don't know what to do in this market? neither do we.

full transcript

auto-generated from the audio, so expect a few typos. the audio is the source of truth.

What's going on podcast listeners? Really excited to bring another episode to you all. I hope you are enjoying these episodes to get you through your quarantine time at home. And also I really hope that you can use these specific episodes as a tool for you to navigate the job search right now if you are really on the job search. So I really ask right now if you can take a few moments either after before you listen to rate and review my podcast. This will allow it to be more discoverable to others and so others can use it as a tool during this time. I really have need for obviously many individuals across the country.

So please go ahead and take a listen. I hope you enjoy this with my dear friends, Jake and Dan. We break down the economy, the job search, how to differentiate yourself, So I've had to work with recruiters. We kind of cover a lot here. It's more of a general type of podcast. I hope you all enjoy. As always, if you need anything, feel free to shoot me an email, Taylor at VACO.com. And if you need to follow me on social media, which I really think you need to, my social media handle on Instagram, Twitter, is at Tdssntdesistyn. Definitely follow me on LinkedIn. I'm putting out a ton more videos.

I'm putting out a ton more video content and uploaded it to my YouTube. So check out my YouTube channel and hope you'll enjoy this podcast. For tuning into this new episode of Guidance Counselor 2.0, really excited to have my best friends for life, BFFLs. I don't know if people are still saying that, but I would say, yeah. I would still say these two guys are absolutely that for me. And so we are going to tackle another topic on this podcast. You know, we've been having conversations around really the time we're in right now and how we can best kind of communicate to everybody listening to this podcast on how to navigate the job search.

And so we were kind of chatting offline just now. And we started talking about really how to work with us and Jake brought up a really good point of, hey, listen, like, I don't even know what that looks like, right? So this specific episode is going to be around. First off, what do we do as recruiters from a day to day and sales people day to day just to shed some light. And so everyone listening and job seekers know kind of what we do on a day to day basis. And then we can kind of break down really how to work with us. Does that sound good guys?

All righty. Exciting. So first off, Jake, you were saying offline and I thought it was really good is really how do we kind of navigate? So I brought up, hey, we need to show people how to navigate recruiters. and obviously you said something very profound. So repeat that for everybody again, and then we can start chopping away on that. Yeah, I mean, right before the kickoff here, it was just a little bit of honesty, or a lot of honesty as we're still trying to figure out how to navigate this kind of new world, new economy right now as well. So as far as best practices with working with us, we have lots of experience in the way things have been.

And as we are moving forward these last few weeks, trying to figure out what this looks like for us and for everyone, you know, it's more of a, let's all be in this together and figure out what that looks like, you know? Cause we're all trying to scramble and see what's best for our families, for our companies, for our personal growth, for career growth, you know? And I think it just comes, we just have to be honest. Absolutely, right. And when you don't know, raise your hand. You know? Seriously, Dan, do you have any thoughts on that? Yeah, no, Jake, you make a good point.

You know, there is a lot that we don't know. And there's a lot that we're trying to figure out alongside. It would say number one is patience, right? I think that there's a lot of companies right now that at one point we're hiring that are maybe slow to respond or going to be slow to move on a roll. On the flip side, there's going to be companies that are desperate. And so, you know, understand that there's going to be definitely some need of maybe leveling expectations on both sides. I think recruiters are really trying to figure out how to navigate a world that just kind of suddenly came to an abrupt halt.

But it didn't have an abrupt halt for everybody. So bear with us a little bit there. There's definitely still companies that are hiring. Number two is I would just say follow up. Sometimes when you're searching and when you're looking for a job, you might stumble across a job posting. And we talked about it either last episode or the episode before, working with a couple of different recruiters. out to them and say, hey, I've noticed this position at XYZ Company. Is that a company that you do work with or can you tell me anything about them? And then three is be open for advice and be open for kind of advisory council on your resume, interview tips and everything else because while it might be slow now, there's no reason for us to believe that it won't just you know, pick up pretty quickly afterwards.

And there's going to be a desperate need for candidates and for people to hop on projects or into full time roles. So you want to make sure that you're ready and not, you know, once we get through this COVID-19 crisis and then be like, oh man, I wish I would have spent time on my resume, spent time prepping for interview, making sure that my dry cleaning's gone and all of that. But use this time, use that time wisely, right? And then, you know, the last thing I would say is, is just try to maintain some positive outlook on everything. Man, well, we can go ahead and wrap it up because I think Dan just, I think Dan just crushed that.

Yeah, I think for me, so I saw a post on LinkedIn last night. I'm going to come at it from a social media perspective. I think now more than ever, you need to tinker around and become proficient in LinkedIn. And to expound that a little bit more, I mean, there's, there's many different facets of LinkedIn, right? Most people think of LinkedIn. It's a bunch of, I mean, it's this platform that like you just like throw up a picture and you say, you know, you know, where you're at from a job perspective and then you don't touch it. I think right now, for me specifically, for my two senses, like you need to treat LinkedIn like it's an Instagram or Facebook, but instead of putting out bathroom selfies or, you know, how clean your house looks like I did yesterday, like you need to be putting out thoughtful content on problems you're trying to solve right now at your current job.

Or if you got laid off, be active on LinkedIn, right? Liking people's comments or posts, re-sharing people's posts, getting into people's DMs. I think LinkedIn right now is going to, I think as a platform solidify itself as kind of the next level of social media quote unquote for the next two or three years because of this time because right now the only way to network is through LinkedIn. And so my big thing for the individuals listening, it's, hey, I think what Dan said, you have to check in with recruiters. Like right now, to put it in perspective, typical recruiters have to meet anywhere in our company from 10 to 15 new people a week, not to mention maintain existing relationships.

So people like Jake, Dan and I, we probably have close to 3,000 to 4,000 people that we have met over the past five, six, seven years, right? That is a lot of people. And the only way that we can really keep you top of mind is if you check in with us. Now, is one text too much? I mean, is one text per day too much? I'd say to start, no, but after two or three weeks of not being sent something, maybe back that off. But I definitely think follow up is another huge point and a huge part of this job search right now Yeah, that's it.

I like what you're saying about that that LinkedIn users specifically, you know Especially around that point around networking that is the place I mean you have to treat it like this is the networking event that I would normally go to this is the happy hour Right and it just happens to be all all around the world on a digital platform that that everything I say, even if I'm slightly tipsy, will be tracked like it's written out. So just understand that you are representing yourself and hopefully you're meeting some people that you can help and that can help you kind of solidify your next step. Find your footage.

Absolutely. And I would also say this, there's a lot of companies and people out there that are putting on virtual happy hours, virtual coffee meetings, virtual meetings just in general. you know, in lieu of going to meetups or some of these networking events, you know, use this opportunity to attend some of those. Use this opportunity to, sorry, there's dogs barking. Use this opportunity to, you know, to upgrade yourself and level yourself up, right? So whether it's learning, like I said, last episode, a new skill, whether it's meeting people or going to that networking event that you may not otherwise go to, but it's now virtual and you can sit at your computer and enjoy a glass of wine.

Instead, do that. Don't let this stop you from doing the things that A, you would normally do or use this as an opportunity to do things that you wouldn't normally do. Yeah, I agree. And I mean, and I think another thing too, I think Dan, you said it is patience. Again, saw a post last night where it was like, hey, I'm on the job search now. What's going on? I'm not seeing anything. It's frustrating. like listen, that the end of the day, things have slowed down tremendously right now. It is not a complete standstill, right? I mean, us three were talking offline right before this.

You know, Jake just closed some huge deals. You know, both Dan and I have closed quite a few deals over the last week. But I think as you're gonna see this thing kind of wear on, you know, that you're gonna see a slowdown. And so I think patience is a big thing. I think a lot of people can sense when you're pressing a lot. And so I would stay away from pressing and definitely becoming aggravated during the job search, right? Because I think a lot of times, I think a lot of times when you press too much, it can actually hurt you. So I didn't know if y'all had any thoughts on that.

No one likes a desperate lover. I never heard that, but okay. Because I mean, if you're coming into this, I think you give up automatically any sort of value or negotiation. If you come in straight out the gate with, I need this, I need this, I need this, I need this, right? And it's hard to interview you objectively. It's hard to find out who you would be if you kind of turn on this kind of yes man hat. Yeah, I could totally do that. Absolutely. skill set, right? And it just sets you and the company up for failure if they do choose you and you actually don't have any of that skill set, or it just makes it seem kind of salesy and pushy and ultimately would probably not lead to an offer towards you as well.

Now, everyone is probably being a lot more and hopefully being more empathetic than usual when it comes to even interview processes and things. And that might be another podcast So we do just having empathy through hiring. But you still have to be somewhat guarded in a, and yes. I'm interested, Jake, and maybe we can unpack this a little bit without going super long. But what I mean, when you say empathy during the recruiting process, right? I think everybody throws around the word EQ now. I think people throw around empathy. And I'm curious to hear your thoughts on what does that mean during the, I guess, during the interview process?

Yeah, so I mean, you're gonna encounter, especially if you're working with a recruiter, multiple players throughout your interview process. So if you're interviewing at multiple companies at the same time, which hopefully you are, hopefully you have that opportunity available to you right now, and you're working with a recruiter, and there's multiple hiring managers within each of those companies. Some people just naturally have that, man, I totally understand the situation that we're all in right now. I understand that you're scared of losing your house. I understand you're scared of losing retirement that you just dropped $200,000 out of your portfolio and I get it. You want this job, you need this job.

Hopefully hiring managers, the few that actually have those openings available, have more of of a humanistic empathetic hat on when they are interviewing people, especially those that are out of the job. You know, because it's a very real awakening to some people that maybe historically were like, man, I am the shit. I have the best skill set ever. I can pick any job I want and not even need this boss because I'm quitting. You know, you can't do that right now. That doesn't exist. You know, and frankly, some people still have made that choice and I talked to someone just on Friday, maybe they just hadn't paid attention to the rest of the world, but they just quit their job because they just, I'm just going to pick up the other one.

I don't really like this boss or this team. You know, they're SOL, you know, but what I mean by that is just hopefully just being humanistic from the hiring perspective so that you could have a little more graces. You're a hundred percent. Danny, I thought it's on that. Sorry. Can you guys hear me? Yeah. Sorry. No, Jake, I mean, you said it all. I don't want to belabor the point. I think what's the most important thing that we can do now is, again, understand that everybody's dealing with a situation that nobody's ever dealt with. I mean, even in the recession in 2008, 2009, that was a slow burn in most industries, and a lot of people started to get themselves prepared, and they kind of had some contingencies in place.

And right now, a lot of companies are still figuring out their contingencies are trying to figure out how to work remote. They're trying to figure out how to make sure that they have enough data and their VPNs are set up and that they have a policy that they can make sure that they monitor appropriately their employees to make sure that productivity hasn't gone down or they're dealing with layouts or they're dealing with furloughs or they're dealing with a lot on that side. On the other side candidates are worried about rent and they are worried about groceries and what to do in this dire situation. So I think for both sides, I understand, It can be desperate.

It can be trying. It can be difficult. But I think the number one thing that you can do is if you put your best foot forward and you represent yourself really well, companies are gonna understand that they're gonna be more empathetic and they're gonna probably be more likely to hire you if you do come from a position of understanding their situation as well. Because I always tell people that a client is just a candidate with a job. And we just never know when that might flip on them as well. So understanding that everybody's in kind of a unique circumstance, a unique position, understand that a lot of people are going through struggles, um, but that we are going to bounce, you know, out of this and that maybe the opportunity wasn't perfect today, but it might be perfect in a month from now or two months from now.

And, you know, those that show empathy and grace now are going to be the ones that get that first call back when, uh, when a company does, um, you know, maybe open back hiring. Yeah, I love that so much. Um, so I, and, and I don't know, you know, I'm interested. If there's one tip or trick that you could really impart on an individual looking right now, I mean, Dan, you did a good job of kind of running through that list. But I mean, is there something that, you know, people listen to this and it's like, you know, Dan, Jake and Taylor are saying all these things.

Like I get it. Like what's one practical thing that I can do after listening to this podcast to go help better position me from a job perspective. I'm interested if you guys have any more nuggets from that perspective. I've been here real quick. I would say the first thing that I would, it's a couple things. You want to make sure your resume is updated. Use this time to look back on your accomplishments in the last few months, last year, whatever it might be an update your resume. Number two is look at those industries, consumer goods, healthcare, look at some of those industries that maybe have been able to do well in this economy and see what they're doing.

There are a lot of companies out there that are hiring for a lot of different skill sets. Three, I would say be open to a potential change if a company is interested in making a change with your career and that's something that you can see yourself doing. The economy has shifted and has probably shifted forever in a unique way. Potentially be open to saying, hey, where else can my career go? Maybe you've spent a long time building one particular skill set that is easily transferable to something else. You just kind of have to think outside of the box. And I think that right now a lot of companies are trying to figure out how to think out of the box to make it through this situation.

And I think those are looking for a job or looking for a change to say, hey, what can I do that a company might be interested in my skill set as well? I love that. Jake, you got anything? No, I mean, that makes her to make Daniel. Oh, you know, for me, I think, and I'm saying all this through LinkedIn, just because I really feel like LinkedIn is just untapped, kind of potential for a lot of people. I would take what Dan said and post your resume on LinkedIn. And quite frankly, I would keep posting it every other day on LinkedIn. Another thing too, I rolled out a video earlier this year that I really think you could really leverage LinkedIn to hack your interview process.

And so the video I put out was essentially all initial interviews with hiring managers and companies are the same thing. Hey, tell me about yourself. Tell me some things you accomplished. Tell me some things that maybe a conflict resolution that you've had in your career. like record yourself doing that and put it out on LinkedIn. Like for me, I think right now and again, so kind of halt that thought for a second is that people probably listen to this podcast like, wait a minute, Taylor, you're saying that I need to like leverage recruiters, but I also need to do stuff on my own. And I would say right now is the time where you have to do it all.

And you really have to do it on your end and also on the recruiters And so, you know, posting stuff on LinkedIn, like a quick video of yourself describing yourself and kind of what you've done, I think, could be huge. And I think could have absolutely, you know, you have all these right now, people are at home on their computers. And so they're going to have more time to scroll the interwebs. They're going to have more time to go on LinkedIn than they ever had before. Like engagement, at least for me, is at all time high with LinkedIn because people are at home right now.

So use that to your advantage and put out content or slash videos or live document your job search, maybe a fail-blotch interview you just had. So other CIO CTOs and directors and managers can see this real time. Those are kind of my, those are my, I guess, practical things to do. I mean, my dad is close to 60 years old and he's even on LinkedIn now, talking about having to let go of some of his employees or, you know, having to have these tough conversations. And if my dad can't get on it, then like, anybody can't get on it. Absolutely. And there's other ways too.

There's, you know, there's Twitter, there's other websites like Fiverr, where you might have a skill set and, you know, that's something where you can hone, you know, a particular scale or theirs. Yeah, I haven't heard of that. Yeah, it's a place where you can go online and people can spend, you know, five, ten, $120 whatever dollars it is, you know, and they can ask you to do all sorts of things whether it's data entry graphic design Website creation whatever and it can go up from there. I think the the initial bids started like $5 But like there's places you can go and it's not just to make additional money But a place to go and hone a particular skill set.

Maybe you find yourself as a you know as a marketing person It's always wanted to get into graphic design, but it's never had the chance to really build their portfolio. This is an opportunity to do that. There's tons of places online to be able to put your skill set out there that are unique and different. And I think people are going to look back and say, hey, I got furloughed for three months or I unfortunately got laid off for three months. But this is what I did. And I think companies are going to really look back when they're on that decision line of, so I hire candidate A, B or C, and they look to candidate A, you know, that really use that time to build their skill set or bring something to the table.

table. I attended this webinar or this live event online, right? Or I did this on five or I did this on LinkedIn and be like, wow, that person really utilized their time wisely. That's the type of go getter we want for our company. Yeah, frankly, that's a great point. There's a lot of companies that you could benefit them and yourself simply by just offering your services, even if it's for free or at a highly discounted rate. And you have to think of it in a few ways. If you come across a local nonprofit that they got all of their funding from a bake sales that they used to do, well, you can't really do that now, right?

Because you can't do a silent auction unless you have a digital platform to do it or things like that. Maybe you could be that person that just happens to want to round out their web site build skill set. And you find them and you say, you know, I'm going to build you all a site and build a portal for donations and let people know about what you do. And instead of charging five grand, you charge a grand or 500 bucks. But now you've rounded out your skillset and you've helped someone who really needs it. You know, it just kind of this, again, with this empathy forward kind of thinking and community mindedness, you know, you can really build out your own portfolio and help others stay successful.

And I love that and it makes me think back on that. So have a few things. One. So I tweeted It was something out a few months ago that went viral for me. But I mean, but it didn't. I know it kind of ruffles some people's feathers about taking on free work. Right now is the time, especially if you don't have a job that I'd be offering your services for free. I tell every code school kid, every recent grad to just go volunteer services at the company you want to work at. 100%. So that way you have the experience that you can get hired at the company you want to work at.

If you don't have a job anyway, it's so hard to question this market because if I could tell you, hey, you're going to not make money for three months, but I'm guaranteeing a job for you. If you just do this for three months, I'm sure most people will take it in this time. Obviously, for those who do not have a job right right now. Well, if you think about you have two paths, especially if we're talking software or cloud architecture specifically, you have two paths to bettering your skillset that traditionally, sorry, three, you have your existing job where you take on other projects and try to touch other projects that are outside of your team.

You have going back to school or certifications, or you have freelance work or side hustle work or side projects. Now, you have to pay to do certifications and education and you don't actually get hands-on experience, right? The likelihood that a lot of members of your existing team will let you touch other technologies is pretty low. But if you're going to give away something instead of paying to go back to school, you might as well just partner with someone and build out your experience real life and real-life time and help that company in the same thing. Not to mention if you start an LLC or an S corp, you could probably write off your hourly rate and multiply it out by the amount of hours that you work into.

Because you just tell them. I think that's huge. So, but, and it shows that you can actually do the work. And it'll lead you to a better job later anyway. I would be saying that, actually I have said that prior. And now is even a more important time to do that. So yeah, I mean, I think take on free work and continue to network and be kind. And man, I just think that's such a good point from the free work perspective. I think more people should do it. And so thanks for bringing that up, Jake. So to finish this episode out right now, I'm curious for any parting wisdom, especially with Jake and Dan, Tell the tell listeners real quick with really put it in perspective of your day right now and how how a job seeker can best approach you, right?

So like I'm not looking for tips or anything like that. I'm just saying, hey, let's talk to me about your day. What does it look like and how can people reach you best because I think all of our answers are going to be a tad bit different. So, Jay, go ahead and kick it off. For me from a cold out reach perspective, I'm probably going to kick you right back out into the into the cold in the in the sense of, hey, we got a you got to help yourself a little bit first before I can help you. You know, and so we'll talk about what are you doing to network?

Have you reached back out to premium? You know, I'm here to help you get you a job, right? So that doesn't have to be through me. It just has to be make sure that you're staying staying employed, you know, and that's that's I think how at our local vehicle office, we treat everybody in the sense is that it's our almost civic duty now to make sure that people have those jobs, right? And so I'm going to kick you back out and start asking some of those tough questions. Have you reached out to previous employers? Have you reached out to previous coworkers? Have you brushed up your resume?

Is your LinkedIn up to date? Do you have work up? Do you have references? Do you have letters or recommendation? What technology skills do you think you're missing that you've heard feedback on in previous teams or in interviews, you didn't have enough cloud experience or I really hope that they had done some more open source projects or whatever that you can help round out. Are you doing all the things that you can do to make you just that much more irresistible to a potential client or a potential job in your case? No, I love that. I love that. You just brought up some really, really, really good stuff there.

I'm Dan, what about you? Yeah, I mean, everything that Jake said is true. I want to make sure your resume is updated. I want to make sure that you are out there trying to figure out how you can best benefit yourself. You know, at the end of the day, like I want to try to help as many people as I can in a variety of different ways. And sometimes that's going to be, hey, I'm going to give you feedback on your resume. And then I want you to come back to me or I'm going to give you feedback on interviewing or I'm going to give you feedback.

And that's me helping you, right? unfortunately I can't get everybody a job, you know, especially right now, you know, my goal is to make sure that every single person that I interact with, I can give some sort of positive feedback to or something to help them in their job search. But, you know, Jake, a lot of what Jake said, I echo, you know, this is going to be a time where everybody needs to be resourceful. And I have, you know, a large number of clients that I work with, and a lot of them aren't hiring, you know, certainly, you know, a number of them are right now.

But this is going to be a time where if you see something or if you hear something reach out, let me try to help you in that way. But I think right now the number one thing is patience, it's understanding, it's being reasonable. And number four is follow up, right? You know, if we're going to talk and we're going to engage, check back in with me. You know, that doesn't mean that you have to text me every day. But it does mean, you know, Taylor, you said it. Let's check in once a week. What have you found? What have you, you know, what are you seeing out there?

Because I promise you if I see something, I'll think of you, right? Especially in this economy, right? Because clients are coming to Oz, a desperate for a particular need, and I want to be able to remember to reach out to you. Or I'll remember to reach out to you. But you might see something and say, Hey, Dan, this is what I'm saying out there. What do you know? Yeah, I love that. I love that. Yeah. And then for me, you know, I really like to kind of drive everything through like text and email my LinkedIn inbox. You know, as I'm pretty terrible at responding back to DMs on LinkedIn.

So if you can shoot me a text or, you know, even if I've never met you just continue, please shoot me a text, shoot me an email. You know, I'm starting to, for those of you who want to check it out, I'm starting to put more videos up on LinkedIn because it's kind of my way to give back, right? I mean, having kind of the same conversations day in day out right now as I know Jake and Dan are as well. And so I'm trying to put out content from a video perspective where you can just log on, watch it and kind of one to three minute segments.

That's incredibly easy to take in. But yeah, I mean, I think check-in's incredibly important. And please know that recruiters, if you have a good relationship with them, I can't speak to everyone. But if you have a good relationship with a recruiter and you know they're good and you haven't heard from them. That's just because they're scrambling right now, trying to take care of a ton of people at one time. So have some grace, have some empathy, you know, on people like me, Jake and Dan, because you know, we are kind of going a thousand miles a minute right now. And then if you and then, you know, we're not going to be the people to check in with you just to say we don't have anything, you will hear something once we have something.

And so I just want to go ahead and put that out into the universe because I think that's the biggest frustration with recruiters. It's like, Oh, they're not checking in with me. What's going on? What did I do? It's nothing that you did. It's just the fact that we're trying to take care of so many people at one time. Yeah. And I don't I want to echo that. And I don't want you, you know, if you're a candidate looking for a job, don't feel sorry for us for being busy or working, right? Like that's that's not what Taylor saying is, as much as we want you to check in with us, right?

We we're running a million miles a minute because it's a really weird economy where you're chasing down things that we've never had to chase down before. We're trying to tie up blue sends on things that we've never had a tie up blue sends on, right? Or we're trying to figure out how we can best help those that have helped us in the past as well. So we are going to be in a position where there's a lot of people reaching out to us. There's a lot of people that are going to be you know, kind of, I don't want to say desperate, but are you know, in a time of need, it's okay to reach out, right?

We want you to reach out, but we also want to be, We want we're here to augment your job search, not to be your job search. That's good. I like that. Cool guys. Well, thanks again for hanging out. I really appreciate both of you too. And maybe we can do this again soon. Okay. All right. Thanks y'all. Absolutely. Bye.