Bullhorn Strikes Back at Indeed

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[00:01:27] and checking out AI for Jobs where you can learn more about how to leverage AI for your recruiting instead of just writing poems and grocery lists. That is thiswayglobal.com. We out. Hide your kids, lock the doors. You're listening to HR's most dangerous podcast.

[00:01:48] Chad Sowash and Joel Cheeseman are here to punch the recruiting industry right where it hurts. Complete with breaking news, brash opinion and loads of snark. Buckle up boys and girls. It's time for the Chad and Chees Podcast. Yeah. Welcome back to the Chad and Chees Podcast.

[00:02:08] That's right, HR's most dangerous podcast kids. I am Chad, past the chaos Sowash and on today's show a staffing expert predicts doomsday. McDonald's backs out of AI. Bullhorn says not so fast indeed and Joel is back. Well, no, no, not that Joel. Not that Joel. Let's do this.

[00:02:32] Okay, listener, how can you help your employees become more productive? I have answers. How about automating manual and repetitive tasks, giving meaning to data, then allowing that data to actually drive decisions? And how about matching people to your jobs quicker?

[00:02:50] Well wait, the Chad and Cheese has a new LLM? No, Cheeseman. I'm talking about TexKernel. Ah, okay. That makes more sense. What I'm hearing is the groundbreaking concept of, wait for it, simplicity. Seriously though, seriously, TexKernel cuts through the complexities like a tortilla chip

[00:03:14] through some hot nacho cheese. Oh my god. Really? Nacho references already. Anyways, TexKernel brings efficiency and productivity to your operations. TexKernel seamlessly unifies your tools and data to drive efficiencies and success. TexKernel is creating new opportunities for your recruitment journey, kind of like adding

[00:03:37] guac to my barbacoa burrito. Oh my god. How about extracting meaningful insights from data? I mean that's something. Swiftly matching people with jobs, automating repetitive tasks. Who knew such advanced concepts were even possible in the land of human resources? We did, Chad. We did. Dude, wrap it up.

[00:04:01] I'm a little hungry. Imagine that. Okay, listener, get ready to use today's tech to drive efficiencies and productivity. Visit TexKernel.com. That's T-E-X-T-K-E-R-N-E-L dot com. Nachos. Okay, kids. So welcome back. Yes, Cheeseman is gallivanting around Singapore this week but I have another Joel in store

[00:04:31] as a special guest host. So Joel is back. Just not the same Joel, right? It is actually, let me share this because you got to see the juice here. Joel Lowji. Did I say that right? You got it. Yeah, you got it.

[00:04:45] Not many people can get it right so well done. Thank god for LinkedIn's little audio clips. I still got that recording on there. That is awesome. I love it. I don't know why more people don't use that thing. It's helpful. Yeah, so literally first time on the show.

[00:04:59] Welcome to the show. Really appreciate you coming on and do me a favor just for all of those listeners who don't know who you are. Give them a Twitter bio. Yep. Joel Lowji been in recruitment space for about a decade and I do a lot of

[00:05:12] content around the recruitment industry. So as you can see, host a podcast called Recruiting is No Joke and doing live events, helping tech brands get their name out there. I love social media. I love recruitment and I'm happy to be here today. Excellent man.

[00:05:29] We are definitely happy to have you. Not to mention you've got great fashion taste. I mean look at that. Come on. Look at that. We definitely didn't even plan it but we kind of planned it. You knew I was in Portugal so I was like, why not?

[00:05:43] Why the hell not? They didn't come out of the chamber hot but they still won. Yeah. I've got to say that again kids we're watching the Euro 2024 which is happening. Portugal probably has one of the most talented teams that are out there.

[00:05:58] The question is can they put it together? Spain is red hot right now. Germany is doing incredibly well. What do you think? I think Germany already qualified. They're at home. They're looking solid and the last three tournaments they just bombed it. I think they're looking good.

[00:06:15] I really like Gunderland who is their captain. I think he is out of all the leaders out there, he's humble, he's just a hard worker, he's a really good guy to have. I think England not doing well. I think Italy is looking strong.

[00:06:33] My thought is Italy, Spain, Germany because I mean Belgium they're not looking good. No they're not looking good at all. I'm sticking with the home turf that I'm on. Definitely go Portugal. How wild is it in Portugal like during the Euros? It's amazing. It is amazing.

[00:06:54] I mean there are a lot of Brits that are down here too so I mean the bars are full no matter England's playing, Germany's playing, Portugal's playing, it doesn't matter the bars are packed so it's good. Yeah it's fun.

[00:07:08] Did you see that Netflix, did you see that Wembley documentary that's out there right now? I haven't seen that one yet now. Go see it, England fans just getting wild and Wembley in 2020. Imagine that. Yeah yeah yeah it's crazy.

[00:07:24] Alright kids if you're not watching Euro 2024 check it out also Copa's happening but it's time for a little business let's do shoutouts. Joel you got to shoutout who you got to shoutout for. Yeah so I got to shoutout JobPixel.

[00:07:39] We've actually got an event coming up with JobPixel so if you don't know JobPixel video platform helps with recruitment. I'm hosting an event with the one and only Chad and we're going to be doing, I think we're going to be just talking about basically video hacks as recruiters

[00:07:56] that you can use to get more candidates, get your name out there so I'm going to be doing that free event Thursday June 27th. If you're interested in that just go to my profile on LinkedIn you'll see it.

[00:08:06] Register, get the team there, going to be a good time. Yeah should be fun, should be fun. I mean I'm an advisor to JobPixel. Love those guys, love what they're doing. I mean the validation with the you know ISIMS acquisition a little while ago.

[00:08:20] I mean I think that really put them on the path and they are on fire right now so I can't wait to join in and have that discussion. I'm going to go ahead and give a shoutout to NVIDIA. You might have heard of these guys.

[00:08:32] They passed Microsoft to become the most valuable public company in the world kids. Jesus. The chip maker passed the three trillion market cap in early June. The company is a fucking rocket ship right now. Just had a 10 to 1 stock split. Thank you.

[00:08:51] That was good for me and there's no sight of slowing down. NVIDIA has about 80 percent. That's 80 percent of the market for AI chips used in data centers and the FANG companies are gobbling them up faster than NVIDIA can produce them.

[00:09:10] I mean the wait list, it's like candy for these companies man. So what do you think? Is NVIDIA going to get some competition sometime soon or are they just going to continue to skyrocket? Man it looks like they're, I think they're going to continue.

[00:09:24] I mean, I'm thinking about investing in silicon itself because I think that would be a good gamble. But the amount, how quickly they've grown and I think AI just becoming the forefront as well, you know, last 18 months, it'd be hard to keep up with them at this point.

[00:09:42] Yeah, about 18 months ago on the podcast and this is the kids don't listen to us for investment. Okay, don't do it. Every now and again we get lucky. But about 18 months ago, I think I actually said on the show, I'm like, if you're not buying NVIDIA, buy NVIDIA.

[00:09:55] I didn't buy it then. I waited like six months. I was so pissed at myself. How do you calculate like how much more you would have made if you? No, no, I don't do that because I'm going to piss myself off.

[00:10:07] But there's one thing that you can never lose on my friend and that's free stuff from Chad and Cheese. You get t-shirts from Aeronapp, beer from Aspen Tech Labs, craft beer delivered to your doorstep, whiskey from Text Colonel who we're going to talk about today.

[00:10:23] Two bottles of whiskey again delivered to your door. And if it is your birthday, you can win a bottle of rum from Plum. You can't win if you don't play. So you got to go to ChadCheese.com slash free or just go to ChadCheese.com,

[00:10:46] click on free in the upper right hand corner and register to win free stuff from Chad and Cheese. Can't beat free. Can't beat free, man, especially that kind of stuff. We're talking high quality stuff. Not to mention the t-shirts. It was funny.

[00:10:59] I brought a bunch of t-shirts here to Portugal with me for my friends who are in Portugal and every single one of them were like, wow, this is high quality stuff. I'm like, yeah, it's like a hug from Chad and Cheese. And we'll be distributing some of those.

[00:11:13] Get ready kids. At events that we're going to, we are going to Wreckfest, Wreckfest, Wreckfest. Wreckfest in July at Nebworth Park and then Wreckfest September 12th and 13th in Nashville. Joel, you've been to the Nashville Wreckfest. What do you think? I loved it.

[00:11:31] I mean, that was the first conference I'd gone to in years, like four years. So definitely my type of vibe. Definitely festival feel. People having a good time, a lot more relaxed, really good conversation, good networking. I had a real good time. Nashville is amazing as well.

[00:11:49] Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah, I want to, I'm looking forward to this year as well. I'll be hosting one of the stages in the morning. Sweet. Excited about it. Yeah. I love it. Hosting is best, right? Hosting versus speaking is way better. Am I right?

[00:12:03] Hosting is pretty awesome. It can be tiring, but it is pretty awesome. Yeah. I mean, so kids, if you're not like Joel and I and you've never been to a Wreckfest, get to a Wreckfest. It's literally an all-hands staff meeting in a big field under circus tents.

[00:12:20] It's literally recruit-a-palooza. I mean, whole recruiting teams come to learn, bond, connect with peers, check out new tech, standardize procedures from experts in the space. And if your team isn't learning about new tech and the velocity of the tech today, then get to Wreckfest ASAP. Love these guys.

[00:12:41] There's no other event that's out there that's like it. All the events have different feels, different characteristics, culture, that kind of thing. But nothing, nothing, nothing compared to Wreckfest. Yeah. Well, what other conference can you go to where you can just shorts and a t-shirt

[00:12:56] and then smash some white clothes in between and you're just normal? And so I love it. You're smashing white cloth. Hey, I gotta keep the hydration going. During the day, I don't want to get too out of control, but it's, yeah, it was last year.

[00:13:14] I thought it was great and looking for a bigger one this year as well. So yeah, yeah. Nedworth, Nedworth's probably gonna have close to 6,000. Nashville, I believe, will double this year. So 2,500, obviously the US very, very big. So yeah, I just can't wait.

[00:13:31] And you know what else I can't wait for? What's that? Topics. That's what baby. Because this week, I mean, we've been talking about it for a while, but I got a recruiter on the show. I also have some footage that we're gonna play.

[00:13:45] And a few weeks ago, we pointed out something big. It's fucking enormous to be quite frank that nobody was talking about during Recruit Holdings investor meeting, which is available via video recording to the public kids. So during that meeting, indeed formally announced launching into staffing,

[00:14:05] not just playing around, but applying the necessary resources to disrupt the staffing industry. We have recorded a couple of different podcasts that dig into the topic, including this Monday's episode with House of HR's Chief Digital Officer and staffing leader, Levin von Levinhausen.

[00:14:24] Plus a great roundtable with Jim the Indeed Whisperer Durbin, Levin, myself, and Sarah and Victor from Adway. You can find that on Adway's YouTube channel. I have a quick video I wanna play. And this is from Tim Meehan, a staffing pro who spent time at a Deco,

[00:14:43] 11 years at Kelly and was their VP of Global Solutions, five years at Kelly OCG where he was VP of Global RPO Center of Excellence, and five years at Pond Tune Solutions as a VP and Global Head of TA Innovation. Tim has the experience in this chop.

[00:15:03] So listen up kids. I was glad that he hooked us up with this. So give it a listen. All right guys, so here's the deal. Years ago I said the staffing companies had to become technology companies and I've worked for them and they don't understand.

[00:15:20] And now with this acquisition from a bullhorn buying text kernel, holy crap, these staffing companies and a lot of other techs are all using text kernel to do their matching. Is bullhorn gonna pull it off? The market and you want text kernel,

[00:15:39] you want a matching algorithm, you gotta use bullhorn? That's gonna be a big game changer for the staffing industry because if they're not using bullhorn, they're gonna have to. And if they are using bullhorn, quite frankly, they've got them by the short hairs.

[00:15:55] And it's gonna force, it's like, what is that Japanese term? Seppuku. It's like it's gonna force them to cut their belly open either they become subservient to the bullhorns of the world or they become pure plain niche and they don't even try and do automated matching. Wow.

[00:16:13] Okay, okay man. So you're a recruiter, you understand the staffing industry. So what do you make of all this? Look, that's one of the strongest predictions I've heard. Usually it's recruiters are gonna be okay. So to hear completely decimated is crazy.

[00:16:30] I think for me, when I look at it, I look at all the data like Indeed has, obviously they've got tons, but it's all user generated. And this is where with resumes in general or LinkedIn profiles or Indeed resumes, it's all user generated.

[00:16:45] So I think as long as users are updating things and they're putting their right skills and they're putting the right information on there, then it's possible. But I don't really know how you get that unless people do a good job with updating that information in the first place.

[00:17:04] And second thought around it is I'm super interested to see how they go to market with staffing services and how much of that business are staffing companies? Like, do you just eat that? Staffing company still gonna buy big contracts, same with LinkedIn.

[00:17:24] That whole business is basically recruitment agencies. So you really wanna kill your biggest client's business? I don't know about that. I'd be also interested, how do you sell or change your brand into staffing versus

[00:17:42] I feel like all their marketing is around candidates and will help you get a job. That's what I think of when I think of Indeed. I think it's candidate play. So how are they gonna shift that branding around? So Indeed from day one has always been

[00:17:57] one of the bullies from a sales standpoint, direct to companies. They always have. I was a VP at Direct Employers Association and we literally were kind of like the guardian for major Fortune 500 global VPs. And they would come to me and say,

[00:18:12] hey, can you tell the guys over at Indeed to back the fuck down? So they've always been aggressive there and I don't think that's gone away. I think staffing was their biggest business. Then the next thing you know, they've been able to,

[00:18:27] I mean pretty much take the leads that staffing are putting into their system and they're going direct to clients and they're also going to agencies. So they're doing a couple of different things to be able to go around staffing so that again, they can get to this point

[00:18:42] where staffing is making 20% maybe even more. They can go half of that 10% and that's still 10X what they're making today. So yeah, I do agree though. The data that they have, the actual candidate data, they're going to have to have enrichment that happens.

[00:19:01] And I would want it to be first and foremost user enrichment where they're just nudging users to come back. Hey, here's a job that you might be qualified for. Oh, by the way, update your information, et cetera, et cetera. Here's the thing that really gets me.

[00:19:16] I've received direct messages from listeners that are still inside major staffing organizations, very high level in major staffing organizations that have reached out to validate those staffing organizations are not ready for the shift from the traditional model. And usually I'm not a fan of Indeed,

[00:19:35] but this disruption forces those old stodgy staffing organizations to evolve or die. So even though it's not going to be easy, I hope Indeed Flex starts making progress quickly because only the nimble will survive and only really crafty and more nimble and evolved recruiters,

[00:19:58] the best recruiters are going to be at staffing companies. And that's what I think the market needs, nimble and fluid. And that's not where staffing is today. It's not where it's been for a very long time. So I really think that if you bring tech to bear,

[00:20:14] which Ronstadt tried with Monster and failed miserably, and Deco did with Hired and Veterine and failed miserably, AMS, they're more RPO, but still they're not going to be safe. They did with the creation and really just bad management of the hourly platform.

[00:20:32] So I think most of these staffing companies are trying to run their tech like traditional staffing organizations, which means to me they got to get rid of leadership. You have to have new leaders who can evolve with new models.

[00:20:48] And it doesn't feel to me, and you tell me what you think, it doesn't feel to me like they have the capacity, the capability to actually evolve with the models and the velocity of technology today. 100% agree. And I think even just even at an individual level,

[00:21:05] speaking from individual recruiters, this is why it's so important to, like you said earlier, if you are not up on what tech is coming into the market or you're shying away from it, which I think a lot of large company leaders,

[00:21:18] I don't think they even have the time to see what is out there and how things are evolving. You've got to stay up to date with it and you got to make those changes. I think what's interesting is like indeed, with those examples that you gave,

[00:21:29] it's like they're almost doing a reverse. So it's like they got all the traffic, they got all of the job board traffic, the job ad revenue coming in and to add staffing on it. But I'm curious with Indeed Flex, they've been around for like a year.

[00:21:44] What's that business like? I don't really see too much about it. They were acquired in 2019, the SIFT out of the UK and they've been kind of like doing these skunk work projects with a lot of different staffing, Indeed staffing orgs. And this one obviously,

[00:21:58] which was one of the biggest segments of the TAM was 127 billion. And that's more, it's lower level, it's easier, right? Because once you start getting into the more complex jobs, it gets much harder to be able to really quickly discern whether people are qualified or not, right?

[00:22:15] When you have very little requirements, heartbeat, being able to lift 50 pounds. Yeah, show up on time, those types of things. It becomes much easier. And that temp staffing side of the house, the Kelly services side of the house that Tim used to work for,

[00:22:32] that's the low hanging fruit for Indeed. And it's $127 billion versus the 32 billion in recruitment marketing, right? So I think that's the foundation that they build on. And then they start to kind of like, they grow from there. And with Daddy Warbucks being recruit holdings,

[00:22:53] not to mention, they're in staffing, one of the, I think top five or at least top 10 staffing companies in the world. They know that they want that US market. So you think they're just gonna hire a ton of salespeople? Yeah, no, I think they will.

[00:23:07] I think they will. And I don't think it's gonna be much different than the old Indeed model. All they're going to do is say, look, we're going to leverage tech to be able to staff your organization and do it for half the cost of Kelly,

[00:23:20] of Ronstadt, of a Deco. What do you think? Yeah, and then you just gotta play it out, right? Three, six, nine months, they get the results. And then that's what every other staffing company is gonna hope that they don't get the results or they're overlooking something.

[00:23:37] The only thing I could possibly think about is at an enterprise level, I see that I still think there's so... One of the things I've noticed with staffing companies is release relationships. And if they're old school, a lot of the relationships they have are also old school.

[00:23:53] And I would imagine that they're less likely to even be looking into technology as well. So that would be the only thing is the relationship management, right? Yeah, I think from a velocity standpoint, all that's gonna go away. And this is gonna become more transactional

[00:24:07] than anything else, especially on the temp side, right? We're not talking about management. We're not talking about management that's going to senior management. We're talking about temp that's $127 billion. So yeah, I think the relationship side of the house, it's gonna turn more into transactional.

[00:24:21] And that again, is because of the power of technology today. I think that's what we're gonna go. Almost like an Amazon model for hiring, where it's like, hey, hire now. Add to your cart. You like that? Yeah. Yeah, boost, right? All right, so this conversation is not stopping

[00:24:40] because we have more news in this segment. We will be right back.

[00:25:29] All right, okay. So this is a pretty big one. This week, Bullhorn acquired Texkernel, an industry leader in sourcing AI solutions, better known as one of the biggest vendors in the world for parsing and matching, which is not an easy fucking business.

[00:25:57] Plus, longtime sponsor of the Chad and Cheese podcast. Texkernel's, they're HQs in Amsterdam, and they power over 2,000 customers globally. And these customers, for the most part, are big vendors that we all know and love, that we think are doing the parsing and the matching. They're not.

[00:26:14] Texkernel is the one who's doing it behind the scenes, including eight of the top 10 staffing agencies worldwide. We were just talking about staffing. A long-time trusted partner to the staffing and recruitment industry, and one of the companies who have performed the heavy lift

[00:26:30] for many of the biggest tech platforms in the industry. So before we get into comments, Joel, let's welcome back the staffing and tech leader, Tim Meehan, for his thoughts. Hey guys, so here's the deal. There's two companies and one technology that are absolutely going to decimate

[00:26:51] the staffing and recruitment industry. The two companies are LinkedIn and Indeed. Make no mistake, they're laser-focused on taking over the end-to-end hiring capability, and we know they own the candidate market already. So now if they go downstream, they've got a sustainable advantage.

[00:27:10] Now you add in Indeed, owned by Recruit Holdings, and Recruit actually, six years ago, redefined their industry to say they are not in the staffing business, they are in the matching business, which takes me to the tech that's going to drive the disruption, which is matching algorithms.

[00:27:28] Now I know matching algorithms aren't where they need to be right now, but they're going to get there. You layer in the generative AI, which by the way on LinkedIn's side, owned by Microsoft, who has ChatGBT, and you see the possibility of some big disruption.

[00:27:46] I think it's going to destroy the staffing industry and recruitment jobs. So there's a choice, Joel. There's a choice. You can continue to stay with Indeed, or you can go with Bullhorn. Sounds like they're going to have tech. It could help out. What do you think?

[00:28:04] As a former Bullhorn user, I feel bad for all the people who are going to have to use Bullhorn with that prediction because I think how you add on these AI tools and integrate is huge. Just in general, I think any AI tool,

[00:28:23] it all comes down to adoption and how people use them. That's always a big question for me. Anytime I hear AI conversations, I don't even know if people are aware of the difference between automation and AI, how to use these tools anyway.

[00:28:41] But I think it seems like a great move for Bullhorn. Obviously for TechSkrill, it's going to obviously open up more clients as well. But I feel like Bullhorn has a better deal out of that one. What do you think? First and foremost, I gotta say congrats to Harard

[00:28:58] and the TechSkrill team. This is the type of tech that has performed, as I said earlier, some of the heaviest technical lifts in the history of recruiting, which is why there aren't many successful companies in the space. A quick and brief history of TechSkrill.

[00:29:16] In 2015, CareerBuilder acquired 60% of TechSkrill and they liked them so much that CareerBuilder, then owned by daddy Warbucks Apollo, went all in and they acquired TechSkrill in 2019. Then Apollo started selling off bits and pieces of CareerBuilder and TechSkrill was sold to main capital in September of 2020.

[00:29:38] Then TechSkrill expanded their footprints into the US by acquiring parsing and matching powerhouse Sovereign in November of 2021. Now I'm saying all of this because it's obvious that TechSkrill is appetizing for many companies. The question is, can Bullhorn pull off an acquisition and technical execution of this size

[00:30:00] when players like CareerBuilder and Apollo just f**king fumbled the ball? The execution will be f**king massive and I'm not 100% sure that Bullhorn can pull it off but I hope they do. To Tim's point and our earlier Indeed, you know, staffing conversation, if Bullhorn isn't positioning themselves

[00:30:20] as an Indeed killer, they're doing it wrong. Staffing organizations spend tens of millions of dollars annually to attract candidates and many of those candidates are already in their goddamn resume database. So now again, if Bullhorn is smart, they will use the parsing and matching

[00:30:39] in every resume in a staffing firm's database. As soon as a rec is posted, they'll match it to those candidates with a high degree of match. Then they should automatically be invited to apply through email, text or whatever messaging they choose.

[00:30:56] That will then lessen the need for Indeeds, the Indeeds of the world plus Bullhorn can reach out to candidates that are going stale to nudge them to add skills, expertise and just, you know, build up their profile. But like I said, it's gonna be a massive undertaking

[00:31:16] and I'm just not sure. I'm sure we'll talk to Bullhorn but I'm just not sure they're up to this task. It is big, not to mention will they make text kernel under Bullhorn or will they keep it as a separate product because they already have

[00:31:31] a humongous portfolio and part of that portfolio are other applicant tracking systems, right? So it's gonna be an interesting dance. What do you think? So you're saying then, so Bullhorn basically uses all of their resumes in all of their clients databases

[00:31:50] as well so then when you open up a rec, it will match from not just your own database that you have but like everybody's, right? Is that what I'm hearing? I didn't go that far but that is, that would be smart if staffing companies, especially smaller staffing companies

[00:32:06] could work together to actually build pools like data lakes is really what it is. But yeah, I don't think the Deco's or the Ronstadt's out there would do something like that. I think they have big enough databases where they don't have to.

[00:32:18] It'll just be forced to be able to go into their database and the candidates that they already have there. Look, I just, the one thing I wonder with everything right now is in general, like just outside of even staffing and recruitment,

[00:32:31] in general everybody's mailboxes are being blown up like I just, and candidates are the same way. They're getting the same, they're getting all of this. So I just wonder if the challenge coming up is recruit like actual recruitment and how do you stand out, right?

[00:32:48] Because I think finding candidates to me, let's it's, you're finding data nowadays is kind of easier and you can do it pretty quick. But it's like reaching people at getting good with messages. Like you said, texting, calling, it's that to me, it's just,

[00:33:04] I don't see how we don't create a big problem with just candidates in general or like what happens when candidates who will already, like I do a lot of social media content. One of the biggest, one of the points

[00:33:16] that goes viral all the time is if I bash particularly LinkedIn and Indeed, if I say are you sick of LinkedIn and Indeed? Here are three other platforms. Those videos always go viral. So I'm like, do these kind of tools, are they just compounding that?

[00:33:28] And then how do you, great, you found the person. How do you really even get a hold of them nowadays? That's what I'm wondering over the next year, 18 months. Yeah, so I think at the end of the day, first and foremost, ZipRecruiter had it right years ago

[00:33:43] and then they just went off the rails on the one IPO. ZipRecruiter had it right. Way back in the day, not lately, not lately. What they did was they actually had this model where they would go into their database and they would literally,

[00:33:57] they would invite individuals who matched up against the requirements of a requisition. Made a lot of sense. They were looking to do and they never did was just create slates, the ones that are higher match in quality than just deliver 10. Instead of delivering 30 or 50 or 300 to a recruiter,

[00:34:20] which is not manageable. I really think that if you get a really good score match up against the actual requirements and what the skill sets that you need, what can happen at that point is a recruiter gets more time to actually focus on interacting with that individual.

[00:34:39] One of the things right now is way too much in ministrivia, not to mention candidates are going into black holes because recruiters don't have enough time to respond to all of them. And in this case, if you get 10 or 15, you can actually take the time

[00:34:55] to be more human with those individuals. So yeah, I think they've already applied for a job within your portfolio of companies. So more than likely you have contact information and if they're smart, they're getting phone number, they're getting messenger, whatever their chosen form of communication is

[00:35:15] and they're gonna be reaching out to them. Then you've got, and this is the fun part, to get into the chat bots of the world, the talk pushes, the paradoxes and whatnot that can actually help nudge candidates. Not just for the interview,

[00:35:30] but also for that first day of work and to get feedback and whatnot. And from my understanding and talking to Adam Gottson when he was at Cielo, not just now he's at Paradox, but when he was at Cielo billing these systems, their ghosting went down dramatically

[00:35:47] just from those little nudge messages, which is pretty amazing. So I think there's great opportunity here. I wanna know with this validation of skills because I know the skills-based hiring keeps on coming up, but I'm like, this is the other issue which I see is

[00:36:04] you've on the other end, you've got candidates now that have tools as well that can make perfect resumes. They can match up to the job. There at some point where's the skills validation and then how are you defining what skills are for jobs? How do you actually, yeah,

[00:36:20] but for some of these jobs, you really need skills as well. Maybe that's it. Yeah, these companies have to understand they've been talking about skills-based hiring forever and they don't know what the hell they're talking about because first and foremost, they don't know what skills it actually takes

[00:36:35] within that job because what they haven't done is they haven't actually taken a look at the tasks that are performed by that job on a daily basis. When you do that, you understand that a job is literally just an amalgamation of tasks, right?

[00:36:50] Can the individual perform those tasks and then what are skills that are tied to those tasks? There's tech out there today that can do that. Tadeo, which again, I'm an advisor for just to be transparent out there, but they are more performance-driven.

[00:37:06] You have to demonstrate that you can perform that task in a simulation before boom, you get that skill, right? So it's becoming more readily available and understandable, but the companies have to do the job upfront of even understanding what the job looks like

[00:37:25] for the person who's doing it task by task by task and then they can understand the skills. Until then, they're literally just bullshitting everybody I believe. So they've got defined skills and then they need it. I think right now they've got to get buy-in

[00:37:38] from candidates to get that data even and I like the idea of inviting people to jobs. I like the way, like you said, when that idea first came out, I get invited all the time by LinkedIn to do different things and it's so off every single time.

[00:37:53] So I think they got to figure out a way of how do we gamify getting the right data even from candidates? Otherwise you're just gonna end up with just wrong matches on both ends and then people go, yeah, it doesn't even work. LinkedIn's matching tech is shit.

[00:38:09] It's so bad. They have more data on me than anybody does. They should be able to match me up very well. And they do a shit job. I get host of Olive Garden because I have podcast host in my bio. I'm a hostess at Olive Garden.

[00:38:27] But that's what I was saying and this is where I think one of the things I notice with any kind of AI tools, one of the things I've noticed really quickly is you have one shot with users like myself, recruiters, and if they don't see,

[00:38:40] saves time, money or it works, you miss in that one shot, they just write you off as it not working altogether. And so this is where it's like, you have to, you gotta deliver on that. Yeah, you do. You've got to remember though, AI is a puppy.

[00:38:53] I mean, it doesn't, it's gonna piss on the carpet a few times. You gotta give it a little grace but here's where TA leaders need to stiffen their spine and all of these processes are gonna be happening behind the scenes

[00:39:07] and they're gonna be delivered up to the recruiters. So this should not be a decision made by the recruiters. It should be made by leadership, right? Now recruiters should be a part of the process to ensure that it actually becomes more fluid.

[00:39:24] We get the best data to be able to train on the right data for the right jobs in the right positions, in the right regions, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But at the end of the day, we can't, and I'll just give you an example.

[00:39:36] At Ronstadt, we had so many people who had LinkedIn seats, who weren't even using LinkedIn seats. Crazy. And we were pushing them off. Oh, we almost had a fucking riot. And it's like, look, you guys aren't even using this and money's being spent, right? Crazy.

[00:39:54] Yeah, so it's just like, you have to stiffen your spine and I was there and I was like, fuck those guys. I don't care. We can find new recruiters. If they can't use the tools that you're giving them and then they bitch when you take them away

[00:40:06] because they're not using them. My point is, leadership has to lead. Yeah. Right? And they're not leading today, period. Yeah, nah, I agree 100%. Well, in that being said, I gotta say. Ma, the meatloaf! Yeah. Fuck! So who likes Swedish meatballs? Everybody likes Swedish meatballs. Got it.

[00:40:26] Well, this from the Dallas Morning News, IKEA, the Swedish retailer lost 62,000 workers in 2022, equating to about a third of its workforce, which cost the company millions in loss of productivity and retraining. I guess the free Swedish meatballs just wasn't enough of a perk.

[00:40:45] What did IKEA do to stop the bleeding? Listen to this, this is gonna blow your mind. They boosted pay, they increased flexibility for frontline employees, and they used emerging technologies to make things easier on workers and their customers, which dropped them from losing a third of their employees

[00:41:04] down to a quarter of their employees. Now, it does get worse when you look at retail industry numbers. McKinsey and Company Research cites that retail jobs are often marked by low pay, go figure, erratic schedules, and irate customers, which helps explain why the quit rate for retail workers

[00:41:25] is more than 70% higher than all other US industries. So Joel, does work-me retail have to suck? It does, it's a rite of passage. It has to. The unions are having a moment right now though. So could having a union in retail actually help?

[00:41:43] I think the problem is that with retail jobs is you just view them as, and I think how most people think about retail jobs, I would imagine it's seasonal. It's usually you're taking the job because you've got something else going on. You're a college kid in summer.

[00:41:57] Maybe you're going through a job transition and you're just taking the job. I think it's almost like a shift in mindset with the job as a whole. I can't imagine too many people going, yeah, I wanna be a cashier. That's my career, right? I can't imagine that.

[00:42:11] So I'm like- But some people it is. Some people it is though. It does become a career for some people for sure. Yeah, yeah. I mean, look, to me this stuff, sometimes it's just like common sense of like, I'm like, at what point do you become disconnected

[00:42:26] to just normal people that you don't see that making people's lives easier in a job, paying them well, and then flexibility. Like when you get disconnected that you don't get, that's what people are looking for. This is where it's like, you got a group of executives off

[00:42:42] and they're not even like looking at what most normal people would want. And then they're like, yeah, we figured it out and then it works. I'm like, is it just common sense? That's why I just don't care. That's ridiculous. And I gotta say,

[00:42:53] hey, human resource professionals out there, when this happens, it's your fault, okay? The C-suite needs to understand attrition impacts revenue. Waiting on positions to be filled being short staff impacts revenue and increases the likelihood of others leaving, which impacts revenue. Underpaid workers are not happy workers.

[00:43:15] Unhappy workers create unhappy customers. Unhappy customers don't come back, which impacts revenue. Unhappy workers means low productivity, which impacts revenue. So all of these things will happen if you don't have systems, training and processes in place to make happy employees.

[00:43:36] Oh yeah, and pay them well by the way. Find your problem, fall in love with that problem, look for products and services to help you fix the problem and then go confidently with a stiffened spine to ask for more fucking budget because guess what?

[00:43:52] All of this impacts revenue. So don't be happy with a broken system because you have quote unquote limited budget. That's a total and complete cop out. Do your research and understand how your problems impact revenue and the C-suite will listen, especially if you can demonstrate the problem

[00:44:10] and present solutions. Ask for the budget. Amazon reported, I shouldn't say reported, a letter, an internal letter popped up that actually showed that they lost $8 billion in revenue due to a attrition alone, attrition alone. I read, I think it was maybe a year and a half ago

[00:44:33] that they are to the point in some locations that they've hired like 80% of people in town. They're out of the workforce. They're literally burning through the workforce. And I think one of their solution, I mean, I know a couple of people who own those Amazon delivery businesses

[00:44:52] and you talk to someone who owns one of those businesses, the delivery isn't the business. You're a staffing company and it's like they've gone, it's so hard to find delivery drivers and people who own these businesses, they spend 90% of their time trying to staff

[00:45:05] reliable people on razor thin margins. And I think at some point, again, it's flexibility and pay right now are on the top of everyone's mind. And if you are not filling those jobs, you've got to think about, I mean, I love that technology piece.

[00:45:23] I'm just thinking in my head, what kind of AI could help people in retail and make their jobs easier? My mind goes to robots and things right away and having that as a help, imagine a robot to take care of angry customers, that'd be amazing.

[00:45:36] But like you said, this guy, I read too the founder of IKEA is like the eighth richest person in the world. So I'm like, come on, don't tell me that you're hurting in any way. It's crazy. Money's going up top, man. Money's going on top.

[00:45:52] We talked about Walmart the other day who maxed out bonuses for somebody who was working there for one to five years at $350 a year. Are you fucking kidding me? I mean, they have over $158 billion in profits for a year. Ridiculous.

[00:46:09] And yet, and yet, I mean, it was just, this is the ridiculous stuff. So TA, again, this is your fault because you are not going to the C-suite and helping them to understand that all of these things are negatively impacting revenue or will

[00:46:25] because it doesn't happen all at once, right? You don't burn through 80% of a workforce all at once, right? But when you do, holy shit, you're screwed. So you've got to focus on the losses and the perspective gains. And as we're talking about losses,

[00:46:41] how about IBM's recent AI loss? We'll be right back. We'd never admit it, but deep down, we all get at least some pleasure from bad things happening to somebody we don't like. History's full of stories about bitter enemies being mutually horrible. Usually nothing good comes of it.

[00:47:00] But sometimes, sometimes, you get soul singers, James Brown and Joe Tex or 17th century nun, Sor Juana and the entire Catholic church duking it out and dramatically changing our world. On Beef with Bridget Todd, we tell the stories of those petty feuds behind some of the greatest art,

[00:47:18] innovation and global events. Listen to Beef wherever you get your podcasts. All right, supersize this. Supersized AI, I guess. I don't think so. This one from The Verge McDonald's will reportedly remove, yes, you heard that, remove the AI from over 100 restaurant drive-throughs after partnering with IBM,

[00:47:42] you might've heard of them, in 2021. Although it's not clear why Mickey D's is ending the IBM deal. It told Restaurant Business Magazine, it was testing whether the voice ordering chat bot could speed up service and that the test left it confident,

[00:48:02] left them confident that a voice ordering solution for drive-through will be a part of our restaurant's future end quote. But it sounds like IBM's chat bot got stale under the heat lamps. Joel, McDonald's reportedly has 14,000 franchise locations in the US alone.

[00:48:22] So 100 locations was really kind of like a sample size, small sample size. Do you think there's another AI powerhouse waiting in the wings for this contract? Honestly, I wouldn't surprise if they were just building in house at this point. Like, I mean, I like, There's no way.

[00:48:38] You don't think so? Like a small McDonald's AI business. No. They're gonna have a vendor do it, I guarantee you. There's no way that McDonald's, the burger place is gonna be doing AI. They've switched from focusing on Big Macs to just now they're an AI company.

[00:48:56] No, look, I mean, that technology, I mean, even in that article, it said the technology is not going away. It makes a lot of sense. So I wonder if they just tested it out. Maybe they're getting some of the glitches out of the way, but yeah.

[00:49:09] I mean, I can't imagine that they're not gonna roll out another vendor or someone else is gonna take that business. I just, I haven't been in McDonald's for years, but I do remember last time I went, the AI would have done a lot better

[00:49:22] just with the whole process. I just, there's no doubt in my mind. I'm excited. I love that. I love the voice technology too with AI. Like some of the emergent use cases for it are great. And I think this one makes a lot of sense.

[00:49:36] Yeah, no, it's really cool. I remember working the Burger King drive-through when I was a teenager. And compared to all of the other jobs in fast food, I fucking love that job. So it kind of sucks that the human interaction is really gonna be taken away

[00:49:51] because that's what that is. I don't know. I think it's gonna happen. There's no question. You take a look at McDonald's. They've gone to the touch screens and you order from a touch screen and then you go pick up

[00:50:02] and who knows they might have a Flippy in the back doing fries and burgers. And then they have AI doing that. I mean, that's really what they're looking to do is come to a self-contained automated restaurant where you have very little human interaction whatsoever

[00:50:19] which to me is not a great experience but it's fucking McDonald's man. I mean, it's not a great experience anyway. I think it's sad in some ways but what I have noticed across the board I think because of those other things

[00:50:34] we were talking about earlier with like low pay and all of the things that come with retail, I think you end up with just nowadays a better experience when a lot less headaches and then you get with a real person because I think in those jobs right now,

[00:50:52] people aren't taking ownership. And I think this is just something that's just shifted in society. When you look at people who have a lot of the jobs unfortunately that burned out, they're not getting paid a lot of money. There's inflation going on. It's usually just a crazy environment

[00:51:08] and I think as a customer, it makes a lot of sense. Even though it's sad that you have that human interaction at the end of the day I don't know if I'm necessarily going to McDonald's for the human interaction anyway. I'm going there for the quick food.

[00:51:20] It's just debts there. Whereas like a fine dining experience is a whole different thing, right? Trans fats, baby, trans fats. That's what it's all about. I'm going there to get fat. That's why I'm going. But it's, yeah, I think it makes a lot of sense.

[00:51:34] And this is where I think recruitment industry as a whole like if you can take orders for food, maybe there's some things in recruitment that some of this voice AI technology can do as well. Oh yeah, yeah. No, it's coming out and it's coming out fast.

[00:51:49] I gotta say Joel, thanks for coming on to the show. Filling in for Cheeseman this week. If somebody wants to find you the podcast wherever, where would you send them? I just go to my website, therealistrecruiter.com. Podcast pops up right away

[00:52:06] and I know my socials are linked to that as well. So come find me guys. Thanks for having me on. And yeah, I'm excited to see you guys too at RecFest coming up soon. So see you soon in real life again. Can't wait.

[00:52:19] Hey, well, and listener, next week Joel will be back behind the mic with I'm sure a Chipotle burrito bowl and a smile. Oh my God, I'm a Chipotle. Chipotle is my wife. We out. Thank you for listening to what's it called? A podcast, the chat, the cheese. Brilliant.

[00:52:43] They talk about recruiting. They talk about technology. But most of all, they talk about nothing. Just a lot of shout outs of people you don't even know and yet you're listening. It's incredible. And not one word about cheese. Not one. Cheddar, blue, nacho, pepper jack, Swiss.

[00:53:03] So many cheeses and not one word. So weird. Anywho, be sure to subscribe today on iTunes, Spotify, Google Play or wherever you listen to your podcasts. That way you won't miss an episode. And while you're at it, visit www.chatcheese.com.

[00:53:26] Just don't expect to find any recipes for grilled cheese. It's so weird. We out. How much do you understand the future of finance? I'm Jim Roos, a top 10 banking influencer and host of the podcast Banking Transform, where we dive deeply into the rapidly evolving world

[00:53:46] of banking and financial technology. Join me as I interview industry experts, thought leaders and innovators as they unravel the latest banking trends, disruptions and game changing technologies reshaping the world of finance. Redefine your understanding of the banking ecosystem. Subscribe now to Banking Transform,

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