Success Strategies for Contract Recruitment: Lessons From Million Pound Biller Sam Ingwell

I kind of dropped everything back in the UK and look, I had done a year of— I want to kind of call it boiler room recruitment back in the UK, which was, you know, every day I just kind of go through adverts and call people. And I didn't quite realize, being a young naive, you know, 19, 20-year-old, I didn't quite realize that Australia is a little bit different.

Welcome back to another episode of the Recruitment Mentors Podcast. My name is Hishem Azzouz, and on this week's episode, I was joined by Sam Ingle from Opus Recruitment Solutions. You found yourself moving to Australia in like 6 or so, 6 and a bit years ago, 2017 you moved there, right?

Yeah, yeah.

Obviously your dad moved over there for work and then you found yourself in Australia and then you've been working for Opus ever since. Sam's based out in Australia and over the last 6 years he has dominated the testing market. In Sydney. And in this conversation, we break down how Sam has gone about growing his book year on year. How has he built this market? How has he built relationships? How has he become exceptional at opening up doors? So much value in this conversation, and Sam does a really good job of breaking things down, being honest, and talking about his journey so all of you can benefit and hopefully continue to excel in your own careers with Sam's wisdom. What do you believe to be the quickest route to being and becoming a subject matter expert?

Yeah, it's a good question.

I mean, let's get into this week's episode. Sam, welcome to the podcast.

Thank you.

Looking forward to this. Uh, nice to have someone from Australia. There's, there's a lot of people that listen to this that live in Australia, so hopefully we can bring some more Australian recruitment stories on here. I think I've sort of neglected Aussies this year, I'm not gonna lie, in terms of who's been on the podcast. So you're changing that.

I'm so, so happy to be here, mate, honestly. Um, representing Australia. There we go.

Um, so today we're gonna break down your journey. You are a, uh, successful contract recruiter. Um, as I said to you, um, I think just for whatever reason I found myself interviewing way more perm recruiters on this podcast compared to contract. Looking to change that, and you're part of that. So as we always do, I want to start with a bit of a career highlight reel. Um, so if I get any of this wrong, you're gonna have to, you're gonna have to let me know and correct me.

Yeah, will do.

So let's just do, let's just do billing because I know you've also gave me the sort of whiteboard number as well, but we'll just do billing if that's okay. So just a bit of context. You found yourself moving to Australia in like 6 or so, 6 and a bit years ago, 2017. You moved there, right?

Yeah.

Obviously your dad moved over there for work. You had worked in recruitment for like a year. And then you found yourself in Australia, and then you've been working for Opus ever since. Your world, I think you described to me, is like a super niche. You actually described it as boring, unsexy. It's not sexy. It's the testing market, right?

Yeah, it's the market that not many people really touch, and definitely a market that people give to their rookies and juniors. Yeah, look, it's, it's not that sexy, but somehow I made it work.

So yeah, so testing, testing market, test the market, test the market, all in Sydney, right?

Yeah, yeah, so all in Sydney, um, and all contracts for the entire tenure. So yeah, it's been very specific, but yeah, cool.

So 2018, this is the, the highlight reel then. So we've got 2018, uh, billings-wise that year, $253K. This is Australian dollars, right?

This is all Aussie dollars.

We're doing this, which she sent— Aussie dollars. Okay, cool. So $253 grand 2018. 2019, $434 grand. 2020, $750 grand. 2021, you broke the million mark, $1.128 million. And then 2022, $1.6 million. That was your best year to date. And then this year you're on track to do— you've done $719-ish so far, probably going to be on track to do just shy of a million billings-wise. Yeah. Is that all right?

That is pretty much it in a nutshell.

Yeah, that's, that's the highlight reel. Okay, cool. So we're going to break this down, but before we start then, I'd love to get your take on what you believe are the common traits, characteristics, habits of successful contract recruiters in today's market. Let's start there.

Yeah, sure. I mean, um, you know, you've interviewed loads of guests and everyone says a lot of the kind of same things, right? Um, but I think particularly in the, you know, in the contract recruitment space, I think, I think being a problem solver is, is absolutely number one in terms of a kind of key trait that makes up someone who can hunt projects and can, you know, provide the right solution to a problem or a project. So I'd say that's probably number 1 or top 3, I'd say. Competitiveness. I've never met anyone who's a top biller who's not wanting to outdo competition, whether it be internally on the leaderboard or whether it be the guy that you, you know, stalk on LinkedIn who you know does the same market kind of thing, you know what I mean? So I think competitiveness definitely comes into play, um, and I think ultimately, you know, if you're going to do really well in recruitment, it's, it's quite a thankless, you know, a thankless career in some respects because, you know, you might have loads of setbacks and, um, you know, you might do loads of the same input and not get the same output. So being really hungry to succeed and wanting to build something special is definitely a key trait that I think not just contract recruiters but recruiters overall need to have. You know, you need to want to take ownership and build something really special and have a USP.

Love that. So let's touch on, I think, because I saw your— I was just going through some of your LinkedIn posts before this and I saw that not too long ago you got your Australian citizenship. Citizenship, right?

That's correct. Yeah. Yeah. After 6 or so years. I mean, to be honest, I was— I've always felt a bit guilty talking about my citizenship and my— you basically have a thing called permanent residency out here. And a lot of my friends, you know, have spent years, you know, trying to get their PR. But I was super lucky. I came out here when I was 19, 20, and I basically was just given a PR through my dad. So it was nice to get citizenship. But, you know, I feel a bit guilty about getting it because I didn't have to work as hard as other people, I guess.

You know, so why I wanted to just, just start there, I think, I think it's, you know, it's a big part of the, the journey, and there's a lot of people, uh, who are based in the UK that find themselves maybe speaking to people about potentially taking their skill set and career over to Australia. So would you mind just talking a bit about— obviously you moved over there with family, right?

Yeah.

Uh, compared to I feel like a lot of people move over there without their family and go over there on their own. So you were just saying just before we started on this, you, you did find it a bit difficult to, to start, if I may say that. Like, do you want to just— yeah, yeah. I mean, it was how you found that initial period when you moved over.

Look, it was, it was, it was a hard time, to be honest, because I kind of, I kind of dropped everything back in the UK. And, and look, I had done a year of— I, I want to kind of call it boiler room recruitment back in the UK, which was, you know, quite literally 100 dials a day chasing direct ads. I was actually like a rookie or a junior who was like kind of like a resourcing role for, you know, a senior team leader in this very, very small company of like 10 people. And every day I just kind of go through adverts and call people. So in that environment, it was quite cutthroat. And, you know, if you made a tea at the wrong time of day, you know, you'd kind of be looked at funny. Anyway, so I kind of took that mentality out here to Australia and I didn't quite realize, being a young naive, you know, 19, 20-year-old, I didn't quite realize that Australia is a little bit different. People are a little bit, you know, a little bit more easygoing, a bit more friendly out here. And even though the office was, you know, full of quite, you know, just English and Irish people because that's recruitment, right? I kind of bought this mentality of, you know, hard ways of doing things and not kind of looking at the relationships internally or externally. And I was kind of trying to, you know, fight for myself at the start, and that didn't work well for me. So, you know, I had to basically relearn recruitment, you know, and I had to just clean slate, take on everyone's advice, be a sponge. And adapt. Because if I continued the same way that I was in the UK and being a young, naive, hungry kid who just wants to be the best and earn money, taking that mentality to Australia just didn't quite work. So yeah, I had to really change. But I'm glad that I took on advice and did that. And I guess I'm quite happy to be where I'm at now. And if I didn't take on that advice and constructive criticism, I certainly wouldn't be sitting here, mate.

And what about personally?

Yeah, I mean—

How do you find adapting to that?

Yeah, personally it was quite tough because I came out here like I didn't really know anyone. So, you know, my entire social group was coming from the office really. And in the first 6 months, you know, I didn't really have— I was kind of living with parents and, you know, on a low basic salary, not earning much. I didn't really know where to go or what to do. So I'd kind of attach to the kind of social groups at work and, you know, see, you know, if I can make friends or friends of friends. So it certainly took a while, but I think after about 6 months I kind of found my feet and, you know, made some good mates within the office. And I was quite lucky in the fact that I had— shout out to Mike, who was my kind of lead, my manager at the time— and he took me under his wing and showed me the way. And Yeah, it's been pretty good ever since, but yeah, it wasn't without its struggles, I'll be honest with you.

So to round that out then, for anyone that's listening, just one or two things, I guess. Firstly, if I'm listening to this right now, I've worked in the UK recruitment market, I've got a good number of years under my belt, I have a degree, there's a genuine opportunity for me to go to Australia. What do you think, or what have you found yourself giving advice to people that come over to open? Because I'm sure that that happens now still. What are some of the things that you find these people have to like unlearn quite quickly a lot of the time when they're sort of coming to the Australian market out of interest?

Yeah, I mean, I think in particular, I think the UK market, obviously it's very saturated, so it can be quite transactional. I mean, I'm not saying it's not relationship-driven because Anyone who's done well in recruitment has to have relationships, right? But I feel like you could get away in the UK of being quite transactional and just being a pure hunter and not really caring about, you know, how it reflects on you or how it reflects on your brand. So I think coming out to Australia, you've got to realize that it's a much smaller market. Everyone knows everyone. So you've got to make sure you're on, you know, your best behavior and you're, you know, looking good, your brand's good. And that you're creating relationships. Because in Australia, I think it can take a much longer time to break into a client and, you know, develop that relationship. Whereas in the UK, you know, people are keen on a bit of spot business and then, you know, I'm not going to take your call for a year. And that's just kind of how it is. So definitely the relationship mentality out here is a lot more longer term and it takes a lot longer to kind of break people down and, you know, get cozy with them, you know.

And then secondly, what about personally, if I'm a friend of yours, I've got some recruitment experience, I've got a degree, I've got Rexorex telling me about how I can take my skill set to Australia. What— how are you describing working in Australia, living in Australia to me? What does that sound like? What are the things that you maybe highlight to people that are true and maybe also some of the things that are maybe difficult or challenges?

Maybe. I mean, people say that it rains less out here and that's not true. When it rains, it fucking pours. It's just a little bit different in the UK. You get a bit of drizzle here, you get an absolute thunderstorm. So look, but on the other side, the weather's amazing, the sun's good. And I think the work-life balance out here is really something that a lot of people from the UK move out here for, right? You know, people that— a lot of my colleagues and friends live in Bondi or Coogee, which is literally on the beach. So in the summer, let's say you finish up at 4:00 or you've just walked out of a meeting, let's go to the beach. So it's definitely a different lifestyle out here. And I find that, you know, people work quite hard in their core hours so that they can have that balance, whereas I found in the UK it was, I guess you could say, kind of like a constant burnout. I mean, I was only a junior in the UK, but I'd be working such ridiculous hours and getting nothing out of it. And it's just a constant reset, rinse and repeat, go drinking on the weekend. So I think here's a bit more of a balance, which is certainly attractive for recruiters, mate.

Yeah, I know what you mean. I think unfortunately in the UK you can't do your core hours and then find yourself down the beach because it'll either be too cold or the weather never went me right. So you found yourself—

I think for a lot of recruiters that obviously come out here as well, there's a lot of options and a lot of choice. When I came out here, for example, I came via a rec to rec, really good guy, and he gave me a load of different options. And every company that I had interviewed had a completely different way of doing things, which I found interesting. I found that over here, there's some companies that are very marketing-driven. There's some companies out here that are suit and tie, but it's very rare. But there's a lot of different kinds of agencies out here. So that was quite interesting when I came here. I probably interviewed with, I want to say, 6, 7, 8 agencies, and every single agency was so different in their approach and their belief system. Um, and that was quite interesting when I moved out here as well.

Yeah, look, this is what I love about recruitment. It's a genuine career. You can— you're building skills that you can apply to future different industries, careers that are really helpful in life. But also it's a skill set that you can take across the world. Yeah, it's unbelievable. Whilst also earning some good money if you work hard and do the right things.

Yeah.

So in terms of this testing market then, how intentional was that? Was that already like a market that Opus had done a bit in? Was it like— talk to me just a bit about that, because I guess I just want to start by just getting your take on how important it is to have a niche and focus, because clearly that's been pivotal in your career. Testing, just testing, just Sydney, uh, Yeah, talk to us a bit about this patch and this intentional niche that you have.

Yeah, I mean, look, it was already a semi-established market. I mean, so we had two guys on it before I came for a couple of years, I want to say. So we had a guy doing perm and a guy doing contract. So when I came in, I took over my manager's kind of patch, which was Sydney, but it was never like crazily built. There was no kind of super huge relationships that would give you any more than two contractors. So It wasn't exactly a standing start, but there was a bit that I could build from and a few relationships that I could leverage. I mean, yeah, the testing market is an interesting one because, you know, when you spoke to Elliot on that podcast about, you know, JavaScript dev recruitment, it's very much, it's a product that you're selling, right? You know, developers are sexy bits of products, especially really good ones. You can market them really well. Um, the, it's an absolute flip side with the testing market because there is thousands of testers out there. Like, it is so hard to manage. It's so hard to like even organize. Like, when people ask me how I organize my stuff, I'm like, it's all in my head. Like, I just, I can't really describe how I, how I've kind of, how I've kind of worked it all out. But, um, it's very different in the sense that let's say you were to spec out a CV of a tester. You're going to get no bite back. You might even get one email, but the email is probably going to say that we're not hiring right now. We've got a vendor that does it for half the price. So when it comes to the testing market, it's all about understanding the projects, their pain points, and how you can bring in resources to kind of give room for, you know, the other skill sets to really succeed. So, for example, in a project team, you might have a few developers And maybe those developers are doing the testing themselves, and that's taking 30% of their time. Why not bring a tester in? And my sell to people is, right, well, let's bring a tester in. How about an automation tester who can automate all the testing, and therefore your devs can focus on what they've actually been hired, you know, hired to do? So yeah, look, testing is, it's massive. It covers every market. For example, let's say you've got JavaScript developers and DevOps engineers and data analysts. My testers can sit across everything. So my testers might work on some JavaScript stuff, they might do some integration stuff in DevOps, they might test some data. So it's a really broad patch, but it's a patch that people don't really want to touch. Um, and that's kind of where I've, I've done well. I've, I've made a name for myself in this place and It's worked out well for me in the end, despite it being so kind of big and hard to operate in and kind of foggy at times. It's, yeah, it's an interesting space.

And do you think you would have got to where you got to if you also did some of the dev contract stuff or different things, or did you stay really religious with the niche and focus of testing and Do you think that's important?

I always stay very true to kind of like, I'm really big on like my brand, right? So like I really want to make sure that on LinkedIn, you know, I'm engaging with people, I'm connecting to people in my space. I want to make sure that when I'm selling to clients, they know that I'm really serious about testing, which is kind of unusual because not many recruiters are coming to them and saying, hey, all I do is testing. Like, let's talk about what tools you're using, how much money you're spending on licenses. Like, other recruiters aren't doing this. They're not understanding the complexities around it. So I guess for my selling point to work and to be, you know, an SME in my market, if I did other markets, it wouldn't quite work. It's not to say though that I haven't jumped opportunities, right? I have, you know, found fallow jobs which might be the occasional Salesforce or PL/SQL developer or something like that that nobody in my company at the time might have had a desk for. And guess what? I'm going to work after hours and I'm going to hopefully place that because I'm all about opportunity. I'm all about seeking, you know, anything that I can. I'm going to give it a go. But ultimately, I'm putting, you know, 99% of my time into that core market because I believe in it.

You mentioned SME there. This is something that we hear a lot. So I'm interested to get your take. And I think that's really evident when I was going through your LinkedIn content. I think that really comes across. You're talking about people asking me what I think of the market. Here's my take. You're commenting on like the contractor rates and the things that aren't competitive and why. So I think you've done a really good job of that. And I think that's probably something that people— I'm sure you've heard in the office the importance of being a subject matter expert. So I just want your take for people listening. If, you know, with what you know now, if you were to start this market again, what would be your route to becoming a subject matter expert as quickly as possible? Is it, I'm gonna speak to as many candidates as possible, be a sponge, ask open questions, really try and download as much information as possible? Is it, I'm gonna be reading X type of content, I'm gonna make sure all of the content that I'm reading is gonna be about this? What do you believe to be the quickest route to being and becoming a subject matter expert?

Yeah, it's a good question. I mean, look, I mean, ultimately it is about volume at the start, especially if you're starting out, right? I mean, it really is about candidate calls. And obviously, in my opinion, like when you put a number on it and say I'm going to aim for 10 candidate calls a day or something like that, it's not enough. You need to be doing like 30 candidate calls in the morning. You need to really have this absolute volume and The thing is with the testing market, because it's so broad, is some calls might be really low quality and you might not learn much from those calls. But the calls when, as soon as you can recognize the really skilled guys, the really connected guys, you really want to engage with them and have a real conversation with them and learn more. Like I ask contractors and people in testing all the time, like if I see a new framework or a new tool or something that I don't know about, I'm always going to ask them to teach me about it, and more times than none, they're always going to explain. So I think it's really key to kind of learn about the tooling and learn about the different projects and stuff like that. And that can really, you know, that gives you a lot of credibility when you're speaking to clients, because I might go into a call with a client and they might be using, you know, there might be a smaller company and might have committed to like some sort of commercial tool that costs them like $50K a month. And I'm going to challenge them and be like, hold on, I spoke to a contractor the other day and they said that you can use this tool and it's free. What have you thought about this? So it gives me the ability to kind of challenge contractors and clients as to what info I'm getting, and that enables me to have way more engaging conversations than, hi, I specialize in this space. How big is your team? When are you hiring? Like you want to dive a little bit deeper. And I'm a big believer in just challenging everyone and, you know, using what you found out to then, even if it might be the wrong kind of thing to use, I want to see how they react. And it just, it creates conversation, you know.

So you're saying a lot of the, the way to do it is through contract conversations.

Totally. Yeah, yeah. I think contractor conversations, I mean, ultimately, you know, you want to be figuring out with contractors, you know, what kind of tools they're using, what's good, what's not, what are the advantages and disadvantages. And then that can lead you on to all sorts of other, you know, useful information that you're going to use to obviously build your market, you know, such as hot leads or what projects are coming up or, you know, what kind of information you should really be going at.

So let me ask you this thing, because this is quite common when I've spoke to contract recruiters, and it's something that their managers will most likely be saying to a lot of people listening. So how— the way that I like to frame this is, what did Sam's contractor call conversations where the intention was to gather information, build credibility, build relationships, do the things that you're talking about, so then you can use the things that you learn to challenge people from, you know, when you're speaking to clients, these different things. What did your calls sound like when maybe you weren't doing a very good job of that compared to how they sound now? Like, was it really transactional and it was very obvious that you were just asking questions because you knew they're the questions that you needed to ask? Like, I don't know, just give us a bit of an insight into what these maybe calls sound like because it might help people understand where they can improve these calls to get more out of them, to build relationships better, whatever they look like?

Yeah, I mean, it's all about obviously using kind of open-ended questions and eliminating the ability for them to have a dry conversation and say yes or no. Obviously referencing other things that you, you know, that you've learned from another contractor. If they're using, you know, X tool, why aren't you using Y tool? Explain, like, You know, let's have a chat about that. And I think at the start, you know, obviously it was definitely a numbers game. And it's— I think a lot of people get trained to, you know, you do that kind of funnel technique and you just ask questions, qualify them, you know, what's your rate, what's your expected rate, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And sometimes you miss the kind of really good snippets of information. So I think as well, you know, bring into those calls useful information, even just giving them a little bit of something before they give you something, just having some common market information and just saying, hey, have you heard about this? And that can really start a decent conversation with a contractor that might be within a target client and might ultimately be a key for you to find your way into that business. So I really believe in keeping, I hate it when people say, I work with the top 5% of candidates or 10%, because you can't quantify that, right? But just speaking to the best people based on where they're working, what they're doing, and their reputations, and digging as deep as you can and getting to know them and checking in on them. Like, I call a lot of the top people in my space just for catch-ups every couple of weeks, you know, if they're looking or, you know, how's it going. And those relationships will ultimately, you know, enable me to find out more about, you know, where they're working, or if they move to another company, you know, they might spill the beans and give me a bit of information about how they got there, you know, what the go is, you know, when they're hiring. So keeping contractors close is really, really key, and making sure that you're having really open conversations and not just qualifying them is super important. It's as important as a BD call, really.

Have you— just because the way that you're— have you read the— are you much of a reader or no?

Uh, I mean, I'm embarrassed to say it, but I haven't read a book since school.

Okay, fair. Have you, have you, have you come across The Challenger Sale?

No, I haven't. No.

Oh, that, that's— I'm reading that at the moment. You should, you should definitely, because the way that you're talking is very much in line with like that.

Do they do a podcast or an audio?

There'll be an audiobook. Yeah, so you should definitely check it out because I think it's, it sort of describes how you're approaching selling, which is the way that you're talking about challenging, uh, people in the market on how they do things, offering them insights using your subject matter expertise, uh, rather than— yeah, I think it's something I thought you might have read it just the way you're talking.

No, I mean, it just kind of— I just think it's the thing that makes sense because like I think everyone— like the way that you need to differentiate yourself is like everyone's going in and telling people that they're specialists and it just holds no weight. But if you can actually have a chat with people and dig a bit deeper, then, you know, if anything, in itself, that's selling, right? I mean, it's just, it's give and take, mate, you know?

No, yeah, totally.

Yeah.

So something that I'm sort of learning and picking up on, I feel like you're talking about it there. Is there any science behind getting good at understanding and knowing what a great world-class contractor looks like? It might be market dependent, but is there, is there any science behind that that you found just really helps you be like, this, uh, yeah, like, this is a top-class contractor? Because when I interviewed Elliot, that seemed to be really quite pivotal. Because if you're very aware that you're dealing with some of the, the best contractors in your space, they're going to be working on the best projects, or like projects that I don't know. Yeah, talk to me a bit about that. Is there any science behind how I can get better at understanding more quickly what a great— when I'm speaking to a great contractor, what a great contractor looks like?

You know what it really is? Is people that are actually really good contractors and people that are just good candidates in general are engaging when you speak to them. Time and time again, I speak to so many candidates, and if they can't get past the whole, you know, how are you today kind of— if they're boring me after a minute, I'm not that engaged, and they're quite obviously not going to do very well in a business environment. So ultimately, the people that are engaging and actually decent to speak to end up working for the best companies and working with the best projects, because C-level people, business people, want to deal with people that can actually communicate on a human level. So obviously it's hard when, you know, you've got a load of CVs, you know, it's very churn and burn, but As soon as you start having one of those really engaging conversations, you know, you just feel this spark inside of you and you're like, nice. All right, let's talk. Let's talk. So, yeah, it takes a few— what is it? You got to kiss a few frogs, right?

Okay. That's interesting.

Yeah.

So talk to me about how it seems quite common, but how fundamental has it been for you to acquire leads, information, market information from your contractors that then impacts the projects that you win, that you get involved on, the sites that you win. How, like, how have you gone about that? Has that been really impactful as part of this journey? And how can we get better at that for people listening?

Yeah, I mean, I think always— I mean, you've always got to have your eye on the money, right? I mean, every conversation needs to have some sort of outcome where you're getting a bit of actionable information. And I think where a lot of new recruiters fall short, or people that, you know, tend to be, I guess, mediocre billers, is they're focused on the outcome of filling their job and they forget that every single call they're making, regardless if it's a contract or a BD call, like everything holds value. Every bit of information you can action, no matter how big or small it might be. So, you know, if it's information about, you know, what project might be happening next or you know, what kind of thing they're using, or, you know, where they're seeing people moving to, or even just having a chat to them about, oh, you know, are other recruiters calling you? Like, what are they talking about? They've been talking about that company again that's hiring. And I think going into conversations as well, and it does take a bit of practice, but obviously when people start out, they ask pretty black and white questions like, are you interviewing? Like, Instead of asking something like that, just joke with them. If you know that like a well-known company, let's just say it's Barclays Bank for the UK listeners out there, and you know that Barclays Bank is hiring people with that skill set, instead of asking them, you know, are you interviewing at the moment, say, oh, has Barclays rung you? Have any recruiters from Barclays rung you yet? And then that just starts a conversation about where they might be getting calls from, and that information can then become leads, right? So I think approaching things very conversationally and being really human with your approach is very key to getting information that you can then action.

And how important— again, this seems like another really important thing. It might not be the case because you said that a lot of the things are in your head, but market mapping, what we're saying about that.

Yeah, I mean, look, market mapping is You know, it's essentially like project information, hot leads, cold leads. I'm a massive believer in basically cold leads. So when I started out, they printed out this A4 sheet of paper with like 25 rows on it with, you know, name of the candidate, who their manager is, which company they work for, which company they're interviewing at, whatever. And I kind of just started out getting really religious with that. And what I'd do is, in the morning, I'd kind of, I'd aim to get about 3, maybe 4 of them completed. So that would probably be, I don't know, let's call it 10 to 15, maybe 20 candidates, depending on how many leads or cold leads I might be getting. And I'll write down every single person, even if I don't connect to them, I'll write down their cold leads. Because ultimately, if this looks like a contractor, it's probably gonna be a company that hires contractors. So I was a massive believer in terms of market mapping, you need to make sure that you're, spreading your seed real wide, because I think a lot of recruiters can get really fixated on those big enterprise clients that are always hiring, right? And they just want to dig into them. But the truth is, it takes, you know, recruiters years and years and so many different angles to get into these clients. So basically, with these cold lead sheets, when you're getting information, you need to be able to look at those cold lead sheets at some point during your day Look at all those companies and make sure that you have a contact point in each company. And then when you revisit those leads, do you have another contact point? Have you sent them a CV? Have you emailed them? Have you LinkedIn messaged them? Have you tried to call them? So I'm a big believer in multiple contact points across a wide market, but that's not to say that you shouldn't also focus energy into target clients. That would be silly to not do, right? Um, but I think where a lot of people fall short is, and I disagree, that's how we started talking, is I disagree with people that say you only need 5 clients to build $1 million, because I think I, I think I had like 23 clients when I built $1 million, right? So spreading your seed means that you have way more relationships and you have way less risk, because the likelihood of all 23 clients saying we're kind of contractors It's a lot less than 5, isn't it?

A very quick word on our sponsors Vinceri before we get back into the episode, as they have a special winter offer that I want to make you all aware of. This offer is only available until the 20th of December, so if you like the sound of this, then make sure you get taking action before then. If you are not happy with your current CRM, don't settle. Switch to Vinceri for zero implementation fees, plus you'll get a gift of your choice. Video interviews, 500 free minutes per month, which is normally £99 per month. Timesheet processing at £1 per worker, which is normally £5 per worker per month. Or recruitment agency website, first 3 months free, which is typically normally between £735 to £3,900 depending on the chosen package. If you also mention that you listen to the podcast, you also get an additional 3 months as a listener of this podcast. So if you want to make the most of this offer, you've got until the 20th of December to get all of those benefits. Check out the link in the show notes. Go to Vincere. So what do you have it? Do you have any sort of system to market map then? You've mentioned the cold lead sheet, which is just to make that clear, that's just a a living, breathing list of companies that you know have hired a contractor in the past or at some point? Like, do you use any other— how do you have any system around market mapping?

It's kind of annoying that we've got this really old database system thing from like 15, 20 years ago that is literally— I don't even know if it's operating on a floppy disk or what, but I'm used to using it, right? So we have We have an ability on this system to obviously tag up managers with skill codes, which I'm sure most recruiters have in their CRM. So obviously I'm going to tag up skill codes. But look, if I could go and redo it today and I could rebuild the market, I'd skill code it beautifully because there's so many people I've worked with who do it so bloody well. The problem is with me is my market was so wide, it was so clouded that it was just impossible to start trying to skill code everything because everything already was automatically coded and there was tens of thousands of bits of data. So I found that really tough, but the way that I managed to kind of juggle stuff was put things in my calendar, just real simple, just to remind myself to chase leads. We had a little column on our thing which is called spec jobs, which is where I'd input my hot leads and my hot project information. So every day I'd be referencing that, not once a day, but I'd be referencing that up to maybe 3 or 4 times a day. Because I'm a big believer in the fact that you can't just go at leads at one angle. If you go at one lead at one angle, it's not going to crack for a long, long time, right? So I had some sort of system, but it was messy. And if I could redo it, I'd have a beautifully skill-coded database and I'd have everything tagged up so that I could just search for everything. But unfortunately, I don't.

That wasn't the case. Okay.

Yeah.

So just to round this bit out, I feel like we spoke about the contractor side quite a bit. So if I'm listening to this and I'm 2 years in, like in my first 2 years of my contract recruitment journey, and I ask you, Sam, what should I be— what are like the 1 to 2 or 1 to 3 activities, habits that I should absolutely just be dialed in on work on every single day, getting better at, that you feel like would really enable me to build a successful foundation to build, uh, to, yeah, like to become a really great successful contract recruiter in the long term? What, what are those things? 1 to 3 things that you'd be like, if you keep really focused on this, Hishem, doing that every single day, trying to get better at it, I think you'll be all right. What are those things?

Yeah, I mean, ultimately it's, it's making sure that you are going at your market properly and you're being a workhorse. So you need to be making that you're not leaving any stone unturned. So, you know, a lot of times people can get carried away and ignore a cold lead. Even if it's a cold lead, one day, you know, that's going to come back around in full circle and it might deliver you a job in the future. So being really focused on making sure that your inputs are double everyone else in that room. You need to make sure that you are putting in a lot of effort, a lot of candidate calls, but then as importantly, a lot of client calls. And I mean, from a client call perspective, the second thing would be Discover and create a USP because there is a lot of people in the market, particularly in those dev markets or those really highly contested markets where everyone's coming with the same sell. I'm a specialist, I've got a great database, I can, you know, I've got the people. You've got to figure out what is your USP and how we— what, like, why is a client going to use you over someone else, right? And it can be as simple as just asking a client. You know, like, how do you like to work, mate? Like, I ask clients all the time, like, alright, look, I get it, you probably, and I level with them, I'm like, look, I get it, you probably get a load of recruiters calling you, like, how can I be the guy that you remember? Like, how can I make a difference? And just put it to them, let them tell you. So trying to stand out, obviously, in a competitive market, making sure that your sell's a little bit different, and just being an absolute workhorse and not leaving any stone unturned is definitely my advice I give to anyone starting out.

Nice. So let— I definitely highlight what you just said. Obviously, some of the things that you said when we prepared for this that you're passionate about is that you're big on the hunter mentality, right?

Yeah.

What I really want to talk to you about, which I think I've really enjoyed listening to you say, is about how you challenge the people that you speak to. You uncover problems, which I really like. So I want to ask you about that. But I think also like what a smart way to discover and understand the type of service that people aren't getting or want to get by asking them those sorts of questions that you just mentioned. So when, it might have changed, but what have been the sort of common things that these people said to you that, Sam, you know what, this is what I feel like I don't get from the recruitment partner that we've used quite a lot of the times, if you were able to do this or if you were able to offer this or if you were able to deliver this for us, that would actually go a long way. So in line, just bringing it back to what you just said there, because I think that's really smart. What were some of the common responses that you got from these people that said, if you do this, then actually that would be really valuable to us? What were some of the things that you picked up?

Yeah, I mean, look, it's definitely in my market in particular, there's a lot of really— I face off against a lot of vendors that are definitely A lot of them are overseas, Singapore, India, etc., Philippines. So a conversation I have with a lot of clients who might be using an offshore vendor is, all right, I get it, you're probably saving on costs. I understand that from a commercial point of view, your C-levels are looking at it and thinking, great, we're saving money. But what is the cost to you guys when that project isn't delivered to the quality that you're expecting? You know, what kind of control do you have over the outcomes, the quality? You know, are you finding that your team's getting frustrated because they don't have embedded quality engineers to drive your products and your projects? Right. So I always try and dig a bit deeper than, all right, we need someone. It's more like, okay, but what's the knock-on effect? And if you were to do this, like, what's going to be the benefit and what's going to be the, you know, the negative to it? Like, you've kind of got to And a lot of times, like, clients will tell me, you know, we're using this other vendor and they're offshore and they're cheap and whatever, and they're stern about it, but I keep on top of them. And then 6 months later, you notice that they come full circle and they come back and they go, yep, you were right, you know, they totally fucked up. We need some people on the ground now.

Wait, so sorry, so like, so what you're talking about there are how you you challenge them on the problems that they have, right? So you talk to them about, okay, so you're doing it this way at the moment, uh, what— yeah, the quality, you're challenging that. But sorry, what I was asking you was, you know, when you said you was asking people directly, what is it that I can offer? Like, what is it that you'd want from a recruitment partner? What is it that—

oh, I see.

Yeah, it seemed really valuable. I know you're talking about the problems there because I mentioned that, but I was just curious to, uh, hear from you, like, when you was asking that direct question because you were saying that's one of the ways that you can discover your USPs. Like, what did you find to be the common response to, Sam, you know what, if you do this for us, or we work this way, or you give us this, that'll actually be really valuable to us?

Yeah, a lot of the time, funnily enough, and, you know, clients say this to recruiters all the time, is, you know, just be soft in your approach, leave me alone for a bit. And I think, you know, when you're starting out and you're really hungry and you really want clients and want business, like, you're going at it and your train's kind of like, you know, call them every other week and, you know, spec them and whatnot. Instead, they might turn around and be like, you know what, I'd really appreciate if you could just send me some market rates and a bit more information about the kind of clients that you've worked with so that when I am ready, I know that I can reach out and I've got something that I can refer to when I call you. So, you know, I've had this kind of, this like PDF document of kind of like case studies with clients and the kind of things that we've done and achieved. And this is just a small kind of 3, 4-page PDF that, you know, I'll just swing out to clients instead of a spec CV or something, because in my market, you know, spec CVs don't get much traction. So, you know, understanding kind of what kind of approach they want is really important. You know, even as simple things like, look, let me just understand, do you prefer emails or calls, mate? Because A lot of the time, there's some people in this world who find it quite offensive to get like a text message out of the blue from recruiter. But in my head, like, I'm texting people all the time. I'm texting clients and candidates all the time. Like, I don't find that weird, but some clients don't like that, right? So sometimes you need to just listen to, all right, how do they like to communicate? What's their approach? Are they kind of a high energy or a low energy person? Like, are we going to How are we going to bounce off each other here? And you've got to kind of feel them out a little bit. So yeah, it's really important to get that right because if you take the wrong approach with the client, you're going to be knocking on that door and ultimately you're just going to piss them off.

So let's keep building on this sort of hunter mentality because you shared with me sometimes that you found people don't give up on leads too soon. —can sort of get complacent with just like sending emails, not making the most out of calling people. And you even shared with me that what you're known for, I mean, you mentioned that the cold leads there is like calling and specifically calling cold leads or cold calling, right? What did— I was like asking this, what did Sam's cold call sound like? Early on compared to how they sound now? How they're different?

Very different, mate.

Um, so how do they, how do they sound at the start?

Oh, at the very start, like, I, I was given a script to my first company, and then it was very similar when I started out. It was very much like you call someone up and you're like, hi, um, you know, I'm, I'm a specialist recruiter, you know, I'm calling from this company. You know, and that's pretty much it. Or, you know, you might try and say, I'm working with this candidate you're hiring, and then they just say no. And then you're kind of new to objection handling, and then you just kind of, your tail goes between your legs and you're like, oh shit. So it's definitely changed in that sense. Like, I've kind of, over the years, I've tried a lot of things, I'll be honest. And I've tried, I think it's a lot of A and B testing. Like, you've got to try a lot of different sales approaches. Approaches and cold call approaches and find what kind of works for you. And the thing is, like, the same cold call might not work with two clients, you know. You've, you've got to mix things up and mix up your approach, um, because if you just keep on calling someone saying, hi, I'm a specialist, they don't give a shit. You have to really find a way to engage them, you know.

Um, and how, so how, how, how would they sound this year then? What's been— because I agree with you, you've got to keep experimenting, right? I think that's, that's so true. But like, how— because I'm sure there's some, like, the way that you do it is, is a lot different now. There's a reason behind why you do it the way that you do. You're saying you're challenging them, give them some insight. So what, what, what might it sound like now if you give me a call?

So, um, look, first things first is like agreeable statements are huge, right? So when I, like, when I do a cold call or even just a call to, to chase anything Or even if I structure an email, I always want to open my statement with some agreeable statements. I want to basically go in and be like, look, I know it's a call out of the blue and I won't waste your time. I understand that you're currently hiring in this space, and let's be honest, it's pretty tough. And I want to basically say some things that in their head they're going to go, yep, yep, I agree with that. And then I've actually got them hooked a little bit to listen to you know, a little bit of an elevator pitch, because if you kind of, if you don't say something that they agree with, psychologically they're going to go, ah, this is just another sales call. I'm not that interested. So if you say and you level with them, look, I know that you're hiring in this space. I know that you need these specific resources. And look, let's be honest, it can be challenging to find them because I know myself, I actually hired a project last week to do this and it was really tough. 'Look, I've got some people that might be able to help you with this, but I just want to understand a bit more about where you're at.' And just keep it really open, like have a conversation rather than going in with a sell. Often works out better, I find.

Yeah, nice. And I think what, again, what you're doing at the beginning of that is you're sort of showcasing your credibility by— that might not always land, but when it does land with people, like you said, they're going, 'Oh, like this guy understands what we're going through or understands what we may have faced. And that again, rather than just being told that you're a specialist, that the person that's calling you is a specialist and whatever, that doesn't, that doesn't really mean anything. But the things that you're mentioning will actually mean something to someone if it's, if it's the right person that have experienced some of the challenges or things that you're discussing. So it's that credibility again.

Yeah. And I think like it's, it's, it's, it's exactly the way that I structure my emails as well. Like I see people all the time who start out in recruitment and, you know, they send a big email sell that might be 3 paragraphs. And the reality is nobody's going to read that. As you would open a cold call, open it with 2 very quick and snappy agreeable statements that they can agree with and they can level with, and then go into a very quick 1 or 2 sentence bit about how you could help and ask them when they're available. Not are they available? When are they available? Let's talk. Presume Go in with, you know, agreeable statements and psychologically you're going to get a better hit rate, better response. And that's for a cold call or for an email.

So what, what, what's been— and I'm sure there's been sort of ebbs and flows, but for you, Sam, throughout your career and building this, this market, like what's been the most consistent way that you've landed great clients that have had, you know, good, good, good projects? Just what's been the most consistent way for you in terms of landing clients?

Yeah, it's a really good question because obviously everyone wants that cash cow, right? Everyone wants the golden ticket or a couple, right? Um, ultimately it's about persistence, um, and it's about approaching a client from several different angles. Um, I mean, obviously when you're going into a client, you want to make sure that you understand the organizational structure, um, you know who your— I guess you could say that your low-level decision makers are. That might be a a technical or a test lead. And ultimately, who's the guy that's signing off their budget? That might be a manager, a development manager, a test manager. And then who's above that? The engineering director, and then the C-level and whatnot. You want to make sure that you're starting to make inroads with everyone. I normally find it starts at the bottom. So it will start with those leads, or even contractors within those businesses. And what you wanna do is you obviously just wanna network around them, and you don't wanna be salesy with your approach, but you can approach all of these leaders and people in the business. You gotta remember that they are not committed to that client forever. They at some point will be searching for a job, so it's worth their time to chat with you because you are an SME, you're a market expert, and they might wanna know about rates in the market or who's hiring, so have a chat with them about that. And then once you've given them something, ask them a bit about, hey, look, I actually got a lead. I'm not sure which team it was, but it says it was using this tech. Can you help me out? Or, you know, how about let's meet? And when you meet them, can you ask them to draw you out an org structure? Like, give me an org map, mate. And I've asked—

give me an org map, mate. Give me a fucking org map. It's crazy how we did a bit of training on this where We're talking about expanding accounts and one of the tips was ask the direct question, do you have an org chart? Like, and you'd be surprised how many people say yes. How many times have people gone, yeah, you go, mate? Or like, I've never had anyone say no.

As soon as you sit in front of someone and you bought them an oat piccolo, I guarantee they are going to give you that org map.

I'm telling you. Yeah. Yeah, so all different angles. Yeah, like you said, you're speaking to people that may aren't going to be there forever. You're giving again, then you're asking. But again, it's smart the way you're asking. People like to help people, right? Yeah. So again, you're leading with, can you help me? Like, I've heard this, or someone said this, is that true, or is this going on? You're, you're then— yeah, like, it's, it's different rather than working through your, uh, lead questions that your manager's got. You're going Uh, have you got— yeah, like, it's just going to sound a lot more unnatural, isn't it, if you're just asking the direct questions?

You almost— I mean, obviously, yeah, it's natural for humans to help humans, but like, it's like you don't want to go in smelling like a salesman, right? You don't want to go in smelling like a recruiter. You want to come in like a friendly face who could help them in the future. And ultimately, you're going to form a relationship with them and you're going to scratch each other's backs. And I say that to people in MySpace all the time, like 'Look, you work with this company. I'll be honest, I've been knocking on their door for 5 years. I'm not even going to talk to you about recruitment, mate, because I'm not interested anymore. But yeah, let's get to know each other because you might move one day, and the likelihood is you will. So I want you to be my friend when you move to that next company,' right? So it's all about thinking long term, right?

What— how— because it looks like— have you ever had some like proper big hits to your contract book? Because it looks like it's sort of grown, it's just sort of gone on, uh, like a sort of upward trajectory really. Like obviously you interviewed Elliot and he got absolutely wiped. Like have you— because I want to speak to you about how does Sam feel, how does Sam think about protecting his book? Because I think that's another thing, isn't it? Uh, so talk to me a bit about that. One, like have you ever had any— have you come in on a Monday and they've gone, Sam, 'Look, we were testing for this piece of tech and now we don't need it.' And there was, you had like 15 contractors. I don't know, have you ever had any like big moments like that?

Yeah, I mean, look, I've, I have had similar kind of things that I've been pretty fortunate in the fact that in my space, um, they do tend to stay for a little bit longer than perhaps in a dev space, um, which is obviously nice, but it might take me a while to place them or to actually get that work on. Um, in terms of drops, I mean, I've had, you know, some of my A clients basically saying that they— one of my, one of my big clients actually at the start of this year basically said to me, uh, yeah, we've overspent by a few million dollars. Um, I don't think we can keep these contractors anymore. Um, so yeah, I think I had about 10 people roll off at the start of this year. Um, it is what it is, man. I mean, I've, I've had, I've had cases of clients letting go a few contractors here and there throughout my career and The way I've always thought about it is the market goes in ebbs and flows. It's like a stock market or whatever. Like you can't just go like that. But even if you're going like up, upward trajectory, there's always going to be peaks and troughs. So look, I'm not going to lie to you. When I first started out and I kind of reached the milestone of like, I remember when like 10K a week was like the OG amount to get to. And I remember reaching that and just coming into the office one day. Yeah. I think I had a few beers the night before and I kind of put my feet up and I went, yeah, I'm a fucking man. And little did I know, little did I know that you can do a lot better than that. But at the time I felt pretty good and I had a few hits early on where it would take me backwards and I just learned, all right, look, this book isn't forever. And at some point—

You got humbled.

You got humbled. Yeah, I got humbled pretty fucking quick. Yeah. But, um, I, I guess in terms of like the way that I protected it, and I've actually fucked up massively on this, is like one thing that my CEO— he's now the CRO, Craig— he told me that, um, I've just got to start being better with speaking to my contractors who work for me. Um, and I found that really tough when I was on my kind of build phase up to like 55 contractors in 2021, 2022, because there were so many fucking people to look after. I just had no idea how I would keep track of them. So being able to do regular check-in calls, and I set this up, and I lost a few contractors where I didn't even know they're finishing, and like they just kind of fell off, and I was like, shit, like how have I not kept on top of this? Like what the hell? And I remember coming in one day and I was really embarrassed, and he pulled me aside and he told me off, and he was like, look mate, you need to be on top of your contractors. Because this shit doesn't fly.

And I was like, yeah, why do you, why do you think you would, why do you think you wasn't? Was it just you just didn't know how to comprehend how you could stay in touch with all these people, mate?

To be honest, it was, it was, yeah, 55 people is a lot of people to check in with every 2 weeks. On top of that, I was going through a phase where I'd never been this busy before and I never had that many jobs on to juggle at once. Um, so ultimately, yeah, like, I just, I had to remember the importance of like, it's as important to extend and keep your current contractors as it is to do a new deal. Like, my mentality this year, it's been a bit of a slower year. I have been full force in making sure contractors are happy, extending them, and making sure that my existing, you know, my existing profit is staying there. Because, you know, the new stuff, the new deals, yeah, looks good, you know, writing up new deals, you know, makes you feel a bit better. But ultimately, you know, I need to make sure that I'm protecting what I've already got. Right. So, yeah, big, big learn for me and something that I've changed at the back end of last year. So, yeah. And I just want to say as well, I hired a kind of delivery consultant, a guy called Logan, absolute legend. I hired him in 2022. I think it was 2022. Right. And having him help me so much because he could free up my time, he could checking on the contractors. I could focus on the client stuff, and we just did a bit of a balancing act, and that was really key to keeping it.

Up until that point, it was just you, right?

Oh, mate, it was nightmare. Yeah, I think I'd got up to something like 40K and 50-odd contractors on my own, and then they basically forced me to hire a delivery consultant. I was saying I was just going to do it on my own, and then they were like, dude, you need someone else to make sure that this is going to plan. Um, and I'm so grateful I did take him on, and, um, he did really well.

So if you, if you were to write down the perfect client spread that you think would make you feel really— it would, it'd make you really easy to sleep at night knowing that you're very confident going to sleep every night knowing that your profit is probably going to have the best chance of remaining the same, or at least not being completely wiped by a big percentage What would that client spread look like in terms of how many clients that you're working with or that you have contractors with? Talk to us a bit about that.

Look, it's so hard to put a finger on it because I think every market is so different, right? Particularly in my market. I mean, having a large client spread's pretty good, to be honest with you, because you had— you know, I like to spread my risk. That's just how I've always done my business. You play—

you place 90— you place with 19 clients in 2022. Your best year, it says on the piece of paper that you shared with me.

I can't remember.

Yeah, something like that. Yeah, yeah, what you shared with me. Yeah, I've got it up. There's 19 clients placed, not including extensions. So that'll be—

yeah, right, right. Yeah. So look, I think client spread can be debatable, right? I mean, I came in on your LinkedIn post saying this is bollocks, you can't make a million dollars with 5 clients. I'd be pretty nervous going to sleep at night with just 5 clients. Um, because as soon as, as soon as the taps turn off, like, that could be one-fifth of your revenue gone. So I think I'd be pretty comfortable having anywhere between 10 and, and 20 clients depending on how much I'm looking to make, how big my book is, how many runners I've got. But, um, I think having a good spread of perhaps 1 to 3 cash cows, a load of B clients, and a couple of one-off C, C clients is, is probably a decent spread.

Like, 2021 you had 25 clients placed with, it says. Yeah, mental. Um, what's interesting as well, what's interesting as well is looking at these— obviously I'm not going to say the, the clients on here, obviously, but what, what is interesting is there are, there are a lot of like 1s and 2s and 3s, and there's only, yeah, like a couple, there's a couple like— so 2022, for example, there's like 1-5, 1-6, 1-4, 1, 9, 1, 6, and then the rest are like 1s and 2s in terms of contractors, which is interesting, right? So again, you sort of also spread the amount of clients that you have more than like 2 or 3 contractors with as well.

Yeah, for sure. I mean, I, I, yeah, I think it wasn't really intentional. I mean, ultimately, like, I, I was always looking over my shoulder. There was another consultant, um, who I worked with, and she had like literally 2 clients with like 40 contractors. She was always beating me. And I always thought, fuck, I really want one of them. But, you know, when the market turns sour and one of those clients turns the tap off, you know, not so good. So yeah, I think I just, I think I just naturally, I think with my market, it just took me to a widespread. And I think that kind of came with the way that I built my business anyway, because I, as I said at the start of the call, like I'm a big believer in making sure that you're spread in terms of communication. You're not just focusing on those A sexy clients. Somebody's got to service the other things, right? And they are golden little opportunities when they come. So, and ultimately with these little one-off placements or placements where you've done two placements in a client, I find that you can have quite a lot of control because perhaps they don't really hire in this space often, or perhaps they don't have a panel and it can be quite an easy win. So I think for building your business, you need to make sure that you're keeping your eyes on these clients.

And what I wanted to ask you as well is, because looking at these, um, years, there, there always seems to be a lot of extensions. Like, looking at the, these different numbers, like 2022, um, 66 extensions, 48 placements. 2021, uh, 39 extensions. Like, is there a science behind getting extensions? Is, is there, is there a science behind that? Is it staying in touch with contractors, understanding what's going on, like asking the— I don't know, is there a science behind getting extensions?

Uh, yeah, I mean, there actually is, to be honest. Um, so in terms of extensions, look, I mean, you need to make sure that you're on the ball really, really early. Like, you need to be thinking about extensions 3 months out. So like 12 weeks out, you need to start thinking about, all right, is this person going to extend or are we going to have to market them out and, you know, get them to another client. So what I do is I speak to both clients and the contractors at the 3-month period. So 12 weeks, probably then again, I'll remind them at 10 weeks, then at 8 weeks I'm gonna start to get really serious and be like, look, you know, we really need to sort this out because I'm not gonna be trying to get a C-level to sign off with a week to go. That's just not how I do my business. I've got reputation here. The contractor's got to pay their mortgage. Like, we have to be adults here. So I make sure that I follow up on email, on calls, everything. And I'm very thorough in terms of am I extending these guys? Because, you know, this is your revenue. You have to protect your revenue. And a lot of people get really focused on that new business and they forget that this is still your money and this is your benchmark, right, that you build from.

But what are you asking the client? Because I'm assuming they're only extending if they feel like they, they need them, right? Are you like— they're not just extending it because like Sam's telling me to, like— no, I hope not. What, what, what— so like, what are you asking? Are you— because again, with your approach, I'm assuming you're going, how's the project looking? Spoke to the contractor, says there's still quite a lot to be working through, there's a lot coming through. Like, do you expect this to, you know, do you expect to need this sort of quality of testing to still be done in another 6 months' time? Like What are you actually asking the client?

I'm, I'm being pretty straight up, so I just want a black and white answer. Like, I need— like, I'm telling the client that you need to let me know if you're not going to extend that contract. So rather than, are you going to, it's more like, if you don't extend this person, this human being, I have to make sure that they're earning money, right? So it is my job, unfortunately, as much I want to help you as a client, I have to make sure that they're gonna, you know, they're gonna go and have a job somewhere else because If you don't let me know, they are, they are going on the market. So I will, I will use that with clients, and that does get a response.

So to, to round this out then, for a lot of people, they've had a difficult year this year. Do you want to just share anything on like your experience of like— you've been doing this for a long time now, right? The testing market, Sydney, you've been smashing it out for a long time, man. So How does Sam think about remaining consistent, not getting complacent? How has Sam approached more often than not being really engaged in what you're doing? I'm sure there's been days where you're like, fucking hell, I've had enough of this tested market. Oh mate! But like, talk to us a bit about that for people listening that might be 3 years in, not 6 years in.

I think you've got to remember that this is one of the most rewarding jobs in the world, right? I mean, it can be very thankless, but if you start to get it right and you start to see little wins, little wins build up. And the feeling you get when you earn that big paycheck and, you know, you're going on the holidays you want and you buy that car and all that kind of good stuff, you have to remember that that comes from consistency and working your ass off. Because, you know, you don't get things free these days, right? You can't just sit there and expect to earn like half a million a year. It's just not going to happen. So it's just, it comes down to work ethic. For sure. It comes down to remembering that it's not a rocket ship. It's going to take time. I mean, some of the best clients that I ever got took me years and years of knocking on the door to actually get. And now, I mean, so one client I had like, or I still have today, he's a great guy and he used to work at a target of mine and I never got a shot there. And then he started his own consultancy. He calls me up out of the blue one day and he says, mate, you are the most persistent fucker I know. I want you to recruit for me. So, and that's literally how, and we have beers now and laugh about how, you know, I was just so fucking persistent. But he thought to himself, he was like, if this guy's this persistent with trying to work with me, imagine the service he's going to give me when I need candidates like today or tomorrow. Do you know what I mean? So I'm just going off on a bit of a tangent there, but that's all right. Yeah, yeah, look, it's, it's really, it's really important to just remember that you need to remain consistent. Um, and I think one thing as well is, um, and this is still a work in progress for me, but you need to focus on yourself outside of work as well. Um, I think it's genuinely important, especially when you're finding it hard at work, to make sure that you've got a healthy enough routine. Because I remember when I started out, like we'd be drinking on a Tuesday or Wednesday and you come in with a hangover and it's horrific, right? Yeah, some weeks, I'm not going to lie. I was 21 years old.

Like, what were you going to do, set me up? No judgment, mate. No judgment. Yeah. Yeah.

So, but look, as I've got, I guess, a bit older and learnt about balance, I think, you know, having a gym routine, having, you know, walking the dog, clearing your head, chatting to your partner, stuff like that. Can really help take that work stress and it can recharge you to come in and, and be a bit hungry the next day. Because if you just keep going at it and then you use alcohol as a release or something like that, you're just going to burn out. And when you burn out, it takes a while to get over that. So yeah, love it.

Well, Sam, look, it's been an absolute pleasure. Kudos to you on everything that you've, you've built so far. I'm sure there's going to be more, more success to come. So thanks so much for, for joining me on the pod.

Thank you very much, mate. Pleasure.