In this solo presentation, Richard Milligan of Foresee Recruiting shares the single most important insight he discovered after 11 years in mortgage‑industry recruiting: the key to successful recruiting is uncovering a candidate’s true “why” – the deeper motivation that drives them. He argues that once a recruiter knows a recruit’s why, the conversation shifts from selling a product or job to building a relationship and aligning the recruiter’s value proposition with that motivation, making the recruit’s decision a matter of “when” rather than “if.” Milligan outlines a four‑stage, face‑to‑face framework that creates meeting momentum and clear next steps, and he illustrates how to dig beneath surface answers (like money or material goals) by prompting candidates to recall a past struggle that clarified their core purpose. Using his own experience during the 2007‑2008 mortgage crisis, he shows how personal hardship revealed his own why (family, responsibility) and how sharing such stories helps candidates articulate theirs. The talk emphasizes integrity, empathy, and the leader’s role in helping recruits achieve their deeper goals, warning that focusing on money alone leads to fragile commitments. Milligan concludes with a call to action for recruiters to adopt this why‑centric approach.
Chapters
Hi everybody, it's Richard Milligan here with Foresee Recruiting, and I'm coming to you today to talk about the importance of what I believe is the one thing inside recruiting. Now, it took me well over 11 years as a recruiting leader inside the mortgage industry to figure this piece out. This is a nugget that will really accelerate your recruiting efforts, but more than that, this is a piece of information that will make you very connectable as a leader when you recruit people. Okay, so here's the one thing. In any business, what people are trying to figure out is what's the one thing that I need to convince people of? And if we can convince them of that one thing, then we realize that it's not a matter of if they buy my product or if they want to be a part of my organization. It's not just a matter of if, it'll become a matter of when. Now here's the one thing inside recruiting, and it's this: It is, what is your recruit's why? What is it that motivates them? Now, I can go back to my own recruiting efforts and here's what I know. For years, I never asked this simple question. And it's so simple and it seems so obvious that when I give it to you, you're gonna go, yes, I should be doing that. And the question is this: what is it that motivates you most? Okay, so I teach 4 stages inside a face-to-face presentation where we should follow 4 simple stages When we're meeting with someone, that gives that meeting momentum, it gives it meaning, and then beyond that, it gives us the power of having something called the next step. And ultimately, that's what recruiting is, right? We're just trying to create next steps. What's the next step? But inside that, if you don't get this little principle, which is how do we figure out what motivates someone most, then ultimately you're simply recruiting. And what we want to be doing is we want to be building relationship. Now, I spent almost 15 years inside the mortgage industry, and I can say this: I never had anybody ever ask me this simple question, which is, what is it that motivates you most, Richard? Okay? So we're going to ask that question when we're meeting with people face-to-face. What is your why? Like, what is it that motivates you most? Now, here's one of the biggest hurdles that you're going to come up against when you ask this question. Most people aren't clear on what it is. In fact, a lot of you right now, if you ask yourself this question, what is it that motivates me most? Aren't going to have a lot of clarity on what that actually is. We tend to answer with very surfacey answers, things like more money. Okay, we'll put a number out there, $100,000 or $250,000 or $1 million that we want to earn, right? Or we'll say stuff like, I want a boat, I want a car, we want to build a new house. Or it could be things that are attached to money, which might be, I want to put my kids through college. Or— but we're not real clear on what it is that motivates us most. So here's a tip that will help you get this, because one of the things that I came up against Again and again is when I would ask people when I was recruiting them, what is it that motivates you most? They would give me that surface answer. And the truth is that if I can get the real answer, the one that's below the surface, and I can pursue them through the lens of that forever— because once I have that, I'll pursue you through the lens of your why, what motivates you most, and it will be my job to convince you with integrity. I say with integrity, not just to convince you as a salesperson, but to convince you with the heart That says that I will do this, but to pursue you through the lens of me being the leader, the only leader in your market, the best leader in your market to help you accomplish that why. So I will convince you, if you will come align with me, then I will help you accomplish what motivates you most. Because this isn't— I don't win whenever I win. I win when you win. And when people believe that, people want to align with you. Okay? So the one thing in recruiting is get their why and then pursue them through the lens of that. Making them understand that you above all other leaders in that market will help them accomplish that. Okay, but here's the problem. When people answer with money or with stuff, how do you pursue through that lens? Because ultimately my belief is that money is the lowest form of human motivation. Like when people give you a dollar figure and that's what motivates them, guess what? You will lose when somebody else offers them more money. So we have to figure out a better lens to pursue through, and ultimately we all have larger reasons of what motivates us. Let me give you an example. In a meeting with someone, if someone would say, it was money or stuff that motivated me, and I wanted to get to the root of what was their ultimate why, I would take them back to a time and place and I would give them some framework. I think the framework always helps us. Examples always help us understand what the right question is, what the right answer is. I would take people back to a place. I'll just give you an example. I would take people back to a place in 2007. And in 2007, I'd been in the mortgage industry for a whopping 5 years, and I just didn't know what I didn't know until it was too late. And when I knew it, I got crushed. So 2007 to 2008, many of you that were in this industry over 10 years ago, you'll understand this best. In 2008, I got ran over by the train again and again and again. At that time, I was scaling my business. I wasn't in tune with what was going on in the market. 95% of my business was refinance, 90% of it was non-conventional, non-government. I had never done an FHA loan, I had never done a VA loan at that time. And so I remember in those moments the desperation. It wasn't money and it wasn't that next car or that boat or that new home that motivated me to get up every single morning because ultimately I was facing failure. I was facing another tough day of trying to figure out How do I get just simply from point A, which sometimes was my bed, to point B, which was putting my feet on the floor in the morning? And so I would tell my recruits an elaborate story about that, a detailed story where I'd bring in the pain of that moment and the struggle of just getting my feet out of bed in the morning and moving forward with my day. And then I can give you clarity because in those moments I became very clear what motivated me most. And at the time I can remember my 11-year-old today was a newborn. My 16-year-old today was 5 years old then. My wife— those were the things— my newborn, my 5-year-old, and my wife were the reasons why I got up every single morning and went through another difficult day during that season. So I encourage you, take your recruits back to a season where you've suffered loss. Take your recruits back to a time where you had a struggle, where you had something that gave you clarity on what motivated you most. And then the framework is Now that I give that to you, what if you found yourself in that situation, what would motivate you to put your feet on the floor in the morning? That will give you a better why. And when we have that, we will pursue forever through the lens of that. Now, in one of my other videos, I'll give you some ideas on how, when I say pursue through the lens of why, what that means. I'll give you some more context around that, but you gotta start by getting it. So if you enjoyed this video, like it, share it. You can also see more videos like this on my website at 4CREcruiting.com. And until we see each other again, all the best to you. And remember, if you're going to become a great recruiter, you have to figure out the why.
