The Transcript

Brad Wolff: 00:01            

Welcome to the “It Is About You Podcast”. Today our guest is Tyler Wentworth with “The Hire”. Tyler, welcome to the show!

 

Tyler Wentworth: 00:12                               

Thanks, Brad!

Brad Wolff: 00:14            

Absolutely! So if you would share a little bit about yourself and your organization “The Hire”.

Tyler Wentworth: 00:22                               

Sure! So “The Hire” was started roughly 2 years ago after spending 7 plus years in the recruiting field with a large Staffing Firm at $20 Billion Company Global Organization. There wasn’t an opportunity for a company to do some things differently and create a culture here where internal employees and clients and candidates were treated and looked at differently. And that was something that was extremely important to me and my business partner. And that’s why “The Hire” was great.

Brad Wolff: 01:04            

Awesome! So you really took the things that you didn’t think were as customer-friendly and candidate friendly with your previous firm and went out on your own so that you can do things in a way that you really believe aligned with your values, it sounds like?

Tyler Wentworth: 01:20                               

Yeah! I think that’s a good explanation. We, I myself, I love this industry and fell, you know, fell in love with it from what I started, knew I wanted to be in this for the rest of my career. But yeah, there were some things that as you probably know in the Staffing Community where can give recruiters a bad reputation. We’ve dealt with that as starting to hire and hopefully have, you know, eliminated those concerns with our clients from, you know, the short time we’ve been able to work with them.

Brad Wolff: 01:57            

Awesome! So you were really clear about what is important to you and why you’re, why you’re in existence. So with that in mind, Tyler, tell me a little bit about what excites you most about your organization?

Tyler Wentworth: 02:11                               

Right! I think there is, I mean, there are a few things, right? One is getting to come to work in a place where there’s excitement, there’s a real passion for what we do every day at my previous role, there was a sense of almost dreading coming to work. And, you know, that was I think creating a culture where people were able to really live out their dreams and you know, it’s a completely different situation. Come into an office where you know, where people want to come every day. When people are excited about helping people find jobs passion sides through when people really love what we do. And I think hiring people that have that same mentality was huge it’s huge, what we look for in people when we hired them is, you know, do they love this industry?

Tyler Wentworth: 03:13                               

Do they want to be a part of it for the rest of their lives? Brand on that may know always come true. But you know, I think the second thing is our passion for the community. Here we have a Rhode Island’s not a very large state. People know each other and we are able to partner with the organizations that need our help in a lot of ways. And I think that’s something that we really take pride in as well.

Brad Wolff: 03:41            

Awesome! So Tyler, what are the things that you feel make your firm stand out as different from other staffing and recruiting firms?

Tyler Wentworth: 03:52                               

So there are, you know, I think there are a few things we can do differently, you know, I think clients want the same thing from all recruiting firms and that’s one of the most important things is identifying the best talent for your client. But I think there are ways to make that process better for candidates and for the clients, you know, one being really our process from start to finish the client discovering spending time with your clients on their culture, the compensation for the role, the interview process, you know, leading into the recruitment strategy, being transparent with the client on where we’re sourcing these candidates, how we’re screening these candidates and how we’re qualifying them, you know, providing them even, I think one of the things that we do differently is spending time to almost go through, you know, a mock interview or call with our clients on how they would describe the culture there.

Tyler Wentworth: 04:58                               

There are their key selling points. You know, when we take on new clients, we want the recruiters to know how they can be there. We want them to be excited about working with this client and you know, have that come through when they’re talking to candidates that if recruiters are passionate about the company that we’re working with or, and excited about this opportunity, you know like the candidate is going to be really excited about going on this interview, learning about the client, you know, that it comes to being able to submit those candidates. And really I think to be thorough in our interview process, getting those motivators out of the candidate before we send them over and making sure that we’re prescreening for salary and telling them what we’ve figured out the value of this candidate will provide when we submit them.

Tyler Wentworth: 05:48                               

Negotiation is kind of the next step, you know, prepping both sides for not wasting their time. Making sure that the salary is where it needs to be on both ends. The feedback, you know, checking in on day one, checking in throughout the process on both sides and then really kind of just in the feedback, the evaluation at the edge strategy sessions being able to feedback, give feedback to our clients on the onboarding process. You know, it’s one thing to place a good candidate there, but to keep them with a client. Is this something that, you know, a lot of recruiting firms maybe not, don’t pay as much attention to.

Brad Wolff: 06:29            

That’s a really good point! So in this day and age, it’s a candidate-driven market. There’s a shortage of really good candidates. What are some of the reasons that candidates would want to work with the higher as opposed to just any other recruiter in the area?

Tyler Wentworth: 06:47                               

I think that you know, our careers will come across as people that truly care about the candidates career, you know, we don’t want to stuff somebody who, a position where they’re not going to be successful or they’re not going to be happy, you know, one of our biggest clients has come from the candidate side. Her company closed. She came to us for help. And even though we weren’t the firm that placed her in her new role, she was so impressed with our process that now we’re the sole provider for recruiting and staffing as they opened up a new facility here in Violin. And if we weren’t, so, you know, which we like to treat people as people our candidates are not just a commodity that we use to help our business grow. I mean, we look at them as actual people and you know, try to guide them in the best way we can in terms of their career.

Brad Wolff: 07:53            

Yeah! And having used a recruiter years ago when I got a job, I know that feeling that I was just a commodity. So that’s very welcome as a candidate when choosing what recruiters to work with and not work with.

Tyler Wentworth: 08:05                               

Yeah! I think you feel it as a candidate, especially if you’re unemployed, to not get a call back after you go take the time out of your day to meet with a recruiter. It’s demoralizing, you’re already feeling somewhat insecure about your own abilities to find a job and then to go ask for help. And if a group feels like they can’t place you may never hear from them again. And, or if you go on an interview and you don’t get, you may not get feedback from them, they may go dark on you. And that was one thing that we really wanted it to try to not have with us. You know, no matter what, if you give us the time, we’re going to make sure we provide your feedback and hope you have a positive experience working with us.

Brad Wolff: 08:50            

Absolutely! That is a big difference-maker and your ability to track the best candidates is a hugely important factor for your clients as well. So is there anything you do to help your clients increase the odds that they’re going to make the right hire when working with you?

Tyler Wentworth: 09:06                               

Yeah! We do use a little bit of a system and technology. We’ve partnered with an assessment tool that we feel very strongly provides not only a cognitive assessment but strength-based assessment tool in terms of, you know, every company is different and every manager can be different and these tools take, provide some science in terms of that in the hiring process rather than, you know, going off just gut instinct and may be outdated interview questions that have been in the, you know, the managers file cabinet for the last 20 years. This gives us a way to, you know, to measure and predict a little bit at least of the success that came, was going to have to work for that manager it fitting in with that company culture.

Brad Wolff: 10:03            

And I know that’s a big deal and I’m very few recruiters are willing to use an objective science-based tool like that because they don’t want to kill their deals, but you’re looking long-term for what’s going to provide the best results for your clients and candidates. Then this can be really a huge resource to help everyone involved.

Tyler Wentworth: 10:23                               

You’re right! And it is tough when the Canada that you hope is going to get the job doesn’t align up from a strength based assessment. But again, it’s not the, you know, the overall MBA, the finishing decision on this. But it is a way to help guide the process and you know, if, and it’s almost a way to figure out some to get ahead of some problems you may have with a candidate. You may this, even if the candidate doesn’t have the strengths, you may say, okay, there’s this person from you know, from a resume standpoint, skill standpoint is so good we can’t pass upon them. But you know, here where some issues may occur after we hire them, let’s get ahead of this and let’s start talking about this so we can avoid those issues.

Brad Wolff: 11:15            

Yeah! that is a huge consulted plus for a company’s looking to hire that they’re going in with more relevant information so that definitely shows a commitment to the right fit rather than just getting a fee. So is there anything about your staff that you feel gives you an edge at “The Hire”.

Tyler Wentworth: 11:37                               

Yeah! I think our team is our most important asset. We have clients that work with us because they trust us. They trust our level of expertise. They know we’ve been doing this for a while. I think one of the hardest parts at a large staffing firm is the turnover that you go through. You build up a team, you build up trust in your clients and somebody leaves it can be devastating to the culture and the team and the client. So what we do here is, you know, I would say we limit our turnover and we have people that are, our least experienced person has been in the industry for three years. So we range from 3 years to 12 years and we have specific backgrounds. Somebody who’s got an accounting and finance degree, who’s lived the life of most of those candidates before they came to work in recruiting and that can be a big differentiator in terms of talking to candidates. Knowing why, you know, knowing what they’re going through when they’re looking at making career moves especially speaking to clients, knowing what they’re looking for in a candidate having lived that life, it’s a different, the different conversation they can have with the hiring manager, then you know, somebody right out of school or who hasn’t been in the canvas shoes before

Brad Wolff: 13:08            

That is a big point because the competency of your recruiters directly impacts the success rate with your clients and the experience that the candidates have when they’re working with you.

Tyler Wentworth: 13:20                               

Yeah! I think asking those right questions for recruiters, you know, instead of just calling up and listening to them list a job description or taking a job order, you know, there’s a different way to do it. And if you have the right recruiter, it’s a game-changer for the client and for the candidate. You know, they can’t.

Brad Wolff: 13:40            

Absolutely!

Tyler Wentworth: 13:41                               

You know, wants to know that, you know, know what you’re talking about when it comes to the job order and the same thing that the client wants to know when you’re submitting a candidate, you’ve vetted them on the ability to do those tasks they’ve done, they’ve talked to you about.

Brad Wolff: 13:54            

Absolutely. That’s what they’re counting on you for the clients. So Tyler, what’s the greatest success story you’ve been a part of at “The Hire”.

Tyler Wentworth: 14:06                               

I think, you know, there’s been a lot for me personally, it’s the ability that we’ve, we’ve had to partner with some of the nonprofits and charities in our community you know, we’ve got 10 organizations on our web page that we’ve either been able to donate to or specifically sponsor one of their events to give back our time and veterans of the organization operation stand down or Island is something we do on a quarterly basis where we spend, you know, an hour with veterans who are looking to get back into the workforce, teaching them to resume writing skills, interviewing skills you know, we’ve donated our time with the Ronald McDonald House and you know, just being able to, this is a lucrative industry that we’re in. And you know, sometimes the client looks at us and as man, I just paid you a huge fee for flipping you a resume.

Tyler Wentworth: 15:08                               

And they don’t see the amount of work that goes into what we do behind the scenes. And you know, especially on the contingent searches, they don’t realize how many times, how many hours we spend to lose out to an internal candidate or to another firm. And so, you know, I think just being able to show them how appreciative we are with our clients and you know, we asked them, “Hey, you know, what’s a nonprofit charity that you are passionate about? How can we partner together?” And you know, so when we do pay us these fees that you feel good about the value you got from us and what we’re doing was with the money.

Brad Wolff: 15:49            

Absolutely! Now I’m a big believer that quotes, failures, and obstacles that we’ve overcome are pivotal to our success and development as human beings do you have any particular failure or obstacle you’ve overcome that’s been helpful for your success and what you contribute?

Tyler Wentworth: 16:07                               

I’ve got many failures, Brad. But there’s, you know, one I tried to do this before I started “The Hire” with somebody else, a former client of mine, and it was a learning experience. You know, I think there’s a couple of different ways to, there are many different ways to run a recruiting firm and the culture has to be aligned with the people who are trying to create it and, yeah, it didn’t work out for many reasons, but I think, you know, what I learned from that failure was, all right, I know we can still do this, but we have to do it in a different way to make sure the message we’re putting out there is correct. I mean, you only get one opportunity with clients in this industry a lot of the times they look at you for, to come through for him and when you don’t, it can be, you could be 2 years, 3 years before you get that opportunity to work with that client again.

Tyler Wentworth: 17:16                               

So, yeah. I tried to do this initially in a different way with somebody else. And a lot of, I would say it was tough learning what not to do, you know, how to cutting corners almost to make initial money because you’re just getting started was something that ended up costing, you know, myself and my reputation in the, in the long-term. So, you know, at this time it was really about doing things the right way, building us a steady base in the platform before you tried to go out and really start getting deals in place.

Brad Wolff: 18:02            

Absolutely! And you know what, that’s what builds trust and just the ability to admit and learn from it makes you more, actually more beneficial than if you never did that to begin with, I believe. So. Thank you so much for sharing that.

Tyler Wentworth: 18:15                               

Yeah!

Brad Wolff: 18:15            

So as we’re wrapping this up, Tyler, is there anything that you’d like to add that we haven’t discussed?

Tyler Wentworth: 18:24                               

I think that you know, from our previous call there talking to other people in this industry, there are really good recruiters firms out there and I would just urge you know, clients to really do your due diligence on the firms you work with what they’re doing out there, their vetting process. And I just think there are ways for us as an industry to be better at this. And I would implore everybody to really look at themselves, be passionate about this career, take this as, you know, not only your job but to always get better, to keep learning about different ways in this industry to improve. You know, technology keeps coming and keeps getting better. We’ve got to advance. But I think there always is going to be a need for, you know, recruiting firms. If you use ZipRecruiter if you use you, all these other technology platforms, you still can’t have a human conversation with somebody else and that’s always going to be needed, I think, in this industry. So hopefully they’ll always be a place for us recruiting firms out there.

Brad Wolff: 19:42            

Absolutely! That’s a very good point, Tyler. So what is your website for “The Hire”.

Tyler Wentworth: 19:50                               

It’s just www dot The Hire dot com

Brad Wolff: 19:54            

Okay, Terrific! Tyler, thank you so much for taking the time and sharing things that are really important and valuable about your organization.

Tyler Wentworth: 20:04                               

Brad is my pleasure, I love talking staffing!

Brad Wolff: 20:07            

Absolutely! I could tell that you’re obviously very passionate about it. Thanks so much!