The Highly Adaptive Mindset

Introducing Our New Podcast: Bridging the Gap in Staffing and Technology

Join us as we embark on our inaugural podcast episode, where we discuss the need for a new, actionable, and multi-perspective resource in the world of staffing and technology. In this episode, we delve into the importance of providing decision-ready insights, avoiding sales pitches, and focusing on education and true value. Get to know your hosts, their backgrounds, and their passion for bringing strategic, innovative, and helpful advice to the community. We outline our vision for the podcast, including reactive and proactive strategies, AI integration, and industry trends. Perfect for executives, emerging leaders, and change makers, this podcast aims to educate, inspire, and provide actionable steps for success. Don't miss our segments on education, industry networks, and expert interviews, all designed to help you stay ahead in the dynamic world of staffing.

Are we doing this?

We're like actually doing this. It's happening right now.

I mean, finally,

What are we doing here now?

I mean, look, there are millions of podcasts that are out there. Does the world need another podcast?

I mean, when you think there is a lot of podcasts, but there needs to be another podcast. if you look at my inbox right now, it is insane. I'm drowning in different things in my inbox. I have an overflow, I'm searching. You don't wanna know the amount of tabs that I have open even right now.

But when I truly strip this down, there is a shortage of decision ready resources that are out there. we're getting way too much, BS sales pitchy, you wanna name it. I'm gonna be honest. so yeah, we need another podcast.

You know, 

You tell me.

I do agree. You know, especially I always say whenever I'm sharing information or insights with the community, like I'm the worst salesperson. 'cause I never position back to what I do. It's always about the information and education. So I'm with you, right? Things are way too pitchy. I also think like there's not a whole lot of actionable insights. I feel like we get to a certain point and then you're kind of left like, like there's, there's nothing like you need.

Yeah, looking for more like where are we going? What's the actual, where, what is the next step I need to take here instead of just sitting.

So I mean, have you run into these things where like you see like these very singular perspectives?

A hundred percent. It's like these little solos, a little snapshot, and I have no idea what the whole picture is. How is it supposed to connect? What is it supposed to do? And I, I'm in this total silo.

So let's talk about how we're gonna bridge the gap, right? So if we're gonna get people to listen in, chime in, subscribe, hopefully, right? Like if we want this to be a good resource, then how are we closing that gap?

Yeah, no, we have to do this because I think that this is important, I don't wanna give anyone, I said BS before and I'm gonna say it again. So no BS advertisement only. Truth. I think we need to your point, true actionable takeaways, like something that's strategic for people.

Mm-hmm.

And we need that multi-perspective discussions.

Like it cannot be siloed. Like let's listen to different people within the industry, different voices. How can we bridge different things together and not just be in a tunnel vision? I think there's probably some other things that you could probably even add to that as well. I.

Well, you know, when you get into sort of the actionable items, like giving people things, they could truly walk away and exercise those fundamentals. If we're gonna provide advice, let's make sure that it's things that they can actually do in their space. And then I agree with you, I think multiple perspectives.

Oftentimes you'll have like maybe a given software. company speaking to something again that is aligned with. Their features of their product, which it, it's fine, it's fine. I get it. But sometimes that lacks the overarching insight that companies need in order to make better decisions holistically. So I think making sure that our topics are holistic, that they approach multiple areas of the business and don't just speak to the areas that even you and I have our expertise in, but that we actually invite people in to bring perspective and really make this meaningful for people if they're gonna spend 20, 30 minutes with us.

Yeah, I couldn't agree with you, Maura. I mean, it's gotta have that agnostic like perspective because I think that's one thing that we're missing. So it's not, so you guys are gonna hear not us pushing a platform, not a vendor. We want to hear from everyone and is this the right fit? And give everyone the kind of tools so they can be successful and make decisions on.

Awesome. Awesome. So look, now that we got some of the housekeeping outta the way, and yes we are in fact

Love it.

Let's like share with people a little bit about who we are. So, do you want to tell people a little bit about your bio, your background, like who you are in the

I love it. You know, this is always the part where I'm like, okay, what do people really want to know about me? So I'm not gonna focus on the personal, but I'll get to the personal, 'cause you guys will know. I do get personal if you follow me on LinkedIn. But quick snapshot, spent most of my career in staffing and technologies from one thing to another.

My happy place I can say, is truly the strategic side and helping executives and leaders change makers. People that wanna make a difference really truly align their business goals and technology. I spend a lot of time with. A lot of different people where we chat through tools, we chat through the future.

So I originally got my start in sales. I don't think many people may have known that. However, I'm a people person through and through, but I really realized that technology was where it's at. And so I realized this is where I wanna be. I wanna drive efficiency, I wanna help people, I wanna educate.

And so I'm excited to be here with you. Jeff, what's your background like? Tell me here, let's tell the people.

So what's really kind of fascinating is I, I've got a lot of experience in sales and then marketing and then I've been in staffing now for over 10 years. But the interesting thing is I came from customer service. so much of my background is based in serving the community and making sure that people are happy and that they're satisfied and that things work and function the way that they're supposed to.

And that. carried over. As I shifted into sales and sales management, I took a more consultative approach, right? It was about building rapport and building connections and building network before, closing a deal. not that long ago, what I think like 12, 13 years ago, at this point, I got involved in staffing.

They were looking for the nerd that can connect the tools and build dashboards, and so. I entered in staffing with automation back then, and so I was building inside Salesforce and HubSpot and now all these platforms now have all these technologies embedded in them, which is fantastic. And so yeah, like it's been really amazing. I will say this, with this particular community, They have been phenomenal at welcoming voices into the space and providing opportunity to be able to share really good information and insights, which I'll also say like, that community has given me the confidence to do something like this with you.

You know, so I'm, I'm really excited about that.

I think the difference on that, and I think that's huge because I don't think any of us grew up saying we're gonna be in staffing, we. All have, I mean, I know for sure I, I didn't even know staffing existed. So I think that having that voice, I think having this audience, being able, we all have different backgrounds and bringing it.

I think this is huge. And so this is why I love going into this with you as well, because we do have different adaptive backgrounds and changes and where we can bring our different insights to everyone here.

That's awesome. So you do a lot in the community already, right? Like talk about some of the things that you've done across the industry, I guess at this point.

Yeah. One thing that's been important for me, and if anyone has not tuned in, you can always do so, but I have a passion for bringing technology partners together. we've been doing an entire technology webinar series of bridging the gap between technology and staffing firms and making it truly educational.

How can we bring different insights? We always leave the audience with one takeaway. What can you do right now? And that's a huge passion in the community. And I know for you, Jeff, you do a lot of mentoring and working in the industry, whether it's with SIA or with American Staffing Association, and so many other organizations like the community here.

So important to me as I know it is for you.

it's really cool. it's been a great journey to find your own individual voice, like how do you bring value to the community? But then I started having a lot of fun in doing these more collaborative elements or hosting panels, where you take the things that you know and allow them to stretch into spaces that you have limited insight on in order to create.

a lot more value around it. So it's been pretty awesome. So yeah, I thoroughly enjoy education. Like it truly is a passion of mine. Seeing the development of ideas, concepts, people, businessesit's incredibly rewarding for sure.

I absolutely love that. So let me ask, because I think everyone's gonna wanna know What's our mindset? What is our progression? Where are we today? What are we bringing to our team here?

So it's interesting in trying to sort of define this space, right, in order to kind of define, even like picking the name was brutal, but in defining the space, you know, I wanted it to mean for the people that are responsible for engineering, the success of an organization. And so.

Why do I think for the people? By the people, but.

But truly, like there are so many moving parts and like, you know, you need a mix of all of them. Like I know that We tend to crap on like people who are reactive and, and listen, you can't stay in a reactive mindset indefinitely. It isn't a very productive one, but you need to react a little bit, but you also need to be proactive too, right?

So like pulling those worlds together and letting people see like. You know educating them on how they can test, and measure the things that they're seeing, feeling, and try to like help them identify solutions on the way out. You know, so making sure that we're serving up that reactive, proactive transition period.

I think that like the reactive side actually allows folks to become proactive because you have to react to different situations, whatever it might be in, in life in general. And then once you do react, it allows you to have a proactive mindset so you don't have it happen again. So you're always thinking forward.

And I think that's such a key, a key aspect. So I think that's huge. And then with that. Which is our core is really being adaptive, that learning, the growing, the evolving, like what's worked, what's not worked, where do we need to pivot super quickly from that adaptive personality and adaptive kind of just mindset overall.

I mean, look, if you

thread it just right. the goal here is to get into more of a predictive element, right? Where you're consuming the right amount of resources, you're consuming the right information, you're testing things, in the environment that you have with your ecosystem and your people and your process in order to figure out. What does that look like for it to be successful in your organization? I love this like mindful kind of process and finding, that fits into your, ecosystem, your tech stack, your people, your process, like all of your things, 

I think that's huge. So basically, if I'm summarizing, because it's what we're all saying, so. Reactive, which will also drive proactive being adaptive, and then eventually getting into a truly predictive mindfulness and mindset for all of us.

Yeah, I think that's

Yep.

the name of the game and I think that sets a really good tone for what people can expect when they come back.

No, I think this is good. I mean, having that mindset is gonna help us build, help us drive, help everyone 1 step at a time. Here

True, true. Well,

I.

we are this far into this first episode, I also do wanna do a quick call out. So just to take a moment you know, the all things staffing brand has definitely emerged. It's finally live and available. and they're producing some fantastic reports. It's called the current. It's done on a weekly basis.

There's doing a lot of curation and consolidation of information. There are some predictive elements. It also sources information across the web as it relates to the topics that are important to that particular report. 

And so if you are looking for a quick five minute digestionThat report is available on all things staffing.com every single Monday. And like I said, it's about a five minute read. 

And if five minutes is a bit too long, good news in LinkedIn, on the All Things staffing page, you could subscribe to that newsletter. And that actually gives you a summary so you can basically get everything in like two minutes or less. So definitely subscribe to these things and make sure that you're staying ahead of the curve. 

I think that's great and you guys, the current truly gives you lots of current information and it is something I subscribe to and highly, highly recommend. So all things staffings.com or LinkedIn,

Yeah. Fantastic. Alright, so I think now that we do some of our housekeeping outta the way and we set the stage. let's talk about segments. Because I think as people come in, the goal of this, for me anywayI wanna make sure that we're rotating segments in so that that way we're contextual, we're hitting things at the time that people need it based on the timeliness of the information, but that we also feed them some evergreen concepts.

We bring in some experts. So let's talk pillars. 

Yep, let's do it.

Wanna dig in? Let's dig into like, education. So if education is a pillar of ours, like what kind of things do you hope that people will be able to get from us? let's even talk, maybe even some topic ideas. 

Yeah, I think that's probably good because when we kind of go back to that mindset of like the reactive, proactive, I like to do what was kind of our quarterly lookback. So what have we learned from the market? What have we learned from the industry? Where are we going moving forward? So I think that's something that we'll bring from a education standpoint.

And then I know one other big thing, which we do see a lot if you don't subscribe to the SIA industry analyst kind of newsletter. Then this is something you might not see, but you also see it in a lot of other spots, but m and a activity. So all those mergers and acquisitions, brand transitions, what's happening in the industry.

I know there's a few other things. I know, Jeff, that falls under education. I'll let you share that we'll bring to the table here.

So I mean, look, we're already in this time of year. So as you get towards end of year, annual planning is significant, right? So making sure that you're coordinating your efforts, evaluating where it is that you are, and trying to project out where it is that you wanna be tomorrow. I know that the past few years have been really challenging, so like making sure that we provide some information on growth funnels, client experience, and even maybe like misconceptions or misnomers as it relates to different elements that. interact or interface with your organization. So again, really good, clean, powerful information, good insights that don't have any sort of pitch to them, but are just simply sharing information to make sure people are better. so now if we go from there then I think another segment, another piece that we were talking about doing was perhaps like industry networks.

A hundred percent. I think industry networks is going to be key for us. So all of the different partners that we work with that are out there, I think it's good for people to know what is available. So we'll definitely chat through chapters. Events, all of that that's coming up. So I think that would be great.

I also wanted to bring something up that we missed on education, which is the topic that I think all of us talk about every single day, and I think will be good for everyone listening is also around. AI and that, how do we strategically support AI within the staffing industry. I know we're gonna do some segments on that, and I think that's something that people will definitely wanna hear, what's working, what's not, how to use it, when to use it, all that fun stuff.

But yeah, so to go back to industry networks, I mean, let's, when we think about industry networks, we have so many, so we're gonna chat through those. But also kind of a key thing is the events that also play in with that. So I know there's some upcoming events that we'll chat through as well.

And you know, I know that like. AI obviously fits in education, but it was a fantastic callback actually, because as we also think about certain interviews that we might be doing, I think it's really important to bring in executives who are already dealing with some of these things, or may have resolved some of these problems for the organizations. So, you know, this could be things just like, you know, innovation. I'd like to bring individuals in that can speak to innovative change, change management, digital transformation growth, even charity, right? Like.

Making sure. Once again, this is not supposed to be sort of a one size fits all.

This is supposed to be like a, a fits all, fits all. I wanna make sure that we are providing insights that can really help and support organizations through each of the areas of their growth and their journey. 

And I think that's key because right now we know that the staffing industry is going through its ups and downs. Hopefully we do show an up this year, but I think that it's also important to focus on lessons that we've learned when we've been in a down economy.

Right sizing our business, diversifying into different industries, how do we leverage partnerships that we have and what are the right partnerships that you should be leveraging so you can also help yourself? So kind of just driving that value. The expansion and different things I think will be really good for all of our listeners out there.

sure. So speaking of listeners, once again, Aaron, fantastic segue. So let's talk about who this is for. This is perfect. So who's gonna get the most out of this? I mean, clearly. I think like executives, like anybody that is in sort of like those leadership positions, I think they will benefit a lot from, the type of material that we're planning on bringing in or the individuals that we'll bring in as guests to be able to come in and have conversations.

But who else would fit into the mix that would gain.

Yeah, I definitely think this is gonna be key for some emerging, emerging leaders. Really. So the folks that have been in the industry for a while, they're looking at taking that next step. Where can they grow? Or maybe they're in like a truly a director role. They're looking at going into an executive role, or they're getting onto a board, they're going into a C-suite or.

I think that also the change makers, the change makers that are out there within these staffing firms. And Jeff, I don't know, you've worked with a lot of different change makers at different firms as well. I mean, how would you describe the changemaker?

So change makers are phenomenal. Those are sort of like, I feel like they're unsung heroes, right? Those are the individuals that are doing a lot of the work, but they're also exploring innovative ideas, and they're trying to bubble 'em up, bring 'em to the surface, It kind of nestles maybe within the emerging leaders, but maybe those are individuals that aren't necessarily looking to grow into a leadership role.

Maybe they just wanna grow into a more senior, seasoned individual doing the things that they're doing. those individuals who really take their craft very seriously and really try to adapt to new changes and new environments and new technologies. And I think there's a lot of them in our space that we probably. Don't give enough credit to but certainly are the individuals that are moving those stones uphill.

A hundred percent. And if you don't have a, like we always say, even like every day I am like, who's your change maker? Who's your change driver? So they are the key, key folks that are. Going to make even technology successful for you because they're gonna help stay behind it. Or any type of process rollout.

Whatever you're doing as a leader, you want change makers on your side. So change makers. This is also for you. So exec. So we covered executives, emerging leaders, and truly the change makers. So I think that, I think, I think that's perfect. We got it covered here.

Agreed. So look, let's just kind of do a quick wrap up, right? 'cause we're already a little over 20 minutes, so making sure we're being mindful of everyone's time. we are here to make sure that we're serving the community right, bringing really good information, really good resources in a quick digestible and hopefully slightly entertaining fashion. We're, we have a highly adaptive mindset, right? Like, I mean, Aaron, you've had to adapt through a, a ton, especially in terms of technology. There's so much that changes. So bringing that to the surface I think is gonna be really important. And then I think we're gonna have some really solid pillars that are gonna hold this whole structure up and, and really give a lot of form to what it is we're trying to do.

A hundred percent. So, I mean, definitely on the adaptive front, we're gonna develop the mindset, the systems to adapt. And eventually predict. So let's do this and excited for next week's session.

Excellent.