James Ayres: Great question, when you think about it, the first thing that comes to mind is finding talent, but that would be erroneous. The biggest challenge is mindset. It's not the mindset of the candidates. It's actually the mindset of the team that's helping you interview. It's having that leadership skill set. So what are we doing here? Why are we hiring? What is it we're looking for? How do we measure it? What tools do we use? How do we say this is a successful campaign?
What KPIs do we use? All these things, you have to get alignment, and the alignment is essentially the key to having a successful run out on your recruitment. Those things, everyone's got different opinion. And so when we think about how we are going to shape it, you have to take all of those ideas into consideration. So really, the biggest thing is getting aligned. That whole mindset about what we're looking at, and what does awesome look like in a candidate, and how do we evaluate?
And how do you gain insights into local markets thinking about your global experience needing to be in multiple different countries sometimes? How do you look at those insights to really understand candidates' journeys in different parts of the world?
James Ayres (03:06): I learned a lot in my experience by having obstacles that we think this is the path to go and we take this path, and something doesn't work. And so the first thing is, we can't assume that what works in the United States or in Canada, or Australia is all the same.
Each market is unique, but the journey of the candidate and how they arrived there, it can be somewhat similar.
I'll give you an example. When we think about the journey of a candidate, typically there's like five or six different points that they have to touch on, to verify whether or not they want to apply for a position. It could be everything from LinkedIn to a store, to Instagram, to friends that work in that organization. They have to get all that feedback and understanding, do I want to apply to this company or don't want to pass? They'll look at scores in the system, they'll look at the company's ratings, and then they'll make a determination if they want to pursue it.
I think anywhere you go in the world, people that want careers and grow, they want to find a company that's going to help them get there. And these are touch points that a lot of candidates go through no matter where you are.
Now, how they are attracted to a company is different. Some places, referrals are the number one thing in the world, we say hey, come on, join us. Other cases is actually brand, the actual company logo. They see a company they go, Wow, what a great company. They don't know anything about it, but they recognize the brand. And so being able to create a brand that attracts a certain profile of the candidate you're looking for that is along the values of your company, what you stand for, from a brand standpoint, that's a challenge and you have to be there in the forefront and have that vision before you even start to work in all these other countries. So there's a lot of different steps, but it's almost like when we go when we want to buy a product, you see a pair of shoes in the store.
And those of you that don't know, malls are, they are these ancient places - still brick and mortar they used to go to, now they seem to be disappearing. But let's just say for argument's sake, you're going through a mall, and you see a pair of shoes and say, That's really cool. Most likely, certainly back then certainly now to a point, you'll go and verify the price of that, at other stores that would carry it, if you're looking for the best price. The some people might say, I valued the customer service at this organization more than the price, it justifies why I would go to this place versus that place. So we'll say going to a restaurant, or you are that restaurant versus this restaurant. All these little data points are different for everyone. And it's no different when you come into recruitment and try to hire the top talent. They all have these different data points that they have to verify before they apply.
I want to dig into how you ensure hiring processes and practices are inclusive. I feel like this is one of the hardest things to get, because we're looking at resumes when we're recruiting, we're looking at how exciting it could be for some individual to work at the business and satisfy the need of the role. But when we're thinking about building teams, we're not just looking at the individual, we're looking at how this person comes into the team. And we're looking at making sure there's little to no bias in the process. So how do you ensure the processes and practices are inclusive?
James Ayres (06:40): When I think about looking at inclusivity, I look at things that are within the teams and recruitment. Everyone has got a strong vision as to what works doesn't work. Ultimately, all these things need to be paid attention to. When I look at teams, and we think about we want to have individuals with specific backgrounds, demographics. The key is everyone has to be on the same page. It's a mindset. It's not something that recruiters need to go out and find. It's something where we need to as an organization believe. And when we look at inclusive teams, one of the first lessons I ever learned was, when we have interview teams, they should be reflective of the organization that you are. So there should be an inclusive interview team, not just trying to find individuals that are from different backgrounds.
And it's one of those 'A'ha' moments. And I'll tell you that the 'A'ha' moment came when we, a company that I used to work at, we're focused on hiring individuals from a specific background. And we were losing, we weren't doing well. And so I kind of went through like What are we not- what's not working? And I kept on looking inward at our company. Maybe it was the questions. We were certainly attracting talent, but they weren't choosing us. I couldn't understand why we were keeping money or do all these things.
And then it dawned on me, one of the lessons that I've learned is that in order to really get deep insights, you have to find out what your customer wants, what their needs are, what they're looking for. And in this case, especially with talent, your customers are either hiring managers, or in a lot of cases, candidates.
So we've created a survey and wanted to find out what worked what didn't. But we did more than just a survey, like send somebody an Excel spreadsheet, and said fill this out. There's no skin in the game for that. We actually did phone calls, video calls, said we just want to learn what could we have done better. And the biggest thing that came back was as someone that came from different backgrounds, when they came into the interview, they didn't see anybody liked them. They felt isolated. They felt like they were the only one. And it made me realize we weren't doing what we said we were going to do and that was having an inclusive organization that includes your interview teams, and we weren't doing that. And so immediately crossed the board.
Any job has to be a reflection of exactly what our company is. And that was a big 'A'ha' moment. And after that things really started to change, because they saw people that they could actually emulate with and people that they feel comfortable with. That made a big difference.
I wonder how far up that goes in the sense of you have to have an inclusive recruiting team or panel, let's say for a candidate to actually meet and see people with different perspectives or similar perspectives, knowing what kind of culture they come into, right. But then in order to get that you need inclusive leadership, right, above them. And then you need an inclusive executive team, would you say that is true that there's the flow there that needs to happen or not so much?
James Ayres (10:17): Yeah, you totally need it. And sometimes you have to actually have pockets of where it's thriving. You need to have that champion that believes in the cause that you're doing, and to show the illustration like this makes such a massive difference. There's also a lot of cases, companies think that we have to hire certain individuals, then we're there. And I've learned that you're never there, you're always going to be growing, you're always going to be looking for top talent. And regardless, you have to have the buy in from leadership.
All the way at the top, it makes a lot easier when you have it from the top down. But a lot of cases, you have to take examples of smaller teams, where an experience because we measure candidate experience and something that I think is so vital to recruitment that when you have a positive outcome for any candidate, even if they don't get the job, that starts your social media chain of where people are talking about positive experiences. And in our world, recruitment 90% of the time, we tell people bad news. We make that experience so that they feel included, and that they have an opportunity to apply back if they had a good experience. And that whole inclusivity has to grow within pockets, and then show the difference it made not only to the individual that we hired, but the experiences that came through.
The difference it makes to the team all the way up the chain to the point where it's like, this is just a no brainer, we shouldn't be talking about this, you should be something that naturally comes. And that's what I like to build is an environment where organically, even before someone decides to apply, they know the logo, they know the company, they've seen the reviews, they go positive experiences.
Yeah, this is fabulous. They take away all those fears, that they will be treated well, that they will be evaluated exactly the way everyone should be evaluated, and that everyone that they interview is an inclusive and demographically equal break down. So big difference.
I want to go back to something you said, 'candidate experience.' What are the biggest factors that...contribute to the candidate experience?
James Ayres: It's like...
Felicia Shakiba: Yeah, you know what I'm going to say...haha
James Ayres (12:47): Yeah, it's not the shirt that you wear. I mean, at the end of the day, it's a candidate experience, you know, I have to go back to you know, I've been doing this for a few years now. And candidate experience was something that when I first started, wasn't even in the ballpark, if I can use that term, I wasn't even on the playing field. At the end of the day, the employer was the one that said, I've got the job, you want it, show me what you can do. And things have changed. And when we look at things now that have come to the forefront, like candidate experience, it actually comes from the mindset of almost like a product mind shift.
It's borrowed from the sense of that everyone that we meet in our world, depending on what company you work for, is potentially a customer. And if we treat our candidates like potential customers, does our mindset change in how we look at them? And really, ultimately, it shouldn't. It should be something where we treat everyone like they are people and humans and that they have an opportunity to make a difference at a company.
But in the past years and years ago, that wasn't even on the forefront. And so now you fast forward and okay 'candidate experience.' Why is that important? I touched on it earlier. In my world, out of all the applications that we get in the majority of them, don't get the job. And it's not because it's a lack of trying just there's the competition is so immense.
The idea is if we have the philosophy and mindset that anyone that comes to our company, first off, honored that you would choose my company.
Your application process, what was that, like? When you came through, did someone reach out to you within 24 hours? When you did have an interview with a candidate, how did that go? How did you feel when you move to progress through the actual interview teams? Did you feel like you had an inclusive nature? Did you feel comfortable? All these test points are the same thing that we would do if we were buying a car or if we were going to a restaurant, how you would feel throughout the whole process because if someone is going through this and they don't get the job, the one thing we can control is how they're treated. If we do those things, right, maybe it didn't come to terms on dollars, maybe it was just another candidate.
And what I found that is candidates go through a positive experience, and they provide their feedback, like I'm looking at how can we get better? How do you feel? If we do that diligently, then nine out of 10 are going to come back and say, I want to go work there. And it's something that actually I went through myself early in my career, there was a company that I interviewed with, and I didn't get the job, I was gutted, I was literally so like, I so wanted it. But the way they made me feel, made me realize, I gonna keep my eyes on that company. And I'm gonna do everything I can, so that next time I do get that job. And I got to learn from all those things that maybe I wasn't so great at. And sure enough, six months later, got back in the process. And this time, nailed it, and really nailed it.
I want to drill down to the nitty gritty of things. How do you localize job descriptions and requirements appropriately for these various markets that are completely different from one another?
James Ayres (16:27): I'll tell you; you learn by - so I'm Canadian build transparency, I'm Canadian. So it seems like anywhere I go in the world, Canadians are known for saying I'm sorry, which is funny, because I'm like, well, we didn't do anything. But we're known for saying sorry. So whenever I'm in another country, and they hear me say, oh, sorry, whether I'm opening up the door- it's one of those things that just goes with being Canadian. And the other piece is humor.
I think for a lot of Canadians, we have a lot of Canadians that are in the business of humor. And so going to new markets, going with a mindset and also with a heart that wants to do the best, a lot of times when going to these markets and posting positions, you just cookie cut, you take the job description, the United States or Canada and you get posted the other country. All right, why aren't they applying? What you realize is that the way words are spelled the way they're laid out, slang, is different in every country.
And I'll give you an example. I'll give you two examples. One example, for one company, I was based in Australia, Sydney, Australia. And we had a job description, and I wanted to get it posted. So I took the job posting, I think, from Canadian jobs, and just posted it. And waiting for people to apply, and we got into the interview process with some candidates. And two of the final candidates said, hey, you know, it's been a great experience, because we're asking, how is your experience? So it's great. Everyone is treating me well, asking great questions.
But I do have one suggestion. I said Okay, great. Change your job description. Like why, what's wrong? He said, you're using American English. And we want to feel as Australians that we're working for an Australian company, because we feel like if we work in an organization, where it's just an afterthought, as people we don't know if do you know our market? Are you valuing, how we speak, how we talk, how we write?
I realized the littlest of things, to me, could be the biggest things to others.
That was one big 'A'ha,' to literally where I changed job descriptions completely. And you know, why we do video job descriptions with an Australian, where they get actually talk this thing because I don't understand Australian some parents and half my family is Australian. So you know, good on you, mate. I was like, what are you talking about? I don't even know what's going on.
But it's one of those things where we celebrate the differences. But we also learn from the things that make us go 'hmm, I didn't know that.' So that was a an 'A'ha' moment, just in certain words. Like the word color is spelt differently in Australia. Certain things that are have a 'u' instead of an 'o' they're normal. But just somebody that's in that country, when they see spelling different than what is normal in their country, they immediately go, 'Is that a yellow flag? Or are they just not aware?' It takes away from the splendor of the candidate experience.
Felicia Shakiba: I think that's a good example. I can relate to that when I'm hiring, and I'm in an interview with someone or with a candidate, I can tell what kind of experiences they've had, depending on the type of vernacular that they might use. And so they're tiny details that impact -have great impact.
James Ayres: Absolutely, yeah. And the other thing, too, that's kind of neat is that even if I take you closer to home, I'm in Canada and Canada, of course, you've got mountains in the West, you've got the sea, Atlantic, East. And we have provinces, not states. So even now, I kind of chuckle when I see some job postings that mention the state in Canada. They didn't put province. So basically, make you kind of think, okay, do they know the market? But it's also one of the things I like in certain places like the province of Quebec, our French hub, Canada, it's important that decisions are posted in French, because it's actually along the lines of the law.
And those are things that also make a huge difference to showing that you understand those particular matters, that only somebody that would have done their due diligence to the province would be aware of. And that makes a huge difference, especially when you are coming outside of the country. It just shows those individuals that, hey, good for them, they figured that one out, I'm going to continue this journey.
I want to spring back up to a more high-level question, because I know that when working with various leaders, and helping them hire, I'm sure you've encountered some resistors to your process or your strategy. Can you share an example of this, and what was the outcome?
James Ayres (21:44): Never... we never. For recruits taking too long to hire, it's always hiring managers fault, right? Isn't that the...haha Look, it's very common. When we think about the resistance, it's a point of view, it's coming in, say, Hey, I got a great idea. I want to try and do this recruit, and someone's like, Nope, this is how we do it. And I've come across a few. A lot of times it comes into systematic processes. I've never heard a hiring manager that sees a different point of view, saying, hey, I want to use these other behavioral based interview questions and competencies.
If I did, I'd love that that's always a great thing. It's typically based around skills is basically based around a resume. And a lot of times, it's because they had bad experiences once or twice. And part of it is to unwind that some markets, we call it baggage. In other markets, it's just bad experiences that they would have had. And so to illustrate a way or a path forward, one, getting back that alignment, every recruiter that I've worked with, including myself, at any level, one of the first things you do as a recruiter is to sit down you have a hiring plan or an intake call.
What are some of the KPIs or the ROI on this position? Like we get pretty deep. And part of that is so that hiring managers and recruiters are aligned, not just the skills, but what is the scope of this role? And where are we going with it, because if we're aligned as we go through a hiring plan, then we should be aligned on how we evaluate that because it's on that form. But when we're changing points of view, one of the best pieces of advice I would provide anyone is you can't just come in and say we're doing it this way, because that's the way.
You have to illustrate through experiences. So I mentioned a little bit about candidate experience, we actually measure the candidate experience for numerous reasons, not only how they involve themselves in the company, and part of that is also to provide feedback to the interviewers. I've worked in companies before where candidates said, Hey, I'd love to come work there, but I just didn't have a great experience. Could be everything from questions that were asked weren't appropriate or cameras were not turned on. If you're doing zoom or a team's call, you need this vital information. Essentially, what you're doing is you're collecting data, and you're trying to influence with data. Because when you have data, it's not my opinion, it's not the hiring manager's opinion, it's the customer. And the customer, or the process is ultimately what is the determining factor on whether it's somebody or not.
If you're selling a product, you would look at your sales figures. If it was something along the lines of a performance as an athlete, did you run faster this week versus last week or this week? What did you do differently? By providing that data, that's how you lead and part of that data collection, look at all the sources and measure, there's 2030 different types of data points you can pull from that all can point in certain direction.
And so the biggest thing is when working with managers or leaders that aren't in the same mindset that we are, we have to get them there as part of what our job is to take them on the journey. And part of that journey is, come on in, I got to drive the car, you're gonna sit next to me, and I'm going to show you the pathway that our candidates take and how they feel going through it. And here's the data whether it's on Glassdoor, whether it's on LinkedIn, maybe it's the number of hits, number of reapplications, referrals, all these different things lead into why data is so vital, and how we can change mindsets using that data. It's vital.
Felicia Shakiba: I love that you said and talked about data, because I think both qualitative and quantitative data are equally important. And I want to jump into my last question, because during our previous conversations, you hinted at your unique approach to recruiting and hiring exceptional talent, referring to it as your secret sauce.
Could you share how recruiters can pinpoint precisely the right candidate to pursue?
James Ayres: It's something I learned, it's something that I saw done, and I went, What a cool idea. And it was something I went through personally. And so the secret sauce is this, if you're a recruiter, and a lot of times, you're getting a list of demands, almost these are the things I need to have, and you need to be a purple unicorn or whatever they you're looking, it's difficult to understand, okay, am I looking for skills, and am I looking for competencies? I don't even quite understand the job. I'm reading the job description; I got a general idea. Maybe you've hopped on YouTube, and what exactly is SQL? Do you code? Wait, what's that, like Java? What, I don't know, I don't know how to do that. The question is, how are you going to know the person that you need to hire unless you understand the role? Early in my career, great piece of advice has been given to me that I was struggling with a role.
I think it was actually in a call center in early days. And I was working at this call center. That candidates are asking me like how many calls you're making, like, what the day is like for them, where are the pluses or minuses? They said, why don't you go hang out with the call center people? And I said, 'Really?' Yeah, go sit with them, find out how they do it. Watch them. Study them. So I went, okay, I thought it was a free day, I was like, well, I don't have to recruit, I can just go hang out with the call center. And what it gave me was such a richness of getting to the real crux of what you're hiring for. The individuals why they chose the job, I spoke to probably 15 people on the floor of that call center that day.
What do you love about the job? What don't you love the job? What do you spend most your time doing? Tell me the system you're working on? Do you actually manually put that in every single time? Do you like that part? What things do you enjoy? What things don't you enjoy? And you just study it. And as recruiters, this is like, you're literally sitting in a forum watching people do what they do, and you're picking up on all these things. At the time, I was like, this is fascinating. Now we call them, like follow me home. Or in marketing, a lot of times, it's when they give a product to a potential customer, and everyone goes behind the glass window, and they kind of watch people play with stuff and they say, 'Look how they do it.' They're studying the behavior of how that person interacts with the product.
And this is the same thing as recruiters, you cannot be expected to go and hire a job, which all you have is a word job description, and know that you found that person. So sitting with them, and what I call them embedded. So now, before you even start talking to the candidate, you need to understand the environment, the people that work there, what they like what they don't like, and you can get so much from a hiring manager. But when you're living and breathing it, you have to walk a day in the shoes, and you'll understand what the challenges are, what the successes are, and that way when you're actually talking with candidates, you have a better understanding of what works and what doesn't.
And so the candidate who really wants to have that type of career will be hopefully impressed by that recruiter knowing so many details about a position that they will become more and more interested in the positions that go on the journey. So it's something that, you know, I don't tell our recruiters now just to do a day, I actually tell them to go for a week and just really get to know it. So that's a huge one.
Felicia Shakiba: That's great advice. And, James, thank you so much for being here today and sharing your incredible insights on how to create this an amazing global talent acquisition strategy. Thank you so much for being here.
James Ayres: It's been a pleasure. And thank you so much for the time. What a great platform. Thank you.
Felicia Shakiba: That's James Ayres, Global Talent Acquisition Leader at Archlynk from Canada.
