How Creating Simple Framework for Phone Scripting Give Dramatically Different Results

Hey everybody, it's Richard Milligan here with 4C Recruiting. I am all dressed up in my winter stuff today. It's, uh, it's official, winter has hit the Midwest. And, uh, man, this, this is the time of year where I'm like, man, I should really live in South Florida. So all of those of you that are in South Florida that really have one season Which is summer, you know, I am envious of you today, but we're not here to talk about the weather. We're here to talk about recruiting, right? I'm going to give you some very, some oversimplified framework for phone scripting. So if you listen to my podcast, we talk about phone scripting from time to time. If you're a recruiting leader, it's an important component to you winning In this area of recruiting. And so one of the things that I just kind of had an aha moment recently is like, why does my phone script work so well? My phone script sets somewhere between 30% and 40% appointment rates for recruiting leaders. And while I, for a long time, have understood some basic premises around it, I think this last week I came up with a very simplistic view of that and why it works. So I'm going to share that on the podcast today. Because not a lot of people know my phone scripting, but I think if you hit these 3 major components of any scripting on the phone, you would be successful. So we're going to share that today. I apologize, I got a bit of an upper respiratory infection. I'm not gonna let that stop me, so I won't be able to pause or mute here, but I will be able to pause or mute on the podcast. So if this bugs you for some reason, then you don't want to hear me coughing, go to my podcast Recruiting Conversations. It's on iTunes, it's on Google Play, it's on several other platforms, including Spotify. And you can actually listen to it there by searching Recruiting Conversations or my name, Richard Milligan. So let's get started with this here in 3 and in 2 and in 1. Hey everybody, it's Richard Milligan here with Recruiting Conversations. I welcome you back. It is the start of a week. I'm recording this on a Monday. And I had a couple of minutes here before I get into my week being really hot and heavy like probably most of you. We are 2 weeks out from Thanksgiving. Gosh, it's hard to believe 2019 has flown by. If it's been anything for you like it has been for me, I'm now looking at the calendar going, how in the world did we get here? I tell you what, it's been a great year. I hope it's been a great year for many of you listening to the podcast. You know, we, gosh, we've, in terms of like the vision that we cast for 2019, the goals that we established, the things that we wanted to accomplish as an organization, we've really been blown away by what we've been able to do. And I think the podcast has been an important component of that. So I just wanna say thank you for listening. Thank you for passing this on. We now have several thousand people that listen to the podcast each week. And that means a lot to me because it means that you all are sharing this, and that means that we're bringing some value to you at some level. And so that's what we're really all about. If you check out our YouTube channel, our Vimeo channel, you know, you'll notice that all week long we're giving away value to you. And I think that value will continue to grow and will continue to improve. You know, we're a relatively small organization here, I think we have 9, maybe 10 people now on board. Because of that, we're limited in terms of how much effort and energy we can put around the free resources, but one of our big goals going into 2020 is to exponentially increase the free resources that we're providing. Some of the ways that we'll actually do that will be to actually begin doing having a larger Facebook component where we'll be going live inside a closed Facebook group. So if you're not there already, please join us there. You will find Recruiting Mastermind with Richard Milligan on Facebook. You can join us there. And one of our goals for 2020 is going to be going live there several times per week with free content and really working to build the community. That's one of the things that We want to do with this is I think as a recruiting leader, when I look at my time in the you know twenty-five years I spent in this role, fifteen of that in one industry, it was actually a pretty lonely place to be. And you know this: there's a really large community here, a community of people that that are doing the same things that you're doing ongoing basis, whether they're doing it in the same industry or doing it in another industry. The recruiting leader role. is someone who actually manages a team, but then is also responsible for building that team, growing that team. And what I found is that there's few organizations that put a lot of resources behind helping you grow the team. And so, you know, what I found in my own career is that 9 out of 10 hires came directly through my own efforts, through my own energies. So what I know is that if you're in a very, very similar role as that, The truth is that if you're going to grow your team, it's going to be on you. So that can feel like a lot of pressure, especially when there's very little training and very little information to a recruiting leader around how you can grow and what's important in things like phone scripting and face-to-face meetings. And, you know, all of the next steps that follow that in the 3 major components of recruiting, which is identifying talent, making contact, And then follow up. That sounds very simplistic when you say that, but at the end of the day, there's literally hundreds of things that make a difference in whether you land a recruit or not. And ultimately, your job security as a recruiting leader comes through your ability to grow the team. So our heart really is in this space where we want you to be successful, especially those of you— you're listening to podcasts, you're probably watching some of my YouTube videos, following me on LinkedIn. You're looking for information in this space to grow. For that person that wants to grow, there should be resources out there. And so that's what we're going to do is we will continue to provide resources at scale in 2020 in this space, including holding our first live event. And so we'll be passing some more information on around that to each of you here over the next couple of months. But let's just talk, get on topic here today and bring you some value. This last week I was in a conversation with someone who Was having a lot of success on the phone. And we got into a deeper conversation around the phones, my phone script, and why does my phone script work? How can you really set 30 to 40% appointment rates with a phone script? That seems impossible for those of you that have been in recruiting long. And what I would say to you is that it's not impossible. That the— I can, in my coaching, one of the things we kind of work through is a 101 version of phone scripting, a 201, a 301, and a 401 version. If you get to a 4.1 version of understanding the phone and my phone script, you're setting appointments. I can tell whether you are comfortable and conversational on the phone based on the percentages of appointments that you're setting, based on the number of contacts that you make. So recently I had someone come into my coaching, and that individual from week to week was measuring their numbers very specifically. And one week they were around 18%. Setting next steps, setting appointments with people, which most people consider huge wins. I mean, this individual made 80 calls in a week. And so when you start thinking about 17% to 18% appointment rate, you're like, that's a huge win. Well, immediately I knew based on the fact that he had tracked and truly legitimately had made those 80 phone calls or those 80 contacts— these weren't calls, these were contacts, people he spoke with— and the fact that he had about an 18% appointment rate, That something was off with the phone. And so we began to talk about that. Most people would say, what are you talking about? That's a huge win. Like, don't even think that that's possible to get that kind of a win. And what I would say is that immediately I knew that something was off because I have the data in my coaching to say that you should be able to sell on the low end around 30% and on the high end around 40% appointment rates if you're using my phone script. You know it by heart, you're able to overcome objections, and it sounds conversational. It sounds Like it's altruistic and it's coming from you trying to actually bring value versus you trying to win a recruit. And so we worked on it that week. He came back the next week and was in the mid-30s in terms of just one week improvement from the prior week of setting appointments. And that was because he had really focused on honing his phone script and getting conversational. One of the things I always say is that your phone script Someone should be able to wake you up like that in the middle of the night and say, what's your phone script? And you should be able to respond to them immediately with what it is. Like, it should be that ingrained on your brain. The phone is a primary tool for you, and if you are not the consummate pro on the phone, you will limit the amount of success that you have. If you don't know how to overcome every objection immediately, well, If you don't have a solid script going in and you're just winging it, basing it on a feeling, basing it on this idea that you know what you want to say, what I would say is this, is that the professional takes their craft serious. I can't imagine being an NBA player, and a lot of things correlate to basketball these days because I've got a couple of boys that just Live and breathe basketball. And so we're at a basketball practice or a game 4 or 5, maybe 6 nights a week. So a lot of it, a lot of it to me goes back to basketball. But when I think of basketball, I think of, imagine trying to step on the NBA floor, right? Where the best of the best, the elite, actually have honed their craft for years and years and years and sacrificed so much to get there and to show up and just wing it. I mean, when you really follow like NBA players and how well they take care of their body in the offseason and how, how much they put into training and, you know, the, the ones that are the best of the best, how early they show up to practice and all the things they put into the number of hours a week that they actually hone that skill set. If we were to take that and self-reflect back on us as recruiters or as recruiting leaders, How much time and effort we put into honing that craft, it would be embarrassing to have the two measured side by side in front of someone. Because ultimately, we end up where we are, having very average wins, very average success here because we haven't honed our craft. Now, excuse me, I've got a bit of a cold. Now, what I would say to that is that I honestly believe part of that has taken place because there's not a ton of resources. Right. There's not a ton of training specific to your role as a recruiting leader. There's a lot of specifics around your position that are just specific to you. Think about it. Most of the people listening to this podcast, if you're a recruiting leader, you fish in a small pond. You don't have the permission to have this unbelievable tenacity that maybe a A national recruiter could have, where a national recruiter can be extremely aggressive in calling someone over the phone, right? They can search for the 5% that are discontent. You, on the other hand, as a recruiting leader, are fishing in a small pond. That means that, like, you have to practically think with a lot of emotional intelligence. Like, these are people you're going to see at networking events. These are people that you have to build relationship with before you ever recruit them. Okay, because you have a limited number of people that you can go after, right? So the national recruiter can have a different mindset and a different approach to this, and not everything I would say would apply to that position. But for the recruiting leader, as I put myself in your shoes, because I walked that mile for 15 years in one industry, what I know is that there's a limited number of people in your market that you actually would want on your team in the first place that represent what you want to represent. So the pond, because of a geography standpoint and then a core value perspective, it gets pretty small. That means that we have to lead with emotional intelligence. That means that we don't think as much recruiting as we do relationship building. Okay? So here's a good phone script that's extremely relational in terms of some framework. I'm going to give you 3 components here, and I find that the number 3 to number 3 or 4 is important. Way to remember things for people. In science, they call it information chunking. Our brain will remember information in chunks of information most easily when it's presented in 3s or 4s. So that's what we're gonna do here, is we're gonna come— we're gonna push some of this into 3 components that will be easy for you to recreate any phone script It'll be easy for you to measure your current phone script, and then you can really decide whether you've got one that measures up to something that should get you a 30 to 40% appointment rate. So the first thing is this: affirmation is critical in a phone script. Okay? We all are designed to want, we're all designed to need affirmation. In fact, you know, when you look at human motivation as a whole, Affirmation is the 2nd most motivating factor for a human being, period. It just is. Larger meaning, playing a role in a larger story, that's the number one reason, but affirmation is right behind that. So, one, I want to work for an affirming leader. I call that a life-giving leader. Someone that actually— affirmation is life. It just is. Life can be difficult. Life can be discouraging. When someone shows up and encourages me, I know there's just a part of me that comes alive. I recently had a conversation. It was like a 1-hour session with someone who's not in my coaching but was just, let me help you for an hour and give you some of my best input. And this individual was extremely affirming. Like, hey, I listen to your podcast. I love it. I love what you're doing on LinkedIn. This video really helped me. I love— I've been trying what you said here and it's working. They were extremely affirming, intentionally affirming. And I just paused for a moment and said, you're a phenomenal recruiter. And the reason why I know that you're a phenomenal recruiter is because you're overly affirming. And I'm just gonna make the assumption that you're like this in your recruiting. And her response was, yes, I'm like this in my recruiting. That affirmation is so key. You want someone to do something for you, right? Really badly. My kids are starting to get the hang of this. They come and they affirm Dad. Dad, you're awesome. Dad, I love you. You're the greatest dad on planet Earth. I know that at some point in the next few seconds I got an ask coming. They know it. Kids are intrinsically designed to know this. Whether we design them like that through our behaviors, because they affirm us and then we give in, or they're naturally born with it, it doesn't matter. At any level, we know that affirmation works from the time that we're a kid growing up. Affirmation's key in your phone scripting. So here's the deal: when you call someone, you got to do a bunch of research on them. Okay, you are blessed. This is 2019. You are blessed to be in a time where information is accessible at your fingertips, to just go to the number one search, you know, engine in the world, Google, and to go First name, last name, industry that they're in, and state. For me, it would have been Richard Milligan, Mortgage, Oklahoma, and you would have gotten 3 pages of things about me that would have allowed you to affirm me coming in. You'd have found out that I did a radio show for several years. You could have gotten to my LinkedIn page, my Facebook page. You could have seen all kinds of information. And guess what? We're not at a stage anymore where maybe we were 5 years ago where it was considered cyberstalking to look at someone's Instagram page or Facebook page before you reached out to them. It is an expectation that you've done that today if you're making the phone call. So if someone doesn't want you to see their information, they'll have their privacy settings set to where you can't see them. Otherwise, if you can see them, then that's information that's at your fingertips to affirm. Okay? And so we've got to lead with affirmation. These are the things I saw about you. I'm overly impressed with you. I noticed your consumer reviews. I saw you've been at this company for 8 years. I noticed that you partner with this key person in your market. I saw that you were at this nonprofit event. I noticed your family is really important to you because I saw that on Facebook. I mean, affirm, affirm, affirm. And then what we'll do is we'll actually say, that's the reason why I'm reaching out to you, is I saw these things about you and I saw similarities between things that you value and things that I value. Okay, so affirmation is key. Second component is this: You have to have a really large why for someone to meet with you, a really large reason why someone should meet with you. When I ask people to give me their original phone script when I'm coaching people, I hear a lot of phone scripts that go along the lines of, I'm reaching out to you to see if you're open to a new opportunity. That's not a very big why, and there's no affirmation in that at all either, because I assume That you're smiling and dialing. You're just picking up the phone, you're calling one person and the next person, that person and the next person, and that I'm not that special. Okay? When you come in affirming, I feel special. Now what you have to have is a really big reason why. Exchanging industry ideas is not a big reason why. I hear that used a lot. That's not a big reason why. Another big reason why is not because we've got a mutual relationship in the marketplace. That's not a big reason why. So you've got to come up with some really big reasons why someone should meet with you. I do a lot of coaching in the mortgage industry. So let me just give you some whys around someone would actually have a meeting with you. Okay? Look at 2018. That's just been a year ago. There was a ton of consolidation that took place in the industry. That's a good reason why. Look, 2020 is an election year, and whether you're Democrat or Republican, One of the things that I know is that election years, there's a lot of change that takes place in election years and post-election year, right? So whether the Republicans win or the Democrats win, whether there's a reversal policy or a non-reversal policy, a lot of times there's a big change that gets— that takes place the coming years after an election. So the election year coming up is another good reason why, like, change is on the horizon. Cost to produce a loan continues to go up for the mortgage industry. That's a problem that hasn't been solved yet. So everyone knows there's a— that problem's looming and it has to be solved. A lot of mortgage companies are over $9,000 to just produce a loan today. So that's a problem that has to be solved. Okay? Again and again and again, these are some— start piling these reasons up as to why. Like the unknown of tomorrow is a really big reason why. Okay? So I just affirmed you. I'm giving you some really big reasons why we should meet. And then here's the third component. Remove all tension. And when I say remove all tension, when we recruit, we insert tension. When we don't recruit, we remove all tension. So I'm intentional in my phone scripting of saying, if you're willing to meet with me, I'll promise not to talk about my mortgage company, my real estate company, my insurance company, whatever industry you're in. I promise I won't talk about my company in our meeting. So now I know that I've removed all tension. Okay, I'm going to protect that first meeting. And guess what? I am going to honestly, with integrity, protect the first meeting. There's other things that are more important than your company value proposition. So if this is your first podcast and you're just now getting to my content for the first time, then this may be a new concept for you. But look, people want to work and people want to align with great leaders. It's the reason why I say there's an intersection where recruiting and leading overlap. Great leaders are naturally great recruiters. So if you're struggling on the recruiting side, one of the things I would say is work to start honing some of your leadership skills because great leaders naturally could walk into a first meeting and have clarity around their vision, have clarity around their core convictions, their values, their beliefs. And those are the things that we lead with in that first meeting when we meet with a recruit, not the company value proposition. So I've done 2 things by establishing that agenda for that meeting. If you're willing to meet with me, I'm not going to talk about my company. Okay? What does that mean? Well, when we meet, I've said I've established an agenda. And that agenda says that now I got to have something else besides talking about my company available. So guess what? We're going to have something else available in that meeting where not only are we going to get to know this person well and figure out their why, but we're going to share our vision, we're going to share our core value system, and we're going to be able to storytell those. Now, I'm not here to talk about those components, but storytelling is some of the secret sauce in being successful in the face-to-face meeting with someone. And you've got to be able to storytell. You got to be able to convince me why those core values are legitimately your core values. And what I'm going to do is I'm going to take a story, go back to a time and a place where that is true about me, where that core value is true about me. And I call those anchor stories, and we would share those. But on the phone scripting, you're now going to represent— you're going to have these 3 pieces of framework: affirmation, a really big reason why you should meet with me, and then I'm going to remove all tension by making a statement and then honoring that statement. That if you're willing to meet with me, I promise not to recruit you and I promise not to talk about my company in that meeting. Now you can take your current phone script, you can measure it against those 3 components and say, what do I need to change process-wise? What do I need to change? You may not be doing a lot of research and you need to do that in order to get to a place where you can affirm. You may not have a really large why and you need to establish that. Begin to ask questions from other leaders like, what are some of the reasons that people should meet with you? And this cannot be because your company is the best thing since sliced bread. That's not a big why. Most people will automatically gravitate towards that and say, my big why is that my company is amazing. That is not a big why. Look, Dana says this, most people are content where they are. Okay, so they made the decision to go to the company they're at, probably choosing over knowing who your company was. Okay, so it's not your company value proposition. That can be the big why. That's what I call the opportunity improvement offer. The opportunity improvement offer just says you're a little bit better. Okay, we're just a little bit better. And that is the least reason why someone's going to actually join your organization. Okay, look, we say this all the time. People leave companies for bad leadership. People leave companies for bad managers. And when I make that statement, I get a lot of head nods. You're right, people do. Then where's the disconnect? If people leave companies for bad leaders, for bad managers, then don't people join organizations for great leaders, or what they believe they're buying into is great leadership? Now, the truth is that in a lot of industries, we let people down. We oversell What we have to offer in terms of leadership, and people get there and there is a lack there. Okay. And that's just a true statement. And that's why there's this intersection I say where recruiting and leading overlap, because great leaders, when they sell their leadership, their vision, their values, their belief system, they deliver on those. And so not only are they able to recruit, they're actually able to retain. And the only way to win the long game of recruiting is by retaining your people. So, really big reason why. And then we're going to remove all the tension as to why they're willing to meet with us. And if you'll do that and you'll incorporate that into what you're doing in your phone scripting, then guess what? You've got a powerful phone script. You're going to have more people say yes to it. And not only that, but it's going to force you to have a better process because then in a face-to-face meeting, you will not talk about the company. Okay? I've got a podcast on here. That you can go back and listen to. If this one is— if you're just now tuning into this podcast, Recruiting Conversations, go search the one that talks about the 4 stages of face-to-face meetings. And that will tell— it will give you a framework for how a face-to-face meeting should go for you. If you are going to follow a process like what I'm laying out here for you, it's a better process. It's how you get into relationship building. And look, we go back again. Recruiting leaders have to have a different mindset, a different process. We're fishing in a small pond, right? We gotta build relationship and we gotta have that first meeting, which a lot of times is only gonna be the only meeting. Think about that. A lot of times in our career, it may be the only meeting we get. If we don't deliver well on that, it gets very difficult to get to any next meeting. So, if I throw up my company value proposition on you, Then you will walk away either saying, wow, that's the company I will join immediately, or you'll walk away saying, I know everything I need to know about that organization and I'm not interested. And if that is to happen to you, then really for the rest of your career, even if your external recruiter, if you're blessed to have one, even if they call the individual, they'll say, oh yeah, yeah, I met with Richard a year ago and found out about your company. I'm happy where I'm at. In their minds, they are thinking, I know everything that I need to know about your organization. People don't move to organizations because of company toolboxes. They move to organizations because of great leaders. The leader is the culture that the organization ultimately presents in markets. The leader is everything in terms of the value that an organization leaves in a local market. And so this is a component you gotta lead with. Your leadership value. And that's why one of the things is that your leadership branding is so important. Your social brand is so important to you as a holistic approach to everything that we're talking about here. Okay? So I want to stay on track. Those are the 3 components: affirmation, really big reason why they should meet with you, and the 3rd part is remove all tension. Let's have that first meeting be a relationship-building meeting only. And if you do that, you've got a powerful phone script. Okay. So thank you for tuning in. I apologize, I muted out most of my coughs, so there's some pauses here. It was me muting those out. Looking forward to hosting another Recruiting Conversations later on this week. So have a great start to your week, everybody, and invite someone in to listening to this podcast as a way of spreading the love of trying to improve recruiting inside your own organization. Have a great week, everybody. We'll talk to you soon. Okay, I apologize. Ah, I can't get over this. I'm on everything. I'm on antibiotics. I'm on a steroid. I went and got a liquid IV that had all kinds of healthy, cool stuff in it over the weekend to get my momentum back. But I'm not going to let that knock me off course. This week is going to be an amazing week. I am not going to settle for anything less. Although I'm going to make sure I rest in the moments that I have the time to rest. So challenge each one of you, evaluate your phone scripting. Does it fall within these criteria? And if it does, 2 thumbs up. If it doesn't, you got to change it. And you will notice, you will notice That once you know that phone script well, that the percentage of people that say yes to you will automatically go up. Your good measuring stick, and you should be measuring your data on number of calls that you make, number of contacts that you actually truly make. So phone calls and contacts are different. Phone calls, number of contacts, and then how many appointments did you set? And I think the best process is to go phone call, If they're willing to say yes, a 10 to 15 minute conversation over the phone. Okay. It's a waste of time to get people into a face-to-face without knowing more about them. And so what that will do is that will actually be a time saver for you. Okay. It's a multiplier effect. What I would do is on the phone, great phone script. Yes to a later this week, a 10 to 15 minute phone conversation where there's no recruiting allowed. And then what I can do is build relationship with them only. I'm asking questions around Ford. Family, occupation, recreation, dreams. Say that again. Family, occupation, recreation, dreams. Okay, tell me about your family, tell me about your work, tell me what you do for fun, and tell me something dreamy that you want to accomplish in the next 5 years. That's a framework for that. Okay, I can do that in 10 to 15 minutes. It's them doing all the talking. I can create a lot of synergy, and then from that I can say, I would like to extend this conversation into a face-to-face. And again, if you're willing to say yes, I put my hands up because this is removing all the tension. If you're willing to say yes to that, then I'll promise that I won't talk about my company in that meeting. Just continue getting to know you and, and, you know, establishing the relationship. So that becomes the next step to that. And that's an incredible process that works extremely well for the recruiting leader. If you have a 10 to 15 minute phone conversation and you realize this person is not your kind of person, Then guess what? You said you weren't going to recruit. You can high-five them over the phone and say you're going to stay connected to each other and you can move on and you haven't lost any brand equity. The problem that I see a lot of people do when they're really trying to recruit and they oversell the company value proposition or just sell the company value proposition, what happens when that person wants to join your team if they're not a good fit? And then you got to push them away. You lose brand equity because that person will disparage you in the market as a way of protecting themselves. A lot of people miss the connections on some of this. This is a very thoughtful process for the recruiting leader. Don't miss that. Don't miss that component. That's the best process. Got it? Okay. Everyone's shaking their heads yes, I got it. Thanks for working through The coughing session today. I appreciate the therapy. It was therapeutic. Have a great week, everybody. I look forward to dropping another video to you soon here on, here on my YouTube channel, Review Channel. Okay, thanks. Thanks.