John Jonas makes the case for hiring inexperienced workers, who can become loyal and cost-effective if given training. He points to long-term hires like Joven as proof and notes that today's newbies arrive with better internet and software skills than before.
Questions this episode answers
Episode 170.
2005.
Around 2008 (speaker said "I think 2008").
Around 2006–2007 (speaker said "I think I hired Paulo in 2006, 2007").
About 5 or 6 trainings (speaker said "We have like 5 or 6 of trainings").
Chapters
Welcome to the Secret Sauce of Outsourcing podcast that's dedicated to making you better at outsourcing. This is episode 170, the case for Hiring Newbie Workers. So I've done a lot of hiring over the years. I've hired a lot of experienced people and I've hired a lot of newbie people. And I get that everyone wants to hire someone experienced. I understand why it makes sense. An experienced ofs gives you like work done right away. Probably they require less training and onboarding. Usually they give you a faster roi. In theory. It doesn't always work out that way. Some of the best people that I have on my team, I hired them as complete newbies, like they didn't have any experience. They hardly knew how to do anything. But they're some of the most hardworking, loyal people that I have and they do an amazing job for me. Take the OnlineJobs PH manager Joven. When I hired him, he knew nothing. And his English wasn't even that great. Today his English is amazing. I can ask him to do anything I want. He'll get it done. He's so dang good. And that's why I encourage people to have an open mind when hiring. So very often experienced people are quite a bit more expensive than new people. And that's to be expected, right? But there's been a lot of times where I've hired someone who was new, who, who was very eager to learn, very quick to learn, very smart, and they end up progressing to being similar to that experienced person really fast. And then they're doing it the way that I want it done, not the way that they think that someone else says that it should be done. So in addition to that, it's really interesting. When I first started this man people, there was so little experience in the Philippines and they knew very little. And today that's not the case. Most people that you'll hire will have significant Internet experience. They will have had classes on Google Docs and all of Microsoft's Office suite. They'll know these things. A lot of them will have some basic programming, They've taken programming classes. There's just a lot of knowledge today compared to when I started, when they knew nothing and I had to teach every single thing. So a newbie person today is not the same as the newbie people that I was hiring when I first started. So if you're putting off hiring because you're worried that you won't find the most experienced person, reconsider that. Just post a job and see what you get. You may find that, oh, man, I just found a really awesome experienced person. Yeah, I'm gonna hire this person. Or I have a couple people here that I can tell. They're really eager, they're smart. I like the way they respond to me. I get along with them. I can spend a little bit more effort. They're so much less expensive than the really experienced person. Then they're going to be really good really quickly. And you can tell that very often when you start to interview people and just by posting your job, you'll get those applicants. This is also the reason why we created VA's made easy, so that if you hire someone new, you can give them training and bring them up to speed really, really quickly. Just so you know, if you hire an experienced person, you still have to provide them training because they expect it. They expect training. You still have to bring them into your business. You still have to explain how this thing, whatever it is, fits in your business. You have to give them all the access. There's still, it's just not that much more work when working with someone new than working with someone experienced. Typically, often there is like, you don't want to hire an inexperienced programmer. You don't want to hire an inexperienced or a poor designer. And you know, new, new designers can still be really, really good. You don't want to hire an inexperienced sales copywriter. That's just not a very good idea. So there are certain things where you want experience for sure, but then a lot of time, like lead generation, man, it's just not that hard to hire someone and teach them how you do lead generation in your business, or it's not that hard to provide them. Lead generation training at VA is made easy. We have like 5 or 6 of trainings that will help your OFS generate leads with LinkedIn or with Pinterest or with paid ads or a whole bunch of different things that we have. In the end, both me and I've talked to a lot of employers who were really glad that the people that they hired were great newbies. They become very loyal to you. You educate them and they'll. I mean, man, Joven's worked for me since 2005 and Juneelo has worked for me since, I think 2008. And Julia and Jessica and Paulo, man, I think I hired Paulo in 2006, 2007, maybe still works for me today. And you get people that aren't super experienced and they just become really, really loyal. And you'll create really great relationships with them. And it's a really good situation. Anyway. Give it a try. Reconsider if you're just willing. If you think you just need an expert, reconsider that. Maybe you could get some stuff off of your plate and get some really good work done with an inexperienced worker.
