Dashboard: Would You Hire Them Again?

[Music] welcome to another 21 hats dashboard I'm Lauren Feldman and today my guest is Kurt Wilkin who has had a broad range of experiences as an entrepreneur and as an investor he's co-founder of higher better a recruiting business and also author of who's your mic which features chapters on the kinds of hiring and management challenges all entrepreneurs face welcome back to the podcast Kurt hey Lauren thanks so much for having me and uh man I've listened to many of your recent episodes I still continue to love what you're doing for the small business owner and the entrepreneur oh that's so nice of you to say I really appreciate uh you're saying that listen you you've been here before Kurt but remind us quickly uh what kind of recruiting does higher better do so we are a strategic Talent partner for entrepreneurial companies uh so think about as as entrepreneurs go from Scrappy startup to Next Level and professionalize your organization that's where we come in to help you uh really build a team to scale which is related to the the book you wrote uh who's your Mike uh tell us who Mike is again uh the quick version is Mike is one of about 12 archetypes in the book and Mike is uh your bookkeeper turned CFO he's been with you for you know five or eight years and now you're trying to grow and scale to the next level and Mike has outlived his not his use usefulness but he's over his title is over inflated for what he's able to do and so what do you do with Mike once you've reached that point where you need a true in this example Next Level CFO but you've got really a glorified bookkeeper in that CFO role so the first chapter is is what do you do with Mike and people like Mike it's a really good book and I think one of the points that becomes clear is that the the only way to avoid that kind of issue is to have a business that never grows otherwise at some point you're going to find that the things that got you where you are aren't going to get you where you want to go and you got to make some changes and sometimes those changes are really painful like with Mike that's exactly right in every entrepreneur either has had a mic will have a mic or currently has a mic you're not alone and uh you know just the question is how do you treat Mike and what do you do if you really want to grow you're exactly right if you don't want to grow you don't need to do anything with Mike now you also do some investing and if I'm not mistaken you might be looking to uh close on a company today is that correct well so with higher bet higher better I have also have a um a Angel Investing uh firm that we've done about 150 Investments the one we're closing today is actually for higher better we're in the process of acquiring a new company that will help us grow our um our capabilities in the in the recruiting world and this so this is right down to the line you expect it to close today it's it's right down to the wire in fact when we hopped on I was checking my text to make sure I didn't have to approve a bank wire to the sellers so this is real time man let's go well well listen if you get a call from your bank and you want to take it while we're doing this podcast feel free we'll all be happy to listen in and hear how it goes can can you tell us what kind of company it is you bet so so currently we help companies mostly with executive level hires and and you know the next level down this uh we've always we get a lot of requests from people who wanted us to help them with deeper uh into the organization non you know executive leadership roles and we're just not priced very well for that we're not set up for that it takes with our process it takes just as much time to help you with a you know mid-level manager as it does for a CEO so we're acquiring a company that's going to allow us to do what we're calling recruiting as a service so if you need 10 to 12 hires over the next year or six months we can uh augment or take over your entire recruiting department on a monthly pay solution and this company's going to give us a head head start on that we're we're super excited we're going to publicly announced it on Wednesday I know this podcast is coming Monday so I won't mention names but uh teaser alert uh look out for news from higher better next week wow that that's really interesting I I'm I'm guessing the last couple of years have been a good time to be in the recruiting business with the great resignation and everything am I right about that it has been it's also been a a time to really separate the the real players from the the people who want just want to get rich because uh it's it's just been a different unique environment so what are you thinking now as the economy turns a little bit um what impact do you think uh a recession might have on on your business you know that's a great question and I I do think that you're going to have continued separation of the wheat from the shaft so to speak and um I think that a recession is not good for recruiters as a whole however I will say this in your audience is a lot of small business owners and entrepreneurs there are a lot of companies who grow tremendously in a down Market if you run your uh your your company well and you're serving the needs of of folks in a in a way that's fair and Equitable I think uh you can continue to do great in a down economy and that's the exact Market that we serve so we think we're going to be okay if not grow um but you never know people are less willing to pay for some of our services in in a down Market as well sure so we're not I'm not naive that's for sure on Friday we just got a report that uh wages continue to rise pretty significantly in the third quarter uh which just highlights what an unusual time this has been um you know every we're all concerned about going into recession but the labor market remains very strong by by a lot of measures uh what do you make of that do you think that the labor shortage is is ending or do you see it going on for a while well I might get myself in a little bit of trouble talking about the recession uh that's you know pending in looming if you will I think some of that is uh unfortunately it's uh you know I don't want to say media driven but the more we talk about a recession more could happen everybody loves to blame the media well you're no longer the media Lauren so yes I am 21 hats media is my company look the the more we talk about it the more it could become a reality right so I'm not I know what you're yeah so and and we've still been dealing with folks a lot of your audience challenged to find employees over the last 6 or 12 months so that's why you're seeing a lot of the rate still increase I think if if you want to attract a players or strong B players to your organization you're going to continue to see those the the Labor uh costs increase if you're content with finding whoever is available um I think uh I don't think you have as big of a problem and I think the same by the same token if you're looking for a job many of your audience may be looking for a job you can find a job the question is you going to find a career are you going to find the right opportunity take your time you know the the thing I keep hearing from people is everybody has worked so hard to get fully staffed a lot of people haven't gotten fully staffed but to whatever extent they have it's been hard work to find the right people and retain them uh nobody wants to to lay those people off or or or think about you know having to go through something like that again I I think people are are are going to be slow to do that even if the economy does uh slow down even if business does slow down for for some of these folks is is is that what you hearing from your clients as well yeah so you're touching on a great topic do I hold on to people and hope that the business turns if I do feel some shrinking in the fourth quarter or do I do I I'll say knee-jerk that's probably not fair but do I start letting people go it's a balance for sure if you think that we're not going to your company's not going to turn anytime soon then do want to tighten the belt it the last thing you want to do is go into the fourth quarter and first quarter of 23 with a fat you know um staff and you can't recover that money uh but by the same token if you think you're going to turn uh I would encourage you to uh think long and hard here's what I think is an opportunity for most of your audience Lauren and that is now if you haven't done so already now is a perfect time to assess your existing team and make changes if you if for the under underperformers that's where I think the opportunity is keep keep your star players and pay for them with the savings you're going to have from people who are underperforming and if you think you you're not sure if you have an underperformer the answer is you probably have an underperformer but I've got some questions you can ask yourself if you think you uh if you're in doubt I I know a consultant who likes to start uh his sessions with business owners and entrepreneurs by asking the question think about your staff would you hire them all again if you had it to do over and I think that kind of leads in the same direction you're suggesting doesn't it that's exactly right that's one of the four questions I like to ask knowing today what you know about your organization and where you're going would you enthusiastically rehire Mike Lauren Kurt Bob whoever in their existing role all right uh a couple of hiring related issues I just love to run by you I've heard a lot of people talking about them lately it's come up on the podcast too um this week a new law takes effect in New York City almost all companies there will have to include a salary range in all of their job listings uh this is happening in other parts of the country as well is this a good thing for businesses or a bad thing to have to include a salary range what do you think you know I think you're already in a candidate driven market so I don't think it's going to hurt you and I don't know exactly what the rule is Lauren you may know better than I do how wide the range can be but if you can you know it's really weird I think they say you have to make a good faith attempt to to give a realistic approach and that's yeah obviously that's going to be hard to Define so I think you put your finger on an important issue yeah I I think here's what where I would encourage your listeners to to to move in in in this direction there's a lot of talk about about compensation being part of the big resignation and I'm sure it and I know it is some but the bigger thing that most candidates are looking for in today's day and age is a mission a vision something they can believe in your core values who you where you're going as an organization that is just as if not more important than than many uh many of than dollars and I know your your audience may say Ah that's not true I can't believe it I'm not talking about the difference between you know $20 an hour and $10 an hour I'm talking about a much narrower difference but if if you've got if you're in line compensation wise and you have something that candidates can believe in now you've got the ability to make a a great company that nobody wants to leave that makes sense uh here's another one do you uh do you use zip recruiter indeed what do you think of those platforms are are they effective for you or do you find another way well we're recruiting firms so we're slightly different so let me give you two answers one for us we do use some platform uh like the job boards to post certain things typically we're getting or we're using it for um for Market data we're trying to find out what else is out there who else is looking most of our candidates are through other means so people who aren't looking for a job however I know for a lot of your folks who are hiring Frontline workers it's a those are great sources the challenge that I have for for most entrepreneurs is you're going to get a lot of volume through some of those shops the question is are you able to be discreet and selective that's the the biggest challenge for most entrepreneurs me for example I'm a very glass half full person and so I'm going to like almost everybody who comes in entrepreneurs are like that yep and and even if I don't like you person you know per se I'm gonna I might take you as a challenge how can I help this stray cat you know become a great line that's dangerous exactly and so that's why I don't hire anymore my team does all um but so that's the thing if you use something like that and you're getting a thousand applicants you need to be able to have a system for going through them and really being selective in finding the top two or three you want to make an offer to all right so you referred to compensation uh CNBC recently had a story about how business owners compensate themselves and they reported that more than a quarter of them don't actually pay themselves and um the story just made abundantly clear that owners really struggle figuring out how to compens how to compensate themselves even if they are paying themselves it's it's hard for them to deal with do you have any advice on that or how someone should think about setting their own salary well so there's a couple of ways I could read your question so I'm going to give you a couple of answers if that's okay please the first one is my business doesn't make very much money so I'm going to make sure I pay my employees and and I'm not going to take a salary and I'm going to hope that at some point I'm going to either be able to turn it around or I can sell it and that's where I'll make my money um that is dangerous because if you aren't able to turn it or you're not able to sell it you just have a really shitty job yep and I mean let's be honest about it right are you able to truly run a profitable business you're not you don't want to do this just for charity surely there's other um reasons you're doing this not just for money but money's got to be part of it so that's one part of the answer is speaking for myself here there are people who are in a situation sometimes where they're hoping the business is going to grow and they're going to get to the point where they can pay themselves appropriately but they feel like they need to do what they need to do to get to that point does that make sense that that's exactly right and and um I think if you've got a if you've been at it for a long time and you're still not making money there's might be some flaws in your business model and and and I know speaking you know openly I know you've taken a look at that and I've taken a look at that from my from myself and you know making the changes to to make it happen so you can't just keep going status quo and and hope it turns there might be some changes that have to take place but be honest with yourself if you're going to be sitting down here three years from now and you're still not making money you that's three valuable years right so let me enter there's another maybe hidden part of the question that CNBC asks and and this is just based on my quick analysis of the question the other thing I think about when I think of small business owners who have trouble paying themselves or how to pay themselves is sometimes we feel guilty paying ourselves a lot if our team makes $20 an hour for example and that's part of capitalism is that the business owner takes the risks the risks should bear out to be to make more money than you would have if you had taken this as a job so I challenge your your small business owners and your entrepreneurs that you work with to not get caught up in comparing themselves with their team because there's a lot of risk you're putting their homes your future your all your compensation at risk the reward should be you make pretty pretty good money at the end of the day does that make sense that does make sense that makes sense uh all right so tell me this you're you're in Austin I know you um you have a broad network of people that you're in touch with you're talking to business owners and entrepreneurs all the time what what's the vibe like in Austin right now well we we feel and this is just an honest answer we feel somewhat insulated in Texas and in Austin because we have such a diverse economy and we've uh we're just different than the rest of the country and usually that's a good thing obviously if we're so tied into oil and gas or something like that it's a bad thing but our economy is so diverse at this point that we feel like we can weather a lot of Storms and in Austin there's a lot of people moving here from the from the coast and their companies are moving from the coast so we're a little insulated so that's a that's a tough question to answer with any real value for the rest of your audience tough because it's just such a a broad range of experiences is that what you mean well tough because because if if I'm in Detroit for example I might feel differently about the future of the economy because I might be so tied in with the Auto industry for example sure and so I'm going to have a much different answer for you if I'm in Detroit than I am in Austin but that's that's why I asked you I wanted to hear even if it makes us jealous I'd like to hear what things are are looking like in Austin yeah so we pressure from the the macroeconomic environment which is the world you know globally in us as a whole and uh and we feel somewhat protected so we don't believe we're going to get hit as hard as some of the other economies might so not that we feel good we I just say we feel better gotcha we're still concerned but not as concerned as I would be in Detroit for example all right kurk we're just about done here have you heard from your bank so uh for those of you uh listening I'm going to get a call from my bank any minute to press send on the wire to acquire this company and I have not heard that yet but I did miss a text string from my partner and our lawyer saying hop on a call at 2:15 so 10 minutes late well I'm going to let you go uh good luck with that Kurt um we we'll have to have another conversation at some point it's interesting that uh you're going to be able to expand your offerings at higher better and I'll be eager to hear how that plays out awesome well I appreciate it Lauren Kurt wilin is co-founder of higher better and author of who's your mic thanks so much for taking the time Kurt you got it Lauren keep up the great work thank you have a great week everyone [Music]