Definition of The Great Resignation

Episode 1018: Definition of The Great Resignation, with Art Boulay and Sue MacArthur

Definition of the great resignation — Learn more factors contributing to resignation by exploring our guide on the definition of the great resignation.

What is the definition of the great resignation? Art and Sue are the best teachers for today’s topic on that one.

Art Boulay’s Biography:

Art Boulay, MBA, is CEO of Strategic Talent Management, a consulting firm he co-founded based in Maine with clients all over the US. Like you, he recognizes that organizations spend lots of money solving problems caused by a lack of soft skills among their leaders, managers, employees and new hires. He is an expert in solving those people challenges.

Art brings practical ideas, humor and common sense solutions to each assignment. He specializes in organizational planning, succession & leadership, and is a certified behavioral and leadership coach. He is an expert in applying assessment tools to solve real-world challenges in coaching & development, hiring, promotion and recruitment.

Art has lived in Maine most of his life and enjoys hiking and camping in the beautiful north woods of Maine. He currently makes his home in Brunswick, Maine with his wife Lori.

Sue MacArthur’s Biography:

Sue MacArthur has developed Strategic Talent Management’s national recruiting practice into being one of four key service areas. Prior to joining STM, Sue had a dynamic career in the areas of human resources and operations. She has worked for Westin Hotels, John Hancock Financial Services, and Manpower Staffing Services; and has worn many hats with a variety of startup companies.

Leadership, people, and problem-solving are her passions. Sue’s non-traditional career path allows her to bring unique insights and diverse perspectives to complex situations and produce innovative solutions. As a reformed politician, building consensus and trust come naturally to Sue, which allows her to create relationships, build rapport, and understand the needs of others. Sue’s professional strategy moving forward is to bring her expertise, experience, and passions together to leave a positive legacy.

What you’ll learn in this episode is about the definition of the great resignation: 

• Art shares how he co-founded Strategic Talent Management, and he explains how his business has evolved over its existence
• Sue shares how she joined STM and quickly began helping to grow the business and evolving the solutions STM offers its clients
• Learn about the definition of the great resignation
• Why the recurring theme Sue hears from employees leaving their jobs is “I just couldn’t go back there”, and what factors are contributing to The Great Resignation
• Why your employer branding needs to be honest, clear, direct, and should avoid sounding too generic or overly rosy
• Why it’s equally important for candidates to know who they are and what their goals for their career are, and how Art and Sue help candidates clarify their aspirations
• How STM’s assessment works, what data points and tools they use, and how their process helps match ideal employers with right-fit candidates
• Art shares how his team helps employers avoid “bad hire” situations, and he shares how hiring mediocre performers is a bigger problem than hiring bad performers
• Why you shouldn’t be looking for “perfect candidates” but rather should be focusing on what you need in a role and then finding someone who fits those needs
• How behavioral assessment tools (such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator) can be useful for learning more about potential hires and how they would fit into the team
• Why your existing team can be an outstanding resource for building a pipeline for talent and bringing in great candidates even during The Great Resignation

Additional Resources:

• Email: [email protected]
• Here are more ideas about the definition of the great resignation
• Learn more about the definition of the great resignation, and you can find Art and Sue here.
• Website: https://strategictalentmgmt.com/
• Art’s LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/artboulay/
• Sue’s LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/suemacarthur/
• LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/strategic-talent-management/
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/Strategic-Talent-Management-77066671390

 

 

Definition of The Great Resignation – Full Episode Transcript

 

Get ready to find your recipe for success from America’s top business owners here at Onward Nation with your host, Stephen Woessner.

 

Good morning. I’m Stephen Woessner, CEO of Predictive ROI And your host for Onward Nation, where I interviewed today’s top business owners. So we can learn their recipe for success, how they built and scaled their business, and write now, candidly, what the key constraints to all of us being able to build and scale our businesses is recruiting and retaining top talent. We’re hearing terms like The Great Resignation, or you might be having lunch with the fellow business owner. And she says to you, well, we just lost Sarah on our team company. XYZ offered her a 50% increase in salary and better benefits. 

 

You know, what we couldn’t afford to match it. Well, as you know, Onward, I spend much of my time each day with business owners. I will tell you about building a pipeline for talent, retaining talent, and why we’re even at this stage. Well, those are topics that are dominating those conversations, and I wish somehow predictive ROI was immune to all of this. Still, the last we, of course, or not, I mean, we recently decided to expand our team by adding a new account supervisor position. Yay for that. Then, we decided to hire a professional recruiter who has a depth of expertise in recruiting for these types of positions. Well, when it came time to discuss compensation for the position Onward Nation, and they shared their expertise from working in the trenches with candidates across the country on behalf of all of their clients, the discussion was a, let’s just call it a dose of reality for me at my leadership team, candidly, my immediate reaction was going into shock than a bit of disbelief than a whole lot of me being uncomfortable. 

 

And then all of that was replaced with me thinking, okay, this time to further level up the business, how do we do that? So, I realized that the context I’m sharing with you is not unique. And you may have a very similar, if not the exact same, story to tell. So what are the solutions, or at least what are some data points you should consider, perhaps some trends to pay attention to, or how could you put yourself in the best possible position to recruit well and then actually build a pipeline for talent? So he went on the surface. It seems like the current conditions would say that the heat of the job market makes having a pipeline for talent impossible while helping us sort through all of that. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Art and Sue Introduction

 

And that’s a lot to sort through. I get it. I invited Art Boulay and Sue MacArthur to join us as our guest experts. So our ensues lead strategic talent management. And by the way, they’re the recruiting experts. He gave me that sobering reality that I mentioned just a few minutes ago. They absolutely know their stuff, without a doubt. So, for additional context, we don’t make hiring decisions here or a predictive ROI without getting their assessment of the candidates and how best to structure that position. That’s how much we trust the opinion of Art and Sue or opinions, I guess I should say. They also run point on our recruiting process, and they’ve taught us a lot along the way, given that the battle for top talent is impacting all of us. 

 

I mean, it’s not just obviously UHS here at Onward. I asked Art and Sue if they would be willing to share some of their helpful insights and recommendations during this conversation yay, and they said yes. So, without further ado, welcome to Onward Nation Art and Sue. Good morning, Onward Nation. Very nice to be here with you, Stephen. Good morning. Art, thank you again for saying yes. As I mentioned, I’m very excited for us to have this conversation because I think it is going to be extremely helpful to all of our listeners we are all sort of feeling the same constraint in varying degrees, of course, but we’re all feeling this constraint to growth before we dive in M cause I’m sure is just a little bit of context around STM, a little bit of context in the relationship that you have with Predictive and how much we value that, take us behind the curtain, ah, at STM and your paths and your journeys. 

 

Ah, and then we’ll dive in with you with what I’m sure he is going to feel like a broad question: are you coming in or coming your way? So, but take us behind the curtain first. Sure. I can kick that off a boat. 30 years ago, I founded STM with a colleague who is a sense retired. And we began our excursion into the business world. As business coaches, we hit both and had a lot of experience as managers, salespeople, executives, and so forth. And then, we took that to our smaller clients here in Northern New England as business coaches. Very quickly, we began to realize that what our clients really needed to hear from us was a better understanding of their people and their staff, which led us to invest in assessment tools. 

 

A did just that. Over the years, those coaching clients began to ask for help in hiring selection and promotion. This is decisions and so forth. And that really led to our first major evolution in the business, which was being clear that we weren’t so much strictly about coaching and learning about business as we were about knowing yourself and knowing your people. And that really has been the bedrock of our business ever since a PSU. I’ll let you introduce yourself here, but about what five or six years ago, I approached my old friend Sue and said, Hey, why don’t we join forces? 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: The Value of Seeking Expert Advice

 

And she luckily said yes. So I’ll let you let you take it away.

 

Yes, well, as Art mentioned, he founded STM 30 years ago, and I have known each other almost that long, but it wasn’t until about five years ago that he said we’ve been talking over the years about working together. We should make that happen. So he brought me on board, and initially, my role was to develop a new area of service. Art has done some recruiting over the years, but it’s very time-consuming, and it takes a lot of resources. So, he brought me on board to help grow that part of the business. So now that just becomes part of the suite of ways we can solve people’s challenges. 

 

And to that, a love that. And especially because you recognize this opportunity now to solve the problem. And now that that opportunity is a really big problem for many business owners who are listening to both of you right now, and Onward, for some additional context here. The reason why I said in my introduction that we now talk with Art and Sue and the team STM about every single hiring decision that we make is that it wasn’t always that way. We didn’t always ask for input every single time. And guess what? When we did it, we paid the price. We hired some people a day to join our predictive team, who left right away in some instances. 

 

I think our shortest is four days or the quickest turnaround. He was four days in. And because there are all sorts of stories. But the point is that we didn’t seek the advice. We didn’t seek an expert opinion. We thought, oh, we’re just going to go on our own and make that type of decision because we needed to make a fast decision, or so we thought, and then we paid the price. And so we’ve learned over a trial and error taking her or lumps, but you have super smart people around, you were going to ask them to share their expertise. And every single time that we’ve asked, they’ve been right every single time that we’ve chosen not to and have gone on our own. 

 

Thankfully, we don’t do that anymore. We were wrong. So yeah, let’s stop doing that and ask the really smart people for their expertise. So, guys, I guess that’s also a thank you for being so willing to share your smarts and expertise with our team. We’re very grateful for that. So thank you, our pleasure, and what you are and what you said to Stephen and to me is the learning process. But most entrepreneurs go through it, and I started probably on the same wavelength. Oh, I could do it at all. I’ve got to training, I’ve got to experience, and whether it’s writing the content or, in my case, a tr trying to build out a new business service from my clients or your best bet, especially is a small business owner, his to get the experts to help you support or support their small businesses, you will accomplish a lot more, and it will be a lot faster, ultimately probably cheaper too in the long run. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Understanding the Shift in Workforce Dynamics

 

Oh my gosh. And certainly a lot less frustrating. Yeah. There you go. So let’s go to the high level here first. So let’s kind of think macro, if you would love for a while to get your assessment, but both of your assessments, if you will, or kind of like, if you want to call it an assessment or state or the union or something around The Great Resignation as to like why we’re seeing that happen. So, in any thoughts and opinions around that topic, like why, why is that happening? I’ve not seen that in my couple of decades as a business owner, a career that happened before we were 4 million people in the month of April just resigned and walked away to do different things. Why is that happening? 

 

Definition of the great resignation – Do you think there’s a theme to what I hear from people when I interview them? And that is, I just couldn’t imagine going back there, and they’d been working from home, or they had been laid off, and it gave people a lot of time to think about what they really wanted. And am I really happy? So, I hear similar stories time and time again. I just couldn’t go back there. Sometimes, it’s a matter of their employer not being willing to continue a remote arrangement, and they had the employee find that that was really working for them. 

 

Continuation of the definition of the great resignation – Some of them opened up opportunities to live a lifestyle that they’d always wanted to live. I spoke with one woman recently who didn’t go back when her company returned to work because she had always wanted to have a farm. And during COVID, she and her husband bought a farm in a rural area, and she was working remotely, and it was a perfect situation for her. And when her company, he said, no, you can not continue to work that way; it is her time to go. 

 

And I think building on that too, this is very new; I mean, it’d probably happen here, and they’re all over the years. But what Sue is describing is a new phenomenon of people really kind of rethinking, and let’s face it. We all have hectic lives, and having 18 months of staring at your navel and having nobody but your spouse and pets to talk to, we think differently. So that is new. Whereas two, three, or four years ago, retention was largely about management problems. We weren’t treating our people well; we weren’t communicating well. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Navigating Through the Chaos of Recruitment in the Great Resignation Era

 

Here is a Definition of the great resignation:

I spent a lot of my coaching hours talking about those very things, and that’s still part of the issue, but as soon as pointed out, people have. And I think probably in the long run, it is for the best people are really exercising, those dreams, doing what they love and things we’ll eventually sort out the butt. In the meantime, it’s a bit chaotic, and we’re suffering from the exact same things here at SDM as we were looking to hire our new team members. So it’s not, you necessarily, it’s the condition, and we just have to, I think, refocus on the things that we know make hiring decisions more effective and more permanent. 

 

Ah, and maybe now more than ever, those things are irrelevant to talk about, which is exactly what he brings us together today. Okay. There are a lot of golden nuggets than that. Let’s start flexing that apart by going back to what Sue just mentioned, where they have this scenario first. So you and the team are in the trenches looking to recruit candidates for exposition that your clients have engaged you for, and it sounds like some of the feedback as to why somebody might be available, you hear a lot of people say, I just couldn’t imagine going back there. 

 

I think that’s what I’m hearing, right? The candidates are sharing it with you, right? 

 

Definition of the great resignation? For a variety of reasons. It may just be that it was a remote situation that changed their thinking. But in some cases, it’s just that I didn’t realize how miserable I was at this company or in having some time away. He gave them the perspective they needed to have the courage to make a change. And if you want to be in the job market right now, it’s the perfect time because there are so many opportunities available. So it’s also less of a risk to make a change. 

 

It’s fascinating because when you just said, I didn’t realize how miserable I was because when I wrote this in my notes, I just couldn’t imagine going back there, and I put that in quotes because, you know, you had said that. And then I thought, as soon as you were talking, I kept going back to that word. They’re like, I couldn’t imagine going back to work there. And I literally have a word written in my notes; that’s a powerful word. And so now you just, I’m hooking that into the miserable feeling of the work. And so, is that what this is? That is why so many people are really re-evaluating what the experience was with their current employer or previous employer, if they’ve already left and then thinking, you know what this as art so eloquently put staring at their navel for the last period of time, it gave them a chance to reevaluate everything, including the relationship with work, right? 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Attracting the Right Talent for Your Company Culture

 

That’s exactly it, it’s remarkable, I’ve never seen anything like this. I’ve been in and out of recruiting for the last 30 years. I’ve never seen anything like that. Does it mean that if employer branding has become a critical part of scaling a business, you are not positioning yourself to be attractive to candidates in some way if you’re not making that effort and you’re not following through on the promises that you present as your image, then you’re going to struggle more than most people are selected? 

 

So, let’s take the employer branding piece. I mean, you started to break that down there, but let’s keep peeling that back. Like, so, from a recruiter perspective, right? In your helping a client, what are some of the things that you want to see that employer do in order to seem desirable using Art’s words? So, the position feels like this. This could be my next forever position, right? I can feel some permanency in this position because of how I feel about the company. So, what are some of the things the two of you feel fit into that category of employer branding? Well, I’m going to jump in here because I think the first thing that occurs to me is how many times employer branding, like, like a lot of planning and strategic statements that we see coming out of my clients and value statement and so forth, they are often too generic we want to make sure we appeal to everybody. 

 

Definition of the great resignation? So, we use the appropriate words. And we end up really saying nothing about who we are. And I think the first step is to be honest with ourselves: What are we really all about here at this company? What do we really believe? What does it really like to work here? Not so much because you’re trying to appeal to every single applicant who might possibly take as a sideways glance that you’re job had, but to be clear and direct and honest, because if you’re all about the bottom line and you all work hard and you work late and you work long hours and so on and so forth, get that out there because there are people who love that idea. 

 

And you might as well spend a day, spend some of that time, this incentivizing people from applying, who just aren’t ever gonna match or a culture than to kind of paint an overly rosy picture, that appeals, which you think appeals to everyone may well appeal to no. And so I think the first step is to be clear and true about what we’re really about because those are the people you want to attract. I don’t know, Sue, maybe you can stay at their more eloquently. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Building a Successful Recruitment Strategy

 

No, I’m not sure I can say the more eloquently, but I think a big piece of this issue is setting very clear expectations at every step of the process. From the minute you put out an ad through every step of the interview and screening process, you need to be painting the picture of what your company’s all about and what makes you different and special and appealing to the right person. So, it’s all about setting expectations. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve interviewed people who I see a quick turnaround on their resume. And when I ask you why you have only been there for six months. 

 

It was not what I expected. That’s why they leave. 

 

Okay. So let me actually come back to that in just a second because that’s really awesome. I just don’t want to shift gears here too quickly. So, I want to recap a couple of these points here because we were starting to build out a checklist here. It’s not my intent, but this is a really cool way that it’s a sort of a coming out here. So, you mentioned being too generic. And then when that happens, because we were trying to think of, or I’m going to, I’m going to have this broad appeal so that every candidate loves me. Then we ended up saying nothing. And I think if so, I’m sort of paraphrasing, but giving this back to you, we needed to be honest with ourselves so that we can then be clear and true with our candidates. 

 

Why would you agree with how I sort of edited that or paraphrased that yeah, absolutely. And again, I think Sue is adding in the expectations as part of that because, again, if we expect people to work long hours and so on and so forth, let’s be clear about that. As I said, some people are kind of excited about that; that’s their natural work habit. If somebody’s looking to cruise through six and a half hours a day and have a long lunch and be totally relaxed about it, they may, or they may have a response to your ad, but they are clearly not going to be there, not going to find a home. There, so let’s be clear about those expectations right up front. 

 

And again, I think it goes back to that statement. I made earlier know yourself, know your people. No, you’re a culture of it. That’s how you are successful. If you are clear about that, and you can state that clearly to the job candidates and even potential clients a day, that’s how you get good long-term employees and good long-term clients,, and have a successful way to build and scale your business. Well, Sue, going to your point about expectations. So, you described a person who found that she actually enjoyed working remotely. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Understanding the Risks in Recruitment

 

It was a dream of her and her husband to have a farm at some point in time. And they did that and really actually enjoyed that. So then we kind of go with Art’s scenario, have the company that has the hard charger work late, blah, blah, blah. You know, all of that kind of stuff. If somehow they had or incentivized that person to the point where she joined that team because she was able to work remotely or whatever, that’s going to be a cultural clash like this, right? I mean, she is going to feel very conflicted or incongruent, or whatever, or maybe that will lead to this six-month turnaround or maybe even shorter. Right, Sue. 

 

Wow. You just said four days, they can be there, but you know. The scratcher when that happened for us, but you know, shocking. 

 

What is the definition of the great resignation for clients?  You know, and the other thing we’re seeing with quick turnarounds is sometimes they just get another offer they’ve committed to you. They’ve started. Another company comes along that they maybe had interviewed with a month ago, and it’s like trying to buy a house right now, and you get multiple offers. You get offers above the asking price. It’s hard candidates are like, how is it? And there’s just a lot of competition.

 

I might add there, too. Is it just as it is important for the company to be clear about who they are, who they’re interested in attracting, and what their culture is, we spent a lot of time and our assessment process and interviewing process, making sure of the candidate who knows what they learned and where are there going and who they are. Because as Sue said, if they are not clear or we often will do a writeup that says this person will be attracted to the next shiny object that comes along. And that is to say, the next shiny job offer or the next, you know, a modest pay raise or improvement in benefits or whatever. 

 

But again, that’s a symptom of the candidate really not knowing who they are and what they want. So that’s the power we take ourselves, but it’s the corollary to the company, and knowing themselves does, as well as whether the candidates really know themselves. And frankly, what is the risk of bringing on this Canada? They may have perfect resumes, or they may interview a beautiful, but if they don’t really know what they want, and we’re going to tell you, the risk is very, very high and proceed with caution if at all, but it’s the same, it’s really the same two sides of the same coin. Okay. So a couple of the things with, with that first it occurred to me as, as, as we’ve referenced kind to the four days, a couple of times in this conversation, I feel like I need to give a full and transparent disclaimer to Onward Nation to this candidate did not come from Sue and Art. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: The Value of Data-Driven Hiring Practices

 

Definition of the great resignation? And again, this was an instance, right? This was an instance of Predictive going sort of off the rails, if you will, of kind of doing our own thing. It was also Before we deepened our relationship with Art and Sue. I just wanna be a hundred percent a disclaimer there because I knew I didn’t want any mixed context there. So thank you for that. Then, we also have the candidate piece because we have seen your assessments on many, many candidates. And there have been times when it’s like this one is a unicorn in, and you need to proceed down this path right away for these reasons. 

 

What is the definition of the great resignation in a different workplace? We’ve also seen the assessments of stop running in completely different directions. I’m putting it in my language, like, do not hire this person for these reasons. And I will tell you, as a business owner, that level of clarity for our decision-making, and then we’ve also seen something in the middle where it was like, this is the assessment in there could be some risks here, candidly. We think these are the things that you should ask in the next interview, which has been extremely helpful to us, and the way that you serve that up. So I think that that is an extremely valuable process from now on, whether you decide to work with art and team or somebody different who has that level of data. So, making data-based decisions is extremely valuable. 

 

So, I think you guys have done that. I know you’ve done it thousands of times, but can you quantify that a little bit? I know you have thousands of data points on this. Well, we have about 15,000 people on our database that we’ve assessed in the past. And I think on each, each one, depending on the timeframe, there were probably a hundred unique data points. And I say that with all due humility because people are complicated, and a hundred data points is still a pretty meager assessment. But what we find is that most of our clients who are familiar with assessment tools and so forth are really focused on behavioral instruments, and behavioral instruments, depending on how you count, are really have for, to maybe eight or 10 data points a day. 

 

And so looking at behavior alone, which is something that you can even figure out by listening to this podcast, you can get a sense of soon as behavior Stephen’s behavior arts behavior because we were all pretty good at that. A behavioral assessment points out some subtleties that you missed, but behavior is not related to success. When we hear stories like, you know, like you are relating about mistakes you’ve made in the hiring process, it’s often because we do connect with people with whom we share behavior. So if you’re outgoing and people-oriented, approachable, and you like to joke around a little bit, we’re all gonna like each other. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Assessing Attitudes, Beliefs, and Values in Hiring

 

Another definition of the great resignation – So immediately, we put an arm around that person. Well, they say we like their behavior. They might share my values. They might share my beliefs. I might share my attitudes, but those are three different assessments. You assess individuals, but those are three very different categories. Attitude motivator’s belief systems. If you’re not measuring those separately than a year or missing, you’re missing an opportunity, particularly missing the opportunity to find out how that person will actually handle the job that you’re looking to bring them in for. 

 

And I’ll give you a perfect example of what just happened this week, or one of my oldest clients sent along or a very highly qualified business development person with a long resume for a long resume of success and some excellent, what do you call them reviews from a reference? That’s the keyword references from people. So those references were outstanding and looked fantastic. Okay. And had a behavior style that you might associate with a really good salesperson: approachable, friendly, a little lighthearted, and so forth. But when we got down to the nuts and bolts, it was specifically what we call the world view of how this person viewed his role as a leader. Frankly, it was terrible. 

 

Oh, the fact that I didn’t even do the write-up the way I normally do the write-up. I simply said the scores are just a Bismal for somebody who is going to manage and build out a team for you. It’s not going to happen. And it also turned out that on a self side, a will just say his ego was highly developed. The problem here is that in a while, one may come across self-confidence, and sometimes, there is a fine line between self-confidence at ego. The takeaway I had was this person who is really about himself; he was not going to be a boat, my client’s team, or building their business or anything else. 

 

They were a little skeptical because of the wonderful feedback they had from his references. But the key came after I sent the report. They made a few phone calls to people in the industry and discovered that people really didn’t like working with this guy. They discovered there were a lot of flies than the ointment that they would have missed completely because behaviorally a resume oriented, even the references he provided were all Steller. I mean, if I stellar to the point where my client was not quite sure, then Art was on the right track. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: The High Cost of Mediocre Performers

 

We gave them enough to say, gee, let’s take one more step. And fortunately, they did. They took that extra step of making a few personal phone calls and discovered there was too much of what we’re pointing out. The assessment wasn’t a reality, and they knew they needed to pass on this individual. Now, whether that person worked with him for four days, four months, or four years, the problem is that the cost is tremendous. Not just in replacing the person with another job search and more recruiting fees and more time and more effort. But the impact on the team, and frankly, my biggest concern with that particular hire, was the impact on the team, which was going to be predictably negative. 

 

They could have the last key team members before they even realized the true reason they were losing team members. So the cost of turnover is way too high, and that’s what we’re helping our clients avoid. And if I might go on one more step, what I’m describing here is a bad hiring situation. We help them avoid that. Well, that’s good, but I don’t think the problem is really about hiring bad people because in four days, they would’ve figured it out, or for weeks, they would’ve figured it out, but yes, it would’ve cost a few dollars, but that the worst part of the worst mistakes we make in the hiring process is hiring mediocre performers. 

 

And our description of mediocrity is somebody who is a perfectly nice person. They’re easy to deal with there and friendly, and they make a few mistakes. So we coach them, we help them, we roll up our sleeves and show them how to do it. Oh. And then they slip up again and again and again. And what happens with a mediocre employee is that they win us over because they are nice people. We keep investing time and money, but it never pays off. And they’re nice enough people; most of us don’t want fire people. We don’t want to have those tough conversations. 

 

So we keep them on the payroll, but they chew up our management time. And they’re also costing us with the rest of the team. Cause the rest of the team is saying, Hey, I work hard. I don’t require all that management time. And this person gets a break after break. So the real point of improving our hiring processes, interview processes, assessments, and all that sort of thing is, yes, it is to avoid bad hires. And we can talk all day about that, but it’s really, and truly about, let’s avoid those mediocre hires that are going to cost us more in the long run, and they deliver in production. 

 

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Definition of The Great Resignation: Understanding the Tools for Hiring Success

 

Okay. And that was awesome. I want to come back to behavioral assessments here in just a minute, but Sue, we’d love to get your perspective here because you’re in the trenches on a day-to-day basis on the recruiting side of the business. So with the, with a hiring mediocre, a mediocre, excuse me, mediocre performers, as it feels like we as owners right now, or are so desperate to fill the seats on the bus that, that we’re not even paying attention to stepping into this mediocrity. I mean, that’s my view, and I want to get your expert opinion because you’re in the trenches every single day, or are you, are you having to guide business owners of like the, well, we’re bringing you the candidates that are not mediocre, we’re bringing you the best candidates because it seems like we were so anxious to fill the seat, but we’re going to make a bad decision. 

 

Yep. A part of that is thinking that there is a perfect candidate out there. They are never, it, there is no such thing as, so part of the process of going through and thinking about who to hire and maybe being more patient than you were hoping to have to be. Still, it’s also about what I really need in this role and what would be nice to have, but we can train to that because sometimes the best employee is not the one that looks all shiny and perfect is the one that has the attitude and the energy and drive. 

 

He has some technical expertise to do the jobs. But sometimes, the best employee is not the one who looks perfect on the surface. 

 

Got it. Okay. So, another in full transparency moment, Onward Nation. So, as I mentioned in the introduction, we’re in the process of recruiting and looking for an account supervisor; as we build out the account services team, even further predictive is a brand new possession for us. So there is a lot that we didn’t know, and certainly, we’re going to work with our team of experts aren’t and Sue in, or to flush that process out. But, even just a couple of weeks ago, I think it is what it was. I was going back and forth with Sue about a candidate. And I’m like, and she gave me as the mentorship that she actually just shared with you right now. Then art jumped in, and we had this mentorship moment in emails. I’m like, okay, all right. 

 

We’re obviously going to trust the opinions of the experts because they are the experts. So first, I think I said thank you and email if I was remiss in it. And I missed that, a thank you. So, Art, for that, a pushback and sharing your expertise. So, there are a couple of things that I want to make sure that we close the loop on, and that is the behavioral assessments. So you brought that topic of arts. So what was like what fits in a bucket of behavioral assessments that people are using to make decisions, but it goes deeper than just a behavioral assessment, but what is in that category of behavioral assessments? Is that like disc NBTI? What are those things? 

 

Yes. And yes. There are hundreds of them, Stephen, but the disc and the NBTI Myers-Briggs type indicator would probably be the most common predictive index. There are many, many of them in what they have in common. Most of them, or all of them, are four-quadrant systems. They speak to how often comes across, or they speak to the impression that won, makes on other people and there, and typically you’ll hear. Things like that, and I’m thinking about Myers-Briggs here, but introverted or extroverted, they’re thinkers or feelers. They are people-oriented and task-oriented.

 

Here are more ideas about the definition of the great resignation 

 

Definition of The Great Resignation: Unveiling the Keys to Predicting Job Success

 

So, typically, it’s about how you come across others. And that is very important. It’s very useful. And the analogy I often bank is if you’re clientele is mostly button-down serious engineers, then it’s probably good to know that the business development person you’re considering as a flamboyant, outgoing, super talkative, friendly joke, joking, nonserious, salesperson, well, that’s probably not going to go over super well with your you’re an engineering client. So, I’m not saying behaviors are unimportant. 

 

We use behavior as one of our three or four assessments, but my point is behavior. Isn’t the only thing, even that very flamboyant a person I’m talking at describing to deal with your engineering team can be, can be very effective for you. If they know themselves well enough, they know they need to tone it down at the sales call, but they can crank it back up at the Christmas party. So what we’re really looking for, and this is why we go deeper with other assessments, is their ability to learn, their ability to adapt, and their ability to read other people very well. 

 

Frankly, they have the ability to know themselves well enough to be able to execute properly when they need to. So again, I don’t wanna suggest everybody out there should stop using behavioral assessments as much to the contrary. We use them ourselves. They are very helpful, but don’t stop there. You need to get to attitudes. You need to really be able to predict performance and behavior, which is going to tell you the how, but they’re not going to predict the outcome. They’re not going to a 10. And here is a simple little exercise I give to people every day. Think of any job really, really well. Let’s use that sale’s example as our sample. 

 

Okay. A and somebody who is outgoing and approachable and friendly, you might think, gee, that I can think of people who are like that and successful in sales, but I bet you can also think of people successful in that same role who are conservative. They’re quiet, they’re reserved. They are much more serious, but they are equally, maybe even more successful. And the fact that we’re able to come up with polar opposite behavior styles that are both successful at a job. And you probably have dozens of examples of that in your head. That’s proof right there. That behavior is not predictive of success. 

 

I love it. When you said we connect with people a few minutes ago, you said we connect with people where we share behaviors. And I literally wrote this down at my, in my notes, but that that’s great for rapport, but if we’re making decisions on that, it can lead us to make some very dangerous assumptions. Right. Okay. So I want to come back to this peace. When we were talking about sort of employer branding, we started kinda mapping out a checklist, and we were talking about being honest with ourselves. Ah, and then I sort of paraphrased with art. We’re saying, be honest with ourselves so that we can be clear and true with our candidates. So my question for you is that something that we should make public?

 

Here are more ideas about the definition of the great resignation

 

Definition of The Great Resignation: Building a Pipeline for Top Talent 

 

What I mean is the public, yeah. We should probably put that in the ad and in our communication back and forth with candidates, but would you suggest that we go even, even more public with, like, is that content that should be on our website? Is that content that should be available in some other medium? Or should we talk about it when we’re guests on a podcast, or how else could we, or should we make that point? 

 

Yes. To all of that. And I think what we’re seeing is the result of a few companies having been paying attention to how they present themselves. They’re great at presenting themselves to their potential clients but not their potential candidates. And I think it’s very helpful. I know when I’m talking to people about a position, I wonder if I can turn them on my client’s website. They go check it out. They say some really interesting things about themselves like they’re talking to you, but they have their employees talking about what it is like to work there. That’s really powerful. And I think that, and I’ll have to say where we are guilty of it, too many companies pay too little attention to how they present themselves to candidates. 

 

This is a big aha moment. And I literally wrote aha in my notes in all seriousness. What I mean by that is, ’cause you said they were great, a presenting ourselves essentially to a prospect. So, listening to BUSD out, right? You know, you’ve got to go out to keep that pipeline full of well-prepared prospects. We’re great at that. But then, thinking about how we present ourselves to prospective candidates, just an afterthought is even that write. And I know when we were going back and forth with you and my business partner, Eric, on the ad, it took us. And we like to think we know ourselves pretty well, but there was the back and forth, back and forth with you. And I’m like, oh my gosh, this is a gap for us. 

 

And we need to be better here. Thankfully, we got that way through your coaching and pushback. But even for those of us who think we have clarity, we didn’t, and it was really important for you to help us through all of that. And so that’s something we’ve committed to be better and build the pipeline. So I know that we’re quickly running out of time. Any other thoughts, suggestions, advice, recommendations, or things you think we might have missed as you think about, Hey, Onward Nation? This is how you can be better at building a pipeline for talent. We would suggest that you consider these 

 

Well, I think you’re your own people or sometimes the best source of a good candidate to look to your top performers, ask them who they know put in an incentive program. if one of your employees refers somebody that you hire they get a bonus or some sort of prize and encourage that. Because if you already have top performers, they’re bound to know other people who can pay top performers for you. 

 

Here are more ideas about the definition of the great resignation

 

Definition of The Great Resignation: The Power of Knowing Your Team

 

I’m going to build on that with a story. SUNO is very, very well. We’ve seen this happen many, many times. Not only are your employees good sources for referrals, but sometimes they are good sources for those to be promoted to that next position. But you’re so used to seeing them as a support role person, or you’re so used to seeing them as a technical role that you are, you truly don’t know them. And that’s a thing we keep coming back to, knowing that people you truly hadn’t taken stock of have their full capacity, their full capability for you. And a very quick story. 

 

Again, the Sioux remember this very well. It is one of our earliest work, a job we had together. We had done some assessment work with a client and concluded. There were six people, or all six people, that he had us assess, and employees were perfectly capable of doing the job for what he was recruiting. Well, I came out with the three of them were near retirement. So clearly, they weren’t going to be, or what they were not interested in. I mean, there are some other reasons. So, we got down to the interview stage. We were interviewing these six employees to see if they were really interested in this promotion or not. 

 

And one gentleman, literally before he sat down in his seat, started saying, I’ve always wanted this position. I’ve talked to my wife about it many, many times. So we knew, first of all, he had the right assessment profile, but he also had the right mindset. Long story short. He took that promotion and became the number two person in the company. We crossed ourselves as a recruiting assignment because, obviously, everything came to do a hot out there, but that has a far better outcome. The tragic outcome with a bin, if we’d been successful in recruiting and outside or for a client, that very capable employee would have probably left, so not only look to your employees as people who can refer wonderful candidates to you, but maybe they are more capable or their capable of more than you are, or you’re recognizing because you haven’t taken full stock. Yeah. Love that very much.

 

Here are more ideas about the definition of the great resignation

 

Definition of The Great Resignation: Last Bit of Advice and Connect with Sue and Art

 

To add to that piece. No, I think that was an excellent point. We see this a lot with our clients. When we look at their team, we will say, why aren’t you putting this person in that role? And they’re sometimes a very legitimate reason. They don’t want to be in a leadership position, for example, but it’s important to have those conversations and really know who you have on your team and what they’re capable of. Yeah. Because he may have some hidden gems. 

 

Well. Okay, it was another transparency moment. The three of us had a phone call. What about three and a half weeks ago? We thought about opening up yet, again, another account services position that we felt we needed some additional capacity in, and you guys had already done an assessment on a candidate for a different role. And you said, actually, it would be good to hire this person because this person is a unicorn, and also, we think that the growth path could be into the position that you want to open up. Think you oughta to just hire him and in and create the right trajectory for him to get into that. So, I appreciated a couple of things. 

 

One, you helped me reassess sort of my perspective on that candidate who is now a full-time member of our team. So I’m grateful for that. And also, you fell on the sword, if you will, or whatever the right metaphor is, and gave away a recruiting assignment, which we would have gladly paid you for. So I am grateful for that because you’re really thinking about our business first and foremost. So thank you. Well, we’d rather do the right thing for you than they are expensive. Amen. 

 

So before we close out and say goodbye, please tell Onward Nation the best way to connect with the two of you. Yeah. I would say you can send an email. We will hit our entire team [email protected]. Okay. Onward Nation, a note, no matter how many notes you took, and I took pages of them, or how often you go back and relisten to Sue and Art’s words of wisdom, which I sure hope that you do, the key is you have to take what they gave you, which was like a blueprint of a roadmap, but a checklist, a tip sheet, whatever you want to call it, they gave it to you take those golden nuggets and not just re-study them, take them and apply them, put your, put them into your business and accelerate your results. 

 

Sue and Art, we all have the same 86,400 seconds in a day. I am grateful that you took some of your precious time to say yes to coming on to the show, to be our mentor and guide, and to help us move our businesses onward to that next level. Thank you so much, my friends, for having us 

 

And thank you, Onward Nation. 

 

This episode is complete. So head over to OnwardNation.com for show notes and more food to fuel your ambition. Continue to find your recipe for success here at Onward Nation.

 

Here are more ideas about the definition of the great resignation