The Full Desk Experience

Ben Mena [00:00:00]:
Companies don't get built without you. Teams don't get built without you. In the government contracting space, failed recruiting is a national security issue for the people that are in medical recruiting. What happens if you don't find that doctor? That would not have happened if it wasn't for you. So you have to, like, sit back and start thinking about the impact that you make as a recruiter, the value that you add to the table as a recruiter. Once you internalize that and a combination of every single thing that you guys just posted in the chat, that's what's going to keep you guys elite. In the world of artificial intelligence, where so many things are parts of our job can easily or will be taken over.

Kortney Harmon [00:00:33]:
Hey, guys. Kortney Harmon, host of fde. We're bringing you a special series of episodes called FDE Plus. Those are going to be highlights from a recent virtual conference where hundreds of you joined us for an incredible event focused on boosting revenue for 2025. Each of these sessions is packed with valuable insights, expert discussions and actionable strategies to help you drive growth in your business. Whether you missed the live event or want to revisit each session, we've got you covered. We're going to drop each of these 10 live events to wrap up our year and kick off the new year. Right.

Kortney Harmon [00:01:15]:
So let's dive into today's session and uncover the key takeaways that will propel your success in the coming year. Stay tuned and let's dive in. Ben, thank you so much for joining us. I am super excited. I've gotten the chance to be on Ben's show as well as he be on ours. Ben is a seasoned expert. He not only is the managing partner of Select Source Solutions, he also has a podcast, does the elite recruiter podcast as well as does so many more pieces like virtual conferences for the industry. It's about giving back to you guys to help you do anything that you're doing today better.

Kortney Harmon [00:01:58]:
So today he's going to be talking about AI in. It's like it was seamless. Ben, Someone was a plant that we were asking a question about ChatGPT to like throw you into this. So you're going to be talking about how top billers stay ahead of the recruiting game.

Ben Mena [00:02:11]:
Awesome.

Kortney Harmon [00:02:12]:
So Ben, with. With that being said, I'm going to be quiet. I'm going to jump off. You should be able to share your screen if you want to share your screen as well.

Ben Mena [00:02:19]:
Well, the plan is to share my screen and this is what I love about like absolutely live stuff. Where you guys get to watch me, like, hey, does this actually work?

Kortney Harmon [00:02:25]:
Yes.

Ben Mena [00:02:26]:
I'm doing the technology. We talk, and it's like, as I'm trying to figure out the technology myself.

Kortney Harmon [00:02:31]:
Yes, absolutely. All the videos, Haresh will be on YouTube. It is streaming live on YouTube as we go. We have a few super excited people about this session, Ben. They're already seeking out and saying they're geeking out about AI, so. So with that being said, I love it. You are on. Everybody can see your screen.

Ben Mena [00:02:51]:
This is stuff that I typically like to handle behind the scenes. So if you guys see me, like, mess up and go back and forth on screens and stuff like that, that is just a hundred percent user error and not anything to do with, like, with the summit error. So. But yeah, Kortney, if you want to hang out here, you're cool. If you don't want to get, you. You just want to get lost. I'm off.

Kortney Harmon [00:03:09]:
Yeah. And this. This is about. You're not me. Okay. Have a great talk. I'll be back with your questions.

Ben Mena [00:03:15]:
Well, me being a podcast host, I'm typically the one just, like, asking questions and just like, shutting up and sitting back. And also, Kortney was really mean to have me go after Tom. Tom is a exceptional speaker. He speaks at a ton of conferences. So let's just, like, share. I want this to be a little bit interactive, so let's jump in. What I'm talking about is the AI advantage and how a top build can stay ahead of the game. And somebody said, just ask AI to summarize it.

Ben Mena [00:03:42]:
I mean, we could do that for this too. So let's see if this works. All right, a little bit about me. My name is Benjamin Mena. If you don't know me, I am a GovCon headhunter, an AI junkie, host of the Pinnacle Take podcast, and host of the Elite Recruiter podcast. I have been in the recruiting space for just shy of two decades now. A combination of agency, internal, and owning our own search firm. So important stat for you guys to get started with the amount of recruiters that are going to be replaced by artificial intelligence, but most importantly, the amount of stats that are complete BS when it comes to presentations that you see at stuff.

Ben Mena [00:04:20]:
But most importantly, if we ever hit that 95% of where recruiters are going to be replaced by AI, we probably have other issues that we're dealing with. That also means, like, 95% of other jobs are being replaced by AI too. And it's our overlord Skynet or chat GPT or whatever. We're going to call it by then. But what I want to talk about today, and like, you guys have actually had probably seen so many talks on artificial intelligence, you guys are probably sick of it. Like, how to write the perfect prompt. This is not a discussion of how to write the perfect prompt. What I want to talk about is, like, what's kind of happening in artificial intelligence right now at this moment.

Ben Mena [00:04:57]:
Kind of hit the point where AI has been overhyped, but at the same time it's also been underhyped. What it's about ready to do. Also, for some reason, every time I talk about AI, people want to talk about tools. So we are going to talk about tools. I even have the tools list built out, so if you need a jump, just let me know and I could drop it in the notes so, like, you can look at the tool list later, look at the presentation later, but we're also going to talk about, like, most importantly, what's going to keep you elite, what is going to keep you as being the top of your game as a recruiter? Let's have some fun. So here's the thing. What I am talking about probably at this very second is already outdated. That's the crazy thing about artificial intelligence.

Ben Mena [00:05:38]:
But OpenAI, aka ChatGPT, their new AI model, which is Dash01, is like having a PhD level sidekick in your pocket. You literally have the capabilities of having a buddy that's like, literally as smart as a PhD, able to answer your questions, help you do stuff. Literally that level of smartness already is there. And this isn't like the basic, like, it's just incredible how fast it's coming and who knows where it's going to be like even three to six months from now. Another like, thing that's like, so crazy is Google's new podcast. Like Google Notebook lm, you can actually drop a document in there. You can drop a podcast transcription, you could drop anything in there. You can click the podcast option and it will actually create a conversation, a voice conversation with itself about the document they did.

Ben Mena [00:06:31]:
And here's the reason why I'm sharing that. Typically, like, we think of, like, AI as like, it's all about the prompt. No, like, AI is now hitting the point where it can actually start creating itself and then chat. We were just literally talking about chat, GPT, Advanced mode. It is able to, like, understand context. It's able to remember past conversations if you want a really good laugh. Just last week, a Wall Street Journal editor actually took all the major AI platforms. The voice versions of it to a camping trip and just spoke with AI for an entire weekend.

Ben Mena [00:07:02]:
She was just blown away about how real they were, how empathetic they were, how they sounded. We are on the cusp of just how much is happening in the AI space just at this moment. And here's the crazy thing, like if you start like listening to and having conversations with like GPT's voice mode, I literally feel like within a year from now, people will not be able to tell if you are speaking with an AI or they're actually speaking with a person. That is how good it's on the edge of getting for everybody that's here. How are you guys using AI? Can you drop that in the the comments real quick? What you guys are using AI for at this very moment? Give it a few seconds for people to type some stuff up. Building search strings, messages, inbound calls. Awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome. All the stuff that like, you know, I'm definitely using right now.

Ben Mena [00:07:56]:
Helping with kids homework. That is epic sounding board. My courses, job postings, candidate profiles, notes, articles, search strings, help with posts with social media, assist with rewriting jobs. I mean, if you guys want a really good laugh. I actually use AI for my hoa. I'm on the board and literally the AI does like all sorts of stuff with it formulas, educating myself, building search strings. Awesome. Perfect, perfect, perfect.

Ben Mena [00:08:22]:
Okay, so here's the thing. Most of you guys are right now writing emails, job descriptions, making images, writing blog posts, summarizing the meetings of the interviews that you guys have. Rewriting resumes. Yeah, actually here's something that's super exciting. Cleaning up your ATS or CRM, because I know most of you guys out there, our ATS data is dirty. It's bad. But guess what? AI can do that. Also, AI can now literally take off all the information off the MPC resume.

Ben Mena [00:08:51]:
So literally you can like drop your resume in there. It pulls all the important information off and then spits out what you need within like a matter of like seconds. But we'll just talk real quick about the rise of AI and recruiting back in 2015. Early adoption of AI power resume screening tools, candidate filtering, fast forward AI gets a little more driven back in 2021, and then the world changed. Chat GPT went live in 2022, and by 2023, AI within recruiting was mostly focused on content creation or advanced matching. And honestly, you can't get a recruiting tool right now in 2024 without AI actually somehow baked in it. Whether you want it or not. Even the ones that don't have like AI, they're a bunch of chat GPT rappers.

Ben Mena [00:09:34]:
But yeah, like, that's a whole nother story. But here's the question for you guys, and I'd love to hear this in the notes. Like, I'll give you guys a second to type this up. What does the future of AI look like in recruiting? And while you guys are typing that up, Kelly can probably chat with Kortney. The new co pilot can actually help clean up the Crelate data from my understanding.

Kortney Harmon [00:09:54]:
You are absolutely correct. We can actually, we actually probably will talk about that tomorrow in tomorrow's session. If you want more about that, let us know.

Ben Mena [00:10:02]:
So, collecting job orders, AI from agencies, taking to AI robust assistance. Awesome. Well, let me just kind of give you a rundown of what I'm seeing right now. It'll automate most of the recruiter activity. All right. Okay, so let me just take this. You guys were talking about what AI in the future is going to look like. Let me tell you what AI looks like at this very moment in the recruiting space.

Ben Mena [00:10:26]:
There's companies out there where a hiring manager can input a job description into the AI software. The AI will go, source, will go write the emails, source, reach out, follow up, follow up, follow up. Go have a interview with that candidate, either voice or even like a video based on a parameter that's set. It can actually go schedule an interview on the hiring manager's calendar and then follow that interview and give a post interview scorecard. Right now, the rise of AI staffing agencies. There's one recently that actually placed 300 hires in one month. Everything fully AI. You know, somebody heard this at Rec Fest.

Ben Mena [00:11:05]:
FedEx right now is getting all the way to the conditional offer stage using AI for something like 20,000 hires. How many recruiters does it take to get to 20,000 hires? And I don't know if you guys heard about Chipotle. They're now using full AI assistant to actually help hire for in stores. I don't know if you guys have seen the new LinkedIn announcement. I think that happened about a week and a half, two weeks ago. LinkedIn recruiter can now do most of the job all the way up until a certain stage. So like this is what AI looks like in the recruiting space at this very moment. And it's one of those things that like, I want people to understand.

Ben Mena [00:11:41]:
It's just like for so long AI was like overhyped. So long people looked at AI as some really crappy chat GPT content. And that was the extent of AI. But no behind the scenes so much is actually happening that so many facets of recruiters, what recruiters typically do is now taken over by, could be taken over by artificial intelligence. Kelly, you actually hit the nail on the head. Like I actually think right now or within about a year, most of the lower, I would say the lower, high volume stuff, maybe lower salary positions will actually have like artificial intelligence like baked into it to do those hirings. So order taking recruiters will unfortunately be easily replaced. Let's talk about this.

Ben Mena [00:12:21]:
Like how can you make AI work for you? And we're going to walk through a few different things. First of all, of course writing emails, AI with a good prompt and some great information can write an incredibly great email. AI can also make images like how long did it take to like back in the day? Or even right now to like go create the perfect thing in Canva, you can write up a quick prompt or if you're like a larger staffing company, you can hop on Mind Journey or some of those other websites and you don't need to hire photographers anymore. Like the AI can create literally photorealistic images based on whatever prompt that you put in or writing blog posts. And there's a lot of when it comes to SEO, SEO is based on blog posts. And how long does it take to write something? Like if I write, actually write an article, it probably takes me about two weeks. But if I need something for some good SEO seconds with artificial intelligence, there's some like good stuff in the conversation, in the chat, guys. Also, like, here's another important thing like AI when it comes to sourcing, like I'm sure every single person that's listening to this or watching this right now has worked with some sort of AI sourcing tool.

Ben Mena [00:13:22]:
AI can literally do so much of what used to be back in the day, tons and tons of digging. It's almost like just watching what's happening now. The, the sourcing function of many recruiters or the sourcing role or the sourcing job is going to have to change because AI can start handling so much of that. Maybe the sourcer is going to be the person that's in charge of these AI programs and the AI integration and all that stuff. But yeah, AI power search. How often now you can do like something like a natural language search, just toss in a job description or even just be like, hey, I'm looking for some engineers with XYZ experience and a polygraph around the CIA headquarters. And that used to be a complex boolean, but now like it actually can pull that kind of information and find those candidates based on that. Hold on a second Larry.

Ben Mena [00:14:09]:
But can AI make a candidate pick up a phone or respond to an email? No, it can't. But it can help you with a hell a lot with a follow up and then we're going to talk about that later. Larry. You know, targeted recommendations, personal engagement, intelligent screening. Now it depends on like what kind of recruiting that you're doing. You can now have like AI actually help with the initial outreach too when it comes to the screening calls. I see that happening with a lot of lower level positions. I would not do that with like a executive at all.

Ben Mena [00:14:35]:
But also do you guys know that you guys can use AI to figure out who's checking out your website? I know one of, I think as recruiting websites, Haley marketing one of their customers actually based on some IP tracking made 14 placements from some like finding out who was actually going to their website. I was just at the Pinnacle Society conference and one of the recruiters there actually made about $50,000 in placements because he uses a platform called Warmly. So you can actually like track and use AI to try to figure out who's actually going to your website, who's actually visiting it. And you can retarget that person literally. You can even set up the auto targeting where emails go to that person or you can go make phone calls to that person. So like they're not really a cold lead, they were just on your website. So you can actually make this a warm lead. I mean give you a perfect example, a combination of there's a website, a company called hey Reach which does like LinkedIn automation.

Ben Mena [00:15:28]:
I went to their website and within a second I actually got a invitation to connect from their founder on LinkedIn and they used a backend integration with BR2B. They were able to figure out who I was, who my, what my LinkedIn profile was and send me a connection request. Just because I went to their website talking about placements, the one at the Pinnacle Society, they were high level construction jobs. So it was about $50,000 in fees for two placements and that recruiter does about $1.2 million a year as a solo biller. So just answering that question real quick. So there's a few different companies that you can look at are b2b, warmly and askwid. AI. You can actually figure out who's on your guys website.

Ben Mena [00:16:11]:
But yeah, I totally get that if it's a low level five dollar an hour job it's not worth it. But yeah, one of the things that I think recruiters need to look at is like what's happening in the go to market space because half the time recruiters are like 10 years or five years behind what's happening. And there's so much technology using AI now that can help you win. But here's another one. Enrichment and market mapping. Here's like three tools that I think every recruiter should at least look at. I think Clay is actually going to be the one of the top recruiting tools in 2025. There are so many different things that you can do with Clay.

Ben Mena [00:16:43]:
It is probably one of the most powerful platforms that I've seen. It is also one of the most hardest to learn platforms that I've seen. It's a reason why there's probably a lot of, there's a lot of agencies, lead gen agencies that are out there selling to recruiters right now because you hop onto clay.com and you're like what the hell am I looking at? But one of the cool things that you could do is you can actually use Ocean IO which if you have like a favorite customer base, Ocean IO will actually find all those customers lookalike customers based on the data for you. So if you're trying to MPC somebody or market somebody or like you have these amazing customers that have been like your honey hole for a while. Why not use AI to figure out the other companies that look like that? And here's what's cool. You can pull that list, drop it into Clay and you can go find all the different C suite, you can find all the different information. Clay can even integrate with like so many different things where it can help you write the emails and plug into like email software. But then there's another company called Full Enrich.

Ben Mena [00:17:41]:
How many of you guys like four or five platforms or two to three platforms when it comes to looking for B2B or contact information. Perfect example. A while back I mostly had like signal higher and like one or two other ones. I'd go to that one click okay, that they didn't have that information. I go to the next platform, they didn't have that information. What Full Enrich does is called Waterfall Enrichment. So they actually plug into all the different providers and they sit there and do a run through of okay, so they don't have this one. We're not going to charge you.

Ben Mena [00:18:12]:
We don't have the information from this provider. We don't charge you. All right. We found the information from the fifth provider and here you go. And we actually did a background check through Zero Balance to make sure it's legit information. Oh, and real quick, Kelly, I love perplexity. Like, I actually use perplexity over Google now. So most of my searches now start with perplexity.

Ben Mena [00:18:32]:
Before I go back to Google, you're going to probably hear more and more about Clay throughout the year. You're going to see people talking about it. Like I said, I think it's going to be one of the top tools when it comes to recruiting in 2025. Recruiting is complex. Sometimes you just need a hand, someone beside you to give you that nudge to keep you on course. Introducing the new Crelate Copilot. Copilot is Crelate's AI assistant. But it's more than just artificial intelligence.

Ben Mena [00:19:03]:
Copilot brings you recruiter intelligence. Need a quick reminder to reply to a candidate's email? Or maybe you're stuck writing up that new job description. Need a nudge to send a follow up to that client who hasn't gotten back to you? Copilot is there to help you craft it effortlessly. With over 30 skills at your fingertips, Crelate Copilot doesn't just keep you organized, it keeps you ahead of the game. Because recruiting isn't just about filling roles, it's about building relationships. And Crelate Copilot is the partner you've been waiting for. Check us out and create the future of recruiting. All right, how many of you guys ever send videos when it comes to either business development or videos? When it comes to candidates, throw a quick yes or no.

Ben Mena [00:20:00]:
Here's what's kind of crazy is did you guys know, like, how much time does it probably take you to make a personalized video to somebody? I think video is going to be like one of the things that also sets people apart because we're also. With everybody utilizing AI, I think candidates are getting smarter in their, you know, it's getting harder and harder to reach people. But here's the thing you now can spend. I see Kortney spends about 30 to 60 seconds when it comes to a video. Kortney, what if you spent 30 to 60 seconds making a video and then that one video can easily go to 300 people? You can actually utilize AI where it really does like a quick clone of your voice to change the name and you can drop that into your email software so it's different and personalized for every single person, but you only spent 60 seconds making one video. I use a company called SensePark. I actually just found out about a month ago Loom actually implemented this and built this into theirs. It's Definitely something to check out when you can utilize AI to actually help you send more videos at scale and outreach at scale.

Ben Mena [00:20:59]:
How many of you guys use email marketing when it comes to getting new candidates or getting new clients? Yes or no. And then question for you, has it gotten harder? Gavin, you also like are a different beast. You have like 600 candidates that you have on your Rolodex and you call them all the time and you bill like crazy numbers. So here's the thing, a lot of emails gotten harder and harder. So. And the problem is there's also like so many different softwares out there that says that they can help you get there. I think the two best out at the moment right now, this literally can change next year are instantly AI and smartly AI. What they do is they're probably the top of the game when it help you actually get into somebody's inbox.

Ben Mena [00:21:39]:
Whether it's helping with like the demarker and all that fun stuff that's typically above my head. But you have to figure out also the warming. Like they help you warm your stuff but both of those also help you have run through multiple domains to like move, like to actually send from, do different domains at different times to help keep your inbox score safe. If you guys want a good laugh, there's a recruiting company that started about a week ago or not a week ago, about a year ago. They use instantly. They don't have a salesperson based on just like kind of watching what they've done so far. In about a year they've built about 3 to 4 million dollars. They also have 400 domains.

Ben Mena [00:22:15]:
They're like cycling through and instantly reaching out to companies. So you need to make sure that in 2025 or that you literally like the rest of this year that you're setting yourself up inbox wise to be able to chase those candidates and chase those clients because like inbox deliverability is going to be one of the top things. And also don't forget that whatever ATS or CRM that you're using has actually a built in email platform in there too. So feel free to use that too. So especially since all the information is captured into the system actually instantly does have the website visitor identification. That is something that just started recently. But the best ones that I've seen so far are the RB2B and warmly when it comes to actual results. Also raise your hand if you have a VA or I can't say raise your hand but you say yes or no if you have a va.

Ben Mena [00:23:05]:
I think with the way technology is moving, within about a year, what is happening in artificial intelligence can actually replace your va. But here's the thing, like, don't get rid of your va and definitely don't get. If you have an ea, don't get rid of va. Now is the time to start training your va. If you don't have the time to hop into a clay university, which actually the clay university is great. They did a great job. So you don't have to sit there and buy like a $5,000 course to figure it out. Have your VA start learning these tools.

Ben Mena [00:23:34]:
Have your VA start learning how to use AI to integrate. Turn your VA into like a digital marketer. Turn them into a recruiting engineer in December, January. Spend the time to literally give them the window to learn so that way they can help you rock 2025. But here's the most important question, and this is kind of like, AI, AI, AI, AI is going to replace people. AI is not going to replace people. AI is going to get rid of recruiters. I mean, well, we are seeing that already.

Ben Mena [00:24:03]:
But here's the question for you guys, and I'll give you guys a second to like, you know, type this out. I think this is going to be one of the most important things. The separating difference between the recruiters that get left behind and the recruiters that turbocharge their career and get ahead. What do you think makes an elite recruiter? And while you guys are typing that out, I'm going to look at some of the questions that you guys have. Personal touch, consistency, niche marketing expertise. Someone who'll be able to give a human touch, the ability to grow and foster relationships. Ooh, that's a big one. Strong relationships.

Ben Mena [00:24:38]:
I just got done interviewing somebody for the Pinnacle Take podcast. Top biller. Year after year, 70% of her placements are from people that she's talked to before in the past. It's all about the relationship right there. Focus, consistency, execution, speed. There are many different factors, but attention to detail for everything. Relationship, consistency, niche, be a giver. Those are all how to grab the attention out of everyone.

Ben Mena [00:25:03]:
Another one is like, how do you persuade? We, we have the ability to persuade. And here's a quick thought that I want you guys to have. You guys are all. And unfortunately, on this system, I can't really tell how many people are logged in. But let's just say that just for numbers sake, that the average recruiter here, we'll just make it a safe number. Do you think the average recruiter probably like, overall, based on the Top billers and people learning across the board. Maybe the people listening today, about $350,000 a year is what they bill. Would that be a good number? Well, here's the thing.

Ben Mena [00:25:34]:
We'll just say at a 25% fee, $350,000 is $1.4 million in salaries. How many lives are being changed with $1.4 million in salaries on a yearly basis? And here's something, like Gavin says, 119. That just kind of throws my numbers. But let's just talk about, like a hundred. Let's just say if there's like 100 people on here, do you realize that's $140 million in salaries on a yearly basis? How many lives are being changed? How much of an impact do you guys make as a recruiter? And I think that's one of the most important things that I think recruiters need to realize is the value that you guys add, the value that you guys provide. You guys on this, watching or listening, you guys make such an impact. Companies don't get built without you. Teams don't get built without you.

Ben Mena [00:26:25]:
In the government contracting space, failed recruiting is a national security issue. For the people that are in medical recruiting, what happens if you don't find that doctor? How many people get sick and are not getting taken care of in the medical device field or the biotech? The people that you find are finding cures. When it comes to actually, like a software world, if you're listening to this and you're in house, you're listening to this at the agency, if you're finding all the software developers for a tech company and they finish their product and they scale and be crazy money, guess what? That would not have happened if it wasn't for you. So you have to, like, sit back and start thinking about the impact that you make as a recruiter, the value that you add to the table as a recruiter, Once you internalize that and a combination of every single thing that you guys just posted in the chat, that's what's going to keep you guys elite in the world of artificial intelligence, where so many things are parts of our job can easily or will be taken over. It's the things that matter, like the relationships. It's the things that matter about you becoming the expert in your niche. I wanted to hear from you what you guys thought. So, like, I just put together a few different ideas and a few different things, but the answer is, like, what you guys put down.

Ben Mena [00:27:33]:
Like, here's the thing. Expert at relationship building. We are a People, business, we are the ones that are connecting. We're like, we are the matchmakers. When it comes down to like, we literally help convince people to completely uproot their lives and change their destiny. We have a deep industry knowledge and that's one of the most important things when it comes to like recruiting and why you should probably be in a niche. You are the experts, you know the candidates motivation, you know the pain points, you know when someone needs to hire. You know, AI can figure out all these data points, but we figure out the people also.

Ben Mena [00:28:10]:
Guess what? Candid experience, how many people on this, listening, watching. When it comes to like getting business, even if you didn't make the placement, people still come back to you because the experience that you brought to the table, you are different than most of the other recruiters out there that just turn a bird. You bring it to the table and guess what? AI can help you experience it even better. Like AI can actually put together like interview coaching and interview notes, just stuff that would have taken you hours to help you bring a better candidate experience. So that way you can stay ahead of the game. We were just talking about the value that you bring to the table and I really. The one thing that I think this year that I wish recruiters would really, really internalize because understanding that value helps you actually be a much better recruiter. And lastly, but not leastly, I think elite recruiters aren't afraid to pick up the damn phone.

Ben Mena [00:28:59]:
Yes, cold calling is harder, which I know that some people love cold calling, some people hate cold calling. But the relationships are either made on zoom, relationships are made in person, relationships are made on the phone. There's nothing separating. You have that personal touch that becomes part of it. But there are so many things that I've seen that like, you know, the work ethic and planning. There's so many factors when it comes to being an elite recruiter that I think are going to separate what's going to happen as AI takes over more and more and these companies are able to. And real quick remember, these AI companies are trained on what we are doing. They're trained on the data that we've literally provided them for years.

Ben Mena [00:29:37]:
But it's these intangibles that you focus on while putting in the work is what's going to set you apart. So I really believe the top builder who embraces AI technology can gain a significant competitive advantage in the recruiting industry. And most importantly. Any thoughts or questions and if anybody wants the full tools list, I will drop it in the comments right now.

Kortney Harmon [00:29:58]:
My favorite part was the baby. AI is amazing, but I would like the baby. I want to squeeze his cheeks.

Ben Mena [00:30:05]:
That is Gabe. He just turned one about two weeks ago. So he's my little running buddy. He's my little recruiting buddy.

Kortney Harmon [00:30:13]:
Happy belated birthday, Gabe. I love that you already gave the list of tools. That is amazing. Thank you very much, Ben. This is great, as always. Does anybody have any questions for Ben? We have 10 more minutes before we go. We have to go to our next one. Utilize Ben and all of his wonderful knowledge and everything that he has because he brings value every time we have him on the show.

Ben Mena [00:30:37]:
Well, thank you.

Kortney Harmon [00:30:37]:
I think you were making people tear up. Gavin. Was it Gavin? Gavin said you were bringing tears to his eyes.

Ben Mena [00:30:43]:
Aw. Hi, Gavin. Thank you.

Kortney Harmon [00:30:45]:
Quick and fast, but great session. Amazing. Don't forget to download that document. Any questions? What is your favorite? If you only had to pick one tool, Ben, what's your favorite AI tool? You only could do one. Like, let's like, think you're going to a desert island. You can only pick one tool. I mean, kind of like that kind of concept. What's the one tool you can't live without?

Ben Mena [00:31:06]:
You mean Creolite?

Kortney Harmon [00:31:07]:
I mean, yes, of course. I did not pay you to say that. But besides that, whenever we're talking about AI, yes, ours is built in all the wonderful things. But I'm just saying, what's your favorite AI tool to add to your superpowers?

Ben Mena [00:31:20]:
I think it would be clay. Clay with, you know, back end with like instantly or smart lead. It's kind of stupid. Like the capabilities of some of the software and just the stuff. Even like a year ago, just sitting there trying to build a list and now literally click buttons and like, the list is built out. I'm like, this is so freaking annoying. I'm like, how did I like, spend the all these nights and hours doing all this and finding the contact information? Like, literally like I was just in a. You can actually use clay to actually like and another website to scrape the leads, figure out who they are.

Ben Mena [00:31:48]:
Like, I just did like a crazy enrichment where it came the entire C suite for the list of 250 companies in the govcon space. Then I did a waterfall enrichment. So I was able to find all their contact information and then you can plug it into chat GB career quad based on the company data to write like a super hyper personalized message because it has like 81 different data points compared to me just looking at LinkedIn and writing it myself. But yeah, what am I planning to do more of in 2025 with AI. Some of the things I'm going to do is actually what I was been talking about is just we've luckily, if you want a good laugh, is we're looking at preparing for potentially the impact of DOGE in the govcon space. So we are actually hitting a lot more of the BD doing a lot of that. So it's going to be a combination of outreach and personalization with the messages when it comes to videos. So those are the, I would say the two biggest things that we'll be doing with AI.

Ben Mena [00:32:40]:
And then we're also really trying to clean up what we're doing when it comes to our processes and systems because I am an agent of chaos. My wife is not. So we are using AI to clean up a lot of our systems and make it all like more operational and cleaner.

Kortney Harmon [00:32:55]:
I love that. And honestly that's something that a lot of firms that I've seen over the years, they just put on the back burner and they don't spend the time to clean it up because they're like, ah, I got in the system. And in reality it's a part of those processes that are broken to begin with because you're not reevaluating. Drew has a question here.

Ben Mena [00:33:12]:
Drew, are we talking about when it comes to resume screening? Are we talking about like sourcing? Are we talking. So some of the ones that I like to I play with when it comes to sourcing and looking for candidates in the cleared space, the 900 pound gorillas clearance jobs. I'll just be honest there as definitely they have AI baked in now, but I would definitely check out people GPT. They're actually a pretty good one and I actually have them on the list if you want to click on that. Holly Hires is actually another good one that is definitely worth checking out. But also it all depends on like what niche you're in and what your specialty is really where that recommendation would go. Kortney, I'll let you answer that one.

Kortney Harmon [00:33:46]:
Well, I mean you could do that in crelate. If you have crelates, that's one thing. Obviously the AI is built in. But what are you using outside of crelate, Ben? Or what are you seeing other firms use whenever they're using AI to clean up their ATSs?

Ben Mena [00:34:00]:
It really depends on which ATS you're talking about. I know Bullhorn is like one of the 900 pound gorillas. There was a company that I was actually trying to get onto the AI summit and what they actually did was if you did a interview with the candidate or intake call with a candidate, it actually auto added all the notes and populated that into the candidates profile using AI without you actually like even pulling up this information. And then we just automatically plugged in and then they, they bought that company and they disappeared. It all depends on like what you're looking at. Every ATS is now trying to move fast when it comes to that kind of stuff.

Kortney Harmon [00:34:37]:
Yeah. And honestly, we integrate with Hire Logic. We just did a webinar with them, so that's some of those pieces as well. Mark, great question. Will there be a session that walks us through the AI tool available and what it can do? We have some of those, but Chris Hessen, our lovely Chris Hessen, he's amazing. He's on our professional services side. He is doing a session tomorrow. It's a 30 minute session, I believe it is, right before lunch.

Kortney Harmon [00:35:02]:
Let me tell you right now when it is. But he is going to be doing a session and it's live. You can ask questions. He is diving into how to gain revenue in 2025 using your ATS. It is from 12 to 1230 tomorrow, so that will be a session. Danielle has a question as well.

Ben Mena [00:35:19]:
Are you doing videos with her voice? Yeah. No. Here's a cool thing about like the videos. When it comes to your voice and using AI, I'll do a pretend video to Kortney. So, you know, hey, Kortney. Or actually with Sensepark, you say, actually hey, Watermelon. And that's the part what actually changes. And then you do the rest of the thing.

Ben Mena [00:35:35]:
Like, you know, I see that, you know, you're in the recruiting space of the chat with you, blah, blah, blah, the rest of the video. So it's literally all my voice. The only thing that AI does is it clones the my voice and changes with the name based on the prompt in there. It is my voice. And if you guys want a really good laugh, I'm horrible at reading. I know there's people that can do like great scripts, read scripts, talk about stuff, but I'm actually reading something out loud. I suck at it. And so I struggled to actually like do a commercial for a sponsor on the podcast.

Ben Mena [00:36:06]:
And finally I just clicked like AI voice, typed it up. And after like three and a half hours of trying the AI voice is like, they're like, we love this one. You did great. And I'm like, God damn it. Actually, I do show my face. So I actually have my face on there. And then typically like that person's like, you also use AI to show their LinkedIn profile. So every single person, it's showing a different profile or their company website.

Kortney Harmon [00:36:31]:
Amazing.

Ben Mena [00:36:32]:
I have the link to most of the stuff that I've been talking about in the Google Doc that I just dropped. So if you're looking for if I didn't like say it too fast or sometimes spoke too fast, which voice tool.

Kortney Harmon [00:36:42]:
The didn't you say it was Send Spark or something like that?

Ben Mena [00:36:45]:
Oh, it's the video tool. Send Spark.

Kortney Harmon [00:36:47]:
Send a Spark. Thank you.

Ben Mena [00:36:49]:
Yep.

Kortney Harmon [00:36:50]:
Amazing. Some of you I saw Lauren asked about prompts. I actually dropped a ebook that we actually use for 10 use cases for prompts for your AI tool. It does say ChatGPT, but you can use them anywhere. But they're the ones that we saw the most whenever you were using with AI. Ben, you're amazing as always. Thank you so very much and joining us, Happy birthday to the little guy. And then if you could send me your deck and I'll make sure it goes out to everybody, including this link.

Kortney Harmon [00:37:18]:
We'll send that at the end of.

Ben Mena [00:37:19]:
The session and real quick. But if you want to connect with other awesome recruiters that are excited about growing, make sure to drop your LinkedIn profile in the chat so that way other recruiters can connect with you. And Honestly, I think 2025 like the work that you're doing now, keep doing it. Spend time with family, but make 2025 your year. Draw the line in the sand. Who cares what happened last year? Who cares what happened this year? Make 2025 your year.

Kortney Harmon [00:37:43]:
I love that. I second that. Amazing. Thank you so very much, Ben. We hope you found today's session insightful and inspiring. Remember to stay tuned in the upcoming weeks as we'll be sharing all of this amazing content of our virtual conference. If you miss any part of it, don't forget to subscribe to our show so you don't miss anything upcoming. And if you like this valuable content, if you enjoyed this episode, please feel free to share it with your network and leave us a review on your favorite podcast platform.

Kortney Harmon [00:38:13]:
We'd love to hear your thoughts. Together we're building a community of growth and learning. Until next time.