Unlocking the Future: How AI Revolutionizes Recruiting with Trent Cotton

[00:02:21] AI: Finding balance between threat and opportunity.

[00:05:27] Get over your fear of AI.

[00:10:05] Using AI and machine learning in HR.

[00:15:56] Help people solve problems instead of mandating AI.

[00:19:46] Productivity enhanced through AI and automation.

[00:22:47] Using a tool to simplify content for better readability.

[00:27:39] Recruiting dysfunctions: no set priorities, candidate process delays, lack of feedback loop. Solution: sprint, prioritize, define, provide process.

[00:31:59] Team prioritized private wealth, achieved impressive results.

[00:35:00] Summary: Future risks and the mindset of tomorrow's HR leader, including the importance of change management and the use of military leaders as examples.

[00:39:10] Favorite tools: ClickUp, Trello-like; Notion, external brain

[00:41:17] Trust the journey, focus on career.

[00:44:40] Finding bright spots leads to success.

Trent Cotton  [00:00:00]:

Welcome to the elite recruiter podcast with your host Benjamin Mena, 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.

Benjamin Mena [00:00:18]:

This is gonna be a fun episode of the late recruiter podcast. I have a returning guest Trent cotton with me to talk about how AI can make you a super powered recruiter, and he has gone in, done a deep dive, way I felt like I was an expert on using AI I just got done reading his book last night, and I feel like I am a slacker when it comes to the amount of stuff that I can get done. and that I can, like, now get done with utilizing artificial intelligence. So Trent, welcome back to the podcast. know it's been a while. It's been a while. You're always one of my favorites to come back to. So real quick for the listeners, I know we typically do it, like, a fun deep dive in how Trent even got started into the wonderful world of recruiting. But so that way, we can focus on actionable stuff. Make sure to go back to episode 40. And Trent talks about how he, you know, landed in the water forward recruiting, how he, like, really focused on, like, you know, recruiting the track towards a recruiting manager, the track towards agile. And my god, if I remember back when I was an internal recruiter, if I actually implemented this agile methodology that he had in recruiters with before internal recruiters, it would blow away some of the Govcon organizations I used to work definitely go back and check that out.

Trent Cotton  [00:01:40]:

Yeah. Trust me me too. And and it's funny whenever I do consulting with with clients and we go through, and I'm I'm trying to help them understand the benefits of of applying sprint recruiting or agile recruiting. It's almost like I get PTSD when they start walking their process. I'm like, okay, let's just not let's just talk about how we're gonna do it going forward. Yeah. I don't I don't wanna I don't wanna go back there.

Benjamin Mena [00:02:00]:

So we'll we'll jump on some sprint recruiting down at the very end because I know there's a lot of, like, every single person that I've actually talked to about Trent's stuff. They're like, oh my god. Why didn't I think of that? But becoming a super powered recruiter with AI, how do you do that? What do you do? What do, like, what do we need to know?

Trent Cotton  [00:02:21]:

Alright. So I always like to start with an analogy because there You have kinda 2 schools of thought in HR specifically reading about AI. You've got the doom and gloom that, you know, kinda look at it as Terminator. It's gonna take your job. It's not reliable. It's, you know, it's just the end all be all of Doom. And then you've got the others of just kinda wanna jump all in and not really do some of the due diligence. I fall right in the middle. So any kind of AI process that I use or tool that I use, I manage it just like I would anybody else on my I inspect what I expect. I think that's that's due diligence that all leaders need to have and all recruiters who want to use AI. That's something that you need That's a core concept that you have to employ whenever you're looking at any kind of AI solution. But I always like to use the the imagery, because I'm a I'm a visual person. I love Tony Stark on Avengers, you know, Ironman. He's a badass. Right? He is a self made billionaire. He invent He's innovative. He's a hell of a business person. He's cocky. He's charming. He's sexy. He's everything that you ever wanna be. So if you look at him compared to most business people. He's already head in shoulders above his peers. But then, whenever he straps on that that, you know, Ironman suit that's got Jasper, I think. Yeah. Jasper is the name of his AI, then he becomes a superhero. But notice one thing, he uses AI to give him additional information. to be able to make a data informed decision. And that that's how I view AI, is I don't want it to do its do my job for me. Maybe some parts of my job, the nonvaluable mundane stuff, if I can get a i to do it and do it more efficiently. Hell, yeah. I'm gonna send it over. but I want it to be able to give me additional data points that maybe I'm not thinking about so that way I can make better data informed decisions. So that's that's kind of the the the big thing of of before we get into how AI can help. Let's set the let's set the table or or kinda create this is the vision that we wanna go into.

Benjamin Mena [00:04:25]:

I love you know, Tony Starkquist, you know I I at least one of my favorite superheroes. Okay. Before we before we do a deep dive into this, if you want a really good laugh, many years ago when I was working for Lockheed Martin, which, you know, Cody Stark's logo is a little bit Oh, yeah. Somebody I doing a presentation in front of, I think, like, 50, 60 people at Lockheed Martin, and somebody switched all the Lockheed Martin logos with stark enterprises. Oh, wow. So about halfway through. Everybody's like, hey. Who are we working for again?

Trent Cotton  [00:04:57]:

Right. Yeah. Was there an acquisition? I didn't know anything about it. Yeah. Well, I I like it because it's just two. I mean, Whenever I think about myself in the meeting, there's a lot of Tony Stark comments that I make that I'm just like, I just made everyone uncomfortable in the room. No one's laughing but me. You know? So maybe that's why I identify with him. Maybe it's not the AI. Maybe it's just he's a cocky s o b m. That's who I feel I am too.

Benjamin Mena [00:05:22]:

Awesome. So the foundation, like, what do we us recruiters need to do?

Trent Cotton  [00:05:27]:

1, get over your fear. And and and I had it too. So let let's talk about one of the ones that's out there that a lot of people can't have access to. It should should at least go and tinker around with. And it's chanting PT. I saw all the hype about it because I I follow a ton of stuff about AI. I was like, that's for nerds. forgetting that I'm a nerd myself. It wasn't until someone on my team did something. And I go, where did you get that? when I ring it through ChatGPT GP team, I was like, oh, you use it? Why don't you teach the other team members in our next team meeting? Why don't you I'll give you 15 minutes. Just walk us through How do you use it? And it was just simple things, you know, rewriting an email. He English is the second language for him, so he uses it to check his grammar. And it just got me thinking, okay. Well, if they can do stuff like that with some pretty decent accuracy, there was still some editing that needed to be done, but it was fairly accurate. It took no time to do. Then I started noticing a lot of marketing people. They would have little ebooks or little prompts of, hey, did you know that ChatGPT GPT can do this for marketing? It can create a marketing strategy. So, of course, the way that my brain thinks is if this then that, if they can create a marketing strategy, it should be able to create a candidate marketing strategy. So then I just got in there and started fooling around. I was looking at what other people were writing, for business stuff and saying, okay. Well, let's apply this to talent and started to really just kinda fall in love with the possibilities. And that's why I created the ebook. It's just, you know, in in the eBook, what I do is just say, this is what this is what I wanted to do. here's the prompt that I used, and here's what the outcome was. So you can literally go in and say, I need to recruit data scientist in Dallas, Texas. Chat GPT. What are 5 subject lines for an email that would attract a candidate who's a data scientist in Dallas, Texas. And it goes through and it gives you 5. Okay. I like the 5. Make them funny. That's all I gotta type. Make them funny. And it goes through and it makes me makes them funny. Alright. Add some emojis sparingly because I wanna catch their eye. It goes in and it does that. And then I can look and say, I really like number 3. Chan GPT using subject line number 3. Write an email of no more than 250 words. Make the tone business casual. You can even what's really funny, if you wanna kinda have some fun, you can go rewrite the email as snoop Dogg loved it. I've done snoop Dogg. I've done snoopie. I've done bugs bunny. I mean, I can't tell you how many hours I've lost trying to figure out what kind of tone of voice. But I mean, it can change the tone. So you can be incredibly formal, or you can be business casual, or you can be very casual. And Do I do I use a 100% of what it does? No. But it it it starts to get me to kinda think, oh, I never would have thought, something like that. So then I was thinking, okay. I wonder if I put in Ben's LinkedIn account versus my linked account. would it tell me who had the the most, or who would be the better candidate? Let's put it that way for a data data scientist. ethically, it's gonna tell you, I can't do that. But what I can tell you is that Trent has 8 years of experience in data science where Ben has 7. it goes through and it just kind of factually lays out the differences between the 2 candidates. So I'm not getting it to make a decision for me. I've got 5 or 6 different candidates. I'm gonna call the ones with the most experience first. Chat be Chat GPT using LinkedIn goes in and does it. and I I have a ranking. So great. Now I can go and plan my day, who I'm gonna call first. Just the it's like my little assistant. You know, if I've got a tickle in the brain, and I wanna find some type of, you know, psychology studies about change management, Hey. Going on, write me an article based on psychology articles on change management. No more than 500 words. Create an outline in the beginning. and it goes and it does it. So while I'm talking to you, whenever we get done, I can go back and look and go, oh, that's right. I don't like point 3. So rewrite eliminate point 3. It goes in and it does it for me. So it's just the the the sky's the limit with it. But my favorite one is snoop Dogg, by the way.

Benjamin Mena [00:09:51]:

Well, per se You have to try it. I'm gonna try snoop Dogg. I'm gonna try snoopy as soon as we're done with this interview. Absolutely. When you think about recruiters using ChatGPT GPTA, at AI, what do you think is the percentage of people out there actually using it?

Trent Cotton  [00:10:05]:

Oh, it's minimal. It's minimal. Because whenever whenever I did the eBook, I actually sent it to, like, 10 or 15 people that I'm always, like, bouncing things off of. I'm not gonna say you're including it. But whenever I send her, you're using Chat GPT for it. Here's a free eBook, you know, just kinda give me some feedback on it. and three or four people that I knew for sure would have said, I was about time you caught up with this. That said, I didn't know it could do this. I mean, it it just really kinda blew my mind. So I think using Check GPT, we're looking at maybe 15 or 20 percent of the recruiter base that's actually using it. Broader AI, I think people are using more AI than we know. So if you're using a a sourcing platform, chances are the good ones have got AI and machine learning built into it. I know we were talking about it like so earlier. You know, they've actually gotten an ATS that's got AI and machine learning built into it. So this is this is becoming the norm. And in our business at hatch words, I mean, we're we're going all in on AI and machine learning because we know that that that's the way to modernize current platforms. And it's also a way that we look at, you know, how do we increase the efficiency of our developers by not doing the same task over and over again. We use AI and ML to be able to automate that, and then turn around and and adviser clients the same. But I think a lot of that is gonna come into HR in the recruiting industry very soon.

Benjamin Mena [00:11:29]:

I just had to ask because I I honestly feel like I'm in a bubble where everybody's playing with it.

Trent Cotton  [00:11:34]:

No. No. You're not. You're not alone. You're not alone. Actually, I think there are there are several people that I see, you know, post stuff I go, that's interesting. Where'd they come up with that? Of course, it's you know, I used AI to do this for me.

Benjamin Mena [00:11:48]:

I I will say personally, I think about 25 to 50% of my LinkedIn posts are actually written by AI and AI prompts. Mhmm. But -- Yep. -- like, at least for me, like, yes. You know, I do put a lot of my own, like, words into stuff. I make a lot of my own posts, but using AI to be omnipresent has actually helped with my recruiting also.

Trent Cotton  [00:12:10]:

It has. And and and and sometimes it's, you know, I want to reshare something that I had maybe written 2 months ago, and I wanna do it differently. And I am brain dead. You know? I can go in and and put the the link of the blog post in there, say, right, a very unique eye catching LinkedIn post with the keyword x. No sooner no more than this many lines and threw emojis in as bullet points. and it does it for me. That's time saving for me versus, okay, how do I rewrite this or how do I copy and paste and do it a little differently, just create me something new. And and I go through and I edit it, because I wanted I have a very distinctive voice. You know, AI doesn't puss. I cut. so I, of course, have to add things in there. But it saves me time. You know? And and a lot of times too, it gives me really I'm like, that's really interesting. I wonder where did it pull that from. And and it it's almost like I'm learning from AI and how it's doing stuff where I can apply some of those lessons to other aspects of business. That's where the real benefit comes in.

Benjamin Mena [00:13:17]:

Did you write Chat JPT the book for recruiters? Because you started realizing that not everybody was actually using AI and they should be.

Trent Cotton  [00:13:26]:

Yep. And I wrote it also too for me because I was on this journey. I was chasing a rabbit, you know. And I would I have a really bad habit of doing something and finding something amazing, and then not remembering how in the hell to do it again. So to me, it started out as kinda like a little cheat sheet of cool things that I found. And then I was thinking, okay. Well, why not? You know, I can turn this into an ebook and share it with recruiters who want to, you know, kinda up their game a little bit or or at least reprioritize because you know, whenever I think of, you know, the span of leadership of of of leaving recruiters, the best ones sucked the process. They sucked at it because they loved the people. Right? Same. Same. You know? It's really awful to be the VP of talent and culture and to screw up an awful way like I do. I mean, it is the basic thing that we're supposed to do, and I always have to have someone look it over because I'm like, I know I made a mistake. Just fix it and send it back to me. But the the good recruiters want to form that human connection and find that right career connection with the company. There are so many things that AI offers to allow them to to to really focus in on on what's what's great, you know? Even going in and saying, hey, what kind of post has been normally talk about. So I what are the top 5 toppings that he talks about? Throw it in a chat JPT, see if it gives something back. If if so, then whenever I pick up the phone and call them, And I know that you write a lot about AI. That is a passionate mind too. You know, it Bam. I've got that connection. I've got that hook. So I think that it's just, like I said, getting over that that mental thing of even I had a chat with QDT, that's just for developers. No. It's not. Not at all.

Benjamin Mena [00:15:11]:

If you want a good laugh, I discovered this week that ChatGPT for your iPhone is one of the best voice transcription programs ever.

Trent Cotton  [00:15:21]:

That's good because Siri sucks, man.

Benjamin Mena [00:15:24]:

It is awesome. So that that's my little, like, I have to

Trent Cotton  [00:15:28]:

I I learned something. I'll have to do it. Because people will know whenever I'm talking through my watch, because it won't make any kind of

Benjamin Mena [00:15:34]:

Yeah. No. Like, use the iOS app for TAO JPT. It's phenomenal. Downloading it now. If you're a recruiting leader. You have a team of recruiters. Mhmm. How do you, 1, teach where the recruiters how to start using artificial intelligence And how do you start implementing the AI to help them become super super powder critters?

Trent Cotton  [00:15:56]:

It's leaving the horse to the water. Okay? I love some of the tenets of of design thinking is is really what is the problem. A lot of times you think you're solving the problem, but you're not actually solving the problem. The step before that is helping people understand that there is a problem. So what I like to do is kinda go through like a a journey map of the recruiting process. from a recruiter standpoint, not from a candidate standpoint. So let's document it all. What part do you hate of this part over here? Why do you hate it? It's mundane. Okay. Why is it mundane? So it's asking those 5 whys to get to the root. And the root of it is because it's time consuming, and it keeps me away from actually being able to interview and and find the right people. Okay. Well, what if we automated this? Oh, that'd be great. Okay. Cool. Well, let's let's let's explore ways that we can do it. And I found that kinda digging into what's bothering them helps them adopt something a lot quicker than going, we're going all AI. I mean, if I if I sit down on I'm just thinking of the team that I loaded the thing at 48 recruiters. I said, we're going all in on AI. I would have lost all but maybe 12 of them, you know, mentally. They would still work there, but they would have been like, let let y'all do the AI thing. I'm still gonna type stuff out. But if I went through and I said, all of us hate because we had an applicant tracking system that was thrown on us that just sucked. And it was it made us do a lot of manual processes. if I would've gone through that and said, this is a manual process. On a scale of 1 to 10, how much does it suck? 10? Okay. Fantastic. What if I told you that we can do an AI thing that will fix this? I would have I mean, their eyes would be glued, ready to learn. So that that's what I would encourage leaders is to scratch an itch before you try to just you know, do a mandate. Because when they'll do if you go, we're going all in on AI, then they'll go, oh, this is a fact. Trend will change his mind or he'll forget his ADD will kick in, and we'll be on something else next week. But if they know that you're actually trying to help them solve a problem, you get a hell of a lot more buying in that way.

Benjamin Mena [00:17:53]:

I I definitely love that approach because you know, sometimes as a leader, I I have what do they call shiny object syndrome, and I'm like, hey. We can use this. We can, hey. Use it. Okay. Good. I'm not alone. No. You're not alone. No. That's why I write things down. Like, if you saw my Notion,

Trent Cotton  [00:18:08]:

I've got an inbox of just things that I've got to get out of my head. it's probably 42 things through. But it I mean, I I like it because sometimes they were great. Sometimes I go back and I'm looking on Google. Well, we don't even think that's stupid. But, no, I suffer from that too. And I drag more protein through all kinds of stuff. Let's try this. You know?

Benjamin Mena [00:18:28]:

I I I love Notion, but check out Mem AI.

Trent Cotton  [00:18:32]:

You can download your Notion into it and, like, include videos, books, all that fun stuff, and Like, it pulls data from that. Look at you and see. We're we're doing this AI swap of knowledge. I know this will be the best hour of my day. I love it. Now, I do like how a notion I mean, that that's another place where, like, it's not necessarily recruiting focus, but a lot of recruiters take notes, you know, or, you know, they they want something in there. Notion's got some really great prompts that's built off of chat GPT. that you can use, and you can leverage. I use it for ideation of tape points 123 and expand. And and it goes in and it pulls in all the different information. So I don't have to do the research, you know. That's another easy quick way. That's a time saved for me, and it's good insight because it's gonna pull information that I won't have access to or think to go get.

Benjamin Mena [00:19:23]:

I I think that's one of the gonna be the big differentiators over the I I would say 2 years is people in this personal opinion, people using AI to really expand their knowledge, become a superpower, super human, versus those that I don't wanna say don't, but, like like, they're gonna get left behind. Am I, like, Yes. Worried in saying that?

Trent Cotton  [00:19:46]:

Well, I I think they'll be out produced as as the probably a a little bit better of a turn, you know, as as someone who will be able to leverage AI to do things more efficiently, so that way they can focus on the things that really bring the value add to the company. They'll be seen as more productive than those that go, I'm doing the same way that I did it 10 years ago. I I don't care the time that's changed. Just another, like, quick example is Chet Sunner, is a Google plugin for Gmail. You know, Gmail, I love how it truncates all the emails, but I have a rule. it's more than four lines, pick up a phone and call me because I'm not reading your email. I'm gonna call you. But there are times where you need it for for you know, because I'm I'm over HR, so there are times that I need it for dark mutation, but it's like, you know, 20 pages of emails or whatever. Chat Sonic, it's got 2 different things. 1, you can go in, and it says create a timeline. So rather than reading the whole email, I just read through the timeline, kinda get the high level points, and then I click the next tab and generate a response and say, I need this polite because I'm not feeling polite today. So I want you to write this politely. It's got casual, funny, polite, formal. So I can hit formal, main hit main points 1, 2, and 3, generate. And then I go through and I'm looking at something else, and it gives me something I regenerated. till I found a response and a like, send it in there, make a couple of edits. Bam. I have just read through 27 emails opined on a response and made sure that Chuck CPT made that I was nice about it because, you know, kinda pissed me off a little bit. But, Chad, Chatby Chat GPT is taking care of making sure that I sound professional. To me, that's a value.

Benjamin Mena [00:21:31]:

So how much time would that have taken before AI versus how much time it took?

Trent Cotton  [00:21:38]:

So how many times I have to read and reread an email? Because I go and, like, is long and then I go do something else and then start back over. Oh, got hour. I mean, it it probably would have taken me 20 minutes to kinda get through everything. and write little notes out versus within under a minute, I've got a timeline. And then I went back and looked at a couple of emails because I was like, I need to look at some of the details just make sure that, again, I'm inspecting what I expect, making sure that AI captured everything. And then it generated a response, probably responded and reviewed in a minute and 30 months?

Benjamin Mena [00:22:08]:

So what could could have been 20 to 30 minutes on just, like, taking care of, like, one email down to a minute or 30?

Trent Cotton  [00:22:15]:

Mhmm. It because it was a media topic. It was a very meaty topic, but it saved me an incredible amount of time.

Benjamin Mena [00:22:21]:

And I I do you want a caveat on to what you were saying about Chad GPT fixing an email? I think recently, I wanted to tell somebody to absolutely just fuck off. Yeah. I prompted chat JPT. Like, here's the email that I wanna send, but please add it a little more nicer, but, like, you know, I add in these emotions, but keep it professional.

Trent Cotton  [00:22:42]:

Yes.

Benjamin Mena [00:22:43]:

Boom. Bam. Yep. Done. It says. Yes.

Trent Cotton  [00:22:47]:

Yeah. No. It it it does help. And and 2, you know, from a I'm trying to think because you can do this in blog writing. So sometimes I get very verbose. And it's not good for SEO. It's not good for readability. So I can actually go in and check GPT and say, rewrite this but make it shorter than it says a little bit easier or explain this to a high schooler. And it goes in and and it takes I don't lose any of the content. It just reverts them in a way maybe easier to use. So that that's for blog, but I can also use it because, you know, we've got a huge base of our employees in Latin America. I can't be overly verbatim. It's not fair. I mean English is a second language. They're at least meeting me 75% of the way. I I can't even speak as well as in Spanish as they will do in English. I wanna make sure that whenever I send something, it's easy for them to read. So I'm thinking about them. I'm using Chat GPT to make sure that I'm being a lot more inclusive. So it's just those are just little bitty things that that I stop and think of going, How can they not help me with this?

Benjamin Mena [00:23:57]:

You can even think about that when you're dealing with international teams. Like -- Yeah. It's helped me

Trent Cotton  [00:24:02]:

be a lot more inclusive and a lot more aware. And to again, I'm going at it from a from a listening standpoint. Okay? So I go through and I have, oh, this is a beautiful paragraph. And then let's see what check GPT does. And it goes in, and it's and it rewwrites it and I go, oh, god, I really gotta work on that, you know. Well, I wonder if people that speak English think that I'm overly verbose. So it it helps me it's kind of like my like I said, it's like my it's like kinda an assistant that says, hey, I'm gonna rewrite this for you because your employees are running, like, you know, just tear this to pieces, but having someone that can do it in under 45 seconds.

Benjamin Mena [00:24:40]:

So there are many ways we can become superhuman using AI. When should we not be using AI? Anything to do with, like, the actual

Trent Cotton  [00:24:48]:

human contact or something that needs delicate hands. Alright? If I have someone coming to me in an email, seeking help for mental health issues. AI is not involved in that. That's that's a 100% trend. I am there, and I am present. interacting with my team members. They know whenever I use ChatGB team or whatever I don't. Now what I'll do is I go, hey, I research this. Here's what Chuck CPT says. Here's what I think. So that way, they can see both. I'm just trying to think of others. And I I I guess I struggle with the question because I use Chat GPT so I can focus more on the human element. I think that's that's why I'm kinda struggling trying to find a an actual situation because everything I'm using it for is a mundane the automation. I need a quick response. I just need to let someone know that I read an email, you know. I mean, think of how many emails you respond to like that. Let me let me

Benjamin Mena [00:25:52]:

give you a couple of bullet points to say I really read your email, and it's not really value add. I think you hit on the head, though. Like, you're you're using it for the mundane stuff so that way you could be human for the human beings.

Trent Cotton  [00:26:05]:

Yeah. I want my energy because people forget your your focus and your energy and your time are limited resources during the day. People think, oh, I'll have another cup of coffee or I'll take a bang or a 5 hour energy drink, and I get more energy. No. All you're doing is you are depleting energy from later on in your body. Your body can only do so much. You can only focus so much, and you only have so much time. Those are three things, add money in the door to that. Those are the things that I protect and I protect fiercely. You know, you're not going to put something on my calendar without having an agenda in there. If you don't have an agenda, I'll decline it. because that is my calendar. That is not a to do list that you have access to. So let let's let's kinda set those boundaries. What I like with chat JBT is it allows me to keep my energy and my focus and my time focused or or pointed to what my primary function is at the organization, and it's everything to do with people. Awesome. So I can spend my time focusing for 45 minutes or trying to research some crazy ass topic, or I can let CHET GT do it, and I go in and I focus that 45 minutes or or an hour on something engaged in one of the employees for hatchworts, and I'm always gonna do the latter.

Benjamin Mena [00:27:22]:

I love that. Now flipping gears. For those listeners that have not heard you before, sprint recruiting. I -- Yes. -- she's my language. Fucking love it, and I wish I learn across this years ago when I was an internal recruiter. Me too. Me too. Can you explain spread recruiting?

Trent Cotton  [00:27:39]:

Alright. So let's talk about the 4 dimensions of recruiting. 1, everything's a priority, which means nothing's a priority. I call this chicken little. This is your managers that think that today, point a, you've got to get point a filled. And by the end of the day, point b is now the new priority, and you just wasted an entire day trying to look for point a, which they close point a to be able to find point b. Alright? That's dysfunction number 1. This function number 2 is that candidates get lost in the process because you have managers that wanna interview forty two people over the span of 3 weeks only to go back and hire 1 of the first three, and to be surprised that the person is no longer in the market because they accepted another offer. The other point 3, with the wrong 3. Right? Point 3 is that we don't stop to say what's working and what's not. It's kinda like that Lucille ball gift that I love so much, where she's in the chocolate factory. Our days are spent just sticking chocolate anywhere in our mouth to keep it off the damn belt, and someone keeps increasing the belt on us. Right? And the last one is the feedback loop is nonexistent. It's not broken. It is just fucking not there. So in sprint, we want 4 principles to counteract those those dysfunctions. The first one is the sprint itself. You've got 4 hundred jobs. The first step is going hiring managers, or let's let's kinda talk, you know, department leader. have 4 hundred jobs in your organization. There is no in hell. I can get all those filled. Today, and like you want to, let's be realistic. But over the next 2 weeks, Which ones are the most important that I've got to get filled in remission critical for you? These 20? Fantastic. So the next one is the business defines the priority. we start with the sprint, 2 weeks. Next is I want you to go and further define out of these plenty I've given you 200 I want you to assign a point value and assign a, like, a level of importance to each one of these different jobs. Just those 2 things alone. I can now say the hell with 380 positions, I'm focusing on these 20, and guess what? I'm gonna work them in sequential order. Then you wanna provide a process to make sure that your candidates move through the right way. So we put WIP limits or work in progress limits. Once I get to 5 interviews on my top point role, I start working on it because I'm waiting on the 4th principle, which is feedback. Feedback, 48 hours, mutual. I send you a candidate. I submit 4 candidates over to you. I'm not gonna work on anything with your role until I get feedback, and you have 48 hours to give it to me. If you don't give it to me in 48 hours, my manager's gonna get in touch with yours since say, is this still a priority? And if we still don't get any kind of information, then the head of talent acquisition's gonna go directly to the head of your and say, I'm icing this position. I'm not I'm protecting my resources. We're gonna work on the next one if we're already until you get your shit together. and that's that's just kinda how it works. It's nice. It's a Willow machine. And at the end of the sprint, you can start looking at we were we were given 200 points. We closed a 160 of them. We hit 80% 80% of the last 2 weeks. My team in recruiting spent its time focused on your top priorities and how you define success. It changes the paradigm and then recruiting begins to tell its own story versus the line of business or your clients, kinda developing their own story. And I mean, let's just face it. 60% of the time is to cover their own house at our expense. Recruiting, whenever I whenever I train people in agile recruiting on a both with the hiring managers and with the recruiters. It said, let me warn you. There's nowhere to hide. Recruiters, If you're not doing your job and you're filling all these roles that don't have points, I'm gonna ask you, why are you taking the easy way out? Why are you not listening to what your client's saying? Managers, If we could have hit a 180 points, but we only hit a 100, because 80 of those points were tied up because you wanted to take your sweet ass time with feedback, guess what? We're gonna have a different conversation about prioritization. It changes the dynamics completely.

Benjamin Mena [00:31:43]:

I love it. So and like I said, if you wanna do a deeper dive, check out episode 40. Also, check out sprint recruiting from Trent Cotton in the book. I'll have that in the show notes. or just connect with Trent. Follow him on LinkedIn. He is constantly sharing stuff that I wish I knew a decade and a half ago.

Trent Cotton  [00:31:59]:

And you and me both? Okay. You and me both. Whatever. We got about a year into it. And I think one of my Just real quick, Sabar. One of my favorite stories is I was working with Mora, who is on our team. She handled, like, the investment, like, the retail investments out of the bank. And the the head guy had 7 direct reports. They each had a hundred points that were assigned to them. We were going through what we call the allocation meeting. That was on a Monday. And they have one division that was private wealth. So higher revenue per client, that particular division had just gotten 10 roles that were absolutely critical for that entire group to hit its group number because, you know, one client represent 1,000,000 of dollars versus, you know, 15 or 20 on the other side representing the same. And so we're going through, and the head guy was like, alright, you know, manager number 1, you have a 100 points where do you want them? He said, you know what? I'm actually good. I think it's more important than Ben in the private world. I'm actually gonna give you my points because we're actually sitting in a good spot more. I'll tell my manager is to leave you alone. Then one by one by one. They all gave their points. As a group, they decided that The Private Wealth was more important for the next 2 weeks, and they and and then went one step further and basically sent an email to their director for say, Leave more of the Hello loan. She's working on a very key project for the bank for the next 2 weeks. And so I remember I hung up the phone, and was almost waiting because Mara picked up the phone and she's she's boss. What the hell just happened? I said, I I don't know, but I love it, you know? And what was great is that in two weeks, these really, really hard rolls, she got 8 out of the tin filled. in 2 weeks because she was able to focus. And I knew that that was a top priority, so I had people helping her source and helping her screen and taking some of the operational stuff off of her. So we were able to quickly align. And then in the end of the, you know, the when we did our retrospective with the client, we said, You define success, and we met it. And we would have hit a 100%, but the the guy didn't accept until the last candidate did not accept until the Tuesday after the sprint closed. But we would've hit a 100%, but it was it it it was mind blowing. I'm still speechless whenever I think about it.

Benjamin Mena [00:34:30]:

the managers sub set deprioritized. Like, what the hell happened? Like, we are so clever.

Trent Cotton  [00:34:37]:

I know. I know. It was almost like, I think I might because, you know, both of those for Katherine were like, I think both of us should go to confession today. Something's wrong in the universe. You know, that went in incredibly well. So it was crazy.

Benjamin Mena [00:34:49]:

So like I said, definitely follow Trent on LinkedIn to catch out some of the stuff and how to implement it. And you have a new book coming out soon. Future a I do. I do.

Trent Cotton  [00:35:00]:

Future risks. So I wanna you know, the the few yeah. The future of our HR is so overplayed. So it's fuhri s t. and it's the tactical mindsets tomorrow's HR leader. I'm a nerd. I already said that, not just with AI, but also with with history. I'm always like try to learn just weird stuff. But I have a really huge passion for like military leaders. To me, it's just there's What makes you decide that you want to go and lead a battle, especially, like, in some of the medieval times? I mean, I I watch stuff, like, watch movies and stuff, and I always tell them about being able to say, I'm so glad I didn't live back then, because I would have been, like, burning the state for being a coward going, I'm not doing that. You know? But what I do is is I kinda go through and I use the military leader and and and tell a story about a particular battle or or something that talks about a mindset, and then go through and say, this is this is applying the principle, and then do a case study of a business that actually did as an example, you know, one of the mindsets that you have to have for tomorrow's HR league or even today's, is an absolute change management mindset. So I love the story of Alexander the Great. He landed in Persia. And he was a little worried about some of his his troops, so he burned the boats. And whatever this general said, How in the hell are we supposed to get back to to Greece, he goes on Persian ships? And what followed that is is incredible innovation. because they there there was no ex there was no escape for them. There was no exit. So they had no choice but to embrace the change and then innovate and persevere through it. And so, you know, we I kinda go through and and talk about change management. Actually, I use Sprint as an example, those that 80% of the time that I am consulting companies on sprint recruiting is not on the methodology. It's on how to manage the change on your team. and with your client. So there's probably 11 or 12. I'm still finishing it a little bit, but I'm really, really excited about because it's it's got some really cool things that like learning about Eisenhower and Patton and Gang and some of that, you know, you're like, I wanna know this, but you get into it and you go, you know what? I can totally identify with that. You know, that makes complete sense. And then to be able to kinda do a deeper dive. So I'm hoping I'm hoping to have that released in the fall. Got a lot going on at business. Actually, getting married on July 29th, and we're going on a honeymoon in August. So I am hoping that We're we're talk about Sprint. I am living personally, Sprint to Sprint. I've got my own little personal board of, like, how many points are we going? What do I need to get done? So it's I'm eating my own dog for per se.

Benjamin Mena [00:37:48]:

Well, definitely congrats on that.

Trent Cotton  [00:37:51]:

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So, yeah, I look for it and The website, I'm gonna be releasing it probably in mid August ahead of the book. So it'll be the futurist.com. our future hrst.com.

Benjamin Mena [00:38:07]:

Awesome. So we're gonna move forward to the quick fire questions. And before we get started with that, make sure in the show notes to sign for the elite recruiter newsletter. Gonna start finally doing that after 75 80 episodes. And so make sure you sign up for that. So Quick fire questions. What advice would you give to a brand new recruiter just getting started in 2023 on how to be successful in our our industry?

Trent Cotton  [00:38:34]:

Learn the business, not recruiting, learn the business that you're recruiting for. You need to be able to speak to it like the ultimate goal for you is that the candidate on the other side forgets your recruiter. About that. Is there a favorite company that has had a huge impact on your career? yes, switched by the the Heath Brothers. Speaking of change management, it goes through how the brain psychology was or psychologically processes change in how you as an individual can embrace change yourself and as a leader, Leech. Is there a favorite tech tool

Benjamin Mena [00:39:06]:

that you that you love at the moment? maybe outside of Chat GPT.

Trent Cotton  [00:39:10]:

That's my favorite right now. My other one is ClickUp. It's a it's kinda like Trello or Asana. It's just I I like it. It's just easier for me to use. There's some automation stuff in there. So whenever I move things around, leading most of an HR department. There's so many different initiatives that are going through, so I can look at it in a kanban style of, you know, to do, done, doing, or doing done. I can also look at it by initiatives so that way I can kinda see, you know, how things are going. So I like to lay out event, and Notion's my other one. Notion's my external brain. I use it for my one on ones. I have the the, you know, I have a template. So, you know, I could document it, then I export it. I'll send the notes over to My team members to make sure I captured everything. But more importantly, I want them to know I was listening. What do you think has been a major impact on your own personal success? exposure. It is easy to think that you were doing well. And what's that? It it's Mike Tyson. I think this is everybody has a plan till they get punched in the jaw. there have been several times where I thought I was doing incredibly well and realized I was so off the mark, and it it it made me stop and do a retrospective on myself to seek feedback from other people and to grow as a result. And also to failure When my back is against the wall, the way that personality wise, my best innovation comes from whenever I feel trapped. and whenever I fail, I always feel trapped. And so it's like I kinda get through this pity phase. It was usually 24 hours, and then I get through the 24 hours of mad. and then I get into the fuck you face. And the fuck you face is how am I going to come out of this and come out of it better? And then how am I going to because I always then switch to what content can I do to be able to prevent someone else from feeling what I just felt over the last 48 hours or a week or however long it's been. And I do that both personally and professionally. Well, I kinda go, like, plays into my question that I absolutely love.

Benjamin Mena [00:41:06]:

Trent, if you like, everything that you've gone through, all the experiences that you have, all the life lessons you've learned, If you can go back to the very beginning of your career and talk to yourself and give yourself advice, what advice would you give yourself?

Trent Cotton  [00:41:17]:

Keep your foot out of your mouth. That would be the biggest one. The biggest one is to trust the journey. There were Whenever I look back over starting out, you know, a a complained I didn't complain. I enjoyed working full time, going school full time, not I mean, I I wish I would have had a college experience, especially now that my daughters have a 1. I was like, what is that like? You know, I don't work full time. But I was always looking for that next thing. And I think whenever I go back and I look in a I wonder how many lessons did I miss because I was looking forward. too much and not being present and going, what do I need to learn today? But collectively, whenever I look back, everything that I'm doing today is because of some weird move that my career made that I didn't understand at the time. But I just embraced it, you know. Perfect example, I was a banker. I love finance. I love my my minor statistics at finance. I love numbers. We implemented a new I think we implemented busier at the bank. There was another person who came over from the banking side into HR and he showed it to me. I was like, oh, that's cool. And so I started asking questions. And then I got to be one of the ones that they always go, hey, we're about to roll something out. What do you think about it? Now, I got to really kinda get headlong into analytics. I was a recruiter, you know. I was just chasing a passion. Now, that's one of the things I would talk about the most, is how do you lead an organization with data? And how do you build a data practice out of it? So if I had to go back to myself, I would just say, trust the journey. Your head focus in a career.

Benjamin Mena [00:42:52]:

but you started chasing a passion while at work. Mhmm. Like, how do you do the how do you, like, find those places, and how do you open those doors, and how do you, like,

Trent Cotton  [00:43:01]:

I changed the entire trajectory of your career. Oh, wow. I've always been one that that intellectually curious, and it didn't do well for me early in life, especially going to Catholic school. They don't really like why. So and they really don't like it whenever you debate theology with them. So You know, growing up, I was always known as the Riddler or the rebellious one because I didn't take things at face value. I had to understand the why. I think my side passions came as a way for me to have an outlet, so that way I could survive at work and not be. that guy that I wasn't, you know, the or the perception of the guy that everybody thought I was in school of. Why can't you just take something at face value? So I let that my mind chase all that stuff into the side projects, the the the pasture projects that now have dipped back over into my life because now it or my profession because I'm going, well, hang on. I learned this over here. I talked to Ben, and he talked about this particular thing over here, and I some research. There's actually some implications that I can do here, and the business benefits as a result. And I'm I'm probably one of the weird leaders that whenever I interview someone, and they say, is it okay that I have a side project? It's almost a guarantee higher. Because if they've got an entrepreneurial mindset, everything that they're trying to learn on their side gig, they wanna apply some of the lessons here, and we all benefit from it. So

Benjamin Mena [00:44:20]:

I'm a weirdo. it's a recurring theme that I've seen where these little things that people have taken on at certain points in their life have completely changed the trajectory 10, 15, 20 years And it's I mean, it goes back to one of the other questions. You asked me why why Switch is one of my favorite books. There's a story

Trent Cotton  [00:44:40]:

I read this in 2010 mind you. So that's what 13 years ago. I can still remember the story, and then almost the chapter word for word, because it just it talks about finding the bright spots. And it it talks about this family that worked for a hunger organization that worked in Vietnam, and they were responsible for increase or decrease in malnutrition from, like, 87% to 60% in 6 months on $30,000. they get there. The plumbing sucks, it's very rule. They're essentially looking at kids every day. Everyday who are male nourished, the brain shuts down. But what they did is they started finding bright spots. know, they found this one village where the kids were not as malnourished. And so they said, what's going on there? And then they they were able to actually hit their goal because they focused on the one right spot that had they not shifted their mindset. They would have just left the country and said. I'm sorry I can't help and think of the impact that woulda had on on a young child's life. So, I mean, as you can tell me, getting emotional, and that sticks with me whenever my my brain starts looking at all the negatives. force myself and say, there's a bright spot somewhere. And whether it's my career, trajectory, whether it's a a problem or a solution, It's looking for the things that no one else sees, and then blowing them up and saying, how do we scale it? Well, Trent, once again, thank you for coming back on the podcast.

Benjamin Mena [00:46:06]:

recruiters get on the AI bus because it is going to super empower you. make you so much more efficient, save you so much more time. Mhmm. It gives you more time to spend with your family even even that, and also more time to have, like, great relationships with candidates, clients, etcetera. So, Trent, before I let you go, is there anything else that you'd love to share with the listeners? Absolutely not. You can you can actually see you can go to sprintrecruiting.com.

Trent Cotton  [00:46:32]:

And under resources, you'll see an opportunity to be able to purchase the ebook, and definitely link up with me on linkedin.

Trent Cotton  [00:46:39]:

and be on the lookout for futurist. I look forward to everyone joining the journey. Let's transform. Until next time, guys. Thank you for listening. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Elite Recruiter podcast with Benjamin Mena. If you enjoyed, it's subscribe and leave a rating.