actually takes their career to success rather than failure, I think this year we were able to really show and demonstrate the achievements that we had, and that's probably what got us to the win.

Nicole, where do you think a lot of people get— so obviously a huge part, as you said, then it was the content, and you said that bespoke a lot you do. I mean, look, you don't have to share all the secrets, but like, where do you think a lot of sort of trainers get it wrong? Because I think I just think of a conversation I had recently, um, I was speaking to a chap and I was talking to— I was pitching him some business. He's like, yeah, like trainers, like some of them are great, but there's a lot of crap ones out there. I always think like, if you're good at what you do, why would you, why would you stop doing it? As in like billing and do you know what I mean? Yeah, I totally get get that.

Yeah.

So like, I don't know where— yeah, what—

yeah, you've kind of just hit the nail on the head. I think, um, a lot of it is credibility. Um, I still do the job every day, so I still— that's big— every day. I still, I register candidates every day. I take feedback, I manage the process. So I think the fact that I still do it every day means that I can relate to the people that I'm training. I, I suppose the only advantage that I have is that I've been doing a hell of a lot longer, so I hear a lot less knows, then they'll hear, but I can educate around that. Um, so I think that's probably one of the reasons why. And I also think the modernization of it, such a great reason.

If I think— I mean, I'm only 6 months in, but if I think the credibility that I get is I have to practice what I preach. So when I'm speaking, when I'm pitching people, and how we've got to that conversation is them sending me a message and then I was getting on a call as well. This is what I want to help your guys and girls girls with, like, I have to practice what I preach. So this is— yeah, this is how we've got to this point. So I think that is such a valid point, and I think that is why there is some of that sort of cynicalness attached to it, is that, well, Nicole hasn't done it for 5 years, so I think—

yeah, I think— I think the other reason I think a lot of people feed this back to me as well is like, they, they go off, they do the training, and then there's no follow-up. Um, I normally set up WhatsApp groups with anyone that's come in the training group, so they're normally from the same business, and then we book in role they practice for the following few weeks. So there's a common saying that it's 28 days to change a habit or create a new habit or behavior. So the implementation piece is, I know how busy managers are, I know how busy recruiters are, so I know how hard it is. You get these people back, they've had the training, and now we're meant to manage it and implement it. But it's a partnership. So I work in partnership with our clients and go, right, this is the content we're going to be training, this is how they're going to need to be managed when they come back, these are the things you need to get them doing. So they will have action plans, and I'll then call them probably 2 or 3 times over the next few weeks and get them to role play me, or I'll book in their diary that they call me and they just pitch to me like I'm a recruiter or anyone. And it's that repetition, that practice, I think makes a difference because they're continuously then developing. Um, then they'll come back and maybe have refresh training as well. But I do think, if I'm honest, and I think you probably agree, it's the fact that you still do the job, um, that you get a lot more engagement and buy-in. And I think it's the delivery as well. There's nothing worse than being on a 5-day training program that's quite generic. Oh yeah, um, you just get bored. And especially people that are quite impatient— if you're in recruitment, you want things to happen, you want to be doing things. So we do our training in bite-sized chunks. So we do much more shortened versions, let them take a bit of learning, go and apply it, then come back and add to it, rather than just throw it all at them in one go and hope that it sticks.

So would a common area where quite a lot, thinking of smaller businesses, that I'm sure, I'd love to know the stat, how many recruitment businesses don't have someone dedicated to training? There'd be a lot. So I guess, is it a common thing that you see that follow-up, as you said, I know it's a common thing, isn't it? 28 days to form a new habit, whatever. But I feel like if I think of the training that I had when I was in recruitment, it would be very easy to be like, ah, done training, completed it. And then you don't revisit that a month later or whatever. Is that a big thing where probably a lot of people get wrong? Definitely.

Biggest gap in the success part of the whole process is getting your managers or your mentors trained on how to, to coach and feedback them accountable. And it's not even making company, it's just there's two types of feedback. There's developmental feedback and motivational feedback. So as soon as people start going around constructive criticism and everything else, people don't want to be criticized. Yeah, normally in recruitment we've got egos, we don't like to be criticized. What we're looking for is feedback that's going to go, do you know what we could have done differently there? Or let's look at that call so that they're constantly learning. But if they did do a great call, be praised for it, but tell them why it was great so they reinforce the same behavior. It's little things with feedback on the job that makes the biggest, biggest difference. So the implementation is far quicker.

And that is so right. Do you— if you're listening right now and you're a manager, or does your manager know, know what those two things, and are they doing it? Not sure. Yeah, because that's so important, isn't I think another thing as well that we've spoken a lot about on here is, which sort of ties into what you said about motivational feedback, I think, what's your sort of view on actually understand, I can imagine particularly with grads as well is like, do you actually know what makes that person tick and what they're motivated by? As you said a lot, that's changed a lot, it's not just money. Oh, so you tell me you wanna buy that house, like, did you know what I mean? It's like, do you actually know what they're motivated by? 'Cause that forms part of that feedback. As well, right?

Yeah, definitely.

It's really interesting. Um, okay, cool. So future Prime then, now, now, uh, um, a bit more structure and have a bit of a plan.

New York, Dubai, definitely Ibiza.

So I guess, so 5 years running a recruitment business, What did you have, like, what was, what do you think? We spoke a lot, quite a lot about the positive. So I guess what have been some of the biggest challenges for you? You've spoken about YouTube, always had to work on relationship. I'm sure that's an ongoing process, but any other sort of big challenges that the both of you could maybe share that you think other people could benefit from or likely go through?

I've got such a long list. No, no, you go. No, you start. No, I think, I think there's so many lessons. Running a recruitment business that we get challenged with day to day. I'd say things that I'd say is people will try and get in your way to success. One of the big bits of advice is just don't let it get in your way. Just keep going, do what you do. Don't be distracted from what you're good at. And people may say that you don't do what you do, but you do do. So as long as you know you're true to yourself, keep going. I think also everyone talks about talks about the recruitment roller coaster. It is well named, um, and it's true. But I think you have to be that person that goes, that is just recruitment. Recruitment is not plain sailing. Your product is people, so you're going to get surprises along the way. Nothing straightforward. It's having the right mentality of having a real deep-rooted reason why you want to be successful, knowing what that is, so that when you have a bad day, the next day you get up and you crack on. But you've know why, why you want to keep going. And I think that's been our biggest thing, is that we have a very clear vision of what we want to achieve. And it is tough at times, like there's certain times you work, it gets really tough. There's certain challenges that come along. Um, that's just part and parcel of what we do. It's accepting that that is recruitment, and there's a reason why it's so highly rewarded if you are successful. There's a reason why there's such great incentives in place, because it's tough. And when you do well, you deserve to be rewarded for it, because you go through all the tough stuff to get to the good stuff.

I think you can, um, there's so many challenges in there, but without going into the specifics, to me the biggest challenge of all is mindset. Yeah, um, it's going to be tough, um, and when you set up a business and it's not just the two of you anymore and there's 20 people in the business that, you know, are believing in that business and believing in you, your mindset is going to be challenged every single day. Um, so the best bit of advice I would, I'd give to anybody is you've got to have a mindset that's positive, um, and that's going to be really hard. It's going to be changed things you can do. You know, I run every single morning, first thing I do before I do anything. And I don't do that for fitness. I do that purely and simply so that I'm fresh and I come into the day after a really bad day the day before, ready with the right behavior. We talk about it a lot, belief, behavior, result. What you believe affects your behavior and your behavior affects the result. And if you've got a positive mindset, it's gonna help. So I think the biggest challenge of all is keeping in a positive place. And if you do that, you know, you're halfway there. Way there to being successful.

And how have you gone about cultivating that in your people? 'Cause that's so important, right? It's easy for you guys, you know your mission, you own the business. Like how, 'cause there'll be a lot of people, obviously the challenge that a lot of owners have, or even managers have is like having that feeling of like, oh, like why can't, why don't they get it as much as I do? Or why aren't they working as hard as I'm working? Do you know what I mean? So I guess, how have you sort of cultivated that type of mindset in your team? Your people?

Well, firstly, you've got to lead by example. You know, I think we, you know, if I'm completely honest, you know, and this is feedback I got from Nicole, actually, I became a bit complacent at one point because things were going so well and, you know, deals after deals and it's great, we're smashing targets. And then all of a sudden it's like, all right, well, you know, I could probably leave at 4 o'clock today or I could probably go and do this or whatever. And then quite quickly you get told that that's not the way.

I think that is the way if you want a lifestyle business. Yeah, absolutely. But if you don't, it's definitely not the way.

But you know, being really honest with it, that's something that happened to me. And then my team then become complacent because you become complacent. So actually the stuff that we've been across, whether you're a graduate or whether you're 20 years into your career, the work ethic thing doesn't change.

Yeah.

If anything, so that's why a career in recruitment isn't about, it's going to be hard for 12 months. Yeah, it's going to be the hardest 12 months hardest, it's going to be hard for, for your career, and you've got to be willing to throw yourself into it. So for me, you, you've got to make sure that you're willing to do that.

I think I always say a success does come at a price. You do have to make sacrifices to make a successful business, and if you, if you want a real successful business, that unfortunately is going to be the case.

Look, for the first 3 years of the business, uh, Nicole's got a young family and she was Manchester, you know, helping drive it, and she lives in London.

Wow.

So, and how's that? The difference is challenging.

Yeah, it was challenging. Um, my kids were quite young then, they're a bit older now, so it was challenging. But I think they're now 11 and 8, but my daughter, she was 3 when we first started Prime. So yeah, it's challenging, but I've got good support network.

So, and now we're in London.

Yeah, now we're in London. And that was always the plan.

But that's the point. Um, and I think, you know, again, people setting out in recruitment, setting up a business, or in the early stages now thinking I'm not growing, well, you've got to think, are you giving it everything? Are you making the sacrifices? Because I assure you, there's someone that is. And when people look at competition, think, wow, why are they doing so well? Well, generally it comes down to they probably sacrifice more and probably working a bit harder. And once you have that reality check, which, you know, something that I did, you get back on, get back onto the train and you get the growth again and you continue to be successful.

Just a quick one on that point, Nicole, about raising a family, just because actually, you may know, do you know Louise McMullen.

I know the name.

White Label Recruitment. Yeah, yeah, the Powerhouse. So, um, uh, yeah, so she had a podcast with her recently and yeah, she spoke a lot around, um, she had a 1-year-old when she started her own recruitment business, but she started her own recruitment business just because she was pitching to everyone that she could bill $150K in 4 days. She had to work 4 days because she's got a young child now, but not many people did that. And they're like, why do you think you could build $150K in 4 days? Never done out before, and we basically spoke a lot about raising a family while running a recruitment business and growing a recruitment business. So I guess just a quick one on that, just because I've got quite a lot of messages recently from mums who have started a recruitment business, saying that, Hishem, if you get anyone that has done that, I'd love you to talk to them more, talk a bit about it, just because I think, yeah, again, talking about sacrifice. I mean, Louise shared her story that her plan was very much get up in the morning, do school run, work, come back, cook, do these sorts of things, and then she'd be doing all of her admin for the next day until 2 AM.

And that—

that she did that for a good couple of years, right?

Yeah.

Don't typically hear that, do you know what I mean? So I guess, what— yeah, how, how did you, uh, deal with that over that particular period of raising that young family? Anything to share there?

I think, I think it's really challenging. It's, um, especially when they're young, um, you feel like guilt. There's a lot of guilt, and then there's a lot of, I suppose, outside opinion of you're not a good mom because you never see your kids and this, that, and the other. And I'm like, it's okay for a dad to do it. A dad can go out to work for long hours and not see the kids, but it's not okay for a mom to do it. And there's definitely a perception. I'm really fortunate that I've got a really good balance in my family. So I'm lucky enough that my husband can be there and do a lot of the mom stuff. And that was a decision we made when we decided that this was the path to go down. And I think it is difficult, but I do think I do think it's more challenging in the early days because you are working so hard to make a business success that you genuinely feel you've got to work longer hours to make it happen. So you are literally getting home, putting them to bed, staying up late, but it doesn't go on forever. I wouldn't say I stop working when I get home, but I'm much more organized. And I think the more you do it, the more organized you become, and then you start to get much better balance. And And I'd say now I definitely have a better balance. I don't miss a school play, I don't miss sports day. I think those things are really important.

You get emails from Nicole at like, you know, 11 PM, you know, or whatever.

Or 5 AM.

Or 5 AM, yeah, it's like, when do you sleep?

That's the great thing with having kids, you learn about having little sleep.

What would your advice be? Just like, I guess there is going to be like the end of the time, I don't know, like what do you say?

I think remember why you're doing it. And Neil always says that to me all the time, when you're having a tough time or you find it difficult or you're feeling guilty, always remember why you're doing it and always try and find some time. So I'll always make sure at least one of my days that weekend is literally just don't pick up your phone, don't check your emails, don't do this, don't do that. Because I think it is important. Otherwise you do lose sight a little bit of why you're doing it. And they're why I do it. They're 100% why I do it. And actually now when they get the nice Christmas presents and the nice treats, they don't mind so much.

I think you make a good point around the opinions piece. Obviously I'm not a mum, obviously, but I can so see that. And I think that's a really important part to point out as well, is that if you know exactly what you're doing, then just treat yourself. Then yeah, get good at blocking out those opinions because they'll be quick to point the finger.

I'll be honest, I hid it. I don't think I spoke about my kids probably for the first 2 or 3 years in the business.

Really?

Barely mentioned them. And I'd never bring them up. And if a client was talking about their kids, never mentioned them because I always felt like there was a stigma attached to it. And we're like, you've got kids, therefore you can't be like this.

Do you think that's changed?

I think now, I don't know if it was more my problem and I saw it as an issue, whereas now it's not an issue at all. Like they've been into the office, like I talk to my clients about theirs. So I think it could have been my view, but yeah, 100% for the first 2 to 3 years I'd never even mentioned them. A lot of people were surprised when they found out I did have kids.

That's crazy. But I think just a final point on what you said as well, I think when you were saying about making sure you, you always have like a day dedicated to your kids or whatever. I think a really important point to add is like, when you are with your kids, like, are you actually with your kids?

Like, so what—

I mean, you could both be mums and you say, oh, I've saw my kids 5 hours this week, and I'll say, oh, I've saw them 15 hours this week. That doesn't necessarily mean that you've got— you've had more time with them, do you know what I mean? I think that's such a good point to make. And that's just in general, like, not just being a parent. Like, are you actually there with your kids and giving them your full attention 7 till 9, 10 PM, or whatever it is? Yeah, it may not be along, but do you know what I mean? I think that's such an important point to add as well.

Yeah, definitely. And I think when you are starting a business, it's a lot harder because your time is definitely dedicated to driving that. And the phone rings, you've got to take the call. But I think you learn very quickly that you've got to get a good balance. And now when I get through that door, I try and get my calls done beforehand, and then, and anything I need to pick up, I try and get it done after they've gone to bed, or at least I've had a good hour of just finding out how their day's been what they've been up to or breaking them up when they're having a fight.

So keep going, people. That's the— yeah, no, I absolutely love that. That's amazing. Um, so what, just, just quickly, I guess, then before we finish and stuff, I think it'd be great. Obviously we started around, um, as you said, um, you know, you wanted to— you had big targets for the first year and stuff. How, how have you done? How was the business growing in terms of revenue and stuff over the last couple years? How does that look? Because I think it's very easy for people people to say, yes, we're going great. But yeah, I mean, how has that been?

Yeah, well, we've grown every year between 50 to 60%. Really? You know, so, and obviously a lot of businesses talk about turnover, but, you know, the big learning from our non-exec was, you know, it's more, it's all about your operating profit.

Yeah, the net fee income.

Absolutely. We've got, we want to kind of get our operating profit, be quite open with that. It's at £400K operating profit at the moment. We want to get that to £1 million in the next 3 years. And for us, that's what it's all about in terms of—

Has that operating profit, I'm sure it's fluctuating, but it typically gone in the right direction?

Yeah, we were fortunate enough to do like, you know, 6-figure profit in our first year.

Really?

You know, turnover was low at 250K, we did 100. Every year we've been able to grow that. And that's pretty much, you know, what we're trying to achieve from a financial point of view. We want to open a third office, which we'll be doing in 2020. Really?

It was that.

In Leeds is what we're looking at at the moment. Why Leeds? It's a, okay, so we look at graduates and where graduates want to stay. So we have to look at what universities are good in terms of, and what city do people stay in.

That's true, yeah.

So, you know, London, obviously people come and study here, they want to work in Manchester, second city really in terms of where people want to stay. Leeds has actually got one of the highest retention rates of people that actually study in Leeds that say, I want to work in Leeds. So for us, if people are going to stay in the area, it is. So we do the studies based on that. And also it's cheaper in the north. Absolutely. And it's, it's a great, it's a great city. It's a great place. It's vibrant.

So, you know, how much you've been— I've signed my first client in Leeds actually the other week.

So it's cool. There's loads of recruitment businesses in Leeds. So we look at where are our clients in terms of our target base. We've also got a lot of clients we work with in Manchester and London that have client bases there. And we look at where a graduate is going to stay. And if those two match, then that's that gives us a good—

Again, it's just like, I know it sounds basic and simple, but like, it's the right— instead of just opening the office for the opening the office sake and a bit of an ego thing, like, that's the right answer that you should be answering around. I'm opening the office in this place because the grads and the retention stuff like that. I don't know, I just think so many people are prone to just opening and headcount and all that just for the headcount sake and open the office sake. That's exciting then.

Yeah, it is. We have We have to do that because we're proud of our process of training people. So if we're going to train candidates as well as place them, then they need to be in touching distance. So actually, that's why cities are great locations for us. We've also took our model on the road as well. So we're doing Prime pop-ups. So we're taking our training day model and for clients that may be in different locations that we can't service out of Manchester and London and doing pop-up training days for them, resourcing for that area and doing training days on site at their company, which has proven really successful as well. So yeah, we want to continue to look at, you know, 50-60% growth year on year.

Um, so how, how do you think— obviously with what you're doing, you're definitely making a dent, an impact— but how do you think we can, um, change the perception of recruitment and sales? Do you know what I mean? How— what else can we be doing? Obviously what you, what you guys are doing is brilliant. What else do you think we can be doing?

I think be, um, be proud about it, you know. Um, I think if you're in the States and you say you're a salesman, you know, they think you're a god. Uh, whereas in UK, people are hiding it because the first thing you think of is PPI sales or something. Well, you know, that's a form of selling, but we all have to start somewhere. So I think firstly, being proud of being in sales and being in recruitment, also making sure it's not just about money. There's got to be really value that we add, I think is really important. And most importantly, investing in people through training and development. You know, if you train people on it, they'll become good at it. And that's what we're all about.

I think a bit. Yeah, I think if I think of the conversation chat and stuff, the amount of people that have sort of been chucked in the recruitment machine and then spat back out because of shit training and all that sort of stuff, those people will then end up working for your clients probably at some point or whatever. And that just, that's just grown massively, isn't it, in terms of just more and more those people going, yeah, recruitment shit, it's horrible, and they're not nice.

It is though, isn't it? If you think how hard recruitment is, if you're not trained on how to do it well, it isn't great. You're not going to enjoy it.

Yeah.

Whereas if if you are getting the skills, you're getting told how to do, you're shown how to do the job, and then you give it a go and it works, then you're gonna go, actually, it's a great career because the rewards are unreal. But yeah, it's not gonna be perfect every day. And I think it's the reality check. We've gotta be more honest with people from the outset that going in isn't all these wonderful things. Yes, the incentives are great. Yes, the money's amazing, but you're gonna have to work really bloody hard to make it happen. And it's not gonna happen overnight. And I think it's the transparency around it that's so important. You said yourself, A lot of people talk about the positives but don't really talk about the challenges that come with it. If we can get the challenges across as well, definitely, definitely changing the perception of the industry for sure.

Just a quick one, because before we finish and I'll ask you the final question, just out of curiosity, what, um, what do you think are some of the sort of best incentives that you've seen out there in the market at the moment? Out of interest, because like some people have got some bad incentives. Like I spoke chatting with a chap called Joe and we were talking about how he just despises recruitment agencies who promote working for them by uncapped commission. Because it's like, when is commission ever capped? It's just, I don't know, do you know what I mean? Just stuff like that. And I guess I think it's come up a few times around free fruit. Like, why is that? Do you know what I mean? Obviously, you know these people, you know what they're doing. Driven by it, particularly obviously young people. So what do you think are some of the sort of best incentives that you've seen so far that have caught your eye, attention?

I think you definitely need a balance of two. So they need their individual incentives, but collaborative team incentives seem to work really, really well as well. And free breakfast seems to be very popular.

Yeah, I think we've— you've got to have your financial incentives. So we, we have them on a monthly, quarterly, uh, and biannual basis, uh, millennials making it quick. Um, but also as well as that, we have team incentives. So for For example, we have a lot of people do monthly target hittings, which is great for individuals and so on. We also have like team target hittings. So for example, if the team hits a target, everybody goes out to celebrate, even if maybe one person has missed. And that's to create the right values because we're always going to have a bad month. But if your team members pull you through, then it raises team ethic.

Yeah.

So I think you've got to have incentives that are team-based, whatever they are, whatever the rewards, as well as individual. And, you know, we go away once a year and the whole business goes based on it. And I think that's important rather than just individuals, is the whole company. If the company has a good year and that creates the right value.

Such an important trip, those types of trips.

Oh, it's great. It's great. But I think for us, my biggest frustration sometimes is people miss out even though they've performed quite well. They might have had a tougher year or whatever, but they've still done quite well, has maybe still been profitable. You know, for me, you've got to give them the opportunity to attend with the team that's helped them along the way because next year they might go over and above and smash it. So I think you've got to have a balance between individual and team, but you know, the stereotypical kind of ones away, you know, nights out kind of incentives obviously work really well because it's a social environment.

So I think I've seen quite a lot of things recently around obviously just the CSR, a lot of agencies. I really like some of that stuff. And I think just a final point, because I think obviously you guys are well positioned talk about it. Commission structures. What's a good commission structure in today's market?

An honest one.

Yeah.

Give us some words, actually, these commission structures. Well, explaining how the commission structure works and that, you know, for example, you know, really clear, we need our resources doing a minimum of 2 deals based in the market we're in, and we want them doing at least 3 deals a month. And we're really clear with the fact of that's because the 2 deals pays for your desk and the 3 deals we're starting to make money from. So when you explain the way commission structures work and how the business makes money, then they can understand the levels of it. Um, at the same time, it's also got to be attractive, you know, because we're not paying high basics. We don't believe that people should be here for a basic salary. We believe they should be here to go out and earn commission, obviously. So it's got to be rewarding enough, um, to do that.

Um, yeah, I think the best commission structures, the ones that are simple. Um, people can calculate what they're going to earn quite quickly. I think as soon as they get complex, then people think there's a hidden agenda behind it. And people want to know very quickly, if I do this, this is what I'm going to earn.

Uh, because everyone says they've got a market-leading commission structure.

This is my bugbear with that, is, um, I think that's why we need to be honest. Now, um, again, it's another tip, and I know we go through it because, you know, we've been through it for 5 years, but we've been quite fortunate that we're— we add things in and don't takeaway. So for example, if you go out, what people do when they try and attract staff at the start, by the way, recruiting staff at the early stage for me is the easiest time to recruit. It's when you get to 20 heads or plus where it's harder to recruit because then your recruitment business is not offering the same dream as being one of the first candidates in. So really when you're 2 or 3 people in, for me that's the best time, the easiest time to recruit because graduates want that progression opportunity to become a leader in the business, share options, whatever. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But the commission schemes, if you're going to say it's the best, you know, I'm paying you 30% or whatever some of these schemes go up to, which are huge, then when you do grow and your overheads grow, you're going to have to start taking that away because a business can't make money if the paying level's that high. And where some entrepreneurs have made that mistake is pay out too much too soon. And then all of a sudden when someone's a year in, you say you're going to earn less commission next year.

Yeah, that's not going to go down well, is it?

So for me, go steady and build. We add something in every year. So every year we add in something. So this year we've added in a biannual wishlist, and that's basically we'll pay up to a certain amount, we'll buy you something that's on your wishlist. Someone wants to go to New York, someone wants a Mulberry handbag, yeah, we'll buy that for you on hitting this objective. And that's another— that's something that's coming this year, so it's fresh, it's new, people have got something new to try.

I think that's such good advice— add to it, don't take away.

Absolutely, it's really important.

Yeah, I think that's a really good point. Um, cool. So last Last question I have for you both.

It's been cool. Yeah, really, yeah, really enjoyed it. Nicole was dreading it as well. Absolutely natural. Absolutely.

Last question is, if you could communicate to every single recruiter out there, they would listen to your advice, they would take it on, they'd implement it. It could be a phrase, could be a word. What comes to mind if everyone was listening out there?

Prime.

Can't use it to sell the car, unfortunately. Come on, some advice. What would you say to these people?

I'd say invest in talent, um, 100%.

I would add, uh, yeah, what would, what would I say to them? Um, I would say to them, be proud about what you're doing. Um, I still think the, you know, there's that stigma attached to recruitment and sales. It really bugs me. Yeah, I think it's an amazing career and there's some amazing recruiters out there that then go on to be successful as entrepreneurs because sales gives them the skills to do that. So for me, be proud about what you're doing and most importantly, believe in it. Because if you believe in yourself, you know, as cheesy as it sounds, you're already halfway there. And a lot of people fail just because they didn't believe they could in the first place. So for me, that's the biggie.

Love it. No, no, Karl, it's been a pleasure.

Thank you.

Absolutely, thank you very much.