This Recruiter made £1 Million in her back Bedroom

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's guest is Wendy McDougall. Wendy has a pretty insane story. She managed to bill over £1 million in her first year of setting up her recruitment business, and she did this with one other person sitting in her spare bedroom. She then went on to sell that business for a hefty profit. She then followed her dreams and decided to set up her own SaaS business called Firefish, which is now 70 people strong. Firefish is designed to help recruiters track their data so they can bill more every month. On today's episode, we're going to be talking about what specific data points that Wendy used in order to be so successful in recruitment. We're going to be discussing valuable tips and insight that Wendy learned from selling her own recruitment business, and we're going to be discussing Wendy's insane journey of being a top biller in recruitment to now setting up a hugely successful SaaS business. So 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?

Wendy, thank you so much for joining us.

How are you?

I am very well, guys. Lovely to be on. Thanks for asking me.

Awesome. Yes, you have a very interesting background. Um, when I did some research, you were a top biller, and then you built your own recruitment company, sold it. So you're already in the top probably 1% of recruiters who managed to do that. And then you went on to set up a 55-person SaaS company, which is—

55 sounds like a good number now with my salary bill, but no, we're now knocking on 70. So it's pretty—

oh God, sorry, that was my bad.

No, don't worry, that's absolutely fine. 55 was good days.

So wow, that's brilliant. So I just feel like you probably have a ton of lessons in there to share with other people, and we're really looking forward to jumping in. So again, thank you so much for joining us.

It's my pleasure. And if I can add some— listen, I know how hard it is to run a business. So I think the people that are doing stuff, if you can learn from a lot of the mistakes I've made along the way, then— and if I can help somebody, then all good.

Amazing. So we always jump into the first question. Sam normally says this, so this is my first time asking the first question, which feels very surreal, which is what's the number one tool in your toolkit, whether it's a mindset, a strategy, or a software?

Yeah, so this is, you know, it sounds weird 'cause obviously I'm driven by software, but this is an output of this, whatever software you're using. So my personal motivation and sort of toolkit is the focus that I bring to everything. So I'm really focused on sort of fixing a problem, finding a solution or anything I do. So that's the mindset that I apply that I think has allowed me to become, you know, past the top biller. But then it's also the data. I love data. So, um, I use data to find trends, to find themes, to give me answers and show me where to go. If the data can demonstrate it, then I know that I'm going to be successful, and then it's a repeat and it's scalable.

Love that one.

I have to go to focus because focus specifically is one thing I've been trying to improve and battling with like my whole career, and I feel like it's something that if people managed to harness in the proper way, they could increase their output by like 50%. Um, I have a little timer sitting by my desk, and me and Ben time our work. We, we do kind of work sprints, so we do 45 minutes of work and it's timed, and then we read for 15 minutes, and then we, we put the timer back on, and then it's 45. That's our little hack for focus, Wendy, and it's worked amazingly well amongst a few other things. Is there anything that you have done specifically that's allowed you to improve your focus? Or have you always been someone that's just very focused and can sit down and not get distracted?

First of all, well done. I mean, that's like going on the— that's a great hack. I don't think I would do it, right? So I'm probably not as disciplined as that. It's weird. You talk about discipline and then you look at focus. Well, focus— to be focused, you need to be exceptionally disciplined. In my head, probably being focused is just being obsessive. So it's something I can't not do. I just want to go and fix a problem or go And so when you have your timer, I just probably work throughout the night in order to fix that. I don't give up until I fix that. So I think that's just a mentality that I've always had. But in terms of using like little hacks, you know, I think I see a lot of people with to-do lists and, you know, they're good. It's a good discipline that you use for your to-do list and stuff. But all these to-do lists are like, you know, 20, 30, you know, 50. And for me, it's actually being realistic with what you're going to achieve. So I always look at, you know, 3 things I'm going to get done that day. So as long as I can do the 3 things I know I'm going to get off my to-do list and be achievable, then I'm going to be, you know, and what I'm focusing around it, then I know I'm making progress on things and I'm solving a problem. So for me, it's been much more realistic with what you're going to achieve in that day. Another little hack that we have as well, which I brought into the business, but I would suggest that anybody out there that's growing a business, it would be a really good thing, is our 4 Ps. So we brought that into the business over COVID or just actually before COVID where, you know, everybody has standups, but you do it on the basis of, you know, your 4 Ps. So it's your plans, your problems, your positives, and your progress. So you basically split that into, you know, what are you gonna progress? So that might be my 3 things on my to-do list I'm gonna progress. You know, what was a positive? I solved that problem. What am I planning to do the following day? Then that's what I'm gonna plan. That's my next 3 things I want to get done. Whether or not that's source a job, it's going to get a couple extensions planned, you know, bringing that into it. But I think that's a really good thing to be able to reflect on what you've been able to do, because how many times when I go back into my recruiter days, you know, you feel some days that you've achieved nothing because you've just been either going out, meeting lots of people, they may not have any vacancies on, they may not be able to, but you know, as a recruiter, every meeting will give you something. So it's like, what was your progress with that meeting? What did you achieve from that? And reflecting on it, I think, always pushes you forward.

It's brilliant. Um, are there any— so those are really interesting, Wendy, thank you for sharing. Is there anything additional that you would add, um, when it comes to the key components of becoming a top biller? I think everyone either wants to be a top biller if you're a recruiter, or if you're hiring, you want to get the best people into your business. So what, what do you think the top components to become a top biller?

So I'm always being competitive. So I do think, and sports, as we know as well, you know, there's a lot of synergies between either your family was from an entrepreneurial background and you were a keen sports person. I've met so many people that are recruitment owners with those types of personalities. So I think a top biller has that stealth in terms of they want to be that top biller, they want to be the best. So that's your competitive nature coming out. And I think, you know, ultimately, you know, entrepreneurialship is still really good as well because you've got to creatively think of different ways to solve problems. And in recruitment, you know, you never know kind of what you're going to be walking into that day sometimes. You know, you think everything's sweet and then the candidate doesn't turn up and you've got to then quickly sort of think about a solution to try and work on it, because if you just fall on your sword, then, you know, you've got nowhere to go and you've just got a problem that you've created for the client. So, um, I think those are the two traits I would always look for people that you're wanting, that they've got half a chance of getting there. And I then think it comes down to actually being really disciplined with the numbers. So, you know, I came from when I was Originally into recruitment, it was contract stuff that really suited me because it was fast, it was quick, and it was scalable. So, you know, once I could, every time I met a contractor, you know, if I couldn't use them now, I know I'd use them in the future and I'd track their, you know, it's just getting it back to basics, tracking their, having the data that just gives you a list of everybody's availability date, you know, and then it was IT contractors. So, you know, ultimately it's not quite like high volume temps there that originally I was doing, where you'll know, okay, 2 months before that end date, you know, that's when the guy's going to be considering either talking about an extension or, you know, looking for something better. So you just then know that every 4, 8 weeks before that person's ending, that's your time to be contacting them and seeing what they're doing and whether or not they're taking that extension or you're gonna be able to spec them out or get them again because you know them and you've built up that relationship. So I think it's finding the key components of the data that you track and then just allowing that to drive your repeatable actions And then you make it scalable. So then, you know, ultimately you start your first year, if you can get 20 guys out, giving you a run rate on that. And then your next year you want to double it. And then you're quickly up to about, you know, 100 recruiters. You need a resourcer to keep tabs on everybody when you're going out and placing them. And it's just then repeat. Okay, now I need another person in. You start again, build another, that resourcer can back up to repeat, you know, and you build the team on that background.

Interesting. Sam, do you mind if I jump in for this one? I just have one follow-up question. Yeah, because I find everything you're saying is, is really interesting, and of course data is so valuable. I find that a lot of recruiters don't leverage data as well as, say, you would, Wendy, and often I find it's because maybe they haven't been taught. It's not a habit. It's not something that perhaps they've been obsessed over for, you know, from, from when they started. So Do you have any advice for people that aren't with the numbers? How do you then become data-oriented, data-driven? Is it putting the right systems in place? Is it habits? Like, how would you go from someone who isn't data-oriented to someone who could then track the data and leverage it?

So you're so correct. You know, I always say a recruitment business is a data business, but nobody under— you know, the percentage of people, the percentage of people are successful do, and that's a trend. You know, we've looked at that at Firefish as well. So those that do, do it. So it's worth starting to— exactly what you say, how do I start with this? And a lot of people are worried, they think it's numbers, and it's not. If you start to think about it as triggers, and I like to think data is trigger points. So if you think, and you stand back and you look at your desk as a recruiter and you think, what are the key trigger points to success? So for me, at Contract, it was 8 weeks before, you know, that contractor is up for renewal wherever they are. Okay. I've worked with other businesses and other clients. We do this a lot to try and help them, as we call it, join the dots. From trigger to trigger to then give them the data that they need to have a look at it. One business I worked with, you know, their data was all about based on— it was in childcare and recruiting childcare for their industry, and it was all based on terms sent out. They had an incredible success rate on being able to just send terms out. If they got the terms, it was 1 in 2. If they got those terms signed, they then had that for the next 6 6 months. So it's finding that metric rather than just, you know, the normal standard KPIs. It's thinking about what makes you successful in your business, um, and then just going to repeat. Now, where to start with that is exactly, um, what a lot of differences between top biller and standard average recruiters— and hey, we need those B players, so, you know, they're still good.

Yeah, absolutely.

But, um, what I see is a lot of it is this, is the difference is that they're very reactive, they're like hamsters on little hamster wheels, not to be sort of negative about that, but they'll just take what is getting fed or take the scraps and they'll work it. So they kind of get really busy with not much purpose, whereas the successful top fillers will have already done an analysis, very quickly be able to see that they have a shorter time to fill of that particular type of developer or that particular type of professional person and they tend to know their market is, you know, they've got the relationships in that location. So they're just going to double down on that and they're going to become the expert in that. So that's where the niche stuff comes. They're more, they're capable of burning a boat, as I call it, in terms of really becoming that niche and leaving the other stuff away. Whereas other guys will, like your sort of average recruiters, they'll take what they can. Because that makes them feel better. So actually being confident and knowing your value, knowing what you're good at, understanding and looking at the database of, you know, any, any decent CRM right now should be able to give you a dashboard of where was all my business, where did I make the business, what clients are my top clients, and what location and what disciplines do I do. Great, do more of that. It's not rocket science.

Really fascinating.

Such a good answer.

I, I—

no one has framed it as triggers. I think that's a brilliant way to describe it, is finding the triggers and then tracking those triggers. I think that's brilliant.

Yeah, not just that. What I got from that as well, tracking the data gives you more confidence and more options.

Absolutely. And that's what I've been driven by. My focus is— I wouldn't say naturally I was working, you know, walking up and going, hey, you know, I'm going to be a fantastic recruiter here. But I just, I just got more confidence in what I did because the data gave me that confidence. And then I was like Superwoman. Hey, yeah, nothing's stopping me.

It makes so much sense because whenever Ben and I go back to tracking specific things in our business and we're just talking about, I guess, generic data here, we always see more improvement and that automatically gives us confidence. So it's just, it's so interesting how universal that is. I had a question, so I was really fascinated about when you, when, when you were in your element of billing and you were, when you were top biller, what were the, what was the main trigger that you always went back to that had the biggest impact on your numbers? Would you say, was there like one trigger that you were like, yes, this is, this is the one.

It was actually my extensions. So, um, I used to— so again, it's very specific with the market I was, um, working on, which was, you know, high-end IT contractors, right? And I was privileged, I, you know, show my age, but it was '98. Um, so I, you know, saw them through the millennium at that point, which was just like, it was brilliant fun and we made a lot of money. Um, but for me there was getting— um, if you hired a contractor just as a sort of a person that you didn't really know and you is a bum on a seat, then they're not likely maybe to get extension. But I, I saw, um, I was brought on to start the contract business in Scotland in IT, and so I was learning from my permanent colleagues, but I saw I just needed to speed that up. But the way that they would actually assess a good cultural fit for that permanent company, or for that permanent candidate and the company, so I like, I took some of that into the contract business, which actually meant that You know, again, you're working smarter because every contractor that I placed, I probably— this is before IR35 Phase 1 that came in— I probably got them there for about a year and a half as my normal contract, right? And they've started on a 3-month and then they were there for a year and a half. Well, I didn't— I just needed to look after that contractor. I didn't need to go and replace that contractor. I didn't need to go because it was a good fit for them and it was a good fit for the company. So that cultural element at high-end contractors, if you get the right match, they're there for however, however long. I had 35. I realized them to be there.

Really interesting. And so it sounds like you did really well as a, as a top biller, and then you had this epiphany at one point to set up on your own. So what happened then? What was the motivation to set up your own business, Wendy? What happened?

So actually, it was never going— it was never— unfortunately for you, it's never an epiphany. It was never anything. I was always going to run my own business.

Oh, really interesting.

So I started my career as to what do I want to learn in order to run my own business, which was quite a difference. Wow.

Yeah.

And so I fell into recruitment as everybody else did, but I worked out very quickly that I was, you know, pretty good at this. Um, and then I wanted to go in and learn lots of different things as much as I could from a brilliant company. So it was Melville Craig up in Scotland. They were the largest independent, uh, recruitment company in Scotland, which I was really lucky to come, you know, to be part of. And it was still just like awesome, that company. But I wanted to get involved in everything there to learn because I saw that as my entrepreneurial sort of university degree to then go and set up. And it was just about timing and when I did it. Now, don't get me wrong, I didn't necessarily think it was going to be a recruitment business that I was going to set up. So my business and my father had— he'd grown up as an entrepreneur And, you know, I'm not sure many people actually do know this. So you're getting some fresh information on that. You know, my dad refused and sort of crossed out 4 business plans that I did before I set up my own recruitment company.

Oh, wow.

So all the other ones were not allowed, as he said. But then when I came to him and said, you know what, I'm actually quite good at this gig, so I think I should just set up a recruitment company. He sat back and went, Jesus, thank Christ you came to that conclusion right when you were starting.

Why did he cross out the others? Just out of curiosity, Wendy.

Oh, a number of things. You know, he would— I mean, not comparing him to Alan Sugar, but he's got a beard, so a wee bit like that. But he would just like, go, right, okay, you know, let's, let's take this down. How much money are you going to— you know, he just asked all the right questions, like, you know, realistically, what's the market? Have you tested it? You know, how much money you're needing to set up on that? When do you think you can become profitable in that? You know, how much scale? How many people? He just asked all the right people and he managed to come to, you know, come to the conclusion that I would turn around and say, 'Not sure it's a guarantee, this one.' So yeah, okay, fair dues, there's some, there's some big, you know, failings in it. And so we, we cross that, or there's too much capital risk there. Um, but, you know, recruitment is such a great industry that we're all in, so privileged to work in it, that there's so little barriers, um, to setting up. And even more so now, you know, when I set up, I still had to have, like, I still went and did a bank, um, bank loan on it, my house was on it, etc., as well, because I still needed like 80K startup. So, because, you know, my tech that I was actually buying, because I wasn't, I was going into scale. So I went in to actually, you know, build a company of substance. And I also had the first employee come in from day one as well, who then said, bless him, he turned up in his suit and at my front door and then went into my back bedroom. We both sat there in my back bedroom and started trading, but I had his salary to look after. After as well. So, you know, we, you know, that still needed, you know, that still needed, you know, the tech I bought and had to then buy at that point was still like $25,000, $30,000. Now, you know, you can buy Firefish up and running for less than a grand, you know, and you're up and running and it's all in the cloud and you don't need it all. But at that point, you know, so it's got even easier. So, yeah, you know, that was the great days and the very— I always tell people to probably, if you are doing it or spinning it out, you know, enjoy those days. They're the fun days. Um, you know, then it all gets very serious.

Absolutely. Well, great story.

I love that. Um, one thing I know our audience loves to hear are specific, like, numbers. Wendy, can you, can you give us a ballpark figure of what you were billing and what it took to get there as well? Because I think in most scenarios, like, what got you to $100K might be different to what gets you to $500K, which might be different to what gets you to a million. So I'm just curious to Yeah, sure.

So, um, God, when I was back in Melbourne Craig, um, I probably— I mean, I was probably running a business there just of my own division that was probably around like $8 million turnover on that because it was all contract business and I'd obviously scaled that with other people. So amazing. And I think that's the rough sort of number in that when you look at it, turnover, you know, and, and, you know, um, profitability there, you know, average margin was around 20% on that. So it was a really good amount of business that we're bringing in for that. Um, so that net profit. When I spun out, and first year, you know, um, I always remember a meeting I went with my dad because my dad, um, at that point had sold his company. So he did— he needed a bit of purpose, so he joined me as the company secretary. Um, so he, he said, right, you get on doing what you do and I'll set up all your Sage at that point because Xero wasn't there and things like that. So, and I had no idea about accounts, so he did it and that was great. So he did the sort of company secretary job and we went in to see the insurance brokers. And my first year of trading, I went back in to do the renewal on the insurance brokers and he turned around and said, Jesus, I wish you'd actually said that you were going to make this amount of money because I think we should have set you up in Jersey or something offshore. And I was like, oh, is that good? You know, so first year of trading, I did over a million.

Amazing.

Just from two, just for the two of us. And that was a mixture of permanent, and we did get at that point, I think I had around 20 contractors out as well. So that did give me like that trading of contract rate. But then as I started to expand, what, you know, you needed more cash for that, for that trading level. So we actually then, you know, the numbers get a little bit, you know, they're not as impressive when you think about it in context. I think it was, you know, 1.6, 1.8 that we got to. But actually that was at that point then all perm. So that then makes it much more sort of, you know, better. And we were trading around 10-15% net profit. I think it was working out at 12% net profit. So that was, you know, it was a good— it was a really good stable business that— but then did the usual fluctuating from the peak, you know, I think it was up 23-24% or something, then would bounce back down because then you had the, you know, we had recession number 1 kicking in, recession number 2 kicking in. So we did that whole you know, 10 to 20, man, bouncing up, bouncing down, don't make profit. When you do, then when you get back down to 10 or 12, you're suddenly in profit again. So hard, you know, that part. I hate it in that 10, 20 mark. But that was the kind of, you know, rates that we were doing. I think the best thing I was— and the proudest thing I had was the two of us just going in, rocking it and making over a million in the first year. That was great.

Yeah, that's insane.

I really enjoyed that.

So it's really like, yeah, absolutely insane. I think that's quite abnormal. And so I have to ask the question, Although it may be hard to give exact steps of how to do that, what would you think were the biggest contributors to two of you making that amount of money? Because it's pretty extraordinary.

Do you know, I don't even know if I'd be able to do it again in this market. I'm not sure. So, okay, I had a lot of clients that were really supportive. So if you're a good biller and people rely on you to make business decisions, then they will come with you, right? Um, so I had a good soft there. And some of the clients, so, that you expect to come with you won't, so don't rely on them. But others, um, that you— sometimes you get the absolute opposite. Some that you don't think will come with you will surprise you and be your best test, and, you know, they'll be your best clients and best advocates. So you get a mix of that. And, and actually, do you know, most people because you're doing something that a lot of people really respect, you're setting up and running your own business. Most people probably are kind of excited for you and want it to do well. So there's a lot of goodwill that goes with it as well. In terms of the fundamentals, I think what allowed me to do that is if you're going in and you're not— I think be very clear with what you're doing and setting up your business at start, because there's nothing bad or wrong with either of these decisions. You either go in and you decide you're going to set up a business to scale, or you go in, you're going to say, I'm going to make a really good lifestyle, lifestyle business. And listen, a lifestyle business can be up to 10 employees. That's cool. But at least know what it is so that you can actually pull the benefit of it. One of the mistakes I probably did, I think, with my recruitment business, I went in and I set up— well, no, it wasn't a mistake. I went in, and that was one of the things I would say is a blueprint. I went in to make it scale. So I was really happy that I did that, and I think that contributed to being able to make that sort of million in the first year. But in hindsight, where I got with that business, I wish I'd almost looked at it as being more of a lifestyle business and taken more benefit personally out for me, because I think you've probably got a lot of owners out there, if they're anything like me, and I sacrificed everything, you know, I was the last to get paid. My payment was shit half the time. And then, you know, you would then start to take dividends when you felt that you had enough business because you were trying to go in there and scale all the time. You're just throwing it back into the business. So at some point you do get a bit resentful out of that. So I made— I should have made a better balance out of that for me personally to keep it going because I think also, you know, a lot of people think that they can set up a recruitment business and get rich really quickly. Um, where, you know, it's not— it's a marathon, and it's a marathon you've got to want to do for a good period of time. You know, now 10 years, I reckon, is not out of the question. So I think I probably didn't think it was going to be 10 years at that point, because at that point as well, there was a better sort of, um, you know, exit route for a lot of recruitment owners as well. So you think you're going to get quick, you know, you are going to get something, benefits. So, um, I'm— yeah, I would have rethought that. But getting back to question you asked, what was the blueprint to make it a success? If you are going to go and scale, you know, set it up so that we had, you know, we had good bank relationships, we had, you know, good accounts set up, we had, you know, structures from the start. I had culture codes in place, I had processes in place because everything I did, I was looking, how do I scale it so I don't need to do it again? So it's putting in those systems and processes and punching way beyond the actual size of a two-man business.

Um, yeah, for me that's a good reminder of planning and preparation. I think that's been of mine. Me and Sam kind of had that realization, kind of got forced into things due to COVID, and so planning and preparation wasn't there. And it's just been in the last few months we've really sat down and really planned and prepared and designed the business that we want over the next 3 to 5 years.

I'm delighted you've done that because it's design the business you want Design the business that suits you, build it all around what you want to get out of it. What is the impact you want to make? And be very clear with that. If you're in business with other people, make sure you're aligned from that start as well. Mm-hmm.

Absolutely love that. I'm really fascinated when you seem really, like, intrinsically motivated, like your energy is infectious. I want to go out and just do more work just, just speaking to you. What drives you and has that changed over time? Like, I'm fascinated if I was in your head on a daily basis, what are you thinking about? That motivates you so much? I'm, I'm curious.

A number of people ask me that, and my husband is fed up with asking me that every day. Um, so I have this great desire to be the best at anything I do, um, so I choose what I want to do. And I think though, you know, if you're going to get into the psychology of Wendy, which is a very scary place to go, um, I think ultimately, you know, I've always had that— I've been lucky that my parents brought me up to say that that's possible. And so I and also went with, I wanted to be the best, I wanted to, you know, best at what I did. But I also, it comes down to, and I think, you know, I'm happy to share this online, I have done before as well, but, you know, I'm really badly dyslexic. So a lot of people that were, you know, either, you know, had on the scale with difference or learning capabilities or had like dyslexic challenges to learning in the traditional format, you know, that basically, you know, ultimately through school, although I was brilliant at sports and everything else behind the but at the classroom I was a bit thick, or I was allowed to make myself, or I was made to feel that way. So, you know, when I'm sitting there with all these successful people around me and I'm sort of like the joke and having fun, but I was great out to the hockey pitch or this, right, next, then I had a point to prove. And so now it's like, yeah, cool, well, you know, rock on accountant and lawyer, see me. And I have a wee bit of that in me. And, you know, I think also you've got to have, if you're gonna really make it as an you know, as a, as a top biller, this is the horrible side of Wendy a little bit coming through. But, you know, we all are arrogant shits at some point. And definitely when I was going and I was a top biller, you know, I was really focused and nobody got in my way. So, you know, I've grown with maturity and understood there, and I'm not as competitive as I used to be. But you do have to have that edge. So, you know, ultimately you got that edge, you can still be nice with it, but you know where you want to go. And nobody's going to stop you.

Love that. Thanks for sharing that, Wendy.

That's really fascinating, interesting. I, I speak to a lot of recruitment owners, uh, Wendy, who I think, um, fantasize about selling their business, and whether or not it's realistic is another story. And I feel like if you've sold your business, you kind of understand some of the aspects that go into selling your business and the hurdles and, you know, what's realistic and Maybe you could tell us, what was it like selling a business? What were the hurdles? Maybe you could just, for people who want to do it in the future, what words of wisdom would you give them?

Yeah, it's not probably what you think it's going to be, is the first thing.

Oh really?

So yeah, um, so you know, ultimately you've got some good options just now, and there you absolutely can have an exit, right? It can be done. I've demonstrated it can be done, and, and you will have an exit. Um, I think I think, you know, ultimately really to scale and exit your business for anything substantial, you know, you need to be making, you know, over a million profit to, to be able to do that, right? So now, how many recruitment companies— and it's really sort of 1 to 5 that you're looking at in there— that's a big ask and it's a big number. Um, so, you know, that's net profit, um, you know, numbers. So the number of the normal recruiting— like, not normal, that, you know, we are living in the biggest geographical demographic area area of 1 to 10 businesses. A 1 to 10 business is not going to achieve that. All right, so that, and when we say that, that is a trade sale. All right, so that's your exit. You always think, you hear about all these lovely businesses getting acquired by another business for lots of money, etc. Now that used to be the case, and it happened to my previous company, you know, that happened to Melville Craig, my company, and I saw that acquisition going back and they did really well. I don't think that's as it's not going to be available for the majority of the people running a standard, you know, not standard, a good solid recruitment company. So then you've got other different options, like one I did, um, where I went and I did a management buyout. And the team actually was the individual, um, my first employee, which is a lovely story. I'm really proud that that happened for him. He went and he got investors, so he got high net investors that had sold companies in other areas to invest in him to then be able to buy me out. And that was a good option and that worked really well. You then have other ones where you could put in like tiers in terms of clawback. So you then almost go into, as an owner, you could go in as a chair and your team could then sort of buy the, or the business could then start to exit you out over a number of years. So there's that sort of, that you can look at. And then you've also got the sort of new employee trust trust scenario where you can put that in and it sets up in a very tax-efficient way for you as an owner to be able to get money out in a tax-efficient manner. But ultimately, everybody then owns the— so it's like the John Lewis concept almost, in terms of they're all owners of that company. So there are different ways. I think everybody that goes in and thinks, I'm going to exit to you know, a trade or another recruitment company or another broker. I think the days of that are more limited. So what I would say is the recruitment business, unlike the business I'm now in, which is a tech business, it's the one business that you can make money if you're good like that, right? That is powerful. Okay, I cannot do that in this current business, and the majority of the business you can't do that. But in a recruitment business if you go hell for leather and you go and make, you know, within a quarter, you can go and make business. And if you are a private owner, you can take those dividends, right? That makes it a really good business to pay you a very good lifestyle. And every year you could be paying off your mortgage with nice dividends on that. That is nothing to be— I think I see a lot of people that do that and then they get a bit sick of it. That is brilliant, right? Go try and find another industry that you can do that in. And I think we don't— we take that for granted a little bit. So focus on that and the benefits that a recruitment business can get out— you can get out of that.

Yeah.

Um, so I think realistically, being aware of it and also taking money along the way, not strangling the business but getting some sort of benefit, I think is the way that people should be thinking about it. And then getting it set up for exit, um, you know, really depends on, you know, how much— let's face it, you know, how much scalability is in the business and how much repeatable income is in there. So if you're doing like retainers and you've got a large contract base, you've expanded— just now they're looking at it— if you've expanded over in the States as well as the UK, then they see all of those things as tick boxes on multipliers. And I think, you know, you've got to move away from just the people as your main asset. You've got to use your database. You've got to demonstrate the value of the data that's in there. What percentage of customers or candidates have placed over and over again? How many people are converting through your web? Where's your metrics in terms of cost to acquire over the traditional business recruitment agencies? What's special about you? How many hits are you getting to your website? How many clients do you have download your content? Those are traditional metrics that other businesses are measured about, and we're far, you know, the recruitment industry, 10 times behind that.

And correct me if I'm wrong, Wendy, that was one of your superpowers when you were selling your businesses, the fact that you had so much data and it was so accurate and you could predict so much more so than the average recruitment company. Am I right in saying that?

Yeah, exactly. They love that and everybody loves that. So it's a really good way of being able to explain where your value is and how repeatable it is.

So to all recruiters listening, I think there's multiple reasons why you should track data, but I guess it's more predictable income, sanity, and also you could potentially get yourself a more sellable business, um, which is really interesting.

Definitely kind of nicely ties into why, why you decided to set up Firefish.

Um, when—

because I think you're extremely unique in the sense that you are— were top biller, started a recruitment company, sold a recruitment company, and now we're in a SaaS business, which is completely unheard of for a lot of recruiters that I speak to and that have been on the podcast. So Um, what was that transition like in that journey into starting Firefish? Can you just tell us a bit about that?

Yeah, so I did get to the stage where I didn't enjoy the day job. I didn't, I didn't enjoy running the recruitment company. Um, I always wanted to run my own recruitment, I always wanted to run my own business, but I really wanted to run a tech business was the honest truth on it. And that's why if you again, if I'm being completely honest, a lot of the business ideas I had at the very start were running around tech, but the capital that you needed at that point, you know, it just meant I ruled those ones out. So when I went into recruitment, I still had this passion of trying to do— use tech to make it better. Um, so hence why we started building what is now Firefish for my own recruitment company. So I almost had built an asset within my recruitment company that I wanted them to spin out. So in 2010, which again, you know, still recession, it was a bit boring there, there wasn't too much to do. And so I thought, yeah, let's spin out a new business and have a child. So did that, and I was running both of them. And so for me, if my super, you know, my sort of toolkit is focus, I didn't do a great job with two businesses. I needed to be focusing on one or the other. So when I focused on one, the other one didn't do so well. When I focused on the other one, it didn't do so well. So I knew then at that point I had to make the break, so I spun Firefish out in 2010 officially into two entities, but I ran them both for 4 years. And then, you know, Firefish was starting to grow arms and legs, and there was a lot of people wanting to use it. So organically, without really trying, it was starting to run. So I knew I had something there that was valuable. And, you know, 920 my original business, and they, you know, I had a team there that wanted to take that on board, and it was probably not where my heart was anymore. I was excited doing the next one. So I love the industry I am in, but for me personally, running a tech business was actually what I always wanted to do. So it was that. Don't get me wrong, my dad didn't talk to me for about 6 months because he thought I was absolutely flipping nuts. And when he was in a business running his for 20 years, he said, yeah, you have days that you don't like it, you just get on with it, Wendy, it pays you a lot of money and you're good at it, and you're going to go into this business, and again, you're going to get no money from it for— you can't tell me when, because you're going to have to throw it all into tech and building. And when would you get even a dividend down that? You can't, you know. So he just couldn't quite understand it. But at that point, I just said, no, I'm, I'm gonna do it, um, and I'll take the hit. So, um, and I'll take the benefits of selling my one business that funded my next business. So that's, that's kind of what I did.

I've got to ask, now that you've got a 70+ successful SaaS business, what's your dad's opinion now? Is he like, oh, great work, Wendy?

He doesn't ever like me. Like me, he doesn't actually say, well, I think that was sensible. He just goes even just because he still— we transferred some shares for him. So I'm delighted that he benefits too. Oh, that's anything I've done. He's been part of that payback metric as well. And I actually, I see him, I see my mom and dad every Friday night for a gin and tonic. And, you know, he gets the board pack every time, goes, 'Wendy, it's got a bit too complicated now for me. I don't understand what you're doing, but it sounds as though it's going well.' So I think we've got to the stage where that sort of mentor coach goes and he doesn't— yeah, he's happy that I'm doing what I do. He doesn't quite get his head around it, but yeah, he's very pleased for me.

So awesome. And well done for following your gut as well. It can be difficult when a parent says don't do it and then you kind of just do it anyway, you follow your gut. So I find that's true, I really respect that. Um, we're coming to the end of the pod, Wendy. There's one other question that I didn't ask before that I'm really fascinated about. You might have answered it in a roundabout way, but I'm curious, when you were selling your business, your recruitment business, what— were there any things that came up that you didn't expect that you can kind of tell other people to avoid this, this didn't go to plan, this was a big, uh, shock for me. Was there anything that happened like that that other people can be made aware of?

Yeah, so it really does depend on where and what you're selling it to and who you're selling it to. So, you know, if it was going through a, like, with an MBO, management buyout, you know, the level of due diligence that you would do is never going to be the same as, like, for example, what I've just gone through with raising investment for Firefish. Like, the level of due diligence I had to do there, you're going to get spanners that come up, going, all right, okay, because you've got 7 companies basically assessing you. With a management buyout, you know, you're not really going to— both of you are wanting to maximize the value and the money in the company at that point for different reasons— me to get it out and him to keep it in. Um, so you're not going to go and spend like, you know, half a million on doing due diligence on that business. It doesn't make sense. So, and you both know what you're buying and you're exiting as well, so there's not going to be those skeletons in the cupboard, if you like, for the closet that is going to come up through it. But I think if you're doing that type of exit, you know, ultimately, you make a decision that you're going to be passing that business on to trusted pair of hands that are partners that you want to go and do that. So ultimately, then what's the price? That becomes the main thing. How do you work out the price? Because the price isn't going for— you've external sort of trade players that would then haggle and negotiate after it and, you know, try and get a bigger price. It's actually more what will he pay for it and what will you accept, right? And that's where you've just got to come through it. And don't get me wrong, you're going to have times where every management buyout, even as if, you know, because the person that bought it off me is still like a brother to me, but we didn't talk for 6 months, you know, it's hard. You know, because ultimately you have different, you just have different opinions and you have different motivations of what you're both wanting to get out of that deal. So that's natural, but hopefully the relationship between you both is strong enough that you then come back, you know, you come back together and you're like, you know, he's still a client of mine now, I'm talking to him this afternoon, you know, I still love him to bits, and you know, in that way, and vice So we've got so many great memories of what we started together. So I think it's not so much like skeletons in the closet when you're doing a management buyout, but it's a realization that, you know, you can't be too greedy. It's going to be tricky to do that. If you can get somebody in the middle to take the sort of the negotiation away and come at it as a middle party, like whether or not that's you're a non-exec or whether or not that is an accountant that was doing the figures for you, somebody that's able to play into that role, or the lawyer that's doing— I don't know, the lawyers, unless you've got a good corporate lawyer, that might not be the right personality. But somebody that can do that negotiation for both parts, I think, is a valuable exercise to do. Don't try and do it on your own because you will fall out, right? And you won't like certain things that are doing in it. But it's just being realistic in the fact that the business is only as much as somebody will pay for it, not what you think you might get for it, because ultimately then you've got to go elsewhere and you might not ever get the exit.

It's really interesting. Um, we've literally got like 5 or 4 minutes and then we've got another call to jump on, but one final question, Wendy, because we didn't actually speak about it. For any recruiter that doesn't know what Firefish does or what it is, can you just give us a brief outline of what it is, please? Is that okay?

Yeah, of course. So Firefish is, um, specifically for recruitment agencies And we are the— it's a CRM that basically brings data intelligence to your business and drives everything by helping you to become that data-driven business. So, you know, everything, you know, it competes with the likes of your Bullhorn, your Access, your Vincere, your JobAdders, etc. We're there to go and smash them all.

Awesome. Love that.

Yeah.

So, and I love that, Wendy, because Firefish kind of plays into what made you so successful, which was tracking the data, and you put your love and soul into into developing this. So any recruiter that wants to follow, following Wendy's path and track the data and have more options, more confidence, yeah, check out Firefish. But Wendy, thank you so much for joining us. We've absolutely loved speaking to you. So thanks coming— thanks for coming on the pod and so many little pearls of wisdom to share with our audience. So thank you.

Oh, Sam, Ben, it's a pleasure, and thank you for asking me. I hope it's been of value.

So 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.