Hourly hiring in 2023: how to build a winning strategy

Daniel Blaser (00:00):

Hello everyone, my name is Daniel. I'm with Workstream, and today it's my pleasure to be here with Angie Figueredo. Angie is the director of talent acquisition at Dhanani Group, and she's agreed to share her wisdom and her perspective, kind of looking back on 2022 and then looking forward and along the way, I think that everyone watching will be able to come away with some really good ideas and maybe some ways that they can improve their hiring and their retention for hourly employees. But Angie, it's so great to have you here. I really appreciate you being here. Well,

Angie Figueredo (00:40):

I appreciate you guys. Thank you Daniel so much for having me. It's a pleasure.

Daniel Blaser (00:44):

Yeah, absolutely. Before we jump into questions and tactics and all that stuff, I wanted to make sure that everyone understands kind of the size of the Nani Group and the size of the operation that you oversee. As far as hiring goes, could you kind of just touch on number of employees and brands and everything that Dhanani Group is over?

Angie Figueredo (01:07):

Yeah, sure. So Dhanani Group, when I say I work for the Dhanani Group, everybody's like, what is that? Who is that? And then they start googling and find some pretty interesting information. Dhanani Group, we have 13 brands under our umbrella that include everything from Popeye's. I think we're the biggest franchise for Popeyes right now. We have Burger Kings, pizza Huts, Wendy's, Sonics. It goes on and on. Total of, again, 13 brands. Overall, we have about 2100 locations throughout the us, qsr, we have C stores and we have full service restaurants as well. Today I manage the Burger King brand, which is 562 locations, and also Pizza Hut brand, which is 3 86 locations. So those are the two brands that I manage.

Daniel Blaser (02:00):

Wow. Wow. You've definitely got your work cut out for you with that scale. And then I think I wrote down, is it somewhere upwards of 20,000 hourly employees that are okay.

Angie Figueredo (02:14):

Wow. Yeah, yeah. And that's growing. The organization is always looking for acquisitions, so we're constantly acquiring different brands and it's a family owned business, and so they don't acquire just like 10, 15, 50 brands at time. It's like hundreds at a time.

Daniel Blaser (02:35):

Wow. And how long have you been with Dhanani Group and then in the talent acquisition space more broadly?

Angie Figueredo (02:44):

Sure. So I have been with Dhanani Group. I started January of this year, so it's almost a year that I've been with them in the industry itself. I've been doing this since I worked in hospitality and then qsr.

Daniel Blaser (03:06):

Awesome. Well definitely you have a lot of experience. And specifically, I love that you started at Dhanani at the beginning of 2020 too, because that's part of, I think what we wanted to do today is to talk about, alright, let's look back as we often do at this time of year, let's look back and then also kind of let's look forward. So maybe I'll just ask to kind of kick it off, as you look back on 2022 in this new role, what would you say when it came to hiring, what was the number one thing that surprised you?

Angie Figueredo (03:45):

Well, with Covid and everything, I don't think anything's gotten any easier, harder, or even stayed the same. I was just doing contract work prior to that, and when I came back to full-time, I expected a whole lot of really changes to the industry. But I was quite surprised that there wasn't a whole lot that we were doing that nobody else isn't doing today. However, recruiting is always changing. For example, we don't recruit, my team doesn't recruit today. They did the first of the year or even last month. So we're all constantly having to pivot, change our strategies, evaluate the strategies on a regular basis. So I'm trying new approaches constantly. So in terms of the change, it's always there, but we're all using the same support vendors like Workstream and Indeed and the ATS systems. So I don't think there's really a secret sauce out there for us. I think a lot of it, the success comes from how you utilize those systems, applying the strategy that you have in place and solid partners, not only with the operational side of the business, our partners there, but also our vendors.

Daniel Blaser (05:18):

Yeah, that makes sense. And definitely how you mentioned it's a space that's always changing. It's always in flux. Would you say, as you kind of talk about your strategy this month is different than maybe it was a couple months ago, what would you say? It might be hard to remember, but okay, January, February of this 2022 versus November, December. If you had to compare and contrast, what would you say? Have you found it's gotten a little bit harder as the year has progressed? Or like you said, is it just kind different?

Angie Figueredo (05:58):

Well, my situation was a little unique because when I came onto the Dhanani group, I really didn't have a team, but I was given a team that was situated with a Pizza Hut, so I had three recruiters there. Those three recruiters didn't really have recruiting experience, but they were great operators. They had been very successful district managers, general managers, and they ran their operations really well. So I had to do a lot of training. Those first few months into probably the middle of the year, we did start kind of kicking it up a little bit. We started introducing, really going after hiring events, trying to reduce our cost of postings.

(06:42):

We're running on a very lean budget, so our creativity really had to kick in and we had to really analyze. Again, I had to look at the bit of the strategy that I had designed for the year and how I was going to achieve it by the end of the year, and it was really to get people in the door, how do we get people in the door? We were kind of playing whack-a-mole at the first part of the year because our operators were in desperate need. So stabilizing that was part of the strategy and then continuing keeping the cost down. So hiring events were and are a huge success for us today. We really taken a different approach to that, and I would say that into 2023, we're going to continue to do that and find ways that we can leverage all the sources that we have to make that happen.

Daniel Blaser (07:43):

Yeah, I'd love to drill down into that a little bit more if that's okay, because I feel like probably a lot of people watching this when you say you're operating very lean, you're expected to do more with less. Those are probably some things that sound pretty familiar to a lot of people in talent acquisition space. So I'd love to talk a little bit more about the events that you said were extremely successful. Was that something with the scale of your operation? Are you sponsoring those? Are you co-sponsoring those? Are you joining existing events? Are they in person online? Can you just kind of explain a little bit more about those?

Angie Figueredo (08:27):

Sure. So we run the entire events ourselves and they're in person, they're at the location. We combine our technology and the resources that we have to hold these events. In the past, what we used to do is we to post, for example, GM budget, hiring quickly responding to those. So that was a part of it that we needed to bridge the gap there and help them along a little bit. So we decided with the hiring events, the recruiters were going to do a really, they were going to do a lot of work behind the scenes to engage. Engagement is part, that's the word we use today here. We're engaging, engaging, engaging with candidates, whether it's through our text messaging, our emails, whatever source that we have, a bunch of candidates, we'll engage for those. So we run the events ourselves, we partner up with the operators.

(09:41):

We have a outline that they follow for each event, and leading up to those events, we may post it for five days prior to the event. And in those five days, we're constantly engaging with not only candidates that are active in our postings through our ats, through Indeed, through any other source, but we're also engaging in passive candidates that we get through Indeed. So that part of it has really filled our bucket a lot more, and the more people we invite, the more opportunity for that time to fill will lessen for us. So as you know in recruiting, it's a numbers game, so I could send out a thousand invitations and maybe 50 people show up and I hire you too. So it's the amount of candidate engagement that we've really dedicated ourselves to. And then the second part of that is the relationship that we have developed with operations to ensure that candidate engagement continues on even especially when they come to the location.

(10:48):

Pizza Hut does an excellent job of really making it an event. When somebody walks in, they have balloons, they give out maybe free pizzas or coupons, things like that. Just simple things, and I know we can all do it, but it really makes people feel like they're needed. They're important and they want to work for us. So that's what we want to bring to the table for that candidate experience. But it does come start with that engagement and just a lot of work behind it in terms of the cost. That's a lot less for us to post and do that way than do those two weeks with nobody really contacting candidates. So there's a lot of ownership on the recruiting team to do that.

Daniel Blaser (11:29):

Yeah, I appreciate you sharing some of those details. It really sounds like there's obviously so much competition around these employees that these events really maybe helps the certain locations stick out in their mind. Like you said, it kind of makes it an event for them. It shows them that they are needed, that there's some passion on the management side around finding the right people, and then that's reciprocated. So anyway, yeah, I appreciate you diving into that a little bit more. So we talked a little bit about hiring. What about retention? Is that something that you are concerned with? And I'd love to hear, have you tried out new tactics to increase retention? How have you addressed that over the course of the last year?

Angie Figueredo (12:20):

Yeah, that's a great, great question. We have been focusing a lot on retention the last part of the year. Again, as I stated earlier in my position when I first came on, it was literally plain whack-a-mole and just reacting to the needs of the stores and understanding how they were managing through their candidates and then developing a strategy and a plan to help train them, get through some of this, and then not to be being proactive versus reactive. So when it comes to retention, my recruiting team is constantly talking about retention. Now understand, my recruiting team was operators, so they understand what it takes to hire somebody for a location and keep them. So that's the beauty of hiring somebody that comes from operation is that they understand that. And so when they talk to their operators and explain the retention part of it, they're speaking in their language.

(13:24):

So part of my plan for 2023 is to put a sustainability, a retention plan together so that we can start officially training our operators on what that means. A lot of thought is going to come into the cost, what it cost to hire somebody, hire hire versus what it costs to retain somebody. The training part of it, and we're really going to deep dive into that because it is, I think today as talent acquisition professionals, I'm kind of looking at it more on retention versus acquiring talent or talent acquisition. So retention should really be our focus today because as you said, candidate pools are shrinking, and so we need to start building that relationship with people that we have, plus those are your future leaders. That's your bench. Growing into shift leader into a gm, into DM or even higher, our CO for Pizza Hut got working at Pizza Hut when he was very young at a hiring event. So hiring events aren't new by any means. It's just the way you manage them and the way you strategize behind them, but it helps.

Daniel Blaser (14:49):

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It seems like the theme with hiring as well as retention, like you said, is it was a little bit of the whack-a-mole trying to just keep up with things. But now as the years progressed, looking forward, you're able to maybe think a little bit more strategic, a little more long-term term. What would you say? I know that this question is probably oversimplifying it, but for somebody watching this and if they're thinking in their mind, yes, I totally agree with what Angie's saying, we need to do better on retention. We need to think more retention versus acquisition. What would you say is the start here or I would recommend these two things to kind of shape your retention strategy?

Angie Figueredo (15:41):

Sure. I think the number one thing I would say is build that relationship with the operations. Even with Burger King, our operations team, we work hand in hand. If the day doesn't go by that we don't have a conversation, a week doesn't go by that we don't meet with them as a whole district managers. When you start building those type of relationships and they start understanding that they're just not out there by themselves, that we're here to support them and help them develop these people, then it becomes a lot easier. In terms of the retention on the candidate or the employee side, again, the manager's part is that they have to be part of that success for that person. We want people to walk into our locations and feel that even if it's three months that they're going to work for us or have a career for the rest of their life with us from the very beginning, it has to be a positive environment.

(16:40):

It has to be a positive experience. People, they have the need again to be wanted and to be part of that success. So the managers have to be in there really making sure that the training is there, we train to retain. So that's kind of our model. But the relationship, I would just go back to the relationship with operations is so important. I can't do my job without operations. We don't sit behind a computer here all day long and just hope that what I call posting and praying and hope that they get people in the door. We push people to get in the door and work with operations on that.

Daniel Blaser (17:25):

So many great things in what you said, and I love to drive. There's kind of a through line to these events where you kind of show externally that you're excited for someone to join the company, but then like you said, that kind of continues. Maybe not with balloons and the party atmosphere, but even after they're hired, it's kind of like there's that through line where you're still communicating the value and all of those good things. So yeah, that makes sense.

Angie Figueredo (17:56):

And my team and to another part of our strategy, our goals for next year is to do stay interviews and really stay connected to the candidates that we're hiring. Right now, my team just handles anywhere from a GM and above hourly is all handled through the store, but even maybe reduce that into a smaller version of how the store can retain by having those stay interviews. A lot of times what we find is that the candidates, especially if it's somebody that we hired, they feel like talking to the talent acquisition team is a little bit safer space than actually talking to a manager. So there'll be a little bit more forthcoming and honest with us on what's good and what's bad, but we want to hear it all. So we want to make sure that we have a clear understanding of how we need to make some changes and then make sure that that information is communicated to the leaders. And the great thing about working for a family run business is that because I worked in corporate too, that I have a direct line to the people that are making the big decisions. So that helps a lot and they're very supportive of that.

Daniel Blaser (19:10):

Yeah. So would you say thinking forward to 2023, the year ahead, would you say that what you kind of just discussed, that's probably your number one priority on the acquisition side?

Angie Figueredo (19:27):

Yeah, definitely. We also will start utilizing a lot of new things that the company has added. Any new vendors, we're constantly testing and talking to different vendors. Automation is going to be a big part of it. We want to make sure that our operators, anytime we look at a new vendor to come in, we really look at the whole picture. But first we look at make sure that it's easy for our operators to use. At the end of the day, we don't make money for the company, our position, the stores do, and so they have to run stores. And with today's staffing, how low, it's sometimes we might have two people running a pizza hut, and that's tough. So they don't have time to go in and source for their candidates. So we identify those 9 1 1 stores and put a little bit more one-on-one attention to that. But in terms of our vendors, definitely automation is going to be part of it. For example, at Pizza Hut, we just got a marketing director, so we're going to be working really close with her to make sure that we already are out there on social media a little bit, but really step up that part of it a little bit more and branding the company for more attention.

Daniel Blaser (21:00):

So definitely like you said, when you, you're vetting vendors, part of it is like, okay, is this solution just easy to use? Does it make sense? How else do you get operators to actually use the tools and the solutions that you've already vetted? They're good, but maybe you're not getting as much uptake as you want. What do you kind of do next?

Angie Figueredo (21:30):

That's a great question because we're actually going through that right now. We're having weekly meetings with all our dms. They're open to inviting their GMs to attend these meetings. After training, we'll have weekly step in meetings for anybody sitting out there and anybody can just jump in and ask questions. We'll be on the line for 30 minutes to make sure that they're doing okay. And this may go on for a few months until we're sure that people are using it. Those weekly meetings do show us the usage and numbers are huge, very much into analytics and reporting. So we really use those to show our operators who's using, who's not, and it's their responsibility to make sure that those people step it up. And we keep track of that really well, but more so the support behind it.

(22:29):

It's the simplest thing, just answer your phone if they call you, because a lot of times they'll call us and say, Hey, or they'll send us an email. The response time for us, whether it's a phone call or an email, we have to respond to them right away because most of the time they have somebody sitting there that's wanting to get hired. If they're having difficulty hiring that person, that person going to walk across the McDonald's things. Really, we just don't try to over complicate it. We think from the operator's perspective, again, I've worked in a lot of stores myself and I've been there working side by side with the operators, so I understand that as well.

Daniel Blaser (23:11):

Yeah. So you've kind of touched on automation and I'd love to talk a little bit more about that topic because obviously that's kind of essential given all of the challenges faced by your space right now. But how do you see automation fitting into the process? Do you have a philosophy of how it should be used or how it shouldn't be used?

Angie Figueredo (23:38):

Yeah, so automation's great, right? But nothing's going to be perfect and there's always going to glitches or things like that. It's again, your time. The admins that are behind that automation that are helping support operations, how are you going to support the issues that are coming through? I would say to anybody that's trying to put something together, allow your team to be the subject matter experts in that automation. Don't always rely on your vendor or even upfront when you're coming to an agreement with that, make sure that you are the super admin within that, that you can make the changes, you can make the fixes, whatever. So that's one thing. So we try to make sure that that part of it is there because again, making it so easy for a candidate from the candidate experience, we redid our application this year. Every year going forward, we're going to look at our application again and make sure that it's easy.

(24:45):

Today it takes less than five minutes to get through our application process. Sometimes just not even that two, three minutes. So we're constantly looking as we ask ourselves, what is it that we really need upfront from candidate to talk to them. Generally it's just their phone number and email address. Having a resume is great, but a lot of hourlies might not have that. So it's just simple things like that and automation. We want to make sure that our operators and our team is working in one system, making sure that your background check is integrated into that, your payroll system, whatever, if you have an HS system is part of that. So we're all working in one area and that is the system of record, but then we also have to understand we can't lose that human touch to it as well. And that goes both on the operational side and the candidate side.

(25:46):

So again, I have a candidate that can't get in there or is having a hard time. We have a lot of Spanish speaking candidates and employees today, so we really need to make sure that if they're having difficult time, we identify that and don't treat them as, oh, here's a link, or here's some information. Follow the steps. We pick up the phone, we make sure that we talk 'em through it. On the operational side, again, that's part of the training that we're doing is to say to them, your part here to make this successful is that you're going to see them face to face. So again, you have to make that experience a great experience. The I'm still a big proponent on calling and talking to people, especially if it's a unique situation or something that I know I can fix. I'll pick up the phone and talk to them.

Daniel Blaser (26:57):

Yeah, it's something so simple, but I know even I'm a millennial, I'm supposed to be the generation that never does a phone call in Gen Z even more. But there are certain milestones or certain scenarios where it's like, actually, I personally want to talk to somebody too and getting applying and potentially starting a new job. I feel like that's definitely one of those where you do kind of want that extra little bit of reassurance. You want to make sure that you're seen as a person and you're not just kind of signing up to be a faceless employee or anything like that. So I love that you touched on the importance of that good candidate experience. And I guess one other thing I thought of is going back to these events that you mentioned. I feel like that's a great way to kind of reinforce that and augment some of the automation with a little bit more of that personal touch. So I really like that. One question that came to mind, I've read a few different places. I've spoken with some other workstream customers about this idea of reducing number of interviews in the process or even I read a piece a couple of days ago about this trend of no interview needed. Have you played around with any of those things, those tactics or yes or no, and how has it gone if so?

Angie Figueredo (28:28):

Yeah, that's a great question. And it actually did come up the first of the year where I did see the interview process kind of being a little fashioned even for hourly person and starting with the application, and that's why we reduced that down. And then the actual hiring manager kind of having one interview to second interviews, we've reduced that down. It's higher on the spot they walk in, you have to hire on the spot, and that goes in connection with our systems. So again, if I can hire you right now, I want to make the way that you have to apply the easiest and fastest way because I got 30 minutes to get you onboarded here total from my interview to my onboarding. That 30 minutes is the most critical time. I think when you're first interviewing somebody face to face is that if it's an hourly person, we tell our operators, you got 30 minutes to hire that person or less and both your part of it and then the other 15 minutes of it is on part of it. It has that. We're really striving to make sure that we reduce that down.

(29:48):

We've even gone as far as into the corporate position and number of people that have to interview. Again, you have to ask yourself, why is this person going to work with the person that we're trying to hire on a regular basis or are you just looking for an additional second person to look at it just to look? So if it's not relevant, we try to eliminate that not only for the person that has to do the interview, but for the candidate itself.

Daniel Blaser (30:23):

Yeah, a lot of great stuff in what you just said, and I want to ask one follow up. When you give this guideline of you have 30 minutes to hire a person, that obviously makes a lot of sense as far as remaining competitive with all the competition right now for hiring. But what do you recommend if it's like you have 30 minutes, hire this person, both make sure that the opportunity appeals to the candidate, but also to vet them and make sure that they're going to be qualified to do the job. How do you train for that is here's how you vet somebody in this small amount of time, but also get the reassurance that they're going to be a good employee.

Angie Figueredo (31:10):

Yeah, we're fortunate in terms of our leadership, and I'm talking like anybody that's a hiring manager, it's usually an am or above. We've been very fortunate both on the Burger King side and the Pizza Hut side that we have long-term restaurant managers and then we do hire, we have those that have that experience. So those few minutes of that first interview is really, their experience kind of kicks in. They understand if this person's going to really be a great fit for it, and then they push them onto the online process side of it. Now after those 30 minutes, you still have the opportunity to sit there and have another conversation, but our goal is get them in the system and get their hiring process done. Now you can go back and have those more personal conversations, get to know the person a little bit better after that, but we want them in the system because we want to start processing and making sure that nothing gets delayed within that. And then we don't want them walking out of the doors, obviously without being in there as well. So I think we rely on a few things. I think we rely on the experience of our general managers to do that and the trust that they'll make sure that they're hiring the best of the best. We've been pretty successful. There's going to be times of course that you're not, but that's part of the game here too.

Daniel Blaser (32:43):

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Now, some of the people watching this right now, I'm guessing maybe they're a little bit newer to the talent acquisition space, the recruiting space, maybe a few months of experience. They're kind of now in this world that's a little bit, I'll call it, it's a little crazy the way it's been the last couple of years, and they're looking forward at the year ahead and they've been tasked with creating a hiring strategy and creating goals, and maybe it's the first time they've done that or the first time they've taken charge with that process. What advice would you give somebody in that situation?

Angie Figueredo (33:26):

Yeah, so stay focused. Stay focused on your strategy. Don't lose sight of the goal and your strategy, your strategy. You can flex that as you go along, but make sure overall at the end of the year, again, it's December here, so I look back and say, okay, what did I accomplish this year? Was it part of the strategy? Where did I have to flex? But the best part about it is that when I do look back and I say, okay, my strategy was met for 99% of it, it's a good feeling to know that strategy and you made a positive impact. Create a routine in recruiting. You have to have a routine. That's one of the things I did teach my team is Monday through Friday, you have to have some sort of routine set in place that works for you, allow for those last minute changes, be flexible to that, communicate heavily with your operations team and with your recruiting team itself. I have weekly staff meetings with my team and we're always learning from each other. I empower them, I give them full. I want them to learn everything that they can. I want them to be smarter, better every day. And they are. They've gotten so much better, even from the short time that I've had them. But you have to be able to communicate well within your team and the operations team. But definitely the strategy part is stay focused.

Daniel Blaser (35:07):

Yeah, and we've talked about it this whole whack-a-mole experience, and I do feel like I hear that a lot from people in your world. It's feeling like you're always playing catch up a little bit. How would you recommend, how do you create a strategy where it's less catch up and it's a little bit more like, okay, now we're a little bit ahead of the curve rather than the whack-a-mole situation?

Angie Figueredo (35:36):

Yeah, another great question. The time that I've spent here with the Dhanani group, definitely like I mentioned, it was a very reactive situation at the very beginning. Maybe panic is strong word, but there was a sense of panic of like, oh my God, I don't have anybody. There's only one person running the store. And we were having to reduce our hours, maybe even shut some locations because of the lack of staff. But with having that strategy, and I know it's hard sometimes because hard, hard, you might even feel a sense of panic within their panic and want to forget about your end goal, your strategy, stay focused on that.

(36:28):

You are patient with that and you stay your course. It's not going to take you long to feel the stabilization of things. So I always tell operators, listen, how long have you been without a staff? Oh, we've been without a staff for six months. Well, okay, that's six months. Do you expect me to staff you in two weeks without a staff six months? It's going to take me a little while, so work with me. Let's work together. Let's make sure that we do everything we can to get people in there. And on your part, the agreement is that you help retain Some of our hiring events haven't been successful. We've not made hires or every time we make one hire, I think it's a success to me, that's just how my head works. But if we don't make those hires, we identify those locations as 9 1 1 stores because if I go back to my reports or any analytics, I can tell that the candidate hasn't been coming in for these stores.

(37:36):

So those are our nine one. So we restrategize for them. We develop a plan, a long-term plan for them. So long term, we can't pull people out. I don't have a magic wand here. And operations is always, I think that recruiting can just wave their magic and people are going to appear. It doesn't work that way. Again, you've been without for six months and now you're calling me, let's try not to wait six months next time, let's continue your hiring plan going forward. And that's what we're doing for 2023 is making that hiring plan for our managers, especially those identified 9 1 1 stores.

Daniel Blaser (38:20):

Yeah, great perspective there and I love that you included. It's like you create the strategy and then you just have to exercise a little bit of patience. It sounds like kind of what you're saying, right, is if you've made the strategy, nothing is going to happen overnight. You got to stick with it rather than feeling the need to run over here and try something else before you've let your plans actually take hold. Right. You talked a little bit about including the data. What metrics are you focused on and when you look thinking the year ahead, what are the top priority metrics ones you're going to be focused on the most and trying to impact?

Angie Figueredo (39:10):

Yeah, so one of the things that really, some numbers that are alarming to me other than the lack of candidate flow to a location is a location that isn't viewing their applications on a timely manner. That's one. And or hiring. So our days to view applications are days to hire is really important for us. We want to focus on that and really bring it to the operator's attention to say, Hey, it's taking five days to view an application that's a little too long. You should be at 0.50 or one. That's the goal. And then to hire somebody, it shouldn't take you five days or more to hire somebody again, remember the 30 minutes, that's what it should be taking you. So those are the numbers we're really looking at. We also understand from the operator's side, when they're using a system and they don't move the candidate from one stage to the next, that kind of skews the numbers.

(40:25):

So we can't hold them completely accountable for those numbers. However, what we can do is say, okay, let's train you to make sure that one, we reduce the number of steps that you have to go through to hire, and two, you understand how important that is because you're going to be held accountable for the number of days it's taking you to interview somebody and to hire somebody. So you got to start there. You can't just go to your numbers and go, oh, you're store number one. You're a bad person because you haven't done this, but I've hired people. Well, the numbers are telling me you haven't. So it's just things like that that really kind of matter to us to understand, again, the operational side of things and what those operators are going through and give them the benefit of doubt to say, okay, there needs some training here and we need to make sure that the numbers that we're getting are correct.

Daniel Blaser (41:16):

Yeah, it fits back into our previous topic of vetting vendors, making sure that, you know, they're easy to use, that this is something that everyone can get bought in on with the right training and a little bit of time maybe. But now we have a couple questions here for those who maybe don't know, workstream sponsors, we call it on the clock community, which is all for talent acquisition professionals, those who basically care about hiring and retaining hourly employees. So definitely Angie, you fit right in there, and we've got a couple of questions that have come in and I would love the opportunity to relay those to you to address. Now, the first one is from Melissa, and maybe some of these we've already kind of touched on, but Melissa asked, how do you stay organized? What are the platforms and other solutions that help you succeed in your role? You don't need to obviously go into all of them. I'm sure there's several, but maybe when you think of organization, what is one thing that you can recommend for Melissa?

Angie Figueredo (42:25):

Yeah, so I think they both go in hand in hand with your platform and organization because you can use your platforms to create that organization for yourself. Again, looking at systems that we work in only, and I know there's going to be times when we have to go outside and log into something else that we have to work in, but making sure that when you do decide to add an ATS system or anything else that works well for your processes, we're trying to work stream out right now, not on the ATS side, but the candidate flow side and the fact that we can, if we do add ATS to that, there'll be one system of record that really completes our entire needs for our company is a great thing. But making sure that you find those solutions that are going to add value and lessen and be effective and lessen the time that you have to spend managing it through. So definitely that organization, again is part of it.

Daniel Blaser (43:44):

That's great advice. Okay. Connie's question. Connie asks, do you have any recommendations for getting better alignment between the work experience and the job history that you're looking for in a role? So you have this ideal in mind, but then you're getting maybe people applying that they don't necessarily align with that experience. What recommendations would you make or what recommendations would you give to an operator who's running into this problem?

Angie Figueredo (44:15):

Yeah, so it's a double-edged sword there because when we post positions out there, anybody and everybody can apply, and it doesn't matter what kind of position, it doesn't matter how great and detailed or specific your job description is. People that aren't qualified are going to apply to that position. I get a lot of complaints from the field on that. Another way you can mitigate some of that or reduce the lack of people that aren't qualified through your application process, but then at the same time, you don't want to people and by having them answer more questions that they really need to. So it's a double-edged sword and we're constantly looking to see, but you have no control over who can apply to your positions. Nobody does. When you have other factors in place, unemployment, as you know, some states require you to apply to different positions and record that.

(45:16):

So we get a lot of that. And so we have to try to be, again, in the training for our managers to understand that when they're reaching out to people and they feel that they might not have the experience necessary or could have maybe worked in retail, we also encourage them to look at transferable skills and yeah, it's probably going to take you maybe a little bit more time to train somebody like that, but there's that effort in there and if you're making that effort to train somebody, there's a potential that person's going to stay with you. So it's really you have to look at everything and what you have control over and what you don't have control over.

Daniel Blaser (46:06):

Yeah, yeah, definitely. It seems like a tricky balance. Alright, one more question from on the clock community, which I'll mention anyone that's watching this is free to join. I'll include some links where you're watching this if you want to be a part of the community. But this question's from Jonathan. Are there any out of the box recruiting efforts that have worked well for your organization? We've already talked about those events that you've seen a good amount of success maybe. Is there any other recruiting effort, random, random things that you've tried that have actually worked?

Angie Figueredo (46:43):

Listen, we try everything in anything all the time and we attend. We try to be part of community, the community around our stores and join any kind of efforts there. We've attended Second Chance job fairs, meaning people that may have a criminal background check or history and they're wanting second chance. We try to offer that opportunity to candidates, so that opens up our pool a little more. But again, I wish I could say I had a secret that I could share with you, but anything, and it may be an idea from our operation side that jump on it and we'll apply what we can on our end to make that successful. But I think it's to make anything successful or any recruiting efforts successful is the engagement. And I'll keep saying that over and over again, both with the operations people and your candidates and applicants that are coming in, that engagement is so important and that's how you're going to make things successful for yourself.

Daniel Blaser (47:57):

Yeah, absolutely. Well, I really appreciate you just sitting here and letting me pepper you with questions and then also relaying some from the community. It's just been, I feel like you've given everyone watching so much to think about and then hopefully some things that they can include in their planning in the year ahead. I wanted to give you the opportunity with all the things we've talked about to maybe leave one final takeaway or one final thought with everyone here.

Angie Figueredo (48:30):

Well, recruiting, you have to have a passion for it. You're a salesperson at the end of the day, you're selling your company. You have to be able to be, have a culture that's very inclusive, diverse. You have to look at things in, we all have biases and sometimes I have to catch myself at times. So you try to put some of those things aside, but you have to have that passion for recruiting. It can get monotonous. It can get a little bit. I do the same thing over and over again. It's a rejection too. A lot of times you get a lot of nos, you get a lot of people ghosting you, so you got to put your feelings aside for all of that and just keep going.

(49:20):

It's that if you don't have the passion for it, I make sure that my team takes time off or they get put on a project that just doesn't, them requiring what I call dialing and smiling all day long. So I try to put 'em on projects and make sure that they engage in that way so that they use their mind in a different form and can develop that part of it and have knowledge to it. If you have a team, empower them. Give them the opportunity, have them them give them opportunities to grow, to listen, have them run projects. I want people to take over my job, my team one day, and to enjoy it and to pay it forward to somebody else. The people that we're hiring today, sometimes that's going to make a big difference in their life. So it's important to make sure that you have that positive influence on anybody, whether you give them a job or not. They should always walk away with their dignity and respect.

Daniel Blaser (50:35):

I like that. That's really great closing words to leave with everyone. Thank you so much, Angie, for your time and your valuable perspective. This has been great.

Angie Figueredo (50:48):

Well, thank you so much for having me, Daniel.