Live from the Shaker Green Room at RecFest USA, The Chad & Cheese Podcast welcomes Paige Elliott, Global Employer Brand Manager at Veeam Software. Paige shares why authentic diversity stories are critical to employer branding and how aligning internal culture with external messaging attracts talent. She offers practical tips on using video, written content, and audio to amplify diverse voices and build a sense of belonging. The conversation also delves into the growing scrutiny of DE&I commitments, strategic partnerships with organizations like Out & Equal and Women in Tech, and the importance of pay transparency and open dialogue in recruitment. Tune in for insights on creating a workplace where values and culture shine through every action!

The traditional approach to developing employer value propositions can often be complex and time-consuming. While this in-depth methodology might work well for large, complex organizations, many employers invest months or even years in exhaustive research and complex frameworks only to often end up with EVPs that sound remarkably similar to their competitors. At the same time, there's growing pressure to activate employer brands quickly to address immediate talent needs, leaving organizations vulnerable to missed opportunities if they get caught in endless cycles of research and refinement. So, how can companies develop distinctive EVPs that genuinely differentiate them while moving quickly enough to address urgent talent challenges? My guest this week is Sam Monteath, founder of research and insights consultancy Reason Why, a research and insights consultancy. Sam shares valuable insights on how organizations can take a more agile approach to EVPs, avoiding the bloat and unnecessary complexity that often characterizes these projects. In the interview, we discuss: • [01:22] The key differences between employer brand, employer branding, and EVP • [04:58] Why some EVP development processes have become unnecessarily complex • [06:54] How organizations can balance speed with rigor in developing their EVPs • [09:55] What is a minimum viable EVP? • [12:28] Why so many EVPs sound similar, and how companies can genuinely differentiate themselves • [15:38] How employer branding has evolved over the past decade • [18:57] The role of AI and technology in transforming employer brand strategy • [20:52] How AI is revolutionizing qualitative data analysis for EVP insights • [22:21] The shift toward more dynamic, evolving EVPs connected to business objectives • [23:53] What does the future of employer branding look like Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts Follow this podcast on Spotify.

What if everything we thought about how organizations function was wrong? For decades, businesses have been structured around hierarchies and rigid processes, assuming this was the best way to manage talent, collaboration, and leadership. But what if the real key to high performance and better talent acquisition lies not in org charts but in networks? The emerging disciple of Network Science has quietly been reshaping everything from social media to healthcare, so what happens when we apply it to how we work, lead, and hire? Organizations are complex systems, yet most companies are still managed using outdated, linear models. What if network science, a discipline that has revolutionized everything from the internet to disease control, could also transform the way we think about leadership, collaboration, and hiring So, how do networks really shape the way organizations function, and could a deeper understanding of them change how we hire, engage, and retain talent? My guest this week is Jeffrey Beeson, a leadership strategist and expert in organizational networks. Jeffrey’s work focuses on how businesses can optimize collaboration, unlock hidden influencers, and rethink traditional hierarchies using the principles of network science. We discuss how understanding an organization’s internal networks can improve hiring decisions, enhance onboarding, and increase retention by fostering stronger workplace connections.  In the interview, we discuss: What is network science, and how does it apply to business? How all complex systems are based on network patterns and laws Three degrees of influence How emotions travel through networks The best-connected individuals have the most influence. Identifying influencers Retention, onboarding, and talent management The application of network science to talent acquisition Applying network solutions to network problems The future of work Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts. Follow this podcast on Spotify.

In this episode of The Chad and Cheese podcast, recorded live from The Shaker Green Room at Recfest USA, Chad and Joel sit down with Nicole Stephens, Recruitment Marketing Manager at Floor & Decor. Nicole who shares her approach to employer branding and recruitment marketing, focusing on making work environments better and more enjoyable. She emphasizes the importance of doing more with less, offering actionable insights on maximizing impact with zero-dollar budgets. Nicole also highlights how companies can enhance their candidate experience without spending a fortune, using examples from brands like Microsoft and Duolingo. She digs deep into the challenges talent acquisition professionals face, stressing the need to understand the business and make meaningful changes, rather than focusing solely on metrics like social media likes. The discussion touches on important topics like employee advocacy, retaining talent, and the critical role of data in recruitment. Nicole shares practical advice on collaborating with other departments, automating processes without losing the human touch, and the importance of taking action, no matter how small. Finally, Nicole’s call to "work like a European" and embrace more holidays underscores her belief that breaks lead to better productivity and creativity. ENJOY!

Improving diversity seems like a very human exercise. But our guest today brings data and technology to the task.

We cover a lot of countries in Europe on this episode, which is why we brought Oana Iordachescu, a talent acquisition specialist at Wayfair - who's worked in just about every country while at places like Facebook, Booking.com, and Criteo - on the show. Where to begin our journey? Of course, there's Ukraine and Russia, where a wide variety of corporations are pulling out of Russia in light of the invasion. Then there's France, where Macron has started his reelection campaign, and to Germany where Zenjob has nabbed significant funding; then we head to the UK where they're humanizing the prison system and to Spain, where it's a tale of two cities, where the educated are happily employed, while the uneducated young are in dire straits. Want more? One of the cohosts has been banned on Reddit! And of course, there's more love for Elon Musk.

This week: Jobvite launches a new recruiting suite, while UKG acquires a mobile communications platform, and more.

Software promising to screen and test the world's best tech talent tend to fall into two camps: Those who can actually do it and those who are totally full of shit. Enter Intervue.io a startup that provides live tech testing to go with its video interviewing solution. Cofounder Rahul Arora enters the Firing Squad firmly convinced that his company falls in the category of vendors who can actually do the job and aren't full of doo-doo. Does he come out smelling like a rose or not? Gotta listen.

We talk about data and talent acquisition with Crosschq CEO Michael Fitzsimmons,

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is prompting strong reaction from the business community, including TA programmatic provider Adzuna. Tesla and Elon Musk do something very right and we give them some props. Finally, a new study shows the power of language and women who transform organizations, transform cultures and shatter gender stereotypes.

vArmour CEO Tim Eades looks at the 2021 ransomware attack on Kronos, and the lessons we can draw from it.

Maybe you've heard, Europe has some stuff it's dealing with at the moment. But the show must go on! This week, the boys are joined by head of talent and author Jan Tegze to tackle a slew of acquisitions by House of HR, a perspective IPO from Jobandtalent and - someone alert HR! - groping in the metaverse. We also highlight some recent startups that enjoyed an influx of cash recently, as well as give our 2 cents on the state of war in Ukraine.

Employer: See Me, Protect Me, Respect Me! Reading Jess Von Bank's post, “Stop filling reqs and start providing safety. Address the toll of fear and create a culture of hope and health. Do nothing but obsess over the care and nurturing of your own people, and you will stop the bleeding. Just a bet.”, left me wanting to know more! Jess is Lepagen's storyteller and Community Leader for the Now Of Work, and all around awesome human. In our conversation we covered plenty, including: employees wanting, 'see me, protect me, respect me, keep me safe' why your business will thrive if you help people thrive why we shouldn't be going externally to 'acquire' talent before we have looked internally Jess's love of WORQDRIVE and internal mobility how recruiters are ready to cherry-pick employees from the companies who will set mandatory returns to the office! :o trusting people to work like adults stopping being slaves to the screen and slaves to work with solid boundaries and the Now Of Work community. Grab a cuppa, pen and paper and settle in! ✍🏻

Destigmatizing career breaks is something that I feel very strongly about and something that talent acquisition needs to take very seriously. With so much lip service paid to diversity and inclusion and the current difficulties of finding talent, it makes zero sense to still view career breaks negatively. This week LinkedIn have announced Career Breaks on the LinkedIn Profile to better reflect the realities of career journeys and, in turn, begin to normalize career breaks in the recruiting process.  My guest this week is Jennifer Shappley, Global Head of Talent Acquisition at Linkedin. As well as talking us through the new career breaks feature, Jennifer discusses the key findings on LinkedIn's latest Global Talent Trends report and shares her thoughts on the future of talent acquisition. In the interview, we discuss: Global Talent Trends Wellbeing and flexibility Trust LinkedIn's new Career Break profile section How can talent acquisition support people who have taken a career break How is talent acquisition changing, and where is it going? Making interviews equitable in a hybrid world What are the biggest challenges talent acquisition teams are facing Listen to this podcast in Apple Podcasts.

Last week, I attended The HR Technology Conference in Las Vegas. The event was full of energy and optimism for the future as hundreds of vendors showcased new AI products and AI integrations. Everyone was playing up the new heights of efficiency and effectiveness AI can take us as an industry. However, there was much debate about the level of genuine innovation on offer and a sense that rather than thinking radically and reinventing what we do, we were just looking at faster ways of solving old problems that don't live up to AI''s potential to challenge the status quo. Here are three interviews I recorded at the show to help you make up your own minds about the levels of innovation we are currently seeing. First up is Allyn Bailey from SmartRecruiters who predicted the rise of recruiterless recruiting on the show last year. I was interested to see how far she thought we had come on that journey and what was going to happen next. The second interview was with Josh Sklüt, co-founder of MyStandard, who was undoubtedly the vendor trying to be the most disruptive, with a very different way of looking at the relationship between employers and potential employers. The final interview is a conversation with David Nason, founder and CEO of HireBrain, who seeks to better align hiring managers and recruiters and who were winners of the Pitchfest competition at the conference.  Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts.

This week in HR tech: Ceridian, Payactiv launch new earned-wage features, salaries make 'staggering' rise and more in this week's roundup.

Inflation is on everyone's mind right now. How will it impact wages? Are bloated margins to blame? How about immigration? How will it impact the cost of doing business? What's going to happen with energy prices? Interestingly, history can tell us a lot about what the future holds. That's why the boys have brought back Columbia professor Suresh Naidu to make sense of the current state of inflation.

On this edition we talk with Cadient CEO Jim Buchanan about how high-volume hiring has changed over the last two years, and the challenges employers face now,

Kim Wilkinson joins as co-host, and as Serge’s attempt at revenge for Shelley’s poor choice of complimenting last week’s guest Chad Sowash. Some parenting advice for Serge, Rupaul’s Drag Race is not appropriate for 7 year olds girls who like to play dress up.   The photoshop palm tree as inspiration, the laundry list of made up job titles and other cringe worthy posts on LinkedIn, we share the horrors of those who violate the community guidelines. With all the new baby recruiters hitting LinkedIn, let’s put some effort into those inmail messages. Back to basics for seasoned pros and great teaching moments for the newbies. We have a receipt! 92% of applicants will bale out on your application if you force them to create a profile before they apply. 51 clicks to apply is so 2014. Help is on the way! Express work permits are back. Let's swing open the gates, only this time, let's make sure they have a job when they land. Government and industry pulling in the same direction.

In this episode, we talk to a friend of the podcast, George LaRocque about all things technology. George is the Founder of WorkTech. The source of truth for industry data on emerging HR tech innovation. He is also a Founding Partner Impact WorkTech Accelerator - Market Analyst, HR & Tech Advisor, HR leader, and HR tech industry executive. And wow- he comes with some great knowledge! If you like what you hear, we would like to encourage you to subscribe to our channel! We would also appreciate it if you would rate this channel by going here: RateThisPodcast.com/inclusiveaf We create this podcast as a labor of love. But if you would like to support this channel you can buy us a cup of coffee here: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/InclusiveAF

Julie and Torin note the potentially historical Russian invasion of Ukraine beginning this week and implore listeners to think about the impact of underrepresented and historically targeted communities who have been safe in Ukraine and very NOT safe in Russia. Then the New York Times helps us understand the importance of alt text in images online - Julie takes it a step farther - when we use alt text we all win. Finally, in our main story, the Baltimore Sun publishes what Julie and Torin feel is a sincere apology and acknowledgement of racist acts in its history. How does it compare to other major pubs like the LA Times and others? How does it make you feel?

For over a decade now, I've been flagging up the development of virtual reality as something talent acquisition should have on their radar. It's taken a while, but with tech giants like Meta and Apple making multi-billion dollar investments in technology and infrastructure is now finally the time for our industry to fully embrace the Metaverse. So how does would this work, and what talent acquisition and HR activities are already in play in virtual reality. My guests this week are Misha Krymov and Jennifer Regan, the CEO and Head of Experiences at Morpheus XR. Morpheus XR is already designing recruiting, onboarding and leadership development experiences in the Metaverse and have a massive amount of knowledge to share with us. In the interview, we discuss: What is the Metaverse, and who is building it? Creating space for meaning and meaningful moments How environment shapes human behaviour How VR gives agency to users that Zoom / Teams calls don't Unbiased recruitment using VR Onboarding What should talent acquisition teams be doing to learn about the Metaverse Inclusion and alternatives to headsets Untangling science fiction from science fact Extending reality What's the potential for VR, and how will it be used in the future Listen to this podcast in Apple Podcasts

Today, we talk with Sherrie Fernandes, vIce president of product management and user experience at Globalization Partners. Their platform makes it easier for businesses to hire and manage international talent.

Strike while the iron is hot!  Lisa Zone, managing director at Dix & Eaton joins us to talk about how recruiting, hiring, engagement, and talent management is at the center of every board room conversation. But who is equipped and positioned to formulate the story and business case in building a strong employer brand?  Another great show complete with Cult Employer Brand master Julie Calli.  Seriously, you wanted the ear of your CEO and board. Now what are you going to do with the opportunity? 

Paycor's new developer portal speeds data transfer, Lever deploys winter release. And more.

In this episode of the Chad and Cheese podcast, the hosts discuss various themes including the impact of AI on jobs, innovative job-seeking strategies, the future of job boards like ZipRecruiter and Dice, the dock workers' strike and its economic implications, Amazon's workforce challenges, and the declining usage of condoms among young adults. Takeaways AI's impact on jobs is often overstated. Innovative job-seeking strategies can challenge traditional norms. The dock workers' strike highlights economic vulnerabilities. Amazon's new policies may lead to significant turnover. Condom usage is declining due to advancements in birth control. Job boards must adapt to survive in a changing market. Raising wages is essential for economic health. The future of work is increasingly influenced by technology. Networking events like HR Tech are crucial for industry connections. Understanding market dynamics is key for job boards. Chapters 00:00 - Introduction to the Podcast and Themes 02:04 - Reflections on HR Tech and Networking 06:01 - Innovative Job Seeking Strategies 10:01 - The Impact of AI on Employment 16:01 - The Future of Job Boards: ZipRecruiter and Dice 35:09 - Dock Workers Strike and Economic Implications 43:57 - Amazon's Workforce Challenges 46:59 - Declining Condom Usage and Societal Changes Keywords AI, job market, HR Tech, employment trends, ZipRecruiter, Dice, dock workers, Amazon, condom usage, economic impact, Butler America, Harold Dagget, Courtney Summer Myers, Gia Johnston, HR Gumbo, Outsolve, Paradox, FactoryFix, Keeyora, Bullhorn, Maersk

There seems to be a new $1B unicorn born every day in the employment industry, but only one has the distinction of being a Chad & Cheese 'Death Match' winner. Enter SeekOut and its CEO and cofounder Anoop Gupta, who recently closed a Series C to the tune of $115M and a $1.2B valuation, who joins the boys for a friendly chat. About what? How about international growth plans, diversity offerings, competing with Eightfold and Phenom (and just about everyone else), and much, much more.

If you love financial news, Buy-or-Sell and snarky commentary around those two things, then this episode if your wet dream. The boys are talkin' earnings and Wall Street news from Seek, Recruit Holdings (Indeed.com, Glassdoor), Randstad, Upwork and Dice this week, as well as playing buy-or-sell with Haul, Kevala, JobPixel, Alongside and Mystery. But it's no mystery that this episode rocks, ending with a reality check around pay transparency. 

Our podcast hero, Chad Sowash from Chad and Cheese joins us for the US take on the trucker convoy blocking trade routes. Serge is upset because she thinks Chad is more handsome. Recruitment Insights for the week, The cost of hiring continues to rise and for employers who weren't paying attention, getting candidates to notice you will be expensive. Just asking questions here; what would happen if we pay applicants to attend an interview. Would anything even change? DEI smoke screen; after 18 months, nothing's really changed and no one is talking about why. Aussie firm Enboarder needs to find a new ad agency, despite landing $32MM USD we still don't know what a people activation platform is? Alongside owner of CareerBeacon.com receives $8 million in funding.

This year, scale and speed are an essential focus for many talent acquisition teams. But how do you scale recruiting and speed up hiring in an environment where recruiting recruiters is as tough as it is right now? My guest this week is David Spencer-Percival, CEO of Life Science People and formerly the founder of high growth recruitment businesses Huntress and Spencer Ogden. David has decades of experience scaling up and recruiting recruiters in various markets. He has developed a tried and tested methodology that many talent acquisition teams can learn from In the interview, we discuss: Recruiting, training and nurturing fantastic recruiters The academy model Selection Building the right culture of success and incentive The relentless pace of change Recruiting processes for a candidate driven market What are the most successful employers getting right? The role of technology Advice to TA leaders on building effective working partnerships with agencies Listen to this podcast in Apple Podcasts.

André is the Founder and CEO of Onboard Health, a specialized executive search and advisory firm focused on creating a more inclusive future of health. A pioneering strategist with deep ties across the healthcare innovation, startup and digital strategy landscapes — André is dedicated to building the future of health through an equity lens. His work and insights have been featured in outlets such as Business Insider, Fortune, Forbes, NPR, CIO, Newsweek, U.S. News and World Report. He was recently named a Fortune Magazine 2020 40 Under 40 in Healthcare. Learn more: Onboard Health Follow André and Onboard Health: LinkedIn Instagram Twitter

We explore the importance of connection, communication and how businesses succeed in the age of Covid, with Laura Lee Gentry, Enboarder's chief people officer.

In this episode, Katee and Jackye speak to Laura Close. And she brought the heat! As a twenty-year veteran of the DEI space, Laura Close started at a time before the term DEI was coined and has spent a career both locking in new structural opportunities and access for historically excluded communities as well as coaching executive leaders within the enterprise on designing and deploying KPIs for DEI at scale. Now, as co-founder of Included.AI Laura and her team have created the first technology of its kind to use AI to identify specific areas where businesses can take further action to remove any potential roadblock from accomplishing the goal of becoming as people-first as possible. She is on a mission to prove that DEI isn’t a tax, PR issue, or feel-good checkbox, but an opportunity to build more competitive businesses. If you like what you hear, we would like to encourage you to subscribe to our channel! We would also appreciate it if you would rate this channel by going here: RateThisPodcast.com/inclusiveaf We create this podcast as a labor of love. But if you would like to support this channel you can buy us a cup of coffee here: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/InclusiveAF

You have questions.... What is RM automation? What does candidate nurture really mean? What is a true talent pipeline? Are you and your company committing crimes against talent pipelines? All great questions for any organization, and the boys, partnered with RecruitmentMarketing.com's Julie Calli, bring on CandidateID's Adam Gordon to the podcast to cover a broad range of recruitment marketing questions and challenges. It's a must-listen for any employer looking to take their game to the next level.

Molly Johnson-Jones shared a post on LinkedIn that stated '“By removing the need to have a ‘reason’ to request flexibility and giving everyone the freedom to choose how to work, we can make true progress on gender equality.” but how do we get that out of our hiring leaders? While Molly, CEO & Co-founder of Flexa, enjoyed London's winter sun, and I only had the heat of the topic to keep me warm, we covered loads including: the motivation behind creating Flexa, a platform where employers can be verified as offering true flexibility to their people surprising survey results that show both men and women want flexibility the two paths to getting your leaders to see that offering flexible & hybrid working is inevitable the challenges that some leaders face when trusting employees and measuring output instead of presenteeism Molly's own lessons-learned running a truly flexible business What is and most definitely isn't a 4 day week! Grab a cuppa, pen and paper and settle in! ✍🏻 Huge 💚 to episode sponsor WORQDRIVE Shift: Your Talent Strategy! Imagine Internal Mobility your employees will actually rally behind.

This week: Talroo launches new jobs ads, Checkr acquires ModoHR, SkillPoints's career-matching solution. And more.

Round up is the monthly show on The Recruiting Future Podcast channel that highlights episodes you may have missed and gives you my take on some of the key learnings from the guests. Episodes mentioned in this Round Up: Ep 639: Inclusive Interviews Inspired By NASA Ep 640: What Is The Value Of TA? Ep 641: How Is TA Evolving? Ep 642: Augmenting Talent Acquisition Ep 643: Career Activism Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts

Screening tech talent is smokin' hot right now. You know the names: HackerRank, Byteboard, Woven, Triplebyte and others. But do you know Tech Screen? If the answer is NO, then you owe it to yourself to checkout this episode of Firing Squad. Chad & Cheese put CEO and founder Mark Knowlton on the hot seat to answer some tough questions. Does he make it out alive? Gotta listen.

Serge is pretty much convinced he's going to Recfect. Shelley's peer pressure might be working? What happens if we run out of people to recruit. We deep dive into this article Appcast comes out with their recruitment benchmark report and it's just chocolate for Shelley. Download it here Why is your online advertising cost going up? Top benefit companies should offer to increase your application rates....Pet Insurance! Amazon increases maximum base cap for salaries How close are we to a 4 day workweek?

mpathic AI's technology analyzes text and voice communication to strengthen a company’s culture and improve performance.

Over the last few months, as I've been researching the practical effects of the Great Resignation, we've heard the stories of talent acquisition professionals from the US, Europe and Australia on what is truly a global issue. One country I really want to know more about though, is India, one of the biggest global markets for tech talent. My guest this week is Aditya Singh, Director Head of Talent Acquisition at Informatica. Aditya has overall responsibility for designing and deploying Informatica's Talent Acquisition Strategy across India and gives us a great insight into what Informatica is doing to stand out in one of the most competitive talent markets on the planet. In the interview, we discuss: The Indian tech talent market Why EVP is critical for differentiation Gen Z's expectations from work Constant engagement throughout the client lifecycle The importance of campus recruiting The rapidly changing landscape of skills and why this makes internal mobility critical The impact of remote The role of technology Data and analytics What TA innovations can we expect to see in the future Listen to this podcast in Apple Podcasts.

Maybe it's the fact the boys are recording from the Arizona desert this week, but this show is hot, hot hot! SmartRecruiters and Checkr go shopping, Enboarder gets paid, the Valley is bummed about losing workers to Web3 and we finally get some numbers around the metaverse ... including a definition. Pass the sunscreen and turn it up. This one gets toasty.

Julie and Torin dive right into the news of the day. Will the Senate act on creating pregnancy protections for expectant employees? Nancy Pelosi dodges reporters questions on Dear White Staffers Instagram tea and Tesla is back in court for firing and then REHIRING a worker who assaulted and spewed racial slurs at a Black supervisor. In our in depth story, we jump in to the death of Amir Locke at the hands of Minneapolis PD on yet another unnecessary no knock warrant. Brian Flores makes it known the Rooney Rule doesn't work and the NFL is again trying to wiggle out of responsibility for the cultures it creates. In mining news, Rio Tinto releases (on purpose) a transparency report of rampant sexual abuse, assault and rape of women and men in their employment. So much on this week's episode of CATK!

While the world teeters on geopolitical confrontation, Chad & Cheese continue to keep the peace with Belgian brother from another mother, Lieven Van Nieuwenhuyze, and special guest Geert-Jan Waasdorp founder at Intelligence Group in The Netherlands. This episode, the boys cover Otta from the Europeans perspective, while tackling new topics like Radancy's acquisition of Firstbird and Phenom's purchase of Tendemploy. Additionally, a little buy-or-sell commences with Alva Labs, Jobilla, and Kleoverse. Spoiler alert: There's a lot of sell, sell, sell!

Happy Friday Everyone, In this episode shares information about transformation. A short recap about the holiday celebrations and a candle with good advice. Let's chit chat about change. You have a change that needs desperate attention because it isn’t balancing your business or perhaps your lifestyle. You decide what that change you are planning to address to your stakeholders. You type it up in an email and click send. Off into the universe it goes. Then you being to think was that a good idea, oh shit! I need to go and delete it. You over think didn’t you. Why are you giving away your own power? Why are you telling the whole world about the changes that you are making, stop asking for permission for approval? Why are you invested in their thoughts and feelings of what you are doing to make something spectacular? I get it is exciting news, but it can wait until you have transformed. “Don’t let people talk you into what they think of you.” Oprah Winfrey Why aren’t people doing what you want them to do? Honestly, people hate change, when they don’t like something their behavior changes, and they don’t want to do it. Change needs to happen we NEED TO MOVE FORWARD! It's hard and scary but it’s exciting also. You need to remove the old to make way for new ideas and growth. The world will move past you if you stay in your comfort zone. Here’s a Tip. Get out your Crayola markers, pens, and crayons, paper large enough for your amazing ideas, and brainstorm the shit out of that plan of yours. Or if you prefer a vision board, find pictures that you love, words, quotes things inspire, motivate you and paste, glue, and tape these on a bulletin board or put them in your journey book. Maybe you’re not the creative type and you prefer to use word or other writing format. Go find something that will work for you to execute that change! Or “Fuck it” it’s up to you to decide. I leave you with this,  “Never water yourself down, just because someone can’t handle you at 100 proof.” (can’t seem to find who wrote this? It is Badass!) P.S. Go buy that candle,

Remember seeing and hearing your first Deep Fake? Synthesized voices that sound like your favorite movie star. Not a great impressionist, on the contrary, algorithmically cloned voices where even the subtlest of nuances of a voice can be captured and recreated. Cringy, yet incredibly cool that tech could accomplish such a feat. Yes, technology is advancing quickly and unfortunately many of the advances are seen as negative. Luckily, Ryan Steelberg, president, and founder of Veritone guides us through a more advanced cloned voice discussion. On this episode we cover: The difference between a deep fake and a "cloned" voices Practical applications for using cloned voices Where are chatbots headed? Will this tech help candidate and employee engagement? How do Pandologic and Wade and Wendy fit into the ecosystem? Well kids, welcome to the Matrix.

We talk about how recruiters can operate successfully in today’s market, the impact technology’s had on recruiting’s evolution and movement toward DEIB.

In this episode of *Talent Chasing*, hosted by Brian Johnson and Chad Sowash, the focus is on entrepreneur James Mims and his journey in founding Mims Bands, a wristband company that has become an iconic part of Major League Baseball (MLB) history. James shares how, as a senior at the University of Southern California, he came up with the idea for personalized wristbands for athletes, starting with a prototype for baseball player Dusty Baker. Over time, Mims Bands became widely recognized, worn by many notable MLB players like Eric Davis and Tim Raines. Despite facing numerous challenges, including resistance from MLB and the Players Association, Mims persevered and got his product used by over 130 players. Mims reflects on the obstacles he faced as a Black entrepreneur, from difficulties gaining access to stadiums to dealing with legal battles. The conversation also highlights how Mims promoted individualism in a highly structured sport like baseball. Brian and Chad emphasize the lessons from his experience, particularly around persistence, relationships, and the critical role of talent in both sports and business. The episode ends with a discussion of Mims' major accomplishments, including his partnership with Topps and the induction of his product into the Baseball Hall of Fame, cementing his legacy in the sport. Chapters 00:00 Introduction and Background 01:19 Taking a Risk: Going for Your Unique Idea 08:11 Empowering Athletes through Individualism 14:54 The Lack of Player Marketing in Baseball 19:55 Breaking Barriers: The First Black Vendor in Baseball 23:57 Navigating Challenges and Building a Successful Business 37:50 The Journey of Mims Bands: Perseverance and Success 47:34 Overcoming Challenges with the Major League Baseball Players Association 59:42 The Power of Individualism in the Sports Industry 01:05:07 From Tops Project 70 to the Hall of Fame: A Pinnacle Achievement

This week we welcome to one and only Will Van Middendorp as a guest co-host. Shelley tries to peer pressure Serge to join her at RecFest in England in July but will HE succumb to FOMO. We also tackle some of the biggest topics in recruitment right now. We talk about how you can turnaround the feedback why candidates leave their old jobs and make it a positive in your job ads. A recruiter went viral this week for all the wrong reasons! Find out why Recruiting Brainfood recruiter survey reveals what ATS recruiters love and they hate.

The world of employment took a break from crowning unicorns this week, and that's just fine with Chad & Cheese, who have gotten a little tired of taking the crazy pills on such a regular basis. In its place, Hiretual has a new brand and new money in the bank, Woven took a Series A, Bullhorn created an investment arm, the NFL has a race problem (still), Home Depot is hiring too fast or not fast enough? ...and finally. OnlyFans has another termination (allegedly) to add to its portfolio. This time, a cop. You have the right to remain sexy unless it steps on our Puritan sensibilities.  Take some crazy pills and enjoy!