March 21, 2025 • 36 mins
Our host, Pete Newsome, sits down with John Ruffini—VP of Professional Development at HealthTrust Workforce Solutions and author of Money Makers—to explore how recruiting is evolving and which fundamentals still hold strong.
While technology and AI have transformed the way recruiters operate, Ruffini reminds us that relationships remain at the heart of great recruiting. He states, “Our business is still about relationships, and people want to interact with other people. It’s just human nature.”
He shares his “million-dollar questions”—thoughtful, disarming prompts that turn reluctant candidates into open conversations—and contrasts this relationship-first mindset with the transactional approaches that dominate today’s landscape.
The conversation also dives into the impact of remote work, including the loss of geographic boundaries and the challenge of developing young talent. Ruffini makes a strong case for hybrid models and shares personal lessons from both wins and failures that helped shape his recruiting philosophy.
Whether you’re a veteran recruiter or just starting out, this episode offers a fresh perspective on the future of talent acquisition—and why human connection still matters most.
Additional Resources:
1. HealthTrust Workforce Solutions
2. Money Makers: Proven Ways to Increase Sales and Productivity in the World of Professional Recruiting
3. Effective Methods of Recruitment and Selection
4. Recruiting Trends for the New Year
🧠 WANT TO LEARN MORE? Be sure to subscribe and check out 4 Corner Resources at https://www.4cornerresources.com/
👋 FOLLOW PETE NEWSOME ONLINE:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/petenewsome/
Blog Articles: https://www.4cornerresources.com/blog/
👋 FOLLOW JOHN RUFFINI ONLINE:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnruffini/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pete Newsome (00:00):
You're listening to the Hire Calling Podcast,
your source for all thingshiring, staffing and recruiting.
I'm Pete Newsome, and my guesttoday is John Ruffini, vice
President of ProfessionalDevelopment for Health Trust
Workforce Solutions.
John, how are you today, pete?
I'm great.
It's good to see you.
It's great to see you.
How long have we known eachother now, john?
I guess?
John Ruffini (00:19):
we initially.
That's gotta be coming up oneight years, that's got to be
coming up on eight years I thinkit has.
Pete Newsome (00:24):
Give or take.
That's what I was thinking.
John, you're a longtimestaffing executive.
I asked you to come on today totalk about what has changed,
but what is still the same instaffing and we know that
there's a lot of both.
And now I should haveintroduced you a little better
than I did, because you're alsoan author of a book that I have
on my bookshelf behind me, thatyou actually wrote a book about
(00:45):
recruiting.
Tell me a little bit about thatbefore we get going.
John Ruffini (00:47):
I appreciate it and it's very timely because I'm
actually updating the book aswe speak.
Back in 2016, I put out a bookcalled Moneymakers and it was
all about the fundamentals ofrecruiting and it took off very
well via word of mouth, verylittle marketing, but a lot of
firms have used it to traintheir new recruiters because it
really does teach you.
The premise behind it is thereare 52 techniques in the book,
(01:09):
one for each week of the year,so it's all about getting a
technique, applying it, makingit work and then slowly building
on that, and it was all aboutthe fundamentals of the business
, where I think every recruiterneeds to be grounded before they
can grow their business.
Actually, the world has changedsince it came out, so I'm
actually in the process ofupdating it and hopefully later
this year there'll be a revisededition coming out.
Pete Newsome (01:33):
Well, I look forward to comparing the two,
because the world has changed alot.
It continues to evolve rapidly.
We're going to talk about someof those changes today and
that'll be interesting to seewhat you can leave in and what
you look at and say, wow, thisno longer even applies.
How far have you gotten with itso far?
John Ruffini (01:47):
I did a first pass .
I went through the first bookand I said, okay, what still
works and what needs to bekicked out the door.
And there was some stuff that Isaid, yeah, that's not really
going to be applicable.
And I added there was enoughnew stuff going on, a nice
refresher.
The fundamentals really haven'tchanged, but the way we recruit
as has.
Pete Newsome (02:04):
Absolutely, I think, the kickoff for what
we're going to talk about today,since I jokingly had emailed
you that you and I have been inrecruiting longer than many
recruiters have been alive.
John Ruffini (02:13):
I don't know if that's a pro or a con.
Sad but true.
Pete Newsome (02:16):
Sad but true.
So what is one thing that justis fundamental in that
technology, or anything elsegoing on in the world, just
won't change.
John Ruffini (02:29):
In my opinion, Pete, the thing about recruiting
, regardless of what happens toinfluence how we recruit, our
business is still aboutrelationships and it's still
grounded in relationships and Idon't see that changing.
So at the end of the day, it'sa people business and people
want to interact with otherpeople.
It's just human nature.
So it's all about therelationships and building those
long-term relationships withfolks, both on the recruiting
(02:50):
candidate side and on the clientdevelopment side recruiting
profession.
Pete Newsome (02:54):
There's talk about recruiters going away, ai
replacing us.
Nothing could be farther fromthe truth, because we need
people to separate all the noisethat now exists between 100%
100,000.
John Ruffini (03:14):
There's new products coming out, it seems,
every day, and they're thegreatest new thing that's going
to help you be better at yourbusiness, and I think that's the
key is trying to figure outwhich one of these tools is
going to work for me, so tospeak, or my firm.
But you're right, it's nevergoing to replace the recruiter.
It'll augment the recruiter'sperformance, but it won't
replace the recruiter.
Pete Newsome (03:35):
I think that's a great way to phrase it and I
couldn't agree more.
So, with that in mind, what isa tool that, when you started
recruiting, it would havesounded like science fiction to
you.
Then, if someone had told youback then hey, this is how we're
going to be doing things, whatcomes to mind?
John Ruffini (03:50):
If someone had told me so, one of the biggest
challenges for any recruiter ismining their own ATS, right?
So there's a lot of data inthere, sometimes millions of
records from God knows how manyyears back, and it's always
laborious years back and it'salways laborious.
So if you had told me a decadeago that there could be an AI
agent that would automaticallyhave a verbal conversation with
(04:11):
thousands of candidates in mydatabase and pre-qualify them
before I even got into theoffice in the morning, I would
have thought you were crazy.
But we have that today.
Pete Newsome (04:19):
That's pretty wild .
How about if someone had saidthat to you five years ago, like
it didn't?
Yeah.
If they had said that to youfive years ago Like it didn't?
Yeah.
If they'd said it to you acouple of decades ago, but even
five years ago that seemed.
John Ruffini (04:31):
Because the automated attendant, so to speak
, has come a long way.
Back five years ago, theautomated attendant would be no
one that I'd want to have aconversation with because it
sounded robotic.
Now they've got technology thatflows pretty smooth and sounds
like a real human, and peopleare receptive to it.
Pete Newsome (04:51):
And it's crazy to me to or not crazy, but I think
it's probably the opposite ofcrazy.
It's probably natural to seethat some companies and
organizations are embracing it.
Others are not.
I was on the phone with anairline a couple of days ago
we're booking a trip for thesummer and I was trying to get
past the auto attendant.
I was hitting zero.
I kept saying speak with arepresentative, but it was such
(05:13):
dated technology it just wasn'tacknowledging that it was
forcing me to follow its set ofprompts and it just didn't apply
to what I wanted.
And as a consumer, I was sofrustrated by that because I
already have expectations of abetter interaction and I could
just tell they haven't updatedtheir auto attendant in probably
five plus years.
(05:34):
Trust me, it did as I wasbanging on the phone because I
was only calling because websitewasn't good enough.
That's really the way thingsare today is.
As a user, we expect, if notdemand, instant interaction and
satisfaction from what we'retrying to do, and I think tell
me if you disagree.
(05:54):
As staffing professionals, webetter be paying attention to
that and keeping up.
If not, we're going to be leftbehind quickly.
John Ruffini (06:02):
Absolutely.
Again, you've got to evolvewith the changing landscapes and
the way that we recruit todayis not the way we recruited five
, 10 years ago.
So, again, there are certainfundamentals that you're still
going to employ, but how yourecruit, you've got to adapt to
the changing landscape and howpeople want to be connected with
and where they want to beconnected with and what mediums
(06:24):
they want to be connected with.
Pete Newsome (06:25):
What got you here won't get you there, so to speak
, in your business, being partof a large organization that
works with a lot of differentstaffing firms.
I have peer groups that I'mpart of.
Of course, we're a little bitsmaller than you guys are as an
organization, but I am seeing alot of talk and thought about it
, but not as much action as Iwould have anticipated, given
(06:49):
how widely available thetechnology is.
Are you seeing something thesame or different?
John Ruffini (06:54):
We are, and I think that's it's a blessing and
a curse being part of a verylarge organization.
The blessing is you got a lotof resources and you've got a
lot of opportunities.
The curse is it takes a longtime to get new technology
through the red tape andapproved and there's fear.
I'm in the healthcare industrynow, so there's a huge fear of
(07:15):
cyber attacks and sensitive datathat may be in existence that
they don't want hacked.
So they're very conservative,very cautious, which from a
recruiting standpoint can befrustrating, because you just
want to at least try thistechnology out to see if it's
going to help and make yourbusiness better, and getting to
that point takes a little bitlonger than we'd like.
You take the good with the bad.
(07:36):
If you're smaller and nimble,you've got a little bit more
flexibility on what you can andcan't explore.
Pete Newsome (07:46):
And there's pros and cons to both, I think, like
you said, because sometimes whenI like to chase shiny objects
on occasion and that ready fireaim approach, isn't always the
best right.
It keeps you on your toes, whichis a good thing, and we're
never going to be left behind asa result, but it's not always.
Sometimes a little hit andpause button making sure you
think things through, and thathas its advantages too.
Absolutely, Absolutely, allright.
So, with that in mind, asthings continue to change, what
(08:09):
is one recruiting tactic thatyou believe is as tried and true
as it comes, and no matter howmuch technology comes into play,
it will still deliverconsistently.
John Ruffini (08:20):
The ability for a recruiter to communicate and
hold a conversation is paramount, and that's as important now as
it's ever been.
It's interesting I was thinkingback to what's a technique that
I've never stopped using and itstill works today, and I used
to have Pete.
I called these my milliondollar questions.
So, as a recruiter, you justwant to have a conversation and
(08:43):
the worst thing is when you call, you give your intro and you
get shut down immediately andyou're thinking how can I keep
this person talking?
Just so I can get a little bitmore information, to see what I
got to work with here.
And I don't want to talk to you, I just simply ask.
(09:05):
Let me ask you a question If Iwas aware of an opportunity that
could improve your lifepersonally, professionally and
financially, would you want tohear about it?
And usually the answer is yes,and that gives me the
opportunity to then say tell mewhat that looks like in your
world.
So it extends the conversation.
Similarly, on the businessdevelopment side, if a potential
client is shutting you down,you say look, when you do hire,
(09:27):
how important is it for you tohire the best talent that the
market has to offer?
And again, most of the timethat manager is going to say, oh
, it's very important.
So then you follow up and yousay, okay, you're running ads,
you're getting the bestcandidate that your ad has to
offer.
Might or might not be the bestcandidate that the market has to
offer.
So it allows you to continuethat conversation and at least
(09:49):
get a little more information tosee if it's worth both parties
exploring.
Pete Newsome (09:54):
I love that.
Thank you for sharing both ofthose, and I would say to call
them million dollar questions isunderstated, because those who
apply them are going to find alot more revenue over time
associated with the resultsthey're going to get from asking
those questions, because Ithink that being inquisitive,
being curious genuinely, is alost art.
(10:15):
That's how I was taught torecruit.
I suspect you were as well.
You've applied it and seen thebenefits from it, but it runs
almost in contradiction to thetransactional world that we're
in.
Right Quick hits Give me a yesor no.
Great, that's wonderful, butthis is too big of a deal what
we're talking about here interms of careers and jobs.
(10:37):
If I am, I'm going to misssomething really important and
it's not going to work out verywell in the end.
John Ruffini (10:42):
And again to your point earlier.
It's counter to our culturetoday.
Right, everything is I want itnow, I want immediate
gratification, I want to recruityou, I want to place you, I
want the job order.
Give it to me now.
And our business just doesn'twork that way.
And if it does, it's usuallygoing to fail.
If it goes too fast and seemstoo easy, there's probably a
reason I love 100%, and I doagree with you that we're
(11:05):
curious.
I think curiosity is somethingthat recruiters just have to
have.
There's always an additionalquestion to ask.
Don't stop at the surface level.
If you get the answer to theinitial question you asked, then
there's probably somebackground information that you
want to know, and the deeper youcan go with that, then the
better the relationship you'llhave with that person that
you're talking to.
Pete Newsome (11:25):
Absolutely, and you will have backouts and
ghosting decreased to such asignificant degree.
Because someone made a commentto me on a podcast a couple of
weeks ago Now, it wasn't arecruiting professional, but it
was someone who is in theindustry as a solution provider
and they said, being inrecruiting.
You know how it is when youtalk candidates into jobs all
(11:45):
the time and I was like, wait aminute.
I didn't say anything in themoment, but you can imagine,
because you and I think a lotalike I know exactly why you're
laughing.
That is the last thing youshould do as a recruiter, right?
It is not about we are not inthe square peg round hole
business, nor should we ever tryto be.
I should find out if I'm doingmy job right, what the candidate
(12:07):
wants, and then decide whetherthere's a potential fit.
But the same thing with clients.
It really does work both ways,which is why I love that you use
that same question, justpositioned a little bit
differently, because there'sequal sides of this equation.
John Ruffini (12:22):
I try to keep things simple.
I always say recruiting it'snot rocket science.
You have to work ridiculouslyhard at it to be successful and
have a career in it.
But from A to Z, if you look atwhat we do, it's very parallel.
On both sides the recruitingside and the client side there's
a lot of the same stuff thatgoes on.
You have a different audience,but the techniques and the
(12:43):
questions and the probing andthe developing a relationship,
that's all the same.
It takes time to develop thatand those that understand that
will have longer careers.
Pete Newsome (12:54):
It's so true, I love this.
I know I'm sensitive to thetime that I have with you, or I
could keep you going all day.
I do have your book and I couldjust ask you to describe all of
it, but I won't.
We'll make whoever really wantsto get all your answers and
secrets to buy it.
But all right, so let's flipthe script a little bit.
What's a recruiting tacticthat's existed for a long time
that you would like to seeburied and gone forever?
John Ruffini (13:17):
This is an easy one for me.
It is probably my biggest petpeeve Pete when say that three
times fast, pet peeve Pete.
This pet peeve Pete when saythat three times fast, pet peeve
Pete.
How many recruiters pick up thephone, call someone and say
I've got the perfect job for you.
Or they call a company and theysay I've got someone that'd be
a perfect fit for yourorganization, and they don't
even know the person.
(13:37):
So I always said how can I callsomebody and tell them I've got
the perfect job for them when Ihave no idea what they want or
what they do or what'sinteresting to them?
So that's something that I wishthat every recruiter would just
stop doing.
But on the flip side, I alwayssay I hope they keep doing it
because that makes it a loteasier for me to look different.
Pete Newsome (13:58):
It's great timing that you would say this, because
I was at an internal interviewlast week and I always give
whoever I'm interviewing thechance to ask questions of me at
the end.
And I said let's get it all onthe table, whatever you want to
know.
And she said all right, pete,how would you differentiate four
corner from a company that hadalready is working with five
staffing companies to get themto want to work with you?
(14:19):
And I said I have no ideawhether they should work with us
if that's all the informationyou're giving me.
I need a whole lot more to knowwhether we're a good fit for
them or whether they're a goodfit for us, and so the first
thing I need to do, I need a lotmore information and then I'll
decide whether we are a good fitor how much differentiation
(14:40):
that I could offer they wouldeven see value in, because in
many cases that doesn't exist.
We know that she was sosurprised by the answer.
She's worked in the industryfor only about a year and as
well as I do and anyonelistening.
There's almost two types ofrecruiting.
There's transactional and thenthere's companies who do it the
right way, and I think it'sabout a 50-50 split of those,
(15:02):
and this is obviously grossgeneralization.
It is a lost art to some degree.
To really stop and this isquickly becoming the theme of
our conversation today, I guessis go deep right, seek to
understand before you offersolutions and answers.
John Ruffini (15:25):
There were plenty of times where I would say that
and like, why should we workwith you?
And I was like, maybe youshouldn't.
You know, let's talk.
Maybe I'm not the right firmfor you or maybe I'm not the
right recruiter for you.
So many people, when you saythat, they're taken aback
because they're expecting you togo right into sales mode and
tell me oh, we do this with ourcandidates, we have this process
and at the end of the day, weall do the same thing.
(15:47):
It's just how we do it thatmakes us different, correct?
Pete Newsome (15:50):
Correct.
Like you said earlier, thankgoodness not everyone applies
this same approach and logic.
If they did, it would be hardto differentiate yourself Today.
I think I may have shared thiswith you when we spoke the other
day.
I was on the phone recently witha prospect and they were just
asking us about our process, howwe do things, and I mentioned
(16:11):
that we meet our candidates onsite for interviews and we walk
them in for their first day,things that I consider to be
one-on-one, and they said, wow,that's such so refreshing, wow,
interesting, and this is arecognizable company.
You would definitely know whothey are.
Anyone listening would.
And I thought man, is the barreally that low now where
(16:32):
something like that is fun?
What I consider to be asfundamental as being present and
as well as I do as a staffingcompany, there's you want to be
on site, you want excuses, andit seems that even that has
fallen off, and I suspect COVIDand being remote.
This changed so many things,including some of these things
(16:53):
that I consider to be asimportant as breathing and tying
your shoe.
John Ruffini (16:57):
Yeah, covid changed a lot of things for good
, but it also changed the way werecruit.
And all of a sudden now there'sno geographic boundaries, so
some of that high touch servicethat you and I were raised on
working in local markets, reallygetting to know all the
companies in your market, allthe candidates in your space in
your market that type of thing.
I would meet every candidate inperson.
(17:19):
We got them a job.
I would take them out to lunch,I would go see them at their
workplace on their first week orwhatever, like you said,
walking them in, making surethey're getting settled All that
high touch stuff when you're100% remote and you're placing
people all over the country.
You got to find a way toreplace that.
In person you can still be hightouch, but it's not exactly the
(17:39):
same.
Pete Newsome (17:40):
That's a great point.
I'm glad you made thatdistinction, because you can't
always do it, but when and whereyou can, you absolutely should
right, Absolutely, All right.
Cool, let's talk about what isone thing that from a candidate
experience standpoint we hearthat phrase a lot what comes to
mind that recruiters can do tomake candidates really feel like
rock stars?
John Ruffini (18:00):
This is going to seem really basic and you might
laugh at me, but recruiters justneed to listen Listen more than
they talk.
It's a very basic skill that'slost a lot because we're in such
a rush to get to the finishline, ask a question and then be
quiet and let them talk and askanother question and be quiet
and let them talk and ask afollow-up question and make it
(18:24):
all about them, because it is,if you treat the candidate like
that and my philosophy is alwaysif you do your job right as a
recruiter, you're never going tolike you said what job did you
put me in?
You never have to sell acandidate on a job.
If you do your job right,because you're going to get to
know them and then, based onwhat they tell you is important
to them, you can then bring jobsand career opportunities to
(18:46):
their attention that fall inline with those priorities,
career opportunities to theirattention that fall in line with
those priorities.
And by doing that, they knowyou listen, they know you pay
attention, they know you care,because you're not wasting their
time saying, yeah, I know youwant this, but how about this
over here?
And that's where recruiters endup shooting themselves in the
foot.
Hone your active listeningskills and it makes a huge
difference on the experience.
Pete Newsome (19:05):
So much wisdom there.
When I started off years agotaking notes, it was hard to
listen and take notes at thesame time.
I found and I don't know ifyou're a fan of some of these
new AI note-taking tools or ifyou've used them, but for
recruiters to be able to stay inthe moment in that conversation
and not worry about recordingthings, I think there's a lot of
(19:27):
benefit.
Have you been exposed to any ofthose note-taking tools yet?
John Ruffini (19:30):
You know what?
I haven't been exposed tonote-taking from a recruiting
standpoint.
I know recruiters who have andthey swear by it and you're
absolutely right.
That allows you to really stayin the conversation.
You don't have to worry aboutmissing something or writing
something down.
I've utilized internally at ourorganization.
We utilize WebEx forcommunications and meetings and
stuff, and WebEx now has atranscribing tool.
(19:52):
When you record a WebEx it willalso transcribe it.
So I've seen that and it'sinvaluable.
You get the whole transcript ofthe whole meeting in one lot
and you don't have to worryabout okay, maybe I missed
something, because you canalways go back.
And I think that is one ofthose pieces of technology could
be a real game changer forrecruiters.
If they've got that technologyand they can stay in the
conversation and really bepresent and not have to worry
(20:12):
about typing or writing, then itmight add even more value to
the process because they canjust go back and look at the
notes.
Pete Newsome (20:19):
Yeah, I feel like all the different apps.
We use Slack internally.
They have that capability.
We also have Teams.
We don't use it as much.
I think recruiters who arewilling to do that are going to
see the benefits from it quickly.
It's just going to enhance whatwe're doing.
That's how I think of AI.
For the most part, it's not asmuch of a replacement it may be
if you're not using it butprimarily it's an enhancement.
(20:43):
Are there any other tools thatyou've seen that really jump out
at you as a potential gamechanger?
John Ruffini (20:48):
So a couple of things come to mind.
One I'm a huge gosh.
I love ChatGPT.
It has really been a gamechanger with respect to
personalizing communications,making them stronger for that
initial outreach resume updating, job description writing holy
cow.
It's been really helpful forthat.
Now, the more you use it, themore you realize that it's all
(21:11):
about what you feed it.
So the better the prompt, thebetter your result.
I even use Chat GPT with ourrecruiters.
You can do a live role playwithin Chat GPT so you can tell
the machine hey, I want you tobe, in our case, a clinician.
I want you to be an operatingroom nurse.
I want you to be very short ontime.
Short to the point, not mincewords.
I want you to have this skill,that skill.
(21:33):
I want you to let me ask nomore than one question at a time
.
You can give it all thisinformation and then you can try
and recruit the candidatethrough ChatGPT and at the end
it will tell you how you did.
It's actually pretty cool.
Pete Newsome (21:45):
Have you now you're in charge of trainings
incorporated that into the wayyou teach?
John Ruffini (21:49):
It's not a staple.
As far as the bootcamp training, we put every recruiter through
.
But when I'm working one-on-onewith recruiters I'll be like,
hey, let's try something.
You may not enjoy role-playingwith me, we'll try role-playing
with a machine.
Yeah, it's something differentto try.
What a great idea.
Pete Newsome (22:05):
It makes sense that capability exists.
I haven't tried it, but I maysteal that idea from you in the
near future.
Now, have you tried Grok, thenew Grok, yet the Grok that just
came out over?
I think over the weekend or thepast week.
John Ruffini (22:15):
You know what?
That's the second time I'veheard that word today.
I saw it, I think, on a threadon LinkedIn.
Someone had a poll out there.
Have you tried Grok?
And I had no idea what Grok is.
Okay, all right.
Pete Newsome (22:24):
So you're probably not a huge Twitter user then
You're probably not a hugeTwitter user then I think a lot
of people do.
I'll just say this and leave ithere for now.
I have had a chat GPT paidsubscription for probably two
years now.
I'm going to cancel it as ofright now.
That's how much better, rock isI no?
Longer feel the need to use Now.
I suspect OpenAI will come outwith something else very soon.
(22:46):
But to say I'm blown away likeit's a step forward it is, would
be an understatement.
John Ruffini (22:52):
So this is the latest and greatest AI tool.
Pete Newsome (22:55):
It is, and I've heard some technologists talking
about what they did in order tobuild this next evolution of AI
.
I highly recommend it.
It's actually free for a periodof time.
Typically, you need to have thepremium X subscription.
I don't know if you can pay forGrok separately, but for right
now they're offering it free.
I think they realize how big ofan advancement it is and they
(23:16):
want it in everyone's hands toreally.
Elon and Sam Maltman fromOpenAI aren't exactly best
buddies, but they're both verysmart they are, so we all
benefit from it.
Right, they're going at eachother spending lots of money.
John Ruffini (23:28):
I am looking forward to checking that out.
Pete Newsome (23:30):
All right, so let's move on to something else.
Hybrid versus on-site where doyou land?
Where do you see that?
How do you see it impactingrecruiting?
John Ruffini (23:40):
a couple of different ways.
From a firm perspective, it'sbeen a game changer because, as
far as hiring recruiters to joinyour team, you no longer have
geographic boundaries.
It's no longer oh, you've gotto be close enough so you can
come into the office every day.
So I know personally we used tobe an in-office.
Every day type of firm andCOVID hit and all of a sudden
(24:03):
we're 100% remote over thecourse of two weeks.
But what we did during that timeis we set up two different,
fully staffed teams ofrecruiters that are 100% remote.
So we took advantage of it.
We said let's just go out andfind the best recruiters,
regardless of where they are,because now they can work
anywhere and that seems to becommonplace in the model.
So from an internal hiringperspective, it's been a game
(24:27):
changer.
I would also say, whenrecruiting, most of your
companies, depending on yourindustry, are also open to a
remote or hybrid role when theyhire somebody.
So that also frees uprecruiters on where they can
recruit from.
So again, you're not justlimited to a certain mile radius
around your client location.
(24:47):
Now it's opened up thegeographic barriers.
That are no more, because nowyou can recruit anywhere.
Pete Newsome (24:52):
For those taking advantage of it.
There's so many benefits.
What about downside, though?
Do you see?
Is any part of that concern you, either short-term or maybe
even long-term, in terms ofwhere that takes us?
I think there's some unknownsthere.
John Ruffini (25:06):
There are some unknowns and one downside that I
think is it's very hard tobuild culture with a remote
staff and to get engagement witha remote staff.
So managing those people is morechallenging and I think it's
harder.
For if you're just coming outof school and it's your first
job and you're in a fully remotejob, I think it's really hard
(25:27):
for that person, because thebest way to learn is when you're
surrounded by other people whoare better than you, and when
you're remote you don't havethat all day.
You might be on meetings duringthe day, but then you're by
yourself, and I think for folksthat are trying to grow their
career, it's a new challengethat they almost seek out.
Now they're like nobody wantsto go in the office five days a
(25:48):
week, but I think they miss thebenefit of doing that by
learning from other people.
In my opinion, if you're ableto do hybrid, that's the best of
both worlds, because you getthat interaction and you also
get the independence and abilityto work and self-manage
yourself.
So I think that's going to besomething that we'll continue to
work through over time.
Pete Newsome (26:07):
I'm with you.
I'm neutral on productivity.
I think there's pros and consto both.
I never would have thoughtbeing at home would be so busy
at times and the people comingin and out.
There's a lot more going on inmy house that I would have
thought being in the officeevery day.
But I do worry about youngprofessionals, my own kids and
my employees.
I think they're not going tocomplain right.
(26:36):
Who doesn't want to work athome if you can?
But I do worry the consoutweigh the pros for their
professional and personaldevelopment.
Now that makes me sound likethe old guy yelling at kids to
get off my lawn.
John Ruffini (26:42):
Not really, because not everybody is built
to work from home, and that'sokay.
Some people need to be in anoffice.
Some people need to be in anenvironment that's going to
motivate them.
Some people go stir crazy ifthey're at home.
So it's not for everybody, andthat's okay too.
Some people may think, oh great, I get to work from home.
It takes a lot of disciplineand if you've never done it
(27:03):
before, it's going to take somegetting used to Again.
Hopefully, if companies aredoing this, they've got some
sort of mentorship set up wherethey're helping these people
figure out.
Hey, here's how you can beproductive when you're working
from home, when you're workingremote, because it's a little
bit different than being in theoffice.
Pete Newsome (27:21):
I think we'll see a whole industry grow around how
to manage, develop, braincomfort, all of the above for
young people who are working athome.
If you're old like me, Ialready have my name right
Loneliness is not a part of theequation.
At this point in my life, itsounds nice in a way Back to
when I was starting off.
(27:41):
There's no way I would havebeen able to grow and develop
professionally at the same paceand that so there's a lot of
aspects that I think we'relearning as we go, but I've come
full circle.
At first I thought hybrid, oh,going back and forth, that's
tough and it does preclude youfrom being able to recruit
nationally.
But as time has gone on, I'velanded where you are now, which
(28:03):
is that's ideal, right?
We really do give people thebenefit of not having to drive
in every day because you get somuch of your life back, but also
be exposed to others.
John Ruffini (28:19):
It's vice versa.
But I want to be around mypeers.
I want to be around otherpeople and have some in-person
meetings and get thatinteraction.
You experience and learndifferent things in person in a
different way than you do whenyou're working remote.
So I agree with you, I thinkit's a nice mix to have.
Pete Newsome (28:38):
The hybrid is like the perfect setup.
Well, and for someone like you,I would suspect, if you're
writing, you have to get intothat deep work mode where you
are uninterrupted, which is hardto do if you're in the office,
but a big piece of your job, ofcourse, is interacting with
people, so it sounds like thatis the best of both worlds,
literally, for you in yoursituation.
John Ruffini (28:57):
I tell you, all the training that we do for the
most part probably 90% of it nowis virtual virtual classrooms.
From a speaker trainerperspective, I miss the live
classroom.
It's just, it's different.
So again, we've had to adapt,my team had to adapt on okay,
how can we effectively engagewith folks in a virtual
classroom?
And when you're live with themit's easier.
(29:18):
I miss that.
I like the live audience.
But again, we talk aboutadapting to changing landscapes
and that's the situation thatwe're in.
We embrace it and move forward.
Pete Newsome (29:26):
As a speaker, a trainer or a professional
salesperson, which is what Iwould call myself, even though
it's not what I've done forquite a few years or even a
recruiter, if you can't read theroom, that's incredibly
difficult to know how yourmessage is landing.
It's body language.
It counts a lot.
John Ruffini (29:46):
Someone once was talking to me about reading a
room on a virtual meeting and myresponse was it'd be a lot
easier to room with people whoturn their cameras on.
Pete Newsome (29:54):
Yes, we drew that light in the sand early on with
COVID.
Everybody had cameras on.
John Ruffini (29:59):
Smart, smart All right.
Pete Newsome (30:00):
So a couple more questions, John, before I let
you go.
Give me a juicy story.
Give me something that waseither an epic win or a fail.
That is just a story.
I know you have a gazillion ofthem that really it would
resonate with a lot of people.
John Ruffini (30:17):
It made a lasting impact in me and that was I'll
try and condense this, becauseI'm Italian, I tend to be
long-winded it taught me thevalue of follow-up communication
.
So it was pretty early in mycareer and I worked at 360 desks
.
So I recruited candidates, Ibrought in clients, we did the
(30:38):
whole thing and every once in awhile you had one of your
clients hire one of yourcandidates and you got the whole
deal.
So that was 100% commission.
So you're real excited.
This was the first one of thosedeals that I ever booked and the
guy accepted the job, gave hisnotice, he assured me he had the
counteroffer discussion, he wasnot going to take a
counteroffer.
Everything was great.
(30:58):
I was partying, I was writingmy numbers up on the whiteboard
in the office, spending thatmoney before it was even in my
pocket.
And on the day he was supposedto start, pete, my client,
called me and said are you awarehe's not showing up today?
And I said no.
They said yeah, he called thismorning, he took a counteroffer,
(31:20):
he's staying where he is.
So, of course, as a recruiter,who do you blame the candidate
for not telling?
But I always tell recruiters no, that's on you, that's on me in
a case that was on me becauseduring his notice period I had
not stayed in touch with him.
Had I been in touch with him Iwould have been able to see it
coming and at least mitigated itwith the client.
(31:41):
As it turned out, I lost thecandidate, I lost the client
relationship because I failedmiserably.
But rest assured, from thatpoint on I called my candidates
multiple times during theinterview.
I had them call me after theyresigned.
I had them call me their lastday, because this counteroffer
occurred at 4.30 on the Fridayof the last day of his notice
(32:02):
and I called them on Sundaynight before their start date.
Taught me a very valuablelesson.
That one stung a lot.
Pete Newsome (32:08):
But imagine how much good it did for you, as I'm
sure you've thought about manytimes over the years and have
shared with others how manysuccesses happened as a result
of that for you and everyonewho's you've ever helped along
the way.
John Ruffini (32:22):
That's how we learn right.
We're going to fall on our faceduring the course of our lives
many times, and the key is whenyou fall on your face, can you
realize why you fell on yourface and try not to do it again.
And that did.
It taught me a very valuablelesson.
Pete Newsome (32:35):
Similarly, if it makes you feel better.
My first place met with FourCorner Resources.
I was at home in my little homeoffice that I the business was
about a month old.
I thought I placed someone whowas a direct hire and I went to
check my computer this before Iwent out to meet him on his
first day and there was an emailhe backed out my first
(32:57):
placement and I still showed upwith my suit on to the client
and told them in person because,again, excuse to be there and
follow my sword.
I looked back, very similar toyour story, and there were red
flags that I missed and I'vetold that story to every
recruiter we've ever hired sincethen.
It made me so much better as aresult.
(33:18):
As painful as it was in themoment, it's soul crushing.
John Ruffini (33:22):
I'm putting myself in your shoes right now,
opening that email, and I canjust feel your stomach.
Pete Newsome (33:27):
I just oh, and I feel it, I like it was yesterday
, because those things you don'tforget those.
Oh, but to your point, and itis such an important point every
day since I've been better as aresult and I wouldn't trade
that experience now for anything, and I'm thankful it happened.
(33:50):
Because you've seen like I have, I'm sure, one of the worst
things.
I think and it's going to sounda little pessimistic that when
new recruiters have a positive,they have wins early and they
think the business is easierthan it is.
John Ruffini (33:59):
I've seen that turn out poorly because that's
almost a detriment when someonegets off to a really rocket
start Because you knowsomething's going to happen.
Pete Newsome (34:09):
You have to have that bad one, right.
You just do to learn, and Ihave so many stories, as I'm
sure you do, over the years, ofmy recruiters putting their
faith in someone where all thered flags were there.
I would say you've got to learneventually, right?
When all the red flags werethere, I would say you've got to
learn eventually, right, whenall the butts come out, excuses.
Thank you for sharing thatstory.
(34:30):
It makes me feel because if ithappened to you, it can
certainly happen to anyone, soyou ready for a quick lightning
round before we go.
Sure, sure, all right.
So what is one skill everyrecruiter needs in 2025?
John Ruffini (34:40):
Communication.
Pete Newsome (34:41):
Absolutely Biggest candidate red flag you've ever
seen.
John Ruffini (34:46):
Lack of communication.
Pete Newsome (34:50):
Most absurd excuse a candidate's ever given for
ghosting.
John Ruffini (34:55):
This is interesting.
I don't have an answer for this, pete, because whenever a
candidate did ghost me, I walkedaway.
So I never really they weren'twith my time.
So if I couldn't get in touchwith them, like tried them once,
tried them twice and they wereghosting me, I just moved on.
So I don't have a good answerfor that one.
Pete Newsome (35:13):
Okay, I have a few they got caught with.
Yeah, social media is a funnything.
John Ruffini (35:19):
One word that recruiters overuse I'll give you
two the word fit and the wordmatch.
Pete Newsome (35:25):
Can't stand them.
John Ruffini (35:26):
All of our recruiters.
Just take them out of yourvocabulary whenever you're
talking to the outside world,because they're very mechanical
and we don't place widgets, weplace people.
Pete Newsome (35:35):
Perfect, I love it All.
Right, Last one phone call,text or email to make candidate
contact initially.
John Ruffini (35:42):
All three.
Yeah, you don't know howsomeone's going to respond if
you don't know them.
So if you have a phone number,an email and a text, I say, try
all three and see which oneworks.
In today's world, most of yourinitial outreach is going to be
digital in some fashion, so it'sprobably going to be text or
email, but eventually, as youand I both know, that has to
(36:02):
progress to a telephoneconversation so you can start
building the relationship.
Pete Newsome (36:07):
Love it, John.
Thank you so much for today.
This has been fun.
John Ruffini (36:11):
I'm so glad you did.
Pete Newsome (36:12):
I don't want to say you're the perfect guest,
but-.
John Ruffini (36:14):
No, far from that.
Pete Newsome (36:15):
Yeah, I'm pretty close to it.
So thank you, this has been alot of fun.
If anyone wants to buy yourbook and I highly recommend it
it just says what needs to besaid.
It is so tried and true, thephilosophy that you have, the
approach that you take.
I really do look forward to theupdate.
How can we get it, other thanconnect with you on LinkedIn or
looking on Amazon?
Any other way we can access it.
John Ruffini (36:36):
Amazon's the easiest way.
They're the big kahuna.
If you look up Moneymakers byJohn Ruffini, you'll find it out
there, and I'll do a shamelessplug You'll also find another
one out there.
It's called A Quest for Alex,and that was a nonfiction book
that I released last year.
Pete Newsome (36:50):
We will put those links in our show notes then,
for sure.
I appreciate it, john.
Thank you so much.
Have a great rest of the day,pete.
Thank you.
You're listening to the Hire Calling Podcast,
your source for all thingshiring, staffing and recruiting.
I'm Pete Newsome, and my guesttoday is John Ruffini, vice
President of ProfessionalDevelopment for Health Trust
Workforce Solutions.
John, how are you today, pete?
I'm great.
It's good to see you.
It's great to see you.
How long have we known eachother now, john?
I guess?
John Ruffini (00:19):
we initially.
That's gotta be coming up oneight years, that's got to be
coming up on eight years I thinkit has.
Pete Newsome (00:24):
Give or take.
That's what I was thinking.
John, you're a longtimestaffing executive.
I asked you to come on today totalk about what has changed,
but what is still the same instaffing and we know that
there's a lot of both.
And now I should haveintroduced you a little better
than I did, because you're alsoan author of a book that I have
on my bookshelf behind me, thatyou actually wrote a book about
(00:45):
recruiting.
Tell me a little bit about thatbefore we get going.
John Ruffini (00:47):
I appreciate it and it's very timely because I'm
actually updating the book aswe speak.
Back in 2016, I put out a bookcalled Moneymakers and it was
all about the fundamentals ofrecruiting and it took off very
well via word of mouth, verylittle marketing, but a lot of
firms have used it to traintheir new recruiters because it
really does teach you.
The premise behind it is thereare 52 techniques in the book,
(01:09):
one for each week of the year,so it's all about getting a
technique, applying it, makingit work and then slowly building
on that, and it was all aboutthe fundamentals of the business
, where I think every recruiterneeds to be grounded before they
can grow their business.
Actually, the world has changedsince it came out, so I'm
actually in the process ofupdating it and hopefully later
this year there'll be a revisededition coming out.
Pete Newsome (01:33):
Well, I look forward to comparing the two,
because the world has changed alot.
It continues to evolve rapidly.
We're going to talk about someof those changes today and
that'll be interesting to seewhat you can leave in and what
you look at and say, wow, thisno longer even applies.
How far have you gotten with itso far?
John Ruffini (01:47):
I did a first pass .
I went through the first bookand I said, okay, what still
works and what needs to bekicked out the door.
And there was some stuff that Isaid, yeah, that's not really
going to be applicable.
And I added there was enoughnew stuff going on, a nice
refresher.
The fundamentals really haven'tchanged, but the way we recruit
as has.
Pete Newsome (02:04):
Absolutely, I think, the kickoff for what
we're going to talk about today,since I jokingly had emailed
you that you and I have been inrecruiting longer than many
recruiters have been alive.
John Ruffini (02:13):
I don't know if that's a pro or a con.
Sad but true.
Pete Newsome (02:16):
Sad but true.
So what is one thing that justis fundamental in that
technology, or anything elsegoing on in the world, just
won't change.
John Ruffini (02:29):
In my opinion, Pete, the thing about recruiting
, regardless of what happens toinfluence how we recruit, our
business is still aboutrelationships and it's still
grounded in relationships and Idon't see that changing.
So at the end of the day, it'sa people business and people
want to interact with otherpeople.
It's just human nature.
So it's all about therelationships and building those
long-term relationships withfolks, both on the recruiting
(02:50):
candidate side and on the clientdevelopment side recruiting
profession.
Pete Newsome (02:54):
There's talk about recruiters going away, ai
replacing us.
Nothing could be farther fromthe truth, because we need
people to separate all the noisethat now exists between 100%
100,000.
John Ruffini (03:14):
There's new products coming out, it seems,
every day, and they're thegreatest new thing that's going
to help you be better at yourbusiness, and I think that's the
key is trying to figure outwhich one of these tools is
going to work for me, so tospeak, or my firm.
But you're right, it's nevergoing to replace the recruiter.
It'll augment the recruiter'sperformance, but it won't
replace the recruiter.
Pete Newsome (03:35):
I think that's a great way to phrase it and I
couldn't agree more.
So, with that in mind, what isa tool that, when you started
recruiting, it would havesounded like science fiction to
you.
Then, if someone had told youback then hey, this is how we're
going to be doing things, whatcomes to mind?
John Ruffini (03:50):
If someone had told me so, one of the biggest
challenges for any recruiter ismining their own ATS, right?
So there's a lot of data inthere, sometimes millions of
records from God knows how manyyears back, and it's always
laborious years back and it'salways laborious.
So if you had told me a decadeago that there could be an AI
agent that would automaticallyhave a verbal conversation with
(04:11):
thousands of candidates in mydatabase and pre-qualify them
before I even got into theoffice in the morning, I would
have thought you were crazy.
But we have that today.
Pete Newsome (04:19):
That's pretty wild .
How about if someone had saidthat to you five years ago, like
it didn't?
Yeah.
If they had said that to youfive years ago Like it didn't?
Yeah.
If they'd said it to you acouple of decades ago, but even
five years ago that seemed.
John Ruffini (04:31):
Because the automated attendant, so to speak
, has come a long way.
Back five years ago, theautomated attendant would be no
one that I'd want to have aconversation with because it
sounded robotic.
Now they've got technology thatflows pretty smooth and sounds
like a real human, and peopleare receptive to it.
Pete Newsome (04:51):
And it's crazy to me to or not crazy, but I think
it's probably the opposite ofcrazy.
It's probably natural to seethat some companies and
organizations are embracing it.
Others are not.
I was on the phone with anairline a couple of days ago
we're booking a trip for thesummer and I was trying to get
past the auto attendant.
I was hitting zero.
I kept saying speak with arepresentative, but it was such
(05:13):
dated technology it just wasn'tacknowledging that it was
forcing me to follow its set ofprompts and it just didn't apply
to what I wanted.
And as a consumer, I was sofrustrated by that because I
already have expectations of abetter interaction and I could
just tell they haven't updatedtheir auto attendant in probably
five plus years.
(05:34):
Trust me, it did as I wasbanging on the phone because I
was only calling because websitewasn't good enough.
That's really the way thingsare today is.
As a user, we expect, if notdemand, instant interaction and
satisfaction from what we'retrying to do, and I think tell
me if you disagree.
(05:54):
As staffing professionals, webetter be paying attention to
that and keeping up.
If not, we're going to be leftbehind quickly.
John Ruffini (06:02):
Absolutely.
Again, you've got to evolvewith the changing landscapes and
the way that we recruit todayis not the way we recruited five
, 10 years ago.
So, again, there are certainfundamentals that you're still
going to employ, but how yourecruit, you've got to adapt to
the changing landscape and howpeople want to be connected with
and where they want to beconnected with and what mediums
(06:24):
they want to be connected with.
Pete Newsome (06:25):
What got you here won't get you there, so to speak
, in your business, being partof a large organization that
works with a lot of differentstaffing firms.
I have peer groups that I'mpart of.
Of course, we're a little bitsmaller than you guys are as an
organization, but I am seeing alot of talk and thought about it
, but not as much action as Iwould have anticipated, given
(06:49):
how widely available thetechnology is.
Are you seeing something thesame or different?
John Ruffini (06:54):
We are, and I think that's it's a blessing and
a curse being part of a verylarge organization.
The blessing is you got a lotof resources and you've got a
lot of opportunities.
The curse is it takes a longtime to get new technology
through the red tape andapproved and there's fear.
I'm in the healthcare industrynow, so there's a huge fear of
(07:15):
cyber attacks and sensitive datathat may be in existence that
they don't want hacked.
So they're very conservative,very cautious, which from a
recruiting standpoint can befrustrating, because you just
want to at least try thistechnology out to see if it's
going to help and make yourbusiness better, and getting to
that point takes a little bitlonger than we'd like.
You take the good with the bad.
(07:36):
If you're smaller and nimble,you've got a little bit more
flexibility on what you can andcan't explore.
Pete Newsome (07:46):
And there's pros and cons to both, I think, like
you said, because sometimes whenI like to chase shiny objects
on occasion and that ready fireaim approach, isn't always the
best right.
It keeps you on your toes, whichis a good thing, and we're
never going to be left behind asa result, but it's not always.
Sometimes a little hit andpause button making sure you
think things through, and thathas its advantages too.
Absolutely, Absolutely, allright.
So, with that in mind, asthings continue to change, what
(08:09):
is one recruiting tactic thatyou believe is as tried and true
as it comes, and no matter howmuch technology comes into play,
it will still deliverconsistently.
John Ruffini (08:20):
The ability for a recruiter to communicate and
hold a conversation is paramount, and that's as important now as
it's ever been.
It's interesting I was thinkingback to what's a technique that
I've never stopped using and itstill works today, and I used
to have Pete.
I called these my milliondollar questions.
So, as a recruiter, you justwant to have a conversation and
(08:43):
the worst thing is when you call, you give your intro and you
get shut down immediately andyou're thinking how can I keep
this person talking?
Just so I can get a little bitmore information, to see what I
got to work with here.
And I don't want to talk to you, I just simply ask.
(09:05):
Let me ask you a question If Iwas aware of an opportunity that
could improve your lifepersonally, professionally and
financially, would you want tohear about it?
And usually the answer is yes,and that gives me the
opportunity to then say tell mewhat that looks like in your
world.
So it extends the conversation.
Similarly, on the businessdevelopment side, if a potential
client is shutting you down,you say look, when you do hire,
(09:27):
how important is it for you tohire the best talent that the
market has to offer?
And again, most of the timethat manager is going to say, oh
, it's very important.
So then you follow up and yousay, okay, you're running ads,
you're getting the bestcandidate that your ad has to
offer.
Might or might not be the bestcandidate that the market has to
offer.
So it allows you to continuethat conversation and at least
(09:49):
get a little more information tosee if it's worth both parties
exploring.
Pete Newsome (09:54):
I love that.
Thank you for sharing both ofthose, and I would say to call
them million dollar questions isunderstated, because those who
apply them are going to find alot more revenue over time
associated with the resultsthey're going to get from asking
those questions, because Ithink that being inquisitive,
being curious genuinely, is alost art.
(10:15):
That's how I was taught torecruit.
I suspect you were as well.
You've applied it and seen thebenefits from it, but it runs
almost in contradiction to thetransactional world that we're
in.
Right Quick hits Give me a yesor no.
Great, that's wonderful, butthis is too big of a deal what
we're talking about here interms of careers and jobs.
(10:37):
If I am, I'm going to misssomething really important and
it's not going to work out verywell in the end.
John Ruffini (10:42):
And again to your point earlier.
It's counter to our culturetoday.
Right, everything is I want itnow, I want immediate
gratification, I want to recruityou, I want to place you, I
want the job order.
Give it to me now.
And our business just doesn'twork that way.
And if it does, it's usuallygoing to fail.
If it goes too fast and seemstoo easy, there's probably a
reason I love 100%, and I doagree with you that we're
(11:05):
curious.
I think curiosity is somethingthat recruiters just have to
have.
There's always an additionalquestion to ask.
Don't stop at the surface level.
If you get the answer to theinitial question you asked, then
there's probably somebackground information that you
want to know, and the deeper youcan go with that, then the
better the relationship you'llhave with that person that
you're talking to.
Pete Newsome (11:25):
Absolutely, and you will have backouts and
ghosting decreased to such asignificant degree.
Because someone made a commentto me on a podcast a couple of
weeks ago Now, it wasn't arecruiting professional, but it
was someone who is in theindustry as a solution provider
and they said, being inrecruiting.
You know how it is when youtalk candidates into jobs all
(11:45):
the time and I was like, wait aminute.
I didn't say anything in themoment, but you can imagine,
because you and I think a lotalike I know exactly why you're
laughing.
That is the last thing youshould do as a recruiter, right?
It is not about we are not inthe square peg round hole
business, nor should we ever tryto be.
I should find out if I'm doingmy job right, what the candidate
(12:07):
wants, and then decide whetherthere's a potential fit.
But the same thing with clients.
It really does work both ways,which is why I love that you use
that same question, justpositioned a little bit
differently, because there'sequal sides of this equation.
John Ruffini (12:22):
I try to keep things simple.
I always say recruiting it'snot rocket science.
You have to work ridiculouslyhard at it to be successful and
have a career in it.
But from A to Z, if you look atwhat we do, it's very parallel.
On both sides the recruitingside and the client side there's
a lot of the same stuff thatgoes on.
You have a different audience,but the techniques and the
(12:43):
questions and the probing andthe developing a relationship,
that's all the same.
It takes time to develop thatand those that understand that
will have longer careers.
Pete Newsome (12:54):
It's so true, I love this.
I know I'm sensitive to thetime that I have with you, or I
could keep you going all day.
I do have your book and I couldjust ask you to describe all of
it, but I won't.
We'll make whoever really wantsto get all your answers and
secrets to buy it.
But all right, so let's flipthe script a little bit.
What's a recruiting tacticthat's existed for a long time
that you would like to seeburied and gone forever?
John Ruffini (13:17):
This is an easy one for me.
It is probably my biggest petpeeve Pete when say that three
times fast, pet peeve Pete.
This pet peeve Pete when saythat three times fast, pet peeve
Pete.
How many recruiters pick up thephone, call someone and say
I've got the perfect job for you.
Or they call a company and theysay I've got someone that'd be
a perfect fit for yourorganization, and they don't
even know the person.
(13:37):
So I always said how can I callsomebody and tell them I've got
the perfect job for them when Ihave no idea what they want or
what they do or what'sinteresting to them?
So that's something that I wishthat every recruiter would just
stop doing.
But on the flip side, I alwayssay I hope they keep doing it
because that makes it a loteasier for me to look different.
Pete Newsome (13:58):
It's great timing that you would say this, because
I was at an internal interviewlast week and I always give
whoever I'm interviewing thechance to ask questions of me at
the end.
And I said let's get it all onthe table, whatever you want to
know.
And she said all right, pete,how would you differentiate four
corner from a company that hadalready is working with five
staffing companies to get themto want to work with you?
(14:19):
And I said I have no ideawhether they should work with us
if that's all the informationyou're giving me.
I need a whole lot more to knowwhether we're a good fit for
them or whether they're a goodfit for us, and so the first
thing I need to do, I need a lotmore information and then I'll
decide whether we are a good fitor how much differentiation
(14:40):
that I could offer they wouldeven see value in, because in
many cases that doesn't exist.
We know that she was sosurprised by the answer.
She's worked in the industryfor only about a year and as
well as I do and anyonelistening.
There's almost two types ofrecruiting.
There's transactional and thenthere's companies who do it the
right way, and I think it'sabout a 50-50 split of those,
(15:02):
and this is obviously grossgeneralization.
It is a lost art to some degree.
To really stop and this isquickly becoming the theme of
our conversation today, I guessis go deep right, seek to
understand before you offersolutions and answers.
John Ruffini (15:25):
There were plenty of times where I would say that
and like, why should we workwith you?
And I was like, maybe youshouldn't.
You know, let's talk.
Maybe I'm not the right firmfor you or maybe I'm not the
right recruiter for you.
So many people, when you saythat, they're taken aback
because they're expecting you togo right into sales mode and
tell me oh, we do this with ourcandidates, we have this process
and at the end of the day, weall do the same thing.
(15:47):
It's just how we do it thatmakes us different, correct?
Pete Newsome (15:50):
Correct.
Like you said earlier, thankgoodness not everyone applies
this same approach and logic.
If they did, it would be hardto differentiate yourself Today.
I think I may have shared thiswith you when we spoke the other
day.
I was on the phone recently witha prospect and they were just
asking us about our process, howwe do things, and I mentioned
(16:11):
that we meet our candidates onsite for interviews and we walk
them in for their first day,things that I consider to be
one-on-one, and they said, wow,that's such so refreshing, wow,
interesting, and this is arecognizable company.
You would definitely know whothey are.
Anyone listening would.
And I thought man, is the barreally that low now where
(16:32):
something like that is fun?
What I consider to be asfundamental as being present and
as well as I do as a staffingcompany, there's you want to be
on site, you want excuses, andit seems that even that has
fallen off, and I suspect COVIDand being remote.
This changed so many things,including some of these things
(16:53):
that I consider to be asimportant as breathing and tying
your shoe.
John Ruffini (16:57):
Yeah, covid changed a lot of things for good
, but it also changed the way werecruit.
And all of a sudden now there'sno geographic boundaries, so
some of that high touch servicethat you and I were raised on
working in local markets, reallygetting to know all the
companies in your market, allthe candidates in your space in
your market that type of thing.
I would meet every candidate inperson.
(17:19):
We got them a job.
I would take them out to lunch,I would go see them at their
workplace on their first week orwhatever, like you said,
walking them in, making surethey're getting settled All that
high touch stuff when you're100% remote and you're placing
people all over the country.
You got to find a way toreplace that.
In person you can still be hightouch, but it's not exactly the
(17:39):
same.
Pete Newsome (17:40):
That's a great point.
I'm glad you made thatdistinction, because you can't
always do it, but when and whereyou can, you absolutely should
right, Absolutely, All right.
Cool, let's talk about what isone thing that from a candidate
experience standpoint we hearthat phrase a lot what comes to
mind that recruiters can do tomake candidates really feel like
rock stars?
John Ruffini (18:00):
This is going to seem really basic and you might
laugh at me, but recruiters justneed to listen Listen more than
they talk.
It's a very basic skill that'slost a lot because we're in such
a rush to get to the finishline, ask a question and then be
quiet and let them talk and askanother question and be quiet
and let them talk and ask afollow-up question and make it
(18:24):
all about them, because it is,if you treat the candidate like
that and my philosophy is alwaysif you do your job right as a
recruiter, you're never going tolike you said what job did you
put me in?
You never have to sell acandidate on a job.
If you do your job right,because you're going to get to
know them and then, based onwhat they tell you is important
to them, you can then bring jobsand career opportunities to
(18:46):
their attention that fall inline with those priorities,
career opportunities to theirattention that fall in line with
those priorities.
And by doing that, they knowyou listen, they know you pay
attention, they know you care,because you're not wasting their
time saying, yeah, I know youwant this, but how about this
over here?
And that's where recruiters endup shooting themselves in the
foot.
Hone your active listeningskills and it makes a huge
difference on the experience.
Pete Newsome (19:05):
So much wisdom there.
When I started off years agotaking notes, it was hard to
listen and take notes at thesame time.
I found and I don't know ifyou're a fan of some of these
new AI note-taking tools or ifyou've used them, but for
recruiters to be able to stay inthe moment in that conversation
and not worry about recordingthings, I think there's a lot of
(19:27):
benefit.
Have you been exposed to any ofthose note-taking tools yet?
John Ruffini (19:30):
You know what?
I haven't been exposed tonote-taking from a recruiting
standpoint.
I know recruiters who have andthey swear by it and you're
absolutely right.
That allows you to really stayin the conversation.
You don't have to worry aboutmissing something or writing
something down.
I've utilized internally at ourorganization.
We utilize WebEx forcommunications and meetings and
stuff, and WebEx now has atranscribing tool.
(19:52):
When you record a WebEx it willalso transcribe it.
So I've seen that and it'sinvaluable.
You get the whole transcript ofthe whole meeting in one lot
and you don't have to worryabout okay, maybe I missed
something, because you canalways go back.
And I think that is one ofthose pieces of technology could
be a real game changer forrecruiters.
If they've got that technologyand they can stay in the
conversation and really bepresent and not have to worry
(20:12):
about typing or writing, then itmight add even more value to
the process because they canjust go back and look at the
notes.
Pete Newsome (20:19):
Yeah, I feel like all the different apps.
We use Slack internally.
They have that capability.
We also have Teams.
We don't use it as much.
I think recruiters who arewilling to do that are going to
see the benefits from it quickly.
It's just going to enhance whatwe're doing.
That's how I think of AI.
For the most part, it's not asmuch of a replacement it may be
if you're not using it butprimarily it's an enhancement.
(20:43):
Are there any other tools thatyou've seen that really jump out
at you as a potential gamechanger?
John Ruffini (20:48):
So a couple of things come to mind.
One I'm a huge gosh.
I love ChatGPT.
It has really been a gamechanger with respect to
personalizing communications,making them stronger for that
initial outreach resume updating, job description writing holy
cow.
It's been really helpful forthat.
Now, the more you use it, themore you realize that it's all
(21:11):
about what you feed it.
So the better the prompt, thebetter your result.
I even use Chat GPT with ourrecruiters.
You can do a live role playwithin Chat GPT so you can tell
the machine hey, I want you tobe, in our case, a clinician.
I want you to be an operatingroom nurse.
I want you to be very short ontime.
Short to the point, not mincewords.
I want you to have this skill,that skill.
(21:33):
I want you to let me ask nomore than one question at a time
.
You can give it all thisinformation and then you can try
and recruit the candidatethrough ChatGPT and at the end
it will tell you how you did.
It's actually pretty cool.
Pete Newsome (21:45):
Have you now you're in charge of trainings
incorporated that into the wayyou teach?
John Ruffini (21:49):
It's not a staple.
As far as the bootcamp training, we put every recruiter through
.
But when I'm working one-on-onewith recruiters I'll be like,
hey, let's try something.
You may not enjoy role-playingwith me, we'll try role-playing
with a machine.
Yeah, it's something differentto try.
What a great idea.
Pete Newsome (22:05):
It makes sense that capability exists.
I haven't tried it, but I maysteal that idea from you in the
near future.
Now, have you tried Grok, thenew Grok, yet the Grok that just
came out over?
I think over the weekend or thepast week.
John Ruffini (22:15):
You know what?
That's the second time I'veheard that word today.
I saw it, I think, on a threadon LinkedIn.
Someone had a poll out there.
Have you tried Grok?
And I had no idea what Grok is.
Okay, all right.
Pete Newsome (22:24):
So you're probably not a huge Twitter user then
You're probably not a hugeTwitter user then I think a lot
of people do.
I'll just say this and leave ithere for now.
I have had a chat GPT paidsubscription for probably two
years now.
I'm going to cancel it as ofright now.
That's how much better, rock isI no?
Longer feel the need to use Now.
I suspect OpenAI will come outwith something else very soon.
(22:46):
But to say I'm blown away likeit's a step forward it is, would
be an understatement.
John Ruffini (22:52):
So this is the latest and greatest AI tool.
Pete Newsome (22:55):
It is, and I've heard some technologists talking
about what they did in order tobuild this next evolution of AI
.
I highly recommend it.
It's actually free for a periodof time.
Typically, you need to have thepremium X subscription.
I don't know if you can pay forGrok separately, but for right
now they're offering it free.
I think they realize how big ofan advancement it is and they
(23:16):
want it in everyone's hands toreally.
Elon and Sam Maltman fromOpenAI aren't exactly best
buddies, but they're both verysmart they are, so we all
benefit from it.
Right, they're going at eachother spending lots of money.
John Ruffini (23:28):
I am looking forward to checking that out.
Pete Newsome (23:30):
All right, so let's move on to something else.
Hybrid versus on-site where doyou land?
Where do you see that?
How do you see it impactingrecruiting?
John Ruffini (23:40):
a couple of different ways.
From a firm perspective, it'sbeen a game changer because, as
far as hiring recruiters to joinyour team, you no longer have
geographic boundaries.
It's no longer oh, you've gotto be close enough so you can
come into the office every day.
So I know personally we used tobe an in-office.
Every day type of firm andCOVID hit and all of a sudden
(24:03):
we're 100% remote over thecourse of two weeks.
But what we did during that timeis we set up two different,
fully staffed teams ofrecruiters that are 100% remote.
So we took advantage of it.
We said let's just go out andfind the best recruiters,
regardless of where they are,because now they can work
anywhere and that seems to becommonplace in the model.
So from an internal hiringperspective, it's been a game
(24:27):
changer.
I would also say, whenrecruiting, most of your
companies, depending on yourindustry, are also open to a
remote or hybrid role when theyhire somebody.
So that also frees uprecruiters on where they can
recruit from.
So again, you're not justlimited to a certain mile radius
around your client location.
(24:47):
Now it's opened up thegeographic barriers.
That are no more, because nowyou can recruit anywhere.
Pete Newsome (24:52):
For those taking advantage of it.
There's so many benefits.
What about downside, though?
Do you see?
Is any part of that concern you, either short-term or maybe
even long-term, in terms ofwhere that takes us?
I think there's some unknownsthere.
John Ruffini (25:06):
There are some unknowns and one downside that I
think is it's very hard tobuild culture with a remote
staff and to get engagement witha remote staff.
So managing those people is morechallenging and I think it's
harder.
For if you're just coming outof school and it's your first
job and you're in a fully remotejob, I think it's really hard
(25:27):
for that person, because thebest way to learn is when you're
surrounded by other people whoare better than you, and when
you're remote you don't havethat all day.
You might be on meetings duringthe day, but then you're by
yourself, and I think for folksthat are trying to grow their
career, it's a new challengethat they almost seek out.
Now they're like nobody wantsto go in the office five days a
(25:48):
week, but I think they miss thebenefit of doing that by
learning from other people.
In my opinion, if you're ableto do hybrid, that's the best of
both worlds, because you getthat interaction and you also
get the independence and abilityto work and self-manage
yourself.
So I think that's going to besomething that we'll continue to
work through over time.
Pete Newsome (26:07):
I'm with you.
I'm neutral on productivity.
I think there's pros and consto both.
I never would have thoughtbeing at home would be so busy
at times and the people comingin and out.
There's a lot more going on inmy house that I would have
thought being in the officeevery day.
But I do worry about youngprofessionals, my own kids and
my employees.
I think they're not going tocomplain right.
(26:36):
Who doesn't want to work athome if you can?
But I do worry the consoutweigh the pros for their
professional and personaldevelopment.
Now that makes me sound likethe old guy yelling at kids to
get off my lawn.
John Ruffini (26:42):
Not really, because not everybody is built
to work from home, and that'sokay.
Some people need to be in anoffice.
Some people need to be in anenvironment that's going to
motivate them.
Some people go stir crazy ifthey're at home.
So it's not for everybody, andthat's okay too.
Some people may think, oh great, I get to work from home.
It takes a lot of disciplineand if you've never done it
(27:03):
before, it's going to take somegetting used to Again.
Hopefully, if companies aredoing this, they've got some
sort of mentorship set up wherethey're helping these people
figure out.
Hey, here's how you can beproductive when you're working
from home, when you're workingremote, because it's a little
bit different than being in theoffice.
Pete Newsome (27:21):
I think we'll see a whole industry grow around how
to manage, develop, braincomfort, all of the above for
young people who are working athome.
If you're old like me, Ialready have my name right
Loneliness is not a part of theequation.
At this point in my life, itsounds nice in a way Back to
when I was starting off.
(27:41):
There's no way I would havebeen able to grow and develop
professionally at the same paceand that so there's a lot of
aspects that I think we'relearning as we go, but I've come
full circle.
At first I thought hybrid, oh,going back and forth, that's
tough and it does preclude youfrom being able to recruit
nationally.
But as time has gone on, I'velanded where you are now, which
(28:03):
is that's ideal, right?
We really do give people thebenefit of not having to drive
in every day because you get somuch of your life back, but also
be exposed to others.
John Ruffini (28:19):
It's vice versa.
But I want to be around mypeers.
I want to be around otherpeople and have some in-person
meetings and get thatinteraction.
You experience and learndifferent things in person in a
different way than you do whenyou're working remote.
So I agree with you, I thinkit's a nice mix to have.
Pete Newsome (28:38):
The hybrid is like the perfect setup.
Well, and for someone like you,I would suspect, if you're
writing, you have to get intothat deep work mode where you
are uninterrupted, which is hardto do if you're in the office,
but a big piece of your job, ofcourse, is interacting with
people, so it sounds like thatis the best of both worlds,
literally, for you in yoursituation.
John Ruffini (28:57):
I tell you, all the training that we do for the
most part probably 90% of it nowis virtual virtual classrooms.
From a speaker trainerperspective, I miss the live
classroom.
It's just, it's different.
So again, we've had to adapt,my team had to adapt on okay,
how can we effectively engagewith folks in a virtual
classroom?
And when you're live with themit's easier.
(29:18):
I miss that.
I like the live audience.
But again, we talk aboutadapting to changing landscapes
and that's the situation thatwe're in.
We embrace it and move forward.
Pete Newsome (29:26):
As a speaker, a trainer or a professional
salesperson, which is what Iwould call myself, even though
it's not what I've done forquite a few years or even a
recruiter, if you can't read theroom, that's incredibly
difficult to know how yourmessage is landing.
It's body language.
It counts a lot.
John Ruffini (29:46):
Someone once was talking to me about reading a
room on a virtual meeting and myresponse was it'd be a lot
easier to room with people whoturn their cameras on.
Pete Newsome (29:54):
Yes, we drew that light in the sand early on with
COVID.
Everybody had cameras on.
John Ruffini (29:59):
Smart, smart All right.
Pete Newsome (30:00):
So a couple more questions, John, before I let
you go.
Give me a juicy story.
Give me something that waseither an epic win or a fail.
That is just a story.
I know you have a gazillion ofthem that really it would
resonate with a lot of people.
John Ruffini (30:17):
It made a lasting impact in me and that was I'll
try and condense this, becauseI'm Italian, I tend to be
long-winded it taught me thevalue of follow-up communication
.
So it was pretty early in mycareer and I worked at 360 desks
.
So I recruited candidates, Ibrought in clients, we did the
(30:38):
whole thing and every once in awhile you had one of your
clients hire one of yourcandidates and you got the whole
deal.
So that was 100% commission.
So you're real excited.
This was the first one of thosedeals that I ever booked and the
guy accepted the job, gave hisnotice, he assured me he had the
counteroffer discussion, he wasnot going to take a
counteroffer.
Everything was great.
(30:58):
I was partying, I was writingmy numbers up on the whiteboard
in the office, spending thatmoney before it was even in my
pocket.
And on the day he was supposedto start, pete, my client,
called me and said are you awarehe's not showing up today?
And I said no.
They said yeah, he called thismorning, he took a counteroffer,
(31:20):
he's staying where he is.
So, of course, as a recruiter,who do you blame the candidate
for not telling?
But I always tell recruiters no, that's on you, that's on me in
a case that was on me becauseduring his notice period I had
not stayed in touch with him.
Had I been in touch with him Iwould have been able to see it
coming and at least mitigated itwith the client.
(31:41):
As it turned out, I lost thecandidate, I lost the client
relationship because I failedmiserably.
But rest assured, from thatpoint on I called my candidates
multiple times during theinterview.
I had them call me after theyresigned.
I had them call me their lastday, because this counteroffer
occurred at 4.30 on the Fridayof the last day of his notice
(32:02):
and I called them on Sundaynight before their start date.
Taught me a very valuablelesson.
That one stung a lot.
Pete Newsome (32:08):
But imagine how much good it did for you, as I'm
sure you've thought about manytimes over the years and have
shared with others how manysuccesses happened as a result
of that for you and everyonewho's you've ever helped along
the way.
John Ruffini (32:22):
That's how we learn right.
We're going to fall on our faceduring the course of our lives
many times, and the key is whenyou fall on your face, can you
realize why you fell on yourface and try not to do it again.
And that did.
It taught me a very valuablelesson.
Pete Newsome (32:35):
Similarly, if it makes you feel better.
My first place met with FourCorner Resources.
I was at home in my little homeoffice that I the business was
about a month old.
I thought I placed someone whowas a direct hire and I went to
check my computer this before Iwent out to meet him on his
first day and there was an emailhe backed out my first
(32:57):
placement and I still showed upwith my suit on to the client
and told them in person because,again, excuse to be there and
follow my sword.
I looked back, very similar toyour story, and there were red
flags that I missed and I'vetold that story to every
recruiter we've ever hired sincethen.
It made me so much better as aresult.
(33:18):
As painful as it was in themoment, it's soul crushing.
John Ruffini (33:22):
I'm putting myself in your shoes right now,
opening that email, and I canjust feel your stomach.
Pete Newsome (33:27):
I just oh, and I feel it, I like it was yesterday
, because those things you don'tforget those.
Oh, but to your point, and itis such an important point every
day since I've been better as aresult and I wouldn't trade
that experience now for anything, and I'm thankful it happened.
(33:50):
Because you've seen like I have, I'm sure, one of the worst
things.
I think and it's going to sounda little pessimistic that when
new recruiters have a positive,they have wins early and they
think the business is easierthan it is.
John Ruffini (33:59):
I've seen that turn out poorly because that's
almost a detriment when someonegets off to a really rocket
start Because you knowsomething's going to happen.
Pete Newsome (34:09):
You have to have that bad one, right.
You just do to learn, and Ihave so many stories, as I'm
sure you do, over the years, ofmy recruiters putting their
faith in someone where all thered flags were there.
I would say you've got to learneventually, right?
When all the red flags werethere, I would say you've got to
learn eventually, right, whenall the butts come out, excuses.
Thank you for sharing thatstory.
(34:30):
It makes me feel because if ithappened to you, it can
certainly happen to anyone, soyou ready for a quick lightning
round before we go.
Sure, sure, all right.
So what is one skill everyrecruiter needs in 2025?
John Ruffini (34:40):
Communication.
Pete Newsome (34:41):
Absolutely Biggest candidate red flag you've ever
seen.
John Ruffini (34:46):
Lack of communication.
Pete Newsome (34:50):
Most absurd excuse a candidate's ever given for
ghosting.
John Ruffini (34:55):
This is interesting.
I don't have an answer for this, pete, because whenever a
candidate did ghost me, I walkedaway.
So I never really they weren'twith my time.
So if I couldn't get in touchwith them, like tried them once,
tried them twice and they wereghosting me, I just moved on.
So I don't have a good answerfor that one.
Pete Newsome (35:13):
Okay, I have a few they got caught with.
Yeah, social media is a funnything.
John Ruffini (35:19):
One word that recruiters overuse I'll give you
two the word fit and the wordmatch.
Pete Newsome (35:25):
Can't stand them.
John Ruffini (35:26):
All of our recruiters.
Just take them out of yourvocabulary whenever you're
talking to the outside world,because they're very mechanical
and we don't place widgets, weplace people.
Pete Newsome (35:35):
Perfect, I love it All.
Right, Last one phone call,text or email to make candidate
contact initially.
John Ruffini (35:42):
All three.
Yeah, you don't know howsomeone's going to respond if
you don't know them.
So if you have a phone number,an email and a text, I say, try
all three and see which oneworks.
In today's world, most of yourinitial outreach is going to be
digital in some fashion, so it'sprobably going to be text or
email, but eventually, as youand I both know, that has to
(36:02):
progress to a telephoneconversation so you can start
building the relationship.
Pete Newsome (36:07):
Love it, John.
Thank you so much for today.
This has been fun.
John Ruffini (36:11):
I'm so glad you did.
Pete Newsome (36:12):
I don't want to say you're the perfect guest,
but-.
John Ruffini (36:14):
No, far from that.
Pete Newsome (36:15):
Yeah, I'm pretty close to it.
So thank you, this has been alot of fun.
If anyone wants to buy yourbook and I highly recommend it
it just says what needs to besaid.
It is so tried and true, thephilosophy that you have, the
approach that you take.
I really do look forward to theupdate.
How can we get it, other thanconnect with you on LinkedIn or
looking on Amazon?
Any other way we can access it.
John Ruffini (36:36):
Amazon's the easiest way.
They're the big kahuna.
If you look up Moneymakers byJohn Ruffini, you'll find it out
there, and I'll do a shamelessplug You'll also find another
one out there.
It's called A Quest for Alex,and that was a nonfiction book
that I released last year.
Pete Newsome (36:50):
We will put those links in our show notes then,
for sure.
I appreciate it, john.
Thank you so much.
Have a great rest of the day,pete.
Thank you.
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