EP 183: How Playing Football Professionally at AFC Wimbledon Influenced This Talent Leader's Perspective

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:46):
Hey, welcome to the show, everyone.
I'm your host, James Mackey.
We got Reese Bachelor heretoday.
He's uh founding talent over atDust, is his most recent role.
So excited to talk about that.
Welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_02 (00:58):
Thanks for having me.
Looking forward to talking.

SPEAKER_00 (01:00):
Yeah, I am as well.
For everybody tuning in, we'dlove to learn more about you,
more about your background.
Um, so did you grow up in the UKor where are you initially from?

SPEAKER_02 (01:11):
Yeah, so born and bred in the UK.
I grew up in a small town justoutside of London called
Crawley, which is by GatwickAirport, one of the main areas,
um, one of the main airports inLondon, or just outside of
London.
So born and bred there, grew up,lived most of my early life
there before eventually movinginto London about two years ago.
So I spent the last two yearsnow living actually in the city

(01:33):
and in London.
And also on top of that, aswell, where I've been working
for French founded companiesover the last two years, I've
been traveling back and forth toParis quite frequently over the
last couple of years as well.
So yeah, it's been interesting.

SPEAKER_00 (01:44):
So was that uh intentional?

SPEAKER_02 (01:47):
Uh no, no, not intentional, actually.
I um I I it's just a nice littleniche, right?

SPEAKER_00 (01:53):
To like work with these French companies, you get
to travel back and forth.
That's uh that's cool.

SPEAKER_02 (01:58):
Yeah, yeah, not intentional.
My old manager at my previouscompany, we've um been
connecting for quite a while.
When he landed it at thiscompany, he reached out to me.
That for me was like a reallycool thing to do, to be able to
have the opportunity there.
And now I've sort of foundmyself in a French ecosystem,
which then landed me my currentjob today, which are also based
in Paris.

SPEAKER_00 (02:16):
That's cool.
And so you're you're going backand forth.
I think uh you said every weekor every couple weeks.

SPEAKER_02 (02:22):
Yeah, every week at the moment.
Uh and then if there's a fewweeks that I can't do, but yeah,
pretty much every weekcurrently.

SPEAKER_00 (02:28):
Are you still loving that, or did you does it start
to get a little tiring?

SPEAKER_02 (02:33):
It's funny because whenever I tell people they're
like, it's really cool, thenovelty wears off in that.
I'm not I'm not sightseeing,right?
I think a lot of my time is justback and forth to the office.
Um a little bit tiring, but thejourney's easy.
It's about two and a half hourson the Eurostar on the on the
train, so the journey itself'seasy.
But I think the main thing iswhen you're staying in hotels
all the time and like you domission your own bed sometimes.

(02:54):
But uh, I I can't complain.
It's like a normal commute, it'scool, but the novelty wears off.

SPEAKER_00 (02:59):
So uh so you said you've been in London for a
couple of years.
What's that been like?

SPEAKER_02 (03:04):
Great.
Uh I love London.
The big thing for me to moveinto London was like more
opportunities, there's a lotmore things to do as well,
easier for commuting into work.
Where I lived in Cruley wasquite a small town, quiet.
And I think the biggest thingfor missing for me was that I'm
quite ambitious in my goals andmy career, and I want to be
surrounded by like equally asambitious people where I can

(03:27):
have like a strong network.
And that for me was I knew I hadto move to the city to be able
to do that.
So that was like the realturning point for me on right,
love my small town, love where Igrew up.
Great people, got my friendsthere, but there's more to this,
so that's what made me make thejump to the city to build a
stronger network and just havemore things to do on the
weekend.
If I want to go to a restaurantor a pub, it's on your doorstep,

(03:49):
right?
So yeah, I I I love London, Ilove the city.
I think wherever I move to nextor go to will always be a city.

SPEAKER_00 (03:57):
Yeah, I hear you on that.
There's definitely always uh alot going on.
It sounds like you like to beable to go around and spend some
time at different you knowrestaurants and travel to Paris
quickly.
That's uh that's nice, man.
That's really cool.
So wait, how far out of the cityis Cro Crowley?
Is it Crawley Crowley?
How do I'm sorry, how do I sayit?

SPEAKER_02 (04:15):
Yeah, Crowley, Crowley.

SPEAKER_00 (04:17):
Okay, so is that a couple away, a couple hours away
from London, or how far away isthat?

SPEAKER_02 (04:21):
It's not that bad.
I mean, if you've got the train,depending on which part of
London, because London'sobviously a big city, you can
get into South London in aprobably about 50 minutes, 50 to
an hour.
Um, so it's not actually too badof a journey.
The issue is of what I found wasjust that the trains aren't
regular, right?
So it's like if you miss one,you've got to wait like another

(04:41):
40, 45 minutes to catch the nexttrain.
They stop running at a certaintime.
So if you're having late nightsin the office, like uh back when
I was working agency and thehours were crazy, you know, I'd
always miss the last train homeand I'm having to get taxis back
or stay in a hotel.
Um, so I think that was like thebiggest blocker is like if I
want to do things past a certainhour, you always have to plan

(05:03):
ahead on like how you're gettinghome.
Whereas when you live in London,you never have to worry about
that.
You've got the tube, or it'seasy to get a taxi or whatever
it might be.

SPEAKER_00 (05:10):
Yeah.
Well, good stuff.
And I, you know, one thing thatI wanted to do before we jump
into conversation more aboutrecruiting is like, as you know,
like a big part of the show isreally diving into folks like
life experiences and getting toa sense of um, you know, values
and experiences that lead to howyou think about talent
acquisition and hiring andpeople in general.
I'd love to just get a sense forwho you were growing up.

(05:32):
What were you into when you werea kid?
Were you into sports or what wasyour thing?

SPEAKER_02 (05:35):
Yeah, I was a big sports person.
So in schools, I did everysports possible: football,
cricket, rugby, athletics.
I did all of them, but my coresports was football or soccer
for anyone in the US.
That was a big thing for me.
So the system in the UK forfootball is you can get picked
up by an academy, which meansyou uh get signed by a

(05:56):
professional football team, andthen you go through their
academy system whilst you're inschool.
Um and I was fortunate enough toget scouted by an academy.
Um, I started off with a teamcalled Crawley Town, which was
my local team.
They were a professional at thetime, had an unfortunate
situation where they decided todissolve the academy, which was
like heart crushing for mebecause I only just signed for
them and it was six monthslater.

(06:16):
It's like I got this childhooddream and it's gone.
And then from there, I wasfortunate enough to go on trials
at a few different other clubs,and then I got picked up by a
team called AFC Wimbledon, whoat the time were League Two,
went to League One, which islike the third third division in
the uh English football tier,and I was with them from the
ages of 14 to I think 18 or 18or 19.

(06:41):
Um, and that for me was like mychildhood, right?
All I wanted to do was when Iwas younger be a professional
footballer and fortunate enoughto go through the academy system
as a school kid, which the greatthing for that for me was it
means that I got taken out ofschool to go play and I did less
days in school when I wastraining, and then I got offered
a scholarship, which is once youfinish school, you either get
released and you're out, you'regone, or you get offered a

(07:04):
scholarship, which is a two-yearcontract, and that's where you
then become full-time.
You're playing footballfull-time, you train every day
full-time, and I was uhfortunate enough to get offered
a two-year scholarship, and Idid that through the ages of 16
to 17 or 18.
And again, like that was mydream.
And uh, I mean, I've got somegreat memories from back then,
but then at the end of thatscholarship, there's another

(07:24):
decision, you know, do you get anew contract and regress from
there?
And uh at the end of that, Ididn't get a new contract.
That was when I just sort of satand I was like, damn, like what
do I do with my life?
You know, do I keep trying to godown this football route or do I
get a real job?
I'm sure we'll talk about itshortly.
But that's sort of then when Ifell into recruiting.
But um, yeah, a big part of meand my journey and the values

(07:46):
and the way that I work todaycome from football, come from
sports, and it's like there weresome real key role models for me
within the team that I played,the competitive nature, but then
competitive in a team way aswell, which I think is like the
perfect mix, right?
It was I was competitive in asense that I wanted to get new
contracts and I had to fight formyself, but then also we're a

(08:07):
team and we have to wintogether, and it's finding the
right balances between that aswell.
So that was like a a corefundamental of my journey, and
and definitely that I'd say hasshaped me into the person that I
am today.

SPEAKER_00 (08:18):
That's a really interesting point that you were
talking about in terms of beingcompetitive to on an individual
basis, to land your owncontracts, but then also
balancing that with being a teamplayer, right?
I I do think that that's reallyrelevant to how we build
companies internally and thinkabout competition.

SPEAKER_01 (08:37):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (08:37):
Is that does that is that ever something you think
about?

SPEAKER_02 (08:40):
Yeah, and it's even like as I've thought about
building my teams and um howI've like set goals for my
teams, it's all been based onboth, right?
I don't want individuals thatonly care about themselves and
the work that they're doing, buton the same nature as I don't
want people that hide behindother people's work, right?

(09:01):
I want someone that'sself-motivated and is
competitive in their own sense,but then also does things for
the greater good, right?
They're thinking about how doesthis affect the team, how does
this affect the company.
Um, and that's always beenthings that I look for in
people, but then at the sametime, it's then how I think
about, you know, how do Imotivate people, how do I build
a winning team?
And that's always really been atthe core fundamental, generally

(09:23):
what I believe in.
I think you've got to beself-motivated, you've got to be
competitive, but you've alwaysgot to think about the greater
picture, right?
It's not just about you and whatyou're doing and your success,
because you can't be successfulif people around you aren't
being successful as well, and ifthe company isn't being
successful.
So it really does come back tothat for me.

SPEAKER_00 (09:40):
So is that when you were playing football, is that a
perspective that just evolvedorganically, or was that did
that come from a coach, or howdo you think you developed that
mindset?

SPEAKER_02 (09:52):
Yeah, um good question.
I so I think my competitivenature has always been sort of
within me.
I think I grew up with an olderbrother and we were competitive
against each other in our ownsense.
So I think that sort ofindividual competition was
always in me.
But I think developing on a teamsense definitely came from a
coach.
I learned a lot from my coach atAOC Wimbledon whilst I was

(10:14):
there, like some really greatvalues, but definitely around
being a team player and how dowe work as a team.
Like every training session thatwe did, all the tactics that we
put in place was like, how do wedo this as a team?
We were big on pressing, right?
And the system that we did forpressing is you have to press as
a team, right?
If one person doesn't press inthe system, everything else
breaks and the ball goes throughand they they get through and

(10:36):
then they can attack you, andthen suddenly the whole team is
out of play.

SPEAKER_00 (10:40):
Okay, so for for those of us that maybe aren't as
like uh famous football, uh sowhat do you mean by pressing?
Yeah, so I mean I think I havean idea just based on what
you're saying.

SPEAKER_02 (10:49):
So pressing is so when the other team have got the
ball, and what we believed inwas pressing from the front.
So a lot of teams will play outfrom the back.
So the goalkeeper will have theball and then they'll pass it to
their defender, they'll playshort, they won't kick it long.
So what we would do is we wouldsit back to encourage the
goalkeeper to play short, andthen we all move up as a unit to
go press the ball and box themin and stop them from going

(11:10):
forward, and then we want to winthe possession up high.
So that's what we mean bypressing.
Now, if only one person pressesby themselves, it's easy to play
around.
If only two people press bythemselves, again, it's easy to
play around.
So you have to press as a unit,as in a function, and you all
have got to do your jobperfectly.
And if you don't, and oneperson's out of place, you get

(11:30):
played around and the wholeteam's now out of play.
Um, so that was all around like,how do we do this as a team?
For example, as well, if if oneof your teammates is caught out
of position or is tired, you goand you go and trap back
yourself, right?
It might not be your position oryour job to track back, but
you're doing that for yourteammate.
So everything that we did waslike, how do we do this

(11:51):
together?
Because if we individuallyperform well and do our jobs
right, all of us do that, thewhole team will, and we will
succeed.
So those are like just some realbeliefs that that was ingrained
to me during that footballcareer.
So yeah, it's it's like you haveto do it well as a team, but to
do it well as a team, you haveto do it well individually.
And if one person on your teamis struggling, you go and help

(12:13):
out and do that for them.
You know, you might be 110%while someone else is 80%, so go
and help them.
Um, so those are things that wedid as a football team, and why
a lot of the times we punchedabove our weight as well.
We were beating teams that werefundamentally better than us on
paper, but we operated as a teamand we worked hard as well.

(12:34):
We were all about working hardand working together as a team,
and that's why we beat teamsthat were fundamentally better
than us, and that's always thenbeen like a core belief of mine.
But there's a famous quote thatis hard work beats talent when
talent refuses to work hard.
You know, that has always stayedwithin me, has always sort of
followed me throughout myrecruiting journey as I think
about you know my work processesand what I need to do.

(12:56):
So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (12:57):
What other values did your team and your coach
talk about?
And this is by the way, theseexperiences you're talking about
when you got to the point whereyou got the scholarship.
Is that right?
So you were in that program.
Like what else were you guystalking about back then?

SPEAKER_02 (13:14):
Um staying grounded, humility, um, you know, no one's
bigger than the team.
So when you get a scholarship asa professional footballer, it's
very easy that it goes to yourhead, right?
You think that you've made it atthis age, you know, you're 16
years old, you're playingfootball full-time, you're you

(13:34):
know, the the one percent,right?
Because everyone wants this andnot everyone gets it.
You're the one percent.
It's very easy.
You start to feel relaxed, youthink you're better than other
people.
And our coach at the time wasvery good at keeping us
grounded, right?
We were very old school in theway that we operated in our, you
know, we were still sweeping thechange rooms after every
training session and stayinglong hours late to make sure

(13:55):
that everything was clean,cleaning the first team football
boots, all having lunch togetherand no one leaves the hall
before everyone's finished.
We were just really taught likethe basic level of being a
decent human being and notletting this go to our heads and
staying very grounded.
And I think that just taught mea lot of respect.
I've always been the now thetype of person I respect

(14:15):
everyone around me, no matterwhat level of person you are.
You know, everyone is in thistogether, from the kit man to,
you know, whoever cleaned yourboots all the way up to the
first team coach, to the CEO,whoever it might be, right?
You can't build a successfulclub without everyone.
And I think I was just reallytaught that respect and to

(14:36):
always stay grounded.
And then the other thing, aswell, that's always stayed with
me is you're only as good asyour last performance.
So we might have won the game onSaturday, great, let's celebrate
that, but then let's get back totraining the next day and we've
got to go again because we'reanother game on the next
Saturday.
So let's not, you know, staystuck in that win and then
become complacent.

(14:56):
Um, so that was another thing.
But then at the same time, ifyou do have a loss, great, we've
got another game around thecorner where we can make up for
it.
So let's look look at thelearnings, great, but let's not
dwell in it, right?
Let's get back to the trainingground and go again.
And I think those are two corefundamental stills uh things.
So one, don't get too umcomplacent when you're winning

(15:16):
because it's very easy to gobackwards, and then also don't
get drowned when things aren'tgoing your way because it's very
easy to correct it.

SPEAKER_00 (15:24):
I feel like that's a a lesson that I am continuously
learning throughout life,hopefully at like deeper levels,
and but it it can it can sneakup on you both ways, right?
Where you can grow complacentwithout necessarily realizing
it, it can just happen overtime, and then it's also easy
to, as you put it, like to carrya loss forward, yeah, right?

(15:45):
Um, I guess I'm curious, how doyou find the balance?
Because I think like when thingsare going well, um it's like
this we need to like lookforward to the next game, but I
feel like you do need to pauseand celebrate the wins along the
way.
And I I do have this tendency toget a major win, but then in my

(16:05):
brain is like, well, yeah, I'mdoing my job.
This is I was supposed to dothis.
So I I own an embeddedrecruiting and RPO agency,
right?
And we won a really coolcontract with the fastest
growing social media platform inthe world and went from zero to
40 million users in 20 months,they're called Blue Sky Social.
We're doing all of theengineering and GTM hiring for

(16:26):
them for next year.
Huge, massive win for us, right?
Yeah, and it like like maybe afew hours was like, Yeah, this
is freaking awesome, and thenit's like boom, immediately it's
like, okay, no, but like wereally need to be here, we need
to be at this next level.
So, how how do you think aboutfinding the right balance
between just enjoying thejourney along the way, but then
also yeah, I don't know.

(16:46):
I mean, like, do you have anythoughts on that?
Like, just from your experience,like playing football.

SPEAKER_02 (16:50):
If I'm to be completely honest with you, I
think me personally, I've notprobably found like the perfect
solution there.
I'm me personally, right?
If there's a win, I will great,yeah, but I'm my mindset goes
straight to right, but what'snext to do?
Or like you said, I'm just doingmy job, or I can't get
complacent.

(17:11):
And I think that's definitelybeen ingrained in me from like
background experiences.
I just know that it's very easyfrom past experiences to become
complacent, or that win can betaken away from you very easily.
So, me personally, I haven'tfound the balance for that.
However, I am very intentionalwith like my team and the people
that I've managed to make surethat they sit in those wins and

(17:36):
they celebrate and to make surethat I give praise externally
because there's some very goodresearch out there, and I was
reading some the other day, um,I can't remember exactly where
it's from, but like howperformance and how individual
performance can grow and itexcel with celebrating the wins,
and teams that don't do that atall decrease its motivation.

(17:56):
Um, so I think it is superimportant.
And I, for the fact that I knowthat I'm not great at it
internally, I'm very intentionalabout it externally.

SPEAKER_00 (18:04):
Yeah, yeah.
Maybe it's like, and this isactually, I was thinking about
this.
I'm really happy we're talkingabout this when Lane on this
because it's something I'mthinking about a lot more
recently.
Um, because I I think I do blowpast wins really fast, too fast.
Yeah, you know what I mean?
And it's probably the case for alot of ambitious people, yeah,
right?
Like like you and like probablyyou know a lot of people that we
know.

(18:24):
I'm just wondering, like, maybeit's just like as simple as
like, well, just celebrate it.
Don't overthink it.
Just like just make it okay.
If you get a win, then you findsome reward, find some
celebration as a team, or evenindividually at times, like just
say, Okay, when I get this, whenI get a big win, I'm gonna do
one of the following things.

SPEAKER_02 (18:42):
We're or as a team, we're gonna do one of the
following things, and you justmake it like a habit to that's
it's very interesting you saidthat because it's something that
I have tried to implement in thepast, I didn't carry it on,
which was exactly that.
So if I set a goal, I would thenset what I do for that goal when
I achieve it.
So it's it's intentional, it'swritten down.

(19:03):
There's no excuses.
You know, if I achieve X, I'mgonna treat myself to a dinner
with my friends, for example, orwhatever it might be.
So I do think that is that isright.
Like if you're going to crackthis, like you when you set your
goals, set the reward rewardsfor it.
Um, I think that's a great wayto do it.
And that builds the habit, thatbuilds the system because it's
there, there's now no excuse,and you hold yourself and

(19:23):
whoever's part of that as wellaccountable to it as well.

SPEAKER_00 (19:26):
Well, so that's really and that's actually the
next level that and I didn'tthink about that, but yeah, it
should be like a proactivething, right?
It's like, okay, like every timewe close a big contract, we're
gonna do this, or every time wehit XYZ milestone, we're gonna
do something, and it's if we'restretch goals, then we're gonna
do something crazy, yeah, right.

SPEAKER_02 (19:46):
Yeah, yeah, because I'm starting to read.
Um, have you heard the bookAtomic Habits?

SPEAKER_00 (19:51):
Oh, yeah, definitely heard of it.
I actually I have not read it,but people have told me about it
or asked me about it so manytimes.
I feel like I need to now,right?

SPEAKER_02 (19:58):
Yeah, great book.
I'm starting to read it, but Iwas listening to a podcast of
the writer who wrote the book.
I listened to a podcast uh overthe week and actually where he's
speaking.
And he talks about buildinghabits and he talks about habits
as like a system.
And like the easiest way tobuild habits is one of the
things is just make itaccessible, right?
The more accessible it is, theless friction there is to doing
it.
So if you think about that,right, is you set your goal and

(20:21):
you set the reward for it, it'snow accessible because it's
there, it's planned.
It's no longer something thatyou need to think about when
that win happens, when yourmindset will naturally shift to
what's next to do, because it'salready been agreed upon.
So, yeah, the best way to buildhabits is by making it so
accessible that there's nofriction to it whatsoever.

SPEAKER_00 (20:39):
So, what about okay?
So, we talked about goals,right?
And we talked about rewardingourselves.
Let's Talk about tech, right?
Let's talk about the last fewyears because I think a lot of
people that were around in thewe had the COVID, right?
And then we had this marketboom, which was insane in 2021,
right?

(20:59):
And it was a lot of fun.
It was very a lot of hard work,but we were going straight up,
right?
And then we had the market crashin tech, and it just dragged
everyone right back down.
And it was it was tough for awhile, right?
And so we talked about moving onfrom losses, is something that
you you learned right and had toreally focus on when you were

(21:20):
playing football at uh a veryhigh level, right?
Yeah, what advice do you have?
Because I still think thatthere's a lot of people in
talent acquisition that I meanthey got beat down pretty bad
and they're in the process ofrebuilding.
So, how do you like from apsychological perspective, how
do you get back on on top, orhow do you focus on the next
game and not carry forward anyof that pain or the

(21:42):
disappointment of the past, youknow, for sure that crash, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 (21:47):
Yeah, for sure.
And firstly, like it's been sotough out there for a lot of
people, and uh, I don't want totake away from you know anything
that I'm gonna say now and howtough it is and how tough the
market is for sure.
Um for me, there's a few thingsthat I always remind myself of
whenever I'm going through likea tough situation, I need to
bounce back from it.
One, like I'm a huge believer ineverything happens for a reason.

(22:11):
You know, I think back to everybad thing that's happened to me
in my life and all those momentsthat I've sat there and it's
been super tough for me.
And I look at where I am today,and I'm exactly where I should
be today.
And I believe in the butterflyeffect.
And if these situations neverhappened, I wouldn't be where I
am today.
I was made redundant by uh oneof my previous companies, Trader

(22:34):
II.
I was there for four years,great company.
I was made redundant there, butat the time I was like, what the
hell do I do here?
I wouldn't be where I am todayif that didn't happen, you know?
And I am so happy with where Iam today.
So I think that's the firstthing is I always believe I
always remind myself everythinghappens for a reason.
I'm a big believer of that.
And um, Joe, actually, so we uhwhilst I was at Trey with my old

(22:58):
manager, we we did somethingcalled journey lines.
Um what journey lines is is youdraw a line down the middle uh
horizontally, and above it islike the uh like the real
positive moments in your life,and then below it is like the
real negative moments in yourlife, and you put a dot along
the line on all the differentsituations that have happened,
both positive and negative, andthen you map it out, right?
And what you see, right, iseveryone has got this up and

(23:21):
down moments throughout theirjourney that have been positive,
negatives.
Um, and what you always see iswhenever someone goes down, they
always bounce back up, right?
There's always a turning point.
So I think for me, it's alwaysjust bringing back to that
moment.
I always think about okay, I'vebeen through this before, I've
been through a tougher situationbefore, and I bounced back from
it and I'm exactly where I needto be today.
So that's psychologically what Isort of remind myself of.

(23:43):
I think the other thing as wellis uh like I'm a big believer in
positive attraction energy.
If I allow myself to stay in themoment of the bad situation, I'm
only going to continue toattract the negative things.
I'm not going to get thepositive outcomes.
So that's another thing that Ibelieve in.
And also, as well, right?
Fundamentally, I go back to mycore.

(24:04):
The more I put out, the more I'mgoing to gain.
For example, when I did get maderedundant, I was hammering
everyone every single day uhbefore I found that next
opportunity.
I was utilizing all of mynetwork, I was reaching out to
everyone.
I wasn't relying on justapplying to a role, I was
reaching out to people directly.
If you didn't have something,who can you introduce me to?

(24:25):
You know, I was working almostlonger days than I was when I
was working for a role uh tofind to try and find that next
opportunity.
Um, so that for me is a bigthing.
I then go to whenever I'm goingthrough a tough situation, like
let's say I'm working on a toughrole and I don't know what's
going on, I go back to just thatcore fundamental of just pure
hard work determination.

(24:46):
Um, and that's always what'sthen got me out the other end.
So there's these psychologicalbeliefs that I remind myself of,
and then these just this corefundamental attitude that I have
to tackling problems, which Iwill default to.

SPEAKER_00 (25:01):
Yeah, it's interesting what you said about
when you were looking for work,you probably put in more hours
uh than at times when you whenyou have a full-time job.
And yeah, I it's um, you knowwhat that reminds me of is when
I was uh a lot younger, this isprobably I don't know, I guess
at this point, man, 15 yearsago, 14 years ago.
I was uh out of high school, Iwas working in a boxing gym.

(25:23):
So I used to compete in MuayThai.
Uh and I used to coach like MMA,boxing, Muay Thai.
Uh, and I did it for likeactually like a living for for
many years uh before I got intorecruiting.
This kind of interesting careertransition.
But yeah, man, I was like all inon it.
It was a time in my life I wasactually living in the gym.
And like literally, but Iremember to make money, I was

(25:45):
doing like personal training,right?
And I remember uh somebody toldme there, he was like, You
should be in the gym, like doingthe like for the hours you want
to be doing PT, you should be inthe gym that entire time putting
in the hours now to make therelationships, putting the hours
that you want to work work thatmuch now.
Yeah, yeah, just love that.

(26:06):
So I was like, I would be in thegym at like you know, as as much
as I possibly could, and puttingin long hours just like I
wasn't, I didn't have the uh anyof like the clients yet, right?
Um but I spent the time thereand I really invested.
And what the what was reallycrazy to me, I mean, I worked at
a pretty cool boxing gym.

(26:27):
We had like Riddick Bo, uhWilliam Joffy, like some really
big like world champions,Olympians in the gym.
But like from a gritperspective, I was always there.
So you had some of these folksthat were like internationally
known, right?
Particularly like Riddick Bo.
But when it came to gettingclients one-on-one, I was there
at 6 30 in the morning untilnine o'clock at night, uh, a lot

(26:48):
of the times, right?
Um, and I ended up building likea book of like 20 something
people that I was training, Iwas doing the classes.
Yeah, I think I pretty muchended up like I was like back to
back on a lot of these sessions.
Uh and it really just came downto working the hours ahead of
time that I wanted.

SPEAKER_02 (27:07):
Yeah.
And uh if people look from theoutside of that though, right,
they're probably going, Oh, he'sso lucky to have got that.
But there's a great quote whichis the harder, harder I work,
the luckier I get.
Uh, you know, I again puttingthis back to like recruiting for
a second.
So uh like I'm I'm a bigbeliever in both quantity and
quality.
Um, there is when I look at thethe quantity side, there is

(27:30):
always an element of luck withinrecruiting and talent.
And the only way you get thatluck is by having some quantity
on top of that.
Um, so yeah, I think a corefundamental for me and listening
to your story, right?
You wouldn't have got that luckof meeting these people if you
didn't put in the hours and ifyou didn't put in the time.
So, while some people see thatas luck, I don't.

(27:52):
That's just work and time andeffort that you're putting in.
Um, but you could translate thatto luck.

SPEAKER_00 (27:57):
But yeah, and just think about this for a second,
right?
Putting in those works in likeMuay Thai and boxing, it landed
me an internship uh at the WhiteHouse, it landed me another
internship in the corporatesector at a software company.
The VP of sales at a companycalled K Force, a large publicly
traded staffing company, was aclient of mine.

(28:19):
He ended up getting me my firstjob in recruiting.
Wow.
Right.
And that's where my careerreally started to take off.
I think this is also when wetalk to people about school and
like education or like whateveryour path is, whether it is,
it's like just if you do followa lot of the times what you're
passionate about, you willproduce the best outcomes.
And producing those bestoutcomes and putting a lot more

(28:40):
out there, as you put it, likeit will lead to opportunities.
100%.
I think one of the things that Ilearned working in the gym is
like a lot of people's mindsetis like, well, I just don't have
the opportunities, or that'sjust not me, or like it's just
not possible, it's just notthere, right?
Or oh, I don't know thosepeople, and it's like, well, the
opportunities are here, you justgotta be aware of it.

(29:00):
You have to understand that likethere are these opportunities to
grow, but you have to be awareof it, and you got to put a lot
of work out there, and it it'sgonna lead to something if you
do.
Yeah, who would have thoughtlike Muay Thai would have led to
getting me in the White House?
Like, it doesn't make any senseon the outside end.
Um, but but yeah, man, anyways,so just kind of dialing in on

(29:22):
like where you are today, Iwould like to talk more about
that.
So, yeah, so for you were atTrey for the better part of four
years, if I'm not mistaken,right?
Okay, yeah, yeah.
And so so then a transition, bigtransition happened, and I know
you've been at more recently.
You just started at dust.
What was it like two months ago?

SPEAKER_02 (29:40):
Yeah, about a month and a half, two months ago.
I've been at dust now.

SPEAKER_00 (29:43):
How's that coming along?
How are you doing so far?

SPEAKER_02 (29:46):
Yeah, great.
It's been a long time since I'velike worked for a product that
I'm truly passionate about.
Uh that that's one part that'samazing.
I think the other part is theopportunity ahead.
I was at a point in my careerwhere I wanted two different
paths.
One was to either work again foran exceptional talent leader and
continue to learn.
Um, you know, I look back on myjourney at Trey, I worked with

(30:09):
two exceptional talent leadersthat I still connect with today,
and I I really see them asmentors, and that that
accelerated my career.
If I didn't have thatopportunity to work with them, I
don't think I'd be where I amtoday.
So it was at that path where Ithought, okay, do I do that
again and continue to learn?
Or is this now an opportunity tobuild from scratch myself?
Um, you know, Photoran wasalmost that journey, but there

(30:31):
was things that were builtbefore me, but I was there to
then come in and take it fromlike it wasn't zero to one, it's
more one to one to one to two,one to five, uh, and sort of
build upon that.
Um, and dust really is that zeroto one project for me.
And it's a great product, it's agreat team.
So I really see this as a greatand exciting opportunity.

SPEAKER_00 (30:50):
And Dust is like what series A, series B, series
B?

SPEAKER_02 (30:53):
Series A, series A.

SPEAKER_00 (30:54):
Okay.
Yeah.
Um, so pretty like new startup,right?

SPEAKER_02 (30:58):
Like, yeah, yeah, been around for about two and a
half years, two and a half,three years.

SPEAKER_00 (31:01):
Yeah, let's just as a lay of the land for folks
tuning in.
What does zero look like?
Like day one, when you come in,like what's kind of the lay of
the land right now?

SPEAKER_02 (31:10):
Yeah, so I mean, the good thing is uh it wasn't
completely scratched, there's sothere's an ATS there.
So that's like that's alwaysgood.

SPEAKER_00 (31:17):
They're ahead of the curve.

SPEAKER_02 (31:18):
No, I've not yeah, I've not had to build out the
ATS, which is great.
But in terms of like thefunction, like the not all of
the functionalities are sort ofbeing utilized yet in the ATS,
but um in terms of thefundamentals that are there is
there are processes built interms of there are interview
processes that are beingfollowed, but then like we
haven't got like things likescorecards built out just yet.

(31:40):
We haven't like fully aligned onlike what our full ICPs look
like yet.
Um, we haven't got like any ofour data analytics built out.
I think the best way that Icould describe it is talent is
completely decentralized, right?
I think every hiring team issort of doing their own thing,
and compliments to them is thatthey've built the company to
where they are today, like this,and I think it's great.

(32:00):
One of the things that I'm superimpressed with is how invested
everyone is into hiring.
Hiring is truly a priority, andthere's not that battle that I'm
seeing with okay, how do I getpeople to do into it?
How do I get people to investtime into here?
Everyone's super invested, whichis great.
And the people that arecurrently owning hiring today
have done a fantastic job andhave continued to build that
out.
Um, Pauline, who works inbusiness operations, has sort of

(32:23):
owned hiring until I joined, andshe's done an amazing job at
building sort of those corefundamentals.

SPEAKER_00 (32:28):
And who's that?

SPEAKER_02 (32:29):
Pauline.
So she works in businessoperations.
Uh, she was one of the first,she was the first uh
non-technical hire in thecompany.
So one of the early employees.
She's done an amazing job to ownhiring and build it where it is
today and to get some of thosecore foundations there.
Now it's really about buildingit out, centralizing talent in

(32:49):
that um I'm starting to build ateam.
Uh, so we're starting to hiresome other talent acquisition
partners in the team, especiallyon the go-to-market side,
because a large part of ourgrowth next year is going to
come in in GTM to continue tosupport that growth.
So we need to build out the teamand hire there to help support
from sourcing, from fullcandidate management, from then
starting to build out the talentsystems on top of that.

(33:11):
Um, so that's sort of like whatmy focus is right now is making
sure that we've got the team inplace to support next year's
growth.
And then on top of that, makingsure that we've got some of the
core systems in place, which isall around how do we use uh as
much automation to streamlinethe processes, how do we adopt
and use AI as much as wepossibly can.

(33:31):
I'm a huge, huge fan andbeliever in AI and talent as
well.
Um, so it's looking at that, andespecially with a product like
Dust, which is all aboutcreating your own AI agents.
I have all the opportunity inthe world to now utilize AI as
much as possible in therecruiting and talent process.

SPEAKER_00 (33:47):
Love it.
So it's it's like you're kind ofbuilding the airplane while
you're flying it, right?
Kind of doing both buildingsystems, hiring.
Are you working on any roleshands-on right now, too?

SPEAKER_02 (33:58):
Yeah, I mean, it's um so where I'm going to focus
on my background is in productand engineering hiring.
So that's where once the team isbuilt, that's where I'll focus.
So I'll focus on productengineering, then the rest of
the team will focus on the GTMum stuff.
At the moment, I'm being sort ofjust dragged in there and as
naturally as it is.

SPEAKER_00 (34:17):
So next year, right?
This sounds like it's a big yearfor you and for Dust, right?
So you're gonna be hiringrecruiters.
If you're hiring recruiters, itmeans you're scaling, right?
So it sounds like scaling a lotof GTM hiring, you're also
building systems out.
It sounds like you have a kindof a base layer ATS.
What ATS are you guys using?

SPEAKER_02 (34:33):
Uh we use Ash V.

SPEAKER_00 (34:34):
Ash V.
Okay, cool.
So you're using Ashby, which isone of the category leading,
right?
ATS providers.
What like North Star, like whatis your goal?
What is the breakthrough, if youwill, like that you're looking
to accomplish in uh by the endof 2026?
When we we do round two of thispodcast next year, what do you
want to uh accomplish?

SPEAKER_02 (34:54):
Yeah, good question.
The top level always is that wehire amazing people and they are
fulfilled and happy within therole that they achieve.
That's always like the just thetop layer thing that I always
think about, right?
How do we build a great companythat continues to drive growth?
So I think the biggest thing forme is everything that we do has

(35:17):
to support the businessobjectives and the business
goals, and we need to build atalent function around that.
So a lot of what I'm thinkingright now, like if I was to
think completely out of the boxbeyond this, what I want to
build is I want to build atalent function that supports
the growth of the business, thatpeople look in and go, how did
you do that with such a leanteam?
Right.
So I don't want to go back tothe days of 2020, 2021 where you

(35:40):
had overinflated talent teamsand then suddenly you're having
to scale down.
Right?
How do we do this and how do wescale the company with a lean
team?
Um, the way that I really seetalent is going to eventually
move towards in how you sort offorce multiply a talent function
is through more talentenablement.
And I don't mean talentenablement in terms of enabling

(36:02):
the talent team, I mean how doyou enable hiring teams?
You know, with the power of allwe've got with AI, et cetera, if
we look at just some like coretalent tasks, the barrier to
entry has extremely lowered.
If you look at Sourcing, forexample, right?
Back in the day, Sourcing, weused to see job descriptions
that would say we're looking forBoolean wizards and things like
that, right?
You had to be an expert inbuilding Booleans to be able to

(36:23):
uncover hidden talent.
Nowadays, with AI, you don'tneed that, right?
You could build a Booleanthrough an AI agent.
You can use tools like MetaViewthat have AI sourcing within it
as well.
So people that aren'texperienced in sourcing can now
ultimately do this themselves ifyou want to.
So, how can we build the systemsin place that empowers hiring

(36:44):
teams that they can actually dosome of this stuff themselves?
And that's how you can keep alean talent team, but then also
scale in the multipliers thatyou need to do.
So that's ultimately what I wantwhat we want to build and what
we want to do.
Um a big thing for Dust, right,is our mission is to change the
way that work has done, right,through AI.
And we want to change the wayworkers done internally as well.

(37:04):
So I think the thing for me isif we spoke in a year's time, is
that I can tell you all of theways that we have built and
scaled Dust where it is today,through AI, through systems that
you maybe haven't heard of orseen before.
Like I really want us toevangelize and uh not plug and
play the same playbook thatwe've seen and done before.

(37:26):
That's really what I want tobuild um over the next year.

SPEAKER_00 (37:30):
How do you think about finding the right areas to
place AI and automation?

SPEAKER_01 (37:36):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (37:37):
Versus maintaining the human touch or maybe
amplifying it through technologyby allowing recruiters to do
more important human aspects ofthe job.

SPEAKER_02 (37:48):
Yeah, good question.
So I mean, my hot take is thatAI makes recruiting more human,
not less, but only if you use itcorrectly.
So, in answer to your question,anything that is administrative,
anything that is repetitivetasks, that's where you plug and
play AI to do the work.
And then that then frees up ourtime in Talon to then work in

(38:09):
the areas that need that humantouch.
You know, working strategicallywith your hiring teams, uh,
working closely with candidateson candidate experience,
managing them through thatjourney, closing, on boarding,
all the areas where we need tobe very present as a human, we
can free up that time to do soby using AI in the
administrative areas or in therepetitive areas.

(38:31):
So that's how I was sort ofthinking about this.
For example, you can do AIinterviews now.
I've not gone as far as doingthat because I believe
fundamentally that is a human'sjob and what we need to do.
Um, but you know, I have used AIin, I guess, in the very
simplest form, right?
In terms of AI, Ashby is greatwith AI, it's got a lot of AI
built into it, right?

(38:51):
So you can scale um personalizedsequence messaging, for example,
through AI tokens within Ashby.
Uh you can personalize interviewfeedback through AI tokens.
I've actually built out uh morerobust agents within Dust around
more personalization.
For example, when we've got alean team and we're having to

(39:11):
give personalized rejectionemails to every single
candidate, we can't physicallydo that when we've got high
volume or something else has tobreak within the process to be
able to do that.
But where you can now plug AI into help manage and do that, that
means that we can scale thateven further.
Now you would still AI, onething I would say as well,
Right, is AI doesn't um AIdoesn't do things automatically

(39:34):
for us.
There's still that human elementthat, you know, I would check
the email and then I wouldapprove and press send.
Uh but that process that maybewould have taken 10 minutes now
takes a couple of seconds, forexample.
And then some more bolder thingsactually that I've been um
trying more recently with AI isI've built an agent to automate
the full intake process with ahiring manager.

(39:56):
Now, in an ideal world, I'd dointakes of every single hiring
manager possible.
Um, but I'm at the moment theonly recruiter and we've got
tons of different roles that weneed to hire for.
So, how do we ensure that westill keep a consistent process,
a consistent scorecard, anobjective process without the
need of me being there all thetime?
Uh so I've built an AI agentthat would act as a recruiter.

(40:18):
And the agent has specificallybeen trained as well to push
back on subjective criteria.
So it would replicate an intakebetween the hiring manager and a
recruiter.
And then at the end of it, onceit's gone through that intake,
it will then automatically buildout the scorecards, it'll build
out the job description, it'llbuild out interview questions,
it will build out a three stagemessaging sequence, it will
build out booleans that you canthen use to go and source from.

(40:40):
So all of that then gets built.
And then that can then be sentto me and go, Reese, you know,
I've done all this, ready to doit.
I can then quickly review, pushback anything that needs to.
Great, we're ready to go, and wecan go do the search.
Um, so these are things that I'mjust sort of thinking about is
okay, beyond where yes is a bitmore administrative, but like
how can we make things moreefficient, but then add in that

(41:03):
human touch to it as well.
We can use AI for an intakeprocess, and then from there, a
high manager comes to youdirectly with all of the
information.
You jump on maybe now a15-20-minute call versus an hour
call.
You're just refining, push itback on a few things, a little
bit of a tweak.
We build it in Ashby and we gowhen we do the search where
we're gonna push the boundary alittle bit more, or maybe the
areas that some people might bea little bit more uncomfortable

(41:26):
with.
Because everything I'm thinkingabout is how do we force
multiply?
And that's how we're gonna doit.

SPEAKER_00 (41:31):
Yeah, it's a really exciting time.
Most of these agents that you'rebuilding, is it like within
Ashby, like workflows, or whereso Ashby has a lot of uh in the
box AI built into it.

SPEAKER_02 (41:42):
So, for example, um AI personalization for messaging
sequencing, AI for feedback,just general AI where you can
ask it questions.
I think with Ashby, that stuffis great, but you can't do any
customization to it.
So it only gives you what it'salready got.
So a lot of now the advancedagents that I'm building is with

(42:03):
Dust.
Because to build an agent onDust, you can give it any
instruction that you want, anyparameters that you want.
So I can customize that agent tobe so specific to what I need it
to actually do.
Um, so with the more advancedstuff, I'm building that with
dust.

SPEAKER_00 (42:19):
Well, it's pretty cool that you get to use your
own product, yeah, man.

SPEAKER_02 (42:21):
And that's why you know I said I it's it I feel so
passionate and excited by theproduct.
Um, like just zooming out, I'vealways been before AI was a
thing, and like I always trylike how can I be as efficient
as possible?
I believe in efficiency ineverything, and uh AI is then
increased efficiency using dustas increased efficiency, so it's
uh super energetic for me.

SPEAKER_00 (42:42):
That's awesome, man.
Sounds like you you have prettyambitious goals between building
systems, uh hiring greatinternal recruiters.
Yeah, and I'm sure to someextent the way that you think
about hiring team members isstill influence back from when
you're playing football.
Um what is a good team memberlook like for you?
You're building this lean team,it's gotta be an ambitious team,

(43:05):
it's gotta be a team that worksreally well together, um, you
know, uh that can push down thefield, right?
Like what you were saying,right?
I mean, how do you think aboutlike when you're hiring people?
Talk to me more about thebehavioral fit, right?
Who you want by your side on thetalent team.

SPEAKER_02 (43:22):
Good question.
I think someone has to alsobelieve in both quantity and
quality.
I don't want someone that isjust quality focused, and I
don't want someone that's justquantity focused.
I think they've got to have theright mix between the two, is
super important for me.
But then just looking at core uhlike behavioral traits,

(43:42):
resilience is a big thing forme, actually.
Resilience.
I think you have to haveresilience in this game because
you are going to be knocked downa lot of times in talent where
you've run in a hard search, youget to an offer, and your
candidate declines and you'reback to back to zero, or you
know, you're working with atough hiring manager and you're
having to push through, orwhatever it might be, this

(44:05):
journey is so up and down andit's never a straight line.
Um, and I think that resilienceto bounce back from these losses
that you're going to have on thejourney is super important.
Um, so I definitely look forresilience in people.
You know, do they have thosebattle wounds in the past?
I actually really like peoplethat have worked for a company

(44:25):
that maybe wasn't the mostsuccessful, but they got the
success out of it versus someonethat just worked very
comfortably at a company thatwas super successful, high and
was super easy because they hadthe big name, they didn't have
to go for any challenges.
I would much prefer someonethat's been through a much
tougher situation and have builtthat resilience.
So I think that's one of them.
The other one as well is likejust trust and autonomy.

(44:49):
Someone that's a self-starter,high agency, someone that you
can just have complete trust inis a big thing.
And then the last one I wouldsay is um maybe goes on top of
the trust part, but like if yousay it, you do it.
If you say you're going to dosomething, you do it.
And if you can't, youcommunicate and give an update.

(45:10):
Never a problem if someone set adeadline and they're going to
miss it for whatever reason, butit's the communication part.
And I think that's not justimportant to me, but I think
about when I work withstakeholders, the biggest thing
I've always believed in is thata stakeholder should never not
know what's going on and alwaysover-communicate.
And look, if you're annoyingthem by over-communicating,
they're going to tell you andyou can find where that middle

(45:31):
ground is.
But someone should never come tome and say, Reese, what's going
on with this search or Reese,what's going on with this piece
of work?
They should just always know theinformation should be always
available to them because you'reconstantly communicating.
Um, and you know, if you sayyou're going to do something,
you follow through and you doit.
Those are the core things thatare super important to me.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (45:49):
So it sounds like that's also what you would you
consider that's like yourfoundation, right?
So like the things that rightare important to you.
So, all right, so you, I mean,look, this isn't your your first
talent acquisition motion,right?
It sounds like this might be alittle earlier stage to some
extent, but you've done thisnow, right?
A few times for hyper-growthtech companies in that

(46:09):
environment.
Yep.
You got really ambitious biggoals that you got to accomplish
this upcoming year, and you'releading the charge, right?
You're making this thing happen.
How do you think about your owngrowth?
What are you gonna have to do asan individual to break through
and accomplish this?
You've gotten to the point whereyou have like the track record,
the success, and you're you'replaying at a really high level

(46:30):
now.
And you got you're accountablefor really big outcomes.
And so it's like, yeah, when youthink about your own development
and your own growth, what doesthat next level look like for
you and how you're gonna performat a higher level?

SPEAKER_02 (46:41):
Yeah, it's a really good question.
I I've actually was thinkingabout this a lot since joining
Dust.
Um, a big thing that I'm workingon at the moment is growing my
network of people.
I think the more people you havein your network, the more you
know you can lean upon people,especially starting as a
founding talent person, youknow, it can become r extremely
lonely, right?
And um, you always have peopleto bounce ideas off internally,

(47:03):
and I'm I'm thankful to havethat.
But maybe on some supertalent-related topics, you don't
necessarily have thatopportunity to.
So who do you lean upon to help?
So for me, the big thing that Iam working on at the moment is
to expand my network of supportaround me that I can both share
ideas with and also get ideasfrom.
It's also always great to justhear what other people are

(47:26):
doing, right?
I think you can become very likeblinkers-on, naive when you're
just focused on your work andyour company, and you can forget
like all these other great ideasthat might be out there,
especially when you don't have abig team of support around you.
So I think in terms of my growthand my development right now,
it's definitely to build astrong network of people around

(47:48):
me that I can lean upon foradvice when it needs to.
I can learn what they're doingmore of, and I can hopefully
give back to as well.
That's like a core, core focusfor me right now.

SPEAKER_00 (48:00):
And that's primarily like what are you looking to get
out of that the most?
It's like more so strategies andwhat other people are doing to
build systems, or really tryingto get a sense into the mindset
of folks that are like alsobuilding and growing and at the
top of their game, like what islike the main piece of insight
you're looking, you're hoping togain or give.

SPEAKER_02 (48:21):
Good question.
I think definitely uh, you know,learning more about what other
people are building and notbecoming blinkers on.
Like, I always want to learnwhat other people are doing, and
then how can maybe I eitherimplement that here or how can I
maybe take some of that and takesome of that here and then mold
it into what works at dust.
I think the other thing, just tobe completely honest to you, is

(48:41):
just to have a nice network ofpeople around you when things
are tough.
And you know, it's uh again, Ithink you can become naive to
how tough situations are for youand think that it's just
isolated to yourself, and thenyou hear what other people going
through going, ah, do you knowwhat this is this is completely
normal?
You know, I'm this isn't uh thisisn't a me thing or a or a dust
thing, but this is completelynormal to the industry and what

(49:03):
other people are going through,and it's okay.
And I think hearing that givesyou a lot of reassurance when
you're going through those toughtimes as well, that this isn't
just an isolated issue orchallenge for me.
This is very, very normal.
So I think that as well is isactually nice to have.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (49:20):
Well, I think it's also a pretty normal progression
because it's like you move intothat leader role, it's like you
no longer have five, ten peersthat are in the same role.
And so it's like there's thislevel of isolation potentially,
where it's like, of course, youhave the other members of the
executive team that you'recommunicating with, yeah, but
there aren't necessarilymultiple people in at your point
of impact or with the challengesand with the outcomes that you

(49:43):
have to produce, right?
And so it's it's nice to be ableto speak with people or to hear
from people that are inessentially a very similar
place, if not the same place,right?

SPEAKER_02 (49:55):
Exactly, yeah.
No, totally.
And uh one of the thingsactually that I've started to
look into as of this weekend, uhgood timing, is a coach uh that
I can work with.
Uh I don't think I'm looking forlike a recruiting or
talent-specific coach, but justlike a coach for both business
and personal.
One of the things that I alwaysthought I I've always had

(50:16):
imposter syndrome, always hadimposter syndrome.
And you know, sometimes sittingin a room with the exec team or
whoever it might be, thatimposter syndrome can creep in.
And I think I've always beenlike if anything's gonna stop me
from being successful, it'dalways be the voice in my own
head versus anything externally.
And I think having a coach andhaving someone to help you and

(50:38):
motivate you and give you adviceis gonna be extremely helpful.
So that's something also thatI'm looking into as well, which
I think will help then elevatemy career and help me with
certain situations, scenarios,collaborating with certain
people.
Um, so that's also something I'mlooking into as well at the
moment.

SPEAKER_00 (50:55):
It takes a lot of self-awareness to get to that
point where you're trying tooptimize and trying to think
about breaking through to thenext level.
And I think a lot of people dostruggle with imposter syndrome
when you're rapidly leveling upand you're taking on more.
Is it okay for me to ask?
I mean, we don't have to diveinto it, but like what when you
are struggling with that, whenyou have those moments,

(51:16):
everybody has them, right?
Um like what is it that like youhear yourself like saying to
yourself, and then how do youget out of that situation?
What do you tell yourself topush through?
And to I'm just curious to ifyou wouldn't mind sharing,
because I know other leaders aredealing with this too.

SPEAKER_02 (51:35):
Yeah, I think so.
Folks in more like, I guess,professional in the in the
talent sense.
So transparently, like I'm youngfor probably where I am in my
career, you know, and I'vealways have been throughout my
career.
I'm 27 years old as of today.
I was managing people when Iwas, I think, 21, 22, and I've
been like a very young leaderworking with founders from a

(51:56):
very young age.
And my imposter syndrome isaround these are older people
around me, more experienced insort of years sense.
Like I shouldn't be in a roomwith these people, or I haven't
got as much knowledge as thesepeople.
And I think that's what sort ofgets in my head and what sort of
has always stopped me.
Less so now.
Like I feel more comfortable inthat now than I did maybe
earlier on in my career a coupleof years ago.

(52:18):
So that is always what has thatvoice in my head that has been
there, or like when I've beenmanaging people who are much
older than me, for example.
Like, how's that dynamic goingto be?
When I take a step back and Itell myself is like I the
fundamental truth is I deserveto be here.
I deserve to be in the room.
I'm here for a reason.
These people trust me.
And if they didn't, I wouldn'tbe where I am today.

(52:39):
I lead by example.
That's like my management.
I don't like the word manager,but I that's sort of my
management style, leading byexample.
Yeah, I'd never ask anyone to dosomething that I wasn't doing
myself.
And I think if I continue to dothat, I will continue to deserve
to be here and to be in a room.
So I think whenever it creeps inand when that pops into my head,
I just sort of take a step back,look myself in the mirror, and

(53:01):
tell myself I deserve to behere.
And something I've started to domore recently is like writing
down my gratitude andaffirmations every morning.
And my affirmations everymorning is like reminding myself
I am a strong talent leader whodeserves to have a seat at a
table, who deserves to be in theroom.
Um, and that's something I'm nowtrying to like continuously tell
myself and write down to tellthat voice in my head that it's

(53:23):
true.
So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (53:25):
Yeah, I love that.
How do you think your definitionof success has changed over the
years?
Like from when you started outand talent in your like around
21, 22, to now being 27, beingin a position at a very young
age where you're responsible fora lot, uh entrusted with a lot.
Yeah.
Um, does success mean anythingdifferent to you at this point

(53:45):
than what it did when you werestarting out?

SPEAKER_02 (53:47):
100%.
If I go back to my agency days,success then was how much I
build.
That was a very individual,selfish look on things.
It was like I need to build Xamount, and that was what sort
of drove me.
Then even when my steppedinternally for the first time,
everything that I measuredsuccess by was how many hires I
made at an individual level.

(54:08):
That was sort of where I wasmeasuring success.
I started to manage and lookafter a team, and my mindset was
slowly shifting to okay, likehow do I, how do we be
successful as a team?
Still more on that volume base,like how many hires we're making
as a team.
But selfishly, there wasprobably still always in my
head, like, well, but what wasmy performance?
But I also think that was anature to what I was also being

(54:31):
measured against.
You know, I probably wasn'tbeing incentivized by the team
and more incentivized by theindividual still.
Um, I fast forward today, andthe main thing that I care about
is that we hire great peoplethat are successful here.
It doesn't matter on the numberof people, it doesn't matter on
that.
It's like, are we hiring greatpeople?
If it takes us longer, that'sokay.

(54:53):
But we need to hire the bestpeople for the company.
Um, and more on top of that, youknow, what I care about is I
look at the business objectives,right?
There's no point in havingtalent goals that don't
correlate to the businessobjectives and what the business
wants to achieve becauseultimately we are here to build
a successful company.
So the things that I look at,you know, whenever I have
interviewed for a company morerecently, whenever I sort of

(55:16):
start to build out the talentgoals, the first thing that I
want to understand is what isthe business objective?
What do we want to achieve as abusiness?
And then once I know that, I canthen define success around that.
So I start from there, whereasback in the day, I just started
from how many hires do I make?
Like the more highs I make, themore successful I am.
So that's sort of where mymindset has completely changed.
I think something else is that'schanged more recently is I was

(55:42):
very much just focused on thetalent side, right?
Hiring great people, but I neverfocused then or thought about
the internal side.
And I'm definitely now startingto think more about, you know,
at least for like that that oneyear, how do we make sure that
we set people up for success?
It's not just about hiring greatpeople, it's about hiring great
people that are right for us asa company.
And then how do we make surethat we set them up for success

(56:04):
and make this a great place forthem?
So I think now my mindset isstarting to shift, right?
You've got the talent side andyou've got the people side.
I'm now starting to think biggerpicture than just talent.
I'm thinking talent and peoplebecause it all connects
together.
If people aren't happy andsuccessful, it means that
they're going to leave, meansthat we've got to do more
hiring, right?
We why make it hard forourselves?
So that's definitely how mymindset of success has evolved

(56:26):
over time.

SPEAKER_00 (56:27):
That's really cool.
Um, what kind of leader do youwant to be?

SPEAKER_02 (56:32):
That's a really good question.
I think this is a really goodquestion because I think I've
I've thought about this a lot,and I I think back to like when
I first became a leader, Iwanted to be the leader that
everyone liked.
And that creates challenges initself because when you want to

(56:52):
be the leader that everyonelikes, you don't then do what
the tough part of a leader needsto do, which is you know, there
are tough conversations that youneed to have.
Um, there are at the end of theday, especially a role like
Talon, it is a veryperformative-driven area where
it can be very black and whiteon performance.

(57:14):
I look back to my early days asa leader, I probably made wrong
decisions when it came toperformance and things like that
and didn't have conversationsbecause I wanted to be liked.
So if I zoom out and today,right, I I don't know whether
this is the right word, and I'llprobably need to explain a
little bit, but it's the bestone that I can think of, right?
I want to be like I want to berespected, and not in the terms
of I want to be respectedbecause of hierarchy or anything

(57:37):
like that, but I want to besomeone that people look up to
as um they felt that I inspiredthem and helped them do the best
possible work that they can do.
And that comes from, yes, beinga great person, being light, all
that side of it, you know,building rapport, but that also
comes from driving andmotivating them and having those

(57:59):
tough conversations and givingthem tough feedback where it
needs to be.
So that's the type of lead thatI want to be.
I I want people to work with meand it to be career-defining
opportunities for them.
You know, the way that I lookback at my two leaders at Trey,
MK and Marianne, right?
I look at both of thatexperience with them as
career-defining and the growththat I had.

(58:21):
And I tell you what, they hadplenty of tough conversations
with me, and I still like them,and we had a great relationship,
but they also gave me that toughlove as well.
And I think that's definitelythe leader that I want to be.
And I'm still learning as I goalong on how you become that
person and how you lead in theright way.
But actually, one of the thingsactually I quickly say as well

(58:41):
is it's definitely like I'llalways be the leader that leads
by example.
I'd never be a dictator oranything like that.
If I say that we need to dosomething or that the objectives
that we set, it's because I'mdoing them along with you.
And if you're struggling, I'llpick you up along the way.
So I think that's how I viewthis and full circle.
But it's one of the reasons whyI've actually loved working with
Paris-founded companies.

(59:02):
The Paris culture is directfeedback, it has really taught
me how to give and receivedirect feedback in a comfortable
way and have those almostuncomfortable conversations in a
non-uncomfortable way.
So it's really helped me getbetter at that side where I was
definitely like not as strongon.
That's the leader that I want tobe as I continue to grow.

SPEAKER_00 (59:23):
I think having those difficult conversations and I
definitely would say that what Ithought being a leader was when
I was starting out in my early20s versus what I know it is now
at 34 is like drasticallydifferent.
Drastic, drastically different.
I mean, it's so far off, right?
I had part of it, right?
When I was young, I startedSecure Vision My Company when I

(59:46):
was 23, so a decade ago, alittle over, I guess.
I I really did think it wasabout inspiring, just inspiring.
Yeah, really focused onmotivation, helping folks become
the best version of themselves.
I had this goal where I wantedeveryone to be better off as a
result of them knowing me, beingaround me.
I think most of the time I'vebeen able to get that, make that
happen, not all the time, I'msure.

(01:00:08):
But uh, I think I've generallyspeaking been able to help folks
progress a lot, whether theystay with me or not.
Um, yeah.
But I think one one of the partsthat I didn't really understand
was the fact that like so muchof leadership is situational to
understanding the person thatyou are working with and really

(01:00:28):
taking the time to understandtheir psychology, yeah, and and
their values and communicatingin a way that makes sense to
them.
Yeah.
I think that there probably waslike a little bit of arrogance
of, you know, I have thisfigured out, I know the way we
need to go.
And if you knew as Much as Ithen you would do you would this
wouldn't you know why why don'tyou see things that if you don't

(01:00:51):
see the way that see things theway that I do, then you don't
get it.
Um I just like look back and Isee how naive that is, and I
think it's it's reallyunderstanding other people is a
big part that I didn't slow downon, and then two like finding an
appropriate way to givefeedback, constructive feedback.
Yeah, I'm curious.
Like when you're saying thatthat's something that you've

(01:01:12):
worked, you've learned a lotabout with these companies that
are are founded in Paris, likethe direct feedback.
Yeah, like what have you learnedwhen you have to have a tough
conversation with somebody thatreports into you, and I'm sure
to some extent again, it's likesituational based on the person,
but are there any bestpractices, or maybe telling it
through a story of a situationin the past would be helpful?
But I'm curious to get yourthoughts on how you do that.

SPEAKER_02 (01:01:35):
Yeah, I mean, to be honest, I think working with the
French culture makes it veryeasy because it's just normal to
have direct conversations, whichmakes it a lot easy.
And I think uh the biggest thingfor me is what that's helped
with is having the conversationsat the point that it's needed to
have, right?
I think the worst thing that youcan do when you're having, let's

(01:01:57):
say, performance issues, forexample, is waiting and not
having it at the moment that itneeds to be had.
Because then suddenly, whenyou're then trying to have that
conversation, it's way too late,right?
You're you're past it, it's notgonna have the direct impact
with that person that it needsto have because it's in the
past, it's sort of out of mind.
So I think the biggest thingthat I've learned, and what's

(01:02:17):
been great, is that as soon asthere's a problem, whatever it
might be, you have thatconversation.
I think the other thing whichyou said, which I think is uh
super important, is there canalways be like a reason as to
why something isn't going.
And actually, I learned probablythe hard way in that before,
where there was performanceissues, we weren't making hires,

(01:02:39):
and just like the corefundamental work behind that
wasn't happening.
And I sort of went into thatconversation more with direct
feedback, and then as we thenstarted to unpack and as the
conversation went along, like Ijust started to learn that there
was more stuff going behind thedoors as to why this was
happening, and actually, thenthe outcome was how do we help?
How do we solve with this?
And I think the lesson from thatfor me was like, okay, yes,

(01:03:03):
there's a point where you haveto have these conversations, but
how do you create that safeenvironment where people feel
comfortable coming to you firstbefore these become a challenge?
And that was definitely like abig turning point for me in
terms of the type ofconversations I was having with
my team.
Like, for example, what yousaid, one of the things I did,
especially when I joined my lastcompany, was I asked them, like,

(01:03:25):
how do you like to becommunicated with?
How do you want to worktogether?
You tell me, right?
And I can then adapt, and thenI'll tell you how I work, we can
find a middle ground.
But building that safe place,and then as trusts and as
relationships were built, whenthere were challenges, they were
coming to me and talking aboutthings that they probably
wouldn't speak to others about.
And that made it so much easierbecause then I understood why,

(01:03:46):
okay, you haven't done thistoday.
I understand that.
But then on the flip side, atthe end of the day, we also have
a business to run, we have to dothings, so it's fine that fine
balance between great, let'sunderstand that.
But now how do we solve this forthe bigger picture?
But that's the job as a manager,right?
That's our role, right?
We've got to find the rightbalance between our team and

(01:04:06):
helping and supporting them, andthen also the business side as
well.
But I think you're right,understanding people on an
individual level, not everyonecan and should be managed the
same.
I actually learned this fromfootball as well.
Um, Joan Klopp, who was themanager for Liverpool, other
teams, I listened to one of hispodcasts, and he said that he

(01:04:27):
doesn't manage every player thesame and he gives different
treatment for different players.
But that's because the mostsenior person in the change room
that's got 500 caps for thecountry and won all the all the
titles, doesn't need an armwrapped around them when they've
lost a game to someone that'sjust come through the academy
system, it's their first game inthe team, right?
So it's about understanding thatand adapting your leadership

(01:04:48):
style to different peoples andto different environments and
situations for sure.
So I think adaptability actuallyis probably the way that I would
summarize it.

SPEAKER_00 (01:04:56):
Yeah, I think one of the things, like we talk about
behavioral traits, like one ofthe things I think it's
important to look for is findingpeople that are coachable.
Yeah, yes, but I I think too,it's like when I was earlier in
my career, I think I wouldconsider more people coachable
than I would have 10 years ago.
Because I think it's likeunderstanding that in order to

(01:05:16):
get through to people, yousometimes you have to coach in
different ways.
Yeah, so it's both.
It's like trying to find peoplethat have some level of humility
or self-awareness or ability totake feedback and change, but
then also checking your ownpotential limitations or blind
spots and really understandingdo I have I developed the skill

(01:05:40):
set and the awareness to be ableto work with different
personalities?
Because I I feel like at thispoint my career, and this is
something I actually had neverreally thought about before, but
I would consider a lot of peoplecoachable.
Now, it doesn't necessarily meanthat I can get great performance
out of everyone.
There, you know, I can't do allof the I mean, I can listen, I
can understand, I can figure outhow they work, and performance

(01:06:02):
may still not work out.
And I still, you know, look,we're pretty good at recruiting,
you would hope, right?
After like with my career, but Idon't always get it right.
And and when I don't, I usuallyI find out very quickly.
Um and sometimes we have to partways with people, but I do try
to always assume, even when it'shard or when I don't see the
solution immediately, that thisperson probably is coachable.

(01:06:25):
Now, does that mean it's gonnalead to the outcome I need?
I can't say for sure, butthere's probably a way to get
through to them.
And if I haven't, it's just Ihaven't figured it out yet,
right?

SPEAKER_02 (01:06:34):
100%.
Yeah, I would agree.
I think the only thing I wouldadd is um I think it's important
to also like recognize yourlimitations and then match that
to the person as well.
Because I agree, everyone iscoachable, but they might not be
right for your environment oreven the core beliefs that you
have as well.
Like if I look at some of myfundamental beliefs around

(01:06:58):
resilience, around hard work,etc., those are core fundamental
beliefs that I don't think I cancoach someone, but I can coach
people more on like thetechnical skills or that side of
things.
So for me, there's definitelylike core fundamentals that
everyone needs to have in who Iwould work best with.

(01:07:18):
And then as long as they've gotthose, we can work on everything
else.
So I think that's definitelyimportant.
And then also I just say likethe environment.
Again, I'm a big believer is Idon't think there's such a thing
as a bad employee, but theremight be a bad employee for that
company or that environment.
If it again, I go back tofootball as like a really good
view or sports in general,right?
You will have a player who waslike a top performer at one of

(01:07:40):
the clubs, and then they getthat big transfer to another
team and suddenly they end upperforming.
And you're like, how is thiseven possible?
Well, it's because they'replaying a different style of
football or it's a differentmanager with a different
management style, and they justdon't fit into that system.
It's not because they're a badplayer, they just don't fit into
that system.
And I think that's superimportant with you know, when
you're thinking about whenyou're hiring people, something

(01:08:00):
I'm trying to think about moreis every company wants to hire
from the same companies, right,with a big brand, the big logos,
etc.
Just because they were a topperformer there doesn't mean
they're going to be a topperformer for your company.
So how do you truly measurethat?
And then the second part of thatis again, if you're thinking
about changing jobs yourself,like really understand like the
values of the company, thevalues of the manager, the

(01:08:21):
values of the team that you'regoing to be working in, and make
that decision in is that theenvironment that you're going to
thrive in as well.

SPEAKER_00 (01:08:28):
I love it.
This has been a really greatconversation.
I'm really thankful that youcame on the show today.
We covered a lot of ground.
Yeah, I enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_01 (01:08:36):
Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 (01:08:37):
Yeah, I really did as well.
To finish us off, I one morequestion for you.
I would love to hear, I mean,because you've had a lot of
really great experiences, bothplaying uh football, both
working in tech, both verycompetitive, if not the most
competitive industries to be in.
Does anything stand out to youas the best piece of advice

(01:08:58):
you've ever received?

SPEAKER_02 (01:09:00):
Yes, it's so simple, but has shaped many decisions
that I've made, and then evenadvice that I have passed down
to other people, which is I'llgive the advice and I'll give
the context behind it.
The advice is what is the rightthing to do for them?
And where this advice came fromwas so we had a candidate and

(01:09:22):
they were at the final stage ofthe interview process, but we
then interviewed anothercandidate early stage who we
thought was also exceptional,and we wanted to get them
through the process to then makea decision on both of them.
But we already told the othercandidate that we were basically
going to move forward to anoffer.
And I was sat there like, whatdo I do in this situation?

(01:09:43):
Um, and I went to my manager atthe time and I said, Hey, the
decision's been made, this iswhat we're going to do, right?
We're not, I'm not coming toadvice on like what do I do with
the high manager or anythinglike that.
I was like, what do I do in thissituation with uh said
candidate?
And he just said to me, It'slike, what was what's the right
thing to do?
What would you want?
I sort of sat there and thoughtabout it.
I was like, I would just wantthem to tell me the truth and

(01:10:04):
give me the honest answer.
He was like, there's youranswer.
And I went and had thatconversation, very honest
conversation, you know.
Yeah, they were upset, but theyunderstood.
And then the outcome was we gotto the final and we ended up
actually hiring that person.
And now, if I tried to lie tothem and give a bogus reason to
us why we were delaying theprocess, we would have probably
lost them.
But as I was open, transparentwith them, and we probably spent

(01:10:25):
about 45 minutes on that calljust going back and forth, me
answering every question theyhad.
Um, and then after that, keptthem constantly updated
throughout the way.
So, whenever I've been in thesecrossroads situations where I
don't know what to do betweenlike a conversation with a high
manager with a candidate,whatever it is, I always just
take that setback is what is theright thing to do?
What would I want in thatsituation?

(01:10:47):
And whatever the answer is tothat, um, is then what I go and
do because it is generally theright answer.

SPEAKER_00 (01:10:53):
That's awesome.
Well, Reese, thank you so much.
This has been a great time.
I I really appreciate you comingon and sharing your insights.
I know that our audience isgoing to be really excited about
this one.
But yeah, thanks again forcoming on the show.

SPEAKER_02 (01:11:05):
Thank you for having me.

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