The Full Desk Experience

Brianna Rooney [00:00:00]:
Everyone's paralyzed right now. I think that the overall theme is people are in. They're stuck and they're in quicksand and they're not doing, they're thinking, they're not doing, they're trying to. If I have this information, then I'm gonna be rich. Guess what? I know how to work out and how to diet, but I don't have a six pack. So information's not the answer. Right.

Kortney Harmon [00:00:23]:
It's where the rubber meets the road.

Brianna Rooney [00:00:25]:
Yeah. You just gotta put your head down and actually do the work. Do the work. That's it.

Kortney Harmon [00:00:33]:
Hi, I'm Kortney Harmon, director of industry relations at Crelate. This is the Industry Spotlight, a series of the Full Desk Experience, a Crelate original podcast. In this series, we will talk with top leaders and influencers who are shaping the talent industry, shining a light on popular trends, the latest news and and the stories that laid the groundwork for their success. Welcome back to another episode of the Full Desk Experience, Industry Spotlight. Welcome to another episode of the Full Desk Experience, your go to podcast for insights, stories and more from the staffing and recruiting industry. I'm your host, Kortney Harmon and I'm super excited for our guest today. Brianna Rooney is a serial recruiting entrepreneur. She's an executive coach, a public speaker who has really made an impact on the world of recruiting as we know it.

Kortney Harmon [00:01:30]:
She is known for the Millionaire Recruiter podcast. She's founded multiple successful companies including Talent Perch and Thriversity.

Brianna Rooney [00:01:39]:
But I don't have a Millionaire Recruiter podcast. The YouTube channel.

Kortney Harmon [00:01:42]:
Oh, okay. Millionaire Recruiter YouTube channel correction. I'm so sorry. And you have really dedicated and revolutionized the way we practice recruiting. So I'm so excited to have you. We're going to talk about industry, your journey, how you've built high performing teams and so much more. So, Brianna, thank you so much for joining me today out of your busy schedule.

Brianna Rooney [00:02:07]:
Yeah, thank you. Thanks for having me. I also love the name of the podcast because I very much believe in Full Desk. So I'm like, oh, yay. Let's talk about this.

Kortney Harmon [00:02:17]:
I love, I love that. So obviously you and I have gotten a chance to talk, but do me a favor. Tell our listeners about you, who's maybe not heard of you from start to finish, how you got into this industry, what you're doing now, that journey to get here and about your companies today.

Brianna Rooney [00:02:34]:
My goodness, start to finish. I mean, is this like a three hour podcast?

Kortney Harmon [00:02:36]:
We got plenty of time. However long you want to take. We got it, girl.

Brianna Rooney [00:02:40]:
Okay, cool.

Kortney Harmon [00:02:41]:
All Right.

Brianna Rooney [00:02:41]:
So flash forward, like to say, I'm 40 now.

Kortney Harmon [00:02:44]:
Woo.

Brianna Rooney [00:02:44]:
Big year. But I started my agency when I was 24. So the way I did that was I went to fashion school. I wanted to be a designer and do all of those things and realize, oh my God, you need like money for that. Okay. I had like that clueless moment and I was like, how do I get money fast? Okay, I'm going to go work at a bar. I'll go bartend and cocktail. And then I realized probably not a good thing.

Brianna Rooney [00:03:11]:
I was taking taxis home after work, right? So yeah, we didn't have Ubers. So then I was like, okay, I gotta get out of the bar. Gotta get out of the bar. How do I make money fast? Sales. My stepdad was in sales. He was an entrepreneur. He's still an entrepreneur. My dad was an entrepreneur.

Brianna Rooney [00:03:27]:
So I was like, how do I get this money fast? And they're like, sales. So I was like, okay, fine. So very long story short, I stumbled my way into this tech recruiting interview. I didn't know what a recruiter was. I didn't know what the tech industry was. I used to get in trouble in high school. I wasn't even allowed to use my computer, so I didn't have any tech skills. And so naturally they're like, you can type, right? I'm like, of course.

Brianna Rooney [00:03:52]:
Anyways, so flash forward to that. I spent a year about, about a year there. And in my interview, the guy goes, you know, he's promised me all these riches. I was like, okay. He's like, well, how much do you want to make? I'm like, I was 22. I was like, well, 300,000. And he looked at me and he was like, you're hired. Because I was like, I was always told, you know, like, don't, don't say anything low because you just don't know what people are going to offer you and what you're capable of.

Brianna Rooney [00:04:18]:
And so I just went for it. I was really ballsy back then. So anyways, went in. I did make a good amount of money. Not the 300,000 that I wanted, but I made 100. And I was really young and it was exciting and my mom was excited. And then I realized we're doing things really wrong. So something happened where I was like, you know what? This doesn't feel right to me.

Brianna Rooney [00:04:40]:
So again, being the ballsy person. Not give a. Can I cuss?

Kortney Harmon [00:04:44]:
Yeah, absolutely not.

Brianna Rooney [00:04:45]:
Give a kind of a thing. I walked out. So it was a Friday. I walked out. I was the Highest performer. And people were like, oh, my God. So we all, like, met up at a bar and celebrated me walking out for, you know, whatever reason. And my mom cried, and she's like, what are you gonna do? And anyways, I had no plan.

Brianna Rooney [00:05:03]:
I literally had no plan. I didn't think I was gonna open up my own thing. And we're at a Laker game. So flash forward a couple days later, I'm at a Laker game with my stepdad. And he was like, what are you gonna do? I'm like, I don't know. Why does it matter? Like, I was kinda like, who cares? It's funny, like, how you just think like that. I wouldn't think like that right now, but. So he goes, well, what does your boss do for you that you can't do for yourself? And again, never giving a.

Brianna Rooney [00:05:26]:
I said, nothing. He goes, well, then why don't you open your own thing? Well, my boss at the. Well, my ex boss at the time was like, do you have a job lined up? I'm like, no. And he was like, again, also baffled, right? He's like, do me a favor. Don't make any moves. I'm going to call you Tuesday. Okay? So I quit on Friday. He'll call me Tuesday.

Brianna Rooney [00:05:43]:
So I honestly just thought I was going to go back and work for him, that whatever problem I had was going to be solved. He didn't call me. So Wednesday morning, I opened techies. I opened up my own agency. He called me a few hours later, and I said, too late. And that was honestly it. So it was kind of crazy.

Kortney Harmon [00:06:00]:
It was like. That was. You're like, I gave you a deadline, and it is what it is. All the signs pointed. I'm going to do this.

Brianna Rooney [00:06:07]:
Yeah. You know what? I'm going to give my mom credit for this. She always taught me, you never go back, so. And she meant with a man, right? Like, it was. She was like, once you're done, you're done. Like, you need to be real with that. And so I always had that with dating, even in my life. I've been divorced.

Brianna Rooney [00:06:26]:
I didn't go back. You know, I mean, like, I've always thought that way. Like, someone says they're gonna do something, they have to do it, and if they don't, guess what? And so on the other side, if I say I'm gonna do something, like, my words, my bond, like, I'm gonna do it, period. So that's how I began.

Kortney Harmon [00:06:43]:
I love. So you started that at 24.

Brianna Rooney [00:06:46]:
24.

Kortney Harmon [00:06:47]:
And obviously you're not 24 anymore. Not. Not obviously for any bad reason, but, like, talk to me about your journey into your agency, what you've done from there, because you haven't just done one or two things, like you've been in this business. So I want to get into all the things you've done since 24.

Brianna Rooney [00:07:05]:
Yeah, I could get into all of that. So I was very content. So what ended up happening is someone that I worked with about a week later joined me as well. He was like, you know what? You're right. I'm out of here. Can I join your. Can I, you know, want to be my business partner? I was like, yeah, cool. You know, like, why not? So we worked out of.

Brianna Rooney [00:07:23]:
Actually, my little room. I had roommates and everything worked out of my room. So anyway, so we did really well, really fast, which was exciting. And again, like, when you're making that much money, you're like, everything's right in the world. Nothing's wrong, you know? So I think my first year, right, we had to have made over 200, I believe, each, you know? So we made 400. Right. And that was super exciting. And I was really careful.

Brianna Rooney [00:07:44]:
I didn't once go back to any of my clients or candidates or anything. I, like, had that mission, you know? Also, I was scared to get sued. And so it was actually my business partner who was like, we need more. I was like, great. Well, like, we'll just keep getting more clients, and we'll close more deals and all these things. He's like, no, we need more. We need, like, employees. And I'll never forget.

Brianna Rooney [00:08:06]:
And I was like, no, I want nothing to do with that. I'm content. I mean, I'm making over 200. We're now into, like, our half of the next year, and we're gonna make a lot more. We were, like, projected to make almost 400 each. And so I'm like, I'm good. Like, I'm fine. We didn't even have an office.

Brianna Rooney [00:08:22]:
Like, we're good. Yeah. I ended up moving to a house. So then we had, like, a dedicated, you know, space. I was like, I'm good. And he's like, no, that's the dream. The dream is to build. And so he was actually the one that got my mind into building.

Brianna Rooney [00:08:37]:
And I was like, okay. But here was my problem. I really liked doing it, so I never wanted to take myself out of that full desk seat.

Kortney Harmon [00:08:46]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:08:47]:
So I was like, okay. And I've realized something about myself. I'm quite controlling. I didn't realize it back then, I now know now a lot of, a lot of help. But I was really controlling and I wanted to make sure I also controlled the destiny and I controlled the training and I controlled our projections and I like all of those things. And at the time it was like, no, my work ethic is just really strong. But what it turns out is actually that's just my controlling nature. Right.

Brianna Rooney [00:09:14]:
So which helped. Which might be another different podcast. I'm not really sure.

Kortney Harmon [00:09:18]:
I love that.

Brianna Rooney [00:09:19]:
Yeah. Anyway, so we hired and what we had taken from our last agency is that he always hired in twos. And the reason that he hired in twos because Data wise, only 50% works out. So you train two, you get one. And so that's what we did. And so we stayed. We went from two to four, then we went from four to six, then we got rid of one, then, you know, so like we just kind of went back and forth. And I'm a big believer as an agency, if you want to keep your sanity and keep your profits high and cost lean, you're going to have about a six person team, maybe eight.

Brianna Rooney [00:09:56]:
Here's what's funny though, as I say that I didn't do that. So I kept building and building and I got to. Well, okay, hold on, let me not skip a step. I ended up buying out my business partner. So I think we were three years in, four years in. Honestly, I don't really remember. So let's just say four years. We were four years in, bought out my business partner.

Brianna Rooney [00:10:16]:
He did not have the same mentality as me. We still talk kind of a little bit. So, like, we're no bad blood. There was at the time, but we didn't want the same things anymore. And we didn't believe in how to build, we didn't believe in how to train. So there was just that, like, disconnect. And so what I did was the same kind of thing that I did back then is I left it all on the floor and I said, I'm out. I'm done.

Brianna Rooney [00:10:40]:
You can have it. He's like, what do you mean? I go, I'm out. I don't want to do this with you anymore. I'll go build my other agency, wave my nom, compete, and I'm out. And he's like, you won't walk away. Because my license plate at the time said techies, okay? I live, sleep and breathe techies. So he called my bluff, like. And I was like, I'm out.

Brianna Rooney [00:11:00]:
So anyways, long story short, he's like, no techies is yours. So he admitted he was like, this is your baby. You waive my non compete and pay me. So paid him. Long thing won't get into that. Paid him a lot. He left, built his own agency. And I literally said, you have the floor.

Brianna Rooney [00:11:19]:
You can take anyone you want. Anyone you want. We had, I think probably 13, maybe 15 people at the time. And I was really good at that. I took the floor with the team because we were all in office. I took the floor and we told them what was happening. And we said, here's what we're going to do. I would love all of you.

Brianna Rooney [00:11:36]:
So I made like a big announcement. I said, I would love all of you, but the bottom line is, is that I know that you guys have another boss. And he wants to talk all of you individually. He has that right. If he can convince you to go with him, go with him and there's no hard feelings. I said, but I'm not talking to anybody because that was the rule. The rule was I wasn't allowed to talk and persuade anybody. But he could.

Kortney Harmon [00:11:58]:
Okay, yeah, so I'm still listening. I'm on the edge of my seat because I'm listening.

Brianna Rooney [00:12:05]:
So two people went and the rest stayed.

Kortney Harmon [00:12:08]:
Okay, that's not bad.

Brianna Rooney [00:12:09]:
Yeah. And it was a very interesting aftermath. It was like, I think we were all really excited and really focused, but it felt really somber in the room for the next couple of months, you know, even though, like, I got what I wanted, I was also nervous. Maybe this wasn't what I wanted. Maybe I did need him. Maybe I needed somebody, you know, Now I'm full owner and I'm full responsibility. And you always, like, think about, like, do you? What do you need? Right. And so flash forward to at the end of the year, I just decided we needed new blood.

Brianna Rooney [00:12:42]:
We need a new mix. And so I just redid the entire office. I redid the mojo. I got new tally games. I got like all of this stuff that I just redid, like, everything during. Because we always take off, like two to three weeks in December. We just close.

Kortney Harmon [00:12:57]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:12:57]:
And so, yeah, so they came January, and it was like, kind of new me, new agency, new office vibe, new new everything. And after that, we just soared. Soared, Soared.

Kortney Harmon [00:13:08]:
That's amazing.

Brianna Rooney [00:13:09]:
Yeah.

Kortney Harmon [00:13:09]:
Mentality is everything.

Brianna Rooney [00:13:11]:
I'm a giant believer in that. I'm a giant, giant, giant believer. I'm, you know, like, you know, you think about, I don't know, I can only think about birth control pills, but you're like, there's that week.

Kortney Harmon [00:13:19]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:13:20]:
There's that week where there's no pills. Right. So it's like. But like, those fake water pills, whatever you call, like, it has a mental value to it.

Kortney Harmon [00:13:28]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:13:28]:
You know, and so if you think about that, it's almost like, oh, great, these are going to be my weight loss pills. You know, like your mindset that you think these are your weight loss pills. All of a sudden, do you stop eating a little bit less? Like, I don't know, you know, so they're. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It really. It makes you think. Exactly. And so, like, mindset for me is, like, the biggest thing.

Brianna Rooney [00:13:49]:
So I know I'm asked, like, what's the one thing? And, like, the one thing is up here. Like, that is the one thing.

Kortney Harmon [00:13:55]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:13:56]:
And you have to play games with yourself because. I know. And actually, I want your opinion on this. I recently heard, and I'm trying to think of where it was, honestly. It might have been a movie, I don't know. But the whole fake it till you make it thing, and everyone says, like, you can't fake it till you make it. I actually disagree.

Kortney Harmon [00:14:09]:
I disagree.

Brianna Rooney [00:14:10]:
I think you can wholeheartedly. Yeah. And I think it's a mental game. And if you believe you can do something, even though maybe at this moment you can't or you haven't, but if you believe you can, I think you can fake it till you make it. I think I faked it till I made it my entire career. So, like, I get annoyed when I hear people say that that's not a true thing. I'm like, I don't know.

Kortney Harmon [00:14:30]:
I think it comes down to the person I truly do like. You have to be the competitive. I hate to say this, Brianna. Or both. Type A or the type A. Like, you have to have the mindset. Not everybody can say, I'm going to do this. And they do it and they execute.

Kortney Harmon [00:14:45]:
But I think there is a specific niche of people that absolutely can fake it till you make it if you have the right mindset. I agree with you 100%.

Brianna Rooney [00:14:52]:
Yeah, for sure. I actually did an interesting smile study. So part of my training is like, just learning. Just, like kind of loving to learn. Which is kind of funny because I absolutely hate school. So I want to like school and learning. Don't admire opinion. Go hand in hand.

Kortney Harmon [00:15:07]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:15:08]:
So I would have learning rainbows. I'd have learning rainbows. Do you remember, like, back in the day, they would have that rainbow. And so I would have something learning rainbow. And a team member would pick whatever they wanted on a Friday, and they would have the floor for like 30 minutes essentially, and they would teach us something. It didn't matter what it was. So, like, one of my employees taught us about the history of Valentine's Day and Christmas. It's like, you know what I mean? Very random.

Kortney Harmon [00:15:32]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:15:32]:
Okay. One of our employees, one of my favorite ones, taught us something about the woman that actually from MIT that actually helped them land on the moon that nobody talks about.

Kortney Harmon [00:15:41]:
Cool.

Brianna Rooney [00:15:42]:
You know, And I was like, oh. So I've learned all sorts of interesting things, but my presentation was about smiling and the power of smiling and how it just registers, you know? And then the trick is to say bad news when you smile, and then in return say good news and not smile and, like, watch the person. So, like, I'll do it with you. It'd be like, Kortney, you just won the lottery. You know, it's like, like where you, like, can kind of confuse.

Kortney Harmon [00:16:07]:
Yeah. Like, it is like. Yeah. It doesn't have the same recognition. Absolutely.

Brianna Rooney [00:16:11]:
Yeah. So on that tangent of things, the whole smile and kind of tricking yourselves, you know, I've actually taught my kids this because, like, you know what, they get hurt. Right. I have a 7 and 10. You were saying you have a 10 year old too. But they'll get hurt. And I'd be like, okay, can you show me that smile? And like, and they're crying. Like, I got my smile on mom and they're crying, you know, but like, it seems to go better.

Kortney Harmon [00:16:35]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:16:36]:
I don't know, like, what goes wrong with a smile? So I taught my team that. So there's just lots of things that I definitely think tactical wise, you can train your team to do and be really good at. Right? The sourcing, the negotiating, the sale, all that stuff. Brand ambassador stuff. But then there's like that soft skills that I feel like misses the mark a lot that I've really focused on my entire career with myself and with my team.

Kortney Harmon [00:16:59]:
I love that.

Brianna Rooney [00:17:00]:
Yeah.

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Kortney Harmon [00:18:07]:
Okay, so besides smiling, let's look. Early on in your career, what kept you going during the challenging parts of building your business? Kind of those people that are in your seat today, what kept you going during that time?

Brianna Rooney [00:18:21]:
Money. I had my eye on the prize. Always. Always. Here's the thing. Anyone that knows me and works with me knows I hate admin work. I'm pretty sloppy sometimes when it comes to stuff like that. I will preach it, but I won't do it.

Brianna Rooney [00:18:35]:
However, something that I was very always organized on was my Excel spreadsheet with my projections. I always knew what companies paid us. I always know what industry they were in, what funding they were in, what our average salary was. I knew how many interviews we had to get a deal. I knew our offer rate, you know, stuff like that. I knew our DEI numbers.

Kortney Harmon [00:18:54]:
Yep.

Brianna Rooney [00:18:55]:
You know, so I knew always what mattered and I knew like activity was always going to that it still came down to a numbers game, but I knew how to pull out fake busy. So I think a lot of business owners and recruiters in general can go one hand in hand. Right. I think there's a lot of fake busy, so I cut that shit.

Kortney Harmon [00:19:17]:
So are you a fan of KPIs? Based on what you just said, no. Okay. I was assuming you're a numbers person. Still ratios, but maybe not KPIs. I don't know.

Brianna Rooney [00:19:29]:
Okay, here I. And I'm going to contradict myself a couple of times.

Kortney Harmon [00:19:32]:
Okay.

Brianna Rooney [00:19:33]:
In my opinion, KPIs were put in place for underachievers. However, when I just said those numbers, I know those numbers. But in my mind I. The KPIs and numbers don't go hand in hand, which I know, again, this is the contradiction of it. But it's like don't have data just to have data. So when I think of KPIs, I think of you're putting it in just to put it in. And no one knows what to do with the data. So that's not what I'm talking about.

Brianna Rooney [00:20:00]:
So like I could tell you, you know, like my LinkedIn response rate today. Right. Because all I care about is which template is working, which method is working. That's all I Care about. Because then I go to. Again, it translates to money.

Kortney Harmon [00:20:14]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:20:14]:
How many deals have I closed? How much money? You know, stuff like that. So I guess I'm going to say yes and no.

Kortney Harmon [00:20:20]:
I love it because I agree with you. I think KPIs were built for the underperformer, to get people up to your high performers. And honestly, it's just a hoop for them to jump through. And if they weren't going to do it in the beginning, they're not going to do it now. I can tell you, when I was coaching, literally, it was like, oh, well, they have to have so many hours of phone time. And I'm like. But really?

Brianna Rooney [00:20:39]:
Yeah.

Kortney Harmon [00:20:39]:
I'm like, why would you do that? Like, I caught people calling the Santa Claus hotline the White House for hours. I'm like, this is what you get for setting unreal. Like, it's not the outcome, it's not the thing that's moving your business forward. It's the task you think that happens to get you there. And it's a false sense of reality.

Brianna Rooney [00:20:57]:
Yeah. When I was at that agency, you had to have three hours of phone time, and he had a call counter. Like, he'd go in this little bitty office and we were all nervous and he would put our numbers down. But guess what? Did he do that when we were doing well? No, he only did that when we were not doing well.

Kortney Harmon [00:21:13]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:21:13]:
And so that was the correlation that I saw where I was like, look, again, this is for the underachievers. So when I have, like, the people who are just killing it every single month. And I'm a big believer in putting your wins up. I mean, again, we were in office putting your wins on. On a whiteboard, and then when we had to go remote, we did it virtually. Yeah, But I wanted people to chase the money, to chase the top performers, do it that way. But I did have people say, well, how many messages is he sending out? How many? And it's like, it's not about that. But if you want a number, I can give you a number.

Brianna Rooney [00:21:46]:
Right. But if you're still not sending quality work, it's not going to convert. Yep. So that was always my issue.

Kortney Harmon [00:21:51]:
But I love it. I love it. I agree with you 100%. I think KPI's is a hamster wheel. So.

Brianna Rooney [00:21:57]:
Yeah.

Kortney Harmon [00:21:58]:
So there we go. Let's talk about the state of the industry right now. You talk to a lot of people through your coaching, through your business. How are you feeling about the current state of the recruiting industry today. And I know it's kind of weird because we're how many days out from an election? So I will caveat that.

Brianna Rooney [00:22:14]:
Yeah. So I think that depends on who you ask, what industry you ask, what level they're at.

Kortney Harmon [00:22:20]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:22:20]:
So I'll give you a sum up. I think people that are managers and above in the TA recruiting space, they're hurting. I do think that along the lines of actually, because I'm in tech, I do think that managers and up are hurting there too. So I can't really speak too terribly much outside of my realm, except for I can fully speak ta. Right. But so I definitely think that ICs are winning right now. Salaries have gone down, so you could literally, managers can go to ICs and make the same exact money they were making with less of a headache probably. So that's where things are, I think now with that in tech, I think tech takes the hit sooner.

Brianna Rooney [00:22:59]:
It's the most innovative space. So. And it has some of the most money. Right. All the VCs and stuff like that. So I think we hit first. So therefore we come back first. Yep.

Brianna Rooney [00:23:09]:
So I personally feel a comeback. I'm actually getting money chills. So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kortney Harmon [00:23:14]:
Yay.

Brianna Rooney [00:23:14]:
I'm coaching a little bit less, recruiting more like that's kind of how that works for me. And so, yeah, so I'm definitely seeing a comeback. I still see a lot of boo hooers. So I just kind of unfollowed that space. And I think that will always happen. I think the question is, is that is it worse or is just people have a platform to say it And I think people just have a platform to say it. I don't think it's any worse. I think our layup numbers have come down and I think that now the problem, and this is why I think job seekers say that it's hard, is they don't know how to think like a recruiter, whereas they don't know how to present themselves.

Brianna Rooney [00:23:52]:
They don't know how to sell themselves as a solution because that's what a job seeker is doing. Right. They're selling themselves as a solution. That's what I have to do every single day.

Kortney Harmon [00:24:00]:
Absolutely.

Brianna Rooney [00:24:01]:
And then there's a big biz dev problem. Well, the biz dev problem comes because no one learned the fundamentals of it. We were just hand fed stuff because everything was so busy. And so I think that's why a lot of people feel that it's really, really hard. And I'm not saying it's easy. I'm not saying it's easy, but I do think that it's a lot better than it was a couple years ago. A lot better than it was a year ago. A lot better than it was six months ago.

Brianna Rooney [00:24:25]:
So I do think the state is great. Naturally, when technology is trying to replace. I'm not even going to say us, but I think a majority of people, it's not even just a recruiting thing, but technology is trying to replace people. So I definitely think that companies are trying to see if it's going to work, but I don't think it's working. So I don't know if you want to dig into that. But like, I definitely think that that's an issue.

Kortney Harmon [00:24:50]:
Let's talk about it right now. So give me the deal. I mean, granted, from our industry, we see a lot of people that want to push AI easy button and it's like, well, I mean, I'm getting emails daily to say, oh, my parents met in Bolivar, Ohio. It's like, no, they didn't. Because the restaurant you named isn't real. It's not a thing. It's like, oh, they met at this one restaurant. Never has existed in my lifetime.

Kortney Harmon [00:25:15]:
So I think it's just funny, like what we're using and what we're pulling as an easy button is actually becoming a detriment to us because we don't have those human connections anymore. So I want to know your opinion and your thought process about it.

Brianna Rooney [00:25:28]:
Yeah, I think about to all of the mistakes throughout my career. Right?

Kortney Harmon [00:25:31]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:25:32]:
The mistakes are always trying to use tools to do something better, faster, easier. That's what it is, Right? Like the easy button, we're supposed to buy them for easier. Right. And I think to the people that have closed the most deals, made the most money, the best of the best, right? People who have been on my team versus others, they never liked those tools. Now at the time I was like, you guys aren't adopters. You need to be adopters. We need to be early adopters. We're intact, we're innovative.

Brianna Rooney [00:25:59]:
I'm bringing all the new, new, I'm paying all this fricking money for it. Like, I need you to use these tools. Right? But here's what was interesting and I didn't realize at the time is I taught them the fundamentals. So could they have used the tools and accelerated? Yes. But the way I was coming to it as is, I was like, kind of forget about the fundamentals, use these tools because they're going to be so Much easier. If I would have at the time been like, look, we have these fundamentals. This is going to enhance us this way. Let's try this.

Brianna Rooney [00:26:30]:
So now flash forward to know better, do better. Right. So of course you should use tools. I'm not saying like don't use tools, but here's the thing. Don't be tool happy.

Kortney Harmon [00:26:37]:
Yes.

Brianna Rooney [00:26:37]:
Pick your pick. Think about your biggest problem. What is your biggest problem? And if you could do it faster or easier, what would that look like? And why? Like all of those that needs to have a why behind something. And if this one tool solves that one problem and makes you better, then do it. But if you're taking too much human element out, there's a really big issue. Like it goes back to back in the day when I used to wake up and be at the office at 6am in the morning, scrape the job board, send out 50 resumes and hope that one or two would three or stick with for the month. And yes, we did that. That was my KPI.

Brianna Rooney [00:27:14]:
I had to send out 50 resumes a day. That's crazy. I send out probably six to nine a week.

Kortney Harmon [00:27:20]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:27:21]:
So it's significantly different. Again, I do tech, so it's different. But yeah. So I think tools is a giant issue. Huge issue. I have so many people asking me to look at their tool on a regular basis and promote it and get paid for it and all of those things. And I'm still very particular, probably to my own detriment, on that. I will not promote a tool that I don't like or that I don't use.

Brianna Rooney [00:27:41]:
If I don't use it and I don't like it, then why am I talking about it? So that's another huge problem.

Kortney Harmon [00:27:47]:
So what tools made the biggest impact on the work that you do?

Brianna Rooney [00:27:51]:
I would say Covey. Covey, probably. If I'm going to dissect that. Covey probably has made the biggest impact for me. Why do you know Covey?

Kortney Harmon [00:28:00]:
I don't.

Brianna Rooney [00:28:01]:
It is. Okay, so it first started out and I don't know why it's not used for this anymore. Because I thought it was really cool it first started out. Whereas your whole team can essentially connect it to LinkedIn and I now have every single one of my people's connections. Like, how cool is that?

Kortney Harmon [00:28:18]:
I didn't know that.

Brianna Rooney [00:28:19]:
Yeah, that's not their main product anymore because people didn't use it correctly.

Kortney Harmon [00:28:23]:
Shocker.

Brianna Rooney [00:28:23]:
Yeah. The whole thing was I could now source through all these other people's connections and vice versa. Everyone could Source through my connections. Everyone could do biz dev through my connections. And I had the most. Right?

Kortney Harmon [00:28:35]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:28:36]:
So I thought it was a gold mine. So that was really cool. So that's how I started with that tool, and then now it has morphed to a lot more, so now it's an extension. So if I'm on your LinkedIn, for example, I can put you into a sequence, like, very easily. Right. And I think, like, most ats at this point can do that. Right. But the game changer for me was their AI bot that sources.

Brianna Rooney [00:28:58]:
And so I was really against this. So keep in mind, I has already a customer of theirs. This was their new new. And I was like, no, I'm a sorcerer at heart. Don't take that job away from me. Like, I'm not interested. Okay. So then when I learned how it was, it was like it took my brain and just basically had an assistant for me.

Brianna Rooney [00:29:16]:
Right. So what it does is I got to go above the Boolean. So I get to tell the bot that I want someone from a SaaS company that currently works in series A that used to work at a fang company.

Kortney Harmon [00:29:28]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:29:29]:
So I get to tell them those things. Yeah. So it's like, bam. So it's sources, and I also get to tell them what I don't like. I get to send profiles that I like. You know, it's like this whole training mechanism. So the training of it takes probably about a good 40 minutes, right. Like, to train it properly, which I thought was cool.

Brianna Rooney [00:29:43]:
So then all of a sudden, it sends out messages and it does a sequence for me, and then when they get back, it lands in my inbox, and now I take over. So that, to me, is a game changer tool. So that's something I can get behind because it's still me, it's still my network, and now we're just expanding it. And it feels good, right?

Kortney Harmon [00:30:04]:
And it makes it faster. And that's the key to this. It's still taking what you have, what you know, who you are, and just speeding it up a little bit. Because speed's the name of our game.

Brianna Rooney [00:30:13]:
Speed's the name of the game. So could it do it with clients? Because then of course, I was like, oh, my God, this works really well. Can I do this with biz dev?

Kortney Harmon [00:30:21]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:30:21]:
And they're like, not yet. And my point was Biz Dev and Canada Outreach is the same thing. It's just one's the solution for me and one's a solution for them.

Kortney Harmon [00:30:32]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:30:33]:
And so, like, that's kind of like the fight there. And so I do sequence, of course. Right. But the key to sequencing, and again, I think this is just where the tool comes in, is that I niche down so much.

Kortney Harmon [00:30:47]:
Yes.

Brianna Rooney [00:30:48]:
Like, so I'm not only just doing San Francisco, I'm doing Python. I'm doing Series A and I'm doing it in fintech, you know, like as teeny as I possibly can. And so now I feel really good about sending a sequence because I have as many common denominators as possible. So now I don't sound like a total idiot. Right. Or I can pitch someone in fintech that has worked in a Series A. You know what I mean? So that's kind of like my thought process there.

Kortney Harmon [00:31:17]:
I love it.

Brianna Rooney [00:31:18]:
I don't. Yeah.

Kortney Harmon [00:31:18]:
I just had a podcast yesterday and someone's like, niches make riches. And I'm like, I love that. That is so funny because. And honestly, not to get away from this, but there's so many people that they're like, well, I'm in the accounting and finance arena. I just. I can't make this work. Well, what about the accountants and finance? Like, where are you at? What industry? What level? And they're like, I don't need to be. I'm like, yeah, yeah, you do.

Kortney Harmon [00:31:42]:
That is part of your problem because you're want to be everything to everyone. Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:31:45]:
Well, so the thing is, is because they're worried about leaving money on the table.

Kortney Harmon [00:31:48]:
Yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:31:49]:
And so actually I have this problem in coaching, which I'm dealing with right now, and I don't know how I'm going to deal with it. So I've always. Forever. I just talked to you about niches. Right. Like, I believe it. That's how I've made all of my money. Right.

Brianna Rooney [00:32:02]:
And I would even separate my teams into different niches because obviously we did mission driven and av, you know, all these things. Right. But because I've been in the industry for so long and I get excited about so many different things, I don't have, like, a specialty. Like, so I try to say, like, well, my specialty is making you more money. Like, I'm going to get you lean and efficient. No more fake busy. That's how I make you more money. But, like, when I go to speak, for example, what do you want to talk about? Like, well, who's your audience? You know, I get really excited about it, but it's do.

Brianna Rooney [00:32:35]:
It does not do me a favor. Like, I have to take my own advice. And I think it's very easy to Say what's right, but it's harder to do what's right.

Kortney Harmon [00:32:44]:
So I love it.

Brianna Rooney [00:32:45]:
Yes. I'm struggling there, but I love it.

Kortney Harmon [00:32:47]:
I love the honesty and thinking about it. You're like, I'm good in this area. I'm not good in this area.

Brianna Rooney [00:32:51]:
Yeah.

Kortney Harmon [00:32:52]:
And like, I always joke. I always joke with my husband. I'm like, the first step's admitting I'm here. But it's really like understanding so you can figure out that your next solution. So I love that. One more question on tech and we're going to move on any trends. Obviously, AI is a thing and that's the only thing out of anyone's mouth, but any tech trends recruiters should be paying attention to right now, going in 25.

Brianna Rooney [00:33:14]:
So are we talking about tech recruiters or are we talking about, like, just the tech tools kind of thing?

Kortney Harmon [00:33:20]:
I'm going to let this up to you however you want to answer it.

Brianna Rooney [00:33:23]:
Oh, that's so interesting. Okay. My mind's going a couple different places. Okay. Yeah. So trends, Trends. Well, it's noisy. Right.

Brianna Rooney [00:33:35]:
So we gotta cut the. People still don't want to do video. And I think that is not good. I think that people get in their own way. But let me talk about a controversial trend. That's where I'll go. Everyone thinks branding and marketing is what will win as far as recruiting goes.

Kortney Harmon [00:33:54]:
Okay.

Brianna Rooney [00:33:55]:
We've always had to be brand ambassadors. Right. Like, that's been our job forever. We just never really spoke about it. And then. But to say that if you don't have a voice on LinkedIn, you're not going to do well is insane. I think that people need to do what makes them feel good and what comes naturally to them.

Kortney Harmon [00:34:13]:
Yes.

Brianna Rooney [00:34:13]:
Because that's where they need to spend their energy. So, for example, someone wanted coaching the other day and they wanted it on biz dev and they're like, I know what you're going to tell me. I need a post. I only post once a year. Da, da, da, da, da. And I was like, I'm absolutely not going to tell you to do that. And they're like, what do you mean? I'm like, how long would it take you to put out a post? Oh, probably like an hour. I'm like, guess how many biz dev messages you can get out in an hour? 20 probably.

Brianna Rooney [00:34:39]:
Right. And good ones. So I think that's controversial because there's so many companies and so much going out to. You need to post. You need to post once a week. I mean, LinkedIn tells you you gotta post once a week, you got to do all this stuff. But then there's a lot of people that says you have to post once a day and then they're given out. You know, thank goodness they've stopped the whole LinkedIn voice thing.

Kortney Harmon [00:34:58]:
Oh, yeah.

Brianna Rooney [00:34:59]:
Which by the way, I will tell you, I got excited about it once I saw someone had it, I'm like, I need to have it. And then I got a couple of badges and I was like, that was stupid. Like, it was too easy. Also, like, I was like, what is this? Anyways, so my point is, is that people are focusing on the wrong thing and they're not focusing on the results. So it's like, is what you're doing giving you the results or is it back to the fake busy? I know people that spend all of their days in these webinars and I think that there comes a time where it's like, you know, enough now, go do it. I would say trend. Sorry, I'm totally tangent here, but I gotta say this last trend, because I hear it so much, it kills me, is everyone's paralyzed right now too much?

Kortney Harmon [00:35:41]:
You mean they're paralyzed from the tech or there's too many things to do?

Brianna Rooney [00:35:45]:
I think it's both. Okay, I hear both. But I think that the overall theme is people are in. They're stuck and they're in quick stand. And they're not doing. They're thinking, they're not doing. They're trying to. If I have this information, then I'm gonna be rich.

Brianna Rooney [00:36:02]:
Guess what? I know how to work out and how to diet, but I don't have a six pack. So information's not the answer. Right.

Kortney Harmon [00:36:09]:
It's where the rubber meets the road.

Brianna Rooney [00:36:11]:
Yeah, you just got to put your head down and actually do the work. Do the work. That's it.

Kortney Harmon [00:36:18]:
Okay, that's fair. I like it. Well, guys, that's all the time we have for today's episode of the Full Desk Experience. I want to give a huge thanks to our guest, Brianna Rooney, for sharing her incredible journey, insights and vision of the recruiting industry. Honestly, Brianna had so much valuable wisdom to share that our conversation ended up running over an hour. So to make sure you get the full in depth of our entire talk, we're splitting this episode into a two part special episode. In the next installment, we're going to dive deeper into the latest trends, innovation, and we're going to really figure out how firms are adapting their strategies. So be sure to tune in next week for part two of our conversation.

Kortney Harmon [00:37:02]:
Until then, keep pushing the boundaries and making a difference and we'll see you soon on the Full Desk Experience. I'm Kortney Harmon with Crelate. Thanks for joining us for this episode of Industry Spotlight, a new series from the Full Desk Experience. New episodes will be dropping monthly. Be sure you're subscribed to our podcast so you can catch the next Industry Spotlight episode and all episodes of the Full Desk Experience here or wherever you listen.