The Heart of HR: Putting People First (Nicole Roberts, SHRM-CP, PHR on Shally's Alley)

All right, everybody. You are live on Shally's Alley. It is Friday, October 20th. We got one more left in the month of October. But here it is. If you're ready for it, Shally's Alley coming at you. Today I have a guest named Nicole Roberts. Nicole has a very interesting background. She has been a VP of HR, head of HR, C-level HR, I guess, executive, and has about 20 years of experience in the business, in the whole human resources and talent business. She's coming at us live after having had a, from what I understand, rather intense battle with cancer and unemployment at the same time. At the same time. I mean, like, one of those is pretty bad, both of those. That's, yeah, that's pretty stressful. So I'm surprised you, you're handling it so well. You seem to have a great smile and a great attitude. But just wanted to introduce you to the world. World, meet Nicole. Nicole, meet world.

Thank you so much. And special shout out to Rachel Kitty Couples for referring me on to your show. I've been a big fan. I go to the, you know, HRTX events and things like that. And so I've, I've been kind of one of those like longtime listeners, first-time callers.

Well, you're more than a caller. You are the guest of honor. It's your show today. You are in the hot seat on the chair. Yeah, very nice to meet you as well. We were talking before the show about your experience as a candidate and Your business is, in part, a consulting, a consulting firm around the candidate experience. So your company is called People Solutions Group.

Yes.

And you talk about leadership development, onboarding, and candidate experience. Is that right?

Yes. Yes.

Okay.

Yeah.

So I have to ask. Yeah, go ahead.

Well, and I help leaders and hiring managers as well. I mean, when you get promoted from either being an individual contributor or if you've been a leader for a while, but you've not hired people before, that's a different skill set. And so I help leaders and hiring managers as well with just creating the optimum candidate experience possible from, you know, communication, first impressions, all of those things.

Yeah, yeah, that's a really good point. It's often overlooked that when you become a hiring manager, it's because you've been, you know, a fresh hiring manager. It's because you've been promoted into an area of higher responsibility because you've been doing a good job. And you're probably really good at what you used to do. And now you have this other thing that you have to do, which is manage people. And it's a different skill. So first-time managers and first-time hiring managers have have a lot to learn. In fact, I'm actually developing an internal curriculum for hiring managers, and the syllabus just keeps getting bigger. Because at first it was like, OK, where do you go to start a rec? Where do you go to find your candidates? And then it's like, oh, shoot, how about where do you interview? And how do you interview? And then it's like, wait, what can you say? What can't you say? And then you start realizing that there's so many things that they don't know as a, as a fresh hiring manager. It's almost like you got to You know, and they don't teach that in college either. You know, they say they don't teach recruiting. They don't teach hiring manager in college either.

They don't. They really don't. And, and there are so many pieces of— I mean, like you've touched on a little bit, right? I mean, you could start with a structure for hiring manager training and just start with interviewing and communication and what to say and what not to say.

And then there's managing people and then there's managing and then there's mental health and not being an a-hole.

And not answering questions for the candidate, right? Like if somebody gets quiet because they're thinking, don't rush to bail them out, you know, like let them think, have that pause. And those are skills that you learn over time as you do it. And so expecting somebody to be a great hiring manager right off the bat is just— because they were good at whatever they asked, right? And I mean, you got to, you got to support people people get really excited and they feel a level of prestige when they become a leader for the first time. And you have to wrap people in support when you do that so that they have a positive experience with it. I mean, we all know somebody, right, who got into a leadership position and didn't have the— didn't have the support. And then they just like got a bad taste in their mouth for it, right? They were like, Yeah, I didn't really like managing people. And it's like, well, it's like, I didn't really like managing people. Like, well, what was it about managing people that you didn't like? And almost every time it was something— when I have a conversation with somebody, it's because they didn't have the support, they didn't have the tools that they need, they weren't confident in, in what they were saying and with the decisions that they were making. And they— you just People have to feel supported and appreciated for the work they do.

I can totally relate to that. In fact, when I first became a manager many, many, many, many, many moons ago and led a team, fortunately for me, I was lucky enough that they were contractors. So I got the, I got the, like, manager-light experience because I didn't have to do things like annual reviews. And, you know, things like that. So my first experience was simply just leading a team, right?

Yeah.

But still, like, I hated it. I didn't. And so my next job, they're like, have you managed people? I'm like, yeah, I managed a team of 23, but I'm kind of not interested in doing that again, you know? They're like, oh, why not? Like, I didn't really like being a manager. And it's exactly what you just said. It's because they just said, you're a manager, you know, wave the magic wand. And then I'm like, oh, okay. So I have employees that call me like so-and-so's staring at my breasts and I'm like, oh, what do I do now? Uh, I know that's not right, but like, what am I saying? What do I do? What do I do? Ah, help! Right? And that was it.

Well, in 23 people, how could you possibly be effective in that? I mean, possibly there was not develop relationships. How could you possibly really get to know your people, understand their skills gaps, help them get to where they want to be? I mean, That's your job as a leader is to do those things.

And that was just a manager job. And I could have team leads, but they were just 3 direct reports.

There's no way you're going to be able to do that.

No, and I hated it. And then for a long time, I think it might have affected my career because for a long time I said, I don't want to be a manager because that was my experience.

Right.

So it's just what you just said. It's like they, they, I didn't have the support. And then I actually didn't want to do it again.

Well, and the other thing is organizations have had a long history of the only way that you can increase your earning potential, increase incentive potential, increase your level in the organization is by becoming a manager. And so you will have people who have no interest in supporting and leading others going into a management role because they're chasing a title, they're chasing money, they're chasing whatever. We are not structuring our organizations enough in a way that you could be a subject matter expert, you could be a, a leader of an area, that you could be that go-to person that is that authority on a certain area of the business, but yet not managing people and still be able to have that.

Now they're creating those positions, right? Like, like Distinguished Engineer or, or Fellow and roles that are individual contributor that are director or MVP level, but don't have the structure of, you know, managing individuals. And yet they do have, you know, there's been cases where I've seen promotions into higher-level roles that are individual contributor that came with raises that put the person at a higher level of compensation than the person they report to because of the expertise. So they're the only one at the company that does that. And their manager is— I don't want to say just a manager because, you know, right. But their manager is managing people, not necessarily an expert in that area. Totally.

Right. Well, and your comp should be tied to the value you bring to the organization, right? So if somebody is—

in that case, somebody could afford me—

that go-to, right? If they are, if they are the go-to for that information or if there's somebody that's really, you know, getting a lot of business out, you know, in the, in the market and all of that, like they're bringing a greater value to the organization, they should be compensated appropriately.

They're inventing new products.

They're— Yes.

Yeah, strategy. So there's a lot of roles like that. I totally get it. And you're right, it comes from that old organizational structure where, you know, it's the, it's the pyramid, right? And the only way up is to essentially just become a manager and then a manager's manager and then a director and then a director's director. And so on. But you, you were talking about the candidate experience before and talking to hiring managers about the candidate experience, talking to employers about the candidate experience. And you made an interesting point around something that I think a lot of companies forget. We, in recruiting, we focus on the candidate experience. But seldom do companies really pay attention to the organization as an entity and the candidate experience. You mentioned a couple of things like, for example, the website. Why don't you tell us a little bit about that, that the overlooked aspect of the candidate experience.

So when somebody is interested in your organization, they're going to go to your website like that. It is very naive to think that people are only going on social media, only going on LinkedIn, only going to that. They're going to go to your website. They want to learn, do your values align. They want to learn different things about you, including, could I be successful in your organization? And the measure of success for a new person who knows nothing about your organization is, what does that executive team look like? Could I see myself being a member of that team at some point in time in my career? And if you haven't updated the headshots, the photos, the bios, whatever, of your executive team in quite some time because that's an afterthought to you. That's a, you know, that's a marketing thing or that's a, oh, we're going to update the website next year. That's a budget item for the following year. And you might have an executive team that is full of diverse thought, right? Different ages, different demographics, different backgrounds, all of those things. But it's your best kept secret because nobody would have any idea by going to your website and seeing you know, 4 white guys in 3-piece suits as your executive team, people aren't going to apply to your job because they're not going to think that they could be successful in that organization. They need to see that they're not just going to be accepted, not just going to belong, but that they could also be successful. And they're not going to think that by just looking at your website and seeing your outdated, exec profiles.

That's a really— so you just You just turned the light bulb on. This is why I love doing the show, because I get all these great ideas and thoughts. The light bulb just went on as you were saying that, and it occurred to me, I've been researching a lot and reading a lot about hidden disability and the sunflower symbol. And the, you know, there's, there's a movement for those of you that don't know, there are disabilities that are often not disclosed. And for whatever reason, you know, that there's shame in them. We've talked about neurodiversity. And those kinds of things. But there's a little bit more talk about neurodiversity than, than there used to be. However, there's a bunch of other areas and disabilities that, that people just don't talk about. So there's, there's this whole hidden disability aspect of it. But as you were talking about the updating your company's profiles and executive page and, and showing what you care about, because you probably care about it but don't show it, they're showing what you care about. It would probably be one of those things that is not, you know, the sunflower. It's not visible.

Yeah.

So you see this, these 4 white guys, and, and maybe one of them has a disability and it doesn't show, right? And so that would be something that the people can connect and relate to. Not that you can't relate to an old white guy, but the point is that there's more than just this picture and this sort of sanitized corporate bio. And then where my light bulb went on was hidden diversity. So, you know, there are all kinds of diversity. Everybody, everybody can be, can probably fall into some kind of diversity category. But there are ways that, that we sort of hide it, you know. So, for example, I'm Hispanic. But if I had my executive picture on a, on a website, nobody would know. They wouldn't know by the color of my skin, they wouldn't know by my name, they wouldn't know by— but yet I do face some discrimination as a Hispanic. Not often, I can definitely pass, right? But I do face it, especially when I speak Spanish, and I can see how people sort of react to that. Yeah, I'm also Jewish, especially nowadays. When you talk about that, it's almost like, so that's a, you know, that's something you can tell by my name, sort of. But there are things that you just don't talk about. Now, I'm thinking about, what about people who have, who are, you know, they consider themselves from a diverse talent pool, but they don't talk about it, right? Could be sexual orientation, it could be gender identification, it could be, you know, national origin. I mean, there's so many things. So if you don't talk about that, nobody will know. Because there are hidden disabilities and there's hidden diversity. Yeah, that's a really good point.

Yeah. Well, and you— people need to know that it's going to be safe, right? Is your organization putting out an impression to others that it's going to be psychologically safe for you to be there? Has the work—

it's not if you have a hidden— right. If you are secretly gay and that's not out in the way that— and someone knows that, that's like, well, this person is not talking about it. Wonder why. Is this a company that doesn't accept? Right? Like almost the opposite effect.

Right. And it's funny because I saw something the other day that somebody was talking about, you know, like support can look a lot of ways, but don't make it a marketing ploy. You know what I mean? Like it should be reputation, not declaration. And that is what I have always said about, you know, the influencers and all of those things. I don't want you to tell me how wonderful you are. I want to learn from other people that you're somebody I should get to know because of the way that you support the community or, you know, whatever way that you're, you know, trying to put yourself out there. But I don't want to just read about it because you're telling everybody how wonderful you are.

Yeah. Yeah. That's come up on the show. You don't know how many times. I mean, it came up around the issue of you don't get to call yourself an ally.

Yeah, I just saw that.

You know, you, you, you can be an ally, but that's— an ally is identified by the people that they, that they are allied with, not by raising their hand going, I'm an ally, right? Like, you don't just get to say that. I mean, you can say that, but that doesn't mean it. And the other way that it's come up before is with people that are just quiet quitting or not talking about it, where they're, you know, they don't even put it in their exit interview. Right? Like, I felt really uncomfortable. This happened to me. I can't name the company, but it happened to me. I mean, I looked around, I was at, I was at the cafeteria, very nice cafeteria, by the way. And I had a guest, because my cafeteria was so nice, that I wanted to show it off to my guest who came and visited, and I got him a visitor badge. And I was walking around the cafeteria trying to find a seat, really big, everybody's out there, it's a sunny day, it's And, and I really, I was like, I felt all eyes on me. It was very awkward. Normally I grab my lunch and go to my desk, or I just, I don't pay attention. But I had a guest, so I was a little bit more alert, right?

Yeah.

And I'm just, I'm very alert and very, uh, I was almost embarrassed because people are staring all over. And I looked at him like, do you feel like people are staring? He's like, oh, definitely. And I'm like, is it because you have a visitor badge? And he's like, no, look, there's a bunch of other visitors. Like, there's lots of visitors here. There's They're not staring at that. And then he said— this is what— because I had no— I was clueless, I had no idea. Then he said, he's, he's a lot like I am. So he said, look at us. And I'm like, what do you mean look at us? He's like, just look at you and me. How do you and me stand out? How are you and me different? And I started looking around, I'm like, oh my God, this entire area is full of 23-year-old skinny nerds, and we are much older than that and not skinny. Like, we're the two old fat guys in a skinny 23-year-old. And I was like, oh, is that— and he goes, oh yeah, this happens to me all the time. I'm like, wow, I was so oblivious to that, right? So there's those kinds of things. And honestly, it never got— I never got away from it after that. I noticed it all the time. And I was— one of the reasons I left that organization, because I was just completely out of place. I felt like I wasn't being taken seriously because I was the old fat guy. Mind you, I wasn't that old, but yeah, older than the 23-year-olds. Isn't that— it just— so yeah, I have two questions. Yeah, why does that happen? In other words, going back to your point, which is updating your website, why isn't that updated? And how do you advise, how do you coach your leadership to update that and not do the, the thing that we talk— my daughter and I have this conversation every Pride Month, um, because she's, she's, uh, non-binary, and she hates Pride Month because she's like, they're— it's marketing. Like, all the people that put the sticker on the window and whatever, they, they switch to that month. So what do you mean? You mean I can only shop here on that month because the rest of the month you don't support us?

Right.

And I'm like, yeah, right.

So I'm like, super included right now, but any other—

the rest of them aren't, right? Or the rest of— yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

So how does it happen? And why does it happen, I should say? And then how do we have the conversation as leaders within TA and HR? Because in recruiting, we have that responsibility.

Yes.

But they don't, you know. So sorry, two questions, but can you start with the why does it happen?

So I would say easy answer of why does it happen as far as not doing the work is because people hire people just like them. And so then you're just perpetuating a culture of people just like you. Why does it happen as far as like the, the websites not being updated and things like that? I mean, I was part of an organization where we had two females as senior executives on the exec— I mean, there are only 5 of us on the whole exec team, so we were almost 50% female on our—

they weren't on the website.

Don't tell me we were not on the website. Oh my God, why we weren't on the website?

That's what I want to know.

Because we were planning a rebrand and we were going to update the website anyway in X number of months, and it was not a priority to update the website.

It was a priority to rebrand It was a priority to rebrand. Therefore, they were like, we'll wait until we do all of these things. Like, not that you couldn't take a photo, put two photos and a little bio on there. I mean, that's not— yeah. Wow.

We had a client reach out and that actually makes sense.

Yeah.

They were concerned about the diversity of our executive team. The email gets forwarded to me, right? And I'm like, well, I can tell you there is a female on the executive team. It's me. And also, you know, my counterpart.

And, um, we were just excluded from the website.

Oh my God, please take comfort in that, at least that we are practicing what we preach. However, you are correct, you do not see that on our website. And then the very next thing the person asked is, I hope you're paid as much as the men there. And I was like, well, we're not even gonna get started on that.

But you're like, let me check, just one second.

Rest assured, there is female representation in the executive team. You are correct. You don't see it on our website. But I mean, it, it can just become such an afterthought when people are not being intentional, especially if somebody has been there for a long time. They don't go to the website hardly ever. You know, they're not looking at it through fresh eyes of what does a candidate see? What does it look like on a phone? Because Very rarely are people first going to interact with your website on a, you know, laptop or on a computer on a larger screen. What does it look like on a phone when they try to do that? And if they're, you know, a little bit older, can they even see it? Can they read it? Are your colors and things like that— is that really hard to read? When I was launching my business, I sent my 70-plus-year-old father my website to look at. I was like, what's this look like for you? And he opened it up and he goes, you've got black on purple. I can't read it. And I was like, thanks, Dad. So, I mean, wow. Yeah. He said, I can't read what it's about because I can't see it. He said the colors aren't, you know, and I said, oh, okay, that's helpful. Thanks.

Wow. Well, that— so you answered my question very well. I think it's, it's not that maybe necessarily an after— it could be an afterthought. So that's one reason. But it could also be they, they are, they are planning on updating it, but the update is being considered as a holistic update. Yeah, they're not thinking about micro updates. So it's like, this is a very small change, right? It's not a rebrand. So they're waiting for the big rebrand. And then in the meantime, they're not— they don't realize that, you know, the small change could, could make a huge difference. Yeah, they're thinking the big change is going to make a huge difference.

Well, yeah, or somebody has a, a website that they have hosted by somebody else, right? That it takes like an act of Congress to get any changes made to the website. And so they're like, we can't— I don't know, because we have to email so-and-so and, and do it and it never gets done, all of these things to get updates made to the website, and they're going to charge us for it because we don't own our website. So like proactively thinking about that when you're a business, when you're building out your, your website, when you're building your career page, make sure you have the ability to make timely changes to it because you want that to be an updated, living, breathing, uh, portrayal of your people and your culture and why people should want to come and, and be part of your organization. If you have you know, benefits that you highlight on your careers page. And it is very targeted to families and to, you know, this environment. We have great schools here, you know. So at one point in my career, we were recruiting, yeah, specialized veterinarians like veterinary surgeons and oncologists. They had just finished their residency, right? Telling them how great the school system is is not going to appeal to them because they're going to look at that and go, well, if this is a really family-focused community and I'm a brand new college grad, brand new out of my, you know, residency, like, maybe that doesn't make sense for me. I— maybe I want to be in an area where there's more single people and I'm going to be able to find you know, more people like me, like, you got to be really aware of who you're trying to target and who you are actually appealing to. And you should ask people to take a look at your website. I mean, hey, if you were going to apply to one of our jobs, if you went to our careers page, who would you think is our target candidate? And they'll tell you. Or say, hey, do you feel like if you went to our website and you took a look at this. Does that seem like a place that you feel like you would be successful?

Can you relate? Yeah.

Can you relate?

That's interesting. Also, maybe even as, you know, the ones that come in as candidates, you can ask them what attracted you, you know, what did you see on our website that you liked?

Oh, always.

Yeah. And answer the question that way. So, wow, OK, so we answered, we answered really kind of how this ends up happening. And I want to kind of jump into another question related to that and then go back to the how do we fix it, right? Have you ever— this has happened to me with my clients. I've had clients where this is, this is fairly frequent, more frequent than I would expect. And I'm wondering if this also happens with your clients. They don't update their LinkedIn company page from a recruitment branding point of view, right? They have their company information. So keep, keep in mind, we use LinkedIn Recruiter to recruit people. And we pay a lot of money for that. And we also use LinkedIn as a marketing tool to market our business. So there are two very distinct, right? But the company page has both in them, which I, to me, that's kind of like, okay. So what ends up happening is the company page is owned by marketing. So they have the company information on it. There's nothing about employment branding, company culture for, you know, hiring and benefits and Nothing. It's, it's, it, that's one of those, it takes an act of Congress to update. And I've asked my clients, like, why aren't you putting all this great career website stuff on the LinkedIn page? Well, we have to go through PR and marketing to get approval. And, you know, and it's like, why don't you have a way, LinkedIn, why don't you have a way to give the TA HR person ownership of that part of the, you know, like there needs to be, Give them an admin login and stop being on your power trip.

I mean, for crying out loud.

Does it happen with your clients? Because it happens with mine.

Yeah. So I— yes. And I've been on that side. And so I just say, I'm like, I used to have an admin login for our company account. I don't understand why you don't. Like, just that point blank, right? Like, more than one person, more than two, more than three people can have an admin login. And you should have one if you are the person who is responsible for the employer value proposition, employer branding, all of those things related to the candidate experience. You want to feel good about that. You want to know that, like you were saying, if they're doing really cool things in the company, if you have people who are out there sharing things that are going on in the business, you want to be able to update your page and have that. You can put testimonials, you can put all kinds of stuff in there. You can link directly to the website. You can, you know, have videos. I mean, it's, it's not that complicated. You just need to have the access.

That's right. Yeah. So, yeah. So it's common for— it's more common than I thought.

And work with your marketing and PR people, right? Like maybe they don't.

Oh, yeah. They say they try.

They don't understand, you know, the value that you're trying to bring to that and I mean, if they would just give you access and they know that you're not going to, you know, impact anything with what they're trying to do, or I mean, for heaven's sakes, try to work together, right?

Like, right. If you do something wrong, they can just call you or email you like, hey, can you fix this? Because, you know, like, how bad is that?

It's— I try to say, like, you know, leadership without borders, like, work with other people. You all have the same shared goal, right? You're all working for the same organization. The marketing team wants to be able to get people into the organization that are, you know, bright and want to be successful and work hard and all of those things. I mean, that should be a shared goal and you should be able to work together. And if you can't work together, then, you know, I mean, I can't— the only person you can control is yourself. And so focus on what you can do. But yeah, I mean, you should be able to get some kind of login or at least be connected with somebody who has those rights to be able to do that. And even if they want you to send the copy to them and then they'll post it, fine, whatever. But I mean, yeah, I mean, you can do it instantly and it'll up and it'll change it. So.

Wow.

Yeah.

So that's a— there couldn't be a more perfect segue into how do we fix it? Yes. But before we jump into that, I wanted to pass along this compliment from someone that was following. I don't know if you read that already. I just want to make sure you saw that. I did.

I lost my train of thought for a second. I did read that, but I appreciate that very much. Thank you.

Yes. Thank you, Tanuja. So how do we fix this? Because, I mean, you've been talking about the marketing side of it. I'm talking about it now. Let's go back to the original, you know, diversity candidate experience afterthought. It's, it's just not making it to the website. We know the, sometimes the reasons for it now, but we still don't know what's, how do we, how do we fix? We, TA doesn't have the power to go to the company's main page and change the executive bias. So how do we do that?

I mean, you got to figure out who does in your organization, right? Like whoever, so in my past, TA always reported to me, and I was the, you know, VP of HR. And so But you still didn't have the power to do that. What?

Do you still didn't have the power to go change the website?

Depends on how big the company is.

Oh, okay. Okay.

So if the company was smaller, I always made sure I had admin rights.

Let's say you don't, because that may be the case with larger companies.

Then I make sure I have a really good relationship with the person that does. And the more that I can prove to them that I'm going to provide value with the content that I create, that I've done all of the work ahead of time, right? And all they have to do is post it for me. They're more than happy to do that. What you don't want to do is say, hey, I want to do all of these things to our website. I don't have a clue how to get started. I want you to write it all, but this is what we need to do. That—

oh, that's more work for them.

Yeah, that's not going to work for them. That's not their priority, right? Like, you need to—

you do the homework.

That you are helping. And so, I mean, yeah, I used to, you know, write the content, add the photos, add the links, add whatever, send it over. But hey, can you post this for me? Yes, absolutely. Because it's click, click, click, right? Then once they got comfortable with me and knowing that I wasn't trying to impact the brand in a negative way, that's when I would get my access. You just, you build trust over time.

Okay, so let me recap. So basically make your bullet point case and create the content, ask them to post it. Once you get to success, or once they see the content is good and that this is all positive, then you get the access. What are the bullet points? That's what I wanted to drill down to. So when you are making the case and, um, How do you sell this? I know you're not in sales, but like, how do you sell the idea? How do you sell the concept of, listen, I know that the company's, you know, main page is for investor relations and, you know, and so on. But there's this other, we have this other objective. How do you kind of inject that in there?

So every person that interacts with your site, with your LinkedIn, with your careers page, with your whatever, has the potential to either be a brand ambassador or a detractor from your brand, right? So, right, maybe somebody goes through an interview process and they don't become an employee, but maybe they had such a positive experience that they mention you in a networking event, and now you've got an investor that's interested in your business. Maybe you've got a new client that's interested in your business. We can't just focus solely on people and groups that we think are going to be a client, going to be somebody that's going to bring us in money. Like, it's, it's not an instant connection and an instant conversion. Sometimes it's just adding to that, that culture of goodwill, increasing your, the positivity of your brand, the reputation of your brand, and giving people a positive experience from start to finish is one of the best ways to do that. Because also, they are going to be talking about you regardless, right? Wouldn't you want them to be talking about you in a positive way? Wouldn't you want them to—

Yes, but they are talking about us in a positive way, according to our marketing plan. And we're getting, you know, more business and more impressions. But Nicole, don't you just push a button on the vending machine and get the next available candidate? Isn't that how it works?

Oh my goodness, I wish.

I mean, that's what they say. That's what they think. That's what the CEO and the CFO think is that you just go, pop, you know, easy button, and then up pops the next candidate.

Oh my goodness.

So you have to— that's what I struggle with.

Yeah.

Talk about transitioning from being an individual contributor to being a manager. That was a big jump in learning. And eventually I did do it, by the way. After I had a bad experience, I did do it and I had support and it worked well. And then I had to transition from being a manager to being an executive to being a leader. And that was a whole different—

Yes, that's a whole different skill set.

Another set of muscles I never even knew I had, right? And now I'm in that position. But even though I'm in that position, I see there's the CEO and the CFO still have the same easy-button mentality, like recruiting is just something anybody can do. You push a button. And so it's still a hard sell to convince them that what you just said, that a candidate comes in, has a great experience, but doesn't get the job, and you land a big deal because they had a good experience. Or the opposite of that, a candidate comes in, doesn't get the job, and they go and they tell 10,000 people how much it sucked. And then you're calling me saying, why are Glassdoor reviews so bad?

Can you fix it? Yes. Yeah.

I mean, until that happens, they don't get it.

So, so backing up from that, first of all, working on the easy button mentality, do they have visibility into the data of what it looks like from, from your candidate flow perspective? Do they know how many people apply to your jobs, what that conversion looks like? Do they know how long your jobs stay open? And I don't mean when you close them and reopen them so that you can skew your statistics. I don't mean that.

I got caught.

I mean, actually, listen, I, I know.

Um, yeah, I get what you're saying. How long does it actually stay open?

Yeah, but, but do they— are they— do they understand that? Do they see like—

yes and no. So yes, they know. I know they know. No, they don't understand it. That's the problem.

Is—

and I'm not talking about my employer now, just so in case anybody's listening. This is as a consultant, my experience as previous employers. I mean, this is very, this is very common. And when it's been my responsibility, I can show them the data and I can explain the data, but they still don't connect the dots. It goes back to the— let me tell you a story. Because I think this illustrates it. There was a company where I broke every record the company had ever had. I ended up hiring everybody in that year without a single agency hire, which was what the objective was. As a result, I saved the company $13.5 million in agency fees. OK, so at my exit interview, when I was leaving, the, um, and my, my boss then is my boss now, my mentor, um, and I had— there was another mentor there who I learned a lot from. So this was a great experience. I didn't leave for any other reason than it was a really, really good— like, it was a ridiculously good opportunity that was just literally written for me. So that's the reason. And my boss supported it. So preface that with, I'm not leaving saying, oh, this place is terrible. I was leaving on a positive way. And they asked me, what could we have done to make this a better, you know, a better place for you. And I point blank, I told my boss's boss, I said, I saved the company $13.5 million, and it went completely unnoticed.

Wow.

And you know what he said? He said, just $13.5 million? That's a drop in the bucket. And that was my lesson. And he was right. Because Then I've moved on to other higher level, you know, that I was a manager then, right? Now, you know, I mean, as a consultant and other, I've seen all these other things that happen. And I can tell you that there are companies that will just pay out $20, $30, $50, $100 million in staffing firm fees, and it's like, we don't care because we make $50 billion this other way. So like, it's almost like we don't care if we have to spend the money. And I have to fight that. That's, that is the reason why the CFO and the CEO think anybody can do it. That is the reason why I can't sell that idea, because it's almost like it doesn't matter. You and I know it does.

Yes.

But they're just not getting the message, and I can't figure out how to tell them beyond the data and what it says, right? No, you're wrong. It's not just $13.5 million that I saved you. It's also the fact that Every single person that interviewed had a great experience. And our reputation increased, and it's probably going to increase our sales. But I can't prove that. So how do I get from here to there?

I was going to say, first of all, I think that it costs $0 to thank your people for even incremental progress. In helping the organization. I mean, when you said it went unnoticed, like that hurt my heart because I mean, I used to keep, I still have them, but I used to keep handwritten thank you notes next to my desk. And when I was on cross-functional calls, I would write notes and mail them to people because I heard their name mentioned on a call. Hey, just so you know, your name came up on this call and thank you so much for that. You, you know, made a positive impact on the business. You mean a different— whether it's a drop in the bucket or not, those dollars still were saved and allocated elsewhere, right?

Yeah, they were.

There's still that, that impact to the business, the impact to the culture, right?

Way beyond the dollars, right?

Yeah, way beyond the dollars.

And the impact, you know, there's, I'm not really sure even how to put this in numbers, but the impact of having somebody join the organization that you recruited. Yes. And then, you know, that you have a relationship with this person, and they become a manager, a director, a vice president, and they had a really good experience, and they stay with the company because they still have connections to the people that they met when they first started, and you're part of that. So there's this other sort of, you know, this is one of the reasons why I think outsourcing recruiting can sometimes be a mistake, because you outsource your culture. Now, it can also not be a mistake if you're able to integrate your culture. Yeah, you have to do that. It's, that's a requirement if you're going to outsource recruiting, not to outsource your culture. Yeah, right. But even when we do it internally, it's hard to translate the numerical value when it's not as easy as saying, "I saved the company $13.5 million." You know? So what I learned from that is it wasn't about the money. Next time, I'm not going to say it's the money. Next time, I'm going to say, "This is the impact that I had." Yes, absolutely. As opposed to, you know, "I saved the company," because that they didn't care about. Had I said the impact instead of the numbers, maybe they would have You know, again, I left in good terms. So this is all positive, right? It was a good lesson for me in, you know, really understanding how the C-suite thinks, because to them it was just money. The other stuff is more important.

So you have to start off— that's a great point. You have to start off first and foremost and understand what is the strategy of the organization, what matters to the organization, what are the values of the organization? Because like you said, when you said I saved a company $3.13 or what, however many million dollars—

they weren't in saving mode, so they didn't care.

They were like, I don't care. That's not what I was focused on at that point in time. What did you do that got us to, you know, 10x, whatever of this impact that we were trying to make?

That's what I learned is aligned to the leadership. That's right.

You have to be aligned. You have to. Absolutely.

What is the company vision? What is the CEO's vision? And then how do you contribute that? And that's what I do now. But I learned that through making this, you know, mistake. And I'm sure— so to me, the question is, how do we put this in bullet points so we can get their attention? Right? So you're saying align to the vision, align to the vision, first of all, make your bullet points to that, make it about the outcomes.

Yes.

Not the activity or the dollar value necessarily, unless the dollar value is what the strategy is. If the strategy is, we need to save $10 million and you save the company $10 million, woohoo. But if the strategy is we need to penetrate new markets and you come in with we saved $10 million, you're like, how did that get us into new markets?

Right?

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, if my objective was— and this was a case— if my objective was improve retention by 10% and I improved it by 19%, I made a meaningful impact on what I was you know, expected on how I was helping the business.

Right.

I didn't talk about how much the savings, which obviously that's a cost savings. Right. But I didn't focus on cost saving. I focused on the measure of retention.

The measure of retention, because that's what they cared about.

That's what they care about.

I want to, you know, just double check here. And I want to assume you didn't just like handcuff people to their desks. No. And that's how you get there. No.

Do you know what I did?

I asked, you forced them to stay.

I said, why are people leaving around here? Like, did we have exit interview data? But even beyond that, asking current people, why do people leave? And they said, right, why do you leave and why did they leave? Yeah, right. If you were going to leave, if— when's the last time you thought about leaving and why? And also why, why have other people left? Like, what is it? And especially looking at that 90-day turnover, like, what are we missing from an expectation compared to reality that people get in here and they— it's that— I mean, erodes trust immediately if you get somebody in and then they go, "Wait a second, this isn't what I expected. Why is that?

What could we have done better?" For the listeners, just to explain the 90-day turnover, it's a measure sometimes, you know, people in recruiting that haven't gotten far enough in their careers yet don't understand what that means. The, the You know, 30- and 90-day turnover measures that we use in TA tell us about the— it's one of the factors in quality of hire. So the concept is, the theory is, if somebody that you recruited looked like a really great candidate, they aced the interview, hiring manager loved them, the candidate loved the company, and then they get there and 30 days later they're going, "Uh-uh, no, this is not the right place for me." It doesn't matter if they were the best candidate in the world; that was not a good match. And that's not necessarily That doesn't mean TA failed at their job. The pattern that you identify with the 30- and 90-day is where the failures are happening, right? Is it the recruiters are not selling the right job or the right way? Is it the candidates aren't getting the right message? Is it the hiring? So, you know, you can pinpoint that. But that's where the, the 30- and 90-day turnover values come from. And historically, why some companies still have a probation period. Um, it's still out there, you know, the, the 30-day probation or the 90-day probation. I don't know if anybody still does that with benefits, but there used to be companies that your benefits wouldn't kick in until 90 days. Um, I'm pretty sure that's gone now. Yeah, there used to be, right? Like, I remember—

yeah, so the, the most that you can go out is, I want to say, first month fine, 60 days. Um, but you Yeah, it's—

they're like, we don't— we're not really sure you're gonna stay, so we're not even gonna—

there was a point in time where— think about that logic though, right?

I am. That's why I'm pointing it out.

We're not gonna have benefits be effective until after 90 days because people don't stay, right?

Um, we're not sure you're a good hire.

I have news for you. Your issue is not your benefit effective date, right? Yeah. Yeah, we can't offer benefits day one because it's too hard to offboard people.

What? That's not the problem, right? That was my point. That's exactly what I'm saying.

That's a culture problem, right?

And that's like, that's reduced now. Not a lot of companies do that because I think that it's identified. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

So connecting the dots. OK, so we've got, just want to make, there's a lot of, there's a lot of meat here. First of all, you had me at the edge, literally, you know, I don't know if you could tell, but I was at the edge of my seat, actually. So there's a lot here. So first of all, the, I don't know, outdated or bland or just missing information gap that is potentially impacting, likely impacting candidate experience can come from simply not knowing or having a bigger plan and not realizing the impact. So you can either, you know, A, inform them, or B, explain the impact, or C, simply being afraid of little changes because of the let's just call it difficulty of making those little changes. Okay, so now we know where it comes from. Now we know how to address it. Then how do we make the, how do they make the changes? Well, first you can create the content and give it to them and ask them to put it up so that you can build the trust. One option. Another option, hopefully you have the power to get the login, right? So that's another possibility. And then you don't have to ask for approval. Or another option is simply provide the data. I'm just trying to recap everything. Provide the data that tells the story that achieves the goal that the CEO has. In other words, you have a lot of data, but you have to present the data in a way that aligns with the company's mission. So present the results or the outcomes and the data to back that up that mean the most to them, and then demonstrate the connection. So now you have why it happens and how you fix it. Is that about right? Did I, did a good job of recapping?

Yeah.

Good. Yeah, I learned a lot from that, by the way. That was, that was fantastic. And just, I'm very happy that you were able to join us.

Thank you.

You seem to have just the most positive, like, I very seldom talk to people that are this enthusiastic and positive about having dealt with some of the, you know, life's most difficult challenges.

Yeah.

Including being a job seeker right now, which is ill, Oh my God. Tell me about that real quick. We've got a few minutes left. How, how horrible has it been to be a job seeker in this market right now?

I, um, was so probably like Q1 of this year, right? I was an active job seeker, right? And then I thought, well, okay, the market is not fantastic, right? I actually got all the way basically to an offer with an amazing organization. And they had a budget meeting and the job got put on hold. And so I thought, okay, that happens, right? No, no ill will whatsoever. I have been here before where we got down to the 11th hour, we were making an offer and I was told the job was no longer being filled. Right. Like I've done that before myself.

You've been in the decision seat.

Totally understand that. Right, right. And then I thought, well, what do I really want to do? Like, let's— this is a opportunity, if anything. So what do I really want to do? And so I have loved the consultative aspect of HR my entire career, especially as I actually had knowledge and education experience to share. I mean, I love that. And so I launched my business while I was going through treatment. Not a lot of people would do that. It seems like a very nice thing to do.

That was the first thing I said was, oh my God. Two very difficult things at the same time.

Yeah. And so, but also you don't have a plan B when you're just one foot in front of the other, right? Like, I can do this one step at a time. I can get through all of the side effects, right? One step at a time. I can do all of these things with— not certainly by myself. I did nothing by myself. I have an amazing community You know, I think I told you that there was, there was an entire GoFundMe campaign set up to help me because I'm a single mom who was doing all of this stuff. And so I certainly did not do it on my own. I definitely accepted help, which is really hard to do when you're really Type A and when you're an independent person and being very independent.

Yeah.

But one of the connections that I made was actually to be a facilitator for HCI, human Capital Institute for their programs. And I absolutely love it. And that has helped me to make an impact with HR professionals that are trying to either be, you know, that strategic HR business partner or the strategic talent acquisition or the coaching. And I've, I've just loved it. And I've really enjoyed it. And then I just keep making connections with people and trying to help people as much as I can. And, you know, do— doing things like this where I can, you know, talk through things. I mean, it, it has been— if nobody is helped or benefited by this journey, then it will all have been in vain. If even one person advocates for themselves when it comes to their healthcare or, um, has the courage to go out on their own, or, you know, learns how to really bring data to try to do a proposal. I mean, if even one person is impacted, then it, you know, it was all for the better.

And now you know why I do this show. And that's— yeah, I mean, you couldn't have recapped— one of the, the last two questions that I always ask, um, one is what do you want people to think about and mull over? You just gave you just gave everybody, well, you gave, you gave all of us, including myself, a lot of meat on the subject matter, but also just something to think about. So I mean, I didn't even have to ask you the question, so I appreciate that. Um, thank you for that. The, the last question I want to ask— what's that?

You can be scared and do, still do things. Do things scared.

Yeah, that's what, that's what I heard, and I think that's what our audience is, you know, courage is is not not being— that's a double negative. Courage isn't about lack of fear. Yes, it's about doing it anyway.

This card was sent to me and it's incredibly true, right? You don't have to be fearless. Doing it afraid is just as brave. Just do it. Just keep doing it.

Yeah, that's right. Courage is not about being fearless. Exactly. I think that's what— and, and now we have, I think, thanks to you, some of the, some of the tools that we need to be not fearless, but to be able to take the risk and go, OK, this is still scary. I don't want to sit down in front of the CFO and the CEO any more than I used to before. But now at least I have something that I can, you know, I can take a shot. And now I can support it. The I didn't even know I could, right? So that's, that's beautiful. Last question, and then I'll let you go because we're pretty close to the hour here. Um, who should be on the show next?

Uh, so there were a number of people that I would have recommended that I saw had already been on here, so it was hard to choose. But somebody who, at least to me, is an up-and-comer— and I apologize if, if she's actually not and she's just fantastic and I just learned about her— is Maisha Cannon. Has she been on your show yet?

I thought so, but, uh, I mean, we're friends and we know each other well, uh, so I thought she had. I'm gonna— I've done more than 220 episodes. Um, it might have been in the show before it was called Shelly's Alley, so it could be.

I'm, I'm super impressed with her, and I want to amplify her voice because I know that she's now going out on her own as well. So I mean, I, I think she's fantastic.

Cool.

Yeah.

You said you had a bunch of names, so I was expecting a list.

Oh my gosh.

One is more than enough. I mean, one is fine. I just— but you're like, I have a bunch of names.

Well, I mean, I was thinking of people that would be impactful in this space. And so I'm like, okay, Laura and Kat and Rachel and all of these people had already been on your show, of course. So, yeah.

Well, then I must be doing either a terrible job or a really good job. Definitely, I'll check and see if she has it, but you know what, even if she has, still—

Yeah.

Oh my God, still worth it. Sorry, the crews are here. I don't know if you can hear that, but the landscaping crews that work on the neighborhood, so they've been like up and down the street. I think they're blowing up some of that leaf smoke. So thank you so much. It's been wonderful. And that is it for Shally Zally, everybody. Be kind to each other. Take care. Bye-bye.