Episode 18: Glen Roberts

Speaker 1: Welcome to the Secrets of Success podcast, a series for recruiters by recruiters, I'm Danny Rainert. And in each episode, I have candid conversations about careers in recruitment, with some of the best talent that Team Eames has to offer. They'll be giving you a glimpse into the highs and lows of their careers, their motivations, and drivers, and their secret to success in the industry. You can listen and subscribe on Apple, Spotify, and other favourite podcast platforms. Let's meet our next guest.

Speaker 2: Good morning, Glen. How you doing?

Speaker 3: I'm good, Danni. How are you?

Speaker 2: Yeah, very well. Thank you. Thank you very much for joining us for another, session of secrets of success.

Speaker 3: Yeah, of course. No worries.

Speaker 2: Thank you. So for people that don’t you, could you kick us off by giving me a quick overview of kind of your role at teams as, as one of our directors and the division that you look after?

Speaker 3: Okay, cool. No worries. So I, so I joined in four and a half years ago, and I look after our banking asset management division, which is essentially finance, um, compliance and audit roles into banks and asset managers. So pretty straightforward. Um, I'm a billing director, so I look after a team of eight. Um, but I'm also responsible for my own, um, portfolio of clients bringing in work to the team, feeding the team, setting the tone, setting the pace, um, and all that kind of good stuff as well. Yeah,

Speaker 2: Absolutely. You'll certainly when we look at sort of directors across the business, someone that definitely leads from the front, do you think you'll always want to bill cause some directors that, you know, they choose not to, and that's absolutely fine. Um, but it's something you've always led from the front on, you know, you've always been kind up there in the leaderboard. What drives you to keep wanting to bill as a director?

ok, I joined this industry in: 2005

Speaker 2: We could do that with all the friends. Wouldn't that be great.

Speaker 3: That'd be great. Um, but no, I genuinely, genuinely really love it. Um, as I've got more experience in recruitment and, and as I've sort of stayed in the game for a long time, I, I probably get more enjoyment now out of seeing, you know, people come through the ranks, um, from people we hire graduates to, um, you know, kind of people we hire from competitors, sort of seeing them come in, you know, figure it out, go out there, sort of develop their own client based, develop their own portfolio, do some like really amazing stuff and, and kind of teach me things as well. I always, always really love that too.

Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely. Fantastic. Well, look, you, you mentioned they're kind of hiring and, and bringing on board people into the business and into your division. That's certainly one of the topics that I want to cover with you today and, and kind of pick your brains on a little bit. So, um, hiring is always a fun challenge. It's always, you know, always makes me smile, how difficult, you know, every recruitment company finds hiring themselves considering it's it's our job. Um, but your success in hiring boarding and developing experienced recruiters, not just at senior consult, but also principal consultant level is kind of unrivaled across our UK business. You've got some great examples of it. So I'm keen to understand what your advice would be for other managers and directors in the recruitment industry who are looking to bring experience talent into their team. Uh, so if we kind of break it down, firstly, if we think about the kind of interview process and engaging those experienced people, what would your advice be to people, you know, going through that process now or on the, the sort of the higher end side

Speaker 3: You're obviously right. I mean, it's the hardest thing this job, I think it's, you know, ironically, we're kind of like quite, you know, go it and bad that they're recruiting for ourselves. Um, but I think when you go out and you hire experience people nine times outta 10, they're usually bought into more the director or the person they're working for rather than the brand, the brand can help sometimes. Um, you know, but, but we all generally go to work each day because we're inspired by our manager and we're brought into what their plan for the future. So I think if you've got a great kind of personal brand name as a, a director associate director or billing manager, whoever you are, but I think you've kind of gotta be known within your space, um, if you are, and if you're looking at people from outside of sector, um, you, you've just gotta be honest with people throughout any form of interview process.

Speaker 3: You could be yourself. That's why people join ES um, all of the hard sell the thick, sell the, the kind of like, you know, sort of bit like swift Tony type stuff from, uh, if you remember, um, kind of fashion show back in the day, it just doesn't work, you know, with sales professionals at the end of the day, but we're also just, most people are just, um, you know, kind of normal as well. And they just want . They just wanna go into a business, meet with someone who has a clear vision for their team, a clear vision for what they wanna do, what they wanna build, what they wanna create and just comes across as, as relatable and, um, and personable. And I think that's where a lot of, um, people fall down, they kind of interview, um, they interview to are, you know, aggressively, or they do kind of like almost like a caricature mm-hmm and I think you to be yourself. And I really think that's why a lot of people not so much just join me, but why any experience or recruiter would join a particular business? You know, like I said, it's, the brand name is important too, but the individual that they're joining is, is usually the reason why they accept an offer. Absolutely.

Speaker 2: Yeah, no great advice. So honest, transparent. Um, I know you've always been very open about plans for your team, but also challenges as well when we can see people and, and what the difficulties have been. And if, if people have left, you know, chat, chat openly about that kind of stuff. So I think that transparency kind of inspires some trust and confidence. Doesn't it? Through that interview process.

Speaker 3: Exactly. You, you got hit on the head, it's just, um, you know, if you, if you know that you are, you've got a desk that's maybe gone through a few troubles, just be honest, like let's face it. Most people kind of find this sort of stuff out. Um, I'd encourage any, the experience recruits is to ignore the white noise. There's lots of, you know, lots of pub chat around different firms out there. And I think, you know, anyone who's smart, ambitious, and wants a career in this industry would rather just go and kind of see people face to face and see what you make of it. Absolutely. Yeah.

Speaker 2: Great advice. Really good advice. And then in terms of onboarding experience, um, experience hires, it's not always easy, cuz obviously I look after the, the learning and development side of things for E so if we hire an associate consultant or a consultant, there's kind of a ready, made training plan, a program to plug them into. Um, and obviously we can tailor it where necessary, but it's very much, you know, we know what that first three months is gonna look like in terms of onboarding and development for principal consultants and, and an experienced recruit is very different. Isn't it? So how have you gone about making sure people land within the business and are onboarded effectively as experienced hires?

Speaker 3: Yeah, I, I think you've just got to promise what you said you would in an interview and there's so many, um, people I meet who come with those kind of, you know, sort of, or of, oh, they promised me X and then I turned up and it was all the load of, you know, load of garbage. I think you've just gotta, um, you've gotta have a plan. You've gotta set the expectation really clear from day one mm-hmm um, you've gotta provide the support. You've gotta be, you know, good, a good people person, you know, you have regular one to ones. Look after people spend time with them. Don't don't of make it feel like, you know, Hey, welcome to our business. Here's three seconds on how the CRM works. Good luck with that. Let's go yeah, there you go. And then then three months time, it's like, sorry buddy.

Speaker 3: It's not worked out, you know, mm-hmm you just gotta, you've gotta have a plan and that's it. You like people have joined you because you promise them something. Yeah. You just don't let them down, you know, set the expectation around what you, what, you know, what good looks like. Um, I was one of the things I absolutely thought was amazing when I first joined in, you know, a very clear one page internal document with, um, sales targets in there around your level going, this is what good looks like. Yeah. It's in black and white. It's the same for everyone you, so I think you've gotta have really clear expectations around what you, what you want them to build. What, what, you know, good week looks like, what healthy, um, death behaviors you wanna see the kind of attitude, all that kind of stuff. Yeah.

Speaker 3: And just make it really clear from, from sort of day one, you know, a lot of experience people often get to a point in their career where they want autonomy to kind to want that flexibility. They wanna be left alone. Um, but also have that support and, you know, kind of notice some, someone there to soundboard off. And I think you've gotta, um, gotta establish that early on and, and, and not make too many assumptions. You know, there's a lot of experienced people who do need structure, who do need, you know, someone sort of, you know, kind of on their back a bit, but nine times outta 10, most experienced people don't they want the autonomy, the freedom, they wanna be empowered and they want to feel like, you know, feel like they've got a good supportive team around them. But, um, I think that's the key thing to hiring any experienced individual is just be really clear around what you expect and, and genuinely treat them like an adult and, and not like a junior junior consultant. I think at the other side of it, that's often the problem too, that, you know, experience people get micromanaged and treated like, you know, like there were 20, you know, someone in their early twenties who's starting off in their first working job. So yeah,

Speaker 2: Absolutely. I think in, and it's, that's not, it's a balance that you've always struck very well because the people that you brought through the business, we had Andy Mac doing the, uh, secrets of success session a couple of months ago and stuff. So, um, but it's not always an easy balance to strike, is it, they can be that fear of, I don't wanna micromanage this person. So I'll be really hands off and probably two hands off and not give them any structure and it's all over to them or the getting too involved and micromanaging and not respecting the fact that somebody has experience. So kind of striking that balance is kinda important. I'm sure you've not always got it. Right. It's something that you kind of learn over time, I imagine by trial and error.

Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. And I think you've gotta be honest with yourself as well. Don't assume that just because someone's got four or five ideas, a competitor that they're gonna come in and do recruitment exactly the way that you do it or exactly the way that you would want it, want it to be done, you've got to, you know, you've gotta kind of learn from each other and, um, a bit like dating, you guys are gotta kind of, you know, figure each other out, um, a bit. Um, and I think, look, anyone in this industry who, who doesn't have that element of accountability and responsibility for development of their desk, you know, think it's very hard, like a lot of experience, you know, a lot of directors and I've certainly made this mistake over the years have kept people in place because the belief is, Hey, like this person's done recruitment for seven or eight years. They must be amazing. You know? So I I've learned the hard way by letting that person staying fit you. Yeah. And it ROS, and it has a big, a bigger impact on the wider team. So I think on the reverse of that, if you're an experienced person, uh, you know, or an experienced director in, in my shoes, you know, you've gotta be prepared to make those calls early on. If someone is totally mismatch, you know, don't, don't have problems faster.

Speaker 2: Great advice. Thank you. Cool. So look, moving on, um, to the sort of other end of the hiring spectrum now, um, you have been really proactively involved with our AC um, group at the moment. So there's quite a few of them in the London business, all at kind of various different stages of their AC life cycle with us, if you like. Yeah. So some of the soons to be promoted, some are newer, um, and you took on and launched the AC competition, um, which was great. And it was across the, the, the London business. Why did you, first of all, give us a quick overview of what that competition sort of involved and why it was that you set it up and launched it.

r, big fat old iPod, oh. From: 2006

Speaker 2: Some bangers on it.

Speaker 3: I bet. Oh yeah. Old school classics. Um, so it's a great, but it's, it is a handy little reminder. And for me, I thought that was really, really important. We we've hired obviously the better part of what 12 ACS over the course of the spring in the summer. So we've had a slightly St stagger intake. Um, a lot of these guys working in very different markets, different desks, still the same job at the end of the day. But a lot of them don't have a lot of natural crossover with each other. Um, they're all quite good powers as well. And they just sort of thought, you know, let's, let's get, let's get the competitive yeah. Um, nature and them going, let's get it, you know, kind of how it was like when I, I, when I first started recruitment, you know, 15, 16 years ago.

Speaker 3: Um, and it was really, really good fun. We had a, you know, the competition was just really simple stuff. It was, it was sales orientated. So it was helping them do everything they need to do to get deals over the line. So, you know, kind of CVS interviews, um, all that kind of, all that kind of stuff. Um, weekly winners. And then, uh, all of the weekly winners, I took out for lunch yesterday with a, you know, a good old slap up Christmas dinner. Um, but it was, it was great to see the energy, the excitement, you know, um, competitive banter, trash talking , um, that, that sort of happened between our, um, between our ACS. And yeah, I think that kind of stuff is so important early on in yeah. In, in the career, you know, recruitment and sales job at the end of the day. And you've gotta make sure these guys kind of know that early on.

Speaker 2: So absolutely. Yeah. Fantastic. And that that's really clear in terms of the why it was set out. I've obviously worked in recruitment a long time now as well. Not quite as long as you, but not far off. And I've been in, um, different businesses where they've run a see competitions and different incentives and things like that. It, it, it can all seem like a great idea, but then sometimes it forms a bit flat and it kind of just all tails off and it loses that momentum. So if you've got, if we've kind of got directors, managers thinking about setting up something that are listening to this now, what would your advice be to those guys around how to read, be effectively kind of launch and run this sort of sort of competition for juniors? Yep.

Speaker 3: I think I'm a simple man. Keep it simple. You know, so many of these competitions have all these kind of rules and aggregators and loads of stuff like that. You don't need it, just keep it simple. Um, keep it simple, proper prizes. So, you know, our guys got a, a decent voucher at the end of the week, a few of them one multiple weeks. So, you know, that buys half their Christmas presents. Um, so yeah, you know, these decent, tangible prizes, regular updates, um, you know, we had a, we've got like a WhatsApp group going between them all. And there's, like I said, there's a lot banter and yeah. Um, a really good memes as well, going around , you know, but it gets, everyone gets everyone excited and it's just simple stuff. So different touch points. And that just kind of keeps it going, you know, kind of keeps people, um, remembering that the competition is there, but for me, these things are always the same. Just you keep it simple, keep

Speaker 2: It simple and you kept good and you didn't make it all year to June. Like it was seven weeks. It was a real strong burst of like couple of months. Yeah. And then we're gonna do it again in the new year. And so it's not something that kind of tracks on quarter by quarter by quarter. It almost creates that burst of energy and engagement, doesn't it. And something a bit different.

Speaker 3: Exactly. And it's, and for me it's genuinely important. I mean, I only have one associate consultant at the moment. I have another associate consultant starting in, in January, but you know, like a lot of recruitment firms has been phenomenal for us. We're investing in our own, we're growing our own, all that kind of stuff. That's so important. It's kind of where I started, you know, 15, 16 years ago and a similar situ. And so for me, it's really, really important that we look after these guys and we, you know, when we're hiring at the associate consulting level, we, we, we genuinely all collectively between the sales directors look after the, the talent that's coming through. Cause it absolutely it's our future. And and it's important that we all all pitch in.

Speaker 2: Absolutely love it. Fantastic. Thank you so much for, for joining us for another session. Um, some really great takeaways there and I appreciate you taking the time.

Speaker 3: Cool. Thanks Danni. Take care.