Effective Recruitment Doesn't Have to Be Hard

You know, you spend thousands on job ads. You spend weeks reviewing resumes and you sat through interviews only to hire someone who's gone before their very first anniversary. Or worse, they stay and they underperform. What if the real problem isn't the people applying but how you're attracting them in the first place. And that's what we're talking about today on Marc Haine Live. Welcome to this episode! I'm so glad that you are here with me for Marc Haine Live. This is where small business owners and entrepreneurs develop new skills to help them create the jaw-dropping, show-stopping experience that your customers and your employees deserve. I am your host, Customer and Employee Experience Strategist Marc Haine. And I'm really glad that you're tuning in today because my guest for this episode is CEO of HR Kyle Services, Kyle Patrick Smith. And today, we are going to flip the hiring game altogether. We're going to flip it onto its head because we're diving into how your brand Your people skills and your mindset could be the difference between attracting top talent or repelling them like a garlic necklace at a vampire party. My one ask is that if you know anybody who could use this information, please make sure you share a link to this episode. And for goodness' sake, please make sure that you subscribe to this podcast. We're on our way to getting 2,000 subscribers. So, I'd love you to be one of them if you're not already. And Heck, invite your friends because it's free. And hopefully, you'll notice very quickly the quality of the podcast, the topic, the guests are stellar. We all know hiring is hard. But what if it's not supposed to be? What if the problem isn't the resumes, or the job boards, or even the candidates? What if the real problem is your approach. Because I hate to tell you, your next great hire isn't scrolling the job boards. They're watching how you show up in the world. I know that you want to vet your candidates. But the candidates are also vetting you. And if your employer brand looks like a stack of dusty policies and outdated job postings, I could tell you the good ones, they've already moved on. And that brings us to our Question of the Day. What is your current recruiting process really saying about your business? Is it repelling the very talent that you're trying to attract? I'd love for you to be part of this conversation. Why don't you go ahead and share a link to this episode on your favorite social media platform. Hashtag it #ExperienceLeadership. Put your comments down and be part of this conversation. This is where the magic happens. Go ahead and do it.

Come on, I know you can.

As I mentioned, my guest today is Kyle Patrick Smith, CEO of HR Kyle Services. With over 25 years in corporate HR, Kyle has seen it all. From the early days of online recruiting to today's employer branding revolution, he's helped companies cut costs, attract top talent, and transform hiring into a strategic advantage. As you will soon see, Kyle is on a mission to guide business leaders through the evolving world of work because he says, HR is the brand today. Kyle, welcome to the show. It's so great to have you.

Well, Marc, great to be here. I'm excited about having this conversation with you and having your audience tune in and be a part of this.

It's going to be a ball. I have a sneaking suspicion we're going to have a lot of fun today. Before we get too deep into today's topic, could you just tell everybody a little bit about who your clients are and how you serve them?

Yeah, great question. So, our typical client is somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 employees to roughly about 250 employees, most often in the manufacturing sector, supply chain logistics, technology, nonprofit, and academia as well. They're an organization that may have HR resources. But they're looking to take their talent management and talent acquisition to the next level.

Gotcha. And so, they call you in when they're having recruitment problems? Or are you training HR managers? What are your roles when they call you up?

You know, great question. It's going to be somewhere to where they see an opportunity or a gap relative to talent acquisition, talent management. So, that gap could be process. It could be people or some combination thereof.

Okay, wonderful. So Kyle, my background I mentioned just before we went live. My background has been in hospitality. And I know that as an entrepreneur, a lot of people don't have HR people working for them. So, I understand that not everybody's been trained on how to do proper hiring processes.

But why as a global whole, why is recruiting still such a hit-or-miss process for Well, a lot of it is the process that we currently use doesn't lend itself well to being successful. And here's what I mean by that. Typically, what you will see is an organization has an opening. They post it online. People apply. And they go through that list of all the people that have applied to see who they think might be the right choice. So, there's not a whole lot of science to that. It's a lot of luck. It's a lot of arts maybe here and there. A lot of it is throwing stuff up against the wall and seeing what sticks. And as we both know, when you take that kind of haphazard approach, you can't really expect the results to be very good.

And so, one of the challenges that I see is that there's an awful lot of software out there now that does like pre-screening of resumes when people put resumes through it. How is this a handicap? Is this a good tool to be using? Where are you as far as that's concerned?

Yeah, great, great question. So first off, let's never forget that all of this is about people.

Mm-hmm.

And anything that takes us away from that is either a distraction or a tool. But it's never going to replace this interaction like you and I are having right now. And let's face it, we could certainly get together and get to know each other by exchanging emails or having some system set up where we ask each other 20 questions and so on. But isn't it much more effective And quite frankly, more enjoyable if we're interacting like this. And we'll spend some quality time here together today, 30 minutes to 45 minutes. We're going to know each other really well. We never would have gotten to that point had we solely relied on a system to act as this ping pong ball bouncing back and forth.

In those systems, and I didn't really want to talk too much about this, but this is just out of pure curiosity because in these systems, It's set up with constraints with some ideas around deliverables. So for instance, somebody needs a bachelor's or somebody needs 5 years of experience. Are we handicapping really finding the best people when we're putting those kinds of constraints into place?

Yeah, great question and very good point. Systems again, as we all know, they're only as good as we program them, right? But systems also have limitations. So to your point, systems work really well because they're based upon this concept of 0s and 1s, right? And but what if the answer is really 2 or 3 or 4? Well, it's the same point when we think about these parameters. Maybe in some cases, someone having a bachelor's degree and 2 years of experience is good. But maybe in another case, it's high school diploma and 5 years of experience. And again, programming a system to understand that complexity, it's certainly possible. But it's much more difficult to do. So again, to your point, we are hampering our process to say, well, let's see how easily we can define this. Well, when we do that, we inevitably screen people out who could very well be a wonderful fit.

I've seen people apply for jobs that on the onset, according to the resume, they didn't look like they're fit. But because their value systems and the skill sets were so intact and so wonderful that it was like, Wow! You know, they have the right attitudes. They have the right value systems. And now, all we need to do is train them with the skills.

Exactly. And you and I both know the easiest thing to do is to train someone that already has the God-given skills or whatever we want to call them, the skills that you can't teach. If they already have those, we can teach them how to do the job and do it well.

Yeah, it's really interesting because I was talking with a food supplier. here in our market. And we were talking about the difference between hard skills and soft skills training, right? We can train hard skills. This is how you turn on the computer. This is how you take orders. This is how you submit the orders. This is how you follow, right? But the soft skill ones become the ones where we have to invest. We either have to invest more time into the individual or they need to have those, as you call them, God-given skills.

Right. And I think to your point as well, organizations that tend to struggle with a lot of this are the ones that try to legislate these soft skills. So they put in strict policies around attendance and, and productivity and absenteeism and so on, rather than saying, let's hire people that we know are going to show up, and they're going to show up on time, and they're quick at learning, and they want to learn new skills. Let's hire for that. And then train for all these other things because they've got the things that we can never train for. And then guess what? We're managing better performers rather than low performers at that point. Right, right.

So, in a nutshell, what would you say is the most expensive mistake you see companies making when they're hiring?

I'm going to sum it up with a statement I use often. The biggest mistake is the organizations that look at talent acquisition as transactional. And it's what I described earlier. Have opening, post it online, accept candidates, hire from that list. That's the most costly and biggest mistake. And as you'd probably imagine, it is the most common mistake that's made.

Now, I know that a lot of people, as I mentioned at the very beginning, a lot of people, especially small businesses, they've never been trained to hire properly. They get a resume in. I don't know. Okay, I'll use my background, which is hospitality. They want to hire a cook. They see an application for a cook. The guy's got 3 years experience at some big brand. And they say, okay, let's bring him in. And they miss out on doing certain things like reference checks, which I just think is like a free consulting service with somebody who's already dealt with this person. But they don't do reference checks. They don't do proper protocols when it comes What are some telltale signs that a company's recruiting process is broken?

Well, I think anywhere where they're not seeking to understand and build a relationship with their candidates. And think about this for a second. What you described there only comes into play when we talk about hiring. We don't buy our homes that way. We don't buy our cars that way. We don't get married that way. No other very important decision do we make on that process other than hiring, which we've already deemed is the most important thing that an organization can do? How many organizations you hear about that say, our people are our most important asset? But it's not. They put more thought into replacing a machine or picking a janitorial service than they do hiring their next valuable employee.

I love that you said that because in my sphere, your customers, the diners, are actually doing more research on your restaurant than you are on the cooks you're hiring for your position.

Exactly!

Like everybody's checking reviews and going through and scrolling through reviews.

And think about this. The customer is choosing the restaurant that has the most reviews, the best things that are said about them. Well, why wouldn't we do the same thing as it relates to hiring our cooks? So, Why wouldn't we be recruiting at the restaurants that have really good food and they score really high? Well, I'll tell you what. People that recruit for me, guess where they go when they're looking for a good cook? They go to places where good cooks are found.

Yes, yes. And again, what you mentioned, the whole thing about the relational side of our business now, this is what's really defining true culture. I mean, if you can't take time to actually meet with people properly and actually investigate and invest time in that recruiting process, then how much time are you going to invest in coaching and supporting them once you do bring them on board?

Exactly. And Marc, I'll go one step further. I'm always recruiting. So, I'm gonna give you a quick example and this hits directly home. Earlier today, we had a person that spent some time with us here in the business. She is someone that I've known now for 8 years. And I met her when I was on the corporate HR side. But when I meet good people, I always remember them. And I make sure that I stay in contact and so on. Well, she's all set to join us here in the next week as our Client Success Manager. I've been interviewing her, so to speak, since the first time I ever met her. So, I tell the organizations I work with, these are relationships. When I'm out somewhere and I meet somebody that provides really good service or they seem really sharp at what they do, I always give them a business card and I say, hey, if you're ever looking for an opportunity or you just like to talk, Let's connect. Because that's where we find good people. And again, you know this as well as anybody. The truest indicator of future performance is past performance in the same or a similar situation.

Hmm.

So, to your example again, as a cook, if I go to a restaurant and consistently that food's really good, you know what I know? If that cook changes restaurants, he's going to be a really good cook at that next restaurant.

I'd like you to repeat that indicator, please.

OK. The best indicator of future performance is past performance in the same or similar situation. So we use that concept on the recruiting side. We also coach all of our clients to think, or excuse me, our candidates to think in that way as well. And where that manifests itself from a candidate standpoint is when you are in an interview, you always tell stories to answer the questions. So, if Marc is interviewing me and Marc asks, well, Kyle, you know, how do you typically handle stressful situations? You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to tell Marc a story about a stressful situation that I had to work through in my previous job and how that all played out.

Mm-hmm.

Because now Marc knows this guy really does know how to handle stressful situations because when he had one, this is what he did. And guess what? That's exactly what I would hope he would do. Because here's what we know. When Kyle encounters that stressful situation again, guess what process he's more than likely going to follow? The same one he followed before.

And what I like about that is it forces us as the hiring manager, forces us to get curious and ask better questions. We're not saying, hey, you worked as a police officer. Did you ever have— you must have handled stress. And they go, oh yes, I did. Great! And so, you must handle it really well. I mean, you were 3 years on the force. And they're like, yes!

Exactly. And I always use the joke. I always say, who's going to say no in that example? No, Marc, I'm sorry. I'm terrible at stress. And I like what you said there because that's how I coach my recruiters. Be curious. The first question I ask in every interview, and you'll love this. I've got the person's resume in front of me. The first question I ask is, Marc, I've got your resume here in front of me. I can see where you've worked and when you worked there. But why don't you tell me the story behind the resume? Why did you change jobs? What made you drawn to that company and understand that role? Because that's ultimately what I want to hear. And to your point, I'm curious. Just like I also coach my interviewers, if they see something on the resume that's a red flag, hey, the person's been out of work for 6 months, or they only stayed at that employer a short period of time, ask that question. Marc, I noticed here, you know, in one of your stops, you were only there for a short time.

Right.

Let's talk about that a little bit. And you know what I may find out? It wasn't a good fit. Here's why it wasn't a good fit. He didn't have good leadership. He wasn't trained well. So, I'm not making any assumptions on the resume.

I'm, to your point, I'm being curious. I had to explain that because my mother had cancer and she was dying, right?

Been there and done that.

I find that when we see the gaps because I've sat just like you. I've sat with supervisors as we go through resumes. And people are like, oh well, they haven't worked in 6 months so they're a loser. It's like, wait a second.

No!

You can't suppose that because he's been out of— I once had a manager tell me, he says, if somebody is applying for the same job 6 months later, so we posted 6 months ago and we're posting for the same position and that same resume comes across the desk, if he's still applying for it, it means he hasn't evolved.

No, I see that totally different. You're gonna love this story. For one, if I'm reposting that job, I'm not even reposting that job because I'm going back to the candidates who applied 6 months ago and saying, hey, you were interested 6 months ago. We've got the position open again. I'd love to talk with you some more. And here's my best example, Marc. You're gonna love this one. I hope you do. I like to tell it. So, I had a candidate that I hired 7 years after I initially met her. We had interviewed initially. It wasn't quite a good fit, but I was impressed with her. So, I kept her as part of my network and kept in contact. Well, what do you know? 7 years later, I needed a salesperson in Texas who was bilingual. She was the first person I thought of. We never posted the job. We hired her in a couple of weeks. And it was a great business decision. That's what hiring should look like to completely counter to your point to say, oh my gosh, 7 years. She should be well beyond this role. No. Yeah, I know her really well at this point.

And again, if we leverage curiosity as like a guiding virtue in the process, then we can still pick up the phone and say, I don't know if you'd be interested. But here's an opportunity. Is this of interest to you?

And people— and what we know is about recruiting, especially the organization I work with, most of them don't do that. So, when the candidate gets that call, they're very, very receptive to taking the call. And even if they're not interested in the position, what I find is they're so impressed that they'll say, you know what, Marc? I'm not ready to move right now. But I got this friend. She's been looking. She'd be great for this role. Would you mind if I send her over? And guess what the answer automatically is? Of course, thank you very much. And that's something I talk about in my book. And I know you alluded to this at the beginning. You begin to build brand advocates by doing these things.

Hmm.

So that person again that we followed up, you know, we followed up with, and yeah, maybe they're not interested after 6 months. But they're so impressed that you called and they had such a good experience the first time that they will People inevitably make referrals. You know, no, Marc, I'm not interested right now. I actually did land something in the meantime. But the way you treated me, I'd love to recommend my, my wife or my friend or whoever it is. I've had that so many times. Or even better, as I mentioned, I've had candidates referred to me when I have nothing open, to where somebody says, you know what, I was so appreciated with how I was treated by through that circumstance. If you ever have anything open, my friend Jen is looking for a job. Can you please keep her in mind? I get a lot of those even to this day, even in the role that I'm in now.

What a difference when we're always fighting for staff. What a difference it is when you yourself as an employer, you are referable. That you made enough of an impression that somebody says, oh, you know what? I did meet this hiring manager at this particular business. Why don't I connect you guys on LinkedIn? Or why don't I send a connection email? Why don't I connect you guys?

Exactly. And then, they're doing your job for you.

Yeah.

I mean, isn't that wonderful? Because so many small businesses, and I know that's a big, big part of your focus here. So many small businesses, and I live this as well, we're literally wearing 20 hats. One minute, I'm hiring somebody. The next minute, I'm answering a customer request. The next minute, I'm processing an order. We're wearing all these hats. If I can have individuals outside of my organization advocating for me and saying, gosh, They're a great group to work for. Let me send you over to them. That's one less thing I've got to worry about. And again, we don't have that luxury, especially as small business owners in a lot of cases, to have this brand.

Right.

You know, when Amazon and Goodyear, they're flooded with candidates. Amazon has more candidates than it ever hoped for.

We don't have that luxury. And yet, it's got the brand. It's got a brand of not being a very good employer. Bingo!

It does. But like I say, it's still, you know, there's so many people looking for jobs that even if they offend 100,000 people, they've still got you know, 200,000 that are willing to work there because of all the other things. Well, we as a, as a, as a small to medium-sized company, if we build a bad reputation, that's going to really hurt our recruiting and our talent efforts.

Right.

Are we going to still get people? Yes, but we're not going to get the top people. And again, that's who we're ultimately especially fighting for as small organizations. Because that one hire can have such a profound effect on your organization, good, bad, or otherwise, that if you can get that one really good hire, their impact to your organization organization culturally, financially, bottom line, all of those good things can be so impactful, much more than it could be for a much larger organization. So, that's why it's such an important issue that we as small and medium-sized employers get the best employee that we can.

Yeah. As we're thinking about this hiring process for the people tuning in, are there any myths that we need to bust about hiring processes today?

You know, I think if on the corporate side, you've hit on a couple. You know, don't rule people out for these arbitrary reasons. And it, you know, how long they've been out of work, how short of a time they were at an employer, they don't have a college degree. I think what we've got to do is question as employers, as companies, what makes someone successful? What are those characteristics they have versus the education, all these things? What are the qualities, the characteristics they have that make themselves successful? So again, I think one of the biggest myths is we get caught in what the requirements are— bachelor's degree, 3 years of experience, this, that, and the other— versus looking at true qualities and qualifications to say, this is what leads to success.

It was really interesting. I applied to a polytechnic. They were hiring for— they wanted a hospitality instructor. And with my 25 years in hospitality, plus the fact that I've trained God knows how many managers. And so, I applied. And they came back to me. And when I followed up with them, they said, oh, I'm sorry. You don't have your MBA. And I said, what? You don't have an MBA? And I said, but I have 25 years of doing this work. It's like, I know what it is.

Literally.

They said, oh, but our policy is That we will not hire an instructor who doesn't have an MBA. So, it's like you're telling me somebody goes to university, gets an MBA, comes and applies to you will be a better asset than somebody who actually lives and breathes the life of what it takes to be successful.

Exactly. And we see that with so many examples, Marc. Another big one I see is companies don't want to hire somebody if they're in their mid to late 50s. They're only going to be here 2 to 3 years. We know with these job markets now, Any employee is probably only going to be there 2 to 3 years. What we also know is the older employee is more than likely going to stay longer than 2 to 3 years because they've got a target date in mind, whether it's 65, 68, or whatever. And they don't care to change. You know, we old guys, and I think I can say that about both of us here, we get to a point we like to just kind of find a nice place to be and just do our best there. We don't want to be thinking about changing jobs and all that. So, you know, that's a myth that I see. We've got a million of them that we talk about in our processes.

Yeah.

We're big on second chance employment. Someone's made a mistake in their life. Maybe they've been incarcerated or something. If they've proven themselves that they're beyond that, they deserve another chance. Individuals with disabilities, for example, whether it's visible or invisible. Some of the best employees I've had have had either a visible or invisible disability. They just need someone to give them an opportunity or a chance. You mentioned the person that's been out of work for 6 months. I'll go one step further. The mother who took 2 to 3 years off to have children and get them into school, she's ready to jump back in the workforce. Those are some of the most dedicated employees that I've ever hired. And again, I've got a lot of these kinds of examples. So, I think a point you made earlier is we've got to work in hiring to be more curious. Who could really be good at this? And think outside the box a little bit. And I hate that phrase. But think beyond your limited cycle.

Yeah.

Open that up and allow yourself to be proven right rather than proven wrong.

Yeah, I love that. That's such a great philosophy, Kyle. Hey, I'd like to jump into some things that the audience can start considering to change the tide on their hiring practices. And we'll get to that right after this.

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Welcome back. I am here speaking with Kyle Patrick Smith.

Kyle, So, I've got a couple of books out there, Marc, and I try to come at it from both ways. Recruiting Is Easy is for especially individuals who are in talent acquisition. They're in recruiting. They're small business owners. And it's really full of practical advice that they can put into place immediately to improve their efforts around recruiting. And as you can see, it's based upon sales and marketing, which I know will strike a chord with you and probably most of your listeners because in my mind, recruiting is just another activity around sales and marketing. Except what you're now selling and marketing is your employment proposition.

I love that. Is there any misconception? Well, I know that there is. There is. When I talk to people, they talk about branding is for customer attraction. Which is a wrong definition for branding. However, how do we start thinking about branding as a leverage for employee attraction?

Well, it really comes down to the fact that whether you realize it or not, your employment, your organization has an employment brand. Every organization has an employment brand. It's just a matter of the scale of it. If you're a small organization, your employment brand may be pretty well blended with your marketing brand in general. And I'll use a typical retail store. Maybe there's one here in my area that they sell popcorn. They sell different varieties of popcorn. Well, their marketing brand and their employment brand probably is pretty much blended together. You go in the store, you get a feel for what it looks like as, as you interact with the employees and so on. So every company has a brand. It really does depend on the size and the reach. And I like using the retail example as a, as really a kickoff point for this, especially for small organizations, because you can leverage that positive marketing brand to enhance your employment brand. Because the person comes in and let's say it's the popcorn store and it's a lot of fun, that the employees have a lot of energy. It seems like a really great place to work and so on because you like, you like shopping there and going in there and And trying the popcorn and so on. Well, you can leverage that as part of your employment brand as well because people say, gosh, I love to shop there. I think I would love to work there as well because it seems like a really fun place and they've got some really good ideas and I get free popcorn every week and so on. So, in a lot of cases, these blend together and we can actually use that to our advantage.

I can't help but wonder if the popcorn shop would have a branding tagline just for Something along the lines of, come and work for us. We'll butter you up.

Ding, ding, ding, ding! Perfect! Love it. We'll keep that to ourselves though because that's got some value to it.

So, I know that part of what we do when I go into organizations, we have to look at their attrition rate. We have to look at their engagement rate. We're looking at culture as a whole. And everything that we've talked about thus far, even though we're talking about it being kind of the hiring brand or the employer brand. This all is mixed within this idea of culture. If you're a lousy hirer at the onset where you don't return calls, you leave people hanging, you're disorganized in the interview process, chances are it's not going to be a positive work environment. How can we leverage things like data to Take a look at where we are today and where we need to be.

Yeah, so great question. I mean, so there's always low-hanging fruit in this, right? Part of it is you're looking at your turnover rates. Part of it is you're looking at individuals and their tenure with the organization and what that tells you. And a lot of times, I'm looking at visuals of that as well. For example, I'll give you a quick example of this one. I'll graph out tenure with an organization. And I'll see this highlight here. And these are the people that have been there 0 to 3 years. And then, I see this big dip for a period of time. And then, I see another hump here that's 10+ and beyond. So, I start to look at that data and says, what is something— this is telling me something. Why are people leaving after 3 years? But if they can get past that 3- to 9-year span, they're going to stay a lot longer. And that's a real-life example.

Yeah.

I've actually worked with an organization that their turnover had that type of, that type of look to it, that visual look. So we're looking at that data to say, OK, what does that tell us about hiring? What does that tell us about progression? And we're using that to understand how we need to hire. Who are we hiring? Where are they coming from? What's their experience where they have here? And what we learned in that example, and you'll appreciate this, was to ultimately advance their career, these individuals had to leave the organization.

Right.

And the ones that stayed beyond a certain point, they were able to, able to reach that level. But they had more patience at it. They were, they knew, OK, if I can just wait till I hit this 10-year mark, then, then there'll be opportunities for advancement. So we were losing people at the 3-year point. And unfortunately, what I call that is, you know, we're the minor leagues for everyone else. We're investing in training; we're developing; we're getting them in a really good spot to contribute really strongly.

Well, and again, I believe that that's not necessarily a bad thing. If we're in our industry and we're giving people resources and we're creating that legacy effect that when people leave us, they're leaving us better than when they came.

Yes.

And because of that, maybe we don't have a supervisory role for somebody. But maybe for them, that's their next step. And they take that capacity, that competency that we help them build and they take it off somewhere else, we just strengthen the industry as a whole. This is not a bad thing. And I wish we would get away from this. Well, what happens if I train them and they leave?

Oh, don't even get me started on that, Marc, because I'm with you. Because that was the gut reaction with the organization I was with. But what I explained to them is exactly what you said. And I said, really what we can do is let's leverage our pipelines now, which again, that's right in my wheelhouse. Let's leverage our pipelines because we know from a succession planning standpoint that we've got this 3-year window. So, we've got to continue to reinforce our bench. So now, we're hiring for people that can come in sooner and make an impact sooner. And maybe we're getting some people that have been trained in some other places and so on. So, it forced us in that example to reconsider what our hiring process is and ultimately what our pipeline looked like and who we were bringing in. And again, to your point earlier, I'm not getting caught up in the fact they've got an MBA. I need someone that has the 3 to 5 years experience that can come in and make an impact sooner than 6 months to a year. So, it forces us to say, okay, rather than hiring younger talent that's degreed, maybe we hire more experienced talent who is possibly working on a degree or has that in their future. And then, that changes our pipeline.

So again, we hire somebody with that talent and then we help them get the degree.

Exactly, which we did. We did a fair amount of that. And we were fine to do that because again, they also became brand advocates for us as well. So, we were always looking for ways to get return on investment.

Yeah, this has been a fascinating conversation thus far. Kyle, if this is resonating with the audience, how can people get in contact with you if they need you?

You know, I'd love to have them reach out via email. I'm perfectly fine with that. It's kyle@hrkyle.com. They can certainly call us at 330-541-5533. And I'd love to have them visit our website. We keep it simple there. It's hrkyle.com. And if you look back behind me there, there's our logo.

I love that. You know, I'm a big fan of business owners and leaders leaving the office and getting out into their communities. I find all too often, I find that people are just stuck in their stores. They're stuck in their work environments and they're not actually getting out into the community to set seeds, both from a marketing branding component but from an employer, like an employee getting out and being able to be the face of a business. What does community engagement look like? In, in the context of recruiting?

Yeah, so it can be a lot of different ways. I'll use us as an example here. As part of our business credo, we make sure that we're, we're investing at least 3 hours of volunteer time every month into our community in a lot of different ways. And we allow our employees to have some flexibility around that to say, well, for one, you're going to get paid to volunteer. But What are the things that mean a lot to you, the things that are important to you? So, first and foremost, we always want to just be giving back to our community. Again, this comes back to a point that I made earlier. I don't want to think of this as transactional. Hey, we'll do some things in the community, but we sure hope we get some hires from it. We never think from that standpoint. It's about being out there, as you said, being a part of the community, giving back, feeling like we're part of something bigger than just this organization. But it's, you know, A big part of it too is giving of your time where it can make the most impact. So if you're an organization that's— we'll use the popcorn company, the popcorn store as an example. You know, there are things that they can do in this community, for example, fundraising. If someone has been impacted by a fire or a loss in their family, that they can, they can do some fundraising for them or what have you, because they're really good at that. Or if there's another part of your organization that you're really good at. Maybe you're a photography firm and you can volunteer at a homeless shelter to help people have professional business pictures and professional business attire and so on. So, you're looking at where your organization is really good at and saying, how can I impact the community? And getting out there. Interestingly enough, as you start to do that more, again, it reinforces that image of who you are as an organization. It lets people get to know you on a more Personal level. We live in a time and an age when so many things feel impersonal that one of our biggest advantages as business owners is making ourselves seem more personable. Even as you think about some of the social media that's the most impactful as a small organization, a lot of times it's behind the scenes. It's getting to know the employees. Who are they? What are they about? Well, you can do that same thing by being active in your community. Maybe you're going out to the schools and you're speaking to students about your business and what it means to start a business and all these things. So, you're As you said, you're getting up out of your seat. You're looking in your community, in your area and saying, where can I have an impact? Where would my knowledge, skills, and ability have a positive impact on the organization? And again, indirectly then, you're allowing the community to get to know you, who you are, what you stand for, what's important to you, and what you're really about. And again, it's unusual, no surprise. Those people then are drawn to your business because there's this reciprocal relationship. Yeah.

I'll take it one step further. What I see is it gives us the opportunity to work with our team members and find out what they care about, what they'd like to invest in. And on top of it all, it's a perfect medium to be able to give them training and coaching at a different level than maybe their job description internally defines. And so now, you put them out there and you say, well, you want to do like a highway cleanup project within the community. Why don't you lead that? We'll help you. We'll coach you on how to do this. And now, without them even really knowing it, now you're training them to be leaders.

Oh my gosh! I've got a great story, Marc. You've triggered another story for me. So, this recently happened for us. So, one of our passions has been because I was a distance runner at one point. I'm no longer doing that. But I still like to be a part of that community in some way. So, we've started to volunteer at our local marathon series here in the Akron area. And they have 3 events they do over the summer. So we volunteer and we man a table there to where we hand out refreshments and so on. Well, come to find out, my wife was talking with the lady who's the volunteer coordinator. And all of a sudden, my wife is now a— trying to think what she's a— she's now more of a coordinator of volunteers for the Akron Marathon series. And again, my thought was, hey, we're going to volunteer. It means something to us. All of a sudden, this was something that she wanted to get more involved with then.

Wow!

And we've got the coordinator coming to visit us. She visited us this week and my wife and her and my wife met and talked about this role. And now, here she is. She's, to your point, she's taking a more active role than even we are as an organization.

That's just gorgeous. And at the same token, these kinds of things outside the job helps us learn who our people are because I do believe, and when I speak to at leadership conferences, I'll ask a question and I'll look at the room of 150 or 200 people and say, how many of you have people in roles that are constrained? That they're capable of doing far more than their job description allows? And almost every single hand goes up. And it kills my heart because if we know that people are capable of doing so much more and yet we're not giving them a medium or a venue to be able to make that happen, Then, when we look at attrition, we wonder why they leave.

Exactly. Yep, that's precisely right. And we know too, and again, thinking about your audience there, the biggest person, the biggest impact is that immediate supervisor.

Yes.

You know, it's not the president of the company. He or she is several layers removed from that person. It's that immediate supervisor who can most impact and quite honestly has the most leeway to allow for more growth and development at what I would consider more of these macro levels. You know, when we talk about adding anybody to this organization— again, I mentioned we're adding someone here— the one thing that I tell them, tell anybody, and I told this individual, I said, I don't want to be a boss. But I'm happy to be your mentor, your coach, your supporter, you know, all of those other things. But I don't, I'm not comfortable being called a boss. I don't want to be that person. And I also want to put you in a position to where you feel like you can own this role, make decisions, do the things that you do based upon your knowledge Skills and Experience, because of exactly what you're saying. We know there's a lot of people in the work world that can do so much more and would like to. You know, I have this viewpoint. Maybe I'm naive, but I think the vast majority of people want to come in and really give their best effort and shine and, and do all these great things. The only thing that holds them back in a lot of cases is the environment they live in.

Yeah, yeah. We get constrained. We get micromanaged and so on. And And I truly believe like when I talk to entrepreneurs and they, oh, my staff are lazy. My staff doesn't take initiative, and so on. I really look at that and I think the problem is not with the staff.

Agreed.

The problem is the leadership needs training. They need to become better leaders. In fact, I believe in this day and age because we mentioned that relational, we're in a relational economy where now I believe that most direct supervisors 100%.

Couldn't agree with you more.

Yeah.

You know, we see that time and again. And, you know, so much of this too, Marc, you know, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you view your people as being lazy and not motivated and not wanting to do these things, it's amazing how they will begin to demonstrate those qualities. And the flip side of that is, if you view them as people who want to come in and feel positive about the organization and support it and do all these good things. It's amazing how often they will fall into that category.

Yes, yeah. This has been brilliant. When we come back, I'd like to talk about some pitfalls and cautionaries. As people start digesting this information, my fear is that we end up with band-aid solutions like the policy of the week is going to be this. So, I'd like to talk about cautionaries and pitfalls as people want to instigate a change. And we'll get to that right after this.

Mm-hmm. You don't even have to look. Be the pro you know you are. Download the app at speakerpresentationtimer.com.

Welcome! Welcome back! We are having a phenomenal discussion. I hope you're getting huge value from what we've been talking about today. As you can tell, Kyla and I are super focused on serving you and your team. So, if you're planning a leadership retreat or a conference, or you'd like to explore how we could be of benefit to you and your team, drop us a line. Our contact details are in the show notes We're here to serve. So, go ahead. Don't be shy. Kyle, a lot of times I get verbiage from franchises that smaller companies, oh, they have it in the bag. They can do anything because they don't have all the policies. And then, smaller companies are like, oh, the bigger companies have it in the bag because they got all the resources and we're just— How can smaller companies start to compete with the big brands for top talent?

You know, it really comes down to their philosophy, as I said, about people, people management, talent acquisition. It really starts with that. And I think something that you sent us into the break with, you cannot think of this as a quick solution. The things that I talk about take time. These pipelines, these building your brand and nurturing it, and making connections with with people on a personal level. That takes time. It's not going to be a quick fix. But the way they can accomplish it is start with these attitudes that people are truly our most important asset. And understanding people, that's something that's very complicated. And these decisions take time. And it's better served to have a lot of information. If you start from that point, and then work to nurture these relationships and consider people well before you ever need You know, it's one thing I take pride in our business. We try to think a couple of steps ahead as we grow. Okay, what is this going to mean from a staffing standpoint, from a resource standpoint, and so on? So, as small business owners, we have to be thinking 2 to 3 steps ahead. And as a result of that, that always involves people. So, as we think of these 2 to 3 steps ahead, who are the people and the skills that we're going to need at that point? So, it's going to take us 6 months to a year possibly to meet this person and get to know them and really determine if they're the right person. And really, the best way to accomplish that is to try to make connections with a lot of people and invest in that time and truly see it as an investment. And I talked with someone earlier today and through the course of conversation, they started to say, well, this call isn't really looking very fruitful. And I said, I respectfully disagree. Every interaction I have, every new person I meet, that's always fruitful. I don't know when. Could be next week. Could be next decade. But I see it as fruitful. I've learned something from this interaction. We're going to connect after this. We're going to stay connected. You may share something on LinkedIn that would benefit me or vice versa. So, it's looking at this from a long-term standpoint, knowing that you need to begin to make these investments and get to know people. And that really is going to make your small business stand apart. Because I find a lot of people in the position to do this don't want to make the investment. So, when someone has a positive experience with you as a business owner, they're going to remember that experience. You know, there's an old saying, and I may not remember your name, Marc, but I'm going to remember how you made me feel. Well, if you have an interaction with someone and they really feel good about it and say, gosh, that Marc is a heck of a nice guy. He made me feel so positive about myself and what I could do and that he'd like to have me work with him someday and so on. That's going to stick with you. And it's those investments over time because then Marc's going to go home and he's going to say, honey, you're not going to believe what just happened. I met Kyle and we were, you know, he owns this business over here and we just had the greatest conversation. He even gave me his card and he said, you know, if I'm ever looking for a job, reach out and so on. And that's how this stuff begins to take off. You can't imagine how many times, Marc, I've had someone reach out to me and say they've lost their job and they're the second person that they reached out, that I'm the second person they reached out to. The first was their significant other and then the second was me because they remembered the interaction that we had and they knew that I was willing to help. And I've had plenty of candidates that I didn't hire that I referred for another opening of someone in my network. And people remember those kinds of good things. So again, I don't do it because I think, okay, tomorrow, something good is going to happen.

Right.

I do it because it's the right thing to do. I believe as humans, I think we should support each other's success. because we all win in that scenario. But I'm not naive enough to know that they're going to remember that. And maybe there's a time sometime when I need something and they can come through with me. So, I'm nurturing a relationship there.

Yeah, and you don't know. It's so funny that I find that as business owners, we tend to get super, super competitive. And we get super scared of kind of sharing anything. One of the things I did in a small market was that we did some staffing shares. We went to another hotel and said, do you have any part-time staff who want more hours that you can't give them? Because we'd like to hire part-time staff. And I thought, why don't we create the synergy between rotating people through? You're the primary employer for this employee. I'll be the secondary. And then, we'll see what we can do. Because I know in my neck of the woods, especially in like the Rocky Mountain properties like Jasper, Banff, which are huge tourism areas and in rural businesses. Like we have so many small towns where I live that are away from major centers. Attracting people is really hard. But what I find is sometimes these companies are like, oh no, no, no. I know they're only working 15 hours a week for me. But they're my employees.

Yep, exactly. Right?

So not only do employers need people to, in some of these, to attract people and they need people to relocate. Maybe they're only relocating for a season. But the employees might also have to do things like share accommodations, which is not a great perk.

Yes.

And because it's so far from city centers, there's a sense of isolation. So, how can we start overcoming the hassle of working for our businesses when we're in those situations?

Well, you made me think of another example, Marc. And we talked about the organization Yeah. There's been a lot of these today. So we talk about smaller organizations, and you know this, you reach a point sometimes where there's no room to promote. There just isn't. There's this person seeking a management-level role, and we don't have it. Well, I worked in an organization where we would occasionally have that happen. And we would refer them to another organization that might have a management opportunity. Because either way, we're going to lose them. You know, let's not, let's not think, oh, you don't have a management opportunity here. I really want it. OK, I'm going to stay. That's more than likely, that's never going to happen. That person is going to be seeking that management opportunity and they're going to leave. Well, we stand such a better chance to employ— to enhance our employment brand if we can say, hey, you know what? I know somebody, you know, HR person at this particular organization over here. Do you mind if I share your name? And for one, they're always, they're blown away by that. When I would do that, it was like, wow, you're kidding me. But it allowed us to kind of keep it in the family a little bit. And then again, to your point, there was this reciprocal relationship to where they may have people that they're going to lay off, for example, and they can say, hey, you know, I know Kyle could use some help in his organization in this particular area. So it becomes this less competitive, because we're not really competing. Hey, if we're as good an employer as we think we are, there's no competition anyways. We're more supporting each other because we'd still rather keep that good employee in the area and working for an organization that maybe is a partner of ours, or they're a community partner of ours. So again, It's less competitive and more about just supporting the community in general. And I feel the same way about this area here. We participate in initiatives here in our community that maybe don't serve us, but they might drive more business to the retail establishments here or the restaurants that are near our business here. And I want that because by doing that, it makes our area stronger. It makes us a a better place for people to want to live and flourish and so on, which ultimately does help our business.

Yeah, and it helps. And what is it? What's the saying? A rising tide lifts all boats.

Exactly. Firmly believe that.

Yeah. Hey, for the people who are tuned in, they know they have to make a change. What cautionaries, what pitfalls should they be aware of as they try to create this more positive branded approach to hiring?

Yeah, great question, Marc. For one, you got to believe it. You know, it's something you said earlier, you know, flavor of the month and so on. You read a book; it sounds like a great idea. Who Moved My Cheese? OK, that's where the organization's heading. Those initiatives work really well because it's, it's at the core of the business itself and what they believe and how people think, feel and act. So you've got to believe in your core that these things are true. You've got to believe that most people are good people. You've got to believe that most people want to do a good job. You've got to believe that it's worthwhile to help people even if they never give you anything in return. If you don't hold these core beliefs, a lot of the things that we're talking about simply aren't going to work. Because what we know is, as soon as it gets a little bit difficult to do it, or as soon as you don't immediately see the results, that you were hoping for, you revert back to your old behaviors. It's just like any other habits that we have. So, for these kind of systems to work, it's got to be from top to bottom, bottom to top, that people believe in what it is that we're talking about. And as I said, it may take a year or longer to get these pipelines going and have people begin to send you their resumes unsolicited and be able to reach out to you and want to talk about opportunities. It will not be overnight. And again, if you're not committed, again, something you also brought up earlier, to following up when someone leaves you a voicemail or responding to an email when someone sends you their resume and be willing to have that dialogue with them even if you don't have a position open. If you're not willing to do those things, these other things that we're talking about, they don't work because you don't believe them here. The things I'm talking about, they work for me. Because I believe them to my core. They work with the organizations that I talk to and I work with because they believe in the concepts that we're talking about.

And to your point, if that's the way you behave on the screening side, on the attraction side, chances are that will translate itself into a positive work culture that people love to work at.

Every time. I talk, you know, part of our business is working with candidates. I always tell them this. Your interview experience is as good as it's ever going to get. You know, no one ever had a horrible interview experience and then working there was fantastic. That's never happened in the history of mankind. So, it's going to either be as good or maybe a little bit not as good. But it's not going to be any better. So, what you're experiencing as a candidate is true. And again, you've spoken to this from the company side. It starts well before There's ever an opportunity to work there and go through that interview process or whatever. How that goes before that is going to determine the relationship throughout.

Yep. And our gut will tell us. Nice and easy. Do you have any last thoughts about what we've been talking about today?

You know, I think in general, small businesses, I would agree with something that you sort of alluded to earlier. Small businesses and medium-sized businesses have an advantage in the things that we're talking about. Because it's the difference between redirecting your rowboat or your small boat and, you know, re-steering the Titanic. It takes a lot more effort, time, and resources and everything to steer that Titanic away from the iceberg than it does you or I in a little motorboat. You know, we're able to steer away from that pretty easy. It's the same is true with small to medium-sized businesses. It's easier to To put these practices in place, make them work, make that investment, improve your employment brand as a small to medium-sized business versus making these same things happen in a larger business. Can it be done in a larger business? Of course. We do that. It just takes longer. It takes more resources. There's more people involved. So, remember that. These things that we're talking about, these positive things that we're talking about today and that Marc talked about, they're a lot easier to do in your small to medium-sized Love that.

Could you remind everybody one more time how they can get a hold of you?

Yeah, the best way, visit our website. If nothing else, come visit us at our website, hrkyle.com. You're going to find a way to reach out to us there. We do a newsletter every week that we love to send out to small to medium-sized businesses that help them with all these HR things that seem so complicated. And I think to Marc's point, we probably do way too much that we offer for free, Marc. But I know you can relate to that as well. Because we ultimately, we love to see people successful and we love to see businesses thriving. So, hrkyyle.com is the best place.

Thank you, Kyle. Thank you so much for being on the show today.

Thank you, Marc. It's been a pleasure. I've really enjoyed a lot. I love the dialogue and especially love to where you're coming from. I appreciate it.

Well, I appreciate you. I appreciate you taking time out to share your passion and your energy today. It really shows that when you have somebody on the show who loves what they're doing, It shows hands down. So, thank you for that.

Yep, thank you. Guilty as charged.

Why don't you let me know if this was of value to you? As always, my offer stands. If you would like 30 minutes of my time to brainstorm your business with you and your team, feel free to book yourself on my online calendar. The link is down below in the show notes along with Kyle's contact information as well. I know it would be an honor for us to be of service to you. And while you're at it, Please, why don't you leave a comment or review about this episode? I'd love to get your feedback. Was this of value to you? And while you're at it, please make sure you subscribe to this podcast. Make sure you share this episode because I know you probably know somebody out there who could use this information. It has been so great having you here with me today. Thank you so much for joining me. My name is Marc Haine. I hope you stay safe, stay healthy, and I hope you dare To be the exception. Thanks for joining.