Episode 17

Being Yourself, FAST

Published on: 7th March, 2024

Stephanie welcomes special guest Jonathan McIntosh, Partner and Recruiter with ThinkingAhead, to discuss the "recipe" for conduct on a call, the beauty and the terror of a cold call, getting off "the ladder", and why the words should never outshine the feeling.

Discover what sets ThinkingAhead apart, hear stories from recruiters, and browse opportunities by clicking here.

Transcript
Stephanie Maas:

Hi, and welcome to The Talent Trade. I'm

Stephanie Maas:

Stephanie Maas, partner with ThinkingAhead executive search.

Stephanie Maas:

Today I am super excited to bring to the talent trade a

Stephanie Maas:

guest. Today's guest has one of probably, I think one of the

Stephanie Maas:

most non traditional backgrounds before joining the world of

Stephanie Maas:

recruiting, which I will let him share with us. And then also

Stephanie Maas:

from a topic perspective, he is going to share with us a little

Stephanie Maas:

bit about the value of being yourself as soon as possible

Stephanie Maas:

when you start out in executive search. So before I bring him on

Stephanie Maas:

a couple of fun little nuggets that you should know, Jonathan

Stephanie Maas:

has been with our firm seven years, one of my favorite

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stories about Jonathan, because we went through training, and

Stephanie Maas:

after gosh, probably about six months, he came to me and said,

Stephanie Maas:

hey, you know, I really promise I was paying attention. I was in

Stephanie Maas:

tune to your training. But I just need some clarity about the

Stephanie Maas:

timing behind this marketing plan that we had put together.

Stephanie Maas:

Because Jonathan, he was so incredibly teachable, he was

Stephanie Maas:

executing our drip marketing plan incredibly well, with one

Stephanie Maas:

exception, the exception that he missed was the timing. So this

Stephanie Maas:

is a seven step drip marketing plan that when executed

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accordingly, should happen over about a four month period with

Stephanie Maas:

Jonathan and his eagerness to get things rolling. He was doing

Stephanie Maas:

it over the course of about seven days. So he'd gotten a

Stephanie Maas:

little feedback from the market that it was a smidge much. So he

Stephanie Maas:

came back and said, I don't think this was a response we're

Stephanie Maas:

going for anyway, I really appreciate his humility in

Stephanie Maas:

approaching and asking what he was doing wrong. But I also

Stephanie Maas:

really the enthusiasm to which he wanted to get started and do

Stephanie Maas:

things the right way speaks a lot to his character while at

Stephanie Maas:

thinking ahead. So without further ado, I'd like to welcome

Stephanie Maas:

Jonathan McIntosh. Welcome to The Talent Trade.

Jonathan McIntosh:

Thank you, Stephanie. Great to be here.

Stephanie Maas:

So I alluded to this interesting background that

Stephanie Maas:

you had, I would love to hear just a little bit of your story

Stephanie Maas:

how you found your way to thinking ahead.

Jonathan McIntosh:

I actually responded to I remember now and

Jonathan McIntosh:

indeed posting I had been in professional ministry for 20

Jonathan McIntosh:

years. That's all I knew. I didn't know the world of sales

Jonathan McIntosh:

at all. I didn't even know there was such a thing as a

Jonathan McIntosh:

headhunter. I needed to make a midlife career change. And I'm,

Jonathan McIntosh:

I'm living proof that you can do that even at 3035 4045 5055. And

Jonathan McIntosh:

a friend said, Hey, have you ever considered becoming a

Jonathan McIntosh:

headhunter? And I didn't even know what that was. And I said,

Jonathan McIntosh:

people get paid to help make connections professionally for

Jonathan McIntosh:

people. She said, Yes, I think you'd be good at it, or

Jonathan McIntosh:

responded to an ad in indeed, for a nonprofit headhunter. And

Jonathan McIntosh:

because I knew the world loosely of nonprofits having worked in

Jonathan McIntosh:

ministry for 20 years, I felt like it'd be a good fit. And

Jonathan McIntosh:

thankfully, thinking ahead, belts think it would be a good

Jonathan McIntosh:

fit to so I'm very grateful to have, as I say, washed up on the

Jonathan McIntosh:

kind shores of thinking ahead executive search.

Stephanie Maas:

Well tell us a little bit about the niche that

Stephanie Maas:

you serve now.

Jonathan McIntosh:

So we have a boutique team under 10

Jonathan McIntosh:

recruiters at any point in time, that works solely with nonprofit

Jonathan McIntosh:

organizations across the country, Health and Human

Jonathan McIntosh:

Services, environmental conservation, the performing

Jonathan McIntosh:

arts culture museums, we do it all primarily director level and

Jonathan McIntosh:

above primarily C suite roles. Now I'm going to be speaking to

Jonathan McIntosh:

areas of success I see across different niches and thinking

Jonathan McIntosh:

ahead, but really what I know most are most well as the

Jonathan McIntosh:

nonprofit industry.

Stephanie Maas:

Okay, so Jonathan is a partner with

Stephanie Maas:

thinking ahead consistently, one of our top performers, what has

Stephanie Maas:

been your best year to date billings wise?

Jonathan McIntosh:

2022; somewhere between that and cash

Jonathan McIntosh:

in half a million somewhere near there.

Stephanie Maas:

So for many of our listeners, the idea of being

Stephanie Maas:

a consistent 350 to 550, a no revenue producer would create

Stephanie Maas:

quite an incredible career and lifestyle. So we've got one live

Stephanie Maas:

here. So Jonathan, again, the idea here is we could talk about

Stephanie Maas:

a lot of the different things that have made you successful,

Stephanie Maas:

but there's one in particular you brought to the table for our

Stephanie Maas:

time today. And this was the idea of being yourself as

Stephanie Maas:

quickly as possible. So put some legs under that table for us.

Jonathan McIntosh:

Yeah, thank you, Stephanie. Our trainings

Jonathan McIntosh:

and thinking ahead, I think are excellent. And any new recruiter

Jonathan McIntosh:

is going to come on to any new team. And they're going to have

Jonathan McIntosh:

a book of scripts that we're always refining, and

Jonathan McIntosh:

specializing for each practice and niche, but I like to remind

Jonathan McIntosh:

recruiters early on that they're not robotic script machines,

Jonathan McIntosh:

that they're a human being on a phone or a zoom call with

Jonathan McIntosh:

another human being. And don't forget to be a human. And when I

Jonathan McIntosh:

think about and I don't know if you've seen this in your niche,

Jonathan McIntosh:

but when I think about the nonprofit team, there's a lot of

Jonathan McIntosh:

churn and a lot of turnover through new hires, and you

Jonathan McIntosh:

always want everyone to make it but not everyone makes it

Jonathan McIntosh:

sometimes that's a that's a work effort issue. Sometimes that's a

Jonathan McIntosh:

phone aversion issue. But I've seen often, people with the

Jonathan McIntosh:

right work habits, they're making the number of dials every

Jonathan McIntosh:

day that they should, but somehow they're not able to put

Jonathan McIntosh:

it together. And I think they still, when it comes to making

Jonathan McIntosh:

connections with people, whether that's a bizdev, or marketing

Jonathan McIntosh:

approach, or if that's a candidate recruiting approach,

Jonathan McIntosh:

they still are very bound by their scripts and don't know how

Jonathan McIntosh:

to find clothes that fit, they don't know how to find language

Jonathan McIntosh:

that feels like them. They don't know how to stop and recognize,

Jonathan McIntosh:

hey, I'm actually talking to another human, I'm actually

Jonathan McIntosh:

listening to another human and they're giving me wonderful

Jonathan McIntosh:

things about their life that I should be curious about. And I'm

Jonathan McIntosh:

just moving on to the next question here on my outline. So

Jonathan McIntosh:

that's kind of the overall thing I if I can emphasize anything to

Jonathan McIntosh:

new recruiters that thinking had or and I don't know how helpful

Jonathan McIntosh:

this will be across the industry, it's a stop and be a

Jonathan McIntosh:

human being on the phone.

Stephanie Maas:

Any backdrop that led you to this kind of

Stephanie Maas:

realization? Or can you remember when this became your aha

Stephanie Maas:

moment?

Jonathan McIntosh:

I think it started initially from I have

Jonathan McIntosh:

ADD, and a lot of the high performers and thinking ahead,

Jonathan McIntosh:

are very process driven. You are Stephanie, a lot of members of

Jonathan McIntosh:

my own team that I respect the hell out of. For me, though, I

Jonathan McIntosh:

needed to find my own voice, first and foremost, just so I

Jonathan McIntosh:

wasn't bored all the time. Like, I'm literally leaving the same

Jonathan McIntosh:

voicemail 30 times in one day, if that's my life, I want to

Jonathan McIntosh:

kill myself. But if I can find my own way, if I can find my own

Jonathan McIntosh:

voice, if I can make it unique, then it becomes fun, and it

Jonathan McIntosh:

becomes a game. So that was kind of one Aha. Number two was after

Jonathan McIntosh:

I'd had some success and hearing from people like, Hey, this is

Jonathan McIntosh:

not like the standard recruiting call that I get, or hey, that

Jonathan McIntosh:

wasn't like the standard cold call that I get. This felt real

Jonathan McIntosh:

different, unique. Three, the third kind of aha, I was

Jonathan McIntosh:

thinking about pattern interrupt, and we can talk about

Jonathan McIntosh:

Pattern Interrupt in a minute. And then for it was watching

Jonathan McIntosh:

people on my team, with great work habits, not put it together

Jonathan McIntosh:

and not make it work. And we go on, they were doing all the

Jonathan McIntosh:

right things that leadership was telling them to do. They went

Jonathan McIntosh:

through the training, they had the scripts, why weren't they

Jonathan McIntosh:

able to make it work in our business. So it was those kind

Jonathan McIntosh:

of four pieces that came together.

Stephanie Maas:

So for you, and again, you came from a

Stephanie Maas:

background where you know, public speaking, talking to

Stephanie Maas:

folks, etc, that that came pretty natural. So when you

Stephanie Maas:

joined thinking ahead, you talk about hey, I had to find my own

Stephanie Maas:

voice. And yet you still talk about using scripts. So how did

Stephanie Maas:

you mesh those worlds together? I think that's something that

Stephanie Maas:

for a lot of our listeners, that is the challenge is, hey, I know

Stephanie Maas:

I need to be scripted. But I also need to use my own

Stephanie Maas:

language. I need to be professional, but I want people

Stephanie Maas:

to see me as a human. Talk to me about your journey with that.

Jonathan McIntosh:

That is such a delicate balance. And that's

Jonathan McIntosh:

one reason that this job requires such high emotional

Jonathan McIntosh:

intelligence, EQ. And I think about the the high performers in

Jonathan McIntosh:

any team, I think an ad they're off the charts when it comes to

Jonathan McIntosh:

emotional intelligence, because you're reading the person on the

Jonathan McIntosh:

other end of the phone all the time, and you're making

Jonathan McIntosh:

adjustments. As I think about scripts, to me a script is a

Jonathan McIntosh:

recipe. And if you've cooked or if you've made cocktails, you

Jonathan McIntosh:

need to stick to the recipe as closely as possible, until you

Jonathan McIntosh:

start to learn the basics. Until you you really become

Jonathan McIntosh:

proficient. For example, I had a friend once who said, Hey, I'm

Jonathan McIntosh:

gonna, I'm going to start to make cocktails, I'm gonna buy

Jonathan McIntosh:

some stuff and start to throw some stuff together. But he

Jonathan McIntosh:

didn't know any of the classic recipes. And why citrus works

Jonathan McIntosh:

with a bitter and you need a sweetening agent. And then you

Jonathan McIntosh:

need a base spirit. He didn't know any of these classic

Jonathan McIntosh:

combinations that bartenders for 150 years had been proving out.

Jonathan McIntosh:

And so he was trying to break rules before he even knew the

Jonathan McIntosh:

rules and why the rules worked. So yes, absolutely, to the new

Jonathan McIntosh:

recruiter go by the scripts, that the people who have been

Jonathan McIntosh:

successful in this business for 20 years are using, learn why

Jonathan McIntosh:

they work, learn the basics, and that's the same thing with any

Jonathan McIntosh:

cooking recipe. But then as you start to become proficient in

Jonathan McIntosh:

the kitchen, you know why Saul, fat, eat and acid work together?

Jonathan McIntosh:

And then you know how to adjust those dials. You can start to

Jonathan McIntosh:

break the rules only after you learn why the rules work.

Stephanie Maas:

Super insightful. I have never heard

Stephanie Maas:

it put that way. I love that scripture recipes. That's a

Stephanie Maas:

great example. Talk to us a little bit about this idea of

Stephanie Maas:

high emotional intelligence. Is it something that you have and

Stephanie Maas:

develop? Can you be taught it?

Jonathan McIntosh:

I think it's both. I think at the end of the

Jonathan McIntosh:

day, it is a trait that not everybody has. I think everybody

Jonathan McIntosh:

can get it better. But we all have an indifferent amounts.

Jonathan McIntosh:

There are these amazingly charismatic people rule that you

Jonathan McIntosh:

just meet. And when you run into them like I want you in my life,

Jonathan McIntosh:

your smile lights up whatever room that you're in, you make

Jonathan McIntosh:

everyone feel like they are the most important person in the

Jonathan McIntosh:

world. But you don't have to have that off the charts. This

Jonathan McIntosh:

off the charts charisma in order to make it work in search. There

Jonathan McIntosh:

are plenty of people that are just pay, I'm a good listener, I

Jonathan McIntosh:

bring a lot of empathy to the table. I'm kind. And then I know

Jonathan McIntosh:

my work. I work my routine. I work my my daily calls. But

Jonathan McIntosh:

yeah, I think you can I think to answer your question more

Jonathan McIntosh:

bluntly, I think you can we all can get better at emotional

Jonathan McIntosh:

intelligence. I think that the entry point to that is

Jonathan McIntosh:

listening. I think when I'm distracted, when I'm my mind is

Jonathan McIntosh:

somewhere else. When I have another app pulled up. And I'm

Jonathan McIntosh:

not fully invested in the call, I miss opportunities to

Jonathan McIntosh:

interject to ask a clarifying question to double click on

Jonathan McIntosh:

something to go tell me more about that.

Stephanie Maas:

And again, I like your phraseology here, you

Stephanie Maas:

said you miss opportunities.

Jonathan McIntosh:

I think the key especially on the recruiting

Jonathan McIntosh:

side, when we're talking about candidate recruiting calls, the

Jonathan McIntosh:

key to being yourself, and sometimes you may need to go off

Jonathan McIntosh:

script is when the person you're talking to on the other end of

Jonathan McIntosh:

the line, this i This certainly works for marketing bizdev, as

Jonathan McIntosh:

well gives you this wonderful, beautiful thing. They've

Jonathan McIntosh:

entrusted you with something, they're opening up. They're

Jonathan McIntosh:

divulging something either about themselves or about their

Jonathan McIntosh:

company. And it's in a requires, it's asking of you a certain

Jonathan McIntosh:

response to go, Wait a second, that's really curious. Wait a

Jonathan McIntosh:

second, what did you mean by that? Wait a second, can we

Jonathan McIntosh:

circle back do you mind, you just said something very, very

Jonathan McIntosh:

interesting to me. And when we're in this call with a person

Jonathan McIntosh:

is this almost sacred space, and you're navigating these very

Jonathan McIntosh:

interesting waters, where you're talking to them about some of

Jonathan McIntosh:

the most personal items in their lives, their interests, their

Jonathan McIntosh:

passions, what they make on a yearly basis, what they think

Jonathan McIntosh:

they should make, why they are undervalued in the market.

Jonathan McIntosh:

Sometimes you're talking about racial dynamics, sometimes

Jonathan McIntosh:

you're talking about office culture dynamics, sometimes

Jonathan McIntosh:

you're you're working through the most difficult and painful

Jonathan McIntosh:

things of their lives right now this toxic thing that I had to

Jonathan McIntosh:

deal with at work, and should I leave? Should I be looking for

Jonathan McIntosh:

something else, but I've given this company or this

Jonathan McIntosh:

organization my entire life? And now I've got a boss that doesn't

Jonathan McIntosh:

see my value? And what should I do in that situation? Jonathan,

Jonathan McIntosh:

it's not like what we do is super difficult. I'm not trying

Jonathan McIntosh:

to overinflate the recruiters role. But human beings are

Jonathan McIntosh:

important, and their stories are important. And do we treat them

Jonathan McIntosh:

as such?

Stephanie Maas:

Okay, so with that talk to me about this idea

Stephanie Maas:

behind pattern interrupt.

Jonathan McIntosh:

The basics of pattern interrupt is, first of

Jonathan McIntosh:

all, let's be honest, we are at least the way we set up our

Jonathan McIntosh:

practice that thinking and we cold call people. And I think I

Jonathan McIntosh:

believe in the cold call, I believe one. My opinion is no

Jonathan McIntosh:

one loves making cold calls, and no one loves receiving a cold

Jonathan McIntosh:

call. But I will tell you, some of my best clients, most of my

Jonathan McIntosh:

best clients, and some really close friendships have come from

Jonathan McIntosh:

a cold call, I believe in pushing through the fear. And

Jonathan McIntosh:

there can be beauty on the other side. But as soon as someone

Jonathan McIntosh:

picks up the phone, and they did not let it roll to voicemail,

Jonathan McIntosh:

whether it's a bizdev or recruiting call, the very first

Jonathan McIntosh:

thing they're thinking when they hear Jonathan McIntosh thinking

Jonathan McIntosh:

I had executive searches, how the hell can I get off this

Jonathan McIntosh:

call? As soon as possible? The only thing they're thinking is,

Jonathan McIntosh:

gosh, this was not the number I thought it was right. Oh, I was

Jonathan McIntosh:

expecting call from a donor colleague, friend, board member

Jonathan McIntosh:

boss. I was not expecting a cold call today. And so you got to

Jonathan McIntosh:

realize they're like a scared horse because they're just like,

Jonathan McIntosh:

they're in their amygdala at that point in time. And all

Jonathan McIntosh:

they're thinking is, how do Why hang up and not seem like an a

Jonathan McIntosh:

hole right now? And you've got to come in and be like, sheesh,

Jonathan McIntosh:

it's okay. It's gonna be alright, we're gonna get through

Jonathan McIntosh:

this together. Let me just calm you down for one second. I'm not

Jonathan McIntosh:

a salesperson. I'm not here to try to sell you something. I'm

Jonathan McIntosh:

not really right now trying to even recruit you for anything.

Jonathan McIntosh:

You can tell me to go pound sand anytime you want. Can I just

Jonathan McIntosh:

tell you why I'm reaching out today. And generally people are

Jonathan McIntosh:

like, okay, I can listen, you sound like a human being. You

Jonathan McIntosh:

sound like you know that this is potentially awkward for me to

Jonathan McIntosh:

calm people down bringing them out of their amygdala so they

Jonathan McIntosh:

can pause long enough to actually hear what you're

Jonathan McIntosh:

saying. Because all they want to do is go nope, not for me. Nope,

Jonathan McIntosh:

not at this time. Note. We don't hire recruiters. No, I'm not

Jonathan McIntosh:

looking right. And so pattern interrupt is any way that you

Jonathan McIntosh:

can kind of stop that. Hey, I'm a recruiter. No thanks. Click.

Jonathan McIntosh:

That's the pattern. How do you interrupt?

Stephanie Maas:

Okay, so show us how you do it. What do you say?

Jonathan McIntosh:

I had someone that we're potentially

Jonathan McIntosh:

recruiting to our team A nonprofit shout me the other

Jonathan McIntosh:

day. And I was expecting to leave a voicemail because I just

Jonathan McIntosh:

wanted to show like, hey, it's easy. You just leave these

Jonathan McIntosh:

voicemails let me show you. And the person picked up the phone.

Jonathan McIntosh:

And it was a surprise to me. I was not call I was planning on

Jonathan McIntosh:

making that day, I was making it just to literally show someone

Jonathan McIntosh:

in an interview setting how we do it. And I found myself saying

Jonathan McIntosh:

Jonathan McIntosh thinking I had executive search, I could hear

Jonathan McIntosh:

you know, you could sense these things like you can feel someone

Jonathan McIntosh:

tensing up over the phone, and I said, Look, I'm not trying to

Jonathan McIntosh:

sell you anything. In fact, I'm going to tell you, I'm calling

Jonathan McIntosh:

if that's okay. And you can tell me afterwards to go pound sand

Jonathan McIntosh:

if you like, is that okay? And she laughed. He said, Yeah, I

Jonathan McIntosh:

said, I'm gonna I'm gonna Headhunter This is a cold. So

Jonathan McIntosh:

I'll say that, like, I'm a headhunter. This is a cold call,

Jonathan McIntosh:

no one likes to get these. But here we are. But my point is,

Jonathan McIntosh:

don't take my phraseology, experiment with what sounds good

Jonathan McIntosh:

coming out of your mouth. Once again, be yourself on the phone,

Jonathan McIntosh:

I'm not going to apologize for making a cold call. In fact,

Jonathan McIntosh:

sometimes I will say, I'm sorry, I'm just now reaching out to

Jonathan McIntosh:

you, man, we've been in the same circles for five years. And I've

Jonathan McIntosh:

never called you, I'm sorry, I don't apologize for it's taken

Jonathan McIntosh:

me this long to call you. But however, in your voicemail, feel

Jonathan McIntosh:

free to be just a little bit weird. I'm not saying be

Jonathan McIntosh:

completely off the charts goofy, and unprofessional. But at the

Jonathan McIntosh:

same time you're talking to a human being, maybe they're at

Jonathan McIntosh:

home, wearing something professional of top in their

Jonathan McIntosh:

underwear, and they're about to jump to a zoom call, you can

Jonathan McIntosh:

acknowledge just kind of the craziness that just is all of

Jonathan McIntosh:

this, like everyone is just playing pretend and anything

Jonathan McIntosh:

they do. And just kind of take the mask off for a second. And

Jonathan McIntosh:

let some of your your humaneness come through. I think that's

Jonathan McIntosh:

attractive. I think that's what people respond to.

Stephanie Maas:

What do you think, causes people hesitation

Stephanie Maas:

from being themselves getting to that point where they'll risk

Stephanie Maas:

being goofy or a little weird? Or going off script a smidge?

Stephanie Maas:

What's the mental hurdle there for folks?

Jonathan McIntosh:

That's a fantastic question. I think

Jonathan McIntosh:

there's a handful of mental hurdles, at least for me, one,

Jonathan McIntosh:

especially when I'm calling someone high up like a CEO of an

Jonathan McIntosh:

organization, big nonprofit that I really respect, I want to

Jonathan McIntosh:

appear buttoned up professional, I want them to respect me, a lot

Jonathan McIntosh:

of that is on the ladder in my head. And the ladder is a phrase

Jonathan McIntosh:

I got from some therapists one time, it's when you are in

Jonathan McIntosh:

constant comparison, and ranking yourself and where you think you

Jonathan McIntosh:

stand either above or below others based on wealth, social

Jonathan McIntosh:

status. And so I can put myself mentally on the ladder below the

Jonathan McIntosh:

CEOs. And so I've become either totally obsequious meaning like,

Jonathan McIntosh:

whatever you want to become a Yes, man, or they become almost

Jonathan McIntosh:

too cold, you do have to read people, that high EQ thing is

Jonathan McIntosh:

you've got to be a bit of a social chameleon. So when I'm

Jonathan McIntosh:

calling into the New York market, I know that most of

Jonathan McIntosh:

those people that I'm reaching out to talk fast, don't have

Jonathan McIntosh:

time for BS, and the moving really quickly. And my syrupy

Jonathan McIntosh:

southern charm can be lost on them. So I can boom, get right

Jonathan McIntosh:

down to business when necessary. And you're trying to like, hey,

Jonathan McIntosh:

how much tolerance can't even tell this person has written

Jonathan McIntosh:

for? So yeah, we want to look good. We want to look

Jonathan McIntosh:

professional, we want to look buttoned up. Also, when you're

Jonathan McIntosh:

New Earth is you want to do it, right. I mean, I go through most

Jonathan McIntosh:

of my life, as far as work, parenting and marriage, how am I

Jonathan McIntosh:

doing it right? Am I failing? Or not? How do I even know. And so

Jonathan McIntosh:

the scripts and the familiarity feels good, because it provides

Jonathan McIntosh:

us with a sense, like, Hey, I made my calls, and I did it on

Jonathan McIntosh:

script. And I can check the box at the end of the day, and

Jonathan McIntosh:

that's fine. But I think if you want to grow your billings, and

Jonathan McIntosh:

you really want to make a memorable impression in the

Jonathan McIntosh:

markets, it's not did I make my calls ended up follow the

Jonathan McIntosh:

script, it's to make a meaningful connection today.

Stephanie Maas:

Correct me if I'm wrong, a lot of what I'm

Stephanie Maas:

hearing is, hey, in the beginning, get your recipe and

Stephanie Maas:

thinking ahead, we give it to you, hey, this is what it's

Stephanie Maas:

gonna take from a work perspective to be successful.

Stephanie Maas:

Put the work in, and then as you do the work and start applying

Stephanie Maas:

these things, again, the best chefs in the world, they all

Stephanie Maas:

have something unique. They make the same dish. What makes their

Stephanie Maas:

dish outstanding, isn't that it tasted exactly like everybody

Stephanie Maas:

else's. It's that they put their twist on it. If I hear you,

Stephanie Maas:

right, that's where you go from connection to meaningful

Stephanie Maas:

connection.

Jonathan McIntosh:

Yes, that's it, Stephanie. But that does

Jonathan McIntosh:

take time. You can be patient with yourself and it takes lots

Jonathan McIntosh:

of repetition. To go back to our our volume piece. You know,

Jonathan McIntosh:

you've heard the story many times about the photography

Jonathan McIntosh:

students, one group of students had to go out and by the end of

Jonathan McIntosh:

the semester, produced 500 photographs, the others only had

Jonathan McIntosh:

to produce one really high quality photograph, but the

Jonathan McIntosh:

students who worried about volume You more than quality, by

Jonathan McIntosh:

the last set of photographs are making, their quality was

Jonathan McIntosh:

higher, your quality only gets better as you practice as you

Jonathan McIntosh:

get into it. That's why what we say around here is, and I remind

Jonathan McIntosh:

myself of this because I make bad bizdev and marketing calls

Jonathan McIntosh:

all the time. They're awkward, they can't, I try to not make

Jonathan McIntosh:

them awkward intentionally. But I mean, I remember the first

Jonathan McIntosh:

marketing call I made to someone in the nonprofit space in a, in

Jonathan McIntosh:

a performing arts organization that I wanted to work with. I

Jonathan McIntosh:

was nervously reading back my script and and I said, and give

Jonathan McIntosh:

me a call and I read, I read the number aloud. And I was like,

Jonathan McIntosh:

Oh, I'm sorry, that's your number that I just couldn't

Jonathan McIntosh:

practice you. I am a professional, I promise. I will

Jonathan McIntosh:

tell you later, I ended up placing that person at another

Jonathan McIntosh:

organization. And I've worked with them since so it wasn't the

Jonathan McIntosh:

end of the world. My point is a good marketing call is one that

Jonathan McIntosh:

is made good marketing call is one that's made, it can be

Jonathan McIntosh:

perfect. And over time, with volume, you get better and you

Jonathan McIntosh:

learn to become yourself.

Stephanie Maas:

Any thing else from your perspective, tips,

Stephanie Maas:

tricks of the trade, etc. that help you kind of push past the

Stephanie Maas:

fear of not sounding professional. The concern of

Stephanie Maas:

again, I love the latter reference, anything else that

Stephanie Maas:

you would recommend to our listeners just to help bridge

Stephanie Maas:

that gap from, you know, hey, we know you have these concerns,

Stephanie Maas:

but just get there anyway or counsel on developing their

Stephanie Maas:

emotional intelligence?

Jonathan McIntosh:

Well, once again, lots of fantastic

Jonathan McIntosh:

recruiters that really do follow scripts really closely. And a

Jonathan McIntosh:

lot of them bill a lot more than me. And they're, they're

Jonathan McIntosh:

wonderful. I would ask them, when's the last time you you

Jonathan McIntosh:

freshened up your scripts, because for me, it's like, hey,

Jonathan McIntosh:

or do the words coming out of my mouth for me, they got to feel

Jonathan McIntosh:

authentic. One of the best things I heard about sales early

Jonathan McIntosh:

on is that it's this transference of energy. That's

Jonathan McIntosh:

what's happening. It's more than the words being said, it's the

Jonathan McIntosh:

feeling and the emotional freight and weight of that the

Jonathan McIntosh:

energy that's coming through. That's why we are phone people

Jonathan McIntosh:

more than than email people. Because you can have those,

Jonathan McIntosh:

those that delicate interchanges of energy on the phone, so much

Jonathan McIntosh:

better than you can be email, it's got to feel authentic. In

Jonathan McIntosh:

order for me to feel like I'm actually doing something of

Jonathan McIntosh:

good. And to leaving voicemails or making calls that matter.

Jonathan McIntosh:

It's got to feel authentic. So when's the last time you freshen

Jonathan McIntosh:

up your scripts? You know, one thing right now that we're doing

Jonathan McIntosh:

our team, basically, we set dream target lists for

Jonathan McIntosh:

marketing, our fantastic assistant put together

Jonathan McIntosh:

basically, a vision board for each of us with these target

Jonathan McIntosh:

organizations. And I've been leaving voicemails telling

Jonathan McIntosh:

people at those organizations like, Hey, I just want you to

Jonathan McIntosh:

know, I may not be on your dream list to work with, but you're on

Jonathan McIntosh:

my dream list to work with. And, you know, that may not mean

Jonathan McIntosh:

anything to you or not. But I'm gonna keep keep calling me

Jonathan McIntosh:

because I really do want us to work together at some point in

Jonathan McIntosh:

time

Stephanie Maas:

That is awesome. This has been incredibly

Stephanie Maas:

insightful and helpful. And I think whether you're just

Stephanie Maas:

starting out or if you've been in it for a while, again,

Stephanie Maas:

whether your next level is just learning the practice or

Stephanie Maas:

learning to get to the next level. I think this is some key

Stephanie Maas:

information. So thank you so much for your willingness to

Stephanie Maas:

share and bring us along on this idea of finding your way to

Stephanie Maas:

being yourself and making meaningful connections.

Jonathan McIntosh:

Yeah, thank you, Stephanie. What an honor. I

Jonathan McIntosh:

really am grateful to be here.

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About the Podcast

The Talent Trade
Presented by ThinkingAhead Executive Search
The Talent Trade is all about finding the right person, for the right opportunity, at the right time. But how exactly do you do that the "right" way? Executive Search Partner and Top Biller Stephanie Maas shares more than 25 years of experience about what it takes to be a top recruiter in today's "talent trade" market, using ThinkingAhead’s four-prong system focused on recruiting, business development, planning, and managing your mindset. It’s real, honest information about how to build your desk, perfect your niche, and stand out among the crowd in your search career.



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