Takeover Unfiltered

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.

So hey.

Hey, Taylor. Hey. Hi.

I'm coming with you at a Woohoo Girl moment. Okay.

it matters, but I think you should.

But today we're going to talk about essentially what

you don't do with text messaging in recruiting.

An article came out that Taylor or Jess, our producer,

found, and so we have to just come to Town

Takeover Unfiltered to get it to bitch about it.

Yeah, that's more on brand to bitch about it.

But essentially what it is is that there is a

recruiter that uses a late night text message to basically

gauge if somebody is a good fit for the job.

So they'll text around 10:00 P.m.

And say, hey, so and so.

This is Taylor.

I can't even say where they were.

I'm not going to say that.

But how did the interview go?

And so they want to know he's gauging.

Like, did you reply?

If so, how long does it take you?

Your decision might affect whether you get hired.

Texting back quickly might up your

chances of snagging the job.

And I was like, mind blown by this.

I was like, this individual really expects

people to text back at 10:00 P.m..

And what he said he's doing is

he's texting them at 10:00 P.m.

Specifically at that time. That's by design.

It's not that he forgot to see a good

measure of whether a job candidate would mesh well

with a client that has a move fast culture.

Yousers.

So where do we begin?

First of all, that's a

booty call, so that's inappropriate.

Let's get that out of the way.

Oh, my God. That's hilarious. Yeah.

The late night text.

Second, I'm sleeping.

I have always talked about I work

out at 05:00 in the morning.

If you're texting me at 10:00 at

night, I am not happy with you.

I don't give a shit who you are, and

I get my hustle on every goddamn day.

So that's ridiculous.

Yeah, no, I was just like, there's no way

that somebody's actually doing it because I feel like

this takes us steps back as far as how

far we've come with how we treat candidates and

different things that are important to candidates and how

you should be in the interview process.

And there's just so much wrong with this

that I'm like, this is taking us back,

like, way steps back 510 years.

For somebody to have this mentality like it's an

employer's job market, which it is right now, but

to take advantage of that and be like, I'm

going to see who responds back at 10:00 p.m.

Because it's going to gauge how serious they are

and are they going to vibe and are they

going to answer these what they called?

It was like are they going

to answer after hours emails?

Should get a response within 24 hours.

That's what he said. Which is fair.

After hours emails, yeah, sure, 24 hours evening

slack messages are rare but should get a

response that night because that's like defcon three.

And I'm like, and if I text you after

hours, I need an answer now, he said, and

if I call you after hours, pick up.

Oh shit.

Okay, so wait, do we know what

roles he fills or what industry? We don't know that.

I mean, it may say that in the

article, but I haven't read the whole thing.

I just read these kind of cliff notes about it.

Yeah, I just wonder.

The only jobs that maybe this works

for I'm going to say is sales.

But I'm still upset about it.

I'm very upset about it.

I don't think any woof.

Yeah, no, I mean I think this is the

type of employer it's taken me back to.

Like these are the things that employees felt like they had to

do to keep a job and this is just not the market

in the world that we live in anymore, I should say.

It's like run by world and if you don't respond

then you're not a good fit for this company.

If I don't respond at 10:00 P.m.

Now, is he at least telling them to,

hey, I might text you at 10:00 p.m..

Or he's just like coming in hot.

His strategy is to text that late.

So to specifically hold off on texting all day long

to see how the interview went, text at 10:00 all

the candidates that interviewed and see who responds back to

you to see how well they're going to mesh with

the move fast culture of that company.

So like if we need you at midnight,

we want you to respond at midnight.

So it's basically like an assessment. Yeah.

You know what, I'm actually getting more pissed and I didn't

think I would, but here I'm coming because why the fuck

wouldn't you text at 06:00 in the morning then?

Are we not giving early risers the same

exact as the ones that go to bed?

Are you fucking blaming doesn't make any sense.

Again, because I'm a morning person, I would be

more inclined to get back on a 06:00 A.m.

Than a 10:00 P.m.

Same one.

I feel like if you're trying to gauge

what he's trying to gauge, which is crazy,

but that would be appropriate too.

Like if somebody texts you back at 06:00 at 1011

o'clock at night, you don't hear from them but they

text you back very obviously the moment they saw it.

506:00 in the morning.

Yeah, I think you're still gauging the same thing.

I think it's still bullshit, but I think

you're still gauging the same thing, right?

Yeah, it's hilarious.

Are we going to share this article?

I almost don't want to give him press.

No, I don't think we should share it.

I think anybody could probably Google it and find it.

But I just want to know, I mean, this

guy's advertising this, but it makes me think about

all the companies right now that could be doing

similar things, like how things my things have shifted

since 2021, you know what I mean, where companies

are back to putting candidates through the wringer.

And I'm excited about that other episode we

have where we talk about those assessments because

we've gotten some questions about that.

So I think that's another good one, like, assessments

throughout the interview process, the extent of them.

So you guys make sure to check out that episode.

But this one, I was like, this is just another test.

But you're not calling it a test.

But if I'm sitting there, like, laying in a bed with

my husband and I get a text from a male recruiter

at 10:00 asking me how they from a man exactly, yeah.

Holy shit.

It's just not I didn't think about that.

Not appropriate.

It is, yes.

Okay, so then what do you feel

the latest text message you would think

is appropriate for an interview situation? Yes.

For this situation, maybe 06:00.

But when you're factoring in all these different

time zones, that's what do you think about,

like, that's still 07:00 in East Coast time?

I don't know.

I really would try to stick to business hours

on that person's time zone, whatever that looks like.

I think it's totally acceptable to text somebody

within eight to 05:00 P.m., but I think

it has to be business hours.

I think you're saying a lot about the company.

I think you could actually end up losing

great candidates if you pull this 100%.

So it's like, what I want to know is,

is this person really getting this strategy from the

company, or is this his own strategy because he

feels they have a hustle culture?

I almost want to have him on, but

I feel like we'd attack the guy.

But I mean, for me, I could go as late

as 08:00 P.m., where my eyes aren't being like, really?

But I would definitely be like, is this

company seriously texting me at 08:00 P.m..

But I've gotten recruiter emails or emails from

companies at, like, one in the morning.

But that's different, though.

I'm not getting alerted on my phone.

I think now we have tons of technology out there that,

for example, I'm sending slack messages, let's see, right now from

Friday, because I put them on when I wanted to send

them, because I didn't want to hit someone up over the

weekend and stuff like that, or after hours.

So I'm being more cognizant to that.

But I can appreciate when you're in the

moment and you have this email to get

out, you don't want to forget it.

It's like, first of all, use technology, but

second, of all, fine, do an email then.

You don't have to do a text message.

It's too intimate because your phone's right

next to your head when you sleep. Right?

It's too intimate.

Well, I don't like it either.

And I'm just going back to if a man

is texting a woman or a woman is texting

a man that late at night, it's not appropriate.

And so it would make me think all kinds

of negative things about that company as far as

the timeline and timing of you texting me.

And it's inappropriate, but it's like that part about it

would make me not move forward with the job.

Like, somebody was so inappropriate to think that

they could text me at 10:00 p.m..

Like, we have a casual friendship.

We don't have a friend.

That's inappropriate. Thank you.

We don't have a friendship.

And I keep trying to find these little

outliers, but it's like, I feel like you

could have maybe one offs where it's like,

hey, the execs traveling to China right now.

I don't know, but I still

can't comprehend why a text message.

But then here, let's do it on the flip side.

Man texting a man, he's gay.

You know what I mean?

What if the guy's gay?

There is no right text message at 10:00.

Definitely after eight. Here's the thing.

I'm used to engineers, and they don't get up until about

eleven, and they work like eleven to seven or eight.

So I can kind of see a little bit

of a late, depending on who your audience is.

But still, that's ridiculous.

Yeah, and I think what you're talking about, too,

is something different where it's like you would hopefully

have established with that candidate what's the best time

to reach you, or something like that.

This guy is specifically going against the best time

to reach them, to try to test them, to

see if they'll answer outside of business hours.

So he said he compared it to pulling off

a successful organ transplant by finding tissues that match.

Oh, you do the things the way they do.

Doesn't make it normal, doesn't make it right.

But you guys match each other.

That's like a quote from it.

I was like, oh, my God.

Oh, he's a doctor. Cute.

Sorry.

Okay, you all can watch this episode, by the way,

in every episode on the Millionaire Recruiter YouTube, because to

see our reactions, I feel like it's priceless.

Wow, that's intense.

Other thing he does no, I don't know. Go ahead.

Okay, so sometimes he will also change the location

of an interview 30 minutes before it's set to

take place just to see how a candidate responds.

It's not something he does all the time.

Some jobs don't require that kind of

flexibility or speed, but he does that.

He'll put somebody in that situation to

see how they respond to that.

That is so fucking rude.

Yeah, I don't know.

I'm like, how did you put

an article out there about this. God. Holy shit. Wow.

Okay, so you know how we all like to keep it raw here.

So obviously I did not even know what

I was rolling to with this conversation.

But now I had after this, just probably like, you are all

going to do, I am going to look up this fucker.

Holy moly.

How does this man have a job?

That is so rude.

I'm like, okay, first of all,

interviews are already anxiety filled, right?

And so to run late for something feels

like the worst thing in the goddamn universe. Right?

Totally.

It's an instant no.

You're already frazzled.

Like all of those things.

Oh my God, that is fucked.

And in New York, is that what you said? New York?

Yeah, he said one time.

Well, he did that in New York City.

He got turned around, realized he didn't have

time to make it to the coffee shop,

so that he'd planned to meet the person.

So he asked them to change the location

just to see how they would respond.

I'm like, there's so many other ways.

So many other because here's the thing I will say.

It's very important to see how people

handle stress and change and pivot.

Are they cool with that. I get it.

But there are so many better ways. Yeah.

This is wrong to me.

Nothing is right about that.

Like you said, interviews are so anxiety ridden.

And I know I show up anywhere 15 minutes early.

That's just what I do.

I feel on time if I'm 15 minutes early.

So I can't imagine I'm probably

already sitting there, probably going over

some interview stuff, like prepping myself.

And then I get a text that you like

30 minutes before you're not going to make it.

You need me to scramble and try to find it.

You're throwing them off their game.

And I think that's really fucked up too.

It's just setting up for failure.

It is.

So going back to like,

wow, we're really dating ourselves.

I mean, I would say about five years

ago, companies finally started putting what to expect

in their interview process on their websites.

Now it's still not a practice that

everybody does, which I don't know why? Why not?

Why are we setting them up for failure?

Do we really want to go through 1000 candidates to

find the one because we put them through the ringer?

Does that make us feel good?

If that's the case, let's go on a Spartan race.

Hey, interviews at a Spartan race.

Let's see how you survive.

Yeah, that's fucking crazy.

And that goes back to some of the

assessments and stuff people are giving out.

It's like, I don't know.

You saw these kind of fall to the wayside

when the market was booming a few years ago.

People were just like and understood

that it was a candidates market.

Like, you're going to lose candidates.

The more hoops that you try to have them jump through.

I think what companies don't realize is that you're

still going to lose candidates the more hoops you

have them jump through, the ones you want, because

anybody has any respect for themselves, they're not going

to fall for this shit. Yes, okay.

That's exactly what I was going to say.

They're going to get somebody, but they're not going

to get the right somebody because the right someone

is going to tell you to fuck off.

Especially now.

Maybe if this person's hiring someone right out

of college and they don't know better.

Sure, okay, maybe. Right? Yeah.

But I mean, it's not a goddamn reality show.

We're not happy.

We're not naked and afraid.

I didn't even think about that.

But this is what it's like a reality

show of putting candidates through the wringer to

see what they'll do and how they'll respond.

It's like these challenges and stuff that they

put them through, like a reality show.

It's exhausting.

I can't even imagine being put through this and then

being told and are you telling them that because they

didn't respond to your text at 10:00 p.m.?

That's why they're not advancing forward?

Are you going to be honest with people? No.

I bet you he's not.

No, I bet you he's not either.

Nobody would be honest about that

if that was their practice.

But I just think it's really interesting how

it has a line in this article that

says the firm enforces these rules.

Like, they back him on this, and it's

like, wow, god, I even think about how

they're just discriminating women or caretakers.

I'm just thinking, like, you have a baby.

My head's just going, like so

many different things, I'd be pissed. Wow.

Well, everyone make sure your phone is on silent when you

go to bed if you're in a job interview, because you

don't know if you're going to get a booty call text.

So do we think it's normal

adding a different caveat to this?

If it's an on call job you're interviewing

for, do we think it's normal then?

I just thought about that.

Would that make it normal to

have a weird text situation?

Yes.

I don't love it, but it would be a little more normal.

So there are systems admins that are on

call 24/7, but again, I still think you

have to set them up for success.

We're not trying to like, oh,

well, this person's sleeping done.

It's like, well, no, maybe the person still has

a job and they were on call the next

night, so now they got to get their sleep.

No, you know what? No, I'm going to go back there. No.

Yeah, I agree. I think it's a no.

Unless they work for your company,

they don't work there yet.

So to have them exactly be held to the same

standards as an employee who's on call is just ridiculous.

What if it was their birthday?

What if it was their kid's birthday party? I don't know.

There's a million situations of like I'm not

going to answer, but I would be weirded

out if somebody texts me at 10:00.

Yeah, okay, so then let's give advice to our listeners.

This is not just about text messages at this point.

This is just poor rude practice

from the recruiter, I guess.

One clarifying question.

Is this an external recruiter or is

this a recruiter for a particular company?

Do we know this? I don't know.

He said that it's for a client, so I don't know.

That could be his hiring manager.

Well, I know we called it our clients internally too.

Like that could be your client.

I don't know, but I have to imagine, based on

what I've read about it, it's a recruiting firm where

the firm backs his process policies or whatever.

But they may recruit for this specific client only.

I don't know what the actual

but there's a million either ways. It's not appropriate.

It's not appropriate to text that late.

You shouldn't have to respond.

I think people may be like, oh, that's weird.

What if it was like a scheduled text?

I don't know, but I would feel

weird had I not read this.

If someone ever texted me at 10:00 at night about an

interview, I'd be like, this has to be a mistake, right?

There's no way they knew they

meant to send that right now.

I would never think that this is a test.

You're testing me until I read this.

So that's really interesting to me.

Okay, well, let's go back because we just did an episode

on doing what you need to do to get the job.

Take the pay cut, do whatever works for you. Yeah.

So do we think that this is like, hey, if you're in

that moment and you really need a job, are you going to

go out of your way to make sure you get this job?

Or is it still like, holy shit, maybe you

should think twice about this if you're up.

So I think it's basically situational.

If I was up at 10:00 P.m.

And someone sent me this, I

would be like, what the fuck?

But if I needed a job, I may respond then

and then may ask the next day or the next

time I talk to that recruiter, is that going to

be the expectation that I respond at ten?

I would want to know this

criteria that he's defining of.

Like, if I'm calling you after hours, it's

an emergency and you need to pick up.

Slack has to be responded to

that night, stuff like that.

I think that stuff that should be made

clear in the interview, in the job description.

I actually think it should be in the job description.

Boom. Even better.

But it should be made very clear to where

this person knows that that's kind of your thing

is to send them text at 10:00 p.m.

Otherwise I would be like, is this an accident?

Did this person the first time?

I may be like, if I'm awake, but if I'm

not awake, I'm not responding till the next day.

This guy actually would get a text probably at

two or three in the morning from me because,

like I said, I'm very much asleep.

Probably like 930 for sure.

But I'm one of those weirdos that in the

middle of the night, if I have an idea

or whatever, I'm checking my phone very randomly.

I don't even know what I'm checking for or what I'm

like, notes I'm doing, but I'm kind of a weird sleeper.

But I would probably respond at like three in

the morning if I really needed a job.

And this is the one that I really

wanted and paid well or whatever it was.

But yeah, I would text that

fucker at three in the morning. Yeah.

Give him a little taste of his own benefit.

Yeah, well, I mean, that just wakes you up. Yeah.

And I would text somebody back at, like when I

got up at six, I would text them back.

So assuming you're a night owl because you text

me late, I'm probably getting you early morning.

So I think that's all totally fair to do.

But I think the root of all of it is that's

the expectation from the employer and you just need to make

sure that that's something that you want to commit to because

it feels very, I don't know, suffocating to me.

It's dated again, going back to like

you have to respond within 24 hours.

You have to pick up this call.

I don't know, I feel like where's my pager?

Give me a pager.

I'm on call. Remember those?

I'm typing in boob list.

Yeah, I definitely don't.

I remember the days of pagers and stuff,

but I'm like, yeah, we're not doctors here.

No, that's great.

Oh, my God.

So with the broke to boss tip leading us into

that so my broke to boss tip for this, because

this guy is very obviously like this is a trend.

This is something people are doing.

They're testing out this texting.

It's just don't do this.

It's not necessary or normal.

Unless you work at the White House or in

the military, nothing is at a defcon level.

Like, nothing is that important.

So it's perfectly acceptable to have boundaries.

Yes, boundaries.

Amen to boundaries.

And also shows that you respect

yourself and you have the confidence.

It's like, again, you got to do what's right for you.

But texting for recruiters out there, we love texting.

Texting is a great idea.

There's so much technology.

You can send the text at any point,

but let's not send it after hours. Yeah.

There's a time, sure as shit not booty call time. Okay.

Which, by the way, is for sure

starts at it starts at ten. She knows.

She established that timeline.

Thank you, guys.

So much for listening, as always.

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See you next week.

Thanks, y'all. Bye.