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Breaking Out of The AI Hiring Algorithm With Beverly Dines
13 Plays4 hours ago
What happens when thousands of qualified candidates are filtered out by the same AI system?
In this episode of Changing Minds & Changing Lives, Julie Sowash sits down with workforce strategist and advocate Beverly Dines to unpack the growing impact of AI-driven hiring tools—and the real-world consequences for job seekers navigating today’s market.
Grounded in a recent Stanford study on algorithmic bias, this conversation goes beyond the headlines to explore how “algorithmic monocultures” are shaping who gets seen, who gets filtered out, and how opportunity is distributed. Beverly brings a powerful mix of data, lived experience, and tactical guidance, offering both job seekers and employers a clearer path forward.
From the emotional toll of repeated rejection to actionable strategies for bypassing automated systems, this episode centers on one key question: how do we build hiring practices that are both efficient and truly human?
Key Takeaways:
- The reality of today’s hiring market and why traditional advice no longer applies
- Insights from the Stanford study on AI hiring tools and systemic bias
- What “algorithmic monocultures” are—and why they matter
- How AI screening tools influence hiring decisions across multiple employers
- The human impact of rejection, ghosting, and automated hiring systems
- The growing gap between hiring technology and ethical implementation
- Ways to Get Out of the Algorithm
- Insights for Employers & Talent Leaders
Resources & Links
- Stanford Study: AI Hiring Tools Can Yield Racial Bias and Systemic Rejection
- Connect with Beverly Dines:
Website: beverlydines.com
Social: @beverlydines (Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, YouTube)
Podcast: How to Give a Damn About Your Workplace - Are Emily and Greg More Employable Than Lakisha and Jamal?
- Whitened Résumés: Race and Self-Presentation in the Labor Market
- Gender, Race, and Intersectional Bias in Resume Screening via Language Model Retrieval
- Algorithmic Monocultures in Hiring
About the Guest:
Beverly Dines is a COO, speaker, creator, and educator, and the #1 voice in tactical career content. She empowers her audience by breaking down the strategic plays insiders use but rarely share. Through her platforms and her podcast, How to Give a Damn About Your Workplace, she turns career strategy into steps you can run today, no fluff, no gatekeeping. Author of Create The Door.
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Transcript
Introduction: Julie Sowash and Beverly Dines
00:00:06
Speaker
Welcome to Changing Minds, Changing Lives. My name is Julie Sowash. I am the CEO and co-founder of Catch-22 Group. And as you all know, I am also the co-founder and strategic advisor for Disability Solutions.
00:00:20
Speaker
I am so excited about today's guest and about the conversation that we're going to have. As those of you who know me, know that I love to get geeky about hiring algorithms, about legislation, litigation, workforce data management techniques, all of those things where actual hiring decisions get made. And knowing what I've seen over the past 15 years,
00:00:46
Speaker
how much they impact our community, even though so much of the time they are black box. So we're going to talk about that and a lot more today with our guest, Beverly Dines. She's a workforce strategist and advocate focused on rethinking how hiring systems evaluate talent in a rapidly changing tech-driven world. She's also a founding member of Fabric in Chicago.
00:01:12
Speaker
and currently serves as the Chief Operating Officer at Foxy, where she's led strategic initiatives, optimized operations, and helped organizations navigate complex systems and scale effectively. She is also the author of Create the Door,
00:01:29
Speaker
She has a background in spanning recruitment, operations, and workforce development. She brings to us today a strong perspective on how hiring systems and workplace structures impact real people, especially as technology continues to shape how talent and all of us are evaluated and the opportunities that are distributed or maybe sometimes not distributed to us. So let me welcome Beverly. Beverly, how did I do on that introduction? What
Beverly's Insights: Education and Market Dynamics
00:01:58
Speaker
did I miss? Tell us some more about you.
00:02:00
Speaker
It was fabulous. Thank you so much for having me on, Julie. um It was wonderful. i think, you know, ah one of the things that's been so exciting as I've started ah this journey as as an educator and as a creator in this space and something that you nailed as you were you were chatting about my experience is this is a rapidly changing hiring market. And because it's a rapidly changing, not just a hiring market, but career landscape. And that's something I like to talk about on my platform as well as while there is a heavy emphasis right now on folks that are actively struggling in this market as technology has kind of infiltrated the systems that used to make um the hiring process process a little bit more transparent, more straightforward even, even for the folks who are facilitating the process. Also, throughout your your entire career, um that this market is changing and the realities within it are changing. I saw a definition recently about how ah companies are starting to create forever layoffs, where it's just a part of their quarterly strategy now, and they're being being very transparent with their teams about it. I mean, we're in a very interesting time and in the career landscape. And so as I think about what I aim to do and and have been you know fortunate enough to do with my platform is tactical strategies that are relevant for today's age. I think that's one thing too that I hear from my audience is you know there's a lot of ah what what I'll say like grandfathered in you know feedback that maybe worked 10 years ago, maybe worked five years ago. but just does not work today. And what I, you know, I've self-proclaimed, you know, myself as your, you know chief empowerment officer for whomever is listening, because I want to empower you with real strategies and real tactics that will actually move the needle for you, as opposed to you applying to, you know, methods that, you know, aren't actually relevant anymore and blaming yourself in the process. I think that's the biggest part of this work for me is empowering folks to take that step back and reevaluate, you know where we're placing our value um as we think about our careers, because as we're seeing,
00:03:59
Speaker
The data, these organizations, you know, funky things are happening across the board. And what's most important to me are is our folks walking away from these tactics and my platform with ah feeling as though they've been seen, that they've been validated, and also that they have something that they can hold on to and take immediately. So I'm, which is also very much on par with what you and your team at Disability Solutions have been doing. And I'm really, you know, excited to to dive further into that.
00:04:27
Speaker
Yeah, no, thank you. Thank you for joining us. You said something really interesting right there is that you want to give people tactical things to take away from and how, as someone who's both been a job seeker and now raised job seekers, um I understand very intimately how people personal applying for a job is. And I think um as I sit on the other side now working with the technology vendors and and the companies that do the hiring, that gets lost
Unpacking Career Systems and AI Concerns
00:04:55
Speaker
so frequently. And one of the things that I love about educating job seekers and people who help get people to work is understanding the underlying systems that are actively
00:05:13
Speaker
shaping their career journey, both in positive and negative ways. Because as as a job seeker, when I go to apply for a job at Acme Inc., all I see is Acme Inc.
00:05:25
Speaker
And when I feel personally rejected or ghosted by Acme Inc., that's impactful in a multitude of ways. And what we get to do here a bit today and what I love to do with Disability Solutions is help job seekers unpack that there may be five to 10 that are actually making decisions, although the law would not say that, that are actually influencing decisions. How about that? About who's moving through the process. And, you know, at the end of 2024, we're really looking at a place where
00:06:04
Speaker
A lot of my conversations, a lot of my speaking was around AI governance, AI transparency, AI fairness. um And I feel like all of a sudden, not all of a sudden, um a lot of that conversation has fallen away. And so what I ah was truly excited to talk with you about today is a new study that came out from Stanford. just at the end of May. We'll link it in the show notes so you guys can read the overview or the full study if you're really geeky like us. um And it's called AI Hiring Tools Can Yield Racial Bias and Systemic Rejection. And quite honestly, I didn't expect to get something out of this that I haven't already lived um around just bias in general and how the bias is working in in the algorithms. um But I actually...
00:06:57
Speaker
This forced me to to think about some things in different ways. So let me just quick set the scene and then we'll get into talking. um So this study by Stanford was based on just about 3.4 million job seekers who submitted 4 million job applications to 1,700 job postings across 150-ish employers in 11 industry sectors.
00:07:25
Speaker
Here's what I think makes this extremely unique and extremely impactful is all those candidates and all those applications were assessed by an AI hiring tool from a single third-party vendor.
00:07:42
Speaker
So that really, to me, changes this conversation in a way that I had not framed that way before. And I think that is so impactful when we're thinking about a lot of the litigation that's coming down the pipelines and a lot of the product development that we're seeing from the tech companies coming down the pipelines. So you know from your perspective,
00:08:07
Speaker
why Why does this matter that it it was kind of that single that single source of decision making or influencing? And how seriously should employers take those findings? We hear a lot of anecdotal dismissals, but I think this lays out pretty clearly that we can't do that anymore.
00:08:26
Speaker
Oh my gosh. I think, why does this matter? My goodness. If I have learned anything from the virality of the post that I made bringing this data to light, it is that finally candidates around the country, around the world, who have been submitting thousands thousands of applications. I think for those who are listening who have not had to enter this hiring market and maybe you the last time you were unemployed was maybe 10 or 15 years ago, I want to just ground ourselves for a moment in the reality that this is not your older sister's or your mom's or your cousin's hiring market. This is not the hiring market where you can submit one application or 10 and get interviews quickly. There are people in my community who have been submitting thousands of applications and getting rejected um even though they are qualified or if not overqualified. And for years, people have been blaming themselves, knowing something is wrong, subconsciously knowing something is not right here. But when you are in survival mode, you don't have the capacity to investigate deeper other than what you're receiving from your, from the
Challenges and Psychological Impact on Candidates
00:09:40
Speaker
responses, right? All you're seeing is rejection after rejection, after rejection, struggling not to internalize that, trying to show up while simultaneously watching your finances dwindle, your kids, not yet having to cut back on your kids' activities, all kinds of things to try to keep things afloat, moving, whatever the case. And, and so,
00:10:00
Speaker
When i shared this post and this data, what really struck me was so many people saying, I knew it wasn't me. I knew that there was something going on. i knew I feel so seen. People saying that they were crying reading the study. And so I want to start there with...
00:10:18
Speaker
before we get ah into any of the data, because yes, this has been a very polarizing study for, I think, a variety of and of interesting reasons, I want us to first ground ourselves in humanism. Regardless of what you think about the data, regardless of what you feel about applicant tracking systems or algorithmic processes, because this is also coming from somebody who has used multiple applicant tracking systems. I understand their benefits. I also understand their deficits.
00:10:43
Speaker
We need to, i think, culturally reground ourselves in the fact that there are millions of people right now who are deeply struggling, who are contemplating ending their lives because of this market. And I i think it's important that as we do discuss this data, too, that we we continue to keep humanism at the center of it because it isn't.
00:11:05
Speaker
as simple as I think a lot of, I always say old guard, a lot of folks who are sitting behind the lines are like, well, if you were if you were qualified, you would just get a job. It's not that hard to just get job. Because maybe you yourself have not had to experience what it's like being on the other end of the table, but I have. And as somebody who has has faced these rejections, had to do AI interviews, where people don't even bother to show up being ghosted, you know, you get prepared, you're in your suit, you're ready to go. And then the the other team doesn't even schedule show up to the call.
00:11:32
Speaker
There is a different type of psychology that exists. And if you're a leader who has experienced being on the other side of the table, this is where to the second part of your question, Julie, we can be really thoughtful about how these systems are utilized. And I think going back to the data, one of the things that I think has, i always say activated some folks who I think benefit from these systems is that The Stanford researchers themselves made the correlation. um And I'd like to take a direct quote from some of the researchers, because I think this is beneficial as we're thinking about the study in general from their eyes, the researchers. One of the researchers, Kathleen Creel, stated, we've speculated in past work that if many firms relied on the same AI vendor to screen job applicants, that could prevent some applicants from getting any interviews. But this study was the first time we were able to show this effect in real hiring data, end quote.
00:12:32
Speaker
right So they themselves were, through this data, confirmed. we've We've all been speculating, but now we have some confirmation. And so when you think about...
00:12:48
Speaker
Application. There's three main arguments that I've been hearing over the past week relating to applicant tracking systems from the hiring side that I think it's important for both job seekers and leaders who are change agents who want to be change agents to hear. The first argument I keep hearing is applicant tracking systems don't auto reject you, they sort you.
00:13:07
Speaker
And I need to express that that is, it is gaslighting when you are saying things like this, because as somebody who has, again, seen these back-end systems, if the There's a psychology, right? If a system is shifting people into one group and saying these are good these are good candidates yep and shifting another batch of people in another another group and saying these are bad candidates through a biased algorithm because the algorithm was configured by humans who have biases, right?
00:13:35
Speaker
as From a psychology standpoint, because I've seen it myself, you are not clicking through every single rejected applicant. It's just not happening. Right? It's not so even so if possible. It's not possible. Right. this That is exactly how the system works. The system is designed to help recruiters and HR leaders to sort candidates more effectively. So if you have an over-reliance and trust, even though we have now confirmed that there something's awry with how the algorithm's sorting...
00:14:07
Speaker
it is, in it is, a it behooves leaders to think through, okay, yes, we want these systems to be able to support efficiency. And how can we ensure that we are doing due diligence to even if the system is sorting folks into a ah specific area,
00:14:24
Speaker
How can we, before we, for example, before you reopen a post again, after you've already gone through a jobs, a process and maybe haven't found your candidate, don't open the post just yet. Go back into that rejection pile or the folks who were scored maybe in the mid range and assess them first, create an A list and a B list and a C list with the people who already did the forthcoming action of applying to your company before scrapping everybody and starting again.
00:14:50
Speaker
You know, it's, it's, that That's just one very small shift you can make. But then the the second argument I hear is in relation to the the semantic around the study of, you know, this was one type of gamified system. Pymetrics is one type of applicant tracking system.
00:15:08
Speaker
All it reads to high, like job seekers are paying attention. they're They're watching on LinkedIn how you respond to the validation that millions are having. And if that is your defense mechanism to to to be weary ah of of of the data, i would and i would implore any leader to think for a moment about if millions of people are saying that they're experiencing the same thing, that is also data.
00:15:37
Speaker
Full stop, point blank, period. it's quantitative and qualitative data as well. And that is just as important as a Stanford study, it's just as important as your experience. and um And then I think the third element, and this is, I always say I'm an equal opportunity empowerment creator, meaning I want to empower employees and I also want to empower leaders.
00:16:00
Speaker
I know in my experience, that HR leaders, recruiters consistently have to fight for a seat at the table. They consistently have to fight to be recognized, to be ah considered at the operational level of businesses, especially at scale. I also know in my experience that historically, ah HR leaders and recruiters are excluded from the very systems and the very decisions that they should be in the room strategically making. They are sometimes the last, I have experienced them myself, some of the last people to find out about initiatives that they're expected to execute yeah with zero context.
00:16:38
Speaker
yeah So I'd like to ground the audience for a moment in the idea of, imagine you are in a consistently either i misrespected role or vilified role because employees don't also jive with HR either. So you're in this really difficult position on either side, not respected by leadership up top, typically consistently downsized, right? But then also not respected by employees because your job is to advocate for the... It's a it's a difficult middle ground. So...
00:17:11
Speaker
You're thinking to yourself, right? the The organization's talking about business objectives, KPIs, and how everybody can pull into this. You find out that there is an efficient way for you to be able to source more applicants, screen applicants quicker, which means hire people faster, onboard people faster, which is going to not only make leadership happy, it's going to make the board happy because if more people are in seats, more people are working, more ah initiatives are happening, more money is being made.
00:17:35
Speaker
So suddenly... You get these demos for these different applicant tracking systems. You pitch them to leadership. You're promoting the data behind why this is beneficial. You are suddenly now seen as an imperative.
00:17:49
Speaker
I always say you're in the king's light is what I like to say. so So now you're gunning for this because finally, okay, we're going to pay for this this system. We're going to give you guys the training.
00:18:00
Speaker
But then here's the catch-22. Okay. because this system has been initiated. Well, you guys don't need more recruiters. Here comes a layoff. Well, you don't need more HR coordinators.
00:18:10
Speaker
Here's a layoff. You have the system now. This is what it's, screen, hire. So then there's a bottleneck. So the the HR leaders, recruiters who were expecting, yes, great, we're finally getting some some validation, some some some thoughtfulness about our strategic, because HR, and ah like it or hate it, HR is a strategic function of a business. You know, it should be treated as such. If you don't have a business, you don't have a business.
00:18:38
Speaker
it's's But it's often not treated that way. So finally you have this system, but then you don't have people to operate it the way it should be operated ethically. so then what happens is your burnout recruiter who is operating 30, 40 different hiring processes, plus their HR leader are looking through all these applications.
00:18:57
Speaker
And from us, again, going to a psychology standpoint, if the system is telling you this and these 600 people who applied, they're not it. you and they and your your company just cut your last five recruiters that would have been able to help you comb through all that.
00:19:13
Speaker
you're You're going to click that. You're going to select all because that's how it works. You select all and then you hit reject and it sends an auto rejection email. That's what you're to So I think there's a radical honesty and a radical accountability that I think everyone is looking for from the the the leaders who are in positions of of power right now.
00:19:36
Speaker
And this study to me has brought forth, I think, really important conversations around, okay, what now? We finally have a name to what we've experienced, which Stanford called algorithmic monocultures.
00:19:51
Speaker
ah HR leaders who I've started to see more and more who are like, yep, this is happening. In fact, I'm actually very fortunate on my comment section. I've had many HR leaders and recruiters self-proclaim, like, I'm an HR leader been doing this for 10 years. This is absolutely happening. i yeah And I have been screenshotting those evidences because I'm like, it's we're not making it up.
00:20:09
Speaker
No. Right? So so so there's there's simultaneously those conversations happening, but then there's also this act of resistance. Right. And I think the resistance, I would say, is going back to what I said about the psychology. You promoted the system being this this thing that can really change the game for your for your business. Now there's potential opportunity for liability like Workday is seeing right now.
Monocultures in Hiring Algorithms
00:20:33
Speaker
Yeah, and I think that is exactly where i wanted to go before we get to monocultures is, you know, we have Workday versus Mobley that's happening right now. we have the eightfold class action. um we i at the for the job board doctor, I've been writing a lot about Indeed's plan to take disposition data from 250 plus applicant tracking systems on millions of applications and make its hiring algorithm smarter. And exactly what we're seeing in those single system decision makers
00:21:12
Speaker
And the ones that, you know, outside of Workday are happening well before we ever get to the applicant tracking system, before we ever get to the apply. Does job seeker A ever see this job? And I think that's really what came out and kind of leads into to monoculture here is that.
00:21:33
Speaker
if a person is applying within the same AI system, wherever that system is in in the apply process, um whether it's at the the job board, so the the attraction stage, or at the hiring decision stage, though the the monoculture of that algorithm is impacting, I think it was what, 10% of job seekers who applied at multiple different companies within that ecosystem. and were rejected uniformly by all of those companies. So I think that's a ah fair definition or example of what monoculture is. but But tell us more about that and why it stood out to you.
00:22:12
Speaker
So, I mean, i think you i think you did. i think you rounded it out really well. I think what's what's going back to what I said before, too, about overarching biases, right, and in in an algorithm And there's i a lot of data to support that strategic presentation matters when it comes to the algorithm, because in AI, I know this is like common, it sounds like it's common sense, but I think it's worth saying again, an AI is not a human screening.
00:22:41
Speaker
you know it It cannot critically think, right? It's been programmed to assess based off of criteria. And so all the way back in 2004, a study was conducted, and i'll I'll share these studies with you too as well for you to share with your audience, Julie, because I think the more that we can empower our audience to with with the information, you can also see for yourself, like, okay, this these these trends are not um just you know being plucked from thin air. Like there's a lot of data to support this continued ah these impacts. But a study that was done 2004 found that
00:23:13
Speaker
and they ah ah When resumes were assigned white-sounding names, for example, they received 50% more callbacks than identical resumes with black-sounding names. yeah A study done in 2017 found that minority candidates who whitened their resumes by removing demographic cues received up to double the callback rates compared to identical racially transparent profiles.
00:23:36
Speaker
And a study that was done in 2026, or I'm sorry, 2024, it was a controlled academic study of AI language model tools that used resume screening.
00:23:47
Speaker
The models favored white associated names in 85.1% of the cases, while black male candidates were disadvantaged up to 100% of tested scenarios. And that was testing AI embedded models in a simulated setting, not specific commercial ETS platforms.
00:24:02
Speaker
So you have to think about it's, it's, The systemic nature of when we think about an algorithmic monoculture, it is requiring candidates to de-mask quickly and put all, remove all identifiers, things that make them uniquely them to accommodate the system, which is what's creating a, a, uh, gamification of the system. I saw a video yesterday. One of my community members sent me that in this, there's a hiring, I guess, a listserv or discord where HR leaders can ask questions. And this one creator was talking about how one of the HR leaders said, You know, we got um all, we opened up a job posting and 90% of our candidates, ah
00:24:51
Speaker
ah the they had really high scores. but when we looked at them, real we realized that all of them were, all of the resumes were tailored by AI. And how do we get around this? and And people in the comments were like, oh, how the turns of how the tables have turned.
00:25:05
Speaker
yeah People are smart. They're going to, they realize, oh, okay, if your system is going to reject me because my first name is Keisha, for example, But my middle name's Grace. Okay, I guess my first name's Grace.
00:25:20
Speaker
Because it's it's an affirmation. I have folks in my comment section saying all they did was change their emails and suddenly they're seeing a return or they've they've shifted um the structuring. But in some of these studies that I'll share with you that your audience can review, it's it's even down to like geographical area. If you put a small, like your zip code.
00:25:39
Speaker
yeah So going back to tactics, don't put your zip code in your resume because these systems, according to these studies, can assess demo demographic, demographic,
00:25:49
Speaker
data about you just based off of your zip code. So if you're putting that on your top line item, just put the nearest largest city to you as an example. yeah um Because these it's it's a it's a it's a monolith.
00:26:03
Speaker
And so when we think about equipping candidates and and their toolkit, as as we think about this this algorithm, I wanna also be conscientious of the fact that there's there's two schools of thought when it comes to this process in general.
00:26:20
Speaker
I believe the first rule of thought is folks are exhausted. They're tired of gamifying their resumes. They're tired of doing one individual resume for every single job they apply to only to still be auto rejected. They're tired of, of lying.
00:26:35
Speaker
Right. Because at one point, at one point, is it fictitious? At what point are you literally just putting whatever word salad on your resume using chat GPT, using Claude, using whatever, in the hopes that it's enough to get picked up? and And some of it isn't even things you've done. It's just like, take the JD, take my resume, make it sound like I've done the thing so that I can get past these screeners.
00:26:57
Speaker
So then you do get the interview because these are these are the ripple effects, right? Of this inauthenticity that comes from an algorithmic monoculture. You're in the interview, you made it, but now you can't speak to some of these things because it was framed in a way that isn't natural to you. It's not how you communicate, all of the above, or even things that you've even done.
00:27:17
Speaker
On the other school of thought, There are folks who are like, I'm willing to do whatever it takes to get in front of a person. And that's where I felt i have felt conflicted in my work because i have there's all kinds of ways. Removing your preferred name, removing certain leadership positions that you've done. If you went to an HBCU or an h ah HSI or any of these other, removing that from your... But at what point are we are we promoting Character erasure, what point are we are we promoting inauthenticity to get a job?
00:27:49
Speaker
But some folks are like, at this point I need one. yeah And so i that's the I think that's where I find myself having deeper dialogue, ah both internally, but also, because ah again, I believe as a creator, I have a responsibility to to educate and empower my audience.
00:28:04
Speaker
i I find myself conflicted of continuing to teach how to battle these systems, which would then, I think, require a lot of candidates to remove the things about themselves that are special, that are unique, that are important. And we live in a society While also educating, which I've started doing over the last week, how to get out of the algorithm entirely.
00:28:26
Speaker
Because there are ways to completely bypass it. I always say there's four hiring markets. The job board and job search process through job boards is only the first. And so i think as as we think about algorithmic monocultures, to me,
00:28:42
Speaker
It's a signal it's time to actually get out of ah ah job boards entirely and starting to think strategically about how to get ahead of that. So tell me more about that. if If we're not going to the job board, where are we going to?
Alternative Strategies for Job Seekers
00:28:56
Speaker
So the first is, um and I think I want to start with what I think makes folks the most uncomfortable, which is there was it there was a time when you would search through the classifieds. For those who are listening,
00:29:12
Speaker
There was a time you went in the newspaper and you saw that somebody was hiring and you cut it out, you got your resume, you walked in and you handed them. There was a personalization element to it, right?
00:29:24
Speaker
Getting outside. I think since the pandemic, folks are starting to get more comfortable being out. There's still, I think, at least I've seen in my community, a resistance still of of the networking aspect of it. Because a lot of folks struggle with networking. They struggle with, again, it can feeling performative and LinkedIn and all the things.
00:29:41
Speaker
but But when I tell you, I have been at networking events where in front of me, like two people are talking. One person's ah a person looking for a job. Another person is a leader who has one.
00:29:52
Speaker
And they're casually talking. First, it's about sports. Then it's about what they're doing. And all of a sudden, you know what? We're actually hiring for this role right now. let me let me give out Let's talk on monday Just like that. No algorithm, no nothing. So the first strategy is what I tell my community to do is wherever you are in your industry, whatever industry you're looking to pursue are the ones that you're in. The first thing I want you to do is look up national and regional associations that are directly correlated to your industry. The second thing I want you to do, because it's not enough just to look at them, but the second thing I want you to do is go to their social media pages, go to their websites, and make sure that they are active. Make sure they have an active community of people who are getting together at least monthly for seminars, weekly, you know, whether it's virtual or in person.
00:30:39
Speaker
They're getting together because if they're getting together, there's consistent programming, networking. That means that there's more opportunities for you to meet people who are decision makers. And then this the third step is having it a part of, if you're in a search process or if you're not in a search process and you're looking to grow in your career, having it be a function of your process to at least once a month be engaging in either in person or virtually with humans. Because these are some of the gatekept things that I'm very fortunate my mentors taught me and why I'm very passionate about teaching to my community. They said, Beverly, that get very comfortable with networking because the decisions are made on the golf course.
00:31:16
Speaker
The decisions are made and then and at the happy hours. The the connections are made. and So so the the first thing is getting outside in aligned spaces. But let's say you're like, Beverly, I don't want to necessarily network at an association. and maybe that's not for me. Maybe for whatever reason, that doesn't feel authentic.
00:31:34
Speaker
The second thing I would educate and encourage my audience to do is you can network anywhere. including in relation to your interests.
00:31:45
Speaker
To give you an example, I was ah two weeks ago, it's now summertime shy, so doing all things outside, right? And I wanted to go on an architecture cruise.
00:31:56
Speaker
So i went on architecture tour, casually having a good time, not at all thinking about networking. And I am on the boat. ah I saw a group of women behind me who were trying to get like a selfie with the skyline behind it. I just turned around i said, you know what? Do you mind if I take, I i want to take your picture so I can get all the, oh my gosh, thank so much. So we start talking.
00:32:15
Speaker
One thing leads to another. um The woman on that, ah the boat, she and I start talking about the work that we do, what we're building, da, da, da. We're chatting, we're chatting. We're really locked in now. we're Again, we're on a boat.
00:32:30
Speaker
Yeah. But we're we're chatting and and without really context, in contextual format, it's not networking in the sense that we went to a networking event, but we are we are networking and we're continuing to chat, we're continuing to discuss.
00:32:45
Speaker
And one thing led to another and she and I had a Zoom call scheduled. One thing led to another. And then we were starting to talk about collaboration and found out that we were both um operating in ah in a very similar space um to to empower those who are ah ah in different stages of their career, just like that. And so if you are um if you want to break it down by interest, one thing I would recommend folks to do is on a piece of paper, because I'm old school, on a piece of paper, write down all the things that you like to do.
00:33:16
Speaker
Genuinely, like to do. And then on a separate list, okay, what are what are these things that could be done with another person? Like book clubs, like ah walking. If you really like to do long walks, there's walking clubs. There's taking that context because it can be fun. It can be intentional.
00:33:33
Speaker
that The third thing I would advise to get out of the algorithm is I want, and this is something I work with my clients on a lot because there's a so there is a conditioning that I think the vast majority of candidates I have, or even professionals, especially if you are a first generation professional, professional who does not have um folks who have ah taken ah a corporate route or a business route um ah in in their careers, there is a conditioning that you are not a knowledge leader.
00:34:03
Speaker
That is for somebody else over there with some other types of titles, other types roles. Every single person who is listening to this episode right now, you are you are a knowledge leader. There are pain points that only you can solve.
00:34:15
Speaker
There are things that people continue to come to you, even in your personal life. What are the things, and this is the this is the first stage of this tactic, write down all the things that people come to you to solve pain points for, no matter how small small they are Every point in your career, what are they when fires are breaking out at work, what are people coming to you with?
00:34:33
Speaker
starting with that. Then once you have that list, identify for yourself, what are the methodologies I use to solve those pain points to the to the point where people are coming to me to solve them where I work because I do so do them so well.
00:34:47
Speaker
That is your zone of genius. That is your expertise. And people right now, today, I'm telling you, if your business, the company you worked for had that issue, 300 other businesses had that issue.
00:35:00
Speaker
And so the third tactic that you you would do with this is think about how can you leverage your own knowledge leadership in a way that is authentic so you can attract aligned opportunities to you? Because I understand that, again, going back to that conditioning, there's a discomfort with putting yourself out there. There's a discomfort with with pitching yourself or or talking about And also as a, as a creator who stepped into the space rather recently, there is a lot of shadow work that goes into putting your yourself online. And even if you are an educator like myself, it's like a whole different thing. But the reality is you don't have to be on camera if you don't want to be on camera.
00:35:37
Speaker
You can have a sub stack or a medium. You can do LinkedIn. You can do research, so like true publication. You can do webinars. If you like to, you can do things in person.
00:35:51
Speaker
um and and i'm And I'm glad that Fabric was mentioned because I did an event a couple of, I did an event um two months ago called Networking for Introverts. I'm very passionate about supporting those who the systems weren't set up for.
00:36:06
Speaker
it was a whole workshop on how to network as as an introvert. You can do that as well with a designated space. and And then attract people to you who are like, oh my gosh, my company is having that exact problem.
00:36:18
Speaker
Let's talk. Yep. So these are just three ways that very tactically you can start to bypass and get away from the the the auto rejections, the systemic issues that you're facing while also getting in front of folks that are decision makers. And now that they have that buy-in from you because they've either been called into the space because they're attracted to what you're you're talking about on your platform, or you've stepped into the space in an aligned way, yeah joined a committee, things like that.
00:36:49
Speaker
there's now that that personalization. that bond. Exactly. That doesn't come from applying. Yeah. no I think that is the perfect place to wrap up. You've given our listeners some very tactical, very walk away from this conversation and understand the importance of networking and finding it in your own way and in your own voice in a way that makes you comfortable and and pulls in opportunity. So thank you for this conversation.
Conclusion and Contact Information
00:37:22
Speaker
um
00:37:24
Speaker
How do our listeners get hold of you? How do they find out more about your services, network with you? Tell us where to find you. Absolutely. So you can find, if you want to work with me one-on-one, you can grab what I call an empower hour. with me um on my website, beverlydines.com. My handle is Beverly Dines Everywhere on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube. um I have a podcast, How to Give a Damn About Your Workplace, that'll be entering its second season soon. So again, that's another avenue.
00:37:50
Speaker
And then to network with me, um just join the community, come into space. I have a school community as well called The Empowerment Suite. where I do weekly Q&As and also weekly classes, um ah educating on professional development. So definitely head to those spaces. And especially if you're looking for tactics and strategies, i always like to say, there's no fluff on my platform. Like we get straight to work. um So if you're ready to get to work, I'd love to work with you.
00:38:14
Speaker
Amazing, amazing. Thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you very all for joining us today. i hope you enjoyed this episode. I really did. i know we're going to be doing more on the Stanford study because my head is so deep into it right now. There's a lot more to talk about. um Join us next time on Changing Minds, Changing Lives.