Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Robert Ashjian: AI, Speed, and Fair Access to Opportunity
6 Plays7 days ago
Curtis sits down with Offerday AI founder Robert Ashjian to explore how his nonlinear career—from landscaping entrepreneur to biochemist, military service, and operational excellence leader—shaped his mission to reinvent hiring. Robert shares how overwhelming applicant volume, slow processes, and subjective evaluation leave great talent unseen and how technology can help recruiting teams find the best, not simply the first, candidates who apply. They discuss the future of hiring in an AI-accelerated world, the importance of removing unconscious bias, and why HR leaders must “do technology with people, not to them” if they want change to stick.
About Mark:
With a career spanning various industries across large corporate organizations, the military, and various startups, Robert has gained valuable insights across many aspects of business. Having made key hiring decisions throughout his career, he is excited to change the hiring landscape. With his latest company, he is dedicated to making hiring a faster process with better quality of hire results.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Overview
00:00:06
Speaker
Welcome to today's Fireside Chat. This is Mustard Hub Voices Behind the Build. Here I talk with the people building, backing, and running better workplaces. I'm your host, Curtis
Guest Introduction: Robert Ashtyan
00:00:16
Speaker
Forbes. Our guest today is Robert Ashtyan.
00:00:20
Speaker
With a yeah career spanning various industries across large corporate organizations, military, and various startups, Robert has gained valuable insights across many aspects of business.
00:00:32
Speaker
Having made key hiring decisions throughout his career, he's excited to change the hiring landscape.
Robert's Career Journey
00:00:38
Speaker
With his latest company, he's dedicated to making hiring a faster process with better quality of hire results. Welcome to Behind the Build, Robert. It's a pleasure to have you today.
00:00:50
Speaker
Curtis, great ah good afternoon and glad to be here. So i'm ah I'm super excited to learn about your story, actually. So um want to talk ah talk a little bit about that before we dive into Offer Day AI and the world of HR. But you've had a really interesting career trajectory. So tell me a little bit about your background, right? What's the journey that brought you at least up to where you are today. Tell me about the startups. Tell me about your experience in the military and how it's all sort of shaped ah you know your journey.
00:01:27
Speaker
Definitely. um it's you know It's kind of common for people to say that their career trajectory is not linear. And that's something that I definitely fall in that category. Sometimes i have to look back and think, did I actually do that?
00:01:43
Speaker
Right. and'd say it it all started...
Entrepreneurial Beginnings and Hiring Experience
00:01:48
Speaker
um Before I even got to university for college, i had a landscaping company. That's where it really, really began. um your your company? Yes. Okay.
00:01:59
Speaker
yes yes okay So I started in landscaping. i had two crews, like 12 employees, lot of commercial accounts, residential, and had just great timing, great opportunity. I sold it and that actually funded myself being able to go to college. So first generation to college. Yeah.
00:02:24
Speaker
Got to school, had a couple startups along the way, t-shirt company, silk screening. um Biggest client we had was a subsidiary for Hilton. So we were doing like uniforms, all the logos, eventually exited that and landed my first internship with Pfizer coming out of undergrad.
00:02:47
Speaker
in oncology as a associate scientist. So I worked for Pfizer for a little bit in oncology after graduating with a degree in biochemistry. And then I started a sunscreen business.
00:03:01
Speaker
So that was that was a big one. I tried building a facility out in Southern California for manufacturing. lot of really, really hard lessons with the sunscreen business, but it was great, right? That's when I really got exposed to having to hire like key contributors to the company, especially in like a very regulated industry.
00:03:25
Speaker
it It was really, really hard to find the right fit. um we had a lot of Whether it was FDA or Department of Public Health, there was a lot of guidelines, a lot of things that we had to follow with the business. So hiring was crucial.
00:03:40
Speaker
From there, I started getting into real estate. so I am a licensed broker, got into construction. I'm a licensed general contractor, started getting into a lot of real estate investments, building a portfolio, property management.
00:03:58
Speaker
And it was like the first time in my career where I just like lost a drive for financial gain. And I said, you know, I want to want to do something more. So I joined the military.
00:04:11
Speaker
Really took a hard pivot there. ah And even though i had it even though I had a degree, I decided to
Return to Entrepreneurship and Offer Day
00:04:20
Speaker
enlist. Wanted to just really change things up and give back in a different way.
00:04:25
Speaker
So went in the military. couple things didn't work out. um And as I was transitioning out, I kind of had this really great opportunity with Thermo Fisher in operational excellence and came in, made some really big changes, huge improvements on the OPEX side. Next thing you know, I was head of OPEX for a business unit, doing really well. But at the same time, I kind of felt like something was missing.
00:04:53
Speaker
And that piece that was missing was I wanted to get back into building, building a company from the ground up. back into being an entrepreneur. And that's when I kind of took a look around of what kind of problems existed and what was something I could actually go after and build a business around.
00:05:13
Speaker
And luckily, i have had a great experience on the hiring side and having to go through that with the sunscreen company and some other ventures along the way and real estate and hiring subs as a contractor.
00:05:28
Speaker
But my wife, her entire career has been HR from recruiting, talent acquisition. And she was able to give like really great insight to problems that are faced today in ta in the TA space. So kind of collaborating with her, next thing you know, here we are today.
00:05:53
Speaker
Okay. So my mind is a little bit blown right now. I mean, you you did more before you finished college than I think some people achieve in an entire lifetime.
00:06:04
Speaker
um that's ah That's pretty incredible. And yeah, talk about nonlinear. Yeah. You know, you've, you've, from services to products and manufacturing and now, and now technology, um, I, I, I won't even ask what's next. Uh, let's, let's just focus on the human resource space for now.
00:06:26
Speaker
Um, So your wife had a lot of input. I'm curious about what you saw in the human resource space that made you feel... you know ah It's becoming highly commoditized in a lot of ways, right? but But the market is...
00:06:43
Speaker
I mean, as big as you could you could possibly imagine or or want a market to be, right? So what was it about that space where you really felt like you could come in and make a
Innovations in Hiring: Offer Day Solutions
00:06:56
Speaker
difference? What were some of those pain points that she that she saw or that she had that there really wasn't a solution for?
00:07:04
Speaker
Yeah, I think a lot of the inputs I got from her was just around the time it takes from like opening a job rack to getting that person onboarded and actually starting. And if that process isn't smooth and it's fast and seamless, like you're starting to miss out on talent, but you're also not able to really evaluate the entire talent pool.
00:07:27
Speaker
So she was just, you know, giving me stories about friends, friends that I knew personally as well that were just like, great, right? You would be so lucky to have these people at your company.
00:07:38
Speaker
And here they were impacted with layoffs, having trouble finding another job and trying to put the pieces together of, okay, why why can these people not find another job?
00:07:50
Speaker
right And it the pain point was like there's too many applicants and not enough recruiters to give everyone enough time to really say who's a good fit for the job, who's a good fit for the company, who's overall the best fit for us. And I think companies really struggle with that, trying to manage all of their day-to-day tasks on top of finding that right fit.
00:08:15
Speaker
I see it. I see the same thing. I mean, I definitely think that it's a major it's a major pain point. So which kind of brings us to Offer Day, um which i I mean, I love the name, right? it's it's um ah I think it's as recruiters or as a recruiter, I'm not a recruiter, but as ah a recruiter, I imagine, right, it's what we all aspire to, right? That Offer Day, right?
00:08:42
Speaker
Um, so I don't know how you came up with the name or if that was part of it, but if it was, it landed well. Um, tell us about what it is. What does it do?
00:08:54
Speaker
Yep. So, and I always like to say, uh, my wife came up with the name actually. And to your point, right. It's like the best, the end of the process, everyone's excited. The candidates getting an offer, the the company sending out that offer. So it's like, that's the,
00:09:10
Speaker
You know, the best moment is that offer day when it actually happens. And what we're really striving to do is, one, elevate candidate experience, meaning that, hey, for the first time, we're giving recruiters the tools they need so every candidate can not just have eyes on and really be assessed at the time of application, but we're releasing a new feature in November called Resume Plus.
00:09:38
Speaker
where number two, we're giving a stage for candidates to actually speak to their skills in what we're calling the modern day cover letter. And three, of course, as we assess applicants at the time of application, we're giving them a stage where they can actually speak to their skills. We're also on the back end working out a scheduling tool. So that way we can kind of go end to end application to the offerer.
00:10:04
Speaker
and have everything scheduled seamlessly, being able to balance everyone's schedules, make sure interviews are happening timely. um And that was, I think, a pain point my wife had brought on early on was just right scheduling people's calendars, not up to date, trying to get time on individuals' calendars, navigating that challenge as well.
00:10:26
Speaker
tell me Tell me more about the modern day cover letter. This is very interesting to me. So We call it resume plus. and the reason we say it's a modern day cover letter is, i mean, some some jobs still require a cover letter, but for the most part, right, that cover letter kind of stood as your way to personalize a message to the hiring manager, to the company. And what we're doing is...
00:10:52
Speaker
we're taking like that AI interview component. We still have it part of our core offering, but instead of doing it to candidates, we're giving them the opportunity to opt at the time of application and submit that ai phone screen with their
Target Market and Application Challenges
00:11:09
Speaker
resume. So now they have an opportunity to speak to their skills, speak to their resume, speak to why they're a good fit for the position.
00:11:18
Speaker
I love that. And I think that I mean, it's ah it's a clever name and and and sort of that pit pitching it as that modern day covered letter, I think is clever and um sort of helpful as far as how I sort of conceive it in my mind. So what kind of organizations does Offer Day typically work with? um You know, you don't have to name any names here, but I'm curious, maybe kind of describe the picture on really who it's built for now and maybe, you know, where eventually, you know, it's kind of going from there.
00:11:50
Speaker
Definitely. So we have kind of like, ah we have three segments that we sell in today. we have our core offering where we sell into like mid-market, 2,500 to 5,000 employees where you have ah frontline staff, high turnover, manufacturing, ah biotech, tech, where you're kind of turning over that zero to five year of experience type of role. So maybe early career individuals, but you have a lot of recs. Like you're hiring, you might have a talent acquisition team of about 10 to 15 recruiters and you're filling maybe 150 to 250 recs per quarter.
00:12:32
Speaker
So it's a lot of volume. It's a lot of applications. And that's where we do our ATS integration to be able to assess all of the applicants. But we also sell back to small businesses.
00:12:44
Speaker
And when I say small business, I'm talking like anywhere from maybe 10 to 50 employees. Micro-smiles. Exactly.
00:12:55
Speaker
And we sell what we call like our mini ATS, companies that don't need a fully robust platform, something that's enterprise grade, just something to help them hire today.
00:13:07
Speaker
And we like to say like, start here, stay here. And that's for the... Sounds like it can kind of scale with you too. I mean, as if if it's a company that's on a growth trajectory, they can kind of get bigger, right? There's obviously opportunities for them to kind of grow with OfferDay.
00:13:24
Speaker
Exactly. And that's that's what brings into like our third segment where we have like a full suite ATS. And the hope is, right, that start here, stay here. Here's our mini ATS. As your company grows and scales, then we hope that we can give you our ATS. Or if you have to go to, like, let's say a larger company such as Workday, we have that integration built.
00:13:49
Speaker
Nice. Tell me of how you support job seekers as well as the, you know, job posters. So we actually went to market last year, 2024, as a consumer product.
00:14:05
Speaker
And what we were doing was were really validating our attack, validating our software, but we have two different products for the consumer model. One is like a resume match scoring, seeing how well their resume aligns to a job and giving them feedback, not necessarily changes, but hey, you know could you reword it this way?
00:14:25
Speaker
Or do you have experience with this that you can highlight to really fit this job description? and then we also have like a mock interview so they can practice going through interviews as well.
00:14:37
Speaker
Nice. I like that. So for for the businesses that that look to OfferDay, what are some of those key challenges that are that are bringing organizations to the platform, right? Why do they choose the platform other over other solutions, for example?
00:14:56
Speaker
Definitely. yeah So I think one of the biggest kind of pain points that they're going or that we try to solve for is just the sheer amount of applications.
00:15:09
Speaker
So, right, it's just not possible to to view every single applicant. And I always go back to this one ah conversation I had because it just resonated so well.
00:15:23
Speaker
I was speaking with a recruiter and he was saying that, you know, I opened a job on Monday. I spoke with him on Thursday. said, I have 500 applicants and the hiring manager wants me to present the top 10 on Friday.
00:15:38
Speaker
He said, it's just not possible for me to go through all 500. So I take the first 50 that apply from that first 50, will find 10 resumes and one person will get hired.
00:15:51
Speaker
So we kind of what we look to solve for companies like that is, hey, instead of taking the first 50 that applied, let's actually find you the best 50 out of 500.
00:16:04
Speaker
Right. And then they can go and kind of filter from that makes total sense. So do you feel like some of these pains are are different for different types of organizations or different sizes? do you find that that those micro smalls are having that same problem?
00:16:17
Speaker
So I think on the like the micro, the mini ATS model, it's not necessarily like the abundance of applicants. I think it's more of an organization standpoint. So for those companies, I mean, they more than likely don't have a careers page. They don't have a job board. They're just, you know, send us your resume. Yeah.
00:16:40
Speaker
So now they're going through their email and that's where we look to actually start like organizing and getting them used to what is an ATS? How do you actually track the flow of applicants? That makes sense. So
Current Hiring Practices and AI Integration
00:16:53
Speaker
curiously, I mean, what do you think employers are really, and and this is generally speaking, i mean, what do you think that they're doing right when it comes to hiring? Are you seeing trends that make you optimistic for, you know, how they're building the workforce?
00:17:07
Speaker
I mean, I think, you know, some things that companies are doing well is I feel like for the most part, companies, when they have referrals, like they give them the time of day.
00:17:20
Speaker
um i know just from when I had worked at some of the larger companies, anytime I had referred a individual, like they always had an interview. Yeah.
00:17:31
Speaker
like whether through Zoom or in person, like they always have that next round interview, which I think, you know, companies take referrals very serious. So it kind of like, I feel like that's something that's done very well across like large organizations.
00:17:50
Speaker
You know, um well, I mean, it kind kind of leads me to that other side of the coin. You know, obviously there's things that probably need a lot of improvement, you know, and some of the first things that kind of come to my mind are, you know, using technology to solve ah a couple things. Number one, not having technology in place.
00:18:14
Speaker
So that when you are overloaded with you know candidates, just a a huge number wind up missing out for no other reason than just because of sensory overload for the whoever whoever is doing all the hiring and all the vetting. They simply can't get to the volume.
00:18:29
Speaker
And so a lot of people might be losing out on an opportunity where they might be the best fit for um but conversely, you know, the idea that some technology can um help exclude some folks, you know, based on how it might be built. Right. And some folks might not get an opportunity because they get filtered out for some reasons that, um you know, for, for whatever reason, um you know, they wind up not, not making that cut. So i'm kind of curious, you know, in your mind, know,
00:19:00
Speaker
you know what What do you feel like is some of the biggest, where's the biggest quicksand that that some leaders are falling into right now with either technology or the lack thereof where they're just not getting it right when it comes to hiring?
00:19:15
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's that's a great question. and you know, one thing i always kind of disclosed right at the beginning is we're we're not making any decisions at the end of the day. we're We're giving data, we're giving insights, we're really breaking down all the scoring, but you still have that human element of going in, vetting out the scoring. And even with the human element, it is a very subjective um process.
00:19:44
Speaker
Right. If you and I both looked at a candidate, we're going to have different, different scores, different ideas. And, you know, I think that's where it's, that's where it's really tough for senior leaders. Cause it's like, okay, if I have this technology and I'm ah able to eliminate that unconscious bias, right. Can I trust the software? And at that point a software now making decisions.
00:20:12
Speaker
because we still have to have that human element. So it's kind of like a conundrum, right? It goes in a circle of, okay, if I bring my the human element back in, then I still have potential unconscious bias, even if the software is telling me I don't.
00:20:27
Speaker
So it kind of, it's like you have to take a risk-based approach. Yeah. seems i mean and It seems like something that there might not be a ah solution for for many years down the line as we start to improve all of that. Let's talk about AI, maybe kind of get into that conversation. I think it's definitely proving itself to be an incredibly beneficial tool in It seems you know it seems to or I should say ah nearly everyone in HR, right, is looking for ways to adopt it somehow in some capacity. um You know, and in some cases, HR leaders don't even know what they want out of it other than the fact that they just want to use it.
00:21:04
Speaker
So um probably saw that at HR tech. um You know, how quickly can I get AI in my business? What do you want it to do? I don't really know.
00:21:15
Speaker
Um, but go a little bit deeper into how offer days, AI solution works. I'm kind of curious. I mean, I know we've talked a little bit cursory glance over the benefits that it provides to HR professionals in this hiring process, but you know, if you could maybe offer a little bit more detail, um, that'd be amazing.
00:21:37
Speaker
Definitely. So, and I think this is, This is something I always bring up whenever, you know, we're selling the product or having those later stage conversations.
00:21:48
Speaker
And it's boded really well for us is, you we went to market as a consumer model, right? We were focused on the job applicant. And at the end of the day, it gave us a huge data set to really go and vet out like our scoring, our algorithm, all of our tech.
00:22:07
Speaker
So we were constantly going back to this huge like data pool to say, like okay, yes, we know that we have subjectivity that and some unconscious bias. like We're not going to be able to eliminate everything. It won't be perfect, but how close can we get it across the group? So for, I mean, it took...
00:22:31
Speaker
had to take at least like three to five months of going through the data, creating our own algorithm, incorporating AI to like look at large data sets and really say like, how do we how do we fine tune this scoring?
00:22:45
Speaker
How do we actually make our model based on all of the information we have very good at this one function? So I think going to market as a consumer model and getting ideas before like going, getting a design partner, beta testing on the enterprise side, it was like, we were able to really fine tune our model of, okay, this is how we score, is how we assess.
00:23:10
Speaker
And then we would go back and manually vet everything. So we weren't just looking at the scores and saying like, okay, yep, no, this is good. We would do it blind.
00:23:21
Speaker
Okay. I know all the scores. Now i'm going to give it to the next person, have them reassess and say what they would come up with. So it was a lot of, a lot of work. I'd say the first person that I brought onto the company was a data scientist.
00:23:35
Speaker
um Alex, he's our head of product. And that was very intentional. We have all of this data. How do we fine tune the model? How do we make the algorithm perfect? that's um That's awesome. And I like that that approach. I mean, starting off like on that consumer side um is ah is unique. I don't know another company that started off that way, um but it definitely gives you like a different, you know, just a different angle.
00:24:02
Speaker
Do you think that ah HR leaders are really, i guess, him embrace, you know, as much as everybody wants it and then they want to use it, um you think they're truly embracing it? I mean, have you heard any concerns, seen any hurdles with the organizations that are, ah you know, adopting tools that are heavily reliant on AI?
00:24:20
Speaker
So I think you said it I mean, you you said it perfectly just a couple of minutes ago, right? They don't really know what they want, right? Other than let's implement AI, right?
00:24:34
Speaker
yeah exactly So I think at this stage, everyone's kind of like very curious as to what the limitations are, what's the accuracy, what, how far can I push AI into the workplace? And I mean, as of today, I don't think we truly know.
00:24:55
Speaker
so everyone's kind of taken a step back of let's put something out there and see what happens. Yeah. And I think we'll still going into 2026, like we're still figuring out what that looks like, which kind of goes back to, you know, i think a lot of companies, what I'm seeing from hiring is they're kind of like pumping the brakes saying, hey, is this the right role I should
Leadership and AI Adoption
00:25:22
Speaker
hire for? Because do they have the right skills that are going to translate later on next year, right
00:25:31
Speaker
Am I hiring for the right stuff based on how fast technology is moving today? Interesting. What do you feel like needs to happen to to empower these HR leaders that um either might not be you know tech ready or that are having these you know kind of concerns that you're talking about?
00:25:56
Speaker
I mean, i think ah I just got back from Gartner's event in Orlando the other week. And I think just like getting out there, I mean, that event was really catered towards that CHRO, senior VP for HRTA.
00:26:13
Speaker
and I think getting out there, listening to some experts in the field and kind of getting a better understanding is definitely like one of the first places to start. But at the same time, I think, you know, companies kind of have to take a little bit of risk and say, what's my exposure of adopting this tool or this potential system or technology? And let's see what kind of results we can drive from it. And if we don't get the results we want, then, you know, we'll try again.
00:26:42
Speaker
So just to kind of pivot on that a little bit, I want i want to talk about leadership, right? I mean, you've talked, you you you you mentioned some of those folks, you know, head of CHRO.
00:26:55
Speaker
What, in your in your words, what makes a good leader? How do you identify those folks who are well-suited for those leadership roles? Definitely. um I think for me, one of the one of the biggest traits I kind of look for is just communication.
00:27:13
Speaker
right? Is this a person that communicates very well, very effectively, and not just at their level, but across all levels of an organization?
00:27:23
Speaker
Because, i mean, coming from when I was at Thermo, right, 150,000 employees, Pfizer's up there, a number of employees, large organizations, I saw like great leaders be able to communicate at different levels. So I think for me, like communication is one of the biggest biggest aspects as well as just being authentic.
00:27:46
Speaker
not, and that's like even today, right? It's i'm technically I'm the CEO, right? Of offer day, but I just, i don't take that title like head of operations. I'm running around doing a million different things. And I feel like I'll, I'll settle into that title, the CEO when I get there. But as of today, like I have a lot to prove, lot to get done before I take it.
00:28:08
Speaker
And I think people that come in and they're authentic, not just relying on, Oh, yep. I'm in the C-suite. Do you think there's things that people can be doing to improve those skills? You know, we're talking about communication, which can be, you know, a big word and and I think mean a lot of things. i think I understand what you mean when you talk about those things. But, you know, how would one go about really...
00:28:37
Speaker
you know, looking to become better at that so that they can either move up the chain or earn those, you know, those letters at the end of their name. Definitely. i think, you know, one of the, one of the greatest things I've seen throughout my career was interacting And, you know, coming from companies where I was in office, it's a little bit challenging now with being remote, but like going and whether it's in manufacturing, being on the floor or having those skip level interviews or setting up time to meet with the different teams, not just, you know, your colleagues and peers at your level, but hey getting with the frontline staff.
00:29:21
Speaker
Like I found a lot of the best ideas come from those people like coming into an organization at that, you know, entry level, especially today, right. With technology, speaking with a lot of individuals that are early in their career, it's like, they have great ideas.
00:29:39
Speaker
um Probably better ideas than me. And it's just interacting, interacting with all different levels. And just, I think that's the biggest thing, just being approachable and not just communicating at your level.
00:29:57
Speaker
Any differences you find with folks, you know, who are leading remote teams, distributed teams, you know, you, you, you mentioned remote and it kind of got me thinking, first of all, I'm curious is offer day all remote. and And if they are, do you approach leadership there differently than you did when you had those two field crews and when you were running the, um you know, the landscaping business?
00:30:19
Speaker
It is, uh, we are all remote as of today. we do have a space down in San Diego that we try to get in person once a quarter, at least for the leadership team.
00:30:32
Speaker
And in my opinion, this is the first time that in my entire career where I'm a hundred percent remote and it's definitely challenging. Um, I prefer face to face being able to walk up to someone's desk and say, you know, hey, let's ah go grab a coffee or let's go have a chat.
00:30:52
Speaker
But I think from a remote basis, it's just, you know, getting time on people's calendars. Like I try to always be available to, you know, within working hour hours. There's a concept coming from an OpEx background, leader standard work, and it's just really how you manage your day. And always make sure that everyone has dedicated time on their calendar where it's, hey, this time it's free and open. So if you need to schedule it for something or you need to, you know, answer questions, ask somebody for questions, we have like dedicated focus time.
00:31:29
Speaker
Going back to to that leadership um conversation, you know, you feel like today's leaders are are kind of setting up that next generation for success. I mean, you you and I probably see a lot of, I don't know if you're my age or not, but you know, a lot, a lot of differences from, I'm i'm generation X, right?
00:31:51
Speaker
Millennials, Gen Z, there's a lot of differences in the younger generations, um, you know, that need a lot of different things. Um, I'm just kind of curious, you know, how do you see, you know, today's leaders setting up that next generation for success? What should leaders today be doing to shape tomorrow's leaders?
00:32:13
Speaker
Yeah, it's ah that's a great question. big black box there for you to open. it's Yeah, it's definitely um that's a a hard one to answer just because I feel like right if I flip back like 15 years ago,
00:32:37
Speaker
we didn't have as much like tech and I felt like things didn't move as fast as it does today. Right. So it's kind of like you can take someone under your wing and teach them, but there's so much information. There's so much out there. So many, so easy to learn new skills that,
00:32:54
Speaker
I think from like a leadership standpoint, it's really making sure that people underneath you have the right resources that if they want it, they can go get it yeah um Whether it's additional training, additional education, or sending them to events or sending them to seminars, I think just giving them the opportunity is going to really help shape like the next leader, all that succession planning.
Managing Multi-Generational Workforce
00:33:24
Speaker
Brings me to, just to tie back you know some of your your ideas on leadership, but also what OfferDay does. you I'm kind of curious, if you see this multi-generational workforce creating challenges for for leaders, number one, in how they work with their staff, right? I mean, you're going to have a mix of folks who are boomers, Gen X, millennials, right?
00:33:50
Speaker
I mean, you know, and and anything else that all the rest of them are all called. um There's challenges with having to, you know, work with folks across that really, really wide spectrum.
00:34:02
Speaker
They need different things. They want different things. they're used to different things in their workplace. And then i would some sort of dovetail off of that question with, are there things that offer day does right? How in the recruiting process, right. Are those unique differences factored? where are like so Yeah. um I guess to the first point, it kind of goes back to the first thing I brought up for like what I look for in leadership and a good trade is,
00:34:38
Speaker
That communication aspect, it's not necessarily just at different levels of the organization, VPs, directors, et cetera, but it's also, right, you take fact, hey, maybe, right, somebody's been at a company for 20 years, right? A lot of experience, to your point, different generations, different ideology, different thoughts. So it's like, okay, how do I communicate to maybe somebody that's been in the workforce for 20 years, has been at maybe the same company,
00:35:07
Speaker
versus somebody new to the organization, new to the workforce, right? Someone just starting their career versus a very well-seasoned individual. So I think that communication at different levels and understanding that you're not always going to have the same conversation with the same person, yeah right? you're going to tailor your messaging depending on the individual. And then as far as For offered in recruiting and our scoring and assessments, like we really try to eliminate any bias.
00:35:37
Speaker
So it's right, like any, whether how long someone's been in the workforce or how much experience, like we eliminate any type of bias towards that and just say, okay, can this person do the job?
00:35:52
Speaker
And we keep it as block line. can some of that information actually be relevant to, and I don't know, this is this is genuinely an open question and maybe the answer is no, but I'm kind of curious, you know, is some of that information relevant possibly to some jobs? And then does leaving it out maybe prohibit somebody from taking advantage of whatever that extra experience that they had because of, you know, what generation they might be part of? Maybe not. I don't know.
00:36:24
Speaker
What do you think?
00:36:28
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, and you know, think it goes back to write that subjectivity of like looking at job candidates. Some people might look at it as, Hey, this could be a really, this could be a positive. Some people might look at it as, Oh, this is a negative.
00:36:44
Speaker
And I think it just goes case by case, depending on the individual, their experience. Yeah. You know, i know that, um, I know that a lot of upscaling and training mentorship, they're, they're super valuable for, for leaders in leadership. you know, I'm curious how you feel, or if you see tech, especially even AI playing part in that leadership development, right? Um, we've talked about how, you know, using AI in ah HR tech, et cetera, or how it might influence, you know, the development of that technology, but what about in least leadership development?
00:37:19
Speaker
You see any kind of predictions on how that might change in the future?
00:37:24
Speaker
Yeah, i mean, i definitely I definitely could see it. I know that there's tools out there right now, like AI-based like learning modules and learning tools, especially um in like the sales industry, like sales coaching, sales training, sales development.
00:37:45
Speaker
So I think there's definitely an area where, right, you're taking a large data set, large information about the training, and training elements and development. So I think that it can definitely play a role and it already is today because I've seen those different sales tools, those different sales companies um offering that capability today. So I think we're just, right, getting, scratching the surface on what other tools could be coming.
00:38:15
Speaker
I would agree with you. I mean, it's, it's, it looks so unpredictable to me right
Future of AI and Workforce Structure
00:38:19
Speaker
now. It's just, and it's so interesting hearing so many different people's perspectives on what that future of work is going to look like. um Right. Nobody, I guess, really, ah really knows.
00:38:29
Speaker
You anticipate any changes to what the workforce overall is going to look like in the coming, you know, three, five, 10 years, you know, further evolutions and in how and where we'll work?
00:38:41
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, i think, you know, there's so much media and buzz around ai is going to take take my role, AI is going to take my job, I'm going to get replaced.
00:38:53
Speaker
And it kind of circles back to what I was saying earlier. i think right now we have like at the top, Hey, we need to implement AI. We need to write, we don't know what it looks like. We don't know how we're going to do it just yet, but I need that. We need to do it. And at the same time, I think leaders are trying to understand what are going to be the relevant jobs, right?
00:39:15
Speaker
It might be a coordinator's role might actually now be like a, uh, like quality coordinating, I don't know, something, right? It's going to evolve to be able to adopt the tech. So I think once we figure out what roles will look like, it's not necessarily replacing jobs. It's just, okay, how do we maybe repurpose this role?
00:39:38
Speaker
Or what does this role look like if we were to incorporate tech?
00:39:44
Speaker
do you think, I mean, just on a more personal note, what do you think your work is is going to look like as the technology evolves? I mean, to address all these changes, you see Offer Day moving in a and ah a different, pursuing different avenues. Do you see what you do at Offer Day changing? You know, you've also been part of of multiple very successful ventures. You know, what's what's new on the horizon for you?
00:40:10
Speaker
Yeah, I think for for me right now, personally, it's just about getting the right people in the company. I mean, we've been hiring a good amount ah this last quarter. We just onboarded two more individuals. We have an open job rack for another position. I think right now it's just we're hiring, ah going through it, using the software. use OfferDay?
00:40:39
Speaker
So, yeah, we have our ATS model for. okay So, I mean, we're users of our own product, which is great because, you know, we're getting feedback in real time, which is awesome. But I think right now it's just like growing the company and being really protective over the brand and the culture and making sure that we have the right fit.
00:41:02
Speaker
And it's, you know, it's hard. Even for us, we're small business and we get thousands of applicants. And like, I try to give as much time as possible. And even, you know, just, I know, i know how painful it is right now for a job applicants. So we try to give as much time as we can towards like hiring and trying to get as many people like on actual interviews as we can.
00:41:32
Speaker
you know Last ah thing I like to wrap up with often, um if ah if a business leader, if an entrepreneur, if ah if an operator or ah hr practitioner you know came to you for advice on how to really truly get it right with their people from day one, right implementing, leveraging technology,
00:41:52
Speaker
especially AI, right in their organization, what's the one what's that one thing that you tell them? You're you're on an elevator up to the top floor and literally before the door opens and they walk right out. What's that one piece of advice that you give them?
00:42:06
Speaker
So the one thing, and I've said it many a times, is don't do it to your people. do it with them, right? if you think so If you think a software is going to make a huge impact for the organization, don't just go do it and get approval from the top, right? Whether it's budget approval or whatever it may be, like do it with your people, the people reporting into you, the people reporting into them.
Concluding Thoughts and Engagement
00:42:31
Speaker
Because when you make them a part of the process, like it just bodes so much...
00:42:36
Speaker
It just, it's so much better for everyone versus, Hey, we have a new tool. We're using it. Yeah. That's great advice, Robert. I, uh, I feel like that needs to be clipped and memed and stuck all over LinkedIn.
00:42:52
Speaker
um I appreciate it, man. Thank you so much for the great conversation. you shared some, uh, some really great insights. I'm so glad that you joined us today, Robert. Awesome. Thanks, Curtis. It was ah great being here and really excited to see what's next in hr with AI.
00:43:10
Speaker
Me too. So for all of you watching or listening to this episode, thanks for tuning into Mustard Hub Voices behind the build. Subscribe, like, share, comment. Be sure to check us out at mustardhub.com to see how we help companies become destinations for workplace happiness and turn culture into a competitive edge.
00:43:30
Speaker
And sign up to get started with Mustard Hub for free while you're there. Until next time.