ROTR - Hayden Hughes
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[00:00:00] This is Recruiters on the Rise, and I'm Colleen Gallagher. Join me for candid conversations with talent leaders as we explore the work that drives them, the lessons they've learned, and how they're helping people find careers they love. This show is sponsored by Lavalyer, an interview intelligence platform built by Textio.
Colleen Gallagher: welcome everyone to another episode of Recruiters on the Rise. Uh, I'm so excited to introduce today's guest. He has led sourcing and talent acquisition strategy for some of the biggest names in global finance and consulting, Deloitte, Citi, and most recently eight years at AMS, where he was a managing director of their Center of Excellence for Sourcing, Intelligence, and Attraction.
He recently launched his own consultancy and is currently helping a global nonprofit rebuild their entire talent infrastructure from the ground up. Uh, he thinks about recruiting, uh, similar to how a great chef thinks about a meal. And yes, we're gonna talk about that a little bit, but he's also a [00:01:00] former commercial photographer, which I think is just cool.
So Hayden Hughes, welcome to the show.
Hayden Hughes: Thank you. Thanks, Colleen. Thank you for having me, and thanks for that lovely intro as well.
Colleen Gallagher: Oh, yes. I'm so excited you're here. Well, let's dive in. So I, I love to start with just hearing from someone like yourself, what do you think is the one thing or one action that sets the best recruiters apart from the rest?
Hayden Hughes: The very best recruiters to my mind and, and certainly I-- for anyone that's worked with me, I worked for a number of
So what does [00:02:00] that look like in practice for you? Like, how do you, um, think that that shows up in, in how a recruiter conducts themselves?
It shows up in a number of ways. I think certainly when you're recruiting great recruiters, you know it when you see it. There's been a few times in my life when I've been interviewing recruiters,
Yeah.
Um, and, and you, have good interviews and then you can sometimes, every now and then, you have a great conversation, a great, You come out of it and you're absolutely buzzing. That person Looks at you, they look in your eye, they make you feel special, and they're not [00:03:00] just going through the motions. It's the same with a great hiring manager conversation. A great hiring manager conversation is intentional. They're really curious about the role.
They're excited. They've done the prep. A good recruiter has read your CV. A good recruit- recruiter, by the way, and this is a controversial take, take for you.
Yeah.
I do believe, can probably look at a CV in under 10 seconds and know whether or not it's a good candidate.
I And mine.
That may or may not be, um, considered the, the right thing to say, but I, I think a good recruiter probably can do that.
However, they will then draw out of that candidate why they're right for the role, and so they'll then in turn pass that down to the hiring manager. As a hiring manager, they're ultimately looking, they are trusting you with that empty chair that they've got. They're trusting you to fill that role with the right person that's gonna make a difference, that's gonna supercharge their team. A good recruiter is really passionate about that.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I, I get the, [00:04:00] uh, I get the hot take there, but I think the reality is that's the amount of time most recruiters have to spend at looking at a resume. And so if you can become good at that, then that could be your secret sauce in terms of, you know, getting, getting the right talent in the door, especially right now with the amount of inbound, um, companies are getting.
Hayden Hughes: Yeah, and I think we are lost in a sea of, um, mediocrity, is the reality now because everyone's CV looks the same. if you are going out and you're looking for, uh, an accountant or an auditor, everybody's CV is going to say, it's gonna hit the same points, the same notes. So it's about your ability to look at that. And I, I was having a conversation with someone earlier, earlier today, and they, they made the interesting point to, to me today actually, that humans have a, an awful lot of bias. So actually is there an interesting take in terms of that sifting [00:05:00] process that
Colleen Gallagher: Mm-hmm. you've... should have a human loop, and I'm a firm believer that we should have a human loop, but it's quite interesting in terms of some of the more challenging cases that are out there at the moment.
Hayden Hughes: We're all aware of them. Um, is it an interesting case to be made to say, "Do you know what? There's some sifting that can go on, and as long as you're then very thoughtfully, intentionally looking at the, um, the long list and the short list, actually maybe that's okay."
Colleen Gallagher: Yes, especially in the age when, um, we do have access to tools to help audit the system
Hayden Hughes: Mm-hmm.
Colleen Gallagher: a way that you don't have An ability to audit the human, right? Um, if you're using something to help with the screening, and I firmly agree with you that it, that it still has to be a human in the loop, and I know that term has become overused and people are sick of hearing it.
But,
Hayden Hughes: It's
Colleen Gallagher: but it's still true. I think it's the best way to summarize what the point is, which is you still wanna make sure that, um, you're not letting, you know, the [00:06:00] computer, the agent, whoever run, run wild in making decisions. You still need the human to be making the decisions and guiding it. And there are things you can do now that, you know, I know ways, um, you know, people would do audits in the past of this, is they would just bring in more humans to review what the humans had done.
So similarly, now you can bring in humans to review what the technology has done, um, and you still have efficiency gains on both sides. So I do think that there are, are solutions in the market that people can use to suss that out.
Hayden Hughes: You've just reminded me, and one of the books I'm talking to, um, the team about is, um, this. I don't know whether you've, you've come across this
before. it's about great tech, to my mind, should be nudging people. So this is, um, this is a, a great book, uh, about nudge theory, and it's about nudging people to make the right, uh, decisions.
So there's a, a famous case, I think it was in the UK actually, where people weren't donating their organs, so they weren't saying, [00:07:00] "When I die, I will give my organs." Um, and that was in part because you had to, um, make that very clear declaration. So they shifted it the other way to say, right, nudge people to say you have to opt out rather
Yeah.
In.
And that switch around, it went from being only 10%, it literally flipped over, so it was 90% were, were donating rather than the other way around. To my mind, really great and intentional recruitment processes should have very clear guidelines. You should be very specific about what you're, um, asking, and it should be repeatable as well. And actually, that ability to nudge and using tech, using AI to nudge hiring managers, to nudge candidates in a certain direction, and that I'm not sure whether we'll get into it, but I think it's one of the things that me actually, when you and I were talking about the Valeo, the, the fact that you are nudging candidates along that journey and nudging, sorry, nudging hiring managers along that journey.
That for me is quite thoughtful and quite intentional, and it's, it's an interesting take in [00:08:00] terms of direction that we should be going in.
Colleen Gallagher: I guess sort of along those same lines, you talked a little bit about how resumes are becoming commoditized, and I'm curious if you have, um... You know, we're sort of at this inflection point where how we evaluate candidates and what we should be evaluating them for, like skills and experiences versus traits like curiosity and adaptability.
How do you, how do you think about that as a recruiter, and how are you looking for that in- A time when we're seeing a lot of commoditization of, of resumes.
Hayden Hughes: And it, Joe, it's, it's something I've thought a lot about. So I've worked, um, very closely with, uh, Vanessa, who you know, um, at, uh, at Bodo. And I think that increasingly we're seeing everyone talks about
skills and the importance of, of skills, and actually building these skills foundation, so it's like a stick of rock through everything you're [00:09:00] doing. Um, and making-- being really intentional about how you're making that part of your recruitment process. It's really hard. And there is a graveyard of ambition of large TA, um, functions trying to build skills taxonomies, skills ontologies, and then going through the motions, spending hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions, and, and a lot of time, effort, and energy on that. The important thing is you're being very clear in terms of what are the core one, two, three, maybe four soft skills that you're looking for,
Mm-hmm.
Sure you're testing those rigorously, thoroughly. That might be through, through psychometrics. It might be asking very specific questions during the process. Um, it's probably some kind of fit interview. Um, and I think increasingly all seen the stories, and we've, we've all lived it as well, the, um, the elongation and of the, um, recruitment process that we've seen in the last two, three [00:10:00] years. I think it's, um... my hope is that we're gonna get to a point where we realize it's not actually resulting in better candidates, a more engaged process. I'm passionate about candidate experience, and to my mind, if we can find our ways around to up on a pedestal things like the, the Candy Awards and really being thoughtful around the candidate experience, no bad thing. That's got to switch, and it's got to change.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah, somebody recently told me, um, they have somebody they know going through-- You know, they're, they're looking for a job right now, and one of the companies they're talking to says that they like to date their candidates, um, which is code for like, "You've done ten-plus interviews, and we still have a, a few more for you to do."
And, you know, obv-obviously I have a, a bit of a bias here since I'm, you know, leading a company that's building interview intelligence. But my, my hope is that, you know, if you can have more insight into what's happening in the interview process, you don't have to [00:11:00] do that many. Because I think a lot of what people are-- You know, they're sort of solving the problem the wrong way, which is let's just add more process to it because we aren't getting the signal we need, and we don't know who we can trust, and we don't know what people are actually demonstrating, and so let's just add more and more s- more stages so that we can get more opinions.
But that's what it is. It's just opinions. Um- And so, you know, I, I really do hope that if, you know, whether somebody's using Lavalliere or they're using any type of interview intelligence software, that it will help not only give people better signal on what candidates actually are demonstrating during the interview process, but also it improves candidate experience and the company and the hiring manager's experience because it's not gonna take as long, because you're actually getting data you can use.
Hayden Hughes: 100%. And th- there's quite a lot to unpack in that actually, because I, I [00:12:00] think for me, one of the things I've really advocated probably over the last five or six years is actually building very, um, clear candidate packs.
Of And actually, you see the very best, um, employers out there in terms of the ones that are consistently not just winning awards, but genuinely hiring the very best talent. It's about showing and being very clear as part of the process from the very outset, here's the things that will mean that you're a good fit. This is what our company's looking for. So it's not just to your point, or it's that signal versus noise thing, and it's not just saying clearly, "Here's what we stand for," but it's also a case of here's what we don't stand for.
So it's, it actually more of a one and, and a zero process. And actually, if you're being really clear with candidates right up front and saying, "These are the things we are looking for, you're-- we're interviewing you, but by the way, you are interviewing us as
well," because it's a, a two-way street. And making sure that step shift is there, being really clear with candidates.
I love there's, there's a number of [00:13:00] employers that are increasingly now beginning to state, "This is our AI policy." And actually at the very early stages of, of interview process say, "Right, here's our AI policy. This is what we do say is okay, this is what we're not happy with." And to my mind, that's really clear so the candidate knows that we are embracing this, we are forward-thinking, we're energized and engaged by where the future and the technology is taking us.
That, to my mind, feels like a great way of embracing that with a candidate. They can then be really clear on what the business does stand for and what the business doesn't stand for. To my mind, that is a great outcome. And so I think you're absolutely right. It's a signal versus noise thing, and it, it's got to change. things you and I had talk- have talked about before is, um, and I think it speaks to this point, is the meeting before the meeting and, and making sure that, um, you know, this is something a, a really good recruiter does at the beginning. So can you walk us through that, what that actually looks like and what you mean by [00:14:00] that?
This is something I h- I kind of- I think it's one of those things, back to your point about what makes a good recruiter, and again, going back to those Michael Page days, and Michael Page isn't alone in it. A lot of the very, the best, both mid-tier and the, the Shreks, all, all the big firms that are recruiters that are really well-trained, it's all about drilling you to make sure that that, um, conversation with the hiring manager or that conversation with the candidate, 'cause it's the same to a little bit of an extent with the candidate, but definitely with the hiring manager, are you as prepped as possible? So are you showing up? And it's the difference to my mind with, you mentioned earlier that piece around chefs, about being prepared. It's about taking the, the candidate on the journey. It's just the same as if you, uh, go, I think you were talking, uh, when we spoke the other day, you said about how you'd been to a, a lovely, um, restaurant.
Was it in Sonoma? I'm
Colleen Gallagher: Yes.
Hayden Hughes: gonna get it wrong. Yes.
Right.
Um, are you showing up and having a [00:15:00] great conversation? So the meeting before the meeting is do you have silver medalists? Do you have referrals? Have you identified an internal candidate? Do you have a simple one-pager?
So have you gone out to the market? Have you got market intelligence to say, "Here's the supply, here's the demand. Here's the, here's what the immediate competitors are looking for. Here's some of the adverts they're looking,
Mm-hmm.
Why did this person leave? Oh, is there some attrition challenges? You've got an immediate competitor coming after your people. Was this about salary? So it's about having a really, taking them on that journey, and that's the difference, back to that point around the, the restaurant. The difference between showing up to a, a good restaurant and being asked, "What would you like for your dinner?
Can I take your order?" And having someone that really shows up, and I think sadly we don't always get this right, [00:16:00] the, the Brits, but you guys definitely do, that, um, "I'm gonna be your server for this evening. I'd really recommend the lamb. This particular wine goes well with that."
Yeah.
That great conversation, making that difference.
I was speaking to someone earlier on in the week about the new Gordon Ramsay, um, uh, series that he's, he's got talking about his launch of his, uh, his latest restaurant.
I've written a post about it actually on, on LinkedIn. And for me, it's the, the thoughtfulness. I mean, it's, it's exec produced by Gordon, right?
So it's quite
Russian?
It's, it's all about Gordon.
Yeah.
Um, the thing that I love about it, again, is this, um, the level of intention that he has in terms of walking his chefs that are going to be Front of house and really the, the, the two key individuals that he has for these two. So he's got, um, the Gordon Ramsay, the fine dining, which I think is eight or nine covers, and then he's got Lucky Cat, [00:17:00] and he's moving someone from his Mayfair Lucky Cat to this new one.
And he goes through a whole process where he's saying, "Right, here's the suckling pig, and this is what, what we're gonna do." And his whole point is, right, here's, here's the theater. This is how we talk people through this stuff, and he's very intentional about where he's going. And the other point he makes is, if I'm sitting down with my, my wife, Tana, want to know that I've got, um, uh, starters for her and for me. So it's not just one of us, and when they're picking she, she would like this, and I would like it. And he's very intentional about what that process should look like. So for me, one of the things I always train the team on, and I always think about with any process, is making sure when you're turning up, meeting before the meeting, you've been very thoughtful about what's this process gonna look and feel like for the hiring manager? Are they gonna walk away and feel like this is a really elevated experience?
Are they gonna be [00:18:00] Yeah.
So it's not just interview, um, playback for the candidate, but it's also using that for the hiring manager as well.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, you know, I've been on the, the other side of that, uh, you know, a number of times where, um, you know, and I've s- I've said this before, but you tend to remember, right? You remember all the, the bad situations much more vividly than, than the good. But I've definitely worked with recruiters where they've come in and just said, "So tell me, what is this thing?
You know, what's this role that you're hiring for?" And I've also had experiences where they come in more with what you're talking about, where they have some sense of, of, you know... Even nowadays, you can just use the title and get a lot of information around, you know, what are the types of things you normally would expect to [00:19:00] see.
And I think what you can get out of that when you come in is, number one, it just builds trust in the relationship right off the bat.
Yep.
And obviously that's such a key component to having a suc-successful search. But I think, um, you know, it's just the other thing that that does that's so important is you align on expectations upfront, because we've all been in situations where you get 30 or 45 days into hiring and you're like, "I'm not seeing the candidates that I want.
I'm not-- like... This all..." Yeah, this is all wrong, you
at-
And, and there's sort of that, that prep, um, that ends up being so important, and if it's not done... And I think this is where- Really good recruiters, to your point, are being proactive about doing that in advance. Um, you know, I think I, I saw a post recently where somebody suggested, like, you send something to the hiring manager to fill out in advance, [00:20:00] which could be a way to do it so you get more signal.
I'm a bit skeptical that people are gonna devote time to that. Um, and, you know, one of the things that I know when we have been developing some of the technology we've been developing and talking to recruiters, what we did hear a lot from, really from the best recruiters was, "I need the intake meeting."
Like, I still get, that's not something I want a bot to do. That's not something that I want, you know, to-- a hiring manager to just do themselves because there is a ton of value in the conversation that we're having.
Hayden Hughes: Yeah. Ultimately, we're part of the human resources team.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah.
Hayden Hughes: Clues in the name, you mentioned an interesting point there, which is trust, and I think that is central and foundational to everything that we're doing. One of the big turning points for me was, um, when I joined AMS, actually, I had a, an old boss, Ish Banzo, and he introduced me to, um, Charles H.
Green and "The [00:21:00] Trusted Advisor" and the trust equation, which is something that I was very lucky with, then went on to actually work closely with Charles, and we then built a whole foundational and training, um, around that, which was, um, partnering closely with him and his team. And his, his point, and I'll, I'll kind of play it back for, for people that aren't aware of it.
So it was, um... it's a, an equation, and it's credibility, riabil- reliability, and intimacy is on the numerator. on the denominator, it's, um, uh, trust, the trust... credibility, reliability, intimacy, and then on the denominator is self-orientation. his point is, you can have all of the top three, but if you are not there being very mindful of your orientation and where
that, that individual sees that, then ultimately it doesn't work.
Interesting.
Playback in terms of there's no point in saying that you're gonna do stuff, and you can have a lovely meeting. [00:22:00] If you then deliver on time, you've immediately messed up your credibility. So
it's a, a fantastic equation, and that whole piece in terms of sure that you're being really thoughtful about putting yourself in that hiring manager's shoes is just phenomenal.
Really
Yeah.
Really would recommend it. "Trusted Advisor."
Colleen Gallagher: That's great. Okay. Um, shifting a little bit, um, you know, you, you've shared that you have seen or heard some senior TA leaders, um, sort of talk about AI in the way of like, "Well, we have a couple of years before AI catches up." So what, what would you say to them? Or how do you f- how do you think about folks, um, or what advice would you have, uh, for anyone who might be thinking that?
Hayden Hughes: If you think you've got a, a couple of years, you're, you're fooling yourself. It's that, is it Jim Collins that kind of get on the bus? This is moving at a exponential rate, the like of we've never seen anything [00:23:00] like this before, the more that you can equip yourself, the better. And I think, however, it should be that it's a little bit like being a parent.
I, I always think whatever you're doing as a parent, you, you never quite think you're getting it quite right.
Colleen Gallagher: What?
Hayden Hughes: and I think that's
What?
Hopefully, that's a sign of being a good parent, is you're always worrying about what could I be doing differently or better. And to my mind, AI right now is exactly the same. If you are not waking up every day saying, I spent a good hour or two learning to do things differently? Have I not been really intentional about how I've used my time? Have I put... Have I taken different approaches to how I'm prompting? Have I learnt about the latest tools?" And just spending time listening to podcasts, reading, talking to people about this. This is like no other change before. And talking to, um, to a leader, um, earlier today actually of, of, um, a business, and [00:24:00] they were saying, and I, I think we are beginning to see this sadly over the last two or three years in particular, that people are acutely aware, humans are acutely aware that there are business cases against them that are often being written, um, that
are-- And there's a nervousness, and I think it's implicit and explicit.
There's a little bit of, kind of fearfulness of, oh goodness, is this technology, is there a business against this, a business case against this? Is this, if we implement this and it works really well, is it going to come for my job? And it was, um, Yeah. this point and it, and I think we were kind of reflecting on it, and it's a fascinating point.
And actually I think, I think to my mind, that's the wrong
What the
was it?
Say, right, this, run it at 100 miles an hour, because actually that genuinely make this a part of their workflow genuinely see that this is an opportunity to supercharge [00:25:00] yourself and double, triple, quadruple your pro-productivity and your output. And we're only scratching the surface. So even now, when you're looking at it, you're thinking, right, okay, I think what the IQ of, uh, of, uh, average AI right now is like 140 or something, isn't it? But it's, it's a polymath in everything that we want to know If that doubles, that-- And then, and then compounds again and again and again, where does that put us in a year or two's time?
It's It is frightening if, uh, i-if you give it too much though, and I think it's right that we should be a bit concerned about how we're using it and being
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah. There is no question
Hayden Hughes: if we were to go back in time 25 years and look at the internet, are there some things that I might suggest we could do differently? And if we were to sit down with Mr. Berners-Lee and say to him, "Tim, it's amazing what you've done. It's changed the world, but there's a ke- few things, maybe the anonymity of certain things,[00:26:00]
various other bits and pieces that we might do differently." I
Yeah.
This is where we've got to be very intentional.
But to answer your original question, anyone that's thinking that they have a year or two and that if they're operationally excellent, that will be okay and that will be enough, it's not gonna be enough because you're up against someone else that's also operationally excellent is
And?
A 20-page presentation by some simple prompts and saying, "Go out and scour the internet and bring me the, best materials you can find.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah, and it ties back to what we were talking about earlier in terms of like what are the, the things that we're looking for when we're hiring right now, which is like, do people have that adaptability and curiosity? And it's like those are gonna be, be the people who succeed in this because I think it actually makes themselves more-- it makes them more valuable because they're willing to push boundaries and,
Yep.
You know, figure out the way to do something.
And I feel like that's where you [00:27:00] have to have some, some trust in yourself too of like, I'm gonna continue to evolve with this and figure this out and find the right, the right place for me.
Um, and I, and I don't say that to, you know, um, you know, not acknowledge that there's, there are people who are, are struggling to find work right now because of some of the, the sort of underlying things.
I think companies are just hiring less 'cause they're trying to figure out if they, they can really fulfill the promise of the efficiency of some of this stuff. Um, but at the same time, you know, there's still... You know, I hear all the time from recruiters like how much they're looking for really good talent, and that's still a, a really big challenge, right?
I think somebody said to me a couple months ago, it's like a knife fight in a phone booth, right? Like there's still really-- it's really hard to find, to find
Hayden Hughes: great
Colleen Gallagher: good... Yeah, yeah. To, to find good talent. I know. I was like, I'm, I'm noting that one down to, to use later. So, um, [00:28:00] you know, one, one thing you-- I, I mentioned in your, um, and we've talked about briefly is you recently are, um, helping a global nonprofit rebuild their entire talent infrastructure from the ground up.
So how are you approaching something like that, um, where it, you know, you feel like you have to... It, it's almost an opportunity in some ways, but
Yeah
pretty challenging. So what are your priorities
It...
looking at that and where are you starting?
Hayden Hughes: Yeah, it's exciting. Um, so having gone from, um... I was joking the other day that, um, I've finally-- My, my mother has for years given me grief about the fact that, uh, she's always seen my, my job p-previously as helping investment bankers and, and, um, and her, her partners of, um, a professional services firm, and she's, she's finally can feel, I think, a little bit better about what I'm doing in, in my job, job. So in answer to your question, yes, I'm working, um, closely in a very [00:29:00] exciting, um, uh, yeah, with an exciting org, which is the, um, Clinton Health Access Initiative. I hadn't heard of them before. Um, it's-- they're, they're called CHAI. They're known as CHAI, and it's, it came about... It's a fascinating, uh, origin story, actually, and, um, there's a film called "Wire in the Blood" that I'd recommend people, um, watch.
It's, um, it's a hard watch at points,
Yeah.
It was Nelson Mandela, um, was on the stage, and there were-- They-- It was 2002, and he was, um, there was a whole load of leaders. Um, they were looking at, I think it was Barcelona, um, they were looking at the fact there was, um, millions of people dying of, of AIDS at the time. And, um, he-- As they're walking off stage, he, um, asks Bill Clinton for a, a favor and says, um, "You've-- We've got millions of people dying," and, um, the antiretrovirals that were there, and at the time, they were about $10,000, um, dollars per person.
Colleen Gallagher: [00:30:00] Wow.
Hayden Hughes: " Bill, can you, um, effectively, um, can you, can you look to see if you can make this available to millions of people instead of it costing $10,000?"
Yeah.
20 years in the future, and it's now $40, um, for a person as opposed to $10,000. And that's the journey that CHAI have, have been on and, um, that's then evolved to, um, sexual health and, um, looking at, um, um, and, and being able to... I think I, I was listening the other day. There was, um, I'm get this wrong, it's just under half a billion dollars worth of savings in terms of women's sexual health.
Colleen Gallagher: Wow.
Hayden Hughes: Um, so giving, um, providing women in, um, low and middle-income countries with, um, implants and, and just it's evolved into, um, hepatitis treatments, into, um, cancer across 40 countries. Um- [00:31:00] As an organization, it's very entrepreneurial, and that's one of the exciting things. So it's working closely with the donors, working closely with, um, the local governments and actually really building and working from within.
So 85% of GI's workforce is actually on the ground, so that's different from... exactly. And that's, that's-- it's really about being embedded in the local government and
genuinely facilitating and making change. That comes with some interesting how do you make a really effective and, and engaging recruitment process?
How do you make sure that we're best in class? So my role is to come in and, and really work with the, the team and hopefully take it from good to great. So yeah, it's a very exciting, uh, opportunity.
Colleen Gallagher: pivoting a little bit more to learn, to learn about you, um, tell me more about your photography background and if
Hayden Hughes: Haha.
Colleen Gallagher: if you're doing that at all anymore.
Hayden Hughes: I got to scratch my photography itch by, uh, for 18 months, I was a photographer. I [00:32:00] had left Michael Page, and this was kind of height of kind of 2007. My wife was traveling a lot at the time, and we'd just had my, um, my daughter. Um, so this is about 18 years ago. Um, and, uh, yeah, I,
Well...
Worked with the BBC. um, photographed quite a lot of, um, bands. Um, did some really-- worked with various record labels, did some really interesting and cool stuff. Um, ultimately, um, whilst it was a lot of fun, it wasn't necessarily going to, um, pay the, rent.
So, um, it was a lot of fun. I got to scratch my itch. I would, I
Yeah.
Genuinely say that in terms of advice to, to people, if you've got something like that, absolutely go for it because, uh, it's, uh- a, a, a fantastic book I once read, I think it's called "Top Five Regrets of the Dying." It's not
[00:33:00] Yeah.
Or cheerful-sounding book, but it's, I think it's one of the most gifted books on, on Amazon, and, uh, it's phenomenal.
And it-- the, the point it makes is people always, um, regret the things that, uh, they didn't do rather than the things that they did do, and that for me was one of the things I, I did do, so hopefully not a regret in the future.
Colleen Gallagher: So how did you end up, uh, getting into recruiting?
Hayden Hughes: I worked for Enterprise Rent-A-Car, a car rental company, and helped them when they were coming over to the UK. They were setting up, um, their, uh, their franchise in, in the UK, and I worked with them in Central London. My time had come to an end with them. I'd done that for five years.
It's hard work. um, the, uh, one of my team then went to work for Michael Page. He then said, "Why don't you give this a go? I think you'd really enjoy it." So I did four years at Page, then went off to be a photographer. But I think one of the... It's a funny thing, that agency piece, and I always say I left, I think it's some-something [00:34:00] a bit sad when people say, "Oh, I fell out of love with agency."
I was very lucky and fortunate. I still really love the agency part of, of my time in recruitment. I look back on it very fondly, and I'd very happily go back to work in agency again. um, I think I, I see my recruitment career in kind of at least two halves, maybe a, a third chapter now.
Yeah.
I was on site at, at Deloitte, and a fantastic firm and I'm very passionate about Deloitte.
But when I first joined there, I was like, "It's a little bit boring and a bit quiet." And, um,
Colleen Gallagher: Shocking. I'm not shocked to hear this.
Hayden Hughes: I'd come from Michael Page, which was, um, in the center of London, a big, buzzy, very high ceilings, all marble. Um, it was a phenomenal location. It's 200 people on a floor. You could be closing a candidate out and having a senior conversation, and American football would be buzzing
Yeah.
It was quite a vibe.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah.
Hayden Hughes: having gone from that[00:35:00]
Yeah.
Um, uh, on the fourth floor in, uh, the center of London in their New Street Square offices, very nice, but it's very quiet, it's very serious.
And, uh, I was asked by my boss at the time, uh, he, he said, "We, we really, we've got a, a role in tax." I was like, "Dude, sorry, I, I'm already..." Yeah, exactly. I, I'm already, I'm already in, uh, accounting. I'm, I'm in a very quiet floor. I'm struggling already, and this is a few months in. I was a contractor. And, um, and so I gave tax a go, but bizarrely that then created my love for sourcing because if you're looking for tax professionals, if you're looking for indirect tax, not-for-profit professionals in Birmingham, which one of the things my team was doing, there's hardly any of them.
There's literally a handful, and they've all been approached, to your point. So anyone that you're, you're headhunting from PwC, EY, KPMG, and probably a couple of other places, and they've already been spoken to about Deloitte. So actually it became about how do you [00:36:00] reach out and engage with passive candidates?
And that for me was where that passion around working with passive candidates, mapping out the markets, and literally sitting down with the partners and saying, "Right, okay, how are we gonna map this out? What does this immediate competitor look like?" And actually
Yeah.
Mapping of who you wanted to target, how are you gonna approach them. then became, right, okay, how do we do that through LinkedIn? How do we build campaigns? How do we then build great employer brand? How do we use... 2017, 2018 came along AMS at, at the time was an absolute pioneer in insight-led sourcing. Now it's one of those things that we all kind of take for granted, but it was like you'd invented fire because you're there suddenly bringing what had previously been just the te- territory and domain of search firms, where they're mapping and bringing that level of, of insight and intelligence to, um, to a client.
Suddenly you're able to bring this to life and going on that journey. So [00:37:00] doing sourcing really well, passive outreach, passive engagement, really being passionate about employer brand, and then in turn using insight and data. for me has been the kind of second half and second chapter of working in recruitment.
So it's that page, building the foundations, being really thoughtful around how do you make for a great candidate and hiring manager experience. Then going on to AMS, huge journey that they went on from being 1,800 people to over 10,000 people and being a, a world leader and kind of Everest, um, peak matrix, um, up there.
Yeah.
Perhaps now hopefully going on to take all the things that I've learned in terms of working with
Yeah.
Phenomenal clients that AMS have and, and hopefully bringing that to bear in, in other sectors is, super exciting.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah, it's very full circle 'cause now you're gonna have to be looking for, you know, folks in country for some of these really niche roles with, with Chi. So, um, [00:38:00] funny
Hayden Hughes: Yes, and,
how it all
I
comes
data because you've got the wealth of data when you're doing that, and you're looking for data scientists on East and West Coast in the US.
When you're looking for that are specialists in vector-borne disease, that's a bit more challenging. You can't go and to the guys at TalentNeuron and Horsefly, I don't think anyway.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah.
Hayden Hughes: watch this space. I'm certainly, uh, doing a bit more digging on that one.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah, for sure. Um, what do you like to do in your free time when you're not focused on recruiting?
Hayden Hughes: I, yeah, as you probably gathered, I, I, um, um, my, uh, of my friends take the Mickey out of me. I, I usually have kind of, um, two or three books. I, I tell them it's two or three. It's, it's more than 10 books on the go at any one time, which is probably a bit geeky.
It's that thing of, and I, I will pick up a different book according to, to my mood. So, um, uh, def- definitely reading. Um, I'm really passionate [00:39:00] about F1 and, um, and, and for me, there's a few things there. There's the drama of the, the fact that you've got the drivers and their capability. Um, I'm, I'm racing this weekend, and I'm quite excited about that.
You know, I've done it, done it once previously, and it's, um, goodness, when you're there in a car, it's, uh, and you're, you're not far from the, the ground, you, you really feel it.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah.
Hayden Hughes: but it's, it's not just that. It's the, it's the absolute capability of those drivers and the fact that you've got youngsters like Kimi Antonelli, uh, age 18.
He's, he's just there. Pa- His mom's having to drive him to and from the circuit sometimes because he hadn't yet got his driving license, he's going in and driving this, this thing at phenomenal spee- speeds and the G-force, and I don't know if you've seen their necks 'cause they're, they're there with the kind of amazing Gs, and so they've got these, uh, skinny little, uh, lads, and then they've got these amazing necks because they, they have to for the G-Force. It, for me, it's not [00:40:00] the, it's not about that. It's all the teamwork and the data
Yeah.
Insight and the competition between the teams. The fact that if you look 20 years previously at the, and it's, it's worth actually having a look on YouTube. If you look at the pit stops 20 years ago, they were taking seven, eight, and more seconds.
Now you're doing it in two seconds, and it's that absolutely in unison. How do you use the data? How do you make sure that you're being really thoughtful to say, "Right, okay, our weather report is saying there's about to be rain in the next 10, in, in the next 10 minutes. Have we, do we make a tire decision?
What do we do?" And actually thinking ahead around what your competition might be doing and making sure you're doing things to get the edge. For me, it's those incremental gains. How do you apply those? Aside from the fact that it's fascinating and fun to watch,
Yeah.
You then apply that in business, and how do you apply that, most importantly, in recruitment?
Yeah.
Those simple little tiny things and the way in [00:41:00] which they compound. They all build to build trust with the recruiters, to build trust with candidates because "No, do you know what? Colleen gets it. She's got my best interest at heart, and
she genuinely is interested." That's the difference between having a average conversation and having a great conversation, and that's the reason why people join companies. It's that It's that sliding doors moment. That's the reason why I'm in recruitment. It's why I think the very best recruiters are in recruitment because they've picked up the phone, they've had a conversation with a candidate, and it's the difference between them being in that or not. It, it is, it's that kind of...
I love that film, "Sliding Doors." It's, uh, it's that, are you having that sliding doors moment? If your life could have gone down one j- trajectory, but as a recruiter, you changed that person's life without sounding trite, and it went down in the
Yeah.
Instead.
Colleen Gallagher: I love that. I, um, I do find F1 quite interesting. I, uh, started watching the Netflix docuseries
Hayden Hughes: [00:42:00] Survive?
Colleen Gallagher: Drive to Survive, but I only-- I've only watched one ep- I've only watched one episode and, and I kind of felt because I'm so... I think it's like six or seven seasons, and it was s- you know, five-plus seasons ago.
I felt like, "Ugh, I feel like I can just Google and find out, like, who wins every season." Maybe
Hayden Hughes: don't.
Yeah.
Need to give up... My wife is really funny over, over Drive to Survive, 'cause she's, we've gone on this journey, and she's so invested in,
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah.
Hayden Hughes: " Oh, look, he's just a young lad. He's just the same age as our kids." And, uh, and so you get the beauty of that is it
Yeah. Yeah.
You, particularly with the youngsters, and they're very... I was actually reading a, an article that was saying they've seen a, a drop-off actually in the last, um, year or so where there's this been absolute... So it's nearly a billion people now are watching, um, F1, so it's just become huge, and it's exponential last year or two, down to Drive to Survive. But they're saying that there's almost this curve and tail off, and they're trying to figure out what does F1 do now because it's [00:43:00] brought in such a huge global audience.
It's whether or not they can sustain that audience because Drive to Survive, it's had this phenomenal effect, but then people have waned in terms of their interest. But I, I'm actually very jealous of you. I think stick with it is my suggestion and certainly when you get to the kind of more recent, the last couple of series beginning to kind of... Some of the youngsters coming through and their stories is, is definitely worth following.
Yeah.
Invested behind it.
Colleen Gallagher: the, the sort of microdose version of it, I guess, is that I watched the movie F1 because I had a plane. I had a flight recently where I could watch a movie because I have a...
Hayden Hughes: Great flight movie
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah, yeah, I have a, you know, I have a two-and-a-half-year-old, so I don't have a lot of time to watch movies or long, long, um, series these days.
But I, you know, it, it was good enough that, like, everything you were just talking about in terms of the training and the teamwork and all that, really, I, I can see that, um, a lot in, in, uh, in how that can apply. A-and just I love, like, the way you've, you've brought [00:44:00] it back to, like, a lot of, you know, practical applications of, of things in everyday life, restaurants or,
Hayden Hughes: It's
chefs
Colleen Gallagher: or, F1.
Hayden Hughes: and the other one is, is the Sky Sports team, so Dave Brailsford. Has anyone ever spoke to you about that? Sky, the Sky Sports team. So, um, the UK had famously, um, not won, um, the Tour de France, and we,
[00:45:00] Oh.
Touring around and going into various different hotels, and they realized that their, um, riders were picking up and getting sick as a result of that. So what they did is they sent an advance crew. They had a clear mattress that they'd worked with a, a whole, um, with sleep experts.
Colleen Gallagher: Wow.
Hayden Hughes: had their own pillow, and they were cleaning them, and they were taking a whole approach, and they were going in, they were stripping the hotel room completely bare. They were completely cleansing it and cleaning it, and then they were putting in their mattress that they [00:46:00] knew was consistent, their pillow that they knew was consistent, and all of these incremental gains, they might add up to only one or two, but they compounded. there was-- they, they had all kinds of massage, um, capability built into their, um, their bus. Their bus is like a whole phenomenon. And, and they had it completely tailor-made to their team, different mood lighting, and sure enough, they went on and won a whole raft of races, various golds. But it's all this theory of incremental gains, and I'm a big fan of that, and I think in, um, in recruitment, it's a hugely important philosophy.
It's those little things that you do that make all the difference.
Colleen Gallagher: Yeah. Amazing. Well, um, if people want to connect with you, what's the best way for them to find you?
Hayden Hughes: LinkedIn, I'm a recruiter, um, is absolutely the, the best way to, uh, to find me. Reach out, connect. Um, I'm always, um, keen to talk to anyone that's passionate about recruitment, um, anyone that just wants to, [00:47:00] to geek out on, on the sourcing,
Yeah.
Intelligence, on attraction, and hopefully building great candidate and hiring manager experiences.
Colleen Gallagher: Well, I really appreciate you joining us today. I really loved, like I said, I love how you use very practical examples to sort of tie that back into your to d- your, your day-to-day and your working life and, and, um, that was really fun and, and I, you know, just really appreciate you taking the time to join us today.
Hayden Hughes: Thank you. It's an absolute pleasure
Colleen Gallagher: All right. Well, thanks for everyone who is listening. If you learned something today or laughed, please tell somebody about this podcast. Thank you again to Hayden, and this has been another episode of Recruiters on the Rise. We'll see you all next time.
And that wraps up another episode. Thank you for joining. For show notes and other episodes, visit us at recruitersontherise.com. Recruiters on the Rise is sponsored by Lavaleer, an interview intelligence platform. Lavaleer goes beyond basic note-takers to improve your ability to assess candidates with AI-powered [00:48:00] interview questions, summaries, and transcription.
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