Reverse Recruiting

Welcome to Talent takeover.

Unfiltered.

When it comes to working hard and

keeping it real, we know our shit.

Self care, happiness, inner peace and time.

I'm Brianna Rooney, and this is Taylor Bradley.

Hey, y'all.

And we have thrived in chaos and

turned it into an art form.

So, Taylor, what are we doing here today?

We're here to give you a raw, under

the hood view of all things recruiting.

And finally, give credit where credit is

due to a long underrated industry that's

full of quote unquote experts.

All right, well, then, let's take

this show to the road.

Hello. Hello.

Welcome to talent. Takeover.

Unfiltered.

We have a very interesting one today.

I feel like they always are.

Taylor, how you doing? Good.

How are good. Good.

I'm excited for this because I think

this is probably what should happen.

But let's talk about reverse recruiting. Reverse.

Reverse.

And everybody's going, the fuck is that?

Even probably recruiters are asking what that is.

But I do love that there's starting to

be these names that they're coming up with.

And we'll talk about this in our episode, but I

think when you and I started talking about it, we're

like, wait, I think there was a name for that.

It used to be headhunter.

But essentially what reverse recruiting is is

when a candidate hires a recruiter to

do the job search for them.

And so what that entails is, like,

understanding different job profiles and how you

compare tailoring your resume to different job

descriptions, getting all your documents ready.

So that could be your transferable skills, doc.

That could be your resume.

That could be some companies require you to

submit things like portfolios or things with your

application, so getting all your documents together and

then submitting those applications for you.

And so how this came about is I guess

there is a discussion about it on TikTok where

recruiters are like and I thought this was interesting

because I'm like, wait, I don't know.

I'm a recruiter, and I don't think I'd

believe that or have that same perspective.

But a recruiter is like, you

should never pay another recruiter.

So speaking on behalf of recruiters, she's saying you shouldn't

pay a recruiter to help you find a job.

Recruiters jobs are to work on behalf of companies.

They don't get paid to represent candidates.

They get paid to fill jobs for companies.

So there's no reason that you should be

paying a recruiter to help you find a

job is basically like what she was saying.

And I was like, okay, I think this used to

be what a headhunter is back in the day when

you and I would have been just starting out.

But I know this is kind of a dying practice,

but I actually disagree because of yeah, I want to

hear I know you've got a lot to say. I disagree. Go.

No go. Okay.

I actually think that it should come back now.

There was definitely a time where it was like, yeah,

as a recruiter, do we want to get paid more,

or do we want to get paid from both sides?

Here's the thing.

Realtors get paid from both sides.

Why wouldn't they, right?

So that's just a thought process there.

But right now, where you're seeing the other

day, it was like some lower level engineering

role had, like, 1000 applicants in five days.

So it's like, whoa, you could be the best

person for this job for so many reasons.

But I will tell you, the chance of you

getting an interview is slim to none just because

of volume, because they can't handle the volume.

So unless they're using stuff like covey, like they

have this new bot that goes through inbound applications.

Pretty freaking cool, you should check it out.

Unless they have something like that, I

mean, for sure you're not getting seen.

And then additionally, think about a bot if they

didn't calculate the bot correctly and you didn't look

at the job description versus your resume and you're

not adding up at percentage wise, having the right

booleans and the right wordings and stuff like that,

you're also not getting seen.

So there's so many reasons why you're not

getting seen and why I always recommend that

you are networking to finding your job.

I mean, think about this.

Another stat is what, 5% to 15% at the

most applicants or jobs are filled by applicants?

It's mostly good. Sorry.

Go, no, I was just going to so

then that begs the question, is it actually

like a moot point to do reverse recruiting?

Because if half those applicants aren't going to even

be seen and you're paying a recruiter thousands of

dollars to do all this stuff that we outlined

for you, job profile, documents, but you're ultimately going

into that same talent pool.

Well, I was actually thinking that if

I'm reverse recruiting, I'm not just applying

them through everyone willy nilly.

I'm not only reaching out to my clients,

I'm reaching out to the other recruiters that

maybe have good clients for you.

So I'm thinking about kind of crowdsourcing this thing and

then I'm going to do the behind the scenes things.

So think about this.

What if let's just pretend you're a

recruiter at Google for whatever you're there.

And I'm like, hey, Taylor, I know you

have all these applicants to go through.

I know you have all these agencies that you

may or may not pay for this role.

I'm doing this for free.

I'm doing this on behalf of my person, my client.

And I want you to take a look at

this resume and look at her transferable skills.

Look how amazing this person is.

It's free. Yeah.

You're going to pick up the phone for that?

I think it's going above and beyond, and what you're

talking about is going above and beyond what we saw.

Like this thing on TikTok is basically just almost

like a resume service, but a job application service.

So they're not actively marketing you to people.

So they're spending, say, $2,000 to just help you

get your documents order, help you align your resume

to the job description and submitting the application.

I think what you're talking about

is taking it one step further.

You're like actively that truly

probably is reverse recruiting.

You are MPC most placeable candidate MPC

them out to companies to try to

bypass that talent pool, that applicant pool.

Whereas this service is just talking about

like, we're going to do applying.

We're going to help you apply.

That can be just draining. Blah, blah, blah.

It's a lot of work.

Boom, boom, boom, just applying.

And I was like, okay, I

think people devalue recruiters a lot.

So I was kind of triggered by that anyway,

because I'm like, it is a lot of work.

And I mean, to have to cater your resume

to different job descriptions, like, if you're willing to

outsource that and pay somebody to do it, it's

because it's work and it's hard.

And you're like, yeah, I don't really know what

I'm doing to be able to do that. Yeah, actually.

So even if we didn't go the extra mile

for this person, I still think it's insanely valuable.

Because, again, going back to where we're talking about

the bot, if your resume is not on par

to what the job description looks like, just to

pull, like, look, as recruiters, as the recruiter I

we're trained to look for certain things.

We've talked to the hiring manager.

We've gone through the job description.

We know what we're looking for, and we're going to

grab the top maybe 20 people from all the applicants.

But the person doing your resume will know that.

That's why I think it is invaluable.

So you should charge a good amount to

help someone do this every single time, because

no one thinks like a recruiter. Exactly. Recruiters.

Well, and now and I just thought of this

as we're talking now, a lot of these applications

because they know they can do it.

They now have questions that you have to answer,

like, why do you want to work here?

What intrigues you most about this company?

And those are like writing little mini essays. Yes.

And it's difficult and it's time consuming people.

Okay, this is great.

So, you know, like when we're training

people to do bizdev right, right.

And we're training them to do a message,

it's that message that takes them in eternity.

And it's crazy.

And so the way that we do that is I say, okay,

talk to me about how you're going to fill this role.

Talk to me about why I should use you.

And on the back, I'm typing this out, and

then we kind of come together and do it.

But man, people think too much.

So this is a great service,

and I think it should exist. Yeah.

And the other thing, I would think that something that

could poke a hole in all of this chat GPT.

So if you have these questions that you're answering and they're

basing because I do know companies, because I have worked for

some that we know when we post a job or back

in the day when we would post a job, that we're

going to get shit tons of qualified applicants.

Because there are just those jobs

that like a business development manager.

You're going to get tons of people

from all different walks of life, but

you're going to get tons of applicants.

And so there would have to be

something that would set an application apart.

And it would be usually

like these preliminary questions.

So not the are you 18 years or older? Are you legally?

Like, not those, but the questions that is like,

did you do your homework on our company?

Why do you want to work here?

What intrigues you the most about this position?

Tell us where you could add value here

or like, what value you would add.

Just things like that.

That I'm like, okay, well, now those things used

to be really critical because it was like, from

the candidate's perspective, why do you think you're different?

Why do you think you stand

out from these other candidates?

But now with chat GPT, I wonder about that.

How unique of responses companies are

actually getting to those questions.

Now with chat GPT existing.

That's a really good point.

You hear us all the time be like, was that chat GPT?

It was like, chat GPT or not, it's

like a fun little game we have.

But yeah, I mean, first of

all, everyone should be using it.

And you can't just use this bot because

it's like, hello, it's still a bot.

You can use it to spice up what you had to say. Right.

So I always recommend saying, hey, put

your response in the chat TPT and

then say, hey, make it more aggressive.

Like, maybe it's a sales job. Make it more aggressive.

Or we had one of our millionaire recruiter

program persons say, make it more whimsical.

I'm like that's kind of fun. Whimsical.

Fun word.

I know.

I liked it. I know.

That's why I like it.

But yeah, chad GPT is another one.

Did I ever tell you or did you read about I

want to say it was a professor at like, Harvard or

something that the students had to do essays or whatever.

And so he got all their essays and he put

them a chat GPT to see who used it.

Every single student in his entire class used it.

So then he had to figure out and was working

with the school and this was several months ago, but

he was having to work with the school to figure

out what to do because there wasn't a single student

that wrote their paper on their own.

Why happening?

Yeah, they were trying to figure out how

they could do a redo because they didn't

want to fail the whole class.

So I didn't ever follow up on it.

But that's where it was at that point, is

the professor was trying to work with the school

to figure out what to do because they didn't

want to fail everybody in the class.

They also encourage innovation.

Encourage it's not technically plagiarizing.

So there was kind of a conflict with it. Right.

And again, this was several months ago.

It was kind of when chat GPT

was just becoming what it is now.

And obviously we know these younger generations are picking

up on this stuff more quickly than the older.

They know about Chat GPT and have known about it

and been using it probably long before we have.

But I think definitely that's something that's obviously

going to continuously be a theme in schools.

But I wonder if any checks and balances

or anything will be put in place with

these different applicant tracking systems and things like

that to track that sort of thing.

Well, I mean, here's the bottom line.

And this goes to schools, too.

So schools for the most part are now

embracing it and saying, wait, we actually need

to teach them how to use it.

Because just like recruiters, you can't not

use it right, like, that's silly.

That's when you're going to get left behind.

But I think, wait, shit, where was I going?

I totally just had a brain fart

thinking of way too many things.

Well, you were thinking of school and then embracing

and learning how to use and embracing Chat GPT.

Yeah, shit.

It'll come to you when you're not thinking about it.

But damn it, I was loving it. I was going for it.

See, I distracted myself with the school thing. Damn.

God damn it.

Damn it.

We'll slap you with his microphone.

You'll think of it in a second.

But we'll get back to the reverse recruiting.

We think this is a good idea.

I feel like people may be like,

oh, well, they're biased because they're recruiters,

but honestly, it's very difficult.

It is very difficult to

go through that application process.

I also think from the perspective of a lot

of people that are reaching out to me, needing

jobs and stuff, and through what we've seen with

all the tech layoffs and whatnot, it can also

be mentally and emotionally draining as well.

If it's something you've been doing for months.

For months.

And I think you just have to make sure that you hired

a recruiter that was going to go above and beyond for you,

like that was going to do outreach to their clients.

Who maybe is going to put up a LinkedIn post

about, I've got this great candidate who's in XYZ Field.

Does anybody need something like an

NPC on a LinkedIn post?

But not just the checks and

balances of helping you apply?

I feel like that's something, especially with the Chat GPT, those

of the world, you can do that on your own.

But I do think if you're going to truly

talk about reverse recruiting, it's worth the money to

invest in a recruiter who's going to go out

and actively market you within their network and to

these hiring managers of these jobs that you want.

Yes, agreed.

I totally remember what I was saying.

So even if someone put Chat GPT

and completely did their resume that way

and then completely answered those questions, that's

just getting them to get a conversation.

Their whole being has to still get them the job. True.

So who cares if chat GPT got them past the first thing?

Because in reality, resume writing, LinkedIn writing, which we

do, chat GPT is not the same thing.

One's a bot and one's a human.

So hopefully the human's doing a better job, but

the human's also combining chat GPT with it.

So yeah, I definitely am

super into the reverse recruiting.

But we even train people how to interview.

Yeah, that's its own separate package.

So now I'm like, wait, we need a reverse recruit here?

But yeah, you need your transferable skills doc, you

need your resume, you need your LinkedIn, you need

to pass these interviews because it's like, again, that's

just the first challenge is getting that phone call.

You need to get through all of the

stages and then you most likely most people

do need help negotiating your offer.

And to your point with your friends who send you

their offer letters, it's like now you need someone to

look at your offer letter to make sure you're not

signing up on something that's completely ridiculous.

So if you're hiring a recruiter for

either one of those aspects, great.

But think about it as a total package.

Even I would do that in 2 seconds.

I mean, I'm unemployable at this point in my

career, but if I were looking for a job,

I would do that in 2 seconds.

And even actually, I think I might

even disagree with you on this one.

Even the admin part I wouldn't want to do.

I would totally pay someone to do that.

Yeah, I know, right?

I believe that about well, but I'm just

saying for people that can't afford maybe somebody

can't afford to do this, it still doesn't

mean that there's not value in that service.

So I think people like completely just shitting on

that service and being like, oh well I think

if you can't do it though, if you can't

afford it, these are things that are really powerful

that you need to make sure you do.

And you just brought up one that wasn't on here.

That is a huge one for us.

But making sure that your LinkedIn profile is

on point because oftentimes companies will read those

questions that they require you to answer and

then they'll go look you up on LinkedIn.

They're not spending as much time on your

resume as they used to, they're going to

spend more time on your LinkedIn.

So you got to make sure that shit looks good and you

have to have a good like you can't have I saw a

photo like that and the shirt was down here and it was

like I'm like, what are we selling on here?

For people who are not watching on the YouTube,

on the Millionaire Critter YouTube, she was being very

seductive, I guess that's what you'd call that.

Well, they have to check out the YouTube to

see because I guess your face is like, what

the fuck is she doing out of nowhere?

But it starts with your LinkedIn.

I feel like your LinkedIn is even

bigger than your resume these days. I agree.

Make sure that shit is on point and

make sure you don't have a ridiculous photo.

And so if you are going to hire somebody to

reverse recruit, make sure part of what they include in

their package for you is an overhaul of your LinkedIn.

Agreed.

And speaking of LinkedIn, get that disgusting green, open

to work banner off of your profile picture.

She hates it.

She hates it.

But I do tips on what they can do instead. Boom. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah.

I feel like I talk about this a lot, and

I've definitely talked about it on the YouTube channel.

But you can be very strategic on your profile.

Now you have, what, 300 characters you could

put that just really goes pops like that's. You right.

Then you can also have a video.

You can have a 32nd video that you do on

your mobile, on LinkedIn, and on Pronouncing, your name.

You have 10 seconds there as well.

So there's a lot of powerful tools that you

can use to make yourself look very employable.

But again, people want what they can't have.

So if you're very openly, like, shirt

off, being like, whoo, look at me.

That's easy, right? Yeah.

With the seductive face with the banner.

There's always going to be those creepy guys at the

bar that are going to take those shirtless girls home.

But that's the one night stand, right? Yeah.

You want to be employed, and you want them

to respect you and know you and learn you.

You know what I mean?

It's like so act like that finding a

job is just like finding your significant other.

Be unavailable if they're asking you

out on a Friday night.

Sorry, unavailable? It's Friday. I have plans.

Washing my hair.

Excuse?

I'm washing my hair.

No, but that's about the open to work banner.

What about people who don't put the banner on,

but they just have it say open to work?

You know how you can opt in? Oh, yeah.

So that's behind the scenes.

And you're just telling recruiters that, I love that.

Okay. And you're good with that one. Okay.

Total app, 100%.

And then what's great about that, too, is so

all the recruiters on LinkedIn recruiter, you get to

see what they're actually looking for, which helps us.

So we're not just throwing shit at the dark.

So, yeah, I love that feature.

You could absolutely tell us that you're

looking without announcing it from the rooftops.

And also, your employer doesn't know

because I'm also baffled, too.

So there's been some times where I've seen people that appear

to still be at that job saying, open to work.

And I'm like, what's going on there? Now?

Of course, I assume they're not really working there

anymore because that seems a little weird to me.

Who knows?

Okay, so you're saying with the banner or

with just the behind the scenes button?

Yeah, no, with the banner.

No, behind the scenes button is great.

No, with the banner.

I recently saw someone because I was reaching out to

some VPs of engineering yesterday, and he has his banner

up, but it looks like he's still there.

And I was like, Am I missing something?

And then, of course, not to mention, what do I do?

Is I now like, wait, are they

looking for a VP of Engineering?

And sure as shit they're looking

for a VP of engineering.

So now I'm like, wow, so are you blasting

that you got fired, or are you blasting that

you quit because you definitely didn't get laid off?

Yeah.

And that discredits you.

No, that one is definitely going to discredit you.

If you have that you're still like, it

says still to the present and your last

place of employment, and then you have the

banner, then yeah, that's going to discredit you.

And that's a whole nother thing to me.

That's not a good look.

Take the banner out of it.

It's the combination of the two for me

that I'm like, that's not a good look.

But if you are still employed and then

you just have the open to work that

recruiters can see, I think that's okay.

That shows us that you're open to learning

about new opportunities, but you're probably still employed.

That doesn't make you a stinky cheese.

No, not at all.

And real quick, back to the reverse recruiting.

As I'm thinking to myself, how many

engineers or Tas or whoever's, right.

Reach out to me and say, hey, I do XYZ.

Do you have anything for me?

And I can only imagine how many

of those messages they've been sending out.

I'm sure it's not just me, right?

That would be silly.

So that alone is super time consuming.

So have a recruiter do that for you.

That totally makes sense.

And also have that or even say, hey, the recruiter

can give you the message to send out to people.

So I think it all depends on how involved

in your job search you want to be.

But back to your point of

having emotion with your job search.

It's like people get really tongue tied when it

says, like, hey, what are you good at?

Hey, why should someone hire you?

It's like it feels hard. Yeah.

I think leading nicely into our broke to boss Tip,

I think this is a great service for people.

I think investing in this, if you think about

how much you spend on the Netflix and the

Hulu's and all of that stuff, you can find.

Yeah, it's like all these expenses, and I know you're

a shopper, so I know you get me on this,

but it's like investing in yourself because a lot of

people would think they'd never need to spend money towards

this, but you're actually investing in your future.

I think what I would recommend to our listeners is try

to find somebody who can at least give you some kind

of guarantees, even though that's really hard to do.

That's hard.

But guarantee you something.

And it doesn't have to be like guaranteeing that you

will get hired, but guaranteeing that they will help you

get an interview or they will coach you through.

Like, I'm guaranteeing that I will do

all of these things for you and

then they're following through with their commitment.

So I think if you're going to find somebody to

reverse recruit for you, just make sure that you find

somebody that is actually aligned with your values, takes this

seriously, is going to go above and beyond.

It is not going to just do the admin part

because I think there's a lot more our jobs as

recruiters are so much more than the admin.

And so that's just one part, is reviewing

all make sure that you have somebody that's

going to go above and beyond for you.

And there are recruiters out there willing to do it.

You're talking to two or you're

listening to two of them. Yeah. It's important.

So before we log off, I want

to put this to the audience.

Actually, as far as comments goes, I'm wondering

how much do we think this service is?

Because technically the value is massive, but how

much people really willing to pay it?

So if people will pay, what resume writers?

Anywhere from $100 to $300, 500, maybe at

the most, if it's some cover letter, which,

by the way, is old, so don't do.

But yeah, would love to hear from

our audience, what's the price on this?

What's the price tag?

It's very interesting. Yeah.

So what would you pay for that?

Put that in the comments.

We'll be really interested to see and then we could

talk about what the results are too, if anybody's curious.

Because I like it.

I just feel like this is a LinkedIn poll.

Oh, this is a LinkedIn poll. We're doing it.

We're doing it.

But we still want you all feedback

combined with the LinkedIn, of course.

Yeah, absolutely.

No, we're putting this shit out first.

Now you guys are getting this first,

then we'll LinkedIn pull it after.

It's live for sure.

Because now we'll be curious. Love it.

Cannot wait to hear.

All right, see you next Tuesday.

Thanks, y'all. Bye.

Creators and Guests

Brianna Rooney
Host
Brianna Rooney
I am the CEO and Founder of TalentPerch, Techees Recruiting, The Millionaire Recruiter, and now Thriversity. My vision for the last 14 years has been to change the way the World views the Recruiting Industry. Even though I have two little kids, I remain firm on maintaining a work-life balance. I believe you can be as successful at work, as you are at home. You don’t have to choose. The choice is, to be present and rock everything you do!
Taylor Bradley
Host
Taylor Bradley
Chief Strategy Officer, Talent Leader, Advisor, Podcast Co-host. I specialize in turning DIRT to GLITTER ✨
Reverse Recruiting
Broadcast by