Recruiter into Job Search Influencer | Mike Peditto [52] - Transferable Skills

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Transferable skills, skills, skills, skills from Cackle
Media. This is transferable skills.
I know Michigan. Today's guest is Mike Pedito who
went from being a recruiter to ajob search influencer.
You can see a lot of his videos and content linked below and on
his website which is also below.I did very minimal editing of
this episode and that was more to test things out.

(00:20):
We had a debate in the beginningand the challenge was accepted.
I'm not going to edit this episode as much as I usually do.
We'll see how it goes. Anyway, with that, I hope you
enjoy Mike. It's great to have you here on
the show. Thanks for being here.
Yeah, awesome. I appreciate it.
I'm excited. It's our Monday morning ready to
go. This is a great way to start my
week. I dump, I jumped deep, deep, Oh
my God, I dive. I dove dive.

(00:41):
I jumped deep into your content and I was really excited by it
and very enthusiastic talking toyou today because you cover a
few things that are super interesting to me, very
interesting to me. The 1st is all about skills,
recruiting, looking for a job candidacy.
So that topic obviously is very relatable and interesting to me.
It's a lot about this podcast, but then talking to somebody who

(01:05):
has made a transition into content on social media and it's
really interesting. We're going to get to through
your career journey, but then where you're at today as a full
time content creator and so and take a deep breath.

(01:26):
Can I do that again? I have a bad habit of rambling.
That's all right. Me too.
And many people wouldn't notice it because I added these shows
so heavily as as a content creator, you want your episodes,
you want your content to be so tight, you want your clips to be
really tight to capture everyone's attention and not
lose them. And I treat that the same way.

(01:47):
Even at a mid length or not longlong format, but mid length like
30 to 45 minutes. And I feel the need obsessively
to do that too for this. So most people went to know that
I ramble a lot. I've had bad habit of talking a
lot. Yeah, no, I get it.
And and yeah, I'm the same way. A lot of times it just hit
record and then at the end just a ton of work of get rid of

(02:08):
every block and every breath andevery kind of pause.
And I talked about that for three minutes too long.
I get it. What's the right thing to do?
Do you think it's better to do abunch of new takes and try to be
more concise, condensed? Or do you think it's just better
to do it in post and edit everything later?
I think it depends. Or I think for short form, it's

(02:29):
like it has to be a bunch of takes, like a bunch of new takes
because you go and you're like, oh, that'd be sharper if I just
said these 4 words. If I just do it this way and
this way or so, whenever I try and do a TikTok where I like
just hit record and I like talk for a few minutes and edit it
down, it's never as good as the one where I just do it in four
or five second bursts. If that's the right way, that's
the right way. When I do podcasts and stuff,

(02:51):
like for me, it's usually just just go and then edit it all
down and clip it together. And it's one of those things
you're so much harder on yourself than anybody else
anyway. I'm so obsessed with getting rid
of every or every pause, every this, and then you listen to a
show and you don't even realize,like people are saying it and
that's what's happening and you don't even care.
All right, so you think this is a me problem?
Do you think as a creator I obsess over the nuance and the

(03:13):
small little details that I editout painstakingly, when in
reality if I didn't edit them out it would add maybe 4 minutes
to the entire length of the episode and people wouldn't even
care or notice? Yeah, it depends on what it is,
but probably not. It's stuff you notice.
But also isn't that part of creating something like you
could say that to a painter like, well, if you would have

(03:34):
not changed the color or added that line, nobody looking at it
would have said it's missing that line, but you thought it
needed it. Like it's your show, it's your
content. If you want it all of that out,
then do it. If you want it to be more like
and that stuff in there and maybe it gives a human feel to
it or whatever and you can have it, but there's no right answer
unless it's the only time it becomes the wrong answer is when

(03:56):
it's like stopping you from doing it.
When you're just like so obsessed with the getting right
that you're like, I'm not even going to put it out because it's
just never ready. That's the definition of when
you have a real problem, like clinically speaking, behavior is
not a problem unless it's actually causing negative impact
on your life or maybe your lovedones around you.
So I guess if I'm editing it or doing anything obsessively and

(04:20):
I'm happy with the results and it's not coming at the cost or
detriment of anything else in mylife, so be it.
But if it is taking 3X longer toproduce something than it
should, maybe that is problematic.
I don't know. Maybe I'll just leave in the
beginning to this episode as an example of what it's like when I
don't do a retake and when I just ramble on and talk about

(04:41):
it, and because that's where we're at now, talking about
this. Yeah, let your listeners, let
your listeners listen to the all6 minutes of this and then
comment and like never do that again, right?
No, we really like that part of the show.
There's the business analytical side of me that actually likes
doing split testing. Not necessarily with this show,
but in in life maybe. So I might do 1 episode where I
don't edit at all. In one episode where I edit

(05:03):
heavily. Do I have enough quantity of
data in order to be able to surmise which one is better?
I don't know, but I do like thatfrom a scientific experiment.
Yeah, I like I can't do that. I do with my news on stuff.
So do you want to AB test different titles or a lot of
social media, but like you can AB test different thumbnails or
this way I'm like, no, I just I don't want to be keep
questioning myself. I'm like, this is the way I did

(05:24):
it and I'm putting it out. I don't need half the people
telling me that it should be theother way.
It's also I also obsess over thecontinuity too.
If you're AB testing, it means you also you're not being
consistent. There's less continuity.
And I maybe this isn't flattering, but I think I'd
rather be wrong but be consistently wrong as opposed to
looking like I don't know what I'm doing and trying a whole lot

(05:46):
of different things until I get to the point where one of them
is right. You disconnect too much when you
over edit and you overthink it. People connect with real.
They connect with who you are. Like people choose to follow and
listen to people that they like and see themselves in or relate
to or whatever else. Not people.
Because they have the best edited show.

(06:07):
That's very true. Like, terrible editing could
cost you an audience, but no one's only like that show
because of how well it's edited.I've never heard anyone suggest
or recommend a podcast to me or anyone else because of the
editing, right? It's because of the content.
I'm learning something now. I'm accepting something now.

(06:31):
This is an acceptance. Yeah, this is a good start.
This is a whole new path and youprobably even thought about
coming down today. Well, there's the things that
you have control of, the things you don't, the things they don't
have control of necessarily is how energetic or how focused I'm
going to be on a Monday morning.But the reality is I was looking
forward to talking to you today,truthfully, because we were put

(06:54):
in touch by a good friend of mine, Dave and Dave's, you got
to meet this guy. He's doing some really cool
stuff, very interesting things that we helped publish a, a book
for him and he's all over socialmedia When I checked out your
content on TikTok and everywhereelse, LinkedIn also, I don't
know, by the way, if you're justcross posting the same content
or if you're doing specific content per platform.
We'll get to that later. But I was checking out your
things across different platforms and I, I love the

(07:15):
subject matter. Obviously it's about careers,
it's about candidacy, it's aboutinterviewing, it's about how to
present yourself and so on and so forth, which is a big
undertone of this show. It's to get inspiration by
people's career journeys and pivots and strategies.
But ultimately it's how are you positioning yourself for the
next chapter in your career? So looking at that was super
interesting to me. And then also it's, it's not

(07:39):
just what you're talking about, but it's who you are.
I really, I don't know if this is persona or this is who you
are in the real world in your life, but you just have a great
presence on camera. And I like how approachable you
seem to be as a viewer. I, I listen to your stuff and I
watch your videos and I'm like, this guy looks like somebody I
trust and I'd like to, I'd like to hear content from and

(08:00):
suggestions from. Yeah, that's the that's me.
And it's like goes back to what we're even talking about, right?
Like people choose to follow or listen to you because they like
you and they want to get it fromyou.
And my videos are not, they're not well edited.
They're edited enough. I they flow, they're going.
But you see a lot of content outthere, short form content

(08:22):
especially that just has the graphics and the B roll and
they're like flying in. And then I don't do any of that.
Every time I try a video fails because my audience doesn't
connect with it. I think they scroll quicker.
I've discussed, I still try it, but every time it's not worth it
for me because I'm being me. And I think that's what people
like and want. And it's just like it's going to
be the number one overall lessonfor all this over and over

(08:42):
again. It's just who in that video is
the same person that you talk toif the camera's off.
Case in point, I like your videos.
It seems like you're a real person and you're just doing
what you want to do about who you are and representing
yourself. That's that.
That's what was relatable. And even better if it means that
less editing all that stuff to make a very short form format

(09:03):
video with all of those distracting cuts and fly
insurance and overlays and text.That takes more work.
And it takes more work to in order to hold people's attention
and to make it seem branded. But that's actually not what I
want when I'm watching one of your videos.
I want to be focused on what you're saying, not distracted by

(09:25):
the all the other stuff. So good on you for being you.
It's also what you just said. What you just said actually
resonates because what you just said ties very well back into
what was said earlier, which is just be yourself and be who you
are. As opposed to saying who am I
trying to attract? It's not about the audience,

(09:45):
it's about who I am. And if I am who I am and I'm
authentic, then the audience will find me.
The right audience will find me.Yeah, 100%.
And that was even getting into the start of this and I don't
know like where you would want me to start or go from here, but
I didn't start doing any of it with any intention.
It literally if you would have told me like a guy in my 40s who

(10:06):
was about to make like my first ever TikTok, like where I'd go,
I was just like, no, that's insane.
I didn't make it with any intention of, oh, start going
viral and build an audience. Like I just wanted to see it and
try it. And so I was never seeking an
audience and I never tried to seek an audience.
An audience found me from day one and that'll probably get
into a ton of what we talk aboutwith even like the way I respond

(10:28):
to people and if you've dug intome, you've seen me and LinkedIn,
like I get messy sometimes, but just I know my audience, they
come find me. I don't care about anyone else.
But you must have had some intention.
You wanted to see what would happen.
You were curious and you want toexplore a video.
When you first uploaded your first TikTok, there had to be
some sort of thought of what do you hope to come of this or what
do you want to do What? Why did you make that first

(10:50):
video? It's a good question.
So I can, and I remember the day.
So I had gone through a layoff and I was the first layoff of my
career at a very successful career up to this point, never
been laid off, was doing really well at the job.
And I got laid off and the job search was tough.
It was the holiday season, the job market was just starting to

(11:10):
turn bad. And this was a couple years ago
and I started a new job. So I got laid off in November,
start a new job in February and I started the new job and it was
slow. I it was just on boarding was
slow. This job didn't really work out
and that's a totally, but we're not going to go in that ramble
right now. But it started slow.
And I don't know what made me like set up a TikTok and I just

(11:34):
made a video that was basically like, Hey, I just went through
the job search and I've seen so much of this.
It's just coming at me. It became my algorithm, just
like the Internet found out I was sending resumes places and
just decided to bury me in job search content.
And most of it was awful. It was wrong, or it was gimmicky
and it was predatory. It was all these things.

(11:55):
Can you describe a little bit further what that means?
I know what it means because I've seen it.
Sure. Yeah, yeah.
So like most, I shouldn't say most, but a lot of job search
content that's out there, like most things on the Internet,
right, Go back to pre Internet, the Evening News.
If it bleeds, it leads, right? And then the Internet comes and
clickbait is here and it's just like to go viral on the
Internet. It's a big following.
You usually have to be flashy and have these hooks that draw

(12:15):
you in. So a lot of job search content
is meant to flame the anxiety inpeople about the job search.
The reason you're not getting a job is because you're doing this
thing wrong, right? You've probably seen that video
come across Stop making this on your resume and it's usually a
bunch of garbage that follows. That provocative and then seem

(12:35):
relatable to to stoke that fear,to make you feel insecure in
order to then take action. Yeah, and it's setting up
scapegoats. And almost all of them were
selling a course on how to get ajob or whatever else comes
right. Like the idea.
And I talk about this a lot whenI talk about like how to find if
you're going to go career coach route, which I don't do.
But if you're going to go careercoach route, like what to look

(12:57):
for and what not to look for. And one of the things I say is
if the feeling of their videos and the feeling of their content
is like, things are bad and you need me to get through them,
then that's not correct. That's someone you want to
avoid. So that's what a lot of it was
that was out there. So I made a video and I remember
my very first video, it was terrible.
And go back and watch it. And like you talk about bad Ed

(13:18):
and like slow millennial pauses and just not cutting.
It we'll link it down below. OK, yeah, it's I'm like 80 lbs
lighter in it, but and it's just, it's real slow.
But it's just there is no universal job search hack or
trick. And I give an example of I don't
mind a twoage resume. Someone else says that they hate
a twoage resume. Neither of us are wrong.
Those are opinions. You need to listen to people who

(13:40):
will admit that as an opinion and not a rule and understand
you can't please everyone. And that was the first video and
I'm talking through air pods. Like the audio sucks on it.
I don't know, it got like 2000 views which is a good first
video but it's not like a. Very good.
No, that's a very good first video.
And also to your point earlier again about it's about the
content, not about the quality of your production or editing
it. Pretty messy audio, poor if any

(14:02):
editing, and yet you were prettysuccessful on that first video.
Yeah, and there was a couple comments.
They're just like, oh, that's soright.
And I think like another like recruiter, content creator saw
it and was just like, oh, this is a great video.
When I was like, OK, cool. And I like texting my friend.
And I was like, yeah, I made a TikTok and then I made like
another one the next day. I made one a day for the first

(14:23):
like week. And then comments were coming
in, I was getting followers. I got, I don't know, 500 or 700
followers in the week. And I was just like, still in
that mind, I'm like, wow, that'sreally quick.
But to be big you have to have thousands and thousands.
So it's nothing but like. Yeah, but you'll never have
thousands and thousands, right? They won unless you're celebrity
or you were on the news or something.

(14:43):
And so that's already off to a good start.
When you were making those firstweeks or two weeks worth of
videos, were you also following strategy that you had read about
in order to gain traction or were you just posting content?
And by strategy, let me further describe what I mean.
I'm sure you as a creator, and Imyself also get about a dozen or

(15:04):
two dozen emails a day all aboutwhat this person can do to make
my content better in the blank. A lot of different things, SEO,
hashtagging, strategic positioning, getting you on
other shows, excuse me. Point is, there's a lot of
people soliciting their servicesto help make your content better
in some number of ways and you and there's also ways that you

(15:27):
can do to position your videos for more strategic search
ability and all that. Were you following any that are
trying to do that? Were you just literally making a
video, editing it and uploading it?
Yeah, I was literally just making a video and uploading it.
I, I, I didn't do anything that the pros say to do.

(15:49):
I didn't watch other content I didn't like.
I those videos hadn't even hit my feed yet because now I get
them constantly. My TikTok is still just want to
grow your TikTok want to want togrow?
The videos were terrible. There's another one I did where
I'm like standing in my bathroomand the like fan is on in like
the bathroom and the audio is terrible and it's like echoey

(16:12):
and in my mind that I just uploaded it anyway.
Because there's best practices and then there's worse
practices. There's terrible practices.
And it was. Terrible practice.
And again, it's because my intention wasn't to get a
following, I was just replying to comments.
People are leaving comments and asking questions and I was
answering their questions. I still a week or two in had 0

(16:32):
intention of anything ever happening or coming from it.
I was just being helpful to people.
OK, so this is the key. This is the key to success.
You're holding it right now and you just covered it all.
You named it, which is you're not trying maybe extrinsically
to gain things, you're just trying to help people.

(16:55):
You're approaching this holistically from your best
intentions, holistic interests, wanting to help others with no
real strategy or long term strategic vision and goals in
mind. And isn't that the key to
success from everyone I have talked to?
It was for me and it's funny because that was around the time

(17:15):
where it was. So then all of a sudden though,
oh, what's your strategy due to this or I don't have one to be
honest with you. I still don't.
I still to this day do not batchrecord and get a bunch of videos
ready, plan things out, schedulemy content, anything like that.
When I feel like it, I open up my phone and I make something.
To this day, I still follow likebad practices.

(17:38):
So who knows where I could have been a best practice to know?
You're turning all assumptions on his head and saying, you
know, strategy is one thing and maybe strategy I can, if I can
use what I'm hearing from you right now as like an improper
use of data. I'm going to take this as gospel
when it doesn't necessarily meanto be.
Strategy is for those that are still struggling with the
content, are still struggling with figuring out who they are

(17:59):
or who they're trying to approach.
And if you figure that out and you know what it is and you're
approaching this holistically with best intention and you're
just doing it for the sake of helping others, strategy is not,
let's say, necessary. Yeah, potentially strategy will
help you. Strategy will help save you time
and stress, right? Like I could be more efficient.

(18:20):
For I was going to say it can optimize things you're doing,
but that's not necessarily it's not predicated.
Your success is not predicated on the strategy.
It won't make up for uninteresting content or things
that are well made or things that aren't like a benefit to
people that are out there. And I think that's the tip I see
missing all the time from these.Just like there's career gurus,
right? There's tons of content gurus
like you were even talking about.

(18:41):
And I'm like, you are selling something to someone who's
failing and thinks that if they buy this package from you, it's
what they need to do. When reality you can't make
their content any better. You'll just make it look a
little bit better, sound a little bit better. 20 years.
Like funny. I'm not a victim.
I certainly fall and prey to a lot of those suggestions and

(19:03):
content that we have promoted tome, things like, for instance,
how to be how to be better at music theory, how to maybe work
on your breath for singing better, how to maybe have a
here's a downloadable content, apackage for assets on templates
for fill in the blank. What are and so it's only like
2995 and I'm and I can tell you something that has been almost

(19:26):
universal. I've done this maybe four or
five times. I think with one exception, I've
purchased it and I've never actually followed through with
whatever I just bought, whether it is sitting through the
lessons, the classes that I I ordered using the templates.
I realized that the promotions are excellent.
They're very well crafted but often times I don't know it was

(19:48):
impulse and it doesn't really fit into my work floor or
lifestyle. Yeah.
And there's not a ton in them usually that like you don't
really know or isn't that helpful already.
And it took me a really long time to make my first ever like
digital product for sale. I never wanted to.
It was never my plan like we've talked about.
But then like I finally did, butit took me a while because I, I

(20:08):
put time into it and then I feltbad like charging anything for
it. And I was selling for 499 my
first ever product that was probably worth $99 compared to
what most people did when I first started doing one-on-one
coaching because I was unemployed again.
And like I was built this following, people go do
coaching. I was doing it for $39.00 like
an hour because I just felt so guilty about it.

(20:30):
And I saw these like 25 year olds with no career experience
selling coaching, career coaching for $200.00 an hour and
I was just, it was wild to me. Mike, for you and the listeners
right now, obviously this won't be released for a couple two or
three weeks from now. But the episode for this show
that released today was with a gentleman who doesn't like to
call himself a consultant, but he's more of an advisor.

(20:52):
And we talked about at length the trend of coaching self
appointed, self defined experts in coaching.
And I hate one thing that I explained the difference between
the coaches that I have had. And you're certainly no
exception to this rule. The coaches that I've had on
this show versus the ones that Ihave not invited to be on the

(21:13):
show are the ones that come froma because they've been asked to
coach, not because they've sought out to be a coach.
The ones that are responding to the request because of their
subject matter, expertise, experience in life, and often
times even certification. And there's just so many people,
like you said, who are young andfairly inexperienced calling

(21:33):
themselves coaches. And but you're doing it because
people are reaching out and saying the content you have
created is very valuable and helpful.
And I'd like more of it, especially bespoke, maybe
one-on-one personal approach. You get to a point where you
can't ignore it. I don't want to say you can't
say no. You can always say no, but you
can't ignore the fact that people are coming to you.

(21:53):
And if what you're providing to them has been helpful, certainly
more of it that's more personalized would be a
multiplier of that success and help.
Yeah, and I've lost out on what could be a lot of money with
that, the approach I take to it.But just I don't like it.
For one, it's just not who I want to be.
But even today, I have a link like in my profile.

(22:13):
People can book coaching with me, but I don't sell it.
I don't ever make videos about it.
And it's only one option. It's an hour with me.
We can cover a lot. Whatever you want.
Book it if you want, and then e-mail me.
We'll set up a time. Otherwise you'll never hear me
ask you about this coaching again.
And it's just there so that people don't have to ask me if
it's there. And when I don't feel like doing
it anymore, I turn it off for a while and then like, I'll put it
back onto the page. But that's all I kind of have.

(22:35):
But yeah, I know I could be charging a ton or making.
Doing it. But here's the thing that you'll
eventually figure out. You'll figure out that your time
is worth something, whatever that is to you.
You'll figure that out. It's not $39.00 an hour, but
you'll figure out what that is that makes you feel both
comfortable in in the value thatyou're providing and the
affordability for the individualthat you're hoping will benefit

(22:58):
from your service. Yeah.
And that's where I got eventually.
I have what I think is a fair price out there and I don't push
it hard and some weeks a bunch of people book it and sometimes
ago weeks without people bookingit and both are fine.
I had somebody reach out to me on LinkedIn like a week ago
asking about the book and they were just like, I released a
book recently and the book's on Amazon.
It's $30. And they were just like, hey, I

(23:18):
really want the book. How much does it cost?
I don't really, I'm in between jobs.
I can't really afford anything like even like having food.
And I was just like I told them I was like, don't buy it.
I was like, I would love a sale.But like of them day, I was
like, this book's not a lifeline.
This book's not going to help you get a job tomorrow.
If you buy it like where you arein life, your last $30 should
not be going towards like a lifeline and hoping it'll get

(23:39):
you a job. Had a conversation with one of
my career coaches in the past when we were negotiating her
fee, I, I asked her, I said, howdo you feel about pricing it
based on performance? And she and I said here, I have
very clear goals. And if you help me achieve those
goals, they'll be a massive kicker.

(24:00):
But you have to also lower your price for your hourly rate.
She's like, I don't work that way.
I said I know. Yeah.
I said I know because I'm also, I know who I'm talking to.
I'm talking to somebody that's more traditional.
And so I like challenging normatives in society and
reality. And something that comes down
to, yeah, if you put your money where your mouth is, if you
believe in what you're doing andyou believe that you have a high

(24:20):
success rate, why wouldn't you? I said you'll make a lot more
money if you do it in my my my model.
Yeah, if everything was success.But that's The thing is you
can't control success in that world.
And that was like a big thing for me.
Like even in avoiding this was like, I don't write resumes for
people. I will never be a resume writer
because I think a resume is. It's such luck sometimes.
Like no matter what, there's no perfect way to do a resume.

(24:42):
I can sit down with you in an hour and I can give you a ton of
advice and show you how I would do it and ideas to get going and
help you start to phrase things.But like you can tell when a
resume is written by someone whodidn't do the job and has never
done the job before. And I just so those are all
those things, right? It's just like people will be
like, oh, can we book a mock interview?
And I tell them, like, sure, I'mhappy to mock interview you, but

(25:03):
I'm also going to be upfront with you that there's a good
chance that you don't get asked one question we talk about in
this entire session because that's just how that works.
Unless they've told you the questions in advance like this,
I can tell you what they're probably going to do.
But I don't know this person or this company you're interviewing
for. I'd rather talk strategy or all
these things with people. And that's what I ultimately use
my hours for with people. But yeah, because you can't

(25:24):
control that. And it's just, it's what's kept
me out of that game. I know right now I could turn on
Mike Dito careercoaching.com andbook like thousands of dollars
in it and my wife and children probably be super happy that I'm
doing that. You have money.
But it's just it's not what I want to do in this space.
OK, so great time to define a few things I'd like to go

(25:47):
through your career. I know we're like 1/2 an hour
into this conversation and I by the way, that might not seem
intentional, but it was intentional.
It was an intention of mine. Speaking of earlier in the
conversation format, editing andover prescribing and being
obsessed over details, I actually made an intention
before I joined this meeting to not do a traditional intro as I

(26:11):
have been doing for a number of reasons.
I wanted to actually AB test. In this case, I wanted to
actually test what it's like because I think about most of
the shows and conversations thatI love listening to.
They somehow jump into a conversation organically.
The problem is even though you and I have never met in person
and this is only the second timethat we've actually spoken, we

(26:32):
can have a great conversation. And I don't need an intro to
you, but the listeners and the viewers have never seen you.
And so they do need an intro. But when you make an intro, and
I felt this in the moment when Idid it even just here, which I
did, I'm not going to edit out it felt it Maybe because I was,
I'm rambling again, maybe because I was thinking about

(26:53):
this in the moment like it was intentional, that I wanted to
figure out how to get into a conversation organically without
making an intro. So when I made the intro I
couldn't help but cringe a little bit because I was trying
not to and I just wanted to hit record and start talking Point
is Jesus. I think this should be the

(27:16):
episode where there's no editingat all and the whole thing just.
I was going to say that, by the way, earlier I was going to say
what as an experiment, what if Idon't edit anything in this
episode? It would be very interesting,
but it also runs the risk of people being like that was I
don't need to go off the rail. I can assume and maybe
appreciate the ADHDI just don't need to go along on the journey

(27:36):
with you, but maybe I'll do that.
The point is that earlier I was I wanted to start with your
career to so we can get to wherewe're at now and understand how
you got to where you're at. But I didn't want to also switch
subjects so quickly. Can we start at the beginning?
Can you tell us a little bit like what you were doing in your
career and then and to how you got to where you're at today and

(27:58):
then we can further define and explain what you're doing in in
this stage? Yeah, so I think my career is
easy to split into 3 phases. So I started working for Kaplan
test prep and admissions when I was in college.
I was a part time worker there and my job at the time was like,
this was a long time ago. It was a very different world

(28:21):
and how people studied. But my job was like going to
Kaplan Centers for people who are prepping for the SAT's and
Lsats and Mcats and all that. That's what Kaplan does.
If you're not familiar, I would work at the center on like
nights and weekends where peoplewould come who were studying for
the LSAT and check out like workbooks that we like covered
in plastic. And they would just use the
Sharpies and dry erase markers to do there.
And then I would like, clean thething and rewind the videotapes

(28:44):
that they were watching. And it sounds like I'm talking
about, you know, 50 years ago. Rewind the videotapes.
And I mean, this was the, this was the 2000s different era.
It wasn't that long ago, but andthen the classes moved online
everything. So I started and then I moved
full time there once I graduatedcollege and I worked for Kaplan
for 10 years. I did a lot.

(29:07):
Eventually I was like running a center.
I moved around and worked in different centers and eventually
I was just like in charge of thecenter hiring all of the part
time staff and the teachers and managing all these things.
And that's where I got my like hiring and managing sort of
leadership start out of all thisstuff.
Eventually they closed all the Kaplan centers down for the most
part, because by this point, 10 years into being there, like

(29:27):
everything, I moved to online courses and online study guides
and, and they moved me into a traveling sales job and I was
good at it. I traveled and I sold nursing
school programs to, to nursing schools.
And I did that for a few years. And then my radicalization
moment came where I was there for a decade.
I had just blown away all my goals.

(29:49):
I beat my goals by like August, by like December, I doubled them
all. And they were just like, yeah,
there's not really, like, promotion or new place to go now
because we're all just remote and spread around the country.
And, like, your boss is in charge of, like, the whole
Eastern half of the US, you know, and you're not going to
have that person's job. And there was no, like, raise or
bonus for, you know, the numbers.

(30:10):
And I reached out to a friend ofmine who was a recruiter, and I
was just like, hey, is there anyone who does what you do but
can help me? He was a tech recruiter, and I
wasn't in tech. It's like, but can you help me
find a job? Because I don't know what to do.
I've never looked for a job. I've been in this company for a
decade. Yeah, let's sit down and meet
about it. So then this is a long story
because I'm going my whole career.
It's a great story, so. Keep.

(30:30):
Going Then I met with him and hewas just like, why don't you
just come work for me? You'd be good at this?
And I was like, oh, OK, So I just did.
I just trusted him. So I quit my corporate job that
I've been in for 10 years. Everything I knew about just
building up through a company had fallen apart on me.
I became a recruiter at an agency and learned how much

(30:53):
better off people were, especially at this time, by
changing jobs every two to threeyears.
I was really good at it, especially because it was me.
It was I'm this. I was the same person, but what
changed was I was no longer doing sales because recruiting
is like sales, but I wasn't asking for any money.
I was helping people find a job and they didn't owe me anything
for it. And that was my favorite part
about it. There was no clothes.

(31:14):
There was no like trying to get them to OK, now I have to tell
you what this cost. And I went great.
And I just, I took to it right away and I was just crushing it
and blowing away all these records they had.
And I was just like learning theindustry was so interesting to
me and might have a part of it might have been because I've had
experience building up large centers and managing and hiring
already. So I did really well with it.

(31:35):
And so then I was in recruiting for a long time and eventually
left there and started moving internal recruiting at companies
for anyone listening doesn't know the difference.
Like an external recruiter is the person who calls you and is,
hey, I have a client. Can I send your resume to them?
You're good for this job and theclient pays them to find people.
Internal is, hey, I work for Google and I'm hiring a Google.
Are you interested in this role of Google?

(31:56):
Like I review your resume when you apply to Google.
I never worked at Google, and similar to internal recruiting,
I've bounced around a bunch of different startups over the
years because startups come and they go.
What's it like though from your standpoint being in those jobs?
How do they differ? You doing those jobs?
The biggest difference is pay. External recruiters work on
Commission now. Again, they get paid by the
client, not by the candidate. Like I say, you never had asked

(32:18):
for a sale. So if I was recruiting, if I was
an external recruiter, Google will say, hey, we'll pay you 20%
of the person's salary if you can find me this person.
So it's a little bit more mercenary like for hire type of
thing. And there's typically also like
a like it's based on retention. They have to be working
successfully for X number of yeah.
There's. Periods and and that's how

(32:38):
you're compensating because you otherwise it's a burning leads
yeah I'll get a sale and doesn'tmatter about whether it's a
qualified sale or not I'll get somebody in the door and.
Of course, yeah. It's all about relationships
because you want to find them someone good who says that they
like, and then they want to use you again for all their new
roles. I have a great question that I'm
always curious about. How good are your digital
forensics and research skills? Because I yeah, I assume people

(33:01):
in your position are really goodat both finding people but also
digging up a lot about them. Yeah, if I want to.
It's funny because now things are way more paywall than they
used to be. Like now you try and Google
anyone's like phone number, whatever, and you find those
like BeenVerified pages or whatever, like these pages that
just want to charge you for everything.
It's a little bit harder. But like, I mean, even right now
I'm very good with like when I don't like someone's comment,

(33:23):
like I find out who you are and I decide if I want to come, not
come after you, but if I want tolike have some fun or not, that
sounds worse. I don't.
I do the same thing too. If I see a comment that's that
peaks my interest positively or negatively, I want to know more
about why would you say something like this or why are
you somebody that behaves this way?
And so I'm going to go down a rabbit hole.

(33:44):
I'm going to find out I did the same thing recently.
I have a habit of buying and selling things on used
marketplaces. It's just an interest of mine,
like guitars is one of them, butother things like watches and
things. And so I recently sold a watch
and I wanted, I didn't know who was showing up my door at my
office. And anyway, so I was doing a lot
of research on this person and Ifound out a lot about the

(34:04):
person. I found out where they lived,
the last two places they lived. I found out where they have
worked, where they went to school.
I found out some papers that they had written and published.
I found out their social media presence across a bunch of
different platforms, things thatthey have said publicly, things
that they probably don't know our public that they have said.
And I had all that stuff together just so you never know
who you're going to meet in person.
Part of that was out of curiosity and some of it was out
of security and being proactive on that.

(34:26):
But it's fun and a lot of peoplethat you're talking to probably
do not realize how impactful some of the things that they
have said. Their digital footprint online
could impact a job and all the time that people can be
disqualified from an offer or even let go.

(34:47):
We saw it last week, sadly, I don't know if it's excessive or
not. The line between your workplace
and your personal life. The Sally, the person who was
let go after stealing that home run ball at the Phillies game.
I just I don't know that you people have to be you have to be
careful about what you say. And that's not by the way, not
to say that you shouldn't say what you're thinking.

(35:08):
But the same time, maybe don't think those things that you're
thinking. I don't if you're closeted
racist, maybe don't be a racist and there's.
So many different levels, right?Because you're talking like,
people who go out there and, like, spew hatred on the
Internet who probably deserve something bad that happens.
And then you're talking about, like, that baseball thing,
right? Yeah, that was bad.
She shouldn't have taken the ball from the kid.
Should her life be ruined? Over no, probably not.

(35:29):
And also you have to remind yourself that there are very few
places in our modern day westernsociety where people are
expected to get emotionally heightened.
And that and and that is any kind of sports arena is you're
almost it's almost promoting that psychotic behavior.
And so sometimes you act before you think and I and we're all

(35:53):
human. And so should that have big
ramifications like that? Probably not.
I don't know. It's also commentary about the
choices in your life and who youare.
But the point is that people saythings and I call it the the
YouTube comments effect is that when there's no personal
connection, even virtually, but you are not doing right now.
But if there's no face, then people forget that there's a

(36:15):
human being, that they are directing these comments and
they lose all sense of ethics and human decency.
I could talk for several hours on this topic of, yeah, the the
way that people treat like, I don't call myself a public
figure. Like whatever, be like somebody
puts themselves out there like the way they treat you, like
you're not a real human. You're entertainment to people.

(36:36):
There's a viral video I really loved a while ago, this
purchase. So the Internet will yes.
Queen you to death like they would just cheer you on watching
you knowing they have no stake in what's going on and then step
back when they're cheering just like pushed you into trouble.
You are nothing but a scroll anda digital thing to people.
So like when I kind of hunt people down, it's more on the

(36:57):
light hearted side of someone even commented on my video of
mine this morning. That was like, tell me why I was
wrong. I was like, I would never listen
to you. I found this person.
I dig into who they were. I found their LinkedIn.
They had worked at a library for30 years.
And I comment, I was like, look,I love the library.
Thank you for your service. 30 years of library, that's
amazing. The last person who should be
talking about what works in the corporate world IN20252025 is

(37:20):
someone who's been at the library for 30 years.
You have no clue. And they deleted the comment
because I think it's just like oh shoot, I didn't realize.
That's a wake up call Yeah, we can find you one of the there's
a couple people online who do this on TikTok and Instagram.
Where they challenge their audience to say, send me a
picture and within a matter of minutes, basically I can figure
out exactly where that photo is taking place.

(37:42):
I find it to be so fascinating. I learned a little bit myself.
I'm not going to do that, but I think it's really amazing and it
demonstrates that nothing is really protected, nothing is
really private and anything can be found, including anyone.
Although it took a long time to find bin Laden, but should have
gotten those guys better. Yeah, deeper in the caves.

(38:03):
But the but everything is everything can be found.
And this is something as a parent I impart on my children
too, is be careful of your behavior.
I know at your age, you know, they're teenagers and at their
age they are who they are. And but remember, what you say
can come back to haunt you in ways that you didn't predict or
anticipate. And whether it's a comment

(38:24):
online, whether it's a video youfound yourself in, whether it's
a group of people, you're surrounding yourself guilty by
association. But just be careful because that
could come back to haunt you at some point.
Yeah, I mean, it's like that that catfish movie on Netflix
right now where that mom probably never thought it was
going to come back to her, but like you, she probably thought
she was totally safe supposed to.
Stay spoiler alert. It's been on long enough.

(38:45):
I'm one of. The last people to see it.
Yeah, but I know what you're talking about cause 'cause
everyone spoiled it for me. Yeah, by the time I saw it, I
knew what happened too. But you still watch it.
You're still amazed. But yeah, like it eventually
gets traced back. It's just like eventually the
right person with the right timeand resources can find out who
anyone is. And the more significant a role
is, the more likely the due diligence will be put in before
making an offer. Yeah.

(39:05):
So I'm going to finish my bio now.
That was I can definitely talk about this stuff forever.
You and I talk the same style orit's just here I go this way.
I get this to my dad, this big Italian storyteller, but so it
was bouncing around. Before you, before you get,
before you continue. There was the end.
Well, thank you for being here. The no before you continue.

(39:28):
I wanted to say this before, butI didn't want to interrupt you.
But when you said storyteller teller, it's worth noting again
in the arc of this conversation and tying back to earlier about
AB testing what people want, whoyou're delivering this to.
Last night, I was at an event and somebody approached me,
shout out, Maya approached me atthis event and saying, I've been
listening to your show. It's amazing.
Thank you very much. And she said, I love the

(39:49):
episodes where people tell stories.
And she went further and described what that means, not
necessarily anecdotal stories, but that they're the career, the
story of their career. And I didn't want to interrupt
because you were in such a greatflow before this when I
interrupted about the internal versus external recruiter.
Because you were doing exactly what she was saying she loves

(40:09):
people doing, talking about their career as a story in a
long journey. And then I've also had other
people say, I'd like it to be more bullet pointed.
Can you get it down to more likegive me the details and then get
into specificity Anyway, So point is, you can never appeal
to an you can't please everyone.But what you're doing is at
least what one person who approached me in person said

(40:29):
that they specifically like. So thank you.
Shout out to Maya, you were going to love this episode.
Maya, you bullet point people, people are going to hate me.
And probably have turned off by now all.
Right. Let's continue with your career,
OK? So that is then well, so that
startups going really well. My biggest thing was like, I was
really good at what I do, but I never taken the time to build
me. No one knew who I was and like

(40:52):
they were famous recruiters and all this other stuff at the
time, like years ago, whatever. But I was just happy in my job.
And so when I got laid off the first time and started making
videos, got a new job and quickly into the new job, I was
growing quickly. I was like a month into the new
job and I think at that point was at like 345000 followers and

(41:13):
just like a couple weeks into making videos.
And I told them about it and they did not like it.
And they're like gorgeous word. You represent us when you talk.
I was like, technically I do because I'm in charge of your
hiring. So if I'm talking about hiring
out there, like that is what's happening at this company as
well because I'm doing it, I think they like that response,
but like it is what it was. Anyway, I found myself let go

(41:35):
there a couple weeks after that with no real feedback or just
vibes. As I said, no 'cause just vibes
and made a video that was just like, all right, I just got
fired and all of you who've beenwatching for the last couple
weeks who say I don't get it, you're going to watch me do
this, You're going to watch me do this whole thing.
And like that connected like that was just like that was the

(41:56):
lightning in the bottle. Everything hit oh, I made a
video about my job interviews A couple days after that I was
like, alright, I'm on the market.
I did I my first ever big video.I can remember it was just like
I did six job interviews this week.
I was asked 6 times tell me about yourself.
I was and I started talking about what happened in every
interview and how it's so easy to get ready for these things
because there's this template that they follow.

(42:16):
And that video was the first million view video I ever had.
And I went from like 6000 to 30,000 followers in the weekend
and that was it. Then that was just like off and
going. That was the first time that I
was like, oh, I can make some money doing this.
I like that you are, you're leading by example.
You're demonstrating the subjectmatter that you're an expert in

(42:38):
because you've been on the otherside of the table, the
recruiting side, and now you areon this side as the candidate
looking and now you're essentially walking the walk.
You're doing exactly that. You have been instructing or
advising others, whether it's a company or an individual, and
now you're doing and you're showing behind the scenes.
Yeah, and a lot of times like when people ask me how I did or

(42:59):
how I grew or I'm just like it was, it was lightning the
bottle. I couldn't recreate it today.
I couldn't just make it happen the way that.
It did it. Was right place, right time.
And so that was going really well for me and then I that
started turning into opportunities.
I was getting paid gigs, paid sponsorships and things like
that for the first time. And I was also like having

(43:21):
companies offer me short term contracts.
Hey, we don't have anything, butwe saw you.
We like the way you talk about it.
Will you do this two-month project to help us fill some
roles or whatever? And I was like, sure.
I was like, I guess now like I'mjust like in this consulting
world because of that. So I did that for a while and
one of them turned into a full time director of talent role.
I finally had gotten to the level I wanted to be at my very

(43:42):
first layoff. I was like, OK, I've hit this
ceiling. I was just like the senior lead
recruiter here. I'm really good.
I think I'm one of the best recruiters out there, but I
don't have anything impressive in my career.
I want that director level. I want that next step.
And I couldn't get it. And then all of a sudden I'd
gotten it for myself through allthese other things, right?
Then the director title fell in my lap.

(44:02):
And which is a huge thing on personal branding, like another
different route to go. Why you need to have that for
yourself? So I took this director of
talent role at a company that had found me because of all this
to begin with. So they were big fans of me
already doing content and makingcontent.
So I was a thing so I didn't have to give that piece up.
And I was able to take this director to start a bro I'd
always want in my career, do that role while building on the

(44:25):
side. And I was doing both very well.
And then it just became full into the one.
And that's where we went up here.
Now I make content full time, but I don't just when I say that
I think people think I make TikTok videos and make your
dance ad. Yeah, and not even just that,
but it's just I think a TikTok is dancing as its own, but like
by content creator full time. I also I speak at events or I

(44:49):
work with companies on better hiring practices because I have
that role like we talked about with like why blew up to begin
with. I'm one of the only people in
this space who has the behind the scenes chops, who's really
good at it and also was on the job market successfully several
times during this. I bridge the gap that didn't
exist somewhere else, like in this space.

(45:10):
And that got me speaking opportunities.
People wanted to hear from like the job seeker and the hiring
expert combined into one. So I go to events and I talk and
I meet with them and I work withtech vendors on what they could
be doing to help on both sides of the aisle with these things.
So it's just turned into all of these kind of opportunities just
in the hiring world, which is why I struggle to say like what

(45:32):
my job even is because I'm not just like making videos, but
that is a big part of it that helps me find people.
Yeah. And I'm curious as a content
creator and when you describe itas more than just making videos
that there's a lot more to it. You're speaking and you're doing
other things and you're helping people, sometimes contracting
short term solutions for companies, organizations, but
individuals as well. I'm curious how much information

(45:55):
or follow up that you get from your audience, whether they're
just people who watch your content and maybe leave
comments, but also people that you engage with personally.
Do you have any kind of success metrics that how you're tracking
towards helping individuals? Like individual job seekers.
Yeah, it's interesting to me, like when you talk about social

(46:16):
media and when we discuss anything about media and
content, it comes down to often times the metrics are views,
Subs, subscriptions, maybe even sponsorships, brand partnerships
and things like that. And I'm curious how much a
content creator can. I'm curious how much a content

(46:38):
creator can really find out the qualitative level of results
from their audience. Yeah, I'll only know what gets
reported to me, but I have hundreds of comments saved.
I have a folder where I favored every comment where someone is
just like, hey, I just wanted tolet you know, like I watched

(46:58):
this video right before my interview and it helped me give
me the confidence. I went and I got the job.
And I always tell people like, Ididn't get you the job.
I just, if I helped you a littlebit advice, but like you ought
to go get it. But I save all of those and I
have them. Does that fuel your motivation
to keep doing it? Yeah, it's really helpful
because there's also a ton of hate, right?
And I save. I also use them to my advantage
sometimes too. Like I have a lot of videos

(47:19):
where someone just why should welisten to this loser giving job
search advice and I'll bring up this video or just these
comments are just popping up like all over me.
I'm just like sitting there in silence as they're like coming
up all over. That's just like I use them.
But yeah, there's. No such thing as bad press,
right? Yeah, exactly.
And I saved the bad ones too. So I wrote a book that just came
out called Yes, You're Being Judged.
And it's got a realist guide to job searching.

(47:40):
And it's really from this lens of what we've been talking about
this whole time of like me beingon the market and me being the
expert at this stuff. I use real life examples like I
show my own e-mail chains, I sent companies, was on my own
job search and talk about my ownresume and my own interviews and
like all these things. So in my book, in the
acknowledgement section, becausethis is the kind of person I am,
the end of the acknowledgement section is me calling people

(48:02):
out. And there's three very specific
comments that like I bookmarked during my time creating content
early on. One told me that I'm on the fast
track to getting cancer because I work in HR.
One said this guy will be irrelevant in six months and 1.
So you contribute nothing. And I saved all of them.
And I called the three people out in the book and the

(48:24):
acknowledgements and it just says I saved those comments.
I read them every time I wanted to stop and every time I wanted
to write this. And then I just said I was like,
I even marked my calendar. I was like today and whatever
day I made the video, I was like, today is 762, day 762.
Since you wrote in six months I will be irrelevant.
That's awesome. And the book came out today and
that's like the video. So just.
Like, did you let the three people know that they were

(48:45):
acknowledged in your book? Yes.
Oh yeah, I made like the video and like tagged them or reply to
them. One of them I think had blocked
me already but. Then that's who I am.
I call out people in a nice way too and those things, but just
so I save all those, the good and the bad.
So I don't have like data numbers behind it.
But yes, like I know a lot of people who have like
specifically come to me and justlike, thank you.

(49:05):
Yeah, that's why I didn't want to say objective metrics of
success, but rather any kind of qualitative.
The ability for you to see that it's not just the numbers which
are an indication that what you're doing is valuable,
relevant and and appreciated theviewership.
The subscription numbers are acknowledging that.
And it's one view is the same asanother view, which is the same

(49:28):
as another view. What are the difference between
the individuals that represent each one of those views and what
has been their personal journey and experience that they have
gained something from you in their lives?
It's what is the human side of each one of those views of your
video, And that is what's interesting to me.
Yeah. And so saving those comments is
important. I get messages on LinkedIn or

(49:48):
emails or whatever else. I don't always reply like I
tried to, but I don't always, but I see them.
And now with the book out, the book's been on the market for
about a month and longer by the time this airs.
But like, even in the month it'sbeen on the market, it's
performed very well. It's all five star reviews at
the moment on Amazon and people have been emailing me.
I got this book as it was recommended to me and I love the
way you talk about this or thankyou.

(50:09):
This has changed so much for me because like I said, none of
it's the magic trick or the lifeline, but it's.
Me. Talking about it in a way that
most people don't in this relatable like self deprecating
but also smart way about it and I think people need to hear
that. And the back of the book even
tells people like, this is not some, like, motivational speech

(50:32):
telling you to just put it on your vision board.
It's going to work for you. This is not something that
sounds as written by someone whohasn't sent out a resume since
2004. This is like a real talk and
stories about what's happening. Yeah, these are pro hacks or the
kids these days would say cheat codes.
These are the cheat codes to finding the job.
Yeah, and it's not even right. It's very clear that like, it's,

(50:52):
I don't want it to be. It's not a cheat code, it's just
it's real. But that's the difference is
that that these books are often times, most books are written
provocatively, that they have tohave some sort of thesis that
looks unique or compelling. And in in reality, they're often
providing the same end result. They're hoping that you'll be
inspired by what they have written here and then take

(51:14):
action on it. What you're doing is you're
cutting out the noise and saying, I'm not here to market
myself. I'm not here to try to sell
myself. I'm here to try to tell you,
here are the steps that I know to work.
Do this. It's it is the cheat code.
It is the cheat code by way of authenticity.
The things that work that that are the real things that work
that you know. Yeah.

(51:35):
And it's, yeah, it's just so it's a lot of mindset shifting.
And I think for a lot of people in the job market, it's about
understanding. What's actually happening?
Like we talked about with like creators like not thinking of
people as like humans A. Lot of people.
Don't realize like when you're job searching on the other end
of like your application, I understand A1 in an application
is like someone in need of work,like I'll never forget that.
But like on the other end, application is also just like a

(51:57):
person who's making probably less money than they need to
survive in life, who has a boss who's demanding more of them
than they really can provide, who's overwhelmed by how much
work there is to do. Who also, when we're talking
about recruiters, is like the most hated person on the
Internet. Just try to do their job as
well. Like they didn't invent the
capitalist system that you're struggling under?

(52:18):
Assuming it is a person and not like an ATS scanner, which if
you want to if for a second. I'm curious to hear your
perspective on the ATS scanner. Just wait.
Can you describe it and then give me your opinion on it?
So the ATS stuff has a lot to it, and I'll try and keep it
simple. It's also something that like
has been evolving a lot recently.
So I always try not to like speak too definitively about

(52:39):
some of this stuff. But if you're listening around
ATS, it's an applicant tracking system.
It's become the hottest buzz term of the boogeyman in the job
searching world these days on the Internet, when we talk about
clickbait posting especially. And ATS in reality is a digital
filing cabinet for recruiters for resumes.
When you apply to a job, it goesinto our ATS system.

(52:59):
It's where we open jobs and typein job descriptions and set up
interviews. It's no different than if you're
in sales, like you're CRM, right?
It's Salesforce but for recruiting and that's it.
It's not a magical piece of software.
It's honestly behind most piecesof software.
There are a lot of misconceptions about how ATS
systems work, mostly perpetuatedby the resume selling and career

(53:24):
coaching industry, and this goesway back.
I could go way down a rabbit hole that I won't, but
essentially A statistic was published that never had any
data behind it by a resume selling company that said 75% of
resumes are never read by a human.
This was published back in like 2013 and so it's all read

(53:44):
through an ATF. This is before like AI was even
what it wasn't that and. They paid to.
Place it into a few media outlets as you can do including
Forbes. So you can see Forbes has an
article that says 70% of resumesare never read by a human.
If you Scroll down to the bottomyou'll see it was a contribution
by a professional resume writer.It wasn't like written by like a
Forbes writer or anything like that.

(54:05):
Or research. No one has ever provided any
data or anything for it. You talk to any recruiter who
manages an ATS, they'll tell youthat isn't what happens and that
isn't accurate. Doesn't matter.
I suppose. It's what's out there won the PR
battle. It won how it is.
So if you're listening, you justknow an ATS might.
The best thing I can tell you isit's not the boogeyman you think
it is. It's just some software.
It is my ATS stance. Now I will say as time goes on,

(54:29):
does more AI get involved? Is there AI reading more than
there used to be? Like of course that's just
what's happening in the industry.
Every ATS is a little bit different, but it is illegal for
a company to rely solely on it and not have humans making
decisions in most compliant companies.
There's currently an ongoing lawsuit against Work Day, which
is like the largest ATS system, which is being sued for having

(54:52):
an AI that is was using age discrimination in in sorting
resumes. So the fact that these lawsuits
are just happening and people don't really know yet shows this
has not been going on forever and that most companies would
not be relying solely on it because like, right now, it's
like a big Gray area mess. I did not know that this was
illegal and I did not know that any of this was going on.

(55:14):
That's wild. Yeah, most people don't, Yeah.
Yeah, I think there is a perception and maybe conspiracy
theory that nobody's ever looking at or seeing.
And I'm certain that there are probably nuanced to the legalese
surrounding how many, what percentage do we have to read
for it to count as us reading? We're not going to read

(55:36):
everyone, of course. And so I think that talking to a
lot of people I know who are in between right now and applying
for the better half of almost 2 years, I hear that people might
submit 100 applications before receiving a response from even
1. Yeah, and that's a matter of

(55:57):
this current job market being overwhelmed by people, not
whether it was a machine or not,because the same issues would
exist. So it's just saturation by
volume of applications. It's, yeah, virtually impossible
to even respond to each. Yeah, when when the market is
this hard, people want a answer and like a scapegoat and this
becomes an easy one. And what I always tell me was

(56:19):
just like, if you follow the logic, it doesn't make sense
because what people will tell you is, oh, AI is reading your
resume. A human doesn't read it and it's
just looking for all of the keywords and if it finds them
then like it passes you through.Some people will tell me, so I
wrote the perfect resume for AI.All the keywords are there and
it's getting auto rejected by AI.
Like that doesn't make sense. It can't be both of those.

(56:41):
Either throwing it on your resume is getting you an
interview or it's not. Both of those things can't be
true. And I don't think people stop to
play that scenario out when theysay these things.
Obviously, AI is not going anywhere.
It's going to be part of both the application process as well
as the vetting, recruiting process and onboarding.
And if there's one thing that you feel is hallmark to a resume

(57:03):
that would allow you to stand out or seemingly just be more
personable, something about you that will be impressionable,
what would that be? What I tell people when it comes
to resumes is the best thing youcan do is make your resume
efficient and think of time to value.

(57:23):
How quickly can I, an overwhelmed recruiter who's
getting 1000 resumes for this role, most of them not good?
How quickly can I see what I need to see to know this?
Is someone worth talking to? Use your space.
I think you see people doing allsorts of things and putting
these huge walls of text and allof this stuff make it easy to

(57:45):
see what I need to see. That is ultimately the best
thing you can do on a resume. Yeah, the ATS scanner, it's
funny. That's technology software
that's used to scan. And it's no different than how
human beings actually process a resume too.
And being somebody who has done the receiving end of a lot of
resumes, we scan, we scan. We're not going to sit and read

(58:05):
paragraphs. We're not going to read.
And bull points are great and but even you need some def
definition and and clarity surrounding the bullet points.
But even those should be easy toquickly scan and understand.
Because the way I'll tell you from my perspective, this is
what I do. And I'm not saying that this is
universal or even a good idea, but this is how I look at a

(58:25):
resume when someone sends me first is I'm going to look at
the top, obviously. So most important thing should
be at the top. And that is who you are, where
you are, and anything about you at the very top that is specific
to you as a person. And I'm not talking about
interest and hobbies. I'm not talking about like the
side stuff you do with a volunteer work.
I'm talking about who you are and how to contact you and
what's most important about you.Skills are important too.

(58:47):
But then at that point, I'm going to quickly glance at the
bottom to see what did you study, if you went to, if you
went to college? And So what are your
certifications, credentials and diplomas look like, Not because
it's a prerequisite, but just out of my curiosity to start
painting a picture of who you are.
And then I'm going to quickly glance, very quickly glance from

(59:09):
most recent and then further back at what you have been
doing. And some, I'm just going to
glance at a few of the things that you were doing within those
roles. But then I'm really going to be
looking at how long were you doing each one of those things?
I want to see, are you somebody that has jumped around every six
to 18 months a bunch of times? Or do you stick with a company
for long enough to both give thejob an opportunity, but also

(59:32):
long enough for them to evaluateyou?
And if you're good, you'll be there longer than six months
likely. But that that's how I do it.
And then if I want to know more about you, I'm going to go
deeper into some of that contentto, to establish a, an
understanding if I want to take this to the next stage and have
a conversation. Yeah, and here's what's funny
about that, right? It's just, that's a very
different approach than I take. And but it's like I said when I

(59:55):
talked to the very first video Iever made, neither of us is
wrong when we say this is how I review a resume because it's how
you review a resume. And it's why I hate resume
advice. It's why I hate giving it.
It's like it's like the most talked about part because it's
like what you send the most of. But it's like the part you have
the least control about what happens from there anyway.

(01:00:16):
Like I spend so much more time talk about getting ready for
interviews and things like that.And like in my book, like the
second chapter, whatever. Like I get into like an intro
and then like a resume chapter and it starts.
It just says like, hey, before we begin.
I hate giving resume advice. I wish I didn't have to write a
chapter in resumes, but my publisher made me.
They said I had to put somethingabout resumes in here.
So here we go because of that. Because just like you and I

(01:00:39):
review resumes totally different.
So an advice that I give might not matter.
And the way that like you would review a resume and it's just,
it's so subjective and there's no universal standard to this
stuff. I would love a future that
doesn't have resumes. I've talked about this before,
but that's super pipe dream. I could spend forever getting us
to. That maybe the resume is just,
it's defined differently. It's not a piece of paper,

(01:01:00):
digital or otherwise, but maybe it's just your LinkedIn or a
link to something different. I I do agree that it is not a
good representation of the individual as a human being and
their qualifications. That you might, by the way, have
amazing technical skills but really poor writing skills.
And if you didn't utilize help from an outside source to review
your resume to give you criticalfeedback or even write for you,

(01:01:23):
then it's a misrepresentation ofyour qualifications for the job,
often that you're applying for. Yeah, there's no perfect way to
hire. There just isn't.
And that's its own conversation.But I have this argument.
I tell people all the time in mycomments, OK, They're just like,
oh, this shouldn't happen. That's all right.
That's isn't how hiring should be.
This should be abolished. It should be changed.
I tell them all the time. I'm like, look, I'm open.
Here's a dialogue. How do I fix it?
I'm up for anything. What'll fix it?

(01:01:44):
What's your solution? And then I always just, oh,
whoever's just the most qualified, hire them.
What's that mean? So you're just saying whoever
wrote the best resume now, like we like skip interview whoever
the best resume writer is? There's no.
Way, I guess the better question, instead of saying
what's your best piece of advicefor your resume is rather the
resume represents the key, the access to get past the
gatekeeper. So then therefore, if it's not

(01:02:05):
the resume or if there's anything else, what was your
advice to being noticed to get through the gatekeeper?
Getting through that stage is the hardest part.
My advice is to do everything right.
So like people always say, should I do this?
Should I do that? And if you're asking, the answer
is yes. People are like, should I
message the hiring manager? Sure.
Should I message the recruiter? Sure.

(01:02:26):
Should I try to do this? Yeah, go.
That's the hardest part because there's so many people getting
in there. And I have emailed recruiters
who never got back to me when I was looking for a job.
I emailed recruiters who got back to me 10 minutes after my
message. It was like, sounds great, let's
chat. So it's just like, neither of
those proves that it works or doesn't work.
It's just everything's a low percentage in job searching.

(01:02:47):
Everything is just like a 1 to 2% success rate and you have to
just understand. It's very similar experience and
skills that it takes to do cold solicitation sales.
You're selling yourself. You're the product now, not the
software or widget that you're selling in a call center.
You're selling yourself and the statistics are probably quite
similar and the effort is actually quite similar.

(01:03:07):
You have to prospect, you have to hound, you have to figure out
every which way to get noticed and to make it obvious that you
are something or someone worth talking to about this subject,
whether it's a product that you're selling or you're not
yourself. So you have to figure out every
every way to get through past that gatekeeper, or just at
least to get noticed in order toincrease your odds on the
statistical conversion rate. Yeah.

(01:03:29):
And I think honestly, like even tying this like the topic of
what we're talking about, like the reason I think I've
resonated and worked for so manypeople is because so much of my
content is focused on the after that part, because so much my
content is focused on what to doafter you've gotten through that
person who's OK, let's explore you for this job because now the

(01:03:50):
ball is way more in your court. You have so much more control
over this stuff, and I think that's important.
And you see so much content out there that goes really viral is
here's how to fix your resume, here's how to get noticed,
here's how to get noticed, here's how to get seen.
And that hardly works still because no matter what you do,
it's like a 2% success rate. And even when it happens, now

(01:04:11):
you have spent nothing but time working and redoing your resume,
and you're not ready for the actual opportunity that you
begged for. My content, I think, is so much
more focused on like, yeah, thatpart really sucks.
Here's some ideas, but here's how you were going to be ready
and do better when you get there.
It's awesome advice. I was watching a few videos also
this morning. You released one just recently

(01:04:31):
all about the transparency of the salary range when
organizations are publishing a ajob wreck.
It goes through all the description, the roles,
expectations, background, experience.
And then it also often and sometimes it's state regulated,
it's required and not always is we'll have a salary range.
And just because there is a range doesn't mean you are

(01:04:52):
qualified to receive the top of that range.
And there all the different parts that are going into them
deciding where to make that offer within that range.
I thought that was really transparent, interesting.
And I think the perception from the candidate is, first of all,
I should get the top. No matter what case you
everybody thinks that they're worth the most, which it's good.

(01:05:13):
You should have confidence. We all want the most we all
want. The most and we all should and
the same time, if you get anything less than that, the
assumption is they're playing hardball to see where like
they're going to, you know, an anchor offer.
I'm going to start low. So that way we have when we do
negotiate higher than that, it'snot negotiating from the top,
rather from the lower, the mid. But in reality it there there's

(01:05:34):
a reason and in fact, there are many reasons why somebody might
fall within the criteria for establishing what that offer is
within that range. I thought that was really
helpful to see in here. I really liked making that
video. I know the exact one you're
talking about and that I even hung that whiteboard for it like
just recently to do. And it's a great example, though
that's not my normal content andit's performed so much worse

(01:05:56):
than like most of my other content does, despite the fact
that I think like it's a way higher effort video and it's
just again, me putting all that time and effort in isn't what my
audience sees in this track. But the difference is I went to
your account to look for videos as opposed to somebody who's
being fed it through the algorithm and what they're going
to respond to or see or whateveris that catches their eye that
they want to click on, whether it's the title or the thumbnail.

(01:06:16):
But that's true. So it it shouldn't factor into
necessarily the average on as a case study, but but I liked it.
Yeah, I appreciate it. That was like, and that's one of
those videos again, I talk, you've never worked in this
world. You don't know that information.
You don't. You'd have never heard the term
internal equity in your life if you've never worked in some type
of like internal hiring role. Some of the questions I always

(01:06:38):
ask is about the skills that make you good at your job or
what qualifies you to do this job.
And it's obvious because that's your background.
This is what you're an expert in, so you know that stuff.
I'm curious if there are things that you have learned about
recruiting since now moving intothe content creation side?
Yeah, for sure. I think I became better at it
doing all of this when I was doing both especially, and I

(01:07:01):
credit a lot when like I was on the job search, especially like
early on and am I making content?
I became known. At one point I did 100 hours of
live streams on TikTok in two months.
I was on every day and people knew they could count on and I
was answering questions. I was reading and reviewing
resumes. I was doing my own job search

(01:07:22):
and I was doing all of it just like in live time and like
talking to people. And I, I, what I always tell
people is I went to where the job seekers were.
I made myself accessible to themand learn what is the real
issue. What right.
I can't fix everything. I can't change hiring.
I tell them all the time, like even when I train companies to
do this better, it's a drop of water in the ocean of like the

(01:07:43):
system that's out there. But what I can do is represent
you and get an understanding. And I don't think that's
something a lot of recruiters do.
It was just connecting with people made me better at it,
change the way that like my confirmation emails are worded.
It made me change the way I preppeople for an interview, the way
I talked to them like during theinterview.

(01:08:03):
Like all these little things that didn't have to be done
differently that like I wanted to do differently now.
And I assume there's probably a lot of skills that you have
gained now in addition to just knowledge and understanding of
the industry. You probably have gained a whole
bunch of new technical skills because really you're not
working for on your someone, you're waiting for yourself.
You're responsible for everything.

(01:08:24):
You have to figure out all the different disciplines of your
what's called small business because that's what it is Your
marketing, you're promoting, create content, you're
scheduling. You're not very strategically,
not a lot of scheduling. We we know this is more
authentic and in the moment, butultimately everything that you
do, anything that's going to help you ladder towards success
is just going to be on you. Are there any specific skills

(01:08:46):
that you feel you have not just gained but gotten really good at
since doing this? I feel like I've gotten very
good at video editing, which I've never done before, of
course. And then one of the things I've
tried to really do for myself iskeep myself open to new
technology. I think that is also like a
really big take away from what I've done is like all these
tools are coming and I've put myself in a position where most

(01:09:08):
of these tools want me, right? They want me to either advertise
for them or use them or whateverit is.
And I take pretty much every legit seeming demo.
I take every opportunity. So I have learned to use these
AI tools and these sourcing tools that exist in the
recruiting world and different ATS systems.
And like I've taken the time to explore them all so that one, I

(01:09:29):
can talk to job seekers about them, but can also talk to
companies about them because most of them aren't going to
every conference and event like I do.
And they're not talking to all these sort of brands or just to
them. They're more salespeople.
But these tools are coming. They do matter.
And I love that I can sit down with like a director of talent
at some company and say, hey, here's the six different like AI

(01:09:51):
sourcing tools that have come out this month.
Here's what I think about them. Here's a difference in where
they're going. So I've learned to really be
able to evaluate a lot of these tools and go that way and play
with them. Whereas when I was just a
recruiter, they were just like spam e-mail.
Don't even just I don't need more sales pitches, like I don't
need any of this. And you can't avoid all these
tools. If you're out there and you're

(01:10:11):
building a team, you're working the space, they're coming, and
you want to be known as the expert at them in your company,
not the person who avoided them.Yeah, said absolutely.
All right, I'm going to ask you another question.
I'm curious to hear your answer.Given your natural strength and
your learned skills, what is a job that you feel you might
excel at but are also exceedingly overqualified for?

(01:10:34):
Might be a guilty pleasure, but something you'd love to do and
you just kill it, but you're a little overqualified.
I would love to be like an eventhost.
It doesn't feel like ATV show. TV shows would be great, but I'm
probably not of a qualified because I've never really been
on TV. But like the kind of person who

(01:10:56):
just introduces events and keepsa crowd going.
Just like at the comedy club between acts.
Yeah, like an MC who just when Iwas in college, I was a DJ for a
little bit at one point in my career.
But someone who just like. I love being in front of people.
I love being on stage in front of people.
I hate talking to people one-on-one, but put a camera in

(01:11:17):
front of me or put an audience who has to sit there and listen
to me in front of me and I love it.
So something like that would just be like, I'm just
introducing community theater shows, but I just want to be up
there with 5 minutes and a microphone.
What? What is that?
What's exciting about that to you?
I just, I don't know, like I almost feel like control, but it
sounds so weird. Like it's just, I love when
people listen to me speak. I'm inherently selfish in that

(01:11:38):
way. I make content and put it out
there because I want everyone towatch me.
If I didn't, I wouldn't put it out there.
Well, I used to be a travel. Like I said, I used to travel
and sell nursing programs to rooms full of nursing students.
Like I love getting in front of people.
And maybe again, it was teachingthem.
Maybe it's like showing people and telling people something.
I think I'd love delivering information to large groups of

(01:11:59):
people. That's great.
I like that. It's a great answer.
Also, I can see that there are likely going to be opportunities
for you to do this, maybe not full time, but ongoing as you
continue to produce content and continue to go down this path of
becoming a true subject matter expert.
That is an, I'm going to use theword, the I word influencer.

(01:12:24):
But you're going, you're going, you're already speaking, you're
already going to conferences. And I can see you leading or
being an MC within conferences like this and helping Segway
introduce, but also interview and being part of that
mainstage. Yeah, I probably will in there.
The dream would just be doing somewhere super low stakes where
my it has nothing to do with my career.

(01:12:44):
But yeah, I just like more opportunities and I tell people
like I'm good on, I'm good on stage, right?
I'm good on shows when I speak. People don't know me enough in
this industry yet as I transition more to like working
on like the HR business to business side and so talk to job
seekers all the time. I'm not as well known on that
side, but everywhere I've ever gone and been on stage, like
people see it, I tell people like I'm like, I make you put

(01:13:04):
your phone away when I'm on stage.
And you just. You pay attention like you hear
from me, you learn from me. And like when like I still get
mad so many job seekers when they get rejected for a job
they're qualified for, look how they're going to hire someone
worse than me. Like when I apply for a
conference and get told no, I'm instantly just this conference
is worse now because of me. Like you're just going to have
someone on stages worse. So that's where I am with that
stuff still. Yeah, that's OK.

(01:13:27):
That makes sense. That's awesome.
No, I like that. I like that answer too.
It's good we're we all take these things personally even
though they're not. Yeah.
It's not personal, Yeah. It's not personal and sometimes
it literally has absolutely nothing to you or your resume or
your application. It has everything to do with
just. We've got 100 others and there
was 10 that we were having a hard time choosing from, let

(01:13:48):
alone another one. So literally has nothing to do
with you unless they replied andsaid, hey, I don't like your
face. Yeah, they're not.
You represent our company. Yeah, I tell me about all the
time. Just so often the person who
gets hired is more about them than you and right.
It's just like when I open a roll, if 500 people apply to it,
at the end of that process, 499 people are going to think I did
it wrong. They're going to, I don't know

(01:14:09):
what I'm doing. They're going to think I didn't
hire someone. They're going to think the wrong
way. They think whoever we hired
suck. That's just like going in.
We know it's going to happen. We know going in 499 people are
not getting this job. And sometimes I have to remind
job seekers that. And they're like, what's that do
for me? I'm like, you just have to know
that because if you forget that and you make yourself the main
character of everyone of these job searches, it's so much

(01:14:31):
harder to like accept what's really happening.
What do you do to set expectations at the beginning of
this process for a candidate? So that way, when that
eventuality happens, because they're only going to look for
one job, they're only going to get one job, right, typically
speaking, but they're going to be rejected from many.
And So what do you do to prep them for that?
Those expectations that you're going to be rejected?

(01:14:52):
Don't take it personally. And here's how I know that's
going to be true. As like someone talking to them
on in my content, it's that right?
It's reminding me of those stats.
It's showing them that the average person gets 2% of
interviews of roles they apply to.
It's explaining that exact number.
It's walking through. If 500 people apply and I
interview 10, you're talking about a very small percentage.

(01:15:13):
And then of those 10, let's say 4 move on to the final round
interview. And now you're talking about
four out of 500 people. You're talking there The point
OO 1%, right? And still, three of them aren't
going to get hired. 490 are annoyed and somewhere between
7:00 and 9:00 feel completely insulted and rejected.
Yeah, or just heartbroken sometimes, just like whatever it

(01:15:35):
is. And that's when you make people
always like, I get to the final interview and then they like
didn't hire me. Like they wasted my time.
They dragged me along. I'm like, they didn't.
It's just like you were in the final two or three out of 500.
Think about how impressive that is.
I know that doesn't pay the bills.
I know that's not like good news, but if you can't think of
it in that context, like, you'renever going to really
understand. Yeah, totally.

(01:15:56):
This is awesome. Before we wrapped up any final
words. I don't think so.
Obviously, I'm sure the links will be there, but you can
follow me on all social media and on LinkedIn whether you're
job searching or not, right? I talk about career things.
A lot of things I talk about aren't even aimed at can be
applied to wherever you are and whatever you're doing.
Like I talked about in the book.If you're reading this on the

(01:16:17):
job search, to be honest, probably isn't your last job
search. Like we're all we're all one
last minute calendar invite awayfrom just like being on the job
search again. And like most of us have been
there before. So it's like I talk about these
things from the realm of what you can always be doing and
where you should always be. So I think it's worth a follow
if you care about your career atall or like the honest talk.

(01:16:38):
Of course, pick up my book on Amazon if you'd like.
I think it's great and that's it.
But obviously I can talk about this stuff forever.
Yeah, I me too. And not because I'm an expert in
this area by any means, but I'm curious.
I love this because it's really all about helping people and
navigating a very difficult, emotional, challenging situation
and process that most people have to go through at least

(01:17:00):
once, if not many times in theirlives.
And it's this sensitivity is pretty high and the opportunity
for disappointment is also pretty high.
So to me, this subject is very interesting because it directly
impacts human beings almost across the board universally.
And I want to be part of helpingmake it better.
And I think I'm doing that by talking to people like you on

(01:17:22):
this platform. Yeah, and it's it's hard, right?
I've also put together, if you're listening to this in your
recruiter and on that side, I'veput together like a recruiting
community. I have a newsletter called Is
this still good time? And it's taglined for recruiters
hanging on by a thread. And I'm starting a podcast with
the same title. And it's the idea of recruiting
so hard right now. And like, on our end too.

(01:17:44):
And we don't really have that community because The thing is
when you're dealing with job searching, you are encountering
most people during a low point of their life, like a lot of
people in a really bad time. And you're adding more vadnais
to them because you're rejectingway more than like you accept.
And I don't want to make that sound like that's worse than
being on the job search and getting rejected.

(01:18:04):
Like I'm never trying to comparethe two.
But there is a lot of kind of just rejection and sadness and
disappointment and all at the same time people hating us.
We're like the most hated peoplein capitalism as it goes.
Like billionaires and recruitersare just like the most hated
people in capitalism right now and that can be hard.
So if you are a recruiter out there listening, I know it is
hard and find your community like to cope with these things.

(01:18:26):
Fantastic, great words of advice.
I will link the book below. Please go out and buy it.
Support Mike. I look forward to the launch of
the podcast. Great title.
Is it still a good time? Fantastic.
I absolutely love it. I'm looking forward to it.
Mike, thank you so much for being here.
This has been a fantastic elevated conversation.
Yeah, thank you. I want to thank Dave Weinberg
for introducing me to Mike as today's guest and suggesting him

(01:18:49):
to be here today. A fantastic suggestion.
And I want to thank you, the listeners, for joining us on
this episode of Transferable Skills.
Remember, the skills you've gained can take you anywhere.
Until next time, keep exploring those transferable skills.

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Recruiter into Job Search Influencer | Mike Peditto [52]

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Recruiter into Job Search Influencer | Mike Peditto [52]