Tom White - From selling phones, to building his own agency with offices in the UK and Europe!

Welcome to the Recruitment Roller Coaster podcast. My name is Hishem Azzouz. Today I am in Bristol. I'm joined by Tom White, who is the founder and owner of a business called Paratus People, and they're a recruitment agency based out of Bristol but also have offices in the Netherlands, Brussels, Amsterdam— sorry to be precise— Amsterdam, Brussels, and Munich. And, uh, you guys are a recruitment agency that specialize in the IoT sector, correct? I did Google that before I came up today. Okay, well, and that's good, right?

Internet of Things.

Internet of Things. Yeah, it's interesting name that. I don't know. Yeah, it left me curious.

So it's essentially anything that's connected to the internet, any device that's connected to the internet.

Yeah, that sounds like a good niche to be in, in today's world, Tom.

Well, it's growing, Hishem. Hopefully it's a good niche. You know, we're in it now, so we kind of got to stick with it. Yeah. Um, well, look, been looking Looking forward to this, mate. Um, likewise.

So obviously I've got a couple of questions for you that I definitely want to ask you. Okay. With you obviously having your own recruitment business, definitely going to have a focus on your journey with your own business. So you've obviously been building and running your own recruitment business now for— is it coming up to 4 years?

Yeah. So, so we incorporated April 2016.

Yeah.

And probably kind of soft launch and then really got going at the start of 2017.

Cool. So where I always like to start, how did Tom White enter the lovely world of recruitment? Let's start there.

Well, do you know what, probably the same as everyone else, right? Because I kind of fell into it.

Yeah.

Um, so I was actually selling phones, believe it or not.

Really?

Uh, yeah, but kind of, um, how difficult is that? So I wasn't doing it face to face, I was doing business sales, so over the telephone.

Oh, okay. Uh, so what, like selling to businesses? Yeah, like getting their phone system?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the God's honest truth is that I, uh, I relocated to Blackpool, of all places, don't ask me why, and, um, ended up selling corporate phone packages for a company called Ferguson Connections.

Okay.

Um, and, uh, yeah, the truth of the matter is I kind of blagged myself the job, right? I said I'd worked Orange, I'd never worked Orange. I said I'd worked in phone sales, never worked in phone sales, and, um, kind of just took to it really well. Uh, yeah, so, you know, I remember going in on the first day Um, did really well. Sold, sold, I think, you know, about 15, 20 phones in packages to different companies.

Really?

Yeah, by the end of the first week.

Warm leads, mate, went into a warm pot, been hot there.

Do you know what, it wasn't even warm, right? So we started, we had— it used to be a banding system, cool. It used to be called IVR, so you used to know what users, um, would, uh, would be spending on their phone contracts and who to pick up and what companies to kind of target. And yeah, by the end of the first week, won what was then a Virgin Red Letter Day. I don't know if you remember those. So they're kind of like corporate prizes. They used to call them Red Letter Days. And yeah, did really, really well. That was a comm-only job. I was earning about £1,000 a week, you know, just selling phones, which is crazy. And it gets you a long way in Blackpool, I can assure you of that.

So sales, and then how did recruitment come about then?

So, so I'm from Bristol, okay? And, um, a wreck-to-wreck basically, uh, contacted me. I didn't know what a wreck-to-wreck was at the time. Um, I still think a lot of people probably don't know what wreck-to-wreck is.

This is the most common story. Yeah.

And, uh, yeah, so this, this chap contacted me and was telling me a story about, um, someone I later met in, in real life, a chap called Charlie Walker, who owns a company called Harmonic, about how he was earning big-time billa. Yeah, yeah, about he was, about he was earning like £120,000 a year doing recruitment.

And, um, why did he tell you about him? Did you know, did you, did you know him, or did he say, oh, do you know this?

Uh, I think it was because it was Bristol. I mean, I never knew the guy. I never knew what recruitment was. I just knew that recruitment consultants were ringing me about jobs that I couldn't do. So I just kind of thought, like, this is, um, okay, this is a joke industry, right? And, um, Anyhow, the guy set me up for an interview at a company called Ashton Consulting, um, back in February 2008.

Yeah.

And, uh, yeah, I had one interview, got the job, um, and that was it, right?

So you've been in, you've been in recruitment since then?

Yeah, February 2008. Yeah.

How did that— how did they sell you recruitment then? Was it in line with, Tom, you could earn some, uh— yeah, that, that a grand a week in Blackpool, mate.

Yeah, way more than that over here. Like, how did they sell it to you, out of interest?

Always curious.

So yeah, so essentially they were basically saying that you could earn, you know, a six-figure salary, um, which we all know to be the case now in recruitment, right? But I think the problem with rec to recs, or in my view at that time, is that it's so far detached from a 23, 24-year-old, uh, saying that you're going to earn £100,000 a year is, is really pie in the sky, right? If you'd have said that you're going to earn £40,000, £50,000 a year, it's probably going to be more achievable. It seems so distant that you You naturally don't believe what they're saying.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're instantly skeptical.

Yeah, yeah. You know, and I'm, I'm probably quite a skeptical person, right? My friends would say that, but I reckon it served me well.

Okay, so just to set the scene then. So entered recruitment in 2008.

Yeah.

And then how long did you work in that agency for?

So I think off the top of my head, I left about August 2009.

Okay, so a little stint there.

Yeah.

And then you joined another business?

Yes, so joined a company called PeopleSource. PeopleSource in October 2009, October 4th, I think.

Really? Okay. And then how long was you there for?

Uh, nearly 6 years. I resigned in December 2015.

So 7 years working for somebody else. What, what were those Billing bays. So just quickly as well, so now run your own business, are you still very much on the tools? You still—

I was at the start, I think. Any, uh, yeah, at the start, yeah. So I think, you know, traditionally speaking, you know, a lot of recruitment companies are set up because you get a good biller, right? And for whatever reason, either born out of frustration or of a want of doing something their own or chasing a dream, they start a company. Uh, so good billers tend to set up companies and then are very much hands-on until such a time that they can build a team around them. Was your good biller Yeah, I was all right. Yeah, I was okay.

What was your best year, mate?

Uh, I think it was just short of a million.

Really? Yeah, it's a lot of fucking— that's a big, big number.

Yeah.

And so, and you as a contract recruiter?

Predominantly contract, yeah.

Have you always been in the— no, so you said IoT is like— like what market was you in?

So at the time I was doing broadcast technology, so a lot of work around set-top boxes and television and deployment of television.

And is that crossover into what you're doing now? Yeah, very much so.

I mean, one of the reasons why Meritus works in the it space is that there was a lot of good people in broadcast, okay, um, who were facing a period of consolidation in the market, right? You know, these days people watch Netflix and a lot of the TV vendors, you know, their main, um, you know, goal is to have Netflix displayed on a device.

Yeah.

Whereas when I started in the industry, it was about the traditional set-top box that sat on top of a TV, and there was, there was a lot of work that went into that.

Yeah.

So there's a basic— yeah, so a lot of— basically a lot of good engineers have, uh, transcended into, into the IoT market.

Okay, that makes sense.

Yeah.

So before we go into the journey of you having your own business, let's just talk. So as I was sharing with you over lunch, like, definitely a lot of billers that listen to this, right? Yeah, aspiring business owners and business owners. So back to your point of when you got into recruitment, you had someone telling you that you could earn, yeah, a lot of money. I feel like a lot of people definitely feel the same when you're, when you're saying, look, my best year was probably just under a million, and I'm assuming that you built up to that and didn't go too far off it. Yeah, around that. So that's definitely going to feel a million miles away. Yeah, a lot of people, right? What, what, what, what are some of the things you think contributed to, to you getting to that level? Because that is high performing.

Yeah, I think— thank you. I think at the time it was—

what year was that? Do you know?

I think, I think between the— well, I mean, I was, I was earning, yeah, between £300,000 and half a million a year gross. Yeah, between 2012 to 2015.

Oh wow. Okay.

Uh, so did very well. Um, and I think kind of what contributed to that was the fact that In a nutshell, I liked nice shit and no one was going to buy it for me.

Okay. She's very motivated.

Yeah, I'm not motivated. Driven.

Driven.

So motivation comes and goes.

Yeah.

If you're driven, it will take you through the hard days, right? You know, and I always say this at interview to people, right? You know, if it's snowing outside, you're going to call in sick. You're going to come in. Do you want to watch Netflix or do you actually want to come in and make money and do stuff?

Yeah.

And for me, it was— I was driven, right? I really like nice cars. And I was frankly frustrated that, you know, not being born into a lot of wealth. I mean, my family, you know, very middle class, right? But I wasn't— I wasn't born into loads of money that in order to generate that, I had to get off my ass and go and do it myself.

Where did this— so, okay, how, how did you cultivate that drive? Would you say?

Um, I had an opportunity when I, when I joined the business to essentially do what I wanted to do and to craft the market. Um, and one of the, the benefits about the company at the time was I was able to come in and, and focus on what I had been doing, but have carte blanche to, to, to grow that how I wanted to do it.

Yeah.

And I could see a lot of opportunity. I could see a lot of competitors in the space that were working in that market, but perhaps not doing as well as they could do. Okay. Or stretching it as far as it could go.

Yeah.

So that's—

that's a big opportunity.

Yeah, massive opportunity. Yeah. Going back to your question about being skeptical, skeptical about the earnings, I think, yeah, you are skeptical about the earnings and I think you know, you have to have a lot of drive and you have to really, really want it because the job is hard. And I often say to people, if you can make it in recruitment, you can pretty much make it in anything.

Yeah.

Because it— you have to— it calls upon so many different techniques, skills, and attributes that you can't necessarily learn, you know, from an academic perspective. Right.

Okay. So just quickly then, So obviously you, you now employ people, and I'm sure now you— obviously you've, you've been there and done it, right? Been a very high-performing biller.

Yeah.

So what, what are some of the— you going through that process and no doubt hiring for your team previously as well, what, what do you think are some of the common things that prevent people from getting to those sorts of levels that you got to, would you say?

Yeah. Okay. So I think, um, and I can't speak for everyone, but I can go on the experience I've had from interviewing people. I think the idea of earning good money and billing good money and the trappings that come with that.

Yeah.

Is, is very enticing. But the stark reality of how to get to it can be sometimes too much for people in the sense that, you know, recruitment as it, as it was and staffing or talent solutions, however you want to call it these days, because, you know, without meaning to get sidetracked, I think recruitment's dead. But that's another topic. It takes a lot of energy, it takes a lot of effort, it takes a lot of drive. And, and I think sometimes people aren't really aware of just how much it may take over in the same way like a method actor would rehearse for their role and live and breathe that character for a period of time. You have to engulf yourself within a market to really understand it and to separate yourself against other people that may be in that market. And I think if you're willing to do that and truly take that on board, then you will be successful.

So it's sacrifices you're talking about?

You could call it sacrifices. I would call it more priorities.

Priorities.

Yeah, I would say so.

Right. In line with what you— yeah, I get that. But what you're saying is on the face of it, looks great, sounds great. Yeah, Tom, I'm up for bidding those sorts of numbers.

Yeah.

But when push comes to shove, Yeah. Are you willing to put in the work?

Yeah, essentially.

And that, that's what you think is the— I think the key thing—

I think, you know, there's a, there's a, there's a quote by Warren Buffett, right, that says that, uh, an idiot with a plan will always beat a genius without a plan. Um, and, you know, never is that more true in, in recruitment or, or staffing or whatever you want to call it, right? Because ultimately you, you have to put in the effort. You have to do the basics right. And this phrase is used a lot in our circles, right? Whenever you hit hard times or whenever you want to progress, you have to do the basics right and you have to do the hard stuff first.

Yeah.

And it's easy to cut the corners. And one of the reasons why, you know, I think the work that you're doing is great is that you acknowledge the fact that you've got to have a digital presence. You've got to be aware of self-branding and promotion of yourself as an individual to use combined with traditional phone sales and the ability to hold and articulate a good conversation with someone that maybe, you know, people that you would, would not necessarily socialize with. Right. But from a business context and, and to, to, to extract information, to go through requirements analysis and to find out useful, um, you know, intel that you can use to your advantage. And I think those two things together are really powerful in this day and age.

Okay, final, like, just real practical question on that, because people always ask me about it. What, what did a typical Tom White day look like in those days? How did you structure your day?

I think, yeah, so I think it depends. If you ask my old boss, right, so At the start, I'd work really hard. I'm not, I'm not gonna lie, right?

Okay, really, really, what do you mean? What, what?

Well, so I used to say to my old boss, and that if he ever listens to this, he'll probably hear it, but I used to, uh, uh, I used to say like, I cannot understand how people get in at 8:30, 9 o'clock when this, this, this environment, this company will allow you to write your own paycheck. I, I could not fathom the fact that people wouldn't get in early and prioritize, not sacrifice, other things in their world.

So what time did you get in?

So like 7 o'clock, 7:15. I used to literally run to work. I used to— I moved closer to work on purpose.

Yeah.

To get close, like to be closer to the environment. Yeah. I used to call it the money room. The money room, right? Yeah, but it is the money room, you know. Like, you know, we're here, we're here to earn money. We're here to, you know, to change our, to change our lives, to do something successful and to make, and to make a difference.

Right? Uh, so you got in early? Yeah.

So, so the first 2 hours of my day was absolutely manic. It was, it was frantic, right? So used to come in, have, uh, most things automated or set up so that I would have either leads in my inbox, candidates ready to go. Yeah, everything, uh, so I could push product out the door.

Okay.

So I would send CVs, I would send intros, I would send business development, uh, emails, messages to people.

Yeah.

Um, from 7:30 to 9:30 and then follow that up throughout the day. So the first 2 hours are just absolutely—

Like the stuff that's imminent that should drive revenue quite quickly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 7:30 to 9:30, then what? So you're doing all that before some people even in the office.

Yeah, like people used to turn up, right? You know, eating bacon sandwiches at like 9 o'clock and I used to look and be like, you know, you're not going to get anywhere, right? You know, what's the point? But the thing is like, I'm slightly older now, right? I'm mid-30s. It's my 35th birthday next month. And I think back then I was probably a little bit more bullish and perhaps slightly more outspoken than I am now, if you can believe it. And I guess it's— I guess for certain people, you know, they want to be in an environment where they want to do well, they want to earn 40, 50, 60K because, you know, they want nice holidays, nice car, etc. But they're content with that. Whereas for me, I wasn't content because enough isn't enough. And Yes, you really wanted that. Yeah. And I, I kind of think it's like a tap, right? You know, it's either on and it's full flowing or it's off. Um, to be a midway recruiter, um, it's actually quite difficult, you know, because it means that you actively have to stop at some point. You do a couple of deals and you sit there and, you know, go on BBC Sport and, and relax.

Obviously wasn't you?

No, not at all.

Yeah, after 9:30.

So after 9:30—

sorry, that's okay.

So after 9:30 Following up on everything that I did, being super proactive, calling people.

Is it many, many clients or was it just quite varied?

So yeah, so to be honest with you, when I, when I was billing well, you know, I used to just literally ring switchboards and try and get business off the back of switchboards. I did it with Tesco, I did it with Legal and General, and I did it with some big accounts. Yeah. With not knowing any names and just being able to manipulate the people on the phone on the switchboard using like social engineering techniques. To go through and get terms. And I used to get terms signed off the back of one call.

What, hitting the switchboard?

Yeah, hitting the switchboard. And honestly, do your research. This isn't a lie. No, this is the truth, right? And for me, it was a test. It was a battle to see if you could do that right. And if you could actually be skilled and adept enough, you know, in your language and your research to be quick enough to do it. So I remember with legal in general. I mean, it wasn't even a niche that I was focusing on at the time. And for some reason I just chased down a lead and they had mentioned something about Solvency II, which was an insurance reform that I'm sure— yeah, oh, you would know, right? Yeah, because you're insurance. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I just muted the mic and Googled it and, uh, you know, and, and I managed, I managed to, managed to kind of get terms on, um But it wasn't, you know, I want to, I want to add to the point, what wasn't just a blag, right? You know, I'd back this up, I'd actually research, I've actually studied it, I've actually go really, really deep into the subject matter. And, um, and eventually that's when I sort of found obviously the work that I've been doing and what I set the company up by going, you know, an inch wide and a mile deep into the subject.

So then did, uh, Tom White take a lunch?

Yeah, yeah, I always had lunch, but, uh, I never, I never went for lunch. Does that make sense?

Always had a pat lunch?

No, I didn't have a pat lunch. Like, well, maybe at the time because I was on comm only for a long time.

Really?

So yeah, I didn't have anything.

So then, and then in the afternoon you're doing a similar thing, like just being really proactive?

Um, at the start, like, you know, probably some of my guys in the office are probably going to listen to this, right? But I've got, I've got to be honest and I've got to tell the truth. At one point when, you know, I was billing a lot of money and I was placing a lot of contractors, you know, $8,000 to $14,000 a month, some at some months, which in tech is a lot, right? We're not talking about temps, we're talking about, you know, quite high margin contractors. Um, I'd sit back and I'd relax a little bit because really, yeah, because I was on comm only and, um, I was earning, you know, more money than I knew what to do with it. Um, but I think, yeah, at the time, looking back now, if, um You know, if I, if I was a little bit smarter or, or were to do things in a slightly different way, I would have focused much quicker in a niche. Um, I would have doubled down in that niche. Um, I would have saved a lot more money than buying supercars and ridiculous shoes.

Yeah. Um, and I think that's such an interest. I'm glad you said that.

Yeah.

Who, like, who speaks to people about, uh, yeah, giving people ideas on how to be smart with their money?

Yeah, so it's a good point. So I think, I think it's the structure. So just to talk a little bit about Paratus, right? So we, we have an independent financial advisor.

Nice.

Um, who will—

oh yeah, you did a post about this, didn't you? Yeah, I remember.

Yeah, so we're talking to people about where, uh, what to do with their money, how to be smart with the money, make the money work for them. Yeah, I fully, I fully appreciate the fact that, yeah, you know, recruitment, whilst it's a career, um, you know, you want to get the best out of it and you want to get the most out of it. And, um, you know, it may be a stepping stone into something else, and that, that's absolutely fine. So Um, we would advise people on property purchases. We actually have a consultant loan scheme as well. Uh, yeah.

So these are some of the things you wish you probably had access to.

Yeah, I think at the time, I think there were pros and cons. I mean, I never had any training as such. Uh, I never really had any guidance in the market that I was doing. Um, and it was a bit of a free-for-all. So you could argue that that was quite poor and that these days it would be very difficult for people to build well and quickly and come up to speed. But the flip side to that is it's survival of the fittest, right? And, you know, you need to make money certainly on a commission-only element as well, because if you don't, you know, if you're not billing, you're not, you're not earning anything.

So it seems like you're just relentless, basically. You just put in the work like you wanted it. You want it.

I wanted it. I had a lot of drive, but I think quite smart about it as well. So, yeah. You know, did certain things, did, did work around branding perhaps, you know, even when I knew it was branding, just being like cute about how to represent myself to the wider market. But, you know, also I had quite a passion about what I did. So, you know, at university I actually studied towards two degrees, but one of them was in computing. And that really helped because a lot of my friends were getting into the industry that I was recruiting for. Okay, so I had a bit of an interest, I had a bit of a passion about that, and I think that really does help.

Yeah.

Um, but yeah, relentless, and, um, I realized I was good at something. Yeah. And, um, I really, really wanted to be the best.

You double down on that.

Yeah, exactly. Triple down on that.

Always want to start your own business?

Um, yeah, that's it. Do you know what, that's an interesting question. Um, yes and no.

Um, because you might obviously— I always hear all the time, like, someone that's been quite well, the mindset is, um, like, well done, yeah, do that for myself, goes in my own pocket. But obviously he was on commission only.

Yeah. So what— so I was doing well, I was earning well at the time, uh, you know, prior to my departure from the company, we were, we were going through a, um, uh, we're going through an event, right? Yeah, we exited and Yeah, and we were acquired by a large corporate. And I think for me at the time, I thought that things are going to probably change significantly and that, that feel and that effect that you could have with the MD and a good relationship might be slightly separated. But I also, I also really wanted to focus on doing something for myself and chasing a dream as such, right? Um, and I think that that's really important that you, you go for something because it's, um, you get an itch, right? And you're the only way to cure that itch is to actually go and do it. And I didn't want to lead a what-if kind of life, you know. And it— when you were earning like a lot of cash, it kind of, uh, earning a bit more doesn't really—

yeah, it doesn't really matter.

And in effect, actually, on a, on a PAYE basis back then, you know, you're paying, you know, super high rate tax So the deal value and what you actually see is really marginal. And there comes a point where you actually probably couldn't bill anymore. I think when I got to like 60 out, I was like, well, I'm not actually that incentivized to make much of a difference once you get to those levels.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Did you have a business plan?

Yes. So did I. I'm quite a mercurial character. Okay.

What does that mean? Sorry.

So my interpretation is that I, uh, I'm quite— I think about a lot of plans, I think about a lot of things.

Okay.

There's a lot of things going on in my head at one time.

Yeah.

Sometimes quite abstract, and I can go full forward with something 100%, and then sometimes I might just want to kind of kick back and reflect on the situation. So yeah, it's quite hard to predict, right? Uh, I had a business plan in the sense that in my head about what I wanted to do.

Yeah.

I had to present it to a bank of course, so I needed to actually put it on paper.

Mate, you had all this cash, mate.

Yeah, yeah, of course I had that, but the thing is—

Yeah, what, did you get a loan to start it?

Yeah, uh, no, I didn't get a loan, but I got an invoice discounting facility.

Okay, I don't know what that is.

Okay, so it's— oh, is that—

oh, is that where— because it's contract, they pay stuff up front and then—

yeah, yeah, okay, okay.

So that cash flow, that's— that's cash flow.

Yeah, so it's called a CID facility. A lot of people start with like an IF facility where invoice factoring, where—

so is that like Sonovay?

Yeah, so I spoke to Sonovate, as most people do, but I mean, it was quite expensive.

Okay, uh, that's why you spoke to the bank.

Yeah, I wasn't trying to mug you off, mate, but no, no, no, you're right, like, it's cool. And anyway, the cost of borrowing is cheap and has been cheap for a long time, so the smart man wouldn't use his own money, right? He'd borrow it at a cheaper rate and, uh, and use it and make it, and make it work for itself at a higher rate. Okay, so I'd probably, even if I could self-fund contractors, I'd probably still borrow money from the bank.

Yeah, yeah.

Um, but I had to put a business plan.

Yes, to do that.

Yeah, but I kind of knew what I wanted to do. It was more about— and it was a nice, uh, kind of cathartic exercise and crystallizing my thoughts, right? Yeah.

Okay, so first year then. Yeah, how was that?

Uh, interesting.

So you went from obviously bidding really well. Yeah, interesting. What happened? What, what did you, um, build in the first year? Was it just you for the whole year?

Yeah.

So remember what you built in the first year?

Um, so it was less about billings and more around turnover and then working out NFI.

Okay, so NFI first year? Well, so we did, uh, just coming up to about $2 million in the first year.

Yeah, just over the first year.

Net fee income?

No, no, no, no, no, turnover in terms of the revenue.

Yeah, yeah. Okay.

Uh, and NFI, we're probably taking about 26%, 27% from that.

Okay. And that was just you?

That was just me, yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

Let's fucking break that down then, son. Yeah, how, how, like, what, how, um, I found a drive again, right? And was you doing this just at home or—

no, no, I got an office.

Okay.

So people can get advice and people can get a lot of advice from a lot of different people. Yeah, we spoke about this over lunch, right? But, but ultimately, you know, so I remember I was speaking to my dad about this and my dad was said, you know, you could just— you've got, you know, got a really nice house in Clifton, right? It's a nice part of Bristol and you could just sit upstairs and, and, and, and build and make money in a spare bedroom. And I said, yeah, but for me, like, I want an office. I want to be in an office. I don't want to do this upstairs because, hey, I have too many distractions, etc. So, um, yeah, I rented a small office in Queen Square in Bristol, sat there, uh, on my own, celebrated success on my own.

How was that?

Um, because, yeah, I was— it was, it was interesting, it was different. But starting from scratch, there's a real Uh, it's a real good feeling, right, to be able to create something from scratch again. And, um, and, and I think a lot of it— and there was a couple of naysayers as well, you know, to be honest, maybe that at my former business or other people to say, you know, it's very difficult to build your book back up when you talk about contractors, right? And that's why people sometimes stay, uh, and why companies offer retainers to get them out of the business because it's difficult to redo it. I just thought, well, look, if I could— if I can get to 60 out on my own then I'd do it again. And I remember one month, uh, you know, placed like 7 contractors in a month. Um, 2 of them were hosted by just ringing up a massive Japanese system integrator that people would probably guess, and, um, did a really good job with them on the phone and took a couple of contractors on, uh, payrolled them at like 18% margin. Uh, that helped me do a couple of deals. And yeah, just quick, right? Just, just quick.

But what did you say? What? So what So what was the, so how did you start building this up then? Was you just straight again doing what you're doing best, smashing the switchboards?

No, so you didn't need, I didn't need to smash the switchboards then because obviously I knew people.

You leveraged your network.

Yeah, I leveraged the network. But I'd like to say for the record, I uphold all my covenants, right? I was under a restricted covenant to not even work in recruitment for 6 months because I was a part of an ERNAT. I was on an EMI scheme as well.

Um, what did you do for 6 months?

I got bored, frankly. Yeah, I was kind of thinking about other things that I could do, other businesses, um, other ideas, you know. Like, I'd set up a, uh, fashion business back in 2014 as a bit of a side hustle. Um, yeah, because I could see all these like pop-up brands that were like, you know, making loads of money and like, and jeans and, you know, guys wearing super tight jeans that are basically jeggings and thinking like, you can make money out of this. But And then I kind of, I kind of thought, well, I want to, I want to focus on what I'm good at. I want to focus on, on building something for myself. So for 6 months, probably spent a lot of money, went on nice holidays and, um, and chilled out, but was eager to get back into it, but respected the fact that, um, you know, it was probably a good thing for me to take a bit of a break as well, right?

What was the biggest challenge in the first year then?

Biggest challenge?

I mean, look, 2 million first year.

Yeah.

That's great, right? So I mean, clearly someone that— I mean, you did it for someone else, let alone for yourself. You're gonna put in the work, had the drive.

Yeah.

What was the biggest challenge?

I think, yeah, so for me, the biggest challenge in the first year was understanding fact from fiction with regards to how to set up a business infrastructure, specifically in, in recruitment, right? Um, and again, this comes back to taking advice, knowing what deals to do, what banks, what back office.

Yeah.

Um, and it was set up an office in, in Amsterdam pretty quickly. Uh, yeah, within like 10 months, and we started dealing with Dutch lawyers and, um, you know, notaries, and, uh, you know, dealing with complicated situations.

Or you—

yeah, I was just fact-finding, right? And I guess, I guess that, you know, when I talk about recruitment, I talk about the fact that ultimately you need a computer and a phone. And I love that, you know, and I love the fact that sometimes you can just be, you know, skilled enough to be able to speak to people, obtain fact from fiction, and find out this information. So I just make lots of calls and find out what was right to do, what wasn't right to do. Um, so I guess the infrastructure, but I also found that quite fun, right? Because it was a new challenge. Yeah. To build the infrastructure and do things right. And as I say, we went for CID straight away rather than invoice factoring, which meant we weren't getting, you know, taken the mickey out of on our rates by companies like Sonovate and others. You know, it was a competitive landscape. I think for me, the overarching difficulty that I had at the start of the journey was internal recruitment, which—

You're hiring for yourself.

Yeah, and it's always ironic when you speak to customers because, uh, they kind of, uh, they kind of think that you should be really good at it. But equally, we're good at finding the people that we find in our marketplace, but not necessarily the people for us.

Yeah.

So I think, yeah, we made some hires, made some mistakes.

Well, in the first year you tried to hire people?

Yeah, yeah, pretty quickly.

Really? Yeah.

And I think—

so did you always want it to be bigger than just you then?

Oh, 100%. Yeah, like, yeah, I didn't want to be a lifestyle business.

You knew that from day one?

Yeah, absolutely. You know, the plan was to, to grow, uh, or the plan is to, is to grow, have an event, uh, and probably, um, form part of a larger organization. Yeah, which is why we're so niche in what we do. We don't want to just be a generalist technology company where there's so many of them. It's just like, where's your USP? What, what are you doing differently to everyone else?

So, um, the biggest challenge was Well, it was a new challenge was building the infrastructure, getting all the tools and things in place to help you scale then, because you clearly wanted to scale. And then it was actually hiring for yourself. All right, quick one then, just to wrap up that first year. Knowing what you know now, starting a recruitment business tomorrow, what tools should I definitely be looking at to invest in? So you said that, because obviously I don't get, don't fully understand the contract world. So the Sonovae and the other comparison that— So what are the tools I should definitely be looking at or look at investing in?

Okay, so I mean, it depends. So I'm quite contract heavy. Yeah, even though I've done permanent. Um, I think ultimately start off real light. You don't get sold the dream that you need super fancy websites, etc.

Yeah.

Um, you know, WordPress is super stable these days. It's secure. Uh, you can get a WordPress site up for £500 if you wanted to. Um, I'd arrange a good deal with a bank.

Yeah. Um, so what's the just pros and cons of that, just for people listening? For the— what— the way that you got it, so the way that you dealt with the bank over— yeah, like we're just using Sonova because they're a big brand, but like the factoring opinion there?

So I, I'd get a good broker.

Okay.

So there's a couple of well-known brokers out there that I know personally. Uh, they're incentivized to get you the best deal possible. They make, you know, commission fee, probably about a couple of thousand if they get you an agreement.

Yeah.

And a debenture over the business in order to do contract recruitment.

Okay.

And I would make sure that you're getting the most competitive deal possible. It's super competitive right now.

Yeah.

Uh, or has been for some time. You know, there's talk of the, the cost potentially rising because of obviously fluctuations in Well, not fluctuations because of Brexit, but that's all right. Yeah, I'd get a good deal with a bank and I'd start off small. Right. You, you spoke to Matt Collingwood, I think, at one point, and the line about headcount is vanity and bottom line is sanity is so apt because, you know, the first question that everyone asks you is, how big are you now? Yeah, you've got quite a few. Oh, everyone says that. Yeah. And it's, you know, it's the wrong question. The right question should be like, you know, what's the NFI?

Yeah.

You know, how is everyone billing? You know what people are up to speed with? You know, not how many people you are, because you could have 20 people, but 4 of them could be billing. It could be like, yeah, Pareto's law of 80/20, which normally is the case.

Yeah. Okay. Second year then. Yeah. How's that?

So second year was interesting because we moved from a small kind of 4-man office to a 10-man office.

Okay.

Started recruiting.

Yeah.

Bought in an ops manager early.

Really?

Yeah.

Why'd you do that?

Good question. I ask myself. No, I'm joking. I bought in an ops manager because I needed slightly more structure. And I think you have to, you have to think about your strengths and weaknesses. So I knew I was good at building, you know, business, sales and what have you. Um, but the biggest team I ever had at my old business was like 3 people, right? I never, I never ran massive teams. Um, and, and part— partly the reason for that is because I wanted to do it on my own. Yeah. But because I didn't have that experience of, uh, learning from lessons, um, that, uh, you know, that, that's something that maybe, maybe would have hindered me. So I brought in an ops manager at the time that was, uh, working at a company in Bristol called G2. Um, she was very good, helped put structure in place, etc. Um, and, um, yeah, so we did that, and then we started forging relationships with, um, good rec-to-recs that were providing trainees. I'd always had the, the thought that trainees were, were the right way to go. Yeah, you need new blood to grow a business, um, I personally feel, right?

Yeah.

And, um, You know, I've coined that phrase from, from Dean Kelly, actually. You know, he mentioned that to me once and, you know, absolutely fantastic guy in his own right. And I'm sure, you know, and I kind of felt that like, you know, with, with senior people, sometimes it can be 50/50. And if they're that good, why are they leaving or why they're not setting up their own business? You get a lot of journeymen in recruitment, people that pop around, and trainees don't know any better. And if you teach people 3 ways— the easy, medium, and hard way— they're going to go for the easiest way. So we started bringing in trainees, teaching them the hardest way. Um, but, but also when I say the hardest, right, it's not just the hardest because it's hard. I mean, yeah, it's the best way, right?

Yeah.

So, you know, selling, selling candidates to jobs with no interviews, immediate starts, trial starts. Yeah, clever stuff. Um, so that was year 2, and we had the end of year 2.

What did you get up to? And we'll— I'll ask you, what did— how did that impact the revenue and stuff? But so around the 2-year mark, what was you— how many people did you have working for you roughly?

Yeah, so there was a fair amount of attrition, um, because we had brought people on. And I think—

I like the honesty.

Yeah, well, you've got to be honest, right? Like, you know, people like numbers, right?

You know, so you see— yeah, you struggle with that. Why do you think that is? Because you had the auto person?

Yeah, so I think personally for me, like I'm quite, uh, I think I'm quite soft sometimes when it comes to people, right? Like, I see the good in people.

Yeah.

And, and I feel as though, um, I feel as though I can make them good.

Yeah.

Um, but what I was, what I was perhaps, um, wasn't fully aware of is that sometimes at trainee level, sometimes people just want a job, you know, and they'll say, they say anything. And, uh, you can sit down, you say, look, it's going to be hard work, it's going to be this, you're not going to get any success in 12 months, etc.

Yeah.

But putting myself back into trainee mode.

Yeah.

Um, people just living sometimes hand to mouth, right, at that point, and they just want a job. So, and I think the implications of actually how hard it is, yeah, and would be, um, turned a lot of people away.

Well, people start to realize that.

Yeah, people start to realize it early on, you know. And, um, you know, as a company, we, we're focused on building contract builders from scratch.

Yeah.

And, um, it takes a lot of hard work. Yeah, it takes a lot of hard work.

Yeah, it's not gonna— it's not gonna happen overnight.

Yeah. So a lot of companies focus on perm, um, or sometimes people dual desk. You know, we don't. We're doing things in a hard way, and, and to be honest, my opinion, probably the right way.

Yeah.

Um, but we want a core team of, of great people. And the word great is really interesting because I think these days it's okay to be good, right? And it's all right to come second.

Yeah.

But since when did that become acceptable, to not be fantastic at something?

Yeah.

It's like, you know, do you want to— do you want to be okay at something, or do you want to be fantastic at something?

Yeah.

And that's the main, uh, drive that I push forward with the business when I'm hiring people, is that, you know, I want— I want them to be fantastic. And, um, sadly, so, so go— yeah, so just going back to it, the second part, um, second year So we had some really good people join, and we, you know, unfortunately hired some people that didn't work out.

Yeah. How did this impact numbers?

So—

Do you remember what you did revenue? What did you do revenue?

I think we had steady growth, but not massively different. And I think, you know, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out the fact that, you know, good biller sets up company, does well, has a spike, first year revenue goes super high. You know, this is why these recruitment companies, and when you look fast-track companies in the UK, they're always so, so quick to grow because it's a service industry. There isn't a load of stock sat in a warehouse, right? You know, you can, you can go up super quick and you can have that year-on-year growth that compounds quickly. But for us, and at that time I became more managerial, less billing, so therefore we didn't—

took a hit.

Yeah, we didn't go super, super— we weren't logarithmic in terms of our, um, our billings and our turnover. But what, what I did do was teach me about really refining interview processes. Yeah. Knowing what to look for in people early on. And, you know, it could have been easy to take the, you know, the experience route and bring people in and let them carry on what they were doing. But, you know, for me, as I mentioned, you know, I really want fantastic people to do fantastic things.

Got high standards.

Yeah, high standards, I suppose, because, yeah, we don't want, you know, we don't as a business want to be a lifestyle business. We want to be known as being experts in what we do. And Paratus as a name means prepared, ready, and skilled. It derives from the Latin term, right? So you can't go into business where the whole mantra of the company is to be prepared, ready, and skilled and to do it half-soaked, right?

Yeah. So, so you, uh, so you, you've just hit year 4 now?

Oh, uh, so why— so financial year, probably— well, no, incorporation date was April 2016 to, to, so 20, so coming up, coming up. Yeah.

Okay, so just, just a quick one, just I guess sort of rounding off those two years. Yeah. What, like, advice, advice for people early on?

Yeah.

In them building, forming, having their own recruitment business that you wish you'd received?

Yeah. Okay. I think people spend too much time looking left and right and forget to look forward.

Okay.

Align yourself with people that are proven, that have walked it as well as spoken it. Yeah. There's a lot of people out there that give advice that haven't really done anything or maybe even started a company. From scratch and been through all of the hardship that that entails. So I would say focus on what you're good at, keep doing what you're good at, don't try to grow too quickly. And remember the fact that adding people for the sake of adding people is a bit of a mug's game, right? You know, focus on growing and developing people slowly but surely and maximizing everything that you can do early on and do that organically.

Okay. So is it fair to say then that obviously you're getting to the point now, or have been on a journey of, as you said, quite rightly said, year 1, it was just you smashing it out.

Yeah.

Obviously, which showed in the revenue. But, and then over the last year, 2 years, you've obviously now been transitioning into a role where it's your job to cultivate it, maximise the people that you bring into the business.

Yeah.

And also, I'm sure that also involves helping the business through your relationships and let's say feeding the people around you, right?

Yeah.

How, how— and that's good, that's going to be typical of a lot of recruitment business owners. How have you— because how many people you have now?

So, so as a core team here we have 11 plus I think we've got another person joining.

Yeah.

And we have an outsourced accounts team plus also advisors um, who do compliance, commercial, uh, a mentor, and a learning and development person. And we might be moving forward on a marketing person soon as well.

Oh nice, okay. So how, how have you, how have you personally found that transition? Um, because you're like not on the tools now.

I still, I'll still attend meetings.

I won't— but you're like, are you billing?

No, no. I— well, I've got a lot of house runners which keep the company going because they're—

so without— what that means is people, contractors that work with you for a very long time.

Um, either contractors that I had placed at some point during the journey of the company or that have migrated from people that have left the business and that go into house.

Okay. Um, so house run— is that what house runners mean?

Yeah, that's what we call house runners.

Yeah.

Um, but yeah, I think I'll still attend meetings. We were at Amazon yesterday.

Yeah.

Uh, we've got a big meeting tomorrow with a, uh, 40 billion £1 million a year turnover company.

Oh wow. Um, so you're still involved in helping the people around you?

Yeah, I really want to help the people, right? You know, I really want to help my guys. You know, I say if you put 100% effort in, I'll put 200% in. I know it sounds like a cliché, but I really mean it. Like, we have always-on WhatsApp groups, you know. Um, I live 15 minutes from the office. If people want to come in and talk about something, I'm there. I, I can afford to do that right now. I don't, I don't have children, you know, I'm a single guy and I wouldn't want anyone ever saying that they didn't get enough support from us. Yeah, because that's, you know, that would be, that would be my nightmare, right? And nothing that I would want to— I wouldn't want someone to feel. So I put a lot of effort into that training development. You know, we're, as I mentioned over lunch as well, we're interviewing— well, we're not interviewing, we're potentially going to have a a learning and development person join us a couple of days, uh, a month that was very senior, uh, at es free. And, uh, yeah, pouring a lot of money into that and, and to people in general.

It's really— yeah, offering. Okay, so how— so how would— what are some of the key things that you think you've done in this business and grown this business that you've done that has enabled your, your people out there to, to, yeah, get, get to the standards or continue performing at the standards you want them to? Like, how have you got— how do you think you've got the best out of your people?

Um, so I think there's a fine line between being someone's mate and being someone's boss.

Yeah.

Um, and I think that you always have to walk that line carefully, especially in the size that you're at as well. Yeah, yeah. And it's—

I would say my— yeah, my boss, which similar size, 12 of us. Yeah, it's like you would— I view him as a bit of— I view him as a mentor, really. But I get, I get that.

Yeah.

Especially when you're a smaller business, right?

Yeah, I think, I think you have to— yeah. So, so to answer that question, so I think you have to be seen as a fairly aspirational figure.

Of course, you know, people want to look up to someone, lead them by the front.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. You know, being there in the trenches with your team. Um, and I think, you know, for me, it's sitting with people, it's jumping in on calls, listening on calls, being able to help, being always on, and treading that thin line as well between putting people in the deep end and seeing if they can swim. Right. But also being able to give them some support when they need it because you don't want to be too over the top because it becomes arbitrary that the advice that you're given is that people will wait for you to come and sort it.

Yeah, that's what I was going to say. Yeah.

Yeah.

So you become a bit of a comfort blanket.

Absolutely. Yeah. And that, and that can be the case. And, and, you know, that, that, that is a difficult balance to meet.

Yeah. Um, but especially in this, this size you are currently.

Yeah.

Because you're so accessible.

Yes. Yeah. And that's, that's a really, that's a really good question, um, really good phrase, right? It's accessibility. Yeah. So you don't want to be seen as someone that you can just answer straight away because you need people to fact-find. So go back to the question you said about when I started the company and what, what did I do. And I said, well, I was fact-finding, right? I was being a recruiter. I was calling people. I was making informed decisions. You know, if you want to know something, you speak to fine people and you take the mean answer from what they say, right? You know, um, and I think that's the same for my guys, is that, you know, you want them to be able to do this themselves. And so they can come to me and say, hey Tom, right, like, I've looked at the training material, I've gone online, I've YouTubed it, I've Googled it, I've spoken to some colleagues, what do you think? Not, Tom, what do you think?

Yeah, yeah, like, yeah, trying to get the answer out of you straight away.

Yeah. And you, and you could argue that it's efficient, right? And some of them are probably, probably, you know, quick enough to say that, but equally it's not helping them in the long term.

Okay. So you, and then how's the journey been for you personally? Like you started this business on your own, right?

Yeah.

I've spoken to a lot of people that, who started their business on their own and advice to people would be like really consider doing it with another person. Like how has the journey been for you on an individual basis? How have you found it?

Yeah, it's, it's been tough. I think at the start it's been tough. It's quite, it's quite draining.

Yeah.

Uh, I think people that say it doesn't take over your life are probably lying somewhat. Um, I purposely started on my own because I've seen many companies that have set up with two founders.

Yeah.

Who have ultimately fallen out.

Yeah.

Um, also for me, starting a business and owning 50% of it didn't really make sense from where I was as an individual in terms of the return.

Yeah, the commission structure.

Yeah. So because I was on, you know, a high commission structure in the past, you know, it didn't really make sense.

Yeah, that makes sense. I get that.

Yeah.

But like, how have you found navigating this journey on your own? Because that's definitely a challenge, right?

Yeah, it's a challenge. I think you have to be really clued up about how you spend your time, with what, with who. And regimental and thick-skinned, right? There's, you know, there's nights where, you know, you can worry about stuff. And I think ultimately it's being able to talk to someone.

Yeah. Who have you been able to talk to?

So, yeah, as I mentioned to you, we're part of a peer group, part of the RSC. Met some good friends from there, being able to talk to people about similar issues. How much has that helped? It helped me quite a lot, to be honest with you. And I'm pretty open about that. I'm an open type of guy, right? I think within, within any peership group, um, or networking forum that you can go to— and I've tried a few in the past, non-recruitment and recruitment specific— you know, there's always again skepticism over the agenda and why people want to be there. But it's as much as you want to get out of it. And it's, it's quite nice meeting people that are in the same position as you, right? But for me, it was important to drive and get a number 2. And because obviously we, you know, we offer, you know, a fantastic commission scheme. I mentioned it, but it goes up to 45% on what you bill.

Really?

Yeah, it's like crazy and it's really good. But I'm happy to do that, right? Because for me, I don't want to give another reason for someone to go elsewhere.

Yeah.

And I want people to be super, super happy. So I've been able to develop a number 2 through that.

Okay.

Who, uh, I can work with, who then I can release equity to potentially down the line, right? Rather than it being a hard and fast, you own 50% of the business. Yeah. So coming, coming back directly to answer your question, I think it might be easier at the start, but I think ultimately long term you'd probably wish that it was just you.

And then how have you— obviously you're in a peer group, which helps, but like just for people, because I think a lot— and this has come up even from like a billing perspective. I was speaking about this with someone yesterday that You can so easily just— you could be sitting in an office right now.

Yeah.

Struggling with something and just not, just, just not making the decision to ask for help.

Yeah.

It sounds really simple.

Yeah.

But just a lot of people won't. So I guess, like, how have you personally found as a business owner when you've reached out to people for help or whatever it may be? Like, how is that— what's your— been your typical experience of that for people that may be a bit worried about reaching out to people and getting rejected and stuff like that?

I think it boils down to the fact that in early, early training that people are given or what have you, the most common thing that people say when they pick up a phone and speak to a client or a customer is, I wonder if you can help. And, you know, people naturally want to help people.

Yeah.

You know, you know, people ask you for directions in the street. You don't necessarily send them on a wild goose chase. Face, right? Unless you're a bit weird.

Yeah, that's true.

So I think naturally people will want to help, they want to guide people, and they understand that people are in similar situations. So I think for me it's a case of aligning yourself with the right people.

Yeah.

And still people come to me, you know, I had a question, uh, today from a mate of mine that works in my old company asking me about, you know, German legislation and what have you, and I was able to provide that help. Um, and it's quite nice that people, you know, come to you for that, for that advice. But again, it's aligning yourself with the right people, taking advice from the right— yeah, and experts that are in their field, right? And, um, you know, it's not, it's not, it's not hard to work out. You speak to, you speak to a variety of types of people, and then you get a gut feel on who you can work with, who's right, who's saying the same things, and just having a good black book of contacts.

Yeah. So you've obviously, from what I understand about your business, you've obviously, you operate a lot in the EU.

Yeah.

So because how much business do you do in the UK?

So traditionally it was small, it was like 10%. Yeah. Um, and then we won a pretty major account with Sky Television.

Yeah.

Um, and started doing quite a lot more work with them.

Um, people, people with obviously the, the, but yeah, the obviously, um, the political environment now. Yeah. All that, like Obviously you're clearly very experienced in working in these types of markets.

Yeah.

Any learnings there that if someone's looking to break into these markets that, yeah, you can share?

Uh, yeah, I think it's, I think it's cultural. I think you need to understand your marketplace.

Yeah.

Um, from a Brexit perspective, uh, as soon as the referendum happened, I applied for my Irish passport.

Yeah. Um, I need to do that.

Yeah, get on it, right?

Yeah, I need to do that.

You need to quick. They might say no now, right?

Really?

Yeah, well, I don't know, maybe. But yeah, so many Irish passports actually came out.

Yeah, off the back of that. Yeah, that makes sense.

Um, so I think you— I think you need to, to try and, um, incorporate yourself in, in country where possible.

Yeah.

So our terms are indicative and reflective of where we are doing business.

Okay.

So, uh, we don't do business in the Netherlands under UK terms. We do it under the court courts of, of the Netherlands, and under, under, instead of under the courts of the UK. And, you know, I would say 90% of the business in the UK that are doing work in the EU are doing it under their UK business, which is in theory the wrong thing to do, because if you ever have any challenging situations and what have you, it can be difficult to pursue debt.

Yeah, make those stand, like, yeah, that makes sense.

Yeah, so, um, so set yourself up to be future-proof. And speak to the right people, and where possible, get an Irish passport, and then you're an EU citizen.

So what I'd love to ask you is a couple of questions. I might actually— well, actually, one thing, actually. Yeah, because you've been really open and honest. How— this is one of the things I write down because it's definitely something that business owners will definitely think about, like how much, like, of a— so what I write down here is like how much of a on a hit, wait, how do I type this? So how much will your profits take a hit? Or how much should I prepare for my profits to take a hit? Should I plan for when hiring, like when trying to grow my business? Have you got any thoughts on that? 'Cause you try, does that make sense? So in the sense— So if I'm listening right now and I'm like, right, over the next 2 years, I want to aim to hire this amount of people, right?

Yeah.

How, like in terms of profit-wise or, revenue-wise, how much should I prepare to take a hit on that? Do you get what I mean?

Yeah.

From your experience.

So I think, I think it depends on the nature of the business.

Of course.

I think if you're permanent, you need to be putting money away for a rainy day.

Yeah.

And I think people talk about 3-6 months worth of cash in the bank.

3 to 6 months of running costs.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, if you look at some big perm businesses and you look at the directors, you speak to the directors, they always say they're 6 months from going bankrupt, right? Because if they're permanent, it's you only as good as your last month.

Yeah.

And you can replicate that by the number of employees that you have. I think if it's contract, it's all about the headroom that you have with the facility at the bank.

Okay.

Ultimately, I think, you know, to answer your question logically is don't run before you can walk.

Okay.

You know, take on people, make sure they're billing, get them up to you know, if it's contract, get them up to £2,500 a week.

Yeah. All right. So you've got some hiring sort of metrics.

Yeah, it's about when to hire and hiring points. So if you've got a good finance person, we've got a great finance person, you have a cash flow and a forecast and you can inject hiring points into that.

Nice.

So you can actually work out exactly when you need to hire.

So hiring triggers.

Yeah, hiring triggers.

That's a better way, isn't it?

Absolutely. In fact, I think that's actually what they call it.

Is it?

Yeah.

So you work that. So what, so on a contract?

Sam, you already know this. You already know this, right?

Hiring triggers. Let's just share that. I think that's really valuable. So on the— obviously, again, obviously relevant to each person's business, but from your experience, what's been a typical good hiring trigger for you?

So I think it's when you know that someone is going to be standalone, so they understand the value of the business.

Yeah.

Um, And that's quite an interesting metric actually to talk about that because it's actually— there's a book called Gung Ho, right?

And a lot of people have read Jamie Fraser.

Oh, did it? Yeah, that's, that's because his dad probably told him to read it because, yeah, Gary said that and it's actually a really good book, to be honest. And Jamie's a nice guy.

Yeah. So in that book.

So yeah, so in that book, I think they say something like enthusiasm is, is equal to the mission multiplied by cash, and congratulations.

Oh wow, okay, that's an interesting equation.

Yeah, so what that essentially means is, uh, you know when to go again when that person is enthusiastic. And, uh, you know, for want of a better phrase, if you cut them, they would bleed the company, right?

Okay, I got it.

And I think once you got to that point and you know that they're billing, that's a hiring trigger. That's a hiring trigger. And you could probably do it a little bit earlier, right?

I mean, you don't have to necessarily—

you've got a for business use of knowing it. And I think perhaps, um, you know, your, your hiring triggers should come from your team leads in the future, I would say, once they, uh, can predict when people are going to start doing well.

Yeah, nice.

Um, in order to go again, because you want to go again, you want to go again.

And you said getting your, getting your, your recruits up to like 2.5K a week.

Yeah. Is a good sort of roundabout desk cost, right?

Yeah.

So desk costs can range from, you know, free 3K up to— I've seen desks cost above 10 grand, 15 grand even, right?

Yeah.

Which is a lot of money.

Yeah.

And that's everything from the lights.

So getting up to that desk being covered is—

that's a good time to be looking at who else can be in there. Profit. And on a growth trajectory, you know, they need to be on a growth trajectory, not a downward trajectory. Yeah.

Yeah. Um, I like that.

Yeah. And I think when you, when you get in there early and you can just keep— and you keep doubling down on the hiring from that and looking what's good Driving internal referrals and things like that, you know, incentivizing your people to do that.

Okay, mate. Couple of questions on resilience.

Go for it.

First one.

Yeah.

What does resilience in recruitment mean to you?

From a consultant perspective, it's, it's knowing that you're going to get no'd a lot and, you know, people talk about 6 nos to get a yes, right? You have to be thick-skinned. You have to know that someone came before you and someone will come after you. So how do you differentiate yourself and how do you stay resilient and tough to people not wanting to talk to you? I mean, that's tough for people.

Yeah.

You know, it's tough to ring someone and for people's tone to be off and, and abrasive. Abrupt and want to get you off the phone. That's— then that's the mark of resilience as a consultant. From a business owner perspective, yeah, um, it's, it's taking the highs and the lows, seeing the long-term vision of what you're trying to do, what you're trying to create, knowing that, you know, there's going to be dark days and there's going to be bright nights or whatever, right? Or the other way around.

Yeah.

And, um, Yeah. And I think being resilient and being tough and, you know, nothing, nothing good happens overnight, really. So answer your question.

Yeah. How, how has the importance or need for resilience changed as the industry has evolved?

So the industry has evolved. Yeah, it's certainly evolved. So as I mentioned, and it's probably a nice link that recruitment in its traditional sense is dying, if not dead.

Yeah.

In fact, we try and remove recruitment from all our literature because it's all about solutions, augmented solutions, embedding your talent on-site, outsource, in-house approaches, talent acquisition as a service, loads of different ways in which you can wrap things up in bundles and productization.

Yeah.

And there's some people doing some super smart things around it, right? And the Brazilian side of that is that the fact that you need to, uh, you know, you need to be up to speed with the changes and you need to be resilient to know that the old methods, uh, may be changing and maybe dying. And of course saturation, right? It's— there's big— I mean, I don't know the official stats, but it's something about 41,000.

It's a lot.

Yeah, there's a lot. I quite like that. A lot of people don't like it. A lot of people think, oh, crikey. But I think, you know, there's a lot of bad companies out there.

Yeah.

And you need, you need bad companies to make good companies look good.

Okay. What can people do themselves to instill more resilience in themselves or their teams?

Um, so to instill resilience, I think goes back down to basics.

Yeah.

So in a team or a team lead or a business owner, depending on the size of the business. So for me, yeah, I would go back down to why someone joined.

Yeah.

And go back through the job spec and go back through actually the attributes that we were looking for, the power of communication, the power of influence, and saying, are you showing these traits? Are you, are you still doing these things? And, um, and to reinforce the fact that, you know, people agreed to do this and that they knew it was going to be tough. And to go back to basics with training, with what they're doing, and to instill the fact that, you know, it's, uh, your show is called A Recruitment Roller Coaster, right?

Yeah.

You know, and I think that people need to be aware that it is a roller coaster.

Yeah. But, but get back to get back to basics to help you out. Oh yeah, that makes sense. What about, what about from your perspective cultivating that in people? Is it the same sort of—

I think so. Yeah, I think, I think it's about back to basics. I think it's about, you know, being pragmatic with your situation, knowing that everything will be all right in the end. And if it isn't, it isn't the end. Um, keep focusing on, you know, where you've been successful in the past and analysis of that, right? A lot of people analyze bad situations, but they never analyze good situations.

Yeah. So you just look at the bad stuff that's gone.

Yeah. I mean, people draw a meeting when things go wrong, right? When you draw a meeting when things go right. Yeah. So the resilience element is about really plugging away and saying, yeah, it is going to get bumpy. Yeah, there's going to be turbulence on the way, right? But you can go through it. And as long as you equip yourself with the basics, basics, yeah, I like that, then you'll get through.

Okay, before I ask you the last question, sure, what, what are you, uh, what's Tom White excited about? What's going on in, uh, 2020 and beyond, mate? What are you excited about?

Um, what, from a personal work perspective?

Either.

Either, right? Okay. Uh, so I think for me, right, 2020 is a big year. It's like 2020 vision, all of this stuff. Yeah, new decade, all that jazz, right? I think For me, it's about really cementing the business about where I want to go. Yeah, we've got some super exciting projects happening, big meetings. I've got a meeting later on this month about running a task solution for literally hundreds of engineers and how we're going to, going to do that, how we're going to handle some growth. I think, you know, recruitment is evolving, you know, into, into 4.0, right? And the very market that we recruit within. And I think it's going to be an interesting time and I think it's booming right now. There's going to be a downturn at some point and a lot of people become rich in downturns, right? And I think you have to be clever. So I'm quite looking forward to that. I'm quite looking forward to being a survival of the fittest.

Yeah.

Going back to basics. Maybe I'll pick up the phone again. I don't know.

Yeah.

And I guess for myself personally, I think I think it's about being able to find a better balance this year as well. Right. And having a, having a good team around you, knowing that the bulk of the billings and the bulk of what keeps the company going isn't necessarily derived from what I had done.

Yeah.

And that's, that's a lovely feeling. And seeing people hit milestones and where they want to be. You know, one of our guys has just bought, you know, a big Range Rover. Right. And it's, and it's wicked to see, right? You're like, yeah, we weren't lying to you. Like, like, you know, you can actually do this. You go right back to what got me into recruitment. Someone talking about £120,000 a year, and it's like, they'll actually see some of my team buy expensive cars or nice things or stuff that they want.

Yeah.

So, so lots more of that in 2020, basically.

Yeah. Senior guys and gals do well.

Yeah. Seeing them do well, um, I've seen how the industry evolved, right, and seeing what happens and being, being prepared for it at every step.

So last question.

Yeah.

Ask everyone on this show. So if you could, uh, communicate to every single recruiter out there, business owner, they'd take on Tom's advice, they'd listen, they'd implement it tomorrow— it could be a phrase, sentence, a word— what are you telling the people?

So, uh, for anyone involved in our industry, recruiters, couldn't—

business owners, whatever comes to mind, what would you say to these people?

Um, I'd say remember why you got into this. I like that, you know.

Remember why you got into the industry.

Yeah, do you know what, I could elaborate more on it, but I think that's enough.

Yeah, that is enough. Remember why you got into the industry.

Yeah.

Tom, it's been a pleasure, mate.

Thank you so much.

Thank you. All right.