How to reprogram your mind for success ($1,000,000 Biller)

Hey guys, welcome back to yet another episode of Top Billers Toolkit, where me and my twin brother interview top billers from all around the globe to unlock the secrets to their success. Today we're joined by Chris Schwenk. Chris is a million-dollar biller, and he's got 3 really important, powerful strategies that we want to dive into on today's podcast. Chris's BD was going downhill fast, his response rates were plummeting, but when he decided to start a podcast and invite high-profile guests onto it, his response rate started climbing back up to where it was supposed to be, and it's completely shifted his positioning in the marketplace. We're also going to be talking about how Chris has been using NLP, which is Neuro Linguistic Programming, for about a year now. Every single day he sits down and he does it. It's made him become more confident, it's helped him achieve his goals, and it's helped him bill more. Lastly, we're going to be talking about how Chris has used VAs to save him hours and hours of time every single week, and why getting past that delegation phase is one of the most important phases for any business owner. Guys, this is a great episode. There's a few things we speak about in here that if you follow, I guarantee you will make you more money. Hope you like it. As usual, grab a cuppa or a glass of wine depending on when you're listening to this, and let's get into it, shall we?

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Hey there, Chris. Thank you so much for joining us today on Top Billers Toolkit. How you doing?

Doing great, doing great. It's great weather in Miami today, so I can't complain.

Yeah, that's awesome. And for those of you that are wondering, that is a real background that Chris is using. Epic view. I'm very jealous. I've got a view that is probably as high, Chris, but Southampton, uh, not Miami, so it does look a little bit different.

I know, I was afraid we would— it's very rare we do get some cloudy days. I was like I was like, hopefully we get this type of, of backdrop for you guys.

Yeah, awesome, man. Um, so I'm going to jump in with the first question as always, Chris. What's the number one tool in your toolkit, whether it be a mindset, strategy, or software?

Yeah, so right now for BD, I am using a podcast strategy that, uh, you know, we can do a deep dive into. A lot of recruiters are kind of like asking me what's going on with that. Is it working? Is it not? How does it work and all that stuff? So I can, you know, I can go into all of that. That's pretty much my best tool for business development at the moment. And that is, that's what I'm doing for all outreach. I mean, I don't even reach out. I do have some automations reaching out like, hey, I saw you have an opening, you know, that type of stuff. But when I'm targeting executives, I've identified that was pretty much the best way to increase response rate. Outside of obviously the best thing is if you have a job that they want that you're recruiting for, then that is the best way to get executives to respond in the tech space. This would be second for me that I've seen, you know, higher response rates.

So interesting.

Awesome.

But before we get into the tool, like the technical, I'm just interested from a seasoned BD professional like you, Chris, about the psychology. Why do you think the podcast gets a higher response rate and why is it now your like go-to tool? What is going on psychologically there? Because I want other people to get their heads around it of not just the how I do this, but like why I'm doing this and why the response rate is better. What have you— what do you think?

Well, I mean, you're offering something, you know, for them to, you know, you're giving them value upfront. Right. Because I kind of show them some past episodes I've done. I've put a lot of money into it and I can kind of get into some of the finances of that. Some things haven't worked, some things have worked, some things maybe will work. So, but you're adding value first. And, you know, we got into a position after, you know, kind of the boom of COVID where, you know, good candidates, you know, they're kind of a dime a dozen. I do mostly staff augmentation for Fortune— we'll say Fortune 500 to 1000s. And, you know, kind of this has been the first time where you have a candidate that's an 8.5 or 9 out of 10. Most of the time that person's getting the job. And, you know, probably 2022 when things started to pull back, that was the first time I realized that isn't enough anymore. So just having great candidates is not enough. You're always getting beat out. With great candidates. So I was like, you know, I need more. I basically needed more clients. This was the fastest, most efficient way to get responses from high-level tech executives. And, and, you know, you're— I think it'll be more prominent for employees. Like, every entrepreneur wants to jump on a podcast. You guys probably get much better response rates than I do because I'm reaching out to executives and kind of hiring managers, you know, employees, it's a little bit of, it's a little bit trickier because I'm navigating PR. Sometimes PR is blocking them. Sometimes they have to get approval. Sometimes they're afraid to even mention they work at the company. This was stuff I didn't know. I thought it was, I thought it'd be like the entrepreneur mindset where everyone's just going to say like, podcast? Yeah, of course. I want to come on and talk and, you know, kind of look like, an expert. So, you know, I think it's, you know, the people that it has worked, what I've identified is I'm starting to see a shift with those type of tech executives, hiring managers. Some are, they're late to it, but they're starting to build out their personal brand and they're realizing that's how I'm gonna get my next job. That's how maybe I'll get speaking engagements and stuff like that. And they realize they have knowledge that people want to hear. When I, when I kind of smell that going on, the LinkedIn is a little flashier. I'm like, okay, that's my target. And, you know, that's why I want to have on the pod. And those people are like dying at the chance.

Love that. And it's interesting. I'm going to be fascinated to go deeper into the, the roadblocks that you've had, Chris, because you're right. Like, it's probably our response rate is pretty insane. I think it's like, I don't know, 8 out of 10 people will probably come back and say yes for me and Sam. Um, and I can see why. There's no one blocking us. It's literally like there's only an upside, really. But I completely understand in your situation there's a lot more to think about. Um, I'd love to go back to that moment you said, which is you, you were being out, um, you— there was too much competition and everyone had good candidates, and that really wasn't enough of a differentiator. Um, why— what was the thing that made you go down the podcast route? Because Oh, like what was the thing that triggered it? Because there could have been multiple different routes you got— you went down, right? And I think podcast is just one of them. Did you see someone else doing it? Did you like— what was the thing that triggered it in the first place, do you think?

Yeah, so I have had some mentors in this space, and I think— I mean, I think everyone should have kind of an alternative BD method right now besides just outreach, because the outreach is the outreach is automated and AI and you're getting lost in the shuffle now. So I think you need some sort of alternative. And basically I had a mentor that taught me how to monetize podcasts, kind of like a flywheel of affiliate deals, brand sponsorships. And, you know, I'm getting speaking fees now because I'm building up the YouTube and the podcast. So that's another way. And You know, and then I, and, you know, I'll get into how the strategy has evolved. But at this point, I'm targeting companies. Yeah, I went from like begging people to come on and hopefully it'll give me business. That was a terrible strategy. And then I went to kind of a strategy of being more upfront, saying like, oh, you want to come on? Yeah, of course. Like, you'd be a great guest and, you know, it'll look great. I pay for this by getting recruitment business. Can you make it? You know, Can you make an intro to HR? Can you make an intro to vendor management? Do you have anything? You know, I just start peppering them at the end of the calls. And so basically my day now is, you know, basically my history was agency recruitment where we're all taking the same managers to lunch and happy hour and sporting events. And, you know, and then, you know, back then everything was on site. So we were all competing for the same pool of candidates. And the same managers and the same openings. So now it's, it's a bit different. And, you know, and so now when my day now instead of lunches is podcast calls from, you know, my assistant is booking calls and saying like, you know, I'm explaining it, I'm showing them past episodes, the edits and everything. And once I get them all juiced up to do it, then I kind of slip in. I am using this as a lead source for my recruitment business. So What can you do? And, you know, and when I say like, my first year, which is true, I lost a bunch of money on it because I wasn't upfront about that. So, and people have been way more open now. It's become a great business development tool that I envisioned. But without that intentionality, it was not good.

Really interesting. I remember you telling me that. So I was, Transparently, Chris, I was, I was interested and surprised by the kind of forward nature of what you were doing there. For me, um, I know there's multiple ways to win business with a podcast, but I was, um, I was impressed by the, by your strategy and how forward it was, I guess. Um, what I'm thinking is some people would really resonate with that and other people definitely wouldn't. For the people that are interested, what's different about those people because they obviously find it— they're obviously like convinced enough that there's enough value in this process to not only come on your podcast but also give you an introduction as well. So have you just— have you noticed anything about what's different about those people at all? Or—

yeah, I think when you lay it out for them, they understand the economics of it. Like, hey, you know, this isn't— I mean, I was doing all in person the first year, which is obviously much more costly and had you know, very high-priced editors. Um, I've switched to a blend model, uh, for economic reasons, and it allows me to target more people. I was, I was too confined to just Miami and just, just the people that, A, were allowed to come on at Fortune 500s, the companies I wanted to do business with, and people that were local. So I kind of expanded it out, and now it gives me a downsell or upsell So I get them on a call and you don't want to say like, oh, you don't have any business, I'm not interested because, you know, that's kind of a bad look. So I say, well, listen, if you don't have any business, you don't have any referrals, you're not even willing to make an intro, that's fine. I still want to talk to you, but we would just do it remote. Hmm.

And so it's quite a good way, actually. Yeah, that's quite a smart way.

Yeah. But, but so I've switched to I basically switched to a new model, which is more of a retained model for the company. So I'll say, you know, would your company sponsor because we're willing to kind of promote what it's like working in tech at such and such company, you know, and so they get PR involved. I get them to sponsor, but I also throw in at the end, okay, you know, at the top level, it's, you know, a few thousand. But I will refund any of that in the first recruitment placement, uh, that I do with your company.

That's cool. That's a clever, clever angle.

Yeah. Um, out of interest, um, Chris, what's the hit rate? So like, let's just imagine you get 10 guests who are interested, uh, on the podcast, and they're like, hey, yeah, love it, want to do it. And then you're like— and then you, you go in with your pit— your, your end pitch, which is like, this isn't free, um, yada yada yada. I'm just curious, what is the— do most people, uh, are most people like receptive and are like, yeah, cool, yeah, let me just introduce you to HR? Is it like a 50/50? Is it like, what is— what's the hit rate on that? Are you— is it pretty good? I'm just curious.

It's pretty good once I get to that point. Now the outreach is mostly done through LinkedIn and email automation, and then I do LinkedIn Recruiter, uh, direct outreach, and then I Obviously, like email automation and then direct email, which I didn't know at first, they're two totally separate things. One is delivered much more. So my VA is just like kind of pounding those email invitations. If I can book them on the call and then I get to that point where they're interested and all of that, then the hit rate is pretty high that it's like, hey, listen, I'm not asking for anything guaranteed. I'm not asking for, you know, just make an intro for me, and if you can't do that, then I'll get back to you about scheduling, you know, um, which I think is fair, honestly.

Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah, yeah.

And what about the hit rate from, let's say you send 10 messages out, Chris, to say, hey, I would love to invite you to my podcast? What percentage of people respond, do you think?

You know, it's still low, it's still low, but obviously it's going to be higher than than just asking for like, hey, I'm a recruiter, I can get you great people. I, you know, no, I'm not niched down. I'm just a tech generalist, which is kind of against the common advice these days. But, you know, I don't know. I mean, I know people are doing great doing that, but I just think back to during COVID I got into a clinical research company and I got in through the tech space and they said, hey, we have a ton of, obviously they had a ton of clinical research work that came during COVID and they said, can you do this? I just kind of said, yeah, of course. I know anything about this, but, you know, in the staff augmentation space, you know, it's not, it's not rocket science. You know, you match the titles, you match the skill sets and go. And I mean, that generated $1 million in just the clinical space. Wow.

Okay.

It was, it was the COVID boom, kind of an anomaly. But had I said no, I'm, I'm a tech guy, you know, I would have lost so much money. So interesting.

So it's like you don't need massive volume because once you get a conversion, the, the upside of what you could gain from it is pretty big. How many, just out of curiosity, Chris, how many intros, let's say over the year, how many intros would you get from this podcast, do you think, on average?

Well, it's been more the last, we'll say, 4 months. Cool.

Okay.

I've gotten MSAs, contingent fee agreements signed. I've gotten a bunch of recs, and it's all just that, just that being very intentional about it. And the right person at a company will want to kind of, you know, they see other people that talking people's ear off on podcasts and they say, well, damn, no one's asked me to be on one of these. I mean, I saw a gap in the market to, I wanted to create a, you know, whatever you want to say, the Tonight Show slash Joe Rogan of tech executives. Like no one was talking to those people. There's a lot of tech podcasts. They only talk to, they basically partner with the bootcamps, which I have some partnerships with them too. but they only partner with the bootcamps, interview people that just broke into the tech space and, and try to convert affiliates from that. And they've done really well. My mentor in that space, he was making 7 figures a year on his podcast. Like, I didn't even have a recruitment business back then. He was making 7 figures on, wow, just the podcast, just all this podcast. So like, it is a much different muscle than the recruitment muscle and the BD muscle. So You know, another thing is, I mean, you know, don't be afraid to get mentors. If you are trying a podcast or some, we'll say, we'll call it alternative method, right? There can be other ways. You could host job fairs. You could host local meetups where you're asking maybe, you know, your ideal client to speak or something like that. Mentor in that space because we don't know that space. We know the recruitment space, but we don't know that space. So Basically, I, I would say anyone that is listening to this, they're interested in, okay, maybe I'll start a podcast to target my ideal client. Get some help because that backend monetization allows you to keep going because you might not convert many clients right off the bat. I mean, I did in my first year, but I mean, I probably made $20 grand in the outside money. That fueled me to get to this year. And, um, and now it is converting clients very well.

So yeah, it's interesting because I think same for me and Sam, it took us a good like 12 months to pick up traction with our podcast, um, maybe even longer. Um, but then I, I always say this to people, we try not— I, I try not to shove podcasts down people's throats too much because some people resonate with it, a lot of people don't. I think they're kind of I don't know why people don't see it in the same way as us too, uh, Chris, until you— I think it's because it's quite a long-term activity and you really have to put in quite a lot of work before you typically see the rewards. But I feel like when you do get to that stage, it's just probably one of the most powerful things you can do for your business on a branding perspective. From mine and Sam's experience, it's like definitely one of the needle movers of our business. Sam, would you agree? Like, in terms of that one of those needle movers that made one of the biggest difference in terms of brand awareness, leads, revenue, um, association. Um, I don't know what you think.

Yeah, totally agree, dude. Um, question I had, uh, Chris, because we kind of know what you're doing that's working. I'm curious what you did at the beginning that didn't work, like in terms of the positioning or, or how you— because you said the thing that changes, you had intentionality with the podcast. I'm What were you doing before that wasn't working? Just so people know what to avoid if they decide to do the podcast BD route.

Well, I just assumed they would kind of put two and two together and never, never assume that, you know, because you have to kind of present it as you'd be this great guest. So they think they're doing you a favor where— and then at the end I would say like, you know, I'd mentioned that I was in the recruitment space. So that's how, you know, I'd always try to weave it into the conversations. And then after the podcast was done, I would be like, hey, you know, can you help me out? And it's always like, yeah, maybe, you know, it wasn't like I was like, oh, well, glad I wasted all this time and money making you look like a star. So, you know, it was like, geez. So now I'm just, you know, I needed to way increase the outreach. And I brought on a VA about a year ago, a full-time VA, and he's just crushing, you know, I just give him lead lists and just to like invite all these people to the podcast and set up calls here. And, um, and now when you have an abundance of guests and the ability to go remote, I could stay consistent without needing to kind of force people into this. It had to be like to stay consistent. I needed to have anyone that was willing to come to the studio. The remote kind of gave me more flexibility. So love that.

Yeah, that makes—

that's so— it's really—

that's really a really important detail that, like, you set up a podcast, you invited a decision maker, you said, oh, I do recruiting, by the way, and kind of expected two and two just to happen, which a lot of people do. I think a lot of people expect that with BD as well instead of being more intentional. But you got them on, and now you're like, hey, very clearly, this is going to be great for you, but, you know, I need to make money, so you have to give me something in return.

I just—

it's a very great detail that could change someone's entire BD journey with podcasts. I think it's a really, really great point, Chris. That's awesome. Um, yeah, yeah.

The, um, just to throw in, because I've— I have a slightly soft— I know there's going to be recruiters here who maybe want a slightly softer approach, which is also, also worth, because I think We've had like 2 or 3 people on the podcast who also have monetized their podcast like you, Chris. And so there's just— there's more than one way to do it. No right way. I think it depends on your personality. But the way that I did it, which worked quite well for me, was get them on the pre-call, ask them loads of questions, and then save a small portion of the end, maybe 10 to 15 minutes, to talk about your service. And kind of ask them a little bit about what they're doing, if they have any hiring needs, or obviously this was related to recruitment, but it's almost like, it's almost like a soft sales call at the end, if that makes sense. And you kind of suss out if it's going to be worth speaking to them and selling harder on after the second call. Does that make sense, or have I, uh, oh yeah, yeah, pre-call. A little bit of a sales— not sales pitch, but like a, um, understanding their needs, if they are a good fit, podcast, and then sell at the end, soft sell at the end, if that makes sense, and then keeping in touch. So that, that's another avenue that you can do. They're just very similar but a bit of a nuance in terms of how you approach it. Oh, that was a long-winded answer.

Awesome.

Cool.

What was the—

I think we were—

there was a few other topics, Ben, on your questions. I think we've covered the podcast bit, unless you have any more specific ones. I'm curious to delve into the other ones.

Yeah, I think the thing that really interested me, Chris, if you're willing to go deeper into this, is the meditation and NLP. I just found that fascinating. I think me and Sam are going for a bit of a mindset shift at the moment and would love to hear more about what that is and why you're doing it so the audience can hear.

Yeah, yeah. So some people may think it's a bit woo-woo. I definitely did. I'm a firm believer in it and And so basically it's, so a practice I've gotten into over the last year, it's meditation, it's NLP, which is neuro-linguistic programming. And you're pretty much, you know, closing your eyes on the couch or, you know, in bed and you're lying down listening to a script. And I have different ones that I listen to. I have a personalized one, which is kind of targeted on my goals. And where I want to be. And I work with a kind of performance coach. I call him my guru. He's— his name is Mark Dahmer. Shout him out. Also fellow countryman of you guys. Yeah. So he's worked with very high-level people. Sam Ovens, he's worked with.

Oh, we love Sam Ovens.

I'm an absolute Sam Ovens fanboy.

He's like one of our heroes. So that's amazing to hear. Yeah, he must be good if he's worked with Sam Ovens.

Yep, Tai Lopez, Sam Ovens. I know Tai's gotten into trouble recently, but, um, it's pretty good. So, um, but essentially, so I'm like, you know, again, at the end of the year last year, I was kind of like, do I keep going with this or not? I mean, no one had told me that the podcast idea was a bad idea. Everyone— talk to business experts, you know, entrepreneurs I know— they're like, oh, it's a great idea. I'm like, Yeah, but it hasn't worked. So what now? Do I keep going? And, um, so I started working with Mark, and essentially he put me in this like kind of meditated, tranquil state. And, you know, he's like talking to you through it, and you pretty much visit— you, you sit down in a room with yourself in the future, and you talk to yourself, which is, you know, really whatever you want to say. at another dimension you're doing it, or some people just like, it's just your brain kind of, you know, telling you, uh, subconsciously what it wants you to know. And, uh, so basically he, he put me in a room with my future self and I kind of said, what do I do? And basically that future self was just like, dude, just keep, keep plowing forward. You're like, what you're doing is right. You just need more. You need more time, need more volume. And then you come out of that and you're, you're much more relaxed. You know, your mindset, you know, when you're doing that every day and you're putting yourself in the shoes of your more successful self, your, your day-to-day problems become much more manageable and you're much more kind of confident and decisive in them. You know, like the indecision is, is the killer. It's, it's not the wrong. Obviously, you can make some bad decisions, but it's the, it's the indecisiveness that's the killer. So, um, it's made me just like, okay, boom, let's do this, let's try this, you know. Okay, like, is it working? Is it not? You know, I'm just much— you're much more confident in your day-to-day, um, because you've seen, you've seen yourself do it. And, you know, as we talked about on, on the pre-interview, The best way to describe it is like, you know, imagine the college version of you talking to the high school version of you and like the problem at school. Oh my God, whatever, this girl doesn't like me. And then the college version of you is like, dude, it's not actually like— just do this, do that, you know, who cares, get over it. You're like, you could be way more cocky. And it's the same thing if like the $10 million version of you, uh, is talking to the $1 million version of you net worth. You're going to be like, dude, that's not really that big a deal. Just do this. You know, you're going to be just calling plays like that. And to me, that's what NLP does. That's, that's what I do every day. And I put myself kind of in that state of, okay, like, you know, one thing I do is I have a spreadsheet that tracks everything, all my, my revenue. Like we said, I kind of a flywheel of monetization. Also do career coaching for people. You know, so it's brand deals, affiliate deals, it's hourly consulting for recruitment, it's perm placements. You know, everything is stacked up by account and or by person if it's the career coaching. And I have a, you know, there's a number at the bottom of the spreadsheet total, you know, grand total for the year. And so the number that I want to see when I'm kind of in that meditative state I'm seeing that.

Interesting. Love that. Really fascinating. Um, I've got quite a few questions around that, Sam. I don't know if you have.

I've got tons. It's really interesting timing as well because me and Ben are literally going through— we've been through this mindset NLP scripts kind of thing before, but I'm jumping back into it, forgetting how powerful it was when I did it like 5 years ago, and, and now I'm getting back into it. So it's just funny, the timing.

Um, I think we, we realized the same thing, didn't we, Sam, when we were doing it? And we were actively focusing on a similar process to you, Chris, when we were visualizing our future, visualizing what we wanted. Um, there was no downside. There was literally no downside. It was only up, like, more exactly what you said, which is more positive, making decisions faster, getting over problems, getting over bad things faster. It was like It was incredible actually how much of an impact it had. I've dabbled with hypnosis, which is, you know, I'm an LP. I know it's quite specific, but I think there's a little bit of a crossover, I think, with hypnosis and NLP. And that, that was like definitely like a huge shift in my mindset when I did that. Sorry, Sam, what were you going to say?

No, no, no, that's really interesting. And I was just going to say that I don't know if this is a similar thing, Chris, but like the course I'm going through at the moment is a guy I know I've been following for a while, Charlie Morgan, who's also a kind of protégé of Sam Ovens, funnily enough.

He—

the mindset course I'm going through now is about shifting paradigms. So, you know, whenever you want to get to the next level, there is a paradigm typically that needs to be broken, doesn't there? Like the $1 million Chris is going to be different to the $10 million Chris, and the $1 million Sam is going to need to break paradigms to get to the $10 million Sam. I'm just wondering if there's any paradigms that you've started to— obviously don't share any personal ones, but I'm just wondering if there's any like business ones that you are starting to shatter through the NLP stuff you're doing. There might not be, but I'm just curious if there's anything that you've noticed in order to get to the $10 million Chris or the $20 million Chris or whatever number you had in your head.

Yeah. Well, I mean, you have to realize you have to work back from that number. And kind of realize, okay, well, what would that be per month? Well, how do we get there? And here are my revenue streams. Some people, it's only the recruitment business. For me, that— it was that for a while. And, um, you know, the thing is, like, when you're red hot, uh, like I was during COVID you know, I went from pretty much, like, in the Staff Aug space, a million— you know, I was like that million-dollar biller, top guy at the company. And during COVID it doubled. So like, wow, you know, yeah. Then it all like pulled back to where I was before and I'm like, well, wait a minute. You know, obviously I added a lot of expenses. You can see, yeah, it's not, it's not cheap in Miami. So, you know, I was like, I need to, I need something very high leverage. And, you know, that's, that's kind of where the social media aspect came in. And, you know, as far as, yeah, as far as paradigms, that's, that's what I really look at. I mean, during my, my meditation, I'm, I have a number for each of my kind of revenue streams. And, you know, where we are now and how do I get to that point? Because if I hit all those points, now that number at the bottom fits, you know, now it's a reality. So, I'm probably taking on too much as most business people would say, but you know, I think in the long run it's gonna work. You know, I think just the podcast on its own, I mean, it has, you know, I'm still at the 5-figure as far as podcast monetization level. You know, a couple monetization pathways is for views and then like I said, the affiliates, that's a couple grand a month. The brand deals are a couple grand a month. I'm working on long-term ones. You can get a long-term brand deal for maybe $10K to $20K for the year, and that just funds everything, um, you know. And I, I want to get to the point where the social media, you know, essentially is my primary revenue driver, to the point I have no time to even do that much recruit. I can pick and choose the recruiting and just take the best, highest level fees that are the most locked down, and, um, and just kind of you know, send off the other ones to companies I know and just, you know, kind of take revenue splits on those. So that's the ultimate goal.

Hmm.

Awesome. Love that. I want to jump back into the NLP thing, if that's okay, Chris. Just want to kind of dig deeper into it. So is it an everyday thing? Are you literally putting in your headphones, listening to the script every— I think I did it every morning and evening when I was in the hypnosis stage. Is it just once a day in the morning or how does it work?

It's at least once a day. Sometimes if I have trouble sleeping in the middle of the night, instead of tossing and turning, I just go right to it. Just throw it in there. And, you know, I have a lot of Joe Dispenza, you know, probably between 20 to 50-minute different ones. Again, I have a personalized one for all my goals. And, you know, it just helps, you know, whatever you envision, whether it's, okay, it's the new Lamborghini, and then you can feel the weight of the key you know, the dealership drops in your head, you know, stuff like that is what I like to visualize. The smell of the leather type, you know, that type of stuff. Right. So, but it's, yeah, it's at least once a day if I'm, what I find is when I'm overstressed, like maybe I'll, I'll just say, I'm gonna stop what I'm doing. Just kind of hop in, knock it out for 20 minutes, then get back to it. Um, that's, that's the type of thing.

It's almost like every possible— well, maybe not every possible one, but in a lot of scenarios you're just trying to like program your mind for this positive way of thinking, which is exactly what we were doing again back in the day when we were doing this, which is interesting. Um, I did have another question, but I've literally completely forgotten about it.

Um, so I used to be very like you know, like a lot of people come on like it's beast mode, it's got, you know, you can get very far with that, but it's not ideal. Like that mindset is not ideal for strategy. And then, you know, in the recruitment space, when things are going well, beast mode is great. You know, 'cause you just need to do more. But we've all, I mean, this is my 18th year in recruiting. So I, you know, I've had good months, bad months, good quarters, bad quarters, all that stuff. And it's like, I mean, you can have a scenario where you have 8 people in play interviewing at the final stages and you don't get one of them.

Yeah.

You know, you go over and it's like you don't have that much backing up that because it took you a lot of time to get those people in play. So you started from square one, you thought you were like, well, maybe I'll go 5 out of 8, worst case 2 out, you get zero. This mode can be tougher in those scenarios. It can be very tough actually. You know?

Yeah, that's a really good point. Um, yeah, I can't imagine having 8 deals on the go and then not having any of them convert. That must be an absolute kick in the, uh, in the gut. Did you— did that actually happen to you, Chris, or was that, was that just a— yes.

Oh yeah, it's happened multiple times. Multiple times. I had one time, but here's the thing, like, I couldn't even specifically, you know, because on a long enough timeline you don't I don't remember the specifics of any of it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I get you, you know, but in the moment it does suck if you're not visualizing that future. Uh, like, I've had— I think I had a scenario once where it was like there were 5 people in play, I had 4 of them. You think you're gonna get that one.

Yeah, yeah. God, that's annoying.

And so just to— sorry, I just want to clarify because it's really interesting, is that the that, you know, the beast mode will get you so far, you do more volume. The NLP, the power of it in the shitty moments, Chris, is that you have something that you're visualizing and you see the future. Is that, is that where the NLP starts to take over? Like, you've got your, your vision for the future, as opposed to in beast mode, you're not necessarily visualizing the future, and so things are going to hit you harder. Is that the right way to look at it? I'm just curious if I've missed anything there.

Yeah, yeah, I think it's, it's because, you know, when you're visualizing it, when you're having those, those visuals of it, it's a certainty, you know, in your head. Your brain doesn't know the difference. So it's just like, okay, yeah, well, yeah, I went 0 for 8, but that's a blip on the radar because I know where I'm going. Um, you know, you know, like I had one last week where, you know, someone's breezing through the interviews and it seems like a done deal, and then they get beat out. Um, so, you know, again, it's, you know, what I've realized through my career is, um, when my best clients are hiring a lot, I'm really good. When they're not, it can be tougher. So the key is you just need more best clients, right? So, um, you know, that's where, you know, like, that's the one thing that You know, for a macro sense, I'm like, oh, why was this better than this? Well, you know, some of my best clients were hiring.

I literally just had this epiphany. It's kind of random, but I was like, what if every recruiter, uh, did nothing else, like forgot about all the tactics and strategies and just focus on their mindset and like listen to a recording once, once a day for like 30 days or like for 2 months, 3 months? How much of a difference that would make to their business? It would be quite a fascinating experiment. I'm just kind of thinking out loud here, but it'd be quite crazy. I reckon that in itself would have more impact than any possible strategy or tactic on the market right now if they just did that. Um, because I feel like if you have that mindset— sorry, go ahead, Chris.

I, I got to that point where I was trying all these new strategies, and I'm like, it's not the strategies, you know, I have to fix people.

Yeah.

So it's like throwing shit against a shitty wall.

Yeah, so true. And I feel like to add to that, it's like the reason it's used— because everyone's kind of smart and capable enough to figure out and do the work, if you know what I mean. Like, we have so much access to information, like all of us can find the answers with enough drive and determination and belief. Kind of, that's what I'm starting to figure out, Sam, as we're going through this 100%. Yeah, process. I'm like, actually, we, we can do it, we just have to believe for long enough in order to actually execute, do the work, experiment, fail.

And like Chris said, see the future as well, because once you see the future and you can believe it and it's certain, as Chris said, um, you're much less likely to stop or give up when things get tough.

Yeah.

Or divert into the next shiny object.

It's just, you know, bad, bad news, bad, bad things, uh, business-wise, are just a speed bump for you because you know where you're going.

So yeah, I love that. And this is the question that I forgot earlier, Chris. The personal recording, how do you create that? Is it your own voice going through the goals or like how is it? How did you create the personal recording?

So I found someone on Fiverr and, you know, someone on Fiverr that are professional voice specialists.

That's so cool.

Yeah, you can prompt. I mean, I had a prompt that my guy gave me, and you fill out all this information about where you want to be and your goals and what you do. You put that information through a prompt and do whatever, whatever AI you're using will create that script. And then I had the guy read it on Fiverr with meditation music behind it.

That's so cool. I've never heard of that, that method before, which is awesome because typically we've I've recorded it myself with my voice.

So it's interesting that you got someone else to do it, Chris. Like, it saves a lot of time as well. And I'm guessing—

I also got sick of my voice. I was like, I don't want to hear me anymore. Someone with a little bit more like— and the good thing is, I guess you could also— you could also maybe update the voice every 6 months or something if you got bored of that voice or have like 3 different voices. I just think that's really clever. I really like that. I'm going to do that.

I think the key is like set a goal. That is, you know, okay, not— don't set a billion-dollar goal. Great. Like, it's just pointless. Like, set a goal that is a little uncomfortable.

Yeah.

Where it's like, oh, okay, well, man, that's going to be hard, but yeah, I guess it's possible. Like, that's the type of goals you want to set. And then once you achieve those, then you update the script.

Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. I love that. That's a lovely little golden nugget there, Chris. Thank you. Anything else to say around the NLP meditation side, Chris, that we haven't mentioned? It's okay if there isn't. I'm just curious.

No, I would, you know, I would say start with some Joe Dispenza meditations. You can just get those on YouTube for free.

Yeah.

Close your eyes, put on the YouTube, put on your headphones, throw those in. Just try for 30 minutes, try to focus on it. Some of them, yeah, like the hypnosis and some of the NLP ones, you don't even have to focus on it. It's just literally talking to your subconscious. Those are pretty cool too. When I'm— I mean, in my apartment building, when I'm walking the stairs, it's very mundane, you know. I don't have my eyes closed, obviously.

I might fall. That'll be pretty impressive, Chris, if you could do that.

But it's, you know, it's kind of the same thing over and over, so I You can kind of get into a meditative state, and I throw on the NLP when I'm in the stairwell too, running stairs.

That's cool, man. Using all those, like, dead moments to upgrade your brain, essentially, when other people would maybe use it to, like, listen to the news or listen to stuff that's not gonna make you feel very good.

Yeah, yeah, you just gotta get that stuff in your head as much as possible.

100%, man.

Totally agree.

It's just like that natural— it's, it's kind of like a natural energy versus a caffeine energy. You know, when like if you listen to just motivational stuff, it can help you. It definitely helped me at times, but I think this is more just like long-term endurance type of energy. Like you're just— I'm just constantly just doing stuff. Like I don't— yeah, nothing really shakes me because I've seen— I'm seeing the future.

I love that.

I love that.

Out of interest, this kind of going back to the NLP, when did you start? From my recollection of doing it, and I'm getting back into it, it happened subtly and I didn't really notice the change. It was like all of a sudden I thought back and I was like, oh, I am more positive on a daily basis. I'm less shaken. I feel more confident. I'm curious, was there a point in time, Chris, when you were like, yes, the 8-month mark was the sweet spot, or the 9-month mark, or the of doing it every day, or was it kind of like I just said, a bit unconscious, so to speak?

It was pretty quick. It was pretty quick. You know, when I had that exercise of sitting down with my future self, you know, again, 2 years ago, if someone said this, I'd be like, okay, buddy. But I was able to get in that, you know, hypnotic state and Yeah, I mean, and again, I needed to hear that, you know. So it's probably my own brain telling me like, like, no, this is— this, this will work. And now it is working. So you just have to keep going with this strategy. And over a long enough timeline with enough reps, like, do as many reps as you know. Obviously putting out more episodes is contacting more people and getting more exposure. Um, you know, it will work. So that, that was game changing. And then from there I was all in and, um, you know, and some recruitment deals did, you know, they were already in play before, but they did close after that. So that made it kind of gave me some instant like, okay, this is legit.

So cool.

Now I'm all in.

So love it. Interesting.

What, what I find fascinating about this whole, cuz essentially what you're doing with this NLP is you're reprogramming your brain to some degree. Like, you are— you're shattering certain beliefs. And what I found interesting with this guy's course that I'm going through is that we all of us have so many beliefs that were set in at a, like, a certain point in our life, whether it is— it was like as a kid, maybe your dad said cold calling will never work or whatever, or you saw your dad not make a lot of money and so money was hard to come by, or there's just so many beliefs that are set in at a young age and you can shatter that whenever you want by using certain scripts and just hammering them into your brain. Um, and so yeah, that, that's what I found— I'm finding really interesting is how many, like, beliefs are still, uh, solidified in my head that happened earlier on in my childhood that actually they don't mean anything.

They're just—

they're just— I just need to reprogram my brain. Um, so yeah, just want other people to listen to that. Like, if you have any shattering beliefs that need shattering then you can just reprogram your brain. It's quite, it's quite a simple process. It just takes—

I think a lot of people don't even realize.

Yeah, you need to understand what beliefs you need to shatter in the first place. But yeah, that's, that's the tough part. Yeah, that is the tough part. You're right.

And some people, like, your brain does not want you to be successful. Yes. When you find out about people and, you know, some people— this wasn't my scenario, but some people's, whatever their parents told them whatever, rich people are evil. Like, yeah, that family across the street is evil. And in your head, like, you're like, oh, I don't want to be evil. You know, there's like, yeah, you hear about, uh, that people have these beliefs. And, uh, like, it's, yeah, the limiting— I mean, limiting beliefs, you know. Again, it, it— I used to think that was all woo-woo stuff, but it, it's definitely, uh, it's powerful if you buy in.

I agree, man. Yeah, I'm excited about the new journey.

Um, um, we are coming towards the end of the pod, Chris. This has been a fascinating conversation. Um, would love to end on VAs because I know you've talked about it in bits throughout the podcast, or you mentioned a couple of lines. Um, what has been— when did you hire your first VA, and what's been the most effective use of VAs for your business? So far, do you think?

So I experimented with it 2 years ago, probably 2 or 3 years ago. I had them do some short tasks, you know, it didn't really pay off, send out some cold emails and stuff. But when you hire them full time, then you can fully, like I'm a big Dan Martell Buy Back Your Time person, which I recommend anyone reading before they take on a VA. I hadn't read his book and I tried to take on a VA. It didn't work. Now, once I did, I was like, all right, now I need to get a VA full-time, 40 hours a week. And there's just so many in the recruitment business. There's so many administrative tasks that for years, like, I mean, basically like months of my life, if you stack up all the time I spent submitting a candidate into a vendor portal, like staff augmentation at big companies, you have to submit the candidates through these vendor portals. Stuff like that, drafting emails, doing the outreach, the cold outreach with direct email, sending the LinkedIn messages, like the LinkedIn recruiter messages for the podcast. He's doing all that and he's doing lead sourcing for me. Basically, basically what I do is if I'm about to do an administrative task or if I'm halfway through it, I stop myself and I say, wait a minute, If I put on Loom, show him how to do it, it's— I never have to do this again. So like, yes, in the moment it's like, ah, I could just do this. It's so much easier. Just do it myself. But I think staffing agencies, they waste so much time on administrative tasks, especially just around, you know, a lot of these vendor portals. Like, I don't touch— she does that. So I just said, I give him a thumbs up. A couple things he can't do. He can't, you know, he doesn't have 18 years experience. He can't identify a good candidate for some of the high-level roles. The lower-level roles, I'm just like, you know, hey, just, hey, if someone sends us someone, you can send. I give him full authority. He posts all my jobs on LinkedIn, which I get great traction on those. So I just say, you know, he knows what jobs to post and what not to. And then he knows, he'll literally kind of aggregate any candidates or responses we get, and he knows— he gets all their information, and then he gives it to me, presents it to me. So I don't do any of that. Hmm. It's just time-saving is like massive.

I think from mine and Sam's journey of hiring more people for help, it was like the easiest task can sometimes get brushed over because it's like, oh, they're so easy. And then you've got all these lots of little easy tasks, and it's like, oh, we need to focus on the hard thing. But actually The easiest things stacked up are the things that I feel like you should get rid of straight away, because that's the stuff that kind of sits, you know, sits on your desk and it's always there, and it can be there for years. And it's like, as you say, if you stack that time up, it's like months of your, of your life of doing like the most basic stuff. Um, just for mine and Sam's experience, so that, that was interesting. It's like, actually, we had loads of easy stuff that we shouldn't be doing that was so simple to pass off to a VA. Yeah, pretty interesting.

What else he does with the YouTube, I'm getting speaking engagements, but you probably, you guys probably get too, but you have to apply like call for speakers and stuff like that. So this morning he had a list of, you know, I ChatGPT aggregate 20 different call for speakers in the tech space. I kind of teach people the candidates about LinkedIn on these. And so I have a, you know, he prepared that presentation and now he applies for speaking engagements for me and I've been getting paid on those too. So that's awesome.

Love that. Love that.

So it, I mean, to me it's, it's, it's a must have. You know, agencies are just, they'll be afraid to kind of outsource that. Like I said, like the, the vendor management function. Submitting the candidates, approving the interviews and stuff like that, you know, they'll be afraid to kind of outsource that. But I mean, to me, it's not rocket science. If it's not rocket science, then get it off your plate.

Last question from me. How many hours do you think your VA saves you every week, Chris, if you were to like just have a rough guess?

Yeah, I mean, well, it is the same. The saving, I have no idea because he's just doing extra stuff. He's doing some stuff I would be doing, some stuff that I wouldn't even be able to get to.

Yeah.

So I have no idea. But it's making, you know, it pays for itself easily. Yeah.

But you said he's working, is it 40 hours?

Did you say?

At the moment.

Yeah.

So I mean, that's pretty insane.

Just there.

Yeah, exactly.

It's like, um, yeah, which is nuts.

Yeah, yeah.

40 hours a week. I mean, sometimes he's like, hey, what do I do? I'm like, uh, I don't, you know, I don't know, look at the LinkedIn response. He's not— he doesn't always have a ton, but when he does, it's, you know, it's just, it's insane, the time saving.

Yeah, yeah, because it's interesting because it's not just the tasks that you're currently doing, it's like projects that you never got around to that would actually push your business forward in some way. Like, like your speaking gigs, for example, Chris. And that's what I've noticed as well, is like actually when you have more help, that you actually work on other things that you just never would have been able to get around to. And then it adds a ton of value in like 3 months' time because you fixed that thing or you've gotten quite far with that project. So it's a really good point. Um, Chris, thank you so much for joining us, my friend. That, that absolutely flew by. Um, can't believe how quickly that went, but, um, thank you so much for joining us. We managed to get through some very juicy topics and you gave some really valuable insight into your day today. So thank you, mate, really appreciate it.

Yeah, yeah, I mean, I've, uh, I had seen a bunch of your episodes before and then obviously I watched a bunch more. So I've, you know, I've been a longtime viewer, um, which I think for you guys and Ben Mena, I like— I wish this type of information was not out there in the recruitment space 10 years ago. Um, there was just— everyone just kept their knowledge to themselves. Uh, there weren't these big forums, and now everyone's kind of sharing the knowledge, which, um, you know, I invite every— like, I always— I pick up something Maybe people picked up something, uh, on this episode, but I always pick up something on everyone's episode where 10 years ago the mentality was your competition, I'm better than them, so like what do they know that I don't? But now script is totally flipped where I'm like, I don't care who they are, they might have something that I'm not doing that I can implement.

So awesome, that's a great ender.

Yeah, thanks for coming on, Chris.

Loved it.

Hey guys, thanks for tuning in to this episode. If you enjoyed it, please don't forget to subscribe on YouTube and Spotify. Tune in for another episode next week, and we look forward to seeing you again very soon.

Peace and love.