Mastering Staffing Sales Without Cash Flow Constraints with Neil Lebovits

Benjamin Mena [00:00:01]:
Welcome to the Elite Recruiter podcast with your host, Benjamin Menna, where we focus on what it takes to win in the recruiting game. We cover it all from sales, marketing, mindset, money, leadership, and placements. Quick announcements before we dive in. First of all, book of the month. Never split the difference by Chris Voss. Pick it up.

Neil Lebovits [00:00:28]:
Read it, level up.

Benjamin Mena [00:00:30]:
I'm excited about this episode of the Elite Recruiter podcast. I have a special guest, and we're going to talk about how you can sell staffing and not just how you can sell staffing, how you can bolt it onto your direct hire firm, how you can bolt it on to being a fractional recruiter, how you can bolt it onto whatever you're doing in recruiting and not be stuck with the. Actually, hold on a second. One of my biggest fears of ever going into the staffing side of the house is I remember I got a call right when I just launched my company. They're like a company wanted to bring on five engineers and wanted to put them on contract through me. I started looking at the numbers and I'm like, holy shit, I can't afford that. There's no way in hell I can afford this. It was a net 45.

Benjamin Mena [00:01:07]:
There was no way at that point in time when I just started my company that I could have actually figured that out, but I actually could have if I knew what to do. And I'm excited by my special guest, Neil Leibowitz, who's the founder of Boss, but he's also another podcaster, too. So make sure to check out his podcast. But he's going to talk about how you can sell staffing and also not have to worry about having the extra few hundred thousand dollars cash on hand to be able to pay these people. So, Neil, welcome to the podcast.

Neil Lebovits [00:01:39]:
Thank you, Ben. It is an honor. We are, what some say. Wow, you do each other, shows your competitors. We're not competitors. Ben, you have the most amazing podcast. I'm honored part of it into your audience. Really? Thank you.

Benjamin Mena [00:01:52]:
Oh, thank you. Thank you. And real quick, before we start diving in what is Boston, talk about your other podcasts.

Neil Lebovits [00:01:59]:
All right, so before we get into that, let's talk about your facial hair, because it's been our enjoying joke. You're the most handsome, if that, what is that, like five minutes? So we're recording like how long, how many hours and staff?

Benjamin Mena [00:02:11]:
I if you want to get laugh. I actually thought about shaving today, but did it because I was going to be having a conversation with you.

Neil Lebovits [00:02:17]:
Because it takes me like a year to grow this and then gets this gorgeous shadow. 3 hours usually. Yeah.

Benjamin Mena [00:02:24]:
Pretty much like whatever you have in your face if you're watching the video of this, like, I could probably have that by tomorrow if I shave today.

Neil Lebovits [00:02:31]:
Well, what most people don't realize is it's almost like time lapse photography. Look at the end of this, let's say 40 minutes show. You're gonna see a full beard on them. You don't notice this slowly throughout the episode. Just. Yeah.

Benjamin Mena [00:02:43]:
Fast forward to 45 minutes. See the difference? There you go.

Neil Lebovits [00:02:45]:
But all right, boss in the podcast. All right, so back office staffing solutions is what boss stands for. And look, we're a turnkey solution for anything payrolling that you need for your people and the temporary side of the business. We can be the illegal employer record for you. We can talk about that when you want to get into boss. It's called eor. We legally employ, we lend you the money, we pay the temps, we employ them, and we take a small cut and invoice for you. Everything's automated.

Neil Lebovits [00:03:14]:
You need a back office solution, whether it be boss or one of my great competitors that are out there. But that's what Ben's talking about. We do the funding and the employment. There's no tax filings. There's no unemployment claims. There's no anything. You don't need secretary of state filing. You don't need unemployment insurance accounts.

Neil Lebovits [00:03:34]:
You don't need any of these things. Workers comp insurance, professional liability. We have all of the debt, as does our industry boss does a little better and differently, but that's what you need to have. So that's what back office is. That's what I do. And that's my big venture. That's my big business. We do podcasting, Ed utters live.

Neil Lebovits [00:03:52]:
You know, all that stuff. It's wonderful. Join our Facebook groups. One big group called the Syndicate that David Patterson and I are co kind of hosting it in the show. That's really exciting that that's coming soon. You know, kind of top secret, but, you know, heads. Not anymore, right? Yep.

Benjamin Mena [00:04:13]:
Awesome. So we always get started with a podcast. How did you even end up in this wonderful world of recruiting?

Neil Lebovits [00:04:20]:
Like, everyone I majored in in college? No, like everyone, I look into it. I worked for Ernst and Young as a CPA, went to Penn State for my CPA, got my CPA, hated it, got hired by Robert, out only $300 million company, soon to become the bogeyman they become. And then I worked ever since. I just took off my first year. I remember I was making $20,800 with my starting salary at 1985 at Ernst and Young, 20,800 as an auditor. And I went there making 30,000 or 40,500 when I left. And I made $85,000 1st year as a recruiter. Now, in those days, 85 grand was like Bill making $300,000 a year.

Neil Lebovits [00:05:08]:
So the rest is history. And then I got on. I became the president of AOC Council and call Aswan and Adeco, and I became a global president. For those who don't know, we had a very big career, incidentally. And let me say this, I was a plumb guy, okay? I started search for Robert half and I was good at it. I loved it. It's sexy. It's what everyone on this podcast loves.

Neil Lebovits [00:05:33]:
But that's all it is, sexy. What can you do for me lately? Sorry. And people came to me, they said, neil, you want to take that? You have so much talent. They said, if you want to take this industry by storm, the game is temp. And they give Joel that entity. Robert half himself told me, think about that to a group. Robert half himself. Bob told him, little skinny old man passed.

Neil Lebovits [00:05:56]:
Get an attempt. It's where the money is. Look at the sector. How big is it now? I don't even look because the last I looked, it was over a quarter of a trillion dollars. Now, when you're at a fraction of a trillion dollars, I don't really care what that number is at this point. The fractions of fraction. So when you look at recruiters that are only doing search, you're taking a tiny slice out of that sick number. And that's the world.

Neil Lebovits [00:06:21]:
You've decided to operate it. Okay. It's a very smart business. Now you're niche or you do all the other things, Ben and. Nope, I'm sorry. There was a stuttering. You're in hyper niche and you're even at a smaller piece, then you need to hyper niche. I'm not saying should you change all your training, but understand that you need to capitalize on this huge sector.

Neil Lebovits [00:06:42]:
And all of your clients that you deal with all have this full need. They're all surrounded by this fraction of a trillion dollars, let's call it 300. Just in the US, let's call it hundreds of billions of dollars that you need to play in. Okay? That's what it said. Today's call. Yeah.

Benjamin Mena [00:07:00]:
So we're going to talk about how you sell staffing. But I have a question for you. You grew in your career in those companies. Why'd you stand out. Why'd you grow and other people didn't?

Neil Lebovits [00:07:11]:
Look, theres a lot to it. It has always been about technology for me. You always need to be with the curve ahead of technology. Heres a great thing and everyone can adopt this. The recruiting industry glows, meaning with technology, its 4510 years behind corporate America, which means you could tap into that because as long as youre ahead of the curve with tech, and I would always find solutions for my clients using tech, and it didn't matter because as long as I thought about it more than they had, I can install an algorithm, I can install a master spreadsheet, I can install a master ATS account for them where I control all their job racks. Right. Think like that. That's how I would do it.

Neil Lebovits [00:07:53]:
How are you? So that, let's be the biggest thing people know. How do I use a database technology data API to be creative, to automate your business? That would be a real big one.

Benjamin Mena [00:08:05]:
So jumping into the staffing side, first of all, there's a lot of recruiters out there that of course chasing the perm work. We've had a crazy economy. Some sectors are literally on fire, growing like crazy. Some sectors absolutely suck. One of the things that I've seen, because I've made it through a few different ups and downs, is one of the first things that comes back is contractors. So how do you sell staffing and how do you sell contractors? Is it different than selling perm or other things?

Neil Lebovits [00:08:38]:
So it's a great, so the answer is yes and no. Let's focus on the notebook or this tool. It's the exact same thing. Now you could get into staffing and consulting, which you need to do. You need to serve your audience, your audience that you deal with. You make these cold calls on that you spend your watch all these podcasts on. Once you have it, you have to milk it. I hate to use that expression, but pretend it's a teat.

Neil Lebovits [00:09:01]:
Why are you only extracting out the beginning of that milk, which you have when the udder is filled with beautiful nutrition that you can, if you don't want it, give it to others and take and sell that to someone? Okay, that's the point. That's the analogy. So listen, don't think you're better than Tim. And that's the thing that I did, an all certain people do, okay? It's not as sexy, it's not as high ticket, but it's where the money's at. We'll talk about that on future shows and everyone knows it anyway, you get a multiple, six times profit. You get no multiple firm. When you sell your business, a multiple of revenue, ultimate profit. I'm talking about multiple.

Neil Lebovits [00:09:38]:
It doesn't exist. So if you make that $200,000 as side money, like Ben said, when you sell your business, that's extra $1.2 million to 2.5 million in your pocket for retirement. So you need to do it. So how do you do it? Here is a simple way, Beth. I want everyone to do two things for this call. One is any unemployed person you come, anyone from now on there is not working or they're about to become unemployed, where they can possibly consult temp contract 1099, whatever you want to call it, and on their level, I need you to look at them that way and figure out how you monetize that scenario. That's a person, unemployed candidate in your existing job order. Okay? Look at it that way in your work.

Neil Lebovits [00:10:27]:
Second thing I want you to do, and this is someone who want to understand, is you need to break every job order you get into. Two distinct orders for now on the search that you're working on, and then the temporary solution to it. Now, don't stop what you're doing. You're going to still work on that search exact same way that Ben and I and everyone have trained you off. However you say, Mister Clyde, there's another angle we need to do. And what I'd like to do, the way I propose we do it, is I'm going to look for people that can consult for you, end of the situation, okay? And the level. But it's all going to be the same thing. Now, these are people that are different than the search side.

Neil Lebovits [00:11:10]:
These will be people specifically out of work or wanting to consult or do whatever temp. The advantages are endless to go that route, but we're going to do both. So we're going to deal right now on the search side like we just ended. And now we're going to add that. I don't want to do that. Oh, no, you do. Hear me out. We all want to go.

Neil Lebovits [00:11:29]:
Perfect. No, no, no. Hear me out, sir. Listen to me. This is the way to do it. Unless you say no. And now benefits are endless. You're going to sell it.

Neil Lebovits [00:11:37]:
Why? Come on, guys, you can't interview people. It's why we have all these guarantee issues. It's not your responsibility to get them in there and then have them get a paper cut, hate the boss or the nursing system, quit their job and then demand a rebuttal from you. You find people, right? So the best interview you can ever have is someone temping there. You will play and you will place. People that would never interview well, would never get the job. These people let you know they're walking properly, perfect bills. They don't dress well, they don't talk well.

Neil Lebovits [00:12:09]:
They get nervous. But they're a great temp. The level for a contract or a temp is so different because it doesn't become this search thing. It becomes this person that's coming in to help solve a short term problem or maybe trade or try before you buy. It's this great person. Might not be as better as the other, but they're perfect for this round. Try them. It's the best interview you can ever have.

Neil Lebovits [00:12:30]:
And it's going to be cheap. It'll be the same rate. You don't have to pay benefits, you don't do anything. I payroll them. We'll invoice you in a month. 45. Like I work with you. Going protected, boss.

Neil Lebovits [00:12:40]:
They'll work with you 30 days. Hey, that's what you got to do. And I'm telling you what's going to happen is you're going to start building up your temp business across the board. And you have one, then two, then three, then four, then five, then ten people. And then you're going to start having a multiple. Then you start being known for people that can provide temp and contracting solutions and they're just going to start up to you. And then you're going to find, guess what, Ben? What? 80% of the time, your close ratio. When you have a perm search deal and you solve it on the temp side, or one of your competitors puts a temp in there, they get the position 88 90% of the time.

Neil Lebovits [00:13:17]:
Google it. How much is your close ratios up for? 15 to 25. We know 15 to 25 for the masters of pinnacle and 13 to 1518 for the masses. Less if you're in other groups. You on a mass email, right? What else? That's the training for today, man. Let's break it down because that's all you need to do. It's that simple. Everyone look at them, who's unemployed and how you can make money and how we could solve a problem client.

Neil Lebovits [00:13:44]:
And then every job where separate it and negotiate it. That's how I was taught by a great guy, Brad Violet and my company separate and negotiate. Same deal with temp to perfect. If someone comes to you as a temp to perm, say, it's great, but I also want to go the perm route. Always go into two. Always solve your client's problem with both angles. Even though you're coming in here, come in with both and start that way. If you want to learn how to build the rest of it, join boss.

Neil Lebovits [00:14:14]:
We train our people. We're having training coming out. David's going to train the people on it. But honestly, Ben wanted to know, how can we do it today? Right, Ben? How can we watch this podcast and walk around with a simple way that I could jump start my business, and we just. That's it, man. I got nothing else other than I could add color to that.

Benjamin Mena [00:14:31]:
Okay, so we have a conversation. We get somebody that's like, hey, yeah, I'm down for bringing this on as a contractor. We reach out to an employment record, a company, like boss, like, contract wise. Like my contract says, you know, 25, 30%. I don't have a contract for, like, what do I do now?

Neil Lebovits [00:14:51]:
So outside of talk to me or any employer record, they all have contract. We have contracts. Will be a denim sheer existing one. Boss can either enter into a boss I salute. So do you all. Boss. Boss.

Benjamin Mena [00:15:05]:
Are you from New York?

Neil Lebovits [00:15:06]:
I know, but I don't talk like that. I say boss. When I was young, I said boss. Coffee, orange. My parents were from Pennsylvania, so they didn't like that very much. So they take. But anyway, we digress. What was my last question?

Benjamin Mena [00:15:20]:
So it's easy just to get, like, an addendum to your contract and just.

Neil Lebovits [00:15:23]:
Like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Benjamin Mena [00:15:24]:
Stick it on a second page.

Neil Lebovits [00:15:25]:
Tricky part. Look, we have a book that people download. It's, you know, it's called go to backofficestaffingsolutions.com. Forward slash staffing. Ben, you could put that up in an overlay, and that shows. Look, it'll tell you exactly how to price it. But basically, Ben, here's what you want to do. So it's a great question.

Neil Lebovits [00:15:45]:
You don't want to bastardize your search, so you want to make the same margin as the bottom line. So if it's $100,000 person, it's a 30%. You want to make 30 grand on the pep site. Okay, so if it's $100,000 person, you know, it's a $50 an hour salary. If you mark it up 100%, that's a $100. It's a $50 spread. I know I'm going fast, people, to slow it down. That spread times amount of hours is the discount you'll give off of your 100,000, off your fee.

Neil Lebovits [00:16:12]:
That we just had your $30,000 fee. Or you sell, I'll give it away to you for free after they're there for four months because it would have made up, you know, 50,000 before you do anything in between. But the bottom line is, let me make it simple for this call. Keep your margin the same. You're not going to bastardize. In fact, you'll make more because they'll pay more because you'll say, I'll tell you what, early there a month, I've been charging 30 grand. This is insurance for you. It's the best thing you'd ever spend your money on.

Neil Lebovits [00:16:35]:
And then it's a win win and you should make more money. Or you can make that markup and then you have the end again. You always do that. You always have. If you have four or 5610 pimps out at once. I have partners like that. You know how much money she makes. She's all you.

Neil Lebovits [00:16:48]:
She's what you guys are. On us alone, she'll make 600, 700 grand admissions that we really get the commission, but we pay it out because we're the employer. She off of us. That's her side gig by having these 1012 people out at that for doing that when they need them. And she's all searching. If she ever wants me to give the name, I will. She's the most amazing thing out there. But because I don't see people monetizing this like her.

Neil Lebovits [00:17:11]:
I don't get it. Why is there so people that come to Boston in your world then that be this in my old world? I don't get it.

Benjamin Mena [00:17:18]:
I mean, it's a combination of. It's a, you know, you don't know what you don't know. I mean, I like exactly how I started the podcast. I was like, read somebody that was like, they knew me so well as a recruiter. I've done such a great job. And when I went on my own, they're like, can you do contractors? And I was just like, no, I could do direct placement. They're like, we need contractors because that's the way the government sets up how we get paid. And I'm like, all right, what you doing?

Neil Lebovits [00:17:44]:
Well, let me say this. I did good. Ask how did I get into boss, it wasn't this good. Stanford business plan. Oh, my God. Neil's background is perfect for it. I lucked into it. I was a trader in the industry.

Neil Lebovits [00:17:55]:
After I left the deco, I became a well known trainer. For those of you who know me, right, you've seen me out there, you know, a lot of dense people know me, and I luck in on it. I remember recruiters came to be like, hey, Neil, do you know what a lawyer record is? You were programmed to an Eor. I'm like, what the hell's an Eor? I didn't know what one was. And I googled everybody. Oh, that's cool. And people, too. Out where.

Neil Lebovits [00:18:14]:
I eventually worked there with one of the large, and then I learned and I lucked into it, because as a trader, you get money referring people places. And I eventually referred people to your sips on the referral fee. I love other things, right. No. So I love. I didn't know that. And it's operating. It's what you know.

Neil Lebovits [00:18:33]:
That's your point. It's what you don't know or what you know. It's your world. So this is what the purpose of your call? And I love that you wanted to do this, Ben, because it's my passion, and it's easy. It's bad.

Benjamin Mena [00:18:42]:
Like, I wanted this because I knew there's another recruiter out there that just started their company that's literally was sitting in my shoes, that they just had a conversation with somebody, and they're like, I don't know how to do this. Like, holy crap. I don't have, like, $150,000 sitting around. And, you know, I don't know if I can get the line of credit, this and that. Figure everything out.

Neil Lebovits [00:19:02]:
And I'll say this. Any events, people, if anyone uses me, you call me directly. Yes. I'll send you my sales. I will negotiate every dealing contract with you on a zoom, okay? That's how I run my company. So you'll get my expertise. If you want to do this, join my company. Backofficenow.com, comma.

Neil Lebovits [00:19:19]:
Go check it out. Go to the enrollment page. You don't have to pay to do it. I'm not a bait. I'm not here to. I am here to promote my company as expert. As someone who say, wow, what does he do now? Website. Bennett always plugs people.

Neil Lebovits [00:19:32]:
But do it and download that book back office staff.com. You'll see a pop up when you go there. You can do it that way or just go forward. Staffing. Okay. Staffing hype. And by having the hype and book, if you want to get technical. But again, we'll put an overlay for everyone, Ben, what else? I mean, I know you had lots of things, but did I answer everything you wanted to out of this?

Benjamin Mena [00:19:53]:
I think you answered like, a good majority of, like, what we originally came on to chat about. So let's kind of like, just jump into the quick fire and we'll take the quick fire two different ways. So the first question is going to be asked two different. Two different ways. The first way I'm going to ask is just the normal advice. And the second way is going to be like, asking it as on the staffing side. So what advice would you give to a brand new recruiter that's just getting started in the industry?

Neil Lebovits [00:20:24]:
All right. Get involved in both perm and temp and get really good at sourcing leads. The cold calling game. All the minutia that you spend in prospecting, contact credibility goes away. If you get good at prospecting. It's the first step in any sales book that's there for a reason, and it's just glossed over every friggin time. Do not gloss over it. In our business, you can find out where the leads are by asking our product, which is one of the few in the world that talks.

Neil Lebovits [00:20:51]:
If you don't get good at sourcing, that's all. I would train recruited. They were dying to get on the phone. Nope. You become a master sourcer because there's a famous guy, Herbert Meyer, I forget his name, whatever he said, I'd rather be a master prospector than a wizard of speech without anyone to tell my story to. Or conversely, telling my story to the wrong people. The least efficient people think about that. Massive prospecting.

Neil Lebovits [00:21:18]:
Same on the temp side, same question.

Benjamin Mena [00:21:21]:
But for somebody that's just getting started off in the staffing side of the house, what advice would you give them?

Neil Lebovits [00:21:27]:
You've got to get really good at solving the ultimate problem. With not an exact resume match, what is your client's problem? It sales 101. And we don't do that on the search side. On the temp side, you can get a strong financial control or accounting manager to do a company where they want to temp for, let's say a bookkeeper to get their books. Now you have a skill set, you have a problem. Your job is match. To be a matchmaker, the true sense of the skill to the solution, different than what we work on. When they say, I need this industry, this background, this, and then we bill it to that, we dont try to say no, we want a different title.

Neil Lebovits [00:22:05]:
Or we can get four titles. As long as theyve done this, then youre good. We dont do that, nor should we. Uncertain. Make sense, Ben makes sense.

Benjamin Mena [00:22:13]:
Oh, and actually pause on the quickfire. Questions. I think I know why people dont even think about eor companies employment of record companies. Like, boss, I started off at a large, large staffing company that starts with an a. It ends at a kick. I think it is. And you just saw this complex operation. I had my wonderful base salary of 27,000.

Benjamin Mena [00:22:33]:
I got my 3% of my gross margin, maybe 5% of my gross margin. Even when I crushed out like over 600k in gross margin, my salary was nowhere close to what you made your first year. But the operation is so complex behind the scenes.

Neil Lebovits [00:22:49]:
That's right.

Benjamin Mena [00:22:50]:
So you're like, when you get out, you're like, I can never do that.

Neil Lebovits [00:22:53]:
And it's so easy. And especially, boss, we're fully automated. Our dashboard, everything's built on. I mean, it's incredible.

Benjamin Mena [00:23:02]:
But yeah, I think that's why it's like you see people that have come from these gigantic operations, like, well, it requires a gigantic operation to do this rather than a plug and play system.

Neil Lebovits [00:23:10]:
That's right.

Benjamin Mena [00:23:11]:
Whether it's employment record or factoring or something of that nature.

Neil Lebovits [00:23:15]:
We could also be, if you want to be a player record, you can do that with us too. Shape work or you just want funding or you just want anything in between. We can help you. Right. Anyone in our industry and given option. Right. That's a point. It's not me, it's our industry.

Neil Lebovits [00:23:28]:
Yeah.

Benjamin Mena [00:23:29]:
So back to the quick fire questions. What's your advice for a recruiter that's been around the block 510 20 years, to be successful, they got to enhance.

Neil Lebovits [00:23:38]:
Contracting side of the business and solid solutions. Look at that. Look at it like the utter, utter to that gorgeous nutritional milk and beauty that sustains life. No, I'm serious. You have to milk. Don't let milking implies it's a bad thing that the cow they love to be milked for a lot of reasons. They look like they're happy with health, but meaning there it's very serene. Red.

Neil Lebovits [00:24:02]:
You're disgusting. I'm going to go to the next question. Okay, let's please go to the next question and leave it to the people's mind. It's a beautiful analogy. How long should I go into the next question? Your laugh was hysterical. I've never seen you laugh that hard on the show. Don't edit an app, not review this.

Benjamin Mena [00:24:24]:
After all your years of recruiting, what is the craziest placement story you have?

Neil Lebovits [00:24:30]:
Oh my God. Well, if you remember the Long Island Lolita, Amy Fisher, many people remember her. She was a really famous movie. That was made about her. She ended up, people are older will know she was as big as the story gets and the news all over the world for basically hooking up with this we italian guy from long island. She ended up shooting the white. She was like the 15 year old girl. He was like, this 50 year old man shot the white point black in the head.

Neil Lebovits [00:25:03]:
She survived, and his name was Joey Butafuko. And anyway, she came to our agency with a fake name, and we placed her, and we found out it was Amy Fisher, because all the time we're like, you know, you look like Amy Fisher. And we placed her at the company. They said, dude, you just placed Amy Fisher with us.

Benjamin Mena [00:25:21]:
Okay, that's crazy. That brings me to my fake helicopter accident story.

Neil Lebovits [00:25:26]:
It's a second, but they keep in mind I'm down to have these stories running gigantic companies. But you asked for the craziest. Yeah, I have shooters. I have someone that took guns out. Boom. Yeah, like Craig. Crazy, horrible stuff. All right.

Neil Lebovits [00:25:41]:
And back in the day when they actually went, shoot, you know, thank God, where it's just correct. Yeah, in the day.

Benjamin Mena [00:25:47]:
That's a whole nother story now.

Neil Lebovits [00:25:48]:
But, yeah, I know, don't make govy star. But anyway, yeah, a lot of crazy.

Benjamin Mena [00:25:53]:
Favorite book that has had a huge impact on your career.

Neil Lebovits [00:25:57]:
Wow. You know, and you warned me about it. It's going to be Tom Hopkins how to master the art of selling it. Why? Because he was a pioneer in it, and it was already an old book by the time I read it. Now we're talking about 40, 50 years old. But you're never going to see sales broken down into a science like this guy did. And it's the first light bulb that went up. It's the first book that someone made me read and to change everything for me and how I would structure training as a trainer, how I would apply these techniques to my secrets and my boot camps and the staffing industry, what the best people I did, and they fucked me.

Neil Lebovits [00:26:36]:
So that would be foundational sales. Look, it's so old school. It's beautiful. How do you get people to say yes? How do you get people to like you? How you fear, bother them, how you treat your taste like that. Right? Like a. Ben, if you and I were going out, talk to business, I would totally be your vibe. I would fully be your chill vibe. Right.

Benjamin Mena [00:26:54]:
Of course.

Neil Lebovits [00:26:55]:
This is how I am with presenting anyway. And it's much more people, like, slow by. Right.

Benjamin Mena [00:27:02]:
Well, on that note, like, you know, as a former trainer and everything, what do you think it keeps recruiters from being successful themselves.

Neil Lebovits [00:27:12]:
People are sometimes successful in spite of themselves. And listen, it's human nature. People aren't honest with themselves. It's really hard to look oneself in the mirror even if they know it's perceptive person with other people that's called human nature. So you need to take fuges from others or you need to know it's human nature. I'm going to really be self aware and self critical. Am I not making these. Why am I not making these cold calls? Why am I not getting these street.

Neil Lebovits [00:27:40]:
Why am I not creating podcasts? Why are you not doing any of these things that you motivated on the. You can't lie to yourself, so be honest with yourself, get out of your own way and don't be defensive. And that's what I've seen my whole career. Human nature is people don't want to admit that they might be wrong or there might be a better way and they're so steadfast their way of thinking that it becomes their achilles heel. And my friend, I'm talking about most people on this call because it's cultural. What I trade on induction psychology. When I went to my master's stuff on that I didn't get my master's, but that's what I was going for on very interesting.

Benjamin Mena [00:28:16]:
And then kind of the next step in that question. What do you think has been a major part of your personal success? Because you've grown like, you know, there's probably a lot of people that worked in those firms that you did, but they probably didn't have a atmospheric career that just skyrocketed like you did. Like what?

Neil Lebovits [00:28:33]:
You know, it's a great question and it's. I want to be humble with it. You need to bring in people better than you are, as good as you, and know that you're not the smartest guy in the room. And I was born one of the smartest guys in the room. This is my mother. You can't have that attitude. You have to be a sponge. It's the same thing.

Neil Lebovits [00:28:52]:
It's the same thing. You can't get in your own way, especially when you become a leader. You have to know that I don't know enough and what am I not good at? How do I constantly refine and you got to look yourself in the mirror even faster. So I think I just got better. I forced me to do it. It forced me. I had training people to Neil, you talk too much in the face. Like you have to be self aware and evolve so it doesn't matter whether you.

Neil Lebovits [00:29:18]:
But that was my key. And as long as I did that, my bosses that got my own way, they saw me as a Spitfire. I always became their boss. They were idiots. They should have embraced me as their partner, someone that they are proud not. Not try to making me against them. They lost every time company. They always will.

Neil Lebovits [00:29:34]:
I didn't know that the very first time it happened, but it's happened 15 times. I become my boss's boss. I'm at boss's boss. But when you see it, people skyrocket. That's the secret. Just a vow and take on stronger people. And it's all books have been written. If I find someone that blows me away, don't be intimidated by it.

Neil Lebovits [00:29:54]:
You know that they're only going to make me. If I attract and keep that person. It's always a reflection on the leader. Why don't leaders of know that the why are they. So.

Benjamin Mena [00:30:05]:
That'S a whole other podcast.

Neil Lebovits [00:30:07]:
Yeah.

Benjamin Mena [00:30:07]:
Another day that we did it.

Neil Lebovits [00:30:09]:
I could talk about all of them because I've witnessed some of the horrible Boston that everyone on this call has. We've all had the horrible ones and the great one. Oh, yeah. And I mean, I'm sure you're the great one. That's all I just said. I know what I hate. Let me take the best of the best and let me get rid of stuff. I hate it from people that suck ass.

Neil Lebovits [00:30:27]:
And that's what they did, man. They suck. They were shitty people. Shitty manager. That really could have destroyed me. And they destroyed a lot of people on this call, but we didn't let them and f up kiddos joke if they can't think of as the jokes there anyway. Well, if you could go back in.

Benjamin Mena [00:30:44]:
Time and everything, you know now with all your experience, the ups and downs, the thing, all the crazy places you've worked, the things you've learned. If you could have a cup of coffee with yourself or a beer with yourself the first week that you became a recruiter, what would you tell yourself for advice?

Neil Lebovits [00:31:02]:
Go into business for yourself. Be your boss. Be your boss. Why I waited so long? I don't care what the road was there at the corporate America, Ben. It's another show I want to do this one with. Corporate America is horrible, and everyone on this call knows it. And again, you asked me for the honor that would be the one saying deal. And I would have been an entrepreneur, like with a boss much earlier I got into, dude, I'm six years old now.

Neil Lebovits [00:31:27]:
I only started this four years. But I've been back office twelve years. I started to back off as 48. For the love of God, I wish I did that. 28. I do. I had the skills that I was scared. It's everything.

Neil Lebovits [00:31:39]:
Because I had the easy corporate gig. I was scared just like everyone out here is scared. I'm just like you. We're all the same. You're my nature, man.

Benjamin Mena [00:31:48]:
Did you, during that time, did you think about being your own boss? Was it kind of like on your shoulder or is it just like you were just.

Neil Lebovits [00:31:54]:
No, no, never. Never. It never was. That's what's so interesting. Ever. Because I was my old boss. Once you get it started with me at sleepweight camp, summer jobs. Once you kind of become the boss and you get in the end with the people that owned the place, they forgive you everything.

Neil Lebovits [00:32:11]:
You get the secret keys to the kingdom. And it's unfair. It's what I hate it because then I have to be sob some people beneath me. So once you have that power and you know they're not going to fire you because your teams can go with you, you're your own boss. Except you have to deal with corporate b's after that. That I couldn't stand. And that's why I wish I left sooner. But I never had the urge because I didn't know what it really meant to not have to deal with that.

Neil Lebovits [00:32:31]:
I never knew until I did. It was too late. Not too late, but I only learned it becoming my own boss after I left deco in 2000.

Benjamin Mena [00:32:39]:
Also, like, like, don't blame yourself. I mean, I, I think like the way that information has changed, people now have learned like, oh, I can do this. I don't, I don't have to have. You're right, machine.

Neil Lebovits [00:32:51]:
You're right. It was, it was a different day. But it's still natural to feel that way. So, you know.

Benjamin Mena [00:32:56]:
Oh, yeah. I mean, I was scared, man.

Neil Lebovits [00:32:59]:
I was like everyone else. I wanted to find a partner. Why? Partnerships. And so flawed. And I finally did it on my own. I opened up awesome. Now I'm giving away shares. But it's a whole different game.

Neil Lebovits [00:33:08]:
But it's my baby. No, not shared by someone else. And even if you and I did it, man, we're gonna have very different views out there. It's really hard to have a lifetime business and you want to grow to be tens of millions or in my case, hundreds of millions or a billion dollars, right. Without being right partners that you pick, not because you're scared to go with. And let me find someone that'll do tep with me because I'm too scared to do alone. Don't do that. I would have done that.

Neil Lebovits [00:33:29]:
I did do that, Shelton. That.

Benjamin Mena [00:33:31]:
So are you saying, I mean, I know a lot of partnerships that have worked out amazingly, but is the one of the reasons why people look for partnership, is it, is it to help them overcome a fear?

Neil Lebovits [00:33:40]:
Totally. Why else? Where's the compelling Unipol? They're either exactly the same. They came from the same. Why is that a plan? It should be a weakness. I do tech. They do not tech. They do temp. I do firm.

Neil Lebovits [00:33:52]:
Where's the symbiosis? Where's the plan? I never hear that. Oh, I want to go and they want to go and now I got that. And they're not. Listen, listen. All be, ask them if they're fear. I guarantee it. But listen, if you don't, if you don't agree with me out there, then it's not, you're right. In your case, it's not true.

Neil Lebovits [00:34:08]:
But you know out there that I'm speaking to you and you know that you're doing it for the wrong reasons like I did. I'll be honest and I look pretty constantly, but that was the reason. I knew it. At the end of the day, it wasn't a smart answer, that they would supplement me in this other area. It would have me have a partner that do it. Take some of the mental nuttiness of becoming your own entrepreneur, which again, most people on your call already have done that leap, folks.

Benjamin Mena [00:34:34]:
And, you know, every day like there's other people making the jump. They're making the leap like they got laid off from corporate America, corporate recruiting. They're like, guess what? I'm jumping in my own company, chasing my own jobs.

Neil Lebovits [00:34:46]:
Yep. Yeah. Amazing job. Divided that. No, you do. This is incredible. Look at this show. And I've watched so many of yours.

Neil Lebovits [00:34:53]:
They're all one's better than the next, so.

Benjamin Mena [00:34:55]:
Well, Neil, before I let you go, is there anything else that you would love to share with listeners?

Neil Lebovits [00:35:01]:
The last thought I'm going to give you is I relocated to Florida. You know, my mom died. It's okay. She was older and I moved to Florida and I should have moved here all along. Just take for granted the world that you live in your life and you make it your norm when it doesn't always have to be. I wish, I wish I moved out ten years earlier and it's a perfect place for me. And it's almost too late. Don't make it too late for you out there.

Neil Lebovits [00:35:30]:
Follow your dream. Take a chance. Get out of your comfort zone. Because your comfort zone is all you know. It's not even a comfort zone. Get out of your world. You have to change it up. You need to relocate one day.

Neil Lebovits [00:35:40]:
You can't stay in the same place. Mix it up. Do a, do business, do something different, add on. Don't let it be too late. It will feel too late. I regret that I did this at 60, but I got 30, 40 years left, maybe more, right? Who knows? That's my advice, beth.

Benjamin Mena [00:35:57]:
Perfect. And for the listeners, how can they follow you?

Neil Lebovits [00:36:01]:
So join my Facebook group, independent recruiters and staffing agencies. Best thing to do is go to my website, backofficenow.com, sign up for that ebook. That'll pop up. You'll get it. Stay on the mailing list. You'll get all write. This podcast will be on there by Steve Binkles podcast that we both have. We're the only two people Finkel did a show with, by the way.

Neil Lebovits [00:36:24]:
Us too. You know what?

Benjamin Mena [00:36:28]:
I haven't shared it yet, but when it's ready to go live in about a week or two.

Neil Lebovits [00:36:32]:
All right. Well, by the time you do, it's out there, so. Yeah. And Ben, I thoroughly love this. I just love questions. I love how you organize this. Amazing.

Benjamin Mena [00:36:42]:
We have fun. We did awesome.

Neil Lebovits [00:36:44]:
Please don't edit out your laughter. Ben let you laugh so hard. It was amazing and it was nothing dirty. So if you look at it, we didn't. I made sure we.

Benjamin Mena [00:36:55]:
Awesome. Well, Neil, I just, like I said, I wanted to bring you on here just because, like, everything that you're doing with boss, it really just. Some of my biggest fears for ever even touching the staffing side was because I worked for this gigantic billion dollar machine, and I thought that you could only do staffing if you. You had this gigantic engine behind you to take care of all the employment, the unemployment, this and that, all the different states, and just all these sorts of mental barriers that I had because I just didn't know.

Neil Lebovits [00:37:26]:
Yeah. When you go to our website, you'll see what we do. We literally do everything. You do nothing. All you have to do is give us contractor or we call them associate employer 1099. You give us the name of the company and we'll do the contracts for you. If you don't have it. We do everything.

Neil Lebovits [00:37:41]:
It's fully automated. You do nothing other than receive the money in your bank account and watch everything in real time on our new app, which you can download on the iTunes store, the droid and play well.

Benjamin Mena [00:37:54]:
Neil, thank you so much for coming on. For the listeners, make this year your best year yet. And why not add staffing onto it, especially with the way the market's going. Make sure you have another way to serve your clients, serve your customers and keep on growing. Alright, thank you guys. Until next time, thanks for listening to this episode of the Elite recruiter podcast with Benjamin Mena. If you enjoyed, hit subscribe and leave a rating.