Blaze Your Own Trail - How to Leverage Your Talents to Create a Successful Business & Podcast with Adam Posner

Episode Date: April 1, 2022

About Adam: Adam Posner is the Founder and  President at NHP Talent Group- a boutique NY-based talent consultancy, specializing in talent access for Senior-level roles within Digital Marketing, Media, eCommerce, Product and Content Creation at startups, Creative Agencies, and Brands. He is also the host of the top global career podcast,  ThePOZcast- showcasing experts to help you harness your inner tenacity to drive your life and career forward. He has produced and aired almost 200 episodes with top guests like Gary Vaynerchuk, Grant Cardone, Kara Goldin, and Tucker Max to name a few.  Prior to pivoting into the world of recruiting, Adam spent 15 years working within the NYC advertising and marketing industry. He has led account management and digital strategy at American Express, SIRIUS XM, and digital ad agencies in NYC like VaynerMedia and EP+Co for major Clients like Verizon, Pepsi, and British Airways. This has instilled him with a unique perspective when working with candidates to truly understand their Career DNA and ensure a good fit on both sides of the recruiting equation. In addition, he brings expert advisory around the Talent Acquisition process, employer branding, and recruitment operations. He has built a strong reputation by always putting relationships first while balancing his Client's business needs and Candidates career goals. Adam is truly a power connector. He identifies opportunities, synergies and connects the dots. In this episode we discuss: Where Adam Grew up Going to New York City Public Schools His favorite Hobby as a kid ( And today) Where he went to College How he got into recruiting  Getting fired from Vaynermedia And much more! Connect with Adam: Buy the PozCourse! https://thepozcourse.gumroad.com/l/thepozcourse Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamjposner/ Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2564146713806159 Website: https://www.nhptalentgroup.com/ We hope you enjoyed this episode! Connect with Jordan: LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordanjmendoza/⁠ Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/therealjordanjmendoza/⁠ Clapper: ⁠https://clapper.vip/jordanjmendoza⁠ Join my Facebook Group: ⁠https://www.facebook.com/groups/linkedintrailblazers⁠ Website: ⁠https://www.blazeyourowntrailconsulting.com Installing strategic sales systems & processes will stop the constant revenue rollercoaster you might be facing which is attainable through our 6 Week Blazing Business Revenue Coaching ProgramBook a discovery call with Jordan now to learn more! Are you an entrepreneur?Join my FREE Group Coaching Community where we have live calls, Q&A and more! Our Trailblazer Ecosystem also enables you to network with other entrepreneurs and creator hub eliminates multiple subscriptions and logins creating a one stop shop to take action!Use code: FOUNDING100 for 12 months access FREE and Founding pricing for life! (While Supplies Last)Join now! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Blaze Your Own Trail podcast. My name is Jordan Mendoza. I'm your host, and I've got a very special guest today. His name is Adam Posner, and I'm going to have him tell you who he is and what he does today. Awesome. Jordan, thank you so much for having me. We go way back and connected on LinkedIn for a bit. So, you know, real high level.

My name is Adam Posner. Some people confuse it as Posner because I am the host of the Pazner. I'm that guy. I was like, it's got to be Pawsner. Now it's Posner. No, it's a common misconception. And that's why I call my show The Pazcast because when I was growing up, people, my childhood nickname was the Paws, because some people would say Posen.

So that's Pazner. So that's kind of the story behind it. But down and dirty real quick, born and raised New Yorker. Love it. Love the city. Definitely holds a real special place in my heart, a lot of pride there. You know, 15 years working in advertising, marketing media in New York. And then about seven years ago, six years ago, I found myself working for the great

Gary Vaynerchuk over at VaynerMedia, which I thought was my dream job. And it turned out not to be. And I ended up actually losing my job. I got fired. And that was a big career in life epiphany, which we'll dig into in a little bit. And I switched gears and followed my strengths into the world of recruiting for marketing, media and advertising. And I haven't looked back.

And it's been about six years and doing this gig. And four years ago, I said, I'm done working for other people. And I went out on my own. And I launched NHP Talent Group. And we're a boutique staffing consultancy. focusing on marketing, media, and advertising. And as I mentioned before, I am the host of the POSCAS, a top global career podcast where I unpack my guest journeys

and bring out all the wisdom just like you're doing here with me. And happy to be here, man. Love it, man. Appreciate you sharing that intro. So now that we know it's Posner, I think we're all good to start the show. Yeah, all right, let's restart it, man. So, all right, so my favorite part of the show, man, as you know, is I love to rewind.

So let's, I know you said you grew up in New York, born and raised in New York. So just give some more context. Where did you grow up? And what was childhood like? What kind of hobbies did you get into? Did you play any sports? Were you more on the academic? And I'd love to just find out a little bit more into Adam.

Cool, man. Yeah, no, definitely. So I'm born and raised in Brooklyn. Shoeba, to be more exact, South Shore, Brooklyn, near Coney Island, if anybody's, you know, familiar with that. And, you know, it's so funny because people are like, yeah, I'm from Brooklyn and literally they were born here and like three months later their parents moved out. But I lived in Brooklyn until I was 12 and it was pretty, pretty formative years.

Both my parents in New York City Board of Ed teachers. So, you know, we grew up pretty humble in a, you know, a two-bedroom apartment. And I shared a room with my brother for those early years, which is a lot of fun. Went to New York City public schools. And I think that, you know, looking back on it now, that was an incredible experience growing up in New York City public schools because you really, it was, you know, just a mix of so many different people, backgrounds and cultures. And I think that really laid the foundation to why I'm just so, you know, open and accepting. And because that's the way I grew up.

And I think a lot of people in New York City are like that when you grow up in a big city and you just surrounded by such a mix of people. And that was an incredible, you know, influence. You know, I played baseball till high school when I realized I really sucked at it. And I didn't make the varsity team. But I always love playing baseball. I'm a huge New York Mets fan, New York Giants fan, Islanders hockey. And it's kind of funny.

I'm not really funny. I mean, I have a passion for Legos, and I've been playing with Legos my entire life. I mean, I even have them up here in my office. You can see up there, you see, I got my spaceship. I got all my cool Lego, adult Legos up there. And I was big with Legos as a kid, up into my teens even. I mean, not too ashamed to admit it. And then I put them away for about 25 years until I had kids myself, and I, I dusted them off.

And my daughter is nine and a half, and my son is three and a half. I've been playing with my Legos and their Legos, you know, for the last six years. And that's really one of the most fun things in my life is to just take out my old Legos and play them with my kids right now. So that's kind of the early days, man. Love it. Love it. Thanks for sharing that. And so do you find yourself, you know, from a metaphor standpoint, taking a lot of things and putting things back together, like in your daily life and your daily work life?

Not so much taking them apart. I mean, I'm a connector. So if you want to use a Lego analogy, I am a connection. I am a natural born connector. It is my superpower. And even more than a connector, I'm a conduit. And I think conduit is because I'm connecting two elements. And listen, if I make a penny on it, great.

If I don't make a penny on it, you know, I truly believe in relationship karma. And that's really what's predicated, you know, my personal and professional success is being able to connect the dots. So yeah, I never even thought about like that, right? I connect Legos and I connect opportunities. Love it. It's my new tagline.

There you go. And so were there any early entrepreneurial influences in the family or did you kind of looking back to childhood? Were there things that you did? Thinking about it today where you're like, yeah, I did have some things. You know, maybe I sold some things or I did some little things. Yeah, it's kind of funny. And I've had this discussion before. And it kind of brings me back to a couple of childhood memories. One, when I was in middle school in Brooklyn for about a year before we moved out to Long Island here, I was on the pretzel squad where we sold pretzels in the cafeteria. And I remember there's a couple of side hustles here or there where, you know,

we would say a pretzel dropped on the floor and, you know, we'd not really drop on the floor and then sell it and, you know, pocket their cash. I don't know how ethical that is, but you know what I mean? Like we were hustling, you know, back then. And, you know, when we moved out to Long Island,

we had a next door neighbor, Rich and Liz. And Rich was a true entrepreneur. He still is. And he was hustling, man. And he was selling, going back and forth to China and doing a lot of like towels, linens, fabric. So I was attracted to that hustle. I saw that hustle from him.

And that translated into me joining the business club in high school, which is called Deca, which stands for Distributive Education Clubs of America. And it's a nationwide business competition. And there's different categories within it. And somehow I fell into wholesale sales. That was just a category that I decided to work in. And I was like, what the hell am I going to sell? at the time I was big into skiing, and I reached out to Smith ski goggles.

I sent them an old school letter before emails or anything. And they loved what I was doing so much, Jordan. They sent me an entire collection of their product line. They sent me, I think, like five or six different ski goggles. Wow. The POS material, the stands, all the stuff that it came with, all their sales material, all their collateral. And I went on, and I won states, at one New York state that year.

And I went on to nationals in Anaheim, and I came third in the country in whole wholesale sales. So it was one of those things where I knew that the art of selling and marketing was always going to be part of my journey. And then, you know, I went off to college and maybe sold a thing or two in college. We're not going to dig too deep into the college days. You know, we sold a couple things in college. But, you know, that entrepreneurial drive was always in me, even, you know, when I was working a salary job. Yeah. You know, even when I was working a salary job, but it really wasn't until I went on to my own four and a half years ago where all of that experience, really came out because, I mean, you know this.

When you work for yourself, you eat what you kill. And if you don't kill, you don't eat. So it kind of all comes together, man. 100%. Yeah. And, you know, thinking back to, you know, the decade's, right? You mentioned writing a letter to a company. I want to make sure that everybody that hears this understands this.

You can still do that today. You can. And it's still effective. And it would still work. It doesn't mean that everyone you write a letter to is going to give you or, you know, something. But that's still an effective way to reach out to people. I think it was more effective because now you're using it to break through the clutter. Right.

And it goes for recruiting too. I mean, if someone actually, it was so funny. Like, that's actually an interesting kind of thing. I never even thought of that. Send somebody. If you're really interested in a job, find their address and send them your freaking resume old school. Because that's going to actually get in front of them. Yeah.

No, no bots either. No, not at all. And put some tracking on it. put a track count so you know when it arrived and then a couple days later do a follow-up email you know if you really want a breakthrough it could work yep yeah i think it could definitely work uh and so you mentioned the college year so where'd you go to school and and what was that experience like was it worth it to you like in hindsight looking back and then what did you end up going for yeah absolutely so it was interesting so when it came time for college i i had a choice

I really had my mindset, Jordan, on going to University of Maryland. I had a couple of friends that went there. I went to visit. It was like cool fraternities, like, you know, at a state school. But it was a fortune. As I mentioned before, my parents in New York City Board of Ed teachers, you know, we were just like normal middle class, nothing crazy. And I went up to visit another buddy at University of Buffalo.

And I thought it was pretty cool. Well, it was freaking freezing, but it's pretty cool up there too. And I liked it. It was great. And, you know, my parents said to me, listen, we, if you want to go to University of Maryland, more than happy. but it's going to freaking bankrupt us. And it's going to be tough to afford it.

And, you know, I got into Maryland. I got into the honors program, which is a partial scholarship, but not a full ride. And Buffalo, you know, was great. And it was back then, it was only, you know, $9,000, $10,000 a year, pretty affordable, plus housing and all that. My parents said, listen,

you want to go to Maryland, we'll figure it out. But if you go to Buffalo, it would really help us. We could help you financially. We'll be able to support you better. We'll help you when you're ready to move off campus. We'll help you with a car. And I made that decision. I looked out for my parents and I go, listen, the two schools, relatively the same education.

And it was a great decision. And college was interesting because the first year I really struggled. I partied too much. I joined the fraternity. And I almost got kicked out. And I have a regret because, Jordan, I got accepted to the business school to University of Buffalo. And it was a five-year MBA program. So if I stuck to my guns and I focused, I would have walked out of there.

five years with an MBA. But I screwed up. And I got kicked out of the business school. My GPA dropped to like one point something. And I got cut and my parents were furious. So I really felt that I owed it to them to pick my shit up. And that's what I did. I got my act together over the next couple of years and refocus on communication. But I also picked up a minor in advertising and PR. And I think that's really what set the trajectory towards going into that field. But Buffalo was great. man, I had a great time up there. I was there for five years, took me four and I have to graduate, took an extra semester, and I spent that extra semester. I was interning for the Buffalo Sabres, a hockey team up there. And I did that for two years. And that really laid an incredible foundation

for my career. And you asked me if it was worth it. I'd say a million percent it was worth it. And I think that it's not just the education you get out of it, but you grow up. Right. And not to say that, you know, kids these days are learning from, you know, YouTube. and, you know, entrepreneurial on their own. But there's something about university. There's something about living on your own, learning how to be an adult on your own, taking care of yourself and growing up.

That's invaluable. And I wouldn't trade that for the world, man. So there's a million different ways to say is college worth it? You know, it just really depends on the angle and what you want to get out of it. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I was the kid that didn't enjoy high school, what didn't do really well.

And I knew I didn't want to go to college. I knew I wanted to do something in sales and eventually be a business owner. And my path looked different, eventually got to where I wanted to go. But I just knew for myself. And I think it's about self-awareness, man. Like understanding and knowing, am I going to go blow somebody's money or my own? Or am I going to actually go do this, right?

And I think you had that pivotal moment where you kind of went in with the plan. It got diverted a little bit. And then you had a wake-up call and you were like, holy crap, I need to pull myself together. And it cost you a half year, right? But you learn some lessons and you're probably a lot more well-rounded because of it, right? Oh, I mean, that half year, I mean, we call it the bonus year. My buddies and I, there was a couple of us that did the fifth year. We call it bonus year.

And it was, we had the most fun. I mean, we were, you know, kings of the castle. You know, we were the old guys on campus. You know, we ran stuff and the fraternity was going and we had that, you know, kind of behind us too. And I went to have traded that for the world. And I love Buffalo. I love the people up there. I mean, I truly immersed myself.

You know, I stayed up there a couple times during the holidays instead of coming home. You know, I enjoyed it. I really love the community and it's really good people up in Buffalo. I also worked at the mall up there, which was great. I forgot about this. I worked at a baseball card store in the mall. And my buddy James worked next door. There was a bonsai shop.

Right? So we would go together, right? And we would like sell bonsai. Yeah, we'd do it be at all the sports cards. I mean, you know this iconic card. I mean, that's, yeah, that he's a legend. man and that card is the rookies that's a don ross no that's the upper deck upper deck yeah the um the the griffmeister i mean he's a he's a legend there but that was fun i mean i worked at the mall and and

you really get to know the people of the town when you work in the mall you know it yep it was cool we had a good time up there and then time to come home and uh jump into the real world man so i've got some buffalo questions you're ready okay so uh first off i know you're not a bill's fan because as you mentioned, you're a Giants fan earlier. So, but I do still have a couple questions because you live there for a little while, four and a half years. I was a, I was a buffalo man. What is a Buffalo bill?

That's my first question. It's a bison. Okay, it's a bison. So it is, there's not, their mascot is the buffalo and it's just a bison. That's it. Okay. Pretty straightforward. All right.

And why do they throw each other onto tables? Oh, it's interesting, man. So, yeah, let me tell you about this. So I've had the, I'll call it the pleasure of attending two Buffalo Bill games in my life. And one of them are, this was a shit show, man. Sorry, I don't like the cursing the show. Our fraternity did a charity where we ran one of the concession stands at the Buffalo Bills game. And you want to talk about a disaster.

We were also handling beer. This is before like, it was Buffalo. They didn't give a crap, right? So we were side selling beers. We were drinking beers. It was a disaster. It was a freezing cold day. People were getting rowdy.

And we still even talk about that day what a crap show was. And we actually, it was a really close game. And I think they were playing the Jets, if I recall. And we literally just stopped selling everything by like, you know, right after the halftime. And we just close up shop and people are like pocketing money. It was just, it was just a disaster, if you could imagine, right? You know, 20 drunken frack guys like controlling a concession stand at a Bills game. But the Bills Mafia is crazy.

So if anybody doesn't know out there, the Bills fans, are actually the craziest and I've been to a bunch of tailgates in different cities. For a four o'clock game, those gates open at 8 a.m. They will be waiting out there. And they will be the spreads that you see there. Doesn't matter, temperature. They don't care. They're out there, man.

Loyal itself. That's what I love about Buffalo. Yeah. I'm just, I'm just curious who thought it'd be a great idea to jump off of high places onto a onto a table. No, I think they picked it up from wrestling, man, obviously. Definitely from wrestling.

Yeah, well, it's what happened. You got to keep warm, you know, you got to keep warm. And it's, you know, freaking wind chill of negative 15. And they're out there with their shirts off. You know, they're well lubricated, man, you know. That's it. That's it. So you finish up college four and a half years.

You know, what was the next step? Where did you end up going after that? And was this a pretty quick process or did you hang around for a little bit? No, it's interesting, man. So a couple of quick things here. So I had an internship in between. I had two kind of internships. One, the summer before I graduated at gray advertising here in New York,

a tremendous big ad agency. And that's really where I cut my teeth into understanding the ad world. And it got me excited and had a great experience there. That's kind of where I knew I wanted to get into advertising. And then this is an interesting one, which I really don't talk about too much. So after I graduated, a buddy of mine was working at a then little beverage company called vitamin water. And we all know what happened with that one.

Glass-o, right? Glass-o back then. Yeah, and it eventually got sold to Coke and everyone made, you know, billions of dollars. And I was there for a couple months, but the only job that was open to me, Jordan, was this role of a merchandise coordinator. It was literally the only thing that was open. So basically, I was ordering the swag, the towels, the cooler bags. And a fun fact, I still have my vitamin water cooler bag 21 years later. And it is my favorite thing in the world.

It's in perfect condition. And we literally use it every week. It's a perfect insulated bag. and it's 20 plus years old. Anyway, at the time, there was a head of marketing there, and everyone could Google his name. His name is Rohan Oza, and he's on Shark Tank, and he's all over the place.

And I would follow him around, Jordan, like a little puppy dog. Because all I wanted to do is emulate him. I wanted to be in marketing and everything. But the lady I was reporting to at the time, she's like, Adam, you're not doing your job here. If you want to do his job, you've got to go work in marketing, but there's no jobs there. And I think I said something stupid to her.

well, I don't want to do this stuff. And she's like, well, then you don't have to do it anymore. And that was the end of it. And, you know, I lasted a couple of months there. And I said, all right, let's see what else is out there. And my first real job in advertising, which is one of my favorites to date is with a food service, B2B food service ad agency called the food group. And I'm still close to many of the people there these days.

And I learned so many early lessons that are the foundation of how I operate today. And what year was that you worked for that first? first agency. 2002 to about 2004 or so. Yeah, I was just trying to think about like the social landscape. So this is, you know, at the end of it, Facebook's just, you know, you know, becoming a thing. So not real big on the social side. So what did that look like from those early days?

You know, what did advertising look like? Yeah, I mean, this is real advertising. I mean, Facebook really, you know, really wasn't from a business perspective. And I think till, I mean, you could fact check me on this about like 2005, 2007. when it really kind of picked up into it. I think 2007-8, it's like when I joined. I don't even know. But the early foundation in advertising,

this is why I think that I have these foundational pieces because I understand the true foundations of a couple of things, one in account management, something that applies to anybody with a core concept. There's two things. Managing expectations, right? And under-promise over-deliver. And those are two core pieces that I apply every single day,

managing client's expectations, candidates' expectations, and always under-promising and over-deliver. That's how you manage someone's expectation. You don't over-promise something. There's nothing worse, Jordan. When someone tells you they're going to deliver something to you, and then that time comes, they're like, oh, no, we don't have it yet. We're not ready. Like, there's nothing worse than that.

And then when it becomes a pattern, it becomes a problem. When something becomes a pattern, it becomes a problem. So I learned that early on. I learned how to manage client relationships, something that I apply to every single day and build upon. But I also learned the old school ad, ed foundations really about messaging, audience,

strategy, how to position a point of view, something that I apply every single day. And I work with some great folks that really taught me those basics, man. It was great. It was a great starting point for my career. Awesome.

Awesome. And so how long did you end up staying there? Yeah. What was that next step? Yeah, I was there for a couple of years and it was time for me to make a move. And it was actually interesting. They lost a couple of clients.

And we saw that there was some attrition. within the organization. So I was proactive. And I joined a cool company called Carlson Marketing. And if anybody in the Midwest knows who Carlson has, they pretty much own all of Minnesota, Minneapolis area, they're tremendous. They have Carlson hotels, food, travel, hospitality, a big group. But we had a little satellite office here in New York and we were working for British Airways, which was pretty cool. And we did marketing for their executive loyalty club. So it was cool about that was that I really learned in that job the idea of loyalty marketing. personalized marketing and print, direct-to-consumer print marketing. What does that look like?

So I learned the print process, you know, how to personalize, how to speak to an affluent audience and really understanding the concept of a premium product and package. Because you're talking to the top premiere of a British Airways frequent flyer. I mean, you're talking a pretty high-class, high-net-worth individual. So how do you speak to them? And in the same breath, how do you talk to folks that are just joining at a basic entry level. And what are the perks and all that? But British Airways did it great, man. They really understood the customer experience, and that was a tremendous learning time for them. But the other interesting thing about my time there is it was right about that time that, you know, Howard Stern, who's someone that I love and grew up with here

in New York, big fan, made the move from Terrestrial Radio, K Rock, 92, 3 here in New York, over to a up-and-coming satellite radio company called Sirius back then. That was before it was Sirius XM, she was before it was Sirius XM, Pandora, Spotify, whatever the hell you want to call it. And I was like, oh, my God, I'd love to go work over there. I'd love to go work where Howard Stern is. And I applied, I interviewed, and I got the job. Awesome.

The most fun five years of my career back then. I mean, that was big, big giant office building, right across from Rockefeller Center, three floors studios, Howard Stern Studios, tons of music, celebrities, entertainment, parties, and I loved it. That was one of the most fun times in my career, man. Awesome, man. And so talk a little bit about what that looked like. And, you know, in that five years, I'm sure you started out in one role.

Did you escalate into a couple? And then how much value do you think that added to you being there? Oh, my God. I mean, so I, what I learned in five years, and I progressed, I went from manager to senior manager in five years. But what I really learned is as I grew, I grew into a marketer. I grew into being a, from just like a worker bee into someone who really focused on strategy and execution, you know, clouds and dirt. And I learned direct to consumer marketing. I learned e-commerce marketing. These are the early days of Facebook. I learned affiliate marketing,

you know, big on, you know, red hat and all these other ones that were coming out there. and I learned the art of affiliate marketing, something I apply now to this day. And I look back on it and all those pieces, all those jobs, all those careers, give me the ability now as a recruiter to talk shop with any client instead and out. You know, if I have a direct-to-consumer marketing company, I could talk shop all day long. It's actually really funny. I had Sean Harper on my show a few weeks ago coming out soon. He's a founder of Kin, which is a direct-to-consumer insurance company. And he was also the founder of Red Hat, which worked with, or Red Door, sorry, which worked with,

serious back then at the time. So it's funny, we look back on and we actually are paths across, you know, 15 years ago. So it's a funny world. But one of the other big takeaways there is I learned the power. I had a great mentor by the name of Debbie Ernst. And on my first day there, Jordan, first day, I'm serious. Before I turned on my computer, before I even did anything, she took me by the arm and walked me around three floors and introduced me to almost

everybody in the company. Yeah. Everyone from the CFO to the janitor to security. guards and she taught me the power of real relationships within the workplace and that's what i built over five years i mean it was my longest career uh my longest tenure to date aside from almost nhp talent group but we're getting there yeah yeah you're gonna you're definitely especially if you're focusing on that you know having somebody show you that example of hey listen i want you to meet everybody because i'm sure you took that with you you know and that's probably something that

100% you implemented your business like hey you're you're starting i want you want other people to feel as special as you felt you know exactly every single person so that's that's awesome that she kind of you know paved that road for you that uh you could follow and um so what was that next role i know it sounds like you really enjoyed it there and i did what was it that uh you know made you leave so this is an interesting one and and i and i kind of look back on this moment where I don't really call it a regret, but I knew it was time for me. You know, it was there for five years. The only other move for me was to go into the brand marketing side, but there wasn't an opportunity.

And there were some changes within our team, and there was a weird dynamic going on. And I had a good friend, my wife and had a good friend that she worked at American Express. I never thought, dude, Jordan, I never even thought I would work in American Express. But she's like, listen, it's great. They have great benefits. They pay well. It could be a really interesting opportunity. And Sirius XM, you know, it was kind of casual.

You know, you can kind of wear what you want there. You're in business, you know, casual American Express a little more buttoned up. Like literally, except for Fridays, you know, I had to wear, you know, slacks and a button down. You know, it was a pretty buttoned up place. And I went through the gauntlet of interviews, dude, a gauntlet. And I joined. I got the offer and it was a big bump in pay. And I think that's something that really brought me over there.

I think it was like a at the time, maybe 20, 25 grand bump, you know, and that was big. You know, that's big back then. And I was senior manager at American Express. And I pretty much knew from the first day that it was a bad decision. I felt completely overwhelmed. I felt like a fish out of water culturally. And I'll tell you why. I was being introduced to people and who were like kind of like my peers,

kind of at the same level as me. And Jordan, we're talking at that point when I'm at least 10 years out of school at that point. And the first question they would ask me is, what B school did you go to? What business school did you go to? And I'd say, I didn't go to B school. I just went to the University of Buffalo and they're like, because these folks are coming from great colleges, universities, lots of money, MBAs, and I have the same job as them, same pay without all that. So let's go back to your college question, right?

Or MBA is valuable. Right, let's take it to the next level there. And I knew from those questions alone, Jordan, that was weird. Like, that's not what I want to ask somebody. If I met you for the first, I'm not going to ask you what freaking college or B school you went to. And I just didn't enjoy my experience there. it never felt right. I never felt comfortable. I never landed, like got comfortable with my team. The lady that hired me, she left after two weeks and I felt kind of duped, you know, because I came

because I liked her and I felt duped. I never really jelled with my next managers. But what I did learn, man, is I learned what I did not like. And I think that's a critical lesson for anyone in their career. I didn't like any of the finance stuff. I hated the process stuff. But on the flip side of it, all that finance and process stuff now, thank God I learned it because I apply it to my business every single day. Yeah. You know, financially, I have my books in order. I manage my business.

I understand profit margins, all because I ran a piece of business, you know, at American Express. So really interesting, I was there for about a year and a half, and they brought on a new president into our division, which was a credit card division. It's funny. I was working on the Delta credit card, which is a card I have in my wallet today. And they said, listen, we're doing a reorg and 150 people, you're going to have a new job in the new year. So you could either interview, re-interview, go through the whole process

again, or you could take a severance package, a six-month severance package. And I go, wait, six months, six months paid with health care. Like, are you kidding me? Right. So at the time, my wife was a month away from having our first child, my daughter, and it was summertime coming up, like after the new year and after, you know, the whole process went through. And I said, screw it. I'm taking, I'm taking this. And I had six months off paid. And two of those were with my wife and we had our daughter. And it was magical, man. We basically had the whole summer off paid together with our baby bonding. And I look back on that and I will never be able to have that opportunity again in my life. Yeah. You know, that's what I'm saying. That's like super,

you're only there, a year and a half. You got six months. Six months, dude. That just tells me something was going down. You know, like you don't know. You don't just give that type of offer. No, no. And it was, It was pretty cool and I think about it because that six months, I also took the time to build out, like, think about what was next. And I made the decision to go back into advertising because I really liked the advertising culture. I like the vibe. I like the energy.

I loved all that. And it took me some time to kind of get back into the swing, but I landed at a great agency called Irwin Penlin, which is now EP and co. And I look back on that and I always say that that was the most fun I've had on the agency world because of the people. We had a squad there, man. That was real culture. That was real energy.

That was real vibe. And we did some really cool work. And I was there for almost two years. And I worked with another amazing mentor, her name of Justina Omakwa, who's big at Apple and Elserra. And she's CMO of, I think, Latch or one of those kind of cool techie startups now. And she taught me how to have a point of view within strategy. She taught me how to hold my own, how to present myself,

how to carry myself professionally in front of folks that were senior level to me. And I learned a ton from her. And then 30 of us got burned, real bad. We got burned really bad. Verizon was one of our big accounts and we lost a major piece of business because someone really screwed up at the higher level. And 30 of us got let go a week before Christmas. Man. They couldn't even wait, dude.

They couldn't even wait until after Christmas. That's tough. That's a BS I'm talking about, man. And that really jaded me. And that's when I went through a really long streak. I think it was about six, seven months of unemployment. And that was really tough. It was a bad market.

And I struggled, man. And I think, looking back, Looking back on that time, I think that's why I can relate so well with job seekers and why I'm so empathetic to their cause because I've been there. I've applied to a million jobs. I've gone to a thousand interviews. I've been rejected a million times. I've been through the same shit that they are.

100% yeah. Right? I'm not just some recruiter coming here who's never done that before. I've worked in your industry. I've been hired in your industry. I've been fired in your industry. I know all about it. And I think that's really one of the reasons I'm, you know, successful at what I do.

And then I struggled then. I went to a couple different ad agencies. One of them literally threw a ton of money at me. He turned out that the boss is toxic and he was awful. And we, we, we parted ways on weird terms. And it was actually one of the only relationships in my professional life that I've had to napalm. You know, but luckily at that time, I got an opportunity to interview with this little company called VaynerMedia. And as they say, the rest is history, man.

And, you know, I, I thought it was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Couldn't have been more excited. And I thought it was my forever job, dude. And let's, let's definitely dive into it. I got a question for you because I think you said something. really important for everybody and you didn't say it in these words but you basically just said that you are a practitioner at what you do you know you've been hired you've been fired you've been fired you've interviewed you've done it and that's something i tell my clients all the time is

is you've got to before you put anything out to the marketplace you better be a dang practitioner at it you better understand it you better understand the good times and the bad and all the in-betweens because if you have someone and you haven't been through that yet there's no way you can relate to him. No. The way that you're going to be able to help them out, you know? No, it's critical, man. So, yeah, I think that was an important thing that you said that, you know, you can relate

to everyone you're working because you've been on all ends of the spectrum. Yeah, and I think, and I think that's really important. And that's not to say that the recruiters out there are bad because they didn't, they haven't gone through what I've gone through. I'm not saying that at all, but it's what gives me a very distinct advantage. 100%. It's a big advantage. It's a huge advantage that I never even have to think about because it's always, it's,

It's ingrained. It's ingrained in my experience. Like those chapters in my book are written and done and complete. And I look back at them, right? And I always say this too. Like, I think it's important to keep your eye on that rear view mirror to give you perspective and everything. But, you know, don't turn around too much and hurt your neck, man. Yeah, don't dwell on it. Keep your eye on the prizes.

So Vayner Media. Yeah, man. And I kind of enjoyed sharing this story because it's really interesting. You know, I, I built, I was only there for about seven months. and I've built so many, so many better relationships after my time at Vayner with, with Claude, with Jimmy, with Mark, with Gary. Like, I've spent, it's been six years since Vayner. And I have such better relationships and potentially working with them in the future on recruiting.

And Gary on the show, James, Claude, a whole bunch of other folks here too. But what's interesting about Vayner is sometimes you think the grass is greener on the other side. And that's totally cool. And it's awesome if it is. But sometimes it's not, man. Sometimes it's not. And my time at Vayner was weird because it was a much younger, less mature organization back then. And a couple of things happened.

One, I was not immediately set up for success. So anybody working in advertising and account management, typically when you join an agency, they're going to put you on one, two, maybe three accounts to lead, typically one. But when I came on to Vayner, for whatever reason, they didn't have an account ready for me to join, but they wanted to hire me. So I kind of floated around. They had me on a couple of accounts, but I wasn't able to really sink my teeth in and establish myself. There was some personality conflicts. It was a very immature organization. And honestly,

Jordan, I did not handle those interpersonal relationships and conflicts well. I was a very different person at the age of 34 than I am at 42. I'm a very different person, maturity-wise, and I did not handle those well. So let's stop here for a minute. So why do you think that was? Was it because you didn't have the info on how to handle them? Or was it because you just weren't in the right headspace to take it on? I'd love to just find out. Yeah, and I love talking about this because I really don't do it too often. So because you could Monday morning quarterback and now, now knowing where my head is at now.

So there's a couple things. One, I was 100% not in the right headspace. So at that time, I was coming into an organization where I was trying to establish myself. I was a director. Actually, I was a senior director. I was coming in to establish myself as a leader, and I really didn't have a ton of leadership experience behind me. So I didn't have those tools and skills to really smooth that out and make those transitions.

There was a power play because people, I was coming in and people thought I was taking their accounts and their roles. So I didn't know how to manage that and smooth it over and really partner with them. So I came in and they saw me as a threat and I was defensive. And I acted in defense and probably acted, said, postured in ways that cause other people to be a great. and defensive themselves. Yeah. I didn't have the mentor at the time to pull me aside and help me lead because my leader at the time was basically the same age as me.

And then on the flip side of that, I was going through external stresses. My daughter was a couple years old. I was dealing with the toddler. We're in the process of moving out of the city, buying a house out in the Burbs Man, dealing with that stress and everything. And it all came to a head and I lost my job and I got fired. And it didn't come out of nowhere. There was conversations in between.

I had an opportunity to course correct and I just couldn't write the ship. I couldn't write the ship, man. And I lost my job. And then actually on that day, you know, which was at the time, the worst day of my career, hindsight, it turned out to be the best. And, you know, on that day, as the story goes, Gary sat with me for an hour. And we always had a good relationship and still do. It's funny.

I see him a couple times a year. I saw him two weeks ago in the city and it's just the look that he gives me like, Like he knows, you know, he knows, he knows our history. It's pretty cool. And he said to me, he's like, listen, it wasn't because we didn't like you. It just wasn't the right time and place right now at this place. And he said, you have to start thinking about what's next for you. I'm like, I don't know.

What am I going to do? What's the process here? He goes, you need to stop. Greatest piece of advice. You need to stop focusing on the things that you suck at and double down your strengths. And I thought Jordan, he was just saying it to me to pat me on the ass. and get me out the door. But no, we talked for an hour about what I'm good at, good at this, good of relationships, good at building. He's like, well, what are you going to do with that?

And I was like, listen, I have a buddy that does, you know, healthcare and finance recruiting. And before I can finish my sentence, Jordan, he goes, dude, you would be a fantastic recruiter. And I went out and I didn't just jump right into recruiting. There was a month period, man, that was dark. It was a pretty dark time in my life before I actually kind of pivoted. And the reason being was it was, could I curse on your show? Go ahead, man. It was a mind fuck. And it was a dark, dark place for me.

And I want to, I want to take everyone to that place. I was out of work, this big house that we just bought, big mortgage, debating, questioning my value. Like, who I am professionally was translating to who I am personally. I'm like, shit, I suck. I got fired. I had an amazing opportunity to be with an incredible agency. And I screwed that up. And I questioned my net worth.

And I had some really, really dark days. And I had days thinking about, you know, am I going to get back into advertising? What am I going to do? How am I going to tell my friends and family that I got fired? I spent a full year before I told anyone I got fired. You know, I was making up like, hey, I left. It didn't work out. But I was only lying to myself.

And it wasn't until I took true ownership of my loss and said, yep, that was. That was me. I own it. Accountability, which we speak about, and ownership of my loss and my weaknesses that I was finally able to have the self-awareness to say, all right, what am I good at? Let me focus on that. But that month was dark man. I spent, you know, some weird days thinking about what was next. I thought about, you know, and no offense, anyone who drives an Uber or works at Home Depot or Best Buy or anything and stuff. But I thought, like, maybe I was going to go into that. maybe I'll just go to the Home Depot work there and, you know, work my way up into management. That's a cool life, you know.

I like that kind of stuff. But no, I said, let me follow Gary's advice. And I thought the recruiting thing was cool. It could be lucrative. But I really didn't know anything about it aside from all the work that I've done with recruiters in my past. I knew it from like an idea perspective. All right, you find people and you connect them with jobs and can't be too hard. But no, I spent about a month and I reached out to every recruiter that I've ever worked with,

every recruiter that was referred to me. and I had informational sessions. And I spoke to them and those turned into interviews. And I started to learn the different types of recruiting firms. And I knew what I didn't want to do. I didn't want to work at a recruiting firm where I would just be picking up the phone and smiling and dialing all day long. I did not want to do that.

And I was lucky enough where I got referred to a great agency called Onward Search that knew my game. My game is relationships. My game's conversations. And they saw what I was capable of. And they gave me a shot. And as I say, the rest is history. I spent about a year and a half there.

I learned the art and science of recruiting. But the real deal was, man, I started at 35. I changed careers. Like, rookie. Bottom of the totem pole shit, man. That was tough. That was a tough pill to swallow. That was humble pie, man.

Yeah. Yeah, no, I could definitely see that being some humble pie, you know, and, you know, those dark places, right, when you've got something good and then all of a sudden it just evaporates, you know, I, it's hard, man. I've been fired from jobs before. it's not easy but I've also worked at a place where I really excelled and then had something happened in my life you know actually had my mom get sick and you know whether it's you know being fired or whether it's experiencing someone you love gets sick or a loss or anything like that

these are real things man these are real things that us you know as humans go through um and so i would i would love to find out you know if you can think back to that dark time um you know, who was a light for you? You know, I'm sure it had to be your wife and, you know, was there other people, family members that were there kind of encouraging you and helping pull you out because as hard as it is, I know from being there, sometimes other people can't do it, man. Sometimes we've just got to figure out a way to freaking claw

nails into the side of the wall and get out. Dude, the treasure, the treasures are in your shit pit. the treasures are at your lowest, and sometimes you need to hit rock bottom, because rock bottom is the purest foundation to build upon. And you got to hit rock bottom to build upon. And that's exactly what I've done over the last six years. I needed to hit rock bottom. And I needed to test myself and push my limits.

And I was a bad person during that time. I was a jerk to my wife at times, a jerk to my kid, jerk to my friends. And it was frustration because we take out our frustrations on people that are closest to us. We're not doing on random strangers. God forbid, right? God forbid we got confrontational and start crap with, we're going to learn a lesson real quick because it's easy. It's easy to take out your frustrations.

And my wife put up with me and she knew that I was going through some stuff, but she also believed in me. And she's everything. She's my supporter. She believed in me. And it was at that time when I really had to dig down and harness that tenacity that I had to pull myself up and pull me forward. You know, I had some friends that I counted on.

I had some trusted advisors. and it helped. But as you said before, dude, it was all on me. Nobody was going to do this. And I was motivated by the love of my family. I was motivated by the example I wanted to set for my daughter at the time.

And I did not want to fail. I did not want to go down like this. And there was some dark times. Yeah. There was some dark times, man. And listen, like, I never, I never, I never seriously thought about, about like, you know, hurting myself or ending my life or anything.

Thoughts got close to that, but I was always pulled back in the light. But that was some really dark times. I mean, there was some really nasty, terrible thoughts going through my head. You know, it's a weird time in your life at 35. You're, you know, you're, you're at a point where you're, you're an adult and your real responsibilities. And you're responsible, you, you're not a kid anymore. there's real repercussions to your actions. Yep.

And other people depend on you. And that's real. Yep. 100%. Yeah, I know the feeling, man. I know that, you know, the scary feeling, right? And I'm sure there was a little bit of that as we talk about that next move, right? Because you worked at a shop for, I said, you said about a year and a half.

And, you know, so what was it next? Was that, you know, diving in, full steam ahead into the big game, man, from all. Yeah, salary to commission. Dude, full guess. And so that was another kind of twist for me, too, going from salary to commission. And I was on a draw for anybody that doesn't know what to draw is. It's a relatively small salary. So it was a $40,000 draw, which literally after taxes barely covered just my freaking mortgage payment.

Like literally, that's what it was. And then any commission that you get on top of that first comes out of the draw and everything else is gravy on top of that. And that was kind of a weird thing for me to comprehend it first. But I started to understand that. So I hit the ground running. I had an amazing mentor that really taught me the art and science of recruiting, how to manage candidate expectations, find out what their motivations are, something that I do to this day. But he taught me something that I do every single day. And it's this motto that I have is plan

your work and work your plan. Every morning when I open up my computer, I look what I got going on and I look at my notepad of the night before, see what I have lined up and what I need to accomplish. This keeps me on track. So I always have my plan. And also at a high level, the big overarching things, the big projects that we're working on, keep it on track. So Tom taught me a lot about how to work, how to be a recruiter, crushed it my first year, at a really good first year, and then I got a little bit cocky, and I took my foot off the gas for about three weeks over the summer. And anybody who's in sales knows this.

You can't take your foot off the gas. And I had three goose egg months in a row. I couldn't close a door, man. I couldn't close a door. Deals were falling through right and left. And at the time, this other search firm, this UK firm that was starting a digital practice here in New York, they courted me. and I went over there.

I was like, all right, I just got to get a fresh start. I got to make a jump. And I went over there and I was there for a couple months. Turned out it just was not the right environment, not the right people I wanted to work with. And I came home one night to my wife. I'm like, these guys are just, this isn't the environment I want to be in.

And she said, you're giving half of your commission to the house. Why are you doing that? Can you just do this on your own? Like, what are they giving you? And I'm like, that you can't do on your own. I'm like, nothing really. You know, I have a book of business. I have clients.

I know how to recruit. She's like, well, why don't you just go out on your own? And that was four and a half years. Our wife's smart, you know. Much smarter than us, man. Our partners. And that was four and a half years ago, man. And it's been the greatest decision I've ever made in my, in my career.

And it just brought out a whole new me. And there's been tough days, as you know, as a business owner. There's some real shitty days. But the good days, I'll number them. And it's everything I've always, it's a culmination of my entire career of, I'm at this place right now. for the right reason at the right time yeah absolutely and so you were what 37 36 37 yeah it's been uh yeah 37 when i launched uh nhp yeah so but think about this right you're like man i'm starting over at 35 right and then fast forward a couple years i'm starting over at 37

but a lot better feeling of starting over and i mean what's it wasn't it starting over it was it was starting out on your own it was so logic that was so nice you know it was so nice you know doing it you're doing your thing and not paying any royalties out to anybody else none of that stuff right and and you know i can relate a lot because i i i uh i left my 15 year in multifamily housing in this january right i was there 15 years and left at the ripe age of 39 i turned 40 in february so 39 i did the same thing i was like you know what yeah i need to do i need to do things on my own i'm course i've been in this role the same role for eight years. My boss is not going anywhere.

His boss is not going anywhere. I don't even have a passion. I have a passion for training and development. I love teaching and training and coaching, but I can definitely do that on my own. And I can do it from the lens of marketing or sales or all the other things that I've done. And so it was very similar to you.

I had to take an inventory in myself and say, what do I bring to the table? What are my strengths? And if I were to go out and do this on my own, could I succeed? And am I willing that if I do fail, that I can go get another position, you know, and man, I just knew I needed to go, you know, blaze my own trail. Like, I've got this podcast and I'm talking about this stuff. I've got to go and do it. You got to go. It's interesting, too. When I went out on my own, actually, it was actually

interesting, even before that, when I pivoted into recruiting, someone said to me, I know there's a famous Arnold Schwarzenegger quote around it, but I had this, I said to me, well, what are you going to do if this fails? And I said, it's not going to fail. Do you have a backup plan? I go, no, I don't have a backup plan because if I have a backup plan, I'm going to think I have a safety net and I'm always going to have that in the back of my head. And it's going to take up mental resources and energy and focus.

I go, no way. I'm doing this all in. And I say that to this day. I do not have a backup plan. I do not have a backup plan. And I will never have a backup plan. Love it. Love it.

So how much longer, right, just to give the audience. some context of the POSCAST. So how much longer after, you know, going out on your own full time, did the idea come about with the show? And did this stem from your, a guy that you looked up to in, you know, Howard Stern was like, man, I definitely want to have a show. Yeah. Something similar to Howard.

A little bit of everything. So the itch came in January of 2019. I heard a couple of other shows out there in like the recruiting HR space. And they were fine, but they weren't that great. And I always had this itch where I knew I could be a good broadcaster, a good host. And I followed the Howard Stern School of interviewing. He's, in my opinion, the best interviewer on the face of the earth, living interviewer on the face of the earth. There's no one better that could have an actual conversation instead of an interview.

If you could turn an interview into a conversation, you're winning the game in our world. And that's what he does best. And I heard a couple of shows. I said, screw it. And I spoke to my friend Brian, who's kind of like my sounding board. And we recorded a couple of test shows. where I just kind of interviewed him off the cup about his career. He's an entrepreneur, business owner.

And I said, all right, I'm ready to do it. And I was like, okay. And I asked my buddy who is a DJ. He made like a little sound intro. He said he would edit the first couple of shows for me. And I was like, all right, well, who's going to be my first guest? And I reached out to this dude that most people know here on LinkedIn is an early influencer Q, Quentin Alums, you know, the dude with the hat.

And we recorded the first episode, which was on Zoom. And I was in a round conference room table in the we work type of office I was working at. and I went out, I got the Yeti Mike on Amazon, and I got it edited. As you do, as you do. Yeah, and it's still there. It's on my shelf. And I look at it. Look at that blue Yeti mic is my reminder, man, until we upgrade to these nights.

It's a physical sign of progress going from that round table to something I'm so freaking proud of of this office and studio that I built. As I say, the rest is history. So February 2019, and now we are approaching book. up to 201 shows booked, up to 199 I'm recording on Friday. And it's been a journey man. And you know, 30,000 plus subscribers, hundreds and hundreds of thousands of downloads, built a great audience. I've had amazing, amazing guests on the show. I've grown so much from doing this. But most importantly, it's, this show is my canvas man, just like yours, where I get to meet

great folks and unpack their career journeys and share those lessons. And this byproduct that came from it after about a year into the show is, I realize that the show is a natural business development tool where I'm reaching out to decision makers, key decision makers in my field, and I can break through the noise and the clutter of email and cold calling and actually form a real relationship that has turned into business. So much of the fact that I'll plug it right now, I took all this IP and I put it into what I call the pause course. Makes sense, podcast, pause course. And now I'm teaching it to everybody. It's literally all, everything that I've learned, my process is I'm not going to teach you how to set up

your mic and your lights and everything there, but I'm going to teach you how to build a business development ecosystem through your podcast, all my CRM tools, the templates, the flow charts, and everything. And so people can replicate it on doing your own. But the biggest thing I'm teaching people is the strategy and mindset of how to be a good host and build a good show. And, and I'm curious to your thoughts on this, I actually try to talk people out of it in the beginning of the workbook. Because I don't think everybody's meant to be a host. I think sometimes people come in and maybe it's the same thing. You remember the fad a couple years ago where everyone has to be a best selling author, right? Like the only way, because you got to have it on your profile, you got to

be an Amazon bestselling author. Now, do it because you want to. Do it because you have a passion for it. Do it because you want to try. But if you really don't want it and you feel like you're being forced into it by external factors, it's going to tell in the quality of the show. 100%. Like, you've had bad days. I've had bad days on air. You could hear it. The audience could hear it. Yeah. They could hear when we're not our best as a host. But what if you're like that on every show? think you're going to have a successful show? No, and you're definitely going to get burned out. And listen, from, you know, from a time perspective, right?

Think about the early days, right? You had a buddy edit a few. Maybe he didn't edit any after that. He had to do it yourself. Well, most people don't realize that one episode it could take up to five hours to, you know what I'm saying? From like your intro, your outro, like recording it, producing it, it takes a lot of time. So like Adam said, hey, listen, if you're not invested in it, if it's not, something that you're passionate about, then definitely don't take it on because most shows,

and this is a staff that I've seen and who knows if it's gone up and down, but don't make it past episode seven. Yep. It's called pod fade, man. And the numbers are weird. It's like 3, 7, 11, and like 18. There's some weird because people, to your point, Jordan, they don't realize how much work and time this takes.

But I also knew from the beginning because I come from a project management account management background that I needed to form a process. I needed to outsource. I never edited one single episode of my life. I outsourced that in day one. I did the first 50 myself. And I knew the value of my dollar and my time and I outsource it. I was an idiot.

I didn't. Well, I got into five or early and I found a great audio editor. And he went away and I have a new one now who's fine. But I wasn't going to learn. The amount of time like, all right, so now I have to go learn how to edit when I could just pay someone a lot less money to just do it. Hell yeah. No way. My time's more valuable than that.

And that's what I teach. preach. I teach about outsourcing and resourcing. Yeah, 100%. So let's talk about your business a little bit because I'm sure, you know, what it looks like from year one to what it looks like in year, you know, six plus is way different. So, and you just brought up some really good points, systems and processes, you know, if you want to be able to scale, you've got to have systems in place, process in place, people in place doing the things that either you suck at or you just don't get any energy from doing, right? So looking at year one and thinking about today, how much different are those systems and processes for you?

100%. You know, year one, I was figuring things out. I was figuring out how to be a business owner. And I think the hardest part, and this applies to anybody in sales, I'm sure you'll agree. Balancing your time between delivering and executing to your current clients and keeping your foot on the gas for business development. And I had to figure out that dynamic. I also took the model that I was doing in recruiting the contingency model for anyone who doesn't know, you only get paid if you place somebody fee-based.

And I was using that model. So if I didn't close a deal, I wasn't getting paid. Right. When I did get paid, it was like hitting a home run. I kind of equates like a home run hitting context. Like it only actually counts if it goes over the wall. You give me 20 balls, right? The only one that's counting is it goes over the wall.

And the concept of not getting paid for my time, it didn't work with me. sit well with me. It didn't, it made me a shitty person. I would get really upset when I lost deals. I didn't handle that well. And I pivoted my model into being consultancy based, hourly based. My clients loved it. It was more value to them. I got paid for every second that I spent on a job, whether I filled it or not, and I just continued to add value to my clients and build those relationships. I said, hey, this is working. They said, hey, we need more Adams. And that's why I went out and started to hire folks and, you know, work with other recruiters and I scaled the team. And that's the model that we have now.

And year over year continued growth, even during the pandemic in the last two years, still increased growth year over year. I got, you know, my first full-time hired this year, Kevin working for me, who I love. He's an absolute beast. I love him. I really enjoy mentoring him and his energy and enthusiasm and his ideas that he brings to the table. And I want to empower him. Right. I want to give him all the tools he needs to help scale because he wants to be part of this growth.

And it's just, it's just been a fun ride, man. I love it. I love it. So let's talk LinkedIn a little bit. You know, I've been on the platform, I think, forever, really didn't get active until probably 2019 is when I got active. And that was really when video started to become hot and heavy. It started to really become the thing on there. And I remember sitting in April of 2019 with, I think, 7,000 connections, didn't really know

what the heck I was doing. And met a guy named Brian Schulman, who's, you know, been on there forever. creating and old school and and that guy inspired me and i saw that he was doing this what's good wednesday and shout out saturday and i'm a super positive guy and i was like man i need to connect with this guy i feel like i could be putting out videos i just don't know what the heck i'm doing and he encouraged me and mentor me he's like man like start putting your stuff out there you you know marketing you know sales just start showing up and man that inspired me to show up and that's how really how i built my audience was just showing up and teaching and training and putting yourself out there

like that putting myself out there so uh i'd love to hear your thoughts on on lincoln like how how long are you on there um you know and then what does it look like for you today from a business standpoint are you generating a lot of organic leads uh and i know you create a lot of content and so what does that team like behind you today as well yeah it's a lot a lot of a lot of questions to kind of unpacked i mean i've been part of the lincoln really old school since 2000 when i first launched 2006 2007 but back then it was literally people, what they call it, it would be like a job site, a job networking sign. It wasn't really to your point until about the last four years with the advent of video coming in and content creators and really taking the platform to the next level. So for me, you know, before I got into

recruiting, it was just another, another social platform to be connected with people. It was basically like an online rolodex, like a business rolodex. But it wasn't until I got into recruiting and really understood the power of LinkedIn for recruiting that I started to put out because I am a Mark Kruder. I'm a recruiter and I'm in a marketer. That's why I approach recruiting. So I knew how to leverage the platform to build a, before personal branding BS, you know, it's called your online reputation, right? I hate personal brand. I hate that term. Really, it's what people say about you behind your back online. That's, that's what personal branding is. But I used it as a platform to create thought leadership, to share my point of view and not just jobs out there. And I started to attract clients. I

started to attract candidates. And then I started to pivot, you know, once I went on on my own, and started to create content. And you went from text content to video content to podcast content, which is a game changer. So for me right now, I mean, I rotate all the time. I rotate between text, thought leadership. I talk about my business. I do the podcast promotion. I have a great one I've been doing the last year or so-called pause off the cuff.

We're literally, there's some content that I plan out, meaning I know what I'm going to post that day. I know the video. Sometimes I'll pre-write the copy so it's ready to fire if I'm promoting a specific show, an episode. And if a pause off the cuff is, is literally unedded, verbal diarrhea, whatever the hell I'm thinking in that moment, in that moment, and I just hit send, publish.

And that's some of my best work. And it goes to show you that people really are attracted to like the realness. When you're being real, when you're not out there, you know, flexing, flaunting, humble bragging, people don't like that stuff, right? Just be yourself. I call it as I see it. And that's really attracted the right people to me from a business perspective. The podcast has been a great platform for me to show my thought leadership and attract real

clients. So how do you use all these pieces for the right content for the right audience? And that's a puzzle that I put together on LinkedIn. And, you know, it's just been great, you know, built a real nice tribe of folks who are in recruiting, other thought leaders in the recruiting space. I made some great friends, some great connections. And LinkedIn is a special place. You know, when you do it right and you have the right intentions and everyone could grow and profit from it. And it's funny because right now is the first time I've ever actually sold anything. but I felt like I lived by the guy Vaynerchuk, jab, jab, jab, right hook, right? Like I put out so much value over the last couple of years that I'm not just coming out there

and trying to shove a freaking course down your throat. I'm doing it based on real social credibility. I've been doing the show for three years. I built real clients from it. I built a real ecosystem. And I'm not just shoving some garbage course down your throat. So now I'm using it for that. 100%.

And like we said before, you are a practitioner. You are literally doing it. And you created it. based off of your personal experience. So, you know, don't do this. Do this. I mean, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, this works.

Yeah, because you know it didn't work because it's, believe me, if you, if you, you've created enough content to know that stuff is going to flop. You know, stuff isn't going to perform as well as you want to all the time. I put something out this weekend. I put something out this weekend and you'll appreciate this. I put out like Saturday morning, maybe it was like 10, 11 o'clock in the morning. and I don't know if it was something with the algorithm. I don't know for some reason.

It literally did not move. Like it didn't physically move. It literally had like 136 views after like three hours. And I'm looking at the content. I'm like, the content's not terrible. You know, there's nothing really bad here. Maybe it could have been more engaging. It wasn't my best piece.

I kind of just, you know, threw it out there. I think I was doing it like from bed in the morning. You know what I mean? We've all had those posts, right? Yep. I'm like, ah, whatever. I'm like, I'm going to delete it. And I rarely do that.

but I just, I felt like something was broken, right? The machine was broken. We've been through this before. Yep. And I'm like, all right, machine's broken. Let me reset it. And I put the same post out and it flopped again. I'm like, all right.

That's it. I'm done for today. And I left it and I left it up there. So sometimes there's no rhyme or reason, man. It's just, what's going to resonate with people, you know, what's going to attract them? And, you know, the content game is interesting because I, and I firmly believe this. There's writing with a purpose. You know, I'm not a big fan of people who do the clickbait.

I'm not a big fan of the people that, You know, intention is everything. And I truly believe it's your how. The how. Your why is critical. Simon Sinek talks about the why. And everyone else talks about your why. You're North Star.

I talk about all the time, but your how. How do you go about doing things? How do you engage with people? How do you treat people? How do you want to be seen and remembered out there? How do you treat other people online and offline? 100%.

And what's your intention behind it? Yeah. And to your point, you've got to be the same person. You can't show up one way in one platform and show up a different way at another platform. We see it all the time. We see it all the time. I saw this morning this influencer and it's funny because this person calls themselves an influencer. And this person put up the most ridiculous photo of themselves celebrating a follower count.

And I'm like, what the, like, what kind of world? Like, I mean, the vanity and it's just like, what value are you adding? you know and then you start to look through their comments and all these all these people from all these I don't even know where these people are from and they're commenting on this person's physical appearance and that person is thanking them for the commenting on their physical appearance not the value that they're adding or anything I'm like what and these aren't the people that I want to be connected with and so you could separate yourself from them you could you could hone your feed right to engage in the content that you want but that's that's where we're living in man listen you could go on

Instagram and you'd be slam with it a million times over than LinkedIn you know yeah yeah Different strokes with different folks, man. 100%. Yeah, I think it's all about your objective, right? What's your true objective? And, you know, I know from you, your goal is you want to help people as many people as you can. You want to build as many quality relationships as you can. And then just that's going to be the cycle that you're continuing to pursue.

Not everyone is about that, right? And that's okay, right? People have different goals and objectives based on their business. 100%. Some people are here to sell, sell, sell. Some people are here to network. work some people are here just to have fun and mess around and that's totally cool but just do things do things you know the right way where you could sleep well at night 100% so i i want to let you plug it again

because you know i know i have courses and my goal with anything i create is always to give way more value than i'm asking for it for one uh right you know under promise and overdelivered but also i want them truly to be able to get results like that's that's that's the name of the game if If I give you something and you go do it, I want you to get something from it, not nothing from it. And we know that there's plenty of that goes out there. So, you know, let's give a shout out for the pause course. Where can people check this out? Where can they get it?

And then just give them kind of a, you know, five to 10 seconds of what exactly is in there that they want. Yeah, absolutely. So it's pretty simple. You can find it at the pausecourse.com. Makes sense, right? So basically what I'm going to teach you is I'm going to unpack. pull back the curtain on my system, my B2B to C platform of how to create a podcast that targets and generates business development, creates thought leadership, and gives you a content platform.

I'm going to show you how I do it. All the nuts and bolts, all the secrets. And so this is the same process, folks, that he's using on a daily basis. That I'm doing right now after this call. Yes, exactly. Getting right back into it. So I'm going to teach that. And honestly, man, and it's hard when you mentioned something interesting.

I'm pricing it like I'm literally pricing an intro right now at a hundred bucks and I and it's like a weird thing for me to think about because I know this it's worth so much more than that your ROI that you're going to get from it from one client in your industry is going to dwarf that it's like a rounding error you know what I mean but I also want to make it accessible I want to get this into as many people's hands as possible to help them because I truly believe in collaboration over competition that there's enough eyeballs there's enough business out there for everybody and if I'm sitting on this information it just hurts me so I want to share it at the same time I'm not giving you're going to wait for free 100% and a business man and also I'm pretty confident that price isn't going to stay there so it's going up on on just want to learn oh there we go yeah so if you want if you want the info if you want to learn it and get it at that price make sure that you guys go get it now i mean it's like we've all spent a hundred bucks on something we never did anything with so you might as well spend the hundred bucks stay on something you stupid you saw on instagram might as well invest in something that's going to actually move the needle for you and it's nice i made it nice It's a nice digital playbook.

It's got videos and links and all my templates. And you could literally like the value to get from one freaking template in there that you could apply to your business is worth $100. You know what I mean? My approach, my CRM tools. You know what I mean? Like the system's like, come on, man. It's a hundred bucks. Like I feel weird hawking it sometimes, you know?

Right? Like it feels kind of like crazy. I know they're going to get the value out of it. I know, you know, I appreciate you coming on. Hang with me. You're a true trailblazer, man. You know, if you think back at the. journey folks everything that adam's been through you know i could definitely see those early

entrepreneurial influences definitely you know are able to take nose right build up the build up that tough skin as a as a kid as well as in college and um and you know all of it's paid off man you know the whether it's being hired or being fired all of them are lessons folks if we actually can extract value out of them and in adam's deepest darkest moment he had some some people tell him and show him that, you know, he did have self-worth. He did have value. But ultimately, he had to make that decision. You know, change comes from within. You've got to want to change. So he made that decision to change and climb out. And I'm so glad you did, brother. Appreciate you coming on the show. Likewise. Thanks for having me, Jordan. I appreciate it. And thanks for your

audience for hanging with us. Thank you.