July 10, 2025 • 58 mins
Tim Armstrong joins the show for a deep and thoughtful conversation covering the future of healthcare, the impact of AI, and what global workforce trends mean for all of us. From military technology and nurse recruitment to immigration challenges and travel experiences, Whether you're curious about the nursing shortage, healthcare quality around the world, or how technology is shaping the future of work, this episode delivers valuable takeaways for a wide audience.
(0:00) Introduction to AI, History, and Military Technology
(3:08) Navy Submarines and Modern Tech
(3:48) Introducing Tim Armstrong
(5:08) Global Nurse Recruitment
(8:02) Analyzing the Nurse Shortage
(11:37) AI in Healthcare
(17:09) The Role of Sleep in Health
(19:03) Nurse Recruitment as a Career
(20:10) Immigration Challenges in Nursing
(22:14) Global Hotspots for Nursing Talent
(25:02) Hospital Concerns About International Nurses
(26:50) Visa Sponsorship in Nursing Recruitment
(29:07) Tackling Human Trafficking in Nursing
(31:22) Benefits of Sponsoring Organizations
(32:22) Tim Armstrong's International Career Insights
(34:41) Recruitment Differentiation Strategies
(37:02) Recruitment Competitors and Verticals
(40:29) Personal Anecdotes from Tim Armstrong
(45:31) Healthcare Quality Comparisons
(48:00) Water Safety and Travel Health
(51:15) The Effects of International Nurse Recruitment
(55:42) Culinary Experiences Post-Travel
- The United States faces a critical nursing shortage projected to reach up to a million nurses by 2030 due to retiring baby boomers and an overburdened education system.
- International nurses from countries like The Philippines, India, Nigeria, and Ghana, who are often already trained in U.S. standards and English, represent a significant untapped resource to mitigate the nursing shortfall.
- Sponsoring international nurses can provide a more stable and long-term solution for healthcare facilities compared to domestic hires, who often have higher turnover rates due to better offers or work-life balance issues.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I've seen some, creators overseas that are, using robots in AI for training. Right? Most of the nursing schools nowadays, are when the nurses go out to the lab or the practicum, they're actually training on some of the mannequins or dummies or dolls, that they are really good with veins and working arteries and crazy stuff like that. But I've also seen, I've seen a developer in, Dubai that's developed a virtual space, that's a a virtual clinic or hospital environment with a virtual patient where the, the nurse, actually wears goggles and actually, can see this patient and actually perform, on the patient. But nothing beats, you know, a live patient, but
(00:01):
we don't wanna train our students. We don't want to experiment on our students. Four scores, and that's all I remember. Did you ever have to memorize what was that? The Gettysburg Address?
Is that what that was?
I don't think I had to memorize that. I guess that was a good thing for us growing up in the Western New York, Buffalo area. You know, it wasn't so history driven as it is here in Virginia.
That's true. In some
cases, though, I wish I would have learned more about the history because when I do go to things, it's always interesting to to learn something new that
Agreed. But I'll put it like this. I was too stubborn and and dumb kid to, like, care about those things. But now I
was I I that would have been me as well.
Yeah. Because, like, when I like, I I still think our area should and I know we have Nautikus in Wisconsin and stuff like that. I still think we should have a better museum than we do for the military.
Oh, for the military?
Yeah. And, like, when I go to places like that like, I remember the time I walked through the Wisconsin. Oh, I cannot believe people do this. Like, people live on these things for months. I was like,
this
is crazy. And so just to, like, I think you appreciate it more as you as you
age. I think for me was I think last year, I was able to go take a tour of submarine, and that was like, dude.
Okay.
That's, that's some close quarters.
Could not do it.
Yeah. That would get
I have nightmares about the closeness things sometimes.
Oh, do you?
I think I have that fear.
Mhmm.
(00:22):
But, like, on a in a hotel, I'm okay. But in a cruise,
I'm okay. Fine.
But think because you just realize how low you are. And is there a pressure thing in those things? They have, like, the
I mean, so I was told back in the day so I used to work with a Submariner, and, you know, and he claimed that if you went down deep enough and if you had a clothesline from one end to the other and you had it taut, and then if you went down, the pressure would there would then some slack would then enter that clothesline because Oh, wow. The pressure being so significant. I don't know what to what extent. It might have been very small. I don't really know.
But still, to your point
There's a Netflix documentary. I haven't watched it yet. But about this the the boat that was trying to go to the Titanic that disappeared, They're using a PlayStation controller as the
Well, the crazy thing is is that that that the navy uses that in their submarines for the Periscope.
Oh, a PlayStation controller?
Yeah.
Interesting.
Think about how much cheaper that is than
I mean, six months.
Kids know how to use it.
That's true. It's true. Now we transition from something that has nothing to do with today's.
Just as big as a problem, just in a different, hard right turn.
Tim Anderson Armstrong. I don't know why.
Don't let the name fool you.
Tim Armstrong. How's it going, dude?
Pretty good, my man. How about yourself?
Pretty good. What kind of headphones are those? I I'm digging those.
These are some generics I ordered off of Amazon, as a cheap alternative to my more Plantronics, my more expensive Plantronics. But the the earpieces were molting, and so my wife made the little baby bonnets to go on top of them. And so I told her, you you should sell those.
(00:43):
She should. Yeah. Yeah. Find out, you know, find out somehow, I'm sure there's a way for you to scrape who was ever bought that thing or looked at it.
Right.
And then send them an ad that says, hey.
Are you you have a multi?
That's cool. So, introduced to you via Chris Tillett of the, city of Portsmouth economic development. Mhmm. Really, I think that's what I think that's how, if I recall.
Yeah. Tim and I have run-in the same circles with Star Peninsula and B Force. And
Oh, cool.
So we've run some in the same circuit from that standpoint. So it's it's great to see that you're still charging ahead with the business. Tell us a
little bit about what it is that you're doing.
Well, our core business is recruiting nurses. We, we absolutely love nurses, and, we're recruiters, the whole team of us. We're a bunch of knucklehead, HR folks that have recruited overseas for fifteen years or more and another ten years in The US. And so we decided to fill a a niche, right, to fill the niche of the the shortfall of nurses in the job market here in The US. And it's not a shortfall that could be met organically.
I often get the questions, why can't we fill the job with Americans? Because we're recruiting nurses from overseas. And the the the quick answer is we don't have enough.
So, Tim, if someone and how is it currently in America if someone like, for a a a US student or someone that is pursuing nursing, how long does that process take as opposed to the overseas track?
Yep. Takes weeks or months. Usually, the nursing programs can last anywhere, from, six to eighteen months. It depends on what track and course they take or what school they they go to and any previous prerequisite, classes that they might have. And then it's just a matter of signing up for your nursing board exam, getting those results back in about thirty days, and then you just go and press forward and get a job.
Usually, nurses in The United States will already have a job by the time they take their nursing exam. A lot of nurses have, employment opportunities before they even graduate because they're doing their practicums and and their, on the job training and, what we call OJT. Yep. In hospitals Training. Yeah.
In a hospital setting that, or clinical setting that they're gonna work in. So it's it's fairly easy. You're not gonna find an unemployed or a nursing student in The US. They won't be hard pressed for work. And if you do have a a unemployed nurse in The US, run.
Good advice. If we take away anything from the show, that might be it.
Run run fast. Okay.
That's right.
So I've noticed this too. Like, when I go to my vet, they have a shortage of of veterinarians in there too. And it sounds like there's a a shortage of this from the from the nurses aspect in hospitals and
and Quick aside. Do you know that it's much harder to go through veterinary school than it is to become
It's, like, seven it's at least seven years.
(01:04):
Well yeah. And you have to learn, like, the the body. You need to learn all of the animal systems as opposed to a doctor. You just have to learn the human system. So from that standpoint, the vet side is a lot more difficult and longer, which is Alright.
Okay.
So but why is there a shortage of these individuals where I mean, it seems like decent paying jobs. I mean, is it a stress thing? Is it like, why why are they so hard to fund?
Yeah. It's it's it's all of the above. It's, we have the largest segment of our population, which are baby boomers. They're retiring at the same time, and, they are retiring and needing geriatric care. And guess, what, population is in that geriatric population, nurses.
So you have a issue that's compounding or stacking upon each other. Plus, you have the nursing schools. They're at capacity. I I hear some numbers like 100, 200, 3% capacity with enrollment. So we're starting to see more and more nurses tools come online and more and more hospitals starting to, have their own nurse training programs.
You have, nurses who are just getting exhausted and just quitting and just leaving, because there's so much so much pressure. So it's just a compounded problem that's coming in from four different directions.
What, I never thought that I would even say the phrase, but, like, what what do the the charts look like in terms of before the curve is kinda flattened? You know? Like, you like, to your point, age continues to go up. Job market, you know, that's only growing as fast as the population. You know, like, what is it gonna take, and how many nurses until there's an adequate number?
The number is insanely high. We we we we there's estimates that we'll have a million nurse shortage, by the end of this decade. But there are a lot of measures being taken to to mitigate that. But, if it doesn't get to the million, it will be, several 100,000, as low as 750,000 nurses shortage in The US by 2030. It's it's really rough.
I mean, I think we walked into 2024 need needing several 100,000, and, of course, it only goes up in in 2025 because of the the age of the baby boomers. My parents are baby boomers. My, mom and dad are 74, 75. My stepdad is 82, and, they're all needing some sort of, some sort of care.
Yeah. It's crazy. I just like my first career was in TV news, and the way I describe it is imagine meeting someone on the worst day of their life every single day. Mhmm. And that's usually just one person.
You know, you go to a hospital, they're seeing that not only every day, but multiple times a day.
Right.
I I cannot imagine the emotion that you have to have and then figure out how to just, like, remove it out so that you can handle it. Like
Yeah. It's it's definitely is a career field not cut out for not everybody can do it.
The faint of heart, if you will. Yeah. I mean,
I got a lot of respect for nurses. They they really go through it because part of my interview process is interviewing. How do you deal with families? Because you have to deal with the patients, the doctors, and, of course, the families, and that can be rough.
Yeah. And it's the other thing, you you've got you this is a field that you cannot make mistakes. I mean, like, even being right 99.9% of the time is still not good enough.
Right. You only remember for the one time you messed it up.
Oh, yeah. And, well, which can be I mean, that could cost someone
their life. Yeah.
It cost someone their life, cost you your freedom, your career. Right?
(01:25):
And you're gonna be thinking about your entire life too. Right? You're gonna live with that, and that that part can't be crazy. So are I mean, are you seeing a lot the robots in AI take over this field? Is that do you think we're getting to that at all, or where where do you see that?
No. I see, I I've seen some, creators overseas that are, using robots in AI for training. Right? Most of the nursing schools nowadays, are when the nurses go out to the lab or the practicum, they're actually training on some of the mannequins or dummies or dolls, that they are really good with veins and working arteries and crazy stuff like that. But I've also seen, I've seen a developer in Dubai that's developed a virtual space, that's a a virtual clinic or hospital environment with a virtual patient where the, the nurse, actually wears goggles and actually can see this patient and actually perform, on the patient.
But nothing beats, you know, a live patient, but
we don't wanna train our students. We don't want to experiment on our students. I remember, when I was
a kid, though, we would be treated at the Naval Hospital here in Portsmouth, and all of my doctors were all interns. So we were being practiced on every single day. But, I don't see AI taking over where the human component is most vital. I see AI taking over in the technical areas and in the areas where, there could be some sort of instruction or, some sort of technical competence building.
And I would think that, like, smart beds and mattresses that can take vitals would also help with the workload so that the nurses don't have to do so many things as they're making their rounds from bed to bed. You're seeing a
lot of that. Of course, I thought it was really groovy, you know, fifteen, twenty years ago when we saw beds so they could actually weigh the patient. But now you have beds that can actually roll the patient up and get them situated in the bed and can tilt to the left or right and do some really interesting things, bed alarms in case someone gets out of the bed. And I have not seen vitals, but, but the beds are measuring other statistics, in charting for that patient.
I mean, it's just like you know, my my bed that I have, I just I have a shout out to sleep aid. I have a mattress cover. But, I mean, that will may it will heat. It will cool. It measures my respiratory rate.
It measures my my heart rate variance. I mean, it's, like, all those. And I get a report every day in terms of, you know, like, how everything is all over time. Heat your bed? That's Heat?
Yeah.
Oh, dude. In the wintertime getting into a warm bed? Oh, baby. I
don't know that I can handle that. So you know what's interesting is, like, I remember the first time I ever put on this thing on Oculus is this is probably 2012, 2013. I got super dizzy. And I was like, I don't get this. It was a playing game.
It was at Maker Faire at the scope. And then fast forward, like, I don't know, two, three years later, a company from Seattle was in town doing demos in my kid to our office, and it was, like, construction training. And I was like, oh, I get it. Yeah. And then so now I just I've been watching I'm a a DC commanders fan, and they say that Jayden Daniels, the quarterback, he puts on the the goggles, and he gets, like, reps that way.
And so that he gets so much again, it's not the real thing, but it's it's closer than ever before. And it's just interesting how that training aspect is giving you so many more reps, which is ultimately what you want, right, is you want your your people who are fixing you to have as much practice as possible. And so that's that's cool that that's how they're looking, how you're seeing the the training aspect of that going to
It's like pilots being in the simulator.
Same thing. Right.
Right?
Right. And race car drivers run it doing the track before they do it.
Do they simulate the g's in that too?
In the
I would imagine that would be the hardest thing.
(01:46):
For simulators? Although they use a yeah. They use a centrifuge or some sort of device that turns them to practices g's because you have to get into a physical device and get swung around the room to pull those g's on you. But, the simulator, the pilot simulator and these are mostly commercial aircraft. The know, they're it pitches.
It rolls. It lifts. It it simulates drag like a pilot would feel in in an airplane, but not the g's.
I correct myself. It is eight sleep is my
What did you say?
That's I said I think I said sleep eight, but it's eight sleep.
Why is it called that?
I think to get your eight hours, I'm guessing, would be the Yeah.
At my age, eight hours is a luxury.
I think I got I got eight hours and one minute last night. And
No. It's not getting
eight hours. Sleep. A beautiful thing.
I'm looking right now. I I mean, people are like, oh, I get five hours. I'm like, Like
Dude, sleep is a you know, they
Necessity.
It is a lot more important than what people It's the key to making it healthy.
It really is. You cannot have life igniting enough sleep.
That's what they say you do all your growth.
Yeah.
Yep. My wife and I just got blackout blinds, and I'm one that wakes up with the sun.
Mhmm. Not anymore.
And I don't. And it's really been creeping me out. Like, I've been sleeping a lot longer, and I'm not getting that, like, that bolt coming in. Stimulation.
(02:07):
Yeah.
And I'm like I look at my watch sometimes, and I'm like, oh, it's probably, like, 05:45. And I don't even wanna tell you guys what number is on my watch when I see this sometimes. Yeah. I'm like, wow. Like, I'm not going to bed later.
Right.
But I'm getting, like, ninety two hours extra sleep, but I used to get eight hours of sleep. So I'm like, damn. This
I I freak out if I wake up in the sun is shining. I I've got to get up before
I got 07:51 last night.
Oh, congratulations. Pretty close.
Yeah. Yeah. I, man, I haven't seen eight hours in a in a minute. Yeah. We got a lot of stuff on our plate right now, Tim, that we're working for.
I pray for eight hours. And, man, if I wake up, as you you know, to do to go to the bathroom, and then my mind starts going, and it's just all over.
Yeah. You're done. Oh, you'll start working in that?
Well, no. My mind will start working, and then I have to, like, go through and try to calm it back down to to to fall back asleep.
Do you have, like, a thing?
I'll I'll typically throw on a podcast or something. And That's what
works for me. Podcast. Yeah.
I always think, like, when I don't think I'm sleeping, I actually am. I'm I'm
actually Those are the worst. Those are the worst nights.
According to the watch, I am getting sleep. I'm like, well, this a freaking I yeah.
I'm with you.
What are we doing?
You're laying enough.
There's some documentation on what we're actually thinking in that time that some, you know, brain scientists figured out, like,
(02:28):
oh, this is what's
the matter with you, and this is when this is happening. Mhmm. So what made you get to this field, Tim?
The need. Right? So, and it was like an epiphany. I I think, one of my partners and I, I think we were sitting in India, on on a trip, because we're still trying to figure out exactly what what we wanted to do. And, or we were so I think may maybe we're in Kuwait, and we saw a bunch of nurses, and I went, hang on.
Wait a minute. Why don't we recruit nurses? Then we did some research and found out that there's a huge niche. Went to India and they were, oh, yeah. These are nurses.
Right? Yeah. Because we have a lot of Asian countries that are graduating, US qualified nurses in the droves. And, the biggest problem that we're having these days with, with getting enough nurses because there are enough nurses, around the globe, that are US qualified and, of course, proficient in English that that that can fill our need. But, unfortunately, we we have a antiquated integration I'm sorry, antiquated immigration system that just doesn't allow it, and it's just incredibly stupid how we immigrate here in in our country.
And that's not that's apolitical. Right?
Well, I agree. I mean, like, this is something that while everything in this world seems to quickly become politicized, this is not a political issue.
No. It has nothing to do with, who's in office. It's the it's the same bad system no matter what.
I mean, we should be recruiting the best and brightest Right. Always. And I've worked in countries where they do. I mean, I I've I've been recruited,
to places like Saudi Arabia where they needed my talent as a human resources practitioner, and it's fast. Yeah. I was able to immigrate myself and get my work visa within, I think, forty five to sixty days. And then once I got mine done, I got my wife and my children done in thirty days. You know, to get my own wife here in in my country, It took my wife got denied three different times.
I had to hire a lawyer and go through a process of getting my wife to my own my own country, my own wife. It's kinda ridiculous when I could've I could get my wife into Saudi Arabia in thirty days. Just just think about that, how ridiculous it is. And I've worked for The United Arab Emirates. I went I worked for one of their paragovernment organizations and had to go through a background check and security clearance to work for their government.
Thirty day process. Right? And so as soon as I got cleared, I was able to get my bring my family in on a visit visa and convert the visit visa to a residency visa, in three days. And so there are countries that are hard to get into that have demonstrated that we can be safe and secure, go through a a really decent, granular process within a short amount of time to make sure that we get the best and brightest in our country. And I've worked in those countries because I had a talent that they wanted and and was able to get in.
So, with with all those countries, what are the top countries that you, currently recruit from, and what are the requirements? I would imagine speaking English being one of them, but what are the countries, and what are the things that you're looking for?
Wow. Okay. So we'll start with the the top countries. The the the country that has the highest passage rate of the NCLEX, which is The US nursing exam, is The Philippines. I mean and they, hands down, for for a long, long time, have been the the, the top performer with NCLEX.
And so, of course, The Philippines is very attractive to us, and we target The Philippines. And India is number two. Philippines, they they India, they they take turns, with number one. Usually, three terms threes, three quarters out of the year, it's, The Philippines. One quarter out of the year is India.
But, we found a rich gold mine in places like Nigeria and Ghana where they're really graduating, US qualified nurses who have a profession who have a, I'm sorry, proficiency in English. Now, they're taking the English exam as demonstrated, through through a paper exam in in a exam facility, and they do it according to The US, standards, based on, whatever the state department has set for one particular year or so. But there are several English exams that any foreign national can take that the US embassy will accept as a part of their their visa processing. And now, we're finding most countries it's very rare that we find a country that does not chart in English. That's very important because our nurses are charting patient progress progress notes or charting in English, and nowadays, we're finding more and more of them that are charting digitally.
And believe it or not, some of those countries are using a a US charting system like Epic. If you go on to CVS or one of the local hospitals in the Hampton Roads area, you'll see that they use something called MyChart. And so I'm finding there are several hospitals, especially in The Middle East, that are using, EPIC, as a charting system. So these nurses are well immersed into, a US style of of, nursing and charting, using English. And you got hospitals in The Middle East, like Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi, and you have, Cedars Sinai, and you have, the Mayo Clinic as well, in in the in The UAE.
All of these are managed by their US counterparts. Although it's staffed with a lot of foreign nationals, but it's managed by The US counterparts. And you get these nurses that are well ready, to come to The US. Did I answer your full question, Tim?
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's just because I'm sure that, people listening to the show are there. They're gonna wanna wonder, you know, yeah, people like to come up with objections.
You know? So knowing that they pass the exams, have the right education, certifications, speak English, are trained on the same platforms. You know? So that is comforting for the potential patients or family members of patients. On the other side of the equation, what kind of pushback from hospitals are you getting, or what is there any objections that you face as to I would think that anyone with a nursing shortage would be lined up to talk to you.
What are the objections that you may get? I
(02:49):
one one of our frustrations is, are the objections of the amount of time that it takes, the cost that is involved. And, my my strategy is to get the hospital or the clinic to think to forward think. You know? And and I I told my clients, listen. I can feel your nursing shortage today.
I can I can find your nurses here in The US domestically? That's no problem. But they're gonna turn over. The the turnover rate for nurses is increasingly high because, you know, you got other hospitals and clinics and medical facilities that are, giving better deals. Location, schedules, pay.
I mean, nurses really want a, work life balance that is normal, but but it's really difficult given their profession. But they will move, and they're they're very mobile, especially in a post COVID environment. So the pushback is really frustrating because I want to just ring their necks. I want to just just scream at the top of my voice and say, hey. Listen, dummy.
Don't do not record that. And say, hey. Listen. Why don't you think about the next three years? Why don't you let me solve your nursing problem for the next decade with a sponsored nurse who is more likely to bring their family and settle than a nurse that's gonna pop all around?
And that's the difference between the international nurse and the domestic nurse.
So, yeah, with that, the question that popped into my mind is who so who pays for the sponsorship of the nurse, and what what per can that nurse then shop around for a different offer and then leave, or is are they tied to that hiring organization for a certain amount of time? How how does that work? Okay. Yeah. So the sponsor of the visa is usually the employer.
We we're not sponsoring nurses at at this point, but we should be by the end of the year.
Pays for the, pays for the visa fees, the the immigration fees, everything that's associated with that include travel. And then that nurse, is now, gonna go to work for that employer. Now depending on the visa type, we can do we can figure out whether that nurse is gonna shop around a bit. Now we're bringing our our biggest client right now is bringing nurses in on the e b three visa. Now that is a green card visa from day one for that that nurse and that nurse's family to come.
And, sir, the nurse literally could get on get on the airplane, come here to The US, get off the airplane, and tell the sponsor, yep. Nope. Not gonna work for you. I'm gonna go work across the street for your competitor. Bye bye.
You know, after that, sponsors probably put up upwards to maybe, 10 to $20,000 investment into that nurse. Now if that nurse comes in on, like, an h one b visa, then that nurse is tied to that employer and cannot move to another employer unless that employer sponsors the h one b visa. So whether that nurse has the freedom and liberty to shop around will be based on that visa.
And and so and I would assume that businesses doing the hiring would wanna reduce their risk as much as they can?
Yeah. I would prefer, an h one b, at least for the first two years so that the employee can recoup the cost. But we have a lot of problems with human trafficking and employers that employers that just do bad stuff. And so, you know, from the very beginning, we were very cognizant of of, human trafficking, and so we select our our, our clients of very That
is wild.
Yeah. It it is wild. And and there are a lot of foreign nurses who are nurse advocates now or nurses who are who are being I want I don't wanna use the word enslaved, but sometimes it feels like enslavement, but more like an indentured servitude. And so there's more than one way to collect debt in The United States other than hoping someone through a visa.
I don't know. I guess me as a person and, Zach, I know you're the same way. I I just I always assume the best intentions out of everyone. I mean, that just that I do my mind is just blown.
It is pretty hard to believe. You're like, what? Like
I can't believe there's not, like, a TV show that's been done on this. You know? Like, how there
probably is.
Or will be soon. But my gosh. I mean, that my mind is just really I had no idea. Yeah.
It's it's it's it's frustrating for me because we have to find the balance, you know, when this sponsor makes a significant investment because, you know, Tim, I've I've been recruited and and mobilized to other countries, and, they spend a lot of money getting me and my family there, and they expect a two to three year commitment. And, you know, I've I've signed these contracts where there's at least, at least, two years commitment. And that's just to ensure that the company gets gets a ROI. You know, they're investing in me and my talent. And so I don't shop around.
And if I did, then I know that, if if I don't complete my first year, then I'm gonna have to repay my mobilization fees. And that's something I don't wanna pay. And we've had nurses to come here to The US who did not want to stay with their employer for many reasons, and some of it were justifiable because of the working conditions, work hours, or breach of contract or something like that, but you still have an obligation to pay. And so we have to find that balance. How do we make sure that we are bringing nurses over here and that we're completely compliant with all global human trafficking regulations, that we're treating our our our nurses with the utmost respect, giving them the great opportunity to, to participate in the American dream.
(03:10):
And yet everyone abides by their contract, including sponsor
and employer. So with that, what is the, the reasoning or why you are moving towards being the sponsoring organization? Why why are you moving your business in that direction?
For for us, it is gonna be a lot easier to make sure that we can get nurses into a clinical setting ex expeditiously. Right?
Mhmm.
So if we're sponsoring a nurse, the the plan is to, batch hire 10 to 15 nurses, house them here, in the area, in the Hampton Roads area, and be able to quickly mobilize qualified registered nurses, to our clients, in in the area and and outside of the area as well. If we have to put them on a plane and fly them out to another state, we'll do it and use them more like a travel nurse. But the idea is to make sure that we can mobilize and get nurses to our clients, in an expeditious manner, which is for us, it's just more revenue, more sales. You
said you grew up here?
Yep. I was, born at Norfolk General, just down the road here and, grew up in Chesapeake. I was a military kid, so we bounced around just a little bit, but I graduated from Indian River, then, North State University. And then, after college, I started to move around because I was working in retail, and I got my first human resource job in retail.
Interesting. How long did you do all that for, that style of career?
Wow. So I got my first HR job out of college in 1995, and I started recruiting for a, for a retailer based in in the Southeast Of The United States. And then as a recruiter, you just kinda bounce around a bit. I drag my family all over the country. My mother calls me a gypsy, rightly so.
So in 02/2004, I was working for a major national retailer doing quite well. Did not see the career progression that I, that I thought I deserved and earned. And then so I kinda rolled the dice and started working. I applied for an army contract position in Kuwait on Camp Nerfjord. You know, everyone thought I was absolutely insane.
And when I took off from Minneapolis headed over the Atlantic Ocean, I thought I was insane.
I feel like I've have called you a gypsy, to be honest. But, you
know Yeah.
Insane gypsy, whatever.
Yeah. Yeah. An insane gypsy. That works. And so I, I went to Kuwait on a one year contract.
I came back ten years later to The United States. Went to Washington, worked for an international organization there. Again, recruiting and mobilizing, pushing people all over the world. Did that based in in Washington for a few years and went back overseas to to to The Middle East and did it for a few more years.
Tim, I don't know about you, but do you do you get a lot of, like, recruit messages, like, in your inbox?
I don't. I I mean, every once in a while, I'll get one. But, yeah, it's not not so important.
Whenever I see these, though, I'm like, okay. Like, I don't know why you guys are sending me this. But, like, what's your strategy? Is there one to, like, stand out from that perspective? Because I think there's so many people are getting so much to, like, information.
They're being bombarded. And it's like, how do you make sure that they see yours and you don't look like some of these other
Which is a pet peeve. You know, my pet peeve is getting these recruiting, messages in my inbox. Tim, we've reviewed your resume, and you qualify for a job in a warehouse in your area. It's quite funny. And these are just absolutely lazy recruiters, and I I've gone through.
(03:31):
I've managed.
Mean, do you even have a resume anymore? Like, I don't. Like
Yes. Yes. It's all
Well, like so I get that, and I'm like, a resume. Like
Well, that's it's it's all laziness. It's just a cut and paste email that is sent out to you. There's no way that you re reviewed my resume because I didn't post it anywhere. I didn't apply for a job. And so I get a lot of people that always send me emails.
To Tim. I got this message from a recruiter. They wanna make me an offer. I went, did you apply for the job? No.
Did you interview for the job? No. Do you have an offer letter? Then how are they offering you a job? And so you have to meet those three criteria, at least two or three of those two of three of those criteria in order to, at least get to the the offer stage.
And so what what we do is we go out, and we purposely hang out where nurses hang out. Right? We engage with nurses in social media spaces. We join groups, and we just participate in the conversation, making ourselves known for who we are and what we do. And then when we see an opportunity, we will run a targeted ad in that particular group.
Or, of course, LinkedIn is where I hang out, because because, you know, I'm
a Gen Xer, and I don't know any better.
But, it's a great place to link up with other professionals and be seen as a professional. This is Tim, a real guy, a real person who wants to engage with you. And so I don't go for the for the hard sell right away, which I had to learn over time. And that is, you know, just reach out to the nurse, build the relationship, talk talk to them about their, their location or their specialty or maybe an article that they post. And, you know, you begin the the, the conversation there, and then you grow that relationship into this is what we do.
And we have a client that would be interested in talking to you. And so we we just don't jump in and send these very cold emails, and it's it's quite a pet peeve of mine. We try to Yeah. Cultivate and enter the relationship warmly. What are the
what are their verticals are there in the recruiting space?
Break that down for me, Tim.
So, like, verdict so, like, you're in the the nursing vertical. Is there any other recruiters that specialize in a certain industry? I know that you have, what what is it, ladders that does 100,000 job $100,000 a year or more, but, like, yeah, there's not any that come to mind in terms of, like, do you have any competition or, you know, who are you competing with?
Yeah. We we we compete with, two firms, here, one in the Tidewater area and one in Northern Virginia that specifically recruit international nurses primarily from India and The Philippines. So we we've identified those, and then we've identified some some of the bigger boys. And I'll talk about the verticals in a minute, but I wanna talk about my competitors for just one second. And so, you know, I think, our our unique selling point is that my team is is a team full of recruiters who this is not our first job.
You know, we have, more gray hair than we'd like to admit. And, that we've done this job for many different sectors and many different employers in many different countries. So I'm sitting here in in in Portsmouth, Virginia, but I've sat in Kuwait and pulled people from all around the globe, put them in Kuwait. Same thing in when I was in Saudi Arabia, when I was in Bahrain, when I was in Abu Dhabi, the same thing. We're always moving people around the from around the globe to a specific place for a specific, job.
And our competitors can't say that they've done that. You know, our competitors may have one or two people on staff. They have a limited amount of experience. But this experience of my team, sitting in different global, seats around the world and pulling people from all around the globe and pushing them out to even third countries. Because when I was in Abu Dhabi, my remit was, most of Southeast Asia, you know, including Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, and The Philippines.
And so we were even from Abu Dhabi, I was able to move maybe a person from Malaysia to Thailand or from Singapore, to Jakarta, Indonesia. And so we we come with a bunch of experience that our competitors just don't have. And I'll make a I bet a nickel to a fat lady that I could stand up against the the biggest boys on the block when it comes to actual real world experience of sitting in these places and actually having people on our team who speak English as a second language or even a third language who has done the very same thing that I've done. Now when it comes to verticals, we're just talking about sectors and silos of recruiting. Before I came to work here in medical, I specialize in oil and gas, and I specialize in, construction and design and engineering.
Now I specialize in recruiting. And these are very niche, niche sectors of recruiting that requires different types of skill sets. And, you know, I've been able to adapt, and and I'm more of a universal recruiter now because I've Mhmm. I've worked in so many different verticals or or sectors, so to speak, but in different cultural environments, different, different linguistic environments, and, different countries.
Interesting. To a lot of places. Yeah. Is there a place that you haven't been to that you wanna go to? Because, I mean, it's like Wow.
(03:52):
I wanna go to Burma.
I do wanna go to Laos. Haven't been there and have not conquered the continent Of Africa. I've learned through DNA that my family heritage is mostly Nigerian. 80% West African, but 30% Nigerian, so I need to get back to the motherland and kiss the ground just one time. So but but in my in my imagination, I believe that there's some sort of a tribe in Nigeria that's missing their crown prince, and I need to go and fulfill that role.
I mean,
I get those emails. But I
didn't send them. Oh, that was
good. But, yeah, they
they I I'd love to visit to I'd love to visit Ghana. I visited North Africa, but not Sub Saharan Africa. Wanna visit Ghana for sure. Nigeria for sure. Eswatini.
What DNA test did you do?
23 and Me.
Did they disclose? Did I hear that?
Was it Yeah. They went bankrupt, but I think someone I think they got bailed out.
They from Yeah. Someone someone acquired them.
Yeah.
Yeah. I think the big yeah. The biggest challenge with that business model is you pay for the kit once and then, you know, and that's it. There's no reoccurring revenue after that.
Yeah. But it works for us because you you you find yeah. You know, when you start shaking your, your family tree, strange fruit falls out.
Yeah. So you better get it. And once 23 and me, what came on board, so even strangers, fruit Yeah. Yeah.
Don't do that. But but interestingly enough Yeah. It sounds enough, I was able to pinpoint because my last name is Armstrong. Right? And I don't Armstrong is Scottish Irish.
I don't look Scottish Irish. And so and so we we we said that that was probably a name of a family that owned my family, here in Hampton Roads. I was able to trace my last name as, for for as far back as the early eighteen hundreds here in in in Chesapeake. They used to call this the Washington, District Of Virginia. But I was able to pinpoint somewhere in in a in a couple of years where my Irish descent started.
And so you could see, okay. This is where it happened. This is where I have, I have a 10% Caucasian, in my blood. And so I found exactly where on the timeline that was. And so, okay.
Well, we know that, we were enslaved by that particular family, and then that particular family's DNA got into my my family's DNA, and that's where I where I picked up. But you also get some very interesting, historical DNA results. Like, I I share the same maternal DNA as as Nessa Mandela, and I share the same paternal DNA as one of the Egyptian pharaohs. I think it's Xerxes. One of the Maybe you are that prince.
I keep telling my wife, you know, I I I should be called his highness or his imminence, but it doesn't work. Wow.
(04:13):
So how do you do that research to to track dates and stuff like that? Because that's that's sounds pretty interesting.
That that's part of your report.
Oh, have you heard on it, Tim?
I don't I guess I have not dug in that deep. Uh-huh. It'll be interesting to take a look, though.
It is an expensive test? I'm I'm
$100.
Oh, okay.
Yeah. Get it on sale. You know, Father's Day, Mother's Day. Use it on significant holidays. They'll knock it off 50
for you. Of July.
Yeah. Yeah. Go go pay 50 for it. Yeah. Don't pay a 100.
Pay 50.
It just seems like a rabbit hole that might be fun to go down. Yeah. Especially, like, with some, you know, fruit falling from the trees, you say. Like like strawberries, blueberries.
Find out about relatives that you never even knew you had.
Exactly. Exactly. Found a relative who was in search of her mother. She was adopted, and her family would not tell her who her mother was. It was some sort of family secret.
But she called me, and, she was a she's a bit of a nomad like me, bit of a gypsy. She's an RV traveling around the country, and she was in Darlington County, South Carolina. And she said, yeah. I'm just camping out here. Are you?
And she told me exactly where she was. I went, yeah. You're not gonna believe this, but you're in ground zero. I said, stop what you're doing. Go down to the county courthouse and look up these names.
And these are the last names of our family from that county. I guarantee you, you're gonna find a clue and a hint. And so she was a distant cousin, maybe 10 times removed or something, but it was so nice to meet her and chat with her and give her some clues or hints of of of, who her family was. And so, I think she was able to actually get some more clues to take her down the road of investigation. So it was really nice.
It's quite nice.
Yeah. It's wild. Just in terms of, like, humanity, we've only been on this we've only represented this planet for, like, a fraction of a blink of an eye. You know? I mean, it's just such a small, small part.
But, like, in terms of all your worldly travels, where where do we still where do you rank health care in The United States? Are we should we still be despite the challenges, we're in good hands, or do we have work to do? What's your thoughts?
I've been treated in hospitals and clinics all over the world, and I guarantee you that America is the best. I've had excellent quality care, in Abu Dhabi at the Cleveland Clinic. Absolutely world class. I recommend anyone, if you're gonna get sick, be be sure you get sick in Abu Dhabi. My mother got really, really ill, in Abu Dhabi before Cleveland Clinic opened up.
(04:34):
The sheikh Khalifa Hospital was managed by Cleveland Clinic, found the doctor, my mother ran out of her meds, and they ran into a doctor from Howard University, believe it or not, at sheikh Khalifa hospital in Abu Dhabi. And they the the pharmacy didn't have her medicine, but we had a compounding pharmacist that actually made my mother's medicine for her, made it in liquid form, and gave me the proper dosage, which was really brilliant because my mother was 6,000 miles away from home and needed her medicine. You know, I've been treated, in The Philippines. I've been treated in Saudi Arabia. I've been treated in Bahrain and Kuwait, and, I've been treated in India.
Right? Got really, really sick in India. And, the everybody. Yeah. Yeah.
The the X-ray machine really scared me because, the vultures that that thing pulled down, I think it shut down the lights in 40 counties. But but but I was treated well. I was really treated well in India. But, you know, experienced medicine all over the world. Take me home Country Road.
Oh, yeah. We forbid one zero when I was at business school, we went to India for our international residency.
Mhmm. You did?
Yeah. And we were there for two weeks. And my gosh. You get Delhi, Delhi? Everybody would just fell.
Just boom. And Wait. What what make because they would eat the local food and, you know, they they would wanna be really adventurous. People would make fun of me and another friend because all we had was bottled water, bread. We are super, super careful about what we and we were the only two that didn't get sick.
And even then, I was, like, on the ropes, like, oh, baby.
But one by one the water in certain countries?
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You can't drink water in any country. You have to drink bottled water.
Even, I have a I have residency in The Philippines. And even in my house in The Philippines, my father-in-law, he sell boils boils of water for fifteen minutes, and then filters it, before he drinks it. And so we we just typically drink bottled water. You know? And when you travel, I've learned, you know, just eat in some of your established, larger hotels or established chains.
I've gotten sick from street food in in The Philippines and and, you know, had food poisoning, which is a horrible experience. And, you know, I remember you know, I I go out and I run-in the morning. Wherever I am, I try to get a five k run. And I remember running through the street food vendors in in Kuala Lumpur and say, wanna stop there. Stop there.
Stop there. And then, you know, I I ran out one morning. There was a big rat making his way through the vendors. I went, yeah. Nope.
Not gonna do that. I I did get risky. I did get frisky one time, and I had street food in Singapore. And I was saved by the bell. I had no no major issues, but I had street food in Philippines.
It didn't work.
I am not a brave person when it comes to that stuff. And, like, I think one of my one of my biggest fears really is, like, you are somewhere in another country, and then something bad happens and you have to yeah.
So how do you recover from that? Is it just, like, an IV or something? Like
Well, Elliot, for our trip, thankfully, we had a physician in our class, and so he brought a whole bag of, yeah, medicines and things to help. And I felt so bad for him. He had to leave early for us ahead of the class. And on his way home, he fell fell ill to the the daily belly, and he had given out all of his stuff. So Oh.
I travel
I travel with antibiotics. I travel with about two or three different antibiotics, because, typically, when I'm bouncing between, time zones, usually, I try to get two or three countries done in one trip, and so you bounce it between a lot of time zones. It worries your body out. And so I typically start to get some sort of respiratory issue going on, and so I I have, some antibiotics that I take prophylactically, especially when you're gonna be out and about. And I try not to you know, when in Rome, there's Romans.
And so I try not to offend my local host, especially when I'm being entertained, and a lot of the entertainment is food. And so really have to pray. My grandmother taught us to say grace before you eat. You better say grace before you eat. But I keep antibiotics prophylactically to take when I'm traveling.
(04:55):
And believe it or not, you can walk up to a pharmacy in any international airport outside of The US, and you can buy any antibiotics you want without a prescription.
Yeah. That part is interesting. Yeah.
Yeah. And so I just keep a stock of it in my bag. And so when I know I'm going into a risky situation, you know, I just take some antibiotics and let's go eat.
What's something we haven't talked about that you wanna talk about?
Well, I, you know, I think, the the nurses that we're bringing in are absolutely fabulous. We're starting to bring in nurses from all over the world. We have quite a number of nurses that we bought in from, from Africa and Asia. We're particularly, finding great nurses, in The Middle East. And the reason why that's happening is because The Middle East is starting to up their game tremendously with world class health care, and they're bringing in nurses from the likes of Africa, India, Philippines, Pakistan.
And the nurses are actually practicing there, and they're getting their Western skills honed and sharpened. And they they they're going there specifically to work. But we we we we particularly like recruiting out of The Middle East because we're finding those nurses are getting that electronic charting experience and getting the the routine of Western medicine under their belt even in The Middle East. You'd be surprised how incredibly sharp the the medical practitioners are in The Middle East, and it's it's quite an interesting story. You know, we're based here in Portsmouth, Virginia.
We are a global company, and, you know, I keep pinching myself, and I get impostor syndrome sometimes. You know, we're really doing it. Right? We're we're we're real employers. We're giving jobs.
We're making difference in people's lives. You know? Our why is to change lives, both for, for the nurse and the patient and also, the patient's family and their their nurse peers because an an extra nurse on a shift is a relief to another nurse within the group. And so we're we're changing a lot of lives in what we do, and we absolutely love it. It's we're really driven by this purpose, and we love what we do.
First of all, I'm a recruiter, and I love recruiting. Recruiting is the best job in the whole world, and it's, it's that career that's paid for my my gallivanting and journey around the planet. And I've done it on someone else's dime. You know? Thank god for for my talent.
But, we're really making a difference. And I think one of my frustrations is that, a lot of our hospitals, especially here in Hampton Roads and believe it not, Tim, all of my nurses are going everywhere except for Southeast Virginia. And that is because a lot of our potential clients you know, we have one major client here that only wants us recruited domestically, won't touch our international nurses, and we've stacked up an entire pool of these great nurses. You know, we have, in our network, in our pipeline over 300 international nurses that are ready to go, and we're starting to send those people, all over the country and not here in Hampton Roads. And so, you know, I'm I'm office in Hampton Roads, but I could probably go anywhere and and and and base myself even overseas because our clients here aren't biting in.
I think that's one of my frustrations here. I don't think it's the trust factor because we've gotten a name for ourselves. You know, I think there's a cost factor there, and a lot of our clients already have established partners that are doing this type of work for them. But, one thing we want them to understand and realize is that we bring something that our their current, their current suppliers aren't bringing them, and that is we've lived in the places where we're recruiting from. Right?
We understand the process where, those people are coming from. And take for instance, I could land in Mumbai today, pick up the phone, make a call, and have two or three different people come pick me up, and let's go sit down and talk about nurses. I'm talking about other recruiting firms and other partnerships that we've created, and these are people that that I've known over a decade. You know, same thing in in The Philippines and in Singapore and and and in other parts of the world where you can land and say, hey, dude. I need 10 nurses.
Can you, can you get them to me in three days? I'd like to interview them, in your office. And it happens. And it's not the the trolling online that that that we we have to do or some of our competitors are doing, but I can sit down in any country, in many countries, at least half dozen countries, make a phone call, have someone pick me up at airport, and have a dozen or so nurses to interview within seventy two hours.
Well, when you're when you come back from all the traveling and you're ready for that that meal, Good old Hampton Roads, Virginia. Where is the what's the one restaurant that you can't wait or you think about when you're overseas that you can't wait to visit as soon as you come home?
Well, it's probably, either the Texas Roadhouse or Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, but, I I jones for some uncle Rick's, custard frozen custard. Oh my god. The the the food there is so incredibly good.
Where is this? In
Portsmouth? Yeah. It it's in Portsmouth, and it is on Airline Boulevard. You gotta it is the smoothest, creamiest frozen custard you're ever gonna get in your life. And, actually, they got good barbecue sandwiches, believe it or not.
And down the street from there, there's a place called Bubba's and Frank's where you can actually get some decent brisket. That's a decent barbecue. But, you know, I'm a steak man. Even when I'm traveling, my go to I love Thailand. I love I love Thai food, but I can only eat about five days in a
row of it. After that, it's like, okay. I need a steak. Amen.
And so, but, you know, my my wife is Filipina, and so, I eat rice every day. And and I have some sort of, rendition of Filipino food, and I've grown to love. And so believe it or not, even when I'm here in The US, my my go to and my comfort food is gonna be something out of The Middle East. I love kopsa. I I love grape leaves.
I love tabula and patoosh. So my go tos are gonna be Arab food or Filipino food when I'm here in The US.
(05:16):
Never heard of any of those things
that you Come have lunch with me. I'll introduce you to it all.
I ain't trying to have to take a little antibiotic, if you know what
I mean.
So, you know, I'm a little nervous. And I know Tim is definitely nervous for that stuff too.
We we we'll put a few pounds on you. I promise you that.
There you go. This has been great. I'm glad mister Tillett was able to connect us. Continued success, and we really appreciate your time.
Yeah. Thanks for having guys. Hey, everybody. I'm Tim Ryan, executive director of Innovate Hampton Roads, and I'm inviting you to attend the StartUp World Cup on August 21, 05:00, here at Town Center in Virginia Beach.
I've seen some, creators overseas that are, using robots in AI for training. Right? Most of the nursing schools nowadays, are when the nurses go out to the lab or the practicum, they're actually training on some of the mannequins or dummies or dolls, that they are really good with veins and working arteries and crazy stuff like that. But I've also seen, I've seen a developer in, Dubai that's developed a virtual space, that's a a virtual clinic or hospital environment with a virtual patient where the, the nurse, actually wears goggles and actually, can see this patient and actually perform, on the patient. But nothing beats, you know, a live patient, but
(00:01):
we don't wanna train our students. We don't want to experiment on our students. Four scores, and that's all I remember. Did you ever have to memorize what was that? The Gettysburg Address?
Is that what that was?
I don't think I had to memorize that. I guess that was a good thing for us growing up in the Western New York, Buffalo area. You know, it wasn't so history driven as it is here in Virginia.
That's true. In some
cases, though, I wish I would have learned more about the history because when I do go to things, it's always interesting to to learn something new that
Agreed. But I'll put it like this. I was too stubborn and and dumb kid to, like, care about those things. But now I
was I I that would have been me as well.
Yeah. Because, like, when I like, I I still think our area should and I know we have Nautikus in Wisconsin and stuff like that. I still think we should have a better museum than we do for the military.
Oh, for the military?
Yeah. And, like, when I go to places like that like, I remember the time I walked through the Wisconsin. Oh, I cannot believe people do this. Like, people live on these things for months. I was like,
this
is crazy. And so just to, like, I think you appreciate it more as you as you
age. I think for me was I think last year, I was able to go take a tour of submarine, and that was like, dude.
Okay.
That's, that's some close quarters.
Could not do it.
Yeah. That would get
I have nightmares about the closeness things sometimes.
Oh, do you?
I think I have that fear.
Mhmm.
(00:22):
But, like, on a in a hotel, I'm okay. But in a cruise,
I'm okay. Fine.
But think because you just realize how low you are. And is there a pressure thing in those things? They have, like, the
I mean, so I was told back in the day so I used to work with a Submariner, and, you know, and he claimed that if you went down deep enough and if you had a clothesline from one end to the other and you had it taut, and then if you went down, the pressure would there would then some slack would then enter that clothesline because Oh, wow. The pressure being so significant. I don't know what to what extent. It might have been very small. I don't really know.
But still, to your point
There's a Netflix documentary. I haven't watched it yet. But about this the the boat that was trying to go to the Titanic that disappeared, They're using a PlayStation controller as the
Well, the crazy thing is is that that that the navy uses that in their submarines for the Periscope.
Oh, a PlayStation controller?
Yeah.
Interesting.
Think about how much cheaper that is than
I mean, six months.
Kids know how to use it.
That's true. It's true. Now we transition from something that has nothing to do with today's.
Just as big as a problem, just in a different, hard right turn.
Tim Anderson Armstrong. I don't know why.
Don't let the name fool you.
Tim Armstrong. How's it going, dude?
Pretty good, my man. How about yourself?
Pretty good. What kind of headphones are those? I I'm digging those.
These are some generics I ordered off of Amazon, as a cheap alternative to my more Plantronics, my more expensive Plantronics. But the the earpieces were molting, and so my wife made the little baby bonnets to go on top of them. And so I told her, you you should sell those.
(00:43):
She should. Yeah. Yeah. Find out, you know, find out somehow, I'm sure there's a way for you to scrape who was ever bought that thing or looked at it.
Right.
And then send them an ad that says, hey.
Are you you have a multi?
That's cool. So, introduced to you via Chris Tillett of the, city of Portsmouth economic development. Mhmm. Really, I think that's what I think that's how, if I recall.
Yeah. Tim and I have run-in the same circles with Star Peninsula and B Force. And
Oh, cool.
So we've run some in the same circuit from that standpoint. So it's it's great to see that you're still charging ahead with the business. Tell us a
little bit about what it is that you're doing.
Well, our core business is recruiting nurses. We, we absolutely love nurses, and, we're recruiters, the whole team of us. We're a bunch of knucklehead, HR folks that have recruited overseas for fifteen years or more and another ten years in The US. And so we decided to fill a a niche, right, to fill the niche of the the shortfall of nurses in the job market here in The US. And it's not a shortfall that could be met organically.
I often get the questions, why can't we fill the job with Americans? Because we're recruiting nurses from overseas. And the the the quick answer is we don't have enough.
So, Tim, if someone and how is it currently in America if someone like, for a a a US student or someone that is pursuing nursing, how long does that process take as opposed to the overseas track?
Yep. Takes weeks or months. Usually, the nursing programs can last anywhere, from, six to eighteen months. It depends on what track and course they take or what school they they go to and any previous prerequisite, classes that they might have. And then it's just a matter of signing up for your nursing board exam, getting those results back in about thirty days, and then you just go and press forward and get a job.
Usually, nurses in The United States will already have a job by the time they take their nursing exam. A lot of nurses have, employment opportunities before they even graduate because they're doing their practicums and and their, on the job training and, what we call OJT. Yep. In hospitals Training. Yeah.
In a hospital setting that, or clinical setting that they're gonna work in. So it's it's fairly easy. You're not gonna find an unemployed or a nursing student in The US. They won't be hard pressed for work. And if you do have a a unemployed nurse in The US, run.
Good advice. If we take away anything from the show, that might be it.
Run run fast. Okay.
That's right.
So I've noticed this too. Like, when I go to my vet, they have a shortage of of veterinarians in there too. And it sounds like there's a a shortage of this from the from the nurses aspect in hospitals and
and Quick aside. Do you know that it's much harder to go through veterinary school than it is to become
It's, like, seven it's at least seven years.
(01:04):
Well yeah. And you have to learn, like, the the body. You need to learn all of the animal systems as opposed to a doctor. You just have to learn the human system. So from that standpoint, the vet side is a lot more difficult and longer, which is Alright.
Okay.
So but why is there a shortage of these individuals where I mean, it seems like decent paying jobs. I mean, is it a stress thing? Is it like, why why are they so hard to fund?
Yeah. It's it's it's all of the above. It's, we have the largest segment of our population, which are baby boomers. They're retiring at the same time, and, they are retiring and needing geriatric care. And guess, what, population is in that geriatric population, nurses.
So you have a issue that's compounding or stacking upon each other. Plus, you have the nursing schools. They're at capacity. I I hear some numbers like 100, 200, 3% capacity with enrollment. So we're starting to see more and more nurses tools come online and more and more hospitals starting to, have their own nurse training programs.
You have, nurses who are just getting exhausted and just quitting and just leaving, because there's so much so much pressure. So it's just a compounded problem that's coming in from four different directions.
What, I never thought that I would even say the phrase, but, like, what what do the the charts look like in terms of before the curve is kinda flattened? You know? Like, you like, to your point, age continues to go up. Job market, you know, that's only growing as fast as the population. You know, like, what is it gonna take, and how many nurses until there's an adequate number?
The number is insanely high. We we we we there's estimates that we'll have a million nurse shortage, by the end of this decade. But there are a lot of measures being taken to to mitigate that. But, if it doesn't get to the million, it will be, several 100,000, as low as 750,000 nurses shortage in The US by 2030. It's it's really rough.
I mean, I think we walked into 2024 need needing several 100,000, and, of course, it only goes up in in 2025 because of the the age of the baby boomers. My parents are baby boomers. My, mom and dad are 74, 75. My stepdad is 82, and, they're all needing some sort of, some sort of care.
Yeah. It's crazy. I just like my first career was in TV news, and the way I describe it is imagine meeting someone on the worst day of their life every single day. Mhmm. And that's usually just one person.
You know, you go to a hospital, they're seeing that not only every day, but multiple times a day.
Right.
I I cannot imagine the emotion that you have to have and then figure out how to just, like, remove it out so that you can handle it. Like
Yeah. It's it's definitely is a career field not cut out for not everybody can do it.
The faint of heart, if you will. Yeah. I mean,
I got a lot of respect for nurses. They they really go through it because part of my interview process is interviewing. How do you deal with families? Because you have to deal with the patients, the doctors, and, of course, the families, and that can be rough.
Yeah. And it's the other thing, you you've got you this is a field that you cannot make mistakes. I mean, like, even being right 99.9% of the time is still not good enough.
Right. You only remember for the one time you messed it up.
Oh, yeah. And, well, which can be I mean, that could cost someone
their life. Yeah.
It cost someone their life, cost you your freedom, your career. Right?
(01:25):
And you're gonna be thinking about your entire life too. Right? You're gonna live with that, and that that part can't be crazy. So are I mean, are you seeing a lot the robots in AI take over this field? Is that do you think we're getting to that at all, or where where do you see that?
No. I see, I I've seen some, creators overseas that are, using robots in AI for training. Right? Most of the nursing schools nowadays, are when the nurses go out to the lab or the practicum, they're actually training on some of the mannequins or dummies or dolls, that they are really good with veins and working arteries and crazy stuff like that. But I've also seen, I've seen a developer in Dubai that's developed a virtual space, that's a a virtual clinic or hospital environment with a virtual patient where the, the nurse, actually wears goggles and actually can see this patient and actually perform, on the patient.
But nothing beats, you know, a live patient, but
we don't wanna train our students. We don't want to experiment on our students. I remember, when I was
a kid, though, we would be treated at the Naval Hospital here in Portsmouth, and all of my doctors were all interns. So we were being practiced on every single day. But, I don't see AI taking over where the human component is most vital. I see AI taking over in the technical areas and in the areas where, there could be some sort of instruction or, some sort of technical competence building.
And I would think that, like, smart beds and mattresses that can take vitals would also help with the workload so that the nurses don't have to do so many things as they're making their rounds from bed to bed. You're seeing a
lot of that. Of course, I thought it was really groovy, you know, fifteen, twenty years ago when we saw beds so they could actually weigh the patient. But now you have beds that can actually roll the patient up and get them situated in the bed and can tilt to the left or right and do some really interesting things, bed alarms in case someone gets out of the bed. And I have not seen vitals, but, but the beds are measuring other statistics, in charting for that patient.
I mean, it's just like you know, my my bed that I have, I just I have a shout out to sleep aid. I have a mattress cover. But, I mean, that will may it will heat. It will cool. It measures my respiratory rate.
It measures my my heart rate variance. I mean, it's, like, all those. And I get a report every day in terms of, you know, like, how everything is all over time. Heat your bed? That's Heat?
Yeah.
Oh, dude. In the wintertime getting into a warm bed? Oh, baby. I
don't know that I can handle that. So you know what's interesting is, like, I remember the first time I ever put on this thing on Oculus is this is probably 2012, 2013. I got super dizzy. And I was like, I don't get this. It was a playing game.
It was at Maker Faire at the scope. And then fast forward, like, I don't know, two, three years later, a company from Seattle was in town doing demos in my kid to our office, and it was, like, construction training. And I was like, oh, I get it. Yeah. And then so now I just I've been watching I'm a a DC commanders fan, and they say that Jayden Daniels, the quarterback, he puts on the the goggles, and he gets, like, reps that way.
And so that he gets so much again, it's not the real thing, but it's it's closer than ever before. And it's just interesting how that training aspect is giving you so many more reps, which is ultimately what you want, right, is you want your your people who are fixing you to have as much practice as possible. And so that's that's cool that that's how they're looking, how you're seeing the the training aspect of that going to
It's like pilots being in the simulator.
Same thing. Right.
Right?
Right. And race car drivers run it doing the track before they do it.
Do they simulate the g's in that too?
In the
I would imagine that would be the hardest thing.
(01:46):
For simulators? Although they use a yeah. They use a centrifuge or some sort of device that turns them to practices g's because you have to get into a physical device and get swung around the room to pull those g's on you. But, the simulator, the pilot simulator and these are mostly commercial aircraft. The know, they're it pitches.
It rolls. It lifts. It it simulates drag like a pilot would feel in in an airplane, but not the g's.
I correct myself. It is eight sleep is my
What did you say?
That's I said I think I said sleep eight, but it's eight sleep.
Why is it called that?
I think to get your eight hours, I'm guessing, would be the Yeah.
At my age, eight hours is a luxury.
I think I got I got eight hours and one minute last night. And
No. It's not getting
eight hours. Sleep. A beautiful thing.
I'm looking right now. I I mean, people are like, oh, I get five hours. I'm like, Like
Dude, sleep is a you know, they
Necessity.
It is a lot more important than what people It's the key to making it healthy.
It really is. You cannot have life igniting enough sleep.
That's what they say you do all your growth.
Yeah.
Yep. My wife and I just got blackout blinds, and I'm one that wakes up with the sun.
Mhmm. Not anymore.
And I don't. And it's really been creeping me out. Like, I've been sleeping a lot longer, and I'm not getting that, like, that bolt coming in. Stimulation.
(02:07):
Yeah.
And I'm like I look at my watch sometimes, and I'm like, oh, it's probably, like, 05:45. And I don't even wanna tell you guys what number is on my watch when I see this sometimes. Yeah. I'm like, wow. Like, I'm not going to bed later.
Right.
But I'm getting, like, ninety two hours extra sleep, but I used to get eight hours of sleep. So I'm like, damn. This
I I freak out if I wake up in the sun is shining. I I've got to get up before
I got 07:51 last night.
Oh, congratulations. Pretty close.
Yeah. Yeah. I, man, I haven't seen eight hours in a in a minute. Yeah. We got a lot of stuff on our plate right now, Tim, that we're working for.
I pray for eight hours. And, man, if I wake up, as you you know, to do to go to the bathroom, and then my mind starts going, and it's just all over.
Yeah. You're done. Oh, you'll start working in that?
Well, no. My mind will start working, and then I have to, like, go through and try to calm it back down to to to fall back asleep.
Do you have, like, a thing?
I'll I'll typically throw on a podcast or something. And That's what
works for me. Podcast. Yeah.
I always think, like, when I don't think I'm sleeping, I actually am. I'm I'm
actually Those are the worst. Those are the worst nights.
According to the watch, I am getting sleep. I'm like, well, this a freaking I yeah.
I'm with you.
What are we doing?
You're laying enough.
There's some documentation on what we're actually thinking in that time that some, you know, brain scientists figured out, like,
(02:28):
oh, this is what's
the matter with you, and this is when this is happening. Mhmm. So what made you get to this field, Tim?
The need. Right? So, and it was like an epiphany. I I think, one of my partners and I, I think we were sitting in India, on on a trip, because we're still trying to figure out exactly what what we wanted to do. And, or we were so I think may maybe we're in Kuwait, and we saw a bunch of nurses, and I went, hang on.
Wait a minute. Why don't we recruit nurses? Then we did some research and found out that there's a huge niche. Went to India and they were, oh, yeah. These are nurses.
Right? Yeah. Because we have a lot of Asian countries that are graduating, US qualified nurses in the droves. And, the biggest problem that we're having these days with, with getting enough nurses because there are enough nurses, around the globe, that are US qualified and, of course, proficient in English that that that can fill our need. But, unfortunately, we we have a antiquated integration I'm sorry, antiquated immigration system that just doesn't allow it, and it's just incredibly stupid how we immigrate here in in our country.
And that's not that's apolitical. Right?
Well, I agree. I mean, like, this is something that while everything in this world seems to quickly become politicized, this is not a political issue.
No. It has nothing to do with, who's in office. It's the it's the same bad system no matter what.
I mean, we should be recruiting the best and brightest Right. Always. And I've worked in countries where they do. I mean, I I've I've been recruited,
to places like Saudi Arabia where they needed my talent as a human resources practitioner, and it's fast. Yeah. I was able to immigrate myself and get my work visa within, I think, forty five to sixty days. And then once I got mine done, I got my wife and my children done in thirty days. You know, to get my own wife here in in my country, It took my wife got denied three different times.
I had to hire a lawyer and go through a process of getting my wife to my own my own country, my own wife. It's kinda ridiculous when I could've I could get my wife into Saudi Arabia in thirty days. Just just think about that, how ridiculous it is. And I've worked for The United Arab Emirates. I went I worked for one of their paragovernment organizations and had to go through a background check and security clearance to work for their government.
Thirty day process. Right? And so as soon as I got cleared, I was able to get my bring my family in on a visit visa and convert the visit visa to a residency visa, in three days. And so there are countries that are hard to get into that have demonstrated that we can be safe and secure, go through a a really decent, granular process within a short amount of time to make sure that we get the best and brightest in our country. And I've worked in those countries because I had a talent that they wanted and and was able to get in.
So, with with all those countries, what are the top countries that you, currently recruit from, and what are the requirements? I would imagine speaking English being one of them, but what are the countries, and what are the things that you're looking for?
Wow. Okay. So we'll start with the the top countries. The the the country that has the highest passage rate of the NCLEX, which is The US nursing exam, is The Philippines. I mean and they, hands down, for for a long, long time, have been the the, the top performer with NCLEX.
And so, of course, The Philippines is very attractive to us, and we target The Philippines. And India is number two. Philippines, they they India, they they take turns, with number one. Usually, three terms threes, three quarters out of the year, it's, The Philippines. One quarter out of the year is India.
But, we found a rich gold mine in places like Nigeria and Ghana where they're really graduating, US qualified nurses who have a profession who have a, I'm sorry, proficiency in English. Now, they're taking the English exam as demonstrated, through through a paper exam in in a exam facility, and they do it according to The US, standards, based on, whatever the state department has set for one particular year or so. But there are several English exams that any foreign national can take that the US embassy will accept as a part of their their visa processing. And now, we're finding most countries it's very rare that we find a country that does not chart in English. That's very important because our nurses are charting patient progress progress notes or charting in English, and nowadays, we're finding more and more of them that are charting digitally.
And believe it or not, some of those countries are using a a US charting system like Epic. If you go on to CVS or one of the local hospitals in the Hampton Roads area, you'll see that they use something called MyChart. And so I'm finding there are several hospitals, especially in The Middle East, that are using, EPIC, as a charting system. So these nurses are well immersed into, a US style of of, nursing and charting, using English. And you got hospitals in The Middle East, like Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi, and you have, Cedars Sinai, and you have, the Mayo Clinic as well, in in the in The UAE.
All of these are managed by their US counterparts. Although it's staffed with a lot of foreign nationals, but it's managed by The US counterparts. And you get these nurses that are well ready, to come to The US. Did I answer your full question, Tim?
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's just because I'm sure that, people listening to the show are there. They're gonna wanna wonder, you know, yeah, people like to come up with objections.
You know? So knowing that they pass the exams, have the right education, certifications, speak English, are trained on the same platforms. You know? So that is comforting for the potential patients or family members of patients. On the other side of the equation, what kind of pushback from hospitals are you getting, or what is there any objections that you face as to I would think that anyone with a nursing shortage would be lined up to talk to you.
What are the objections that you may get? I
(02:49):
one one of our frustrations is, are the objections of the amount of time that it takes, the cost that is involved. And, my my strategy is to get the hospital or the clinic to think to forward think. You know? And and I I told my clients, listen. I can feel your nursing shortage today.
I can I can find your nurses here in The US domestically? That's no problem. But they're gonna turn over. The the turnover rate for nurses is increasingly high because, you know, you got other hospitals and clinics and medical facilities that are, giving better deals. Location, schedules, pay.
I mean, nurses really want a, work life balance that is normal, but but it's really difficult given their profession. But they will move, and they're they're very mobile, especially in a post COVID environment. So the pushback is really frustrating because I want to just ring their necks. I want to just just scream at the top of my voice and say, hey. Listen, dummy.
Don't do not record that. And say, hey. Listen. Why don't you think about the next three years? Why don't you let me solve your nursing problem for the next decade with a sponsored nurse who is more likely to bring their family and settle than a nurse that's gonna pop all around?
And that's the difference between the international nurse and the domestic nurse.
So, yeah, with that, the question that popped into my mind is who so who pays for the sponsorship of the nurse, and what what per can that nurse then shop around for a different offer and then leave, or is are they tied to that hiring organization for a certain amount of time? How how does that work? Okay. Yeah. So the sponsor of the visa is usually the employer.
We we're not sponsoring nurses at at this point, but we should be by the end of the year.
Pays for the, pays for the visa fees, the the immigration fees, everything that's associated with that include travel. And then that nurse, is now, gonna go to work for that employer. Now depending on the visa type, we can do we can figure out whether that nurse is gonna shop around a bit. Now we're bringing our our biggest client right now is bringing nurses in on the e b three visa. Now that is a green card visa from day one for that that nurse and that nurse's family to come.
And, sir, the nurse literally could get on get on the airplane, come here to The US, get off the airplane, and tell the sponsor, yep. Nope. Not gonna work for you. I'm gonna go work across the street for your competitor. Bye bye.
You know, after that, sponsors probably put up upwards to maybe, 10 to $20,000 investment into that nurse. Now if that nurse comes in on, like, an h one b visa, then that nurse is tied to that employer and cannot move to another employer unless that employer sponsors the h one b visa. So whether that nurse has the freedom and liberty to shop around will be based on that visa.
And and so and I would assume that businesses doing the hiring would wanna reduce their risk as much as they can?
Yeah. I would prefer, an h one b, at least for the first two years so that the employee can recoup the cost. But we have a lot of problems with human trafficking and employers that employers that just do bad stuff. And so, you know, from the very beginning, we were very cognizant of of, human trafficking, and so we select our our, our clients of very That
is wild.
Yeah. It it is wild. And and there are a lot of foreign nurses who are nurse advocates now or nurses who are who are being I want I don't wanna use the word enslaved, but sometimes it feels like enslavement, but more like an indentured servitude. And so there's more than one way to collect debt in The United States other than hoping someone through a visa.
I don't know. I guess me as a person and, Zach, I know you're the same way. I I just I always assume the best intentions out of everyone. I mean, that just that I do my mind is just blown.
It is pretty hard to believe. You're like, what? Like
I can't believe there's not, like, a TV show that's been done on this. You know? Like, how there
probably is.
Or will be soon. But my gosh. I mean, that my mind is just really I had no idea. Yeah.
It's it's it's it's frustrating for me because we have to find the balance, you know, when this sponsor makes a significant investment because, you know, Tim, I've I've been recruited and and mobilized to other countries, and, they spend a lot of money getting me and my family there, and they expect a two to three year commitment. And, you know, I've I've signed these contracts where there's at least, at least, two years commitment. And that's just to ensure that the company gets gets a ROI. You know, they're investing in me and my talent. And so I don't shop around.
And if I did, then I know that, if if I don't complete my first year, then I'm gonna have to repay my mobilization fees. And that's something I don't wanna pay. And we've had nurses to come here to The US who did not want to stay with their employer for many reasons, and some of it were justifiable because of the working conditions, work hours, or breach of contract or something like that, but you still have an obligation to pay. And so we have to find that balance. How do we make sure that we are bringing nurses over here and that we're completely compliant with all global human trafficking regulations, that we're treating our our our nurses with the utmost respect, giving them the great opportunity to, to participate in the American dream.
(03:10):
And yet everyone abides by their contract, including sponsor
and employer. So with that, what is the, the reasoning or why you are moving towards being the sponsoring organization? Why why are you moving your business in that direction?
For for us, it is gonna be a lot easier to make sure that we can get nurses into a clinical setting ex expeditiously. Right?
Mhmm.
So if we're sponsoring a nurse, the the plan is to, batch hire 10 to 15 nurses, house them here, in the area, in the Hampton Roads area, and be able to quickly mobilize qualified registered nurses, to our clients, in in the area and and outside of the area as well. If we have to put them on a plane and fly them out to another state, we'll do it and use them more like a travel nurse. But the idea is to make sure that we can mobilize and get nurses to our clients, in an expeditious manner, which is for us, it's just more revenue, more sales. You
said you grew up here?
Yep. I was, born at Norfolk General, just down the road here and, grew up in Chesapeake. I was a military kid, so we bounced around just a little bit, but I graduated from Indian River, then, North State University. And then, after college, I started to move around because I was working in retail, and I got my first human resource job in retail.
Interesting. How long did you do all that for, that style of career?
Wow. So I got my first HR job out of college in 1995, and I started recruiting for a, for a retailer based in in the Southeast Of The United States. And then as a recruiter, you just kinda bounce around a bit. I drag my family all over the country. My mother calls me a gypsy, rightly so.
So in 02/2004, I was working for a major national retailer doing quite well. Did not see the career progression that I, that I thought I deserved and earned. And then so I kinda rolled the dice and started working. I applied for an army contract position in Kuwait on Camp Nerfjord. You know, everyone thought I was absolutely insane.
And when I took off from Minneapolis headed over the Atlantic Ocean, I thought I was insane.
I feel like I've have called you a gypsy, to be honest. But, you
know Yeah.
Insane gypsy, whatever.
Yeah. Yeah. An insane gypsy. That works. And so I, I went to Kuwait on a one year contract.
I came back ten years later to The United States. Went to Washington, worked for an international organization there. Again, recruiting and mobilizing, pushing people all over the world. Did that based in in Washington for a few years and went back overseas to to to The Middle East and did it for a few more years.
Tim, I don't know about you, but do you do you get a lot of, like, recruit messages, like, in your inbox?
I don't. I I mean, every once in a while, I'll get one. But, yeah, it's not not so important.
Whenever I see these, though, I'm like, okay. Like, I don't know why you guys are sending me this. But, like, what's your strategy? Is there one to, like, stand out from that perspective? Because I think there's so many people are getting so much to, like, information.
They're being bombarded. And it's like, how do you make sure that they see yours and you don't look like some of these other
Which is a pet peeve. You know, my pet peeve is getting these recruiting, messages in my inbox. Tim, we've reviewed your resume, and you qualify for a job in a warehouse in your area. It's quite funny. And these are just absolutely lazy recruiters, and I I've gone through.
(03:31):
I've managed.
Mean, do you even have a resume anymore? Like, I don't. Like
Yes. Yes. It's all
Well, like so I get that, and I'm like, a resume. Like
Well, that's it's it's all laziness. It's just a cut and paste email that is sent out to you. There's no way that you re reviewed my resume because I didn't post it anywhere. I didn't apply for a job. And so I get a lot of people that always send me emails.
To Tim. I got this message from a recruiter. They wanna make me an offer. I went, did you apply for the job? No.
Did you interview for the job? No. Do you have an offer letter? Then how are they offering you a job? And so you have to meet those three criteria, at least two or three of those two of three of those criteria in order to, at least get to the the offer stage.
And so what what we do is we go out, and we purposely hang out where nurses hang out. Right? We engage with nurses in social media spaces. We join groups, and we just participate in the conversation, making ourselves known for who we are and what we do. And then when we see an opportunity, we will run a targeted ad in that particular group.
Or, of course, LinkedIn is where I hang out, because because, you know, I'm
a Gen Xer, and I don't know any better.
But, it's a great place to link up with other professionals and be seen as a professional. This is Tim, a real guy, a real person who wants to engage with you. And so I don't go for the for the hard sell right away, which I had to learn over time. And that is, you know, just reach out to the nurse, build the relationship, talk talk to them about their, their location or their specialty or maybe an article that they post. And, you know, you begin the the, the conversation there, and then you grow that relationship into this is what we do.
And we have a client that would be interested in talking to you. And so we we just don't jump in and send these very cold emails, and it's it's quite a pet peeve of mine. We try to Yeah. Cultivate and enter the relationship warmly. What are the
what are their verticals are there in the recruiting space?
Break that down for me, Tim.
So, like, verdict so, like, you're in the the nursing vertical. Is there any other recruiters that specialize in a certain industry? I know that you have, what what is it, ladders that does 100,000 job $100,000 a year or more, but, like, yeah, there's not any that come to mind in terms of, like, do you have any competition or, you know, who are you competing with?
Yeah. We we we compete with, two firms, here, one in the Tidewater area and one in Northern Virginia that specifically recruit international nurses primarily from India and The Philippines. So we we've identified those, and then we've identified some some of the bigger boys. And I'll talk about the verticals in a minute, but I wanna talk about my competitors for just one second. And so, you know, I think, our our unique selling point is that my team is is a team full of recruiters who this is not our first job.
You know, we have, more gray hair than we'd like to admit. And, that we've done this job for many different sectors and many different employers in many different countries. So I'm sitting here in in in Portsmouth, Virginia, but I've sat in Kuwait and pulled people from all around the globe, put them in Kuwait. Same thing in when I was in Saudi Arabia, when I was in Bahrain, when I was in Abu Dhabi, the same thing. We're always moving people around the from around the globe to a specific place for a specific, job.
And our competitors can't say that they've done that. You know, our competitors may have one or two people on staff. They have a limited amount of experience. But this experience of my team, sitting in different global, seats around the world and pulling people from all around the globe and pushing them out to even third countries. Because when I was in Abu Dhabi, my remit was, most of Southeast Asia, you know, including Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, and The Philippines.
And so we were even from Abu Dhabi, I was able to move maybe a person from Malaysia to Thailand or from Singapore, to Jakarta, Indonesia. And so we we come with a bunch of experience that our competitors just don't have. And I'll make a I bet a nickel to a fat lady that I could stand up against the the biggest boys on the block when it comes to actual real world experience of sitting in these places and actually having people on our team who speak English as a second language or even a third language who has done the very same thing that I've done. Now when it comes to verticals, we're just talking about sectors and silos of recruiting. Before I came to work here in medical, I specialize in oil and gas, and I specialize in, construction and design and engineering.
Now I specialize in recruiting. And these are very niche, niche sectors of recruiting that requires different types of skill sets. And, you know, I've been able to adapt, and and I'm more of a universal recruiter now because I've Mhmm. I've worked in so many different verticals or or sectors, so to speak, but in different cultural environments, different, different linguistic environments, and, different countries.
Interesting. To a lot of places. Yeah. Is there a place that you haven't been to that you wanna go to? Because, I mean, it's like Wow.
(03:52):
I wanna go to Burma.
I do wanna go to Laos. Haven't been there and have not conquered the continent Of Africa. I've learned through DNA that my family heritage is mostly Nigerian. 80% West African, but 30% Nigerian, so I need to get back to the motherland and kiss the ground just one time. So but but in my in my imagination, I believe that there's some sort of a tribe in Nigeria that's missing their crown prince, and I need to go and fulfill that role.
I mean,
I get those emails. But I
didn't send them. Oh, that was
good. But, yeah, they
they I I'd love to visit to I'd love to visit Ghana. I visited North Africa, but not Sub Saharan Africa. Wanna visit Ghana for sure. Nigeria for sure. Eswatini.
What DNA test did you do?
23 and Me.
Did they disclose? Did I hear that?
Was it Yeah. They went bankrupt, but I think someone I think they got bailed out.
They from Yeah. Someone someone acquired them.
Yeah.
Yeah. I think the big yeah. The biggest challenge with that business model is you pay for the kit once and then, you know, and that's it. There's no reoccurring revenue after that.
Yeah. But it works for us because you you you find yeah. You know, when you start shaking your, your family tree, strange fruit falls out.
Yeah. So you better get it. And once 23 and me, what came on board, so even strangers, fruit Yeah. Yeah.
Don't do that. But but interestingly enough Yeah. It sounds enough, I was able to pinpoint because my last name is Armstrong. Right? And I don't Armstrong is Scottish Irish.
I don't look Scottish Irish. And so and so we we we said that that was probably a name of a family that owned my family, here in Hampton Roads. I was able to trace my last name as, for for as far back as the early eighteen hundreds here in in in Chesapeake. They used to call this the Washington, District Of Virginia. But I was able to pinpoint somewhere in in a in a couple of years where my Irish descent started.
And so you could see, okay. This is where it happened. This is where I have, I have a 10% Caucasian, in my blood. And so I found exactly where on the timeline that was. And so, okay.
Well, we know that, we were enslaved by that particular family, and then that particular family's DNA got into my my family's DNA, and that's where I where I picked up. But you also get some very interesting, historical DNA results. Like, I I share the same maternal DNA as as Nessa Mandela, and I share the same paternal DNA as one of the Egyptian pharaohs. I think it's Xerxes. One of the Maybe you are that prince.
I keep telling my wife, you know, I I I should be called his highness or his imminence, but it doesn't work. Wow.
(04:13):
So how do you do that research to to track dates and stuff like that? Because that's that's sounds pretty interesting.
That that's part of your report.
Oh, have you heard on it, Tim?
I don't I guess I have not dug in that deep. Uh-huh. It'll be interesting to take a look, though.
It is an expensive test? I'm I'm
$100.
Oh, okay.
Yeah. Get it on sale. You know, Father's Day, Mother's Day. Use it on significant holidays. They'll knock it off 50
for you. Of July.
Yeah. Yeah. Go go pay 50 for it. Yeah. Don't pay a 100.
Pay 50.
It just seems like a rabbit hole that might be fun to go down. Yeah. Especially, like, with some, you know, fruit falling from the trees, you say. Like like strawberries, blueberries.
Find out about relatives that you never even knew you had.
Exactly. Exactly. Found a relative who was in search of her mother. She was adopted, and her family would not tell her who her mother was. It was some sort of family secret.
But she called me, and, she was a she's a bit of a nomad like me, bit of a gypsy. She's an RV traveling around the country, and she was in Darlington County, South Carolina. And she said, yeah. I'm just camping out here. Are you?
And she told me exactly where she was. I went, yeah. You're not gonna believe this, but you're in ground zero. I said, stop what you're doing. Go down to the county courthouse and look up these names.
And these are the last names of our family from that county. I guarantee you, you're gonna find a clue and a hint. And so she was a distant cousin, maybe 10 times removed or something, but it was so nice to meet her and chat with her and give her some clues or hints of of of, who her family was. And so, I think she was able to actually get some more clues to take her down the road of investigation. So it was really nice.
It's quite nice.
Yeah. It's wild. Just in terms of, like, humanity, we've only been on this we've only represented this planet for, like, a fraction of a blink of an eye. You know? I mean, it's just such a small, small part.
But, like, in terms of all your worldly travels, where where do we still where do you rank health care in The United States? Are we should we still be despite the challenges, we're in good hands, or do we have work to do? What's your thoughts?
I've been treated in hospitals and clinics all over the world, and I guarantee you that America is the best. I've had excellent quality care, in Abu Dhabi at the Cleveland Clinic. Absolutely world class. I recommend anyone, if you're gonna get sick, be be sure you get sick in Abu Dhabi. My mother got really, really ill, in Abu Dhabi before Cleveland Clinic opened up.
(04:34):
The sheikh Khalifa Hospital was managed by Cleveland Clinic, found the doctor, my mother ran out of her meds, and they ran into a doctor from Howard University, believe it or not, at sheikh Khalifa hospital in Abu Dhabi. And they the the pharmacy didn't have her medicine, but we had a compounding pharmacist that actually made my mother's medicine for her, made it in liquid form, and gave me the proper dosage, which was really brilliant because my mother was 6,000 miles away from home and needed her medicine. You know, I've been treated, in The Philippines. I've been treated in Saudi Arabia. I've been treated in Bahrain and Kuwait, and, I've been treated in India.
Right? Got really, really sick in India. And, the everybody. Yeah. Yeah.
The the X-ray machine really scared me because, the vultures that that thing pulled down, I think it shut down the lights in 40 counties. But but but I was treated well. I was really treated well in India. But, you know, experienced medicine all over the world. Take me home Country Road.
Oh, yeah. We forbid one zero when I was at business school, we went to India for our international residency.
Mhmm. You did?
Yeah. And we were there for two weeks. And my gosh. You get Delhi, Delhi? Everybody would just fell.
Just boom. And Wait. What what make because they would eat the local food and, you know, they they would wanna be really adventurous. People would make fun of me and another friend because all we had was bottled water, bread. We are super, super careful about what we and we were the only two that didn't get sick.
And even then, I was, like, on the ropes, like, oh, baby.
But one by one the water in certain countries?
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You can't drink water in any country. You have to drink bottled water.
Even, I have a I have residency in The Philippines. And even in my house in The Philippines, my father-in-law, he sell boils boils of water for fifteen minutes, and then filters it, before he drinks it. And so we we just typically drink bottled water. You know? And when you travel, I've learned, you know, just eat in some of your established, larger hotels or established chains.
I've gotten sick from street food in in The Philippines and and, you know, had food poisoning, which is a horrible experience. And, you know, I remember you know, I I go out and I run-in the morning. Wherever I am, I try to get a five k run. And I remember running through the street food vendors in in Kuala Lumpur and say, wanna stop there. Stop there.
Stop there. And then, you know, I I ran out one morning. There was a big rat making his way through the vendors. I went, yeah. Nope.
Not gonna do that. I I did get risky. I did get frisky one time, and I had street food in Singapore. And I was saved by the bell. I had no no major issues, but I had street food in Philippines.
It didn't work.
I am not a brave person when it comes to that stuff. And, like, I think one of my one of my biggest fears really is, like, you are somewhere in another country, and then something bad happens and you have to yeah.
So how do you recover from that? Is it just, like, an IV or something? Like
Well, Elliot, for our trip, thankfully, we had a physician in our class, and so he brought a whole bag of, yeah, medicines and things to help. And I felt so bad for him. He had to leave early for us ahead of the class. And on his way home, he fell fell ill to the the daily belly, and he had given out all of his stuff. So Oh.
I travel
I travel with antibiotics. I travel with about two or three different antibiotics, because, typically, when I'm bouncing between, time zones, usually, I try to get two or three countries done in one trip, and so you bounce it between a lot of time zones. It worries your body out. And so I typically start to get some sort of respiratory issue going on, and so I I have, some antibiotics that I take prophylactically, especially when you're gonna be out and about. And I try not to you know, when in Rome, there's Romans.
And so I try not to offend my local host, especially when I'm being entertained, and a lot of the entertainment is food. And so really have to pray. My grandmother taught us to say grace before you eat. You better say grace before you eat. But I keep antibiotics prophylactically to take when I'm traveling.
(04:55):
And believe it or not, you can walk up to a pharmacy in any international airport outside of The US, and you can buy any antibiotics you want without a prescription.
Yeah. That part is interesting. Yeah.
Yeah. And so I just keep a stock of it in my bag. And so when I know I'm going into a risky situation, you know, I just take some antibiotics and let's go eat.
What's something we haven't talked about that you wanna talk about?
Well, I, you know, I think, the the nurses that we're bringing in are absolutely fabulous. We're starting to bring in nurses from all over the world. We have quite a number of nurses that we bought in from, from Africa and Asia. We're particularly, finding great nurses, in The Middle East. And the reason why that's happening is because The Middle East is starting to up their game tremendously with world class health care, and they're bringing in nurses from the likes of Africa, India, Philippines, Pakistan.
And the nurses are actually practicing there, and they're getting their Western skills honed and sharpened. And they they they're going there specifically to work. But we we we we particularly like recruiting out of The Middle East because we're finding those nurses are getting that electronic charting experience and getting the the routine of Western medicine under their belt even in The Middle East. You'd be surprised how incredibly sharp the the medical practitioners are in The Middle East, and it's it's quite an interesting story. You know, we're based here in Portsmouth, Virginia.
We are a global company, and, you know, I keep pinching myself, and I get impostor syndrome sometimes. You know, we're really doing it. Right? We're we're we're real employers. We're giving jobs.
We're making difference in people's lives. You know? Our why is to change lives, both for, for the nurse and the patient and also, the patient's family and their their nurse peers because an an extra nurse on a shift is a relief to another nurse within the group. And so we're we're changing a lot of lives in what we do, and we absolutely love it. It's we're really driven by this purpose, and we love what we do.
First of all, I'm a recruiter, and I love recruiting. Recruiting is the best job in the whole world, and it's, it's that career that's paid for my my gallivanting and journey around the planet. And I've done it on someone else's dime. You know? Thank god for for my talent.
But, we're really making a difference. And I think one of my frustrations is that, a lot of our hospitals, especially here in Hampton Roads and believe it not, Tim, all of my nurses are going everywhere except for Southeast Virginia. And that is because a lot of our potential clients you know, we have one major client here that only wants us recruited domestically, won't touch our international nurses, and we've stacked up an entire pool of these great nurses. You know, we have, in our network, in our pipeline over 300 international nurses that are ready to go, and we're starting to send those people, all over the country and not here in Hampton Roads. And so, you know, I'm I'm office in Hampton Roads, but I could probably go anywhere and and and and base myself even overseas because our clients here aren't biting in.
I think that's one of my frustrations here. I don't think it's the trust factor because we've gotten a name for ourselves. You know, I think there's a cost factor there, and a lot of our clients already have established partners that are doing this type of work for them. But, one thing we want them to understand and realize is that we bring something that our their current, their current suppliers aren't bringing them, and that is we've lived in the places where we're recruiting from. Right?
We understand the process where, those people are coming from. And take for instance, I could land in Mumbai today, pick up the phone, make a call, and have two or three different people come pick me up, and let's go sit down and talk about nurses. I'm talking about other recruiting firms and other partnerships that we've created, and these are people that that I've known over a decade. You know, same thing in in The Philippines and in Singapore and and and in other parts of the world where you can land and say, hey, dude. I need 10 nurses.
Can you, can you get them to me in three days? I'd like to interview them, in your office. And it happens. And it's not the the trolling online that that that we we have to do or some of our competitors are doing, but I can sit down in any country, in many countries, at least half dozen countries, make a phone call, have someone pick me up at airport, and have a dozen or so nurses to interview within seventy two hours.
Well, when you're when you come back from all the traveling and you're ready for that that meal, Good old Hampton Roads, Virginia. Where is the what's the one restaurant that you can't wait or you think about when you're overseas that you can't wait to visit as soon as you come home?
Well, it's probably, either the Texas Roadhouse or Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, but, I I jones for some uncle Rick's, custard frozen custard. Oh my god. The the the food there is so incredibly good.
Where is this? In
Portsmouth? Yeah. It it's in Portsmouth, and it is on Airline Boulevard. You gotta it is the smoothest, creamiest frozen custard you're ever gonna get in your life. And, actually, they got good barbecue sandwiches, believe it or not.
And down the street from there, there's a place called Bubba's and Frank's where you can actually get some decent brisket. That's a decent barbecue. But, you know, I'm a steak man. Even when I'm traveling, my go to I love Thailand. I love I love Thai food, but I can only eat about five days in a
row of it. After that, it's like, okay. I need a steak. Amen.
And so, but, you know, my my wife is Filipina, and so, I eat rice every day. And and I have some sort of, rendition of Filipino food, and I've grown to love. And so believe it or not, even when I'm here in The US, my my go to and my comfort food is gonna be something out of The Middle East. I love kopsa. I I love grape leaves.
I love tabula and patoosh. So my go tos are gonna be Arab food or Filipino food when I'm here in The US.
(05:16):
Never heard of any of those things
that you Come have lunch with me. I'll introduce you to it all.
I ain't trying to have to take a little antibiotic, if you know what
I mean.
So, you know, I'm a little nervous. And I know Tim is definitely nervous for that stuff too.
We we we'll put a few pounds on you. I promise you that.
There you go. This has been great. I'm glad mister Tillett was able to connect us. Continued success, and we really appreciate your time.
Yeah. Thanks for having guys. Hey, everybody. I'm Tim Ryan, executive director of Innovate Hampton Roads, and I'm inviting you to attend the StartUp World Cup on August 21, 05:00, here at Town Center in Virginia Beach.
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