Winning Strategies for Recruiting and Retaining Top Talent in the MSP Space
In this episode of WIN (What's Important Now), host Carrie Richardson talks with repeat guest John Ahlberg, the CEO of Waident Technology Solutions.
They explore Waident's successful strategies for recruiting and retaining talent, especially in the Managed Service Provider (MSP) industry.
John explains the importance of a people-first culture, work-life balance, and a unique hiring process that emphasizes culture fit, talent, and experience over traditional qualifications. He also shares insights on maintaining flexibility, providing opportunities for employee development, and avoiding the pitfalls of settling for less-than-ideal candidates.
00:00 Introduction and Welcome
00:45 Recruiting and Retaining Talent
01:48 Flexible Work Culture
03:44 Onboarding and Training
04:08 Encouraging Innovation and Change
06:36 Hiring for Culture and Weirdness
10:09 Transparent Job Postings and Interview Process
16:59 Advice for MSPs on Hiring
19:17 Conclusion and Farewell
Carrie Richardson and Ian Richardson host the WIN Podcast - What's Important Now?
Serial entrepreneurs, life partners and business partners, they have successfully exited from multiple businesses (IT, call center, real estate, marketing) and they help other business owners create their own versions of success.
Ian is certified in Eagle Center For Leadership Making A Difference, Paterson StratOp, and LifePlan.
Carrie has helped create and execute successful outbound sales strategies for over 1200 technology-focused businesses including MSPs, manufacturers, distributors and SaaS firms.
Learn more at www.foxcrowgroup.com
Book time with either of them here: https://randr.consulting/connect
Be a guest on WIN! We host successful entrepreneurs who share advice with other entrepreneurs on how to build, grow or sell a business using examples from their own experience.
Carrie and Ian Richardson are partners in Richardson & Richardson Consulting.
Carrie is the founder of the content collaboration agency, Croocial.
Ian is the founder of the strategic consulting firm, Fox and Crow Group.
00:00:00 --> 00:00:01 <v Carrie Richardson>Good afternoon, everybody.
00:00:01 --> 00:00:03 <v Carrie Richardson>My name is Carrie Richardson.
00:00:03 --> 00:00:08 <v Carrie Richardson>I'm a partner at Richardson and Richardson, and today I am your host for WIN, What's Important Now.
00:00:09 --> 00:00:11 <v Carrie Richardson>Welcome back to John Ahlberg.
00:00:11 --> 00:00:39 <v Carrie Richardson>John is the CEO of Waident Technology Solutions in Chicago and was recently featured in Channel Pro Network, which was where I caught A few tips that I wanted to learn a little bit more about, primarily around how Wadent over the last 20 years and through five acquisitions has managed to retain many of their employees for over 14 years, which I think in the MSP space is very impressive.
00:00:40 --> 00:00:40 <v Carrie Richardson>John, welcome.
00:00:40 --> 00:00:42 <v Carrie Richardson>Thanks for joining us again.
00:00:43 --> 00:00:44 <v John Ahlberg>Thanks for having me.
00:00:45 --> 00:00:52 <v Carrie Richardson>So what I wanted to talk to you about today was your process around recruiting and retaining talent.
00:00:52 --> 00:01:00 <v Carrie Richardson>It looks like Waident has done an exceptional job of finding the right people and incentivizing them to stay long term.
00:01:00 --> 00:01:01 <v Carrie Richardson>How'd you do it?
00:01:02 --> 00:01:06 <v John Ahlberg>Yeah, I wish I knew exactly what I planned on or doing it.
00:01:06 --> 00:01:09 <v John Ahlberg>It's just one of those, I do what I think is right and it works.
00:01:09 --> 00:01:17 <v John Ahlberg>Again, we're a bit different in a sense'cause, we'll have prospective clients and we'll ask the question okay, tell me about your tenure with your team.
00:01:17 --> 00:01:21 <v John Ahlberg>And that's usually because they worked with another MSP and it's I really love Bob.
00:01:21 --> 00:01:23 <v John Ahlberg>And then six months later, Bob was gone.
00:01:23 --> 00:01:25 <v John Ahlberg>Then I got Dan, and I really don't like Dan.
00:01:25 --> 00:01:26 <v John Ahlberg>But then six months Dan was gone.
00:01:26 --> 00:01:28 <v John Ahlberg>So it was like a revolving door.
00:01:29 --> 00:01:31 <v John Ahlberg>we just don't have that problem at all.
00:01:31 --> 00:01:36 <v John Ahlberg>I remember one time in an interview, I'm like, we fired more people than quit.
00:01:36 --> 00:01:37 <v John Ahlberg>And she's what?
00:01:37 --> 00:01:39 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like, I guess this is not good.
00:01:39 --> 00:01:41 <v John Ahlberg>To say on a job interview.
00:01:41 --> 00:01:47 <v John Ahlberg>But the whole point is, people don't want to leave and we don't take, firing lightly at all.
00:01:47 --> 00:01:48 <v John Ahlberg>We haven't done it a lot.
00:01:48 --> 00:01:59 <v John Ahlberg>a lot of it is more on the culture side where, I try to give as much flexibility as they need, part of the one culture aspect, is, people 1st, it's family 1st.
00:01:59 --> 00:02:04 <v John Ahlberg>We'll bring people on and we're like, look, we're an organization that if you work more than 40 hours, you might get yelled at.
00:02:04 --> 00:02:07 <v John Ahlberg>Not because we don't want to pay overtime or any of that.
00:02:07 --> 00:02:11 <v John Ahlberg>It's just we want you to have, good home life and free time.
00:02:12 --> 00:02:19 <v John Ahlberg>And we can all help manage our calendars you're not stuck working all weekends and stuck working at nights and working 68 hours a week.
00:02:19 --> 00:02:21 <v John Ahlberg>You just don't have to in our company.
00:02:21 --> 00:02:22 <v John Ahlberg>That's never happened.
00:02:23 --> 00:02:28 <v John Ahlberg>So that's 1 of the drivers that people, look at and get, we're big enough and we have a team.
00:02:28 --> 00:02:40 <v John Ahlberg>I remember hiring, someone out in our Milwaukee office and, he has two young daughters and I have two older daughters, When I started the company every day, I'd walk home for lunch because my office is walking distance.
00:02:40 --> 00:02:44 <v John Ahlberg>I would have lunch with them, and when they came home from school, I would manage my schedule.
00:02:44 --> 00:02:47 <v John Ahlberg>I'd come home when they're home from school and that work later a night when they're in bed.
00:02:47 --> 00:02:50 <v John Ahlberg>So I told him, I'm like, I never want to hear you.
00:02:50 --> 00:02:56 <v John Ahlberg>Say, I couldn't make my kids thing at two o'clock cause I had to work, that's complete BS.
00:02:56 --> 00:02:57 <v John Ahlberg>Your schedule.
00:02:57 --> 00:03:00 <v John Ahlberg>If you absolutely have to do something, hand it off to someone else.
00:03:00 --> 00:03:01 <v John Ahlberg>You need to do that.
00:03:02 --> 00:03:06 <v John Ahlberg>A month later, he was talking to me going, Oh, this is the first year I'm going to miss the brewers home opener.
00:03:07 --> 00:03:07 <v John Ahlberg>I'm like, why?
00:03:07 --> 00:03:09 <v John Ahlberg>And he goes, I just started working here?
00:03:09 --> 00:03:09 <v John Ahlberg>I need to work.
00:03:09 --> 00:03:10 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like, no you don't.
00:03:10 --> 00:03:12 <v John Ahlberg>Take that off and go to the brewers.
00:03:12 --> 00:03:15 <v John Ahlberg>People get mad at you if you missed it because, quote, you had to work.
00:03:16 --> 00:03:20 <v John Ahlberg>You're not going to remember that day at work, but you are going to remember that day where I started a job and I went to the game.
00:03:20 --> 00:03:26 <v John Ahlberg>We have that core philosophy that people do work as teams, we don't have egos.
00:03:26 --> 00:03:29 <v John Ahlberg>So the techs like it and they learn.
00:03:29 --> 00:03:34 <v John Ahlberg>What I found is, if a tech has worked in another MSP were different In a lot of ways.
00:03:35 --> 00:03:38 <v John Ahlberg>So we brought on someone who's yeah, I'm working a ton.
00:03:38 --> 00:03:39 <v John Ahlberg>We're like, yeah, you're not do that here.
00:03:39 --> 00:03:42 <v John Ahlberg>And he's geez, when I started, they talked to me for a day.
00:03:42 --> 00:03:44 <v John Ahlberg>And then day 2, it's just here's clients go do your stuff.
00:03:44 --> 00:03:45 <v John Ahlberg>We don't do that here.
00:03:45 --> 00:03:47 <v John Ahlberg>We have a 2 month.
00:03:47 --> 00:03:53 <v John Ahlberg>Onboarding for employees, so we know what they're doing, how they're doing it, how we're limited and what we're training They sit with peers.
00:03:54 --> 00:03:56 <v John Ahlberg>So you don't have to worry about that again.
00:03:56 --> 00:03:57 <v John Ahlberg>We're a big open.
00:03:57 --> 00:03:58 <v John Ahlberg>Book here.
00:03:58 --> 00:04:00 <v John Ahlberg>We want somebody great.
00:04:00 --> 00:04:03 <v John Ahlberg>Take somebody who's only worked here three months or on a help desk.
00:04:04 --> 00:04:07 <v John Ahlberg>Say, Hey, I wish we could do this or I wish we could do that.
00:04:07 --> 00:04:07 <v John Ahlberg>It's a really good idea.
00:04:07 --> 00:04:08 <v John Ahlberg>Let's look into that.
00:04:08 --> 00:04:12 <v John Ahlberg>we have policies and procedures all over the place, but none of them are written stone.
00:04:12 --> 00:04:17 <v John Ahlberg>We fully expect, having an eraser because these are going to change and we love changing them.
00:04:17 --> 00:04:18 <v John Ahlberg>And someone has a good idea.
00:04:18 --> 00:04:19 <v John Ahlberg>And we're like, okay, we're all in.
00:04:19 --> 00:04:21 <v John Ahlberg>The last one was years ago.
00:04:21 --> 00:04:24 <v John Ahlberg>And we switched to a new documentation platform.
00:04:24 --> 00:04:30 <v John Ahlberg>We just invested 50 grand into this documentation platform and a whole bunch of hours.
00:04:30 --> 00:04:31 <v John Ahlberg>It was good.
00:04:31 --> 00:04:34 <v John Ahlberg>We weren't in love with it, but it was better than SharePoint and everything.
00:04:34 --> 00:04:36 <v John Ahlberg>then suddenly a new tool came along.
00:04:36 --> 00:04:38 <v John Ahlberg>I saw it and I'm like that's interesting.
00:04:38 --> 00:04:41 <v John Ahlberg>So I flipped it over to my CIO who's in charge of it.
00:04:41 --> 00:04:42 <v John Ahlberg>He's we just built this other thing.
00:04:42 --> 00:04:43 <v John Ahlberg>I don't want to look at this.
00:04:43 --> 00:04:44 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like, just look at it.
00:04:45 --> 00:04:48 <v John Ahlberg>And then he came back the next day and he goes, all right, you're going to hate me.
00:04:48 --> 00:04:51 <v John Ahlberg>I want to throw away what we just did and go use this new stuff.
00:04:51 --> 00:04:52 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like dig into it a little bit more.
00:04:52 --> 00:04:53 <v John Ahlberg>And he did.
00:04:53 --> 00:04:56 <v John Ahlberg>And he's I know we just spent time and money.
00:04:56 --> 00:04:57 <v John Ahlberg>This other one's better.
00:04:58 --> 00:04:59 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like, all right, let's do it.
00:04:59 --> 00:05:01 <v John Ahlberg>you can't just stick with something that's just okay.
00:05:01 --> 00:05:02 <v John Ahlberg>If there's something better.
00:05:02 --> 00:05:09 <v John Ahlberg>And we dove in headfirst and, changed how we document things, which is, key for us.
00:05:09 --> 00:05:09 <v John Ahlberg>We document everything.
00:05:09 --> 00:05:13 <v John Ahlberg>So once we change our documentation process, that's a really big deal.
00:05:14 --> 00:05:19 <v John Ahlberg>So we give people a voice, we communicate with them, we want to hear their ideas.
00:05:19 --> 00:05:21 <v John Ahlberg>we pay fairly.
00:05:21 --> 00:05:24 <v John Ahlberg>You're not going to make the most money here, but you're certainly not going to make the least.
00:05:25 --> 00:05:26 <v John Ahlberg>You have freedom to do what you want.
00:05:26 --> 00:05:31 <v John Ahlberg>Now, after the pandemic, everyone has freedom to work from home two days a week, and they're in the office three days a week.
00:05:31 --> 00:05:33 <v John Ahlberg>Some people are all over that.
00:05:33 --> 00:05:36 <v John Ahlberg>Other people, like me, it's just like now I'm going to the office all the time.
00:05:36 --> 00:05:37 <v John Ahlberg>It really doesn't matter.
00:05:37 --> 00:05:38 <v John Ahlberg>So it's kind of 50 50.
00:05:39 --> 00:05:40 <v John Ahlberg>Half the people just come in all the time.
00:05:40 --> 00:05:41 <v John Ahlberg>The other people don't.
00:05:41 --> 00:05:52 <v John Ahlberg>early on, years ago, I remember talking to my operations person and I said in the corporate world, we used to have summer Fridays, where you could just take the Friday off once a month That'd be cool.
00:05:52 --> 00:05:54 <v John Ahlberg>How come we can't do that?
00:05:54 --> 00:05:55 <v John Ahlberg>And of course we were a company of six people.
00:05:56 --> 00:05:59 <v John Ahlberg>And my office manager operations person was like I don't know how we're going to do that.
00:06:00 --> 00:06:01 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like let's figure out how.
00:06:02 --> 00:06:03 <v John Ahlberg>And then we figured out.
00:06:03 --> 00:06:03 <v John Ahlberg>Yeah.
00:06:03 --> 00:06:17 <v John Ahlberg>Again, I think oddly, for me, I'm like, okay, if I, what I would really like to do, since I can take off whenever I want, but if I was an employee, I'd want to take off every month, a Friday and a Monday, so I can have a nice long weekend, You don't have to take vacation time.
00:06:17 --> 00:06:19 <v John Ahlberg>You just work a little bit more each week to, make up your time.
00:06:19 --> 00:06:21 <v John Ahlberg>And now you've got a four day weekend every single month.
00:06:22 --> 00:06:25 <v John Ahlberg>Now, the interesting part is there's only probably Two people in the company has ever done it.
00:06:25 --> 00:06:26 <v John Ahlberg>is this a good thing?
00:06:26 --> 00:06:30 <v John Ahlberg>For me, I'd be mapping it out like every other month at least going, Oh, I'm going to go do this.
00:06:31 --> 00:06:36 <v John Ahlberg>But people just don't do it, so I think a lot of it's just the culture then we hire for culture.
00:06:36 --> 00:06:37 <v John Ahlberg>So we meet with them.
00:06:37 --> 00:06:39 <v John Ahlberg>That's where we're, different.
00:06:40 --> 00:06:42 <v John Ahlberg>I remember working with a recruiter a long time ago.
00:06:42 --> 00:06:49 <v John Ahlberg>I'm telling the recruiter, I'm like, we hired culture first, talent second, and skills and experience third.
00:06:49 --> 00:06:51 <v John Ahlberg>And the recruiter is I can't do culture.
00:06:51 --> 00:06:52 <v John Ahlberg>I don't know how to do talent.
00:06:52 --> 00:06:54 <v John Ahlberg>I have to anchor off of skills and experience.
00:06:54 --> 00:06:55 <v John Ahlberg>I'm like that doesn't work.
00:06:55 --> 00:07:05 <v John Ahlberg>we tried that years ago, where, you hire someone for all the skills and experience, but if the culture is not there and the talent's not there, given a certain amount of time, they hate you and you hate them.
00:07:07 --> 00:07:08 <v John Ahlberg>So it just doesn't work.
00:07:08 --> 00:07:09 <v John Ahlberg>So we flipped it all.
00:07:09 --> 00:07:14 <v John Ahlberg>And again, we have a 10 page hiring protocol of, we ask all the same questions.
00:07:14 --> 00:07:15 <v John Ahlberg>We know what we're doing.
00:07:15 --> 00:07:21 <v Carrie Richardson>So one of the things I wanted to ask you about is one of your corporate policies is hire for weird.
00:07:21 --> 00:07:22 <v John Ahlberg>Yes.
00:07:22 --> 00:07:23 <v Carrie Richardson>What does that mean?
00:07:23 --> 00:07:30 <v John Ahlberg>I started calling it that probably 10 or so years ago, there's a CEO that I know of a company.
00:07:30 --> 00:07:33 <v John Ahlberg>I really like him and respect him and everything.
00:07:33 --> 00:07:39 <v John Ahlberg>And I would go to his office and he would every summer bring in an intern and they were in finance, real estate.
00:07:39 --> 00:07:44 <v John Ahlberg>So these interns were like Yale and Harvard and like incredibly smart people.
00:07:44 --> 00:07:46 <v John Ahlberg>And I'd be like, wow, they're, they're great.
00:07:46 --> 00:07:48 <v John Ahlberg>I would talk to them and be super impressed.
00:07:48 --> 00:07:55 <v John Ahlberg>And then one year he brought someone in and I'm like, eh, and he goes, yeah, I'm the same way.
00:07:55 --> 00:07:58 <v John Ahlberg>And he figured out later, he was like, I figured it out.
00:07:58 --> 00:07:58 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like, what?
00:07:58 --> 00:08:01 <v John Ahlberg>And he goes, the person I hired was just not weird enough.
00:08:02 --> 00:08:03 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like, we started laughing.
00:08:03 --> 00:08:04 <v John Ahlberg>Actually, that makes sense.
00:08:04 --> 00:08:10 <v John Ahlberg>Cause then I started thinking on my own team, we hired people with odd backgrounds or odd hobbies.
00:08:10 --> 00:08:12 <v John Ahlberg>They're weird in a good way.
00:08:12 --> 00:08:15 <v John Ahlberg>Like now we have someone who used to be a probation officer.
00:08:16 --> 00:08:19 <v John Ahlberg>Who's a business analyst doing project and client management.
00:08:19 --> 00:08:26 <v John Ahlberg>For me, I talked to him and I'm like all those skills that you had to deal people out of jail, and all that transferred directly over.
00:08:27 --> 00:08:30 <v John Ahlberg>And like within a month, it was just like perfect fit.
00:08:30 --> 00:08:31 <v John Ahlberg>And, it's amazing.
00:08:31 --> 00:08:36 <v John Ahlberg>We have someone else who used to be a professional poker player, that, did ID, but that's what they did.
00:08:36 --> 00:08:37 <v John Ahlberg>And, again, just.
00:08:38 --> 00:08:39 <v John Ahlberg>Made sense.
00:08:39 --> 00:08:42 <v John Ahlberg>Our CIO is, you talk to him, you never know he's an IT guy.
00:08:42 --> 00:08:48 <v John Ahlberg>He's in a band, he homebrews, does all the anti stereotypical IT guy stuff.
00:08:48 --> 00:08:55 <v John Ahlberg>That just started becoming part of our interview process where I stole it from, I think, the CEO of Zappos.
00:08:55 --> 00:08:57 <v John Ahlberg>I just say on a scale of one to ten, how weird are you?
00:08:58 --> 00:09:02 <v John Ahlberg>And it's actually, for us, it's a really interesting question because we have some people that are flat out.
00:09:03 --> 00:09:04 <v John Ahlberg>Expression no comment.
00:09:04 --> 00:09:05 <v John Ahlberg>They're like, I don't know.
00:09:05 --> 00:09:12 <v John Ahlberg>I don't think i'm that weird and it just doesn't go over and you're like Probably not weird enough, but you ask the right person and they start laughing.
00:09:12 --> 00:09:15 <v John Ahlberg>They go, I'm a solid seven and here's what I do.
00:09:15 --> 00:09:16 <v John Ahlberg>And this is what I think it's weird.
00:09:16 --> 00:09:19 <v John Ahlberg>And then they'll talk for five minutes on themselves.
00:09:19 --> 00:09:20 <v John Ahlberg>And that's what we want.
00:09:21 --> 00:09:22 <v John Ahlberg>We need to know who you are.
00:09:22 --> 00:09:28 <v John Ahlberg>So we just ask that question among others, I ask if you were on a reality TV show, which one would it be?
00:09:29 --> 00:09:30 <v John Ahlberg>And that one goes crazy.
00:09:30 --> 00:09:31 <v John Ahlberg>I've literally had people go.
00:09:31 --> 00:09:33 <v John Ahlberg>I'd be on Naked and Afraid.
00:09:33 --> 00:09:34 <v John Ahlberg>I'd be on The Bachelor.
00:09:34 --> 00:09:35 <v John Ahlberg>I'd be on, Survivor.
00:09:35 --> 00:09:36 <v John Ahlberg>I'd be singing.
00:09:36 --> 00:09:38 <v John Ahlberg>It goes all over the place.
00:09:38 --> 00:09:43 <v John Ahlberg>But again, you get the right person, they'll talk for five minutes on why they want to be on that reality TV show.
00:09:44 --> 00:09:46 <v Carrie Richardson>Wait, what reality TV show do you want to be on?
00:09:47 --> 00:09:49 <v John Ahlberg>Oh, for me, it's always been Survivor.
00:09:49 --> 00:09:57 <v John Ahlberg>Problem is I'm too old now, but years ago when I was younger, I wanted to go on with my best friend, he's a X marine, big, strong guy.
00:09:57 --> 00:09:58 <v John Ahlberg>And I'm like, I want to go on with you.
00:09:58 --> 00:10:03 <v John Ahlberg>Cause they had like friends and family, some episodes cause I think he would love it.
00:10:03 --> 00:10:04 <v John Ahlberg>And I would have fun with it.
00:10:05 --> 00:10:06 <v John Ahlberg>Sadly, I will not go on it.
00:10:06 --> 00:10:07 <v Carrie Richardson>There's still time.
00:10:08 --> 00:10:08 <v John Ahlberg>Yeah.
00:10:08 --> 00:10:09 <v John Ahlberg>Someday.
00:10:09 --> 00:10:17 <v Carrie Richardson>I understand that one of the things that you guys do differently is put all of your expectations right within your job postings.
00:10:17 --> 00:10:20 <v Carrie Richardson>Tell me what they looked like before you started doing that.
00:10:21 --> 00:10:26 <v John Ahlberg>We just write some sort of job description and, let's do quote the standard interview process.
00:10:26 --> 00:10:36 <v John Ahlberg>And we did it, but the problem is it's time consuming, then we took a totally different angle and I stole part of it from a friend of mine, when he was hiring, so we like, okay, here's the job description.
00:10:36 --> 00:10:37 <v John Ahlberg>We just want to put everything in it.
00:10:37 --> 00:10:39 <v John Ahlberg>So there's no surprises.
00:10:39 --> 00:10:40 <v John Ahlberg>They know where it is.
00:10:40 --> 00:10:42 <v John Ahlberg>We're not going to hide the salary or anything.
00:10:42 --> 00:10:43 <v John Ahlberg>It's just all there.
00:10:43 --> 00:10:50 <v John Ahlberg>So when somebody looks at it goes, okay, I know what I'm getting into, in a bigger picture, I think, and I tell people all the time.
00:10:50 --> 00:10:51 <v John Ahlberg>How you get hired is.
00:10:52 --> 00:10:57 <v John Ahlberg>Reflective of the culture of the company, and I feel bad because we've interviewed people who are like, oh, thank you.
00:10:57 --> 00:11:00 <v John Ahlberg>You've communicated, we interviewed, we did all this stuff.
00:11:00 --> 00:11:02 <v John Ahlberg>You turn me down, but still thank you.
00:11:02 --> 00:11:07 <v John Ahlberg>Cause I can't tell you how many times I'll go in for an interview and I hear nothing or I'll apply and I hear nothing.
00:11:07 --> 00:11:08 <v John Ahlberg>We just think that's rude.
00:11:08 --> 00:11:11 <v John Ahlberg>So we have to get around that, to make things more efficient.
00:11:11 --> 00:11:22 <v John Ahlberg>What we do is, we'll put the job posting out there and pretty much anyone who can somewhat qualify for the job then gets a list of a dozen questions and some are basic, how much money you're looking for.
00:11:22 --> 00:11:24 <v John Ahlberg>And Hey, do you have a car?
00:11:24 --> 00:11:27 <v John Ahlberg>Cause you might have to drive around to different clients, even if it's tech position.
00:11:27 --> 00:11:29 <v John Ahlberg>And then we asked some culture questions.
00:11:29 --> 00:11:31 <v John Ahlberg>You don't tell me a story when you help somebody.
00:11:31 --> 00:11:38 <v John Ahlberg>And then we'll ask a few tech questions that we fully expect somebody Copy the question, put it in Google and then paste in the answer.
00:11:38 --> 00:11:38 <v John Ahlberg>That's fine.
00:11:38 --> 00:11:41 <v John Ahlberg>That's what techs do all day long for a big part.
00:11:41 --> 00:11:51 <v John Ahlberg>But the interesting part is for the tech positions, if a hundred people apply and I send out a hundred questions, usually 90 people won't even answer the questions.
00:11:51 --> 00:11:52 <v John Ahlberg>So those are 90 people.
00:11:52 --> 00:11:56 <v John Ahlberg>I would not want to interview, waste their time or anything out of the 10.
00:11:57 --> 00:11:58 <v John Ahlberg>Five usually just answer.
00:11:58 --> 00:11:59 <v John Ahlberg>Yes.
00:11:59 --> 00:12:03 <v John Ahlberg>No, not too much there But you always get one or two that are excited going.
00:12:03 --> 00:12:13 <v John Ahlberg>Oh my gosh, I get to you know I get the right to tell you Why i'm so good for this position takes five minutes and they just write and we look at it And those are the ones we go.
00:12:13 --> 00:12:14 <v John Ahlberg>Okay That makes sense.
00:12:15 --> 00:12:20 <v John Ahlberg>So then we, we'll schedule a 15 to 30 minute culture video call.
00:12:20 --> 00:12:21 <v John Ahlberg>It's just to know each other.
00:12:21 --> 00:12:22 <v John Ahlberg>You can ask questions.
00:12:22 --> 00:12:23 <v John Ahlberg>We can ask questions.
00:12:23 --> 00:12:26 <v John Ahlberg>If they pass that, then we bring him to an office.
00:12:26 --> 00:12:29 <v John Ahlberg>And then we have kind of 45 minutes to an hour.
00:12:29 --> 00:12:30 <v John Ahlberg>Two of them.
00:12:30 --> 00:12:31 <v John Ahlberg>First one's culture.
00:12:31 --> 00:12:33 <v John Ahlberg>And we tell them this is about culture.
00:12:33 --> 00:12:34 <v John Ahlberg>This is just get to know us.
00:12:34 --> 00:12:37 <v John Ahlberg>We want to learn about you to make sure we want to work with you.
00:12:37 --> 00:12:41 <v John Ahlberg>But more importantly, you need to learn about us to make sure you want to work with us.
00:12:41 --> 00:12:42 <v John Ahlberg>So we do that.
00:12:42 --> 00:12:44 <v John Ahlberg>That's where I ask the weird questions and.
00:12:46 --> 00:12:54 <v John Ahlberg>It's interesting, because the HR person's asking very traditional HR flat questions, and then I pop up with Hey, what reality show do you want to be on?
00:12:54 --> 00:12:59 <v John Ahlberg>And I come out with those earlier if they seem nervous, because that helps with that.
00:12:59 --> 00:13:03 <v John Ahlberg>And then after that you Then there'll be more of the technical side, no matter what the position is.
00:13:03 --> 00:13:07 <v John Ahlberg>Right now, we're hiring a project manager So that is people who are involved in project manager.
00:13:07 --> 00:13:10 <v John Ahlberg>You can sit there and go tell me how you think what you do in project manager.
00:13:11 --> 00:13:15 <v John Ahlberg>So it's getting down to the actual job on the tech side.
00:13:15 --> 00:13:21 <v John Ahlberg>Our site will literally put the fear in them in a sense and say, this is what it's like to work here.
00:13:21 --> 00:13:27 <v John Ahlberg>You got so many tickets, it's high pace, you need to do this, but you have all these opportunities.
00:13:27 --> 00:13:31 <v John Ahlberg>And, we want to let them know day one what they're getting into not.
00:13:31 --> 00:13:35 <v John Ahlberg>Bs our way in and say, no, this is really mellow and it's great.
00:13:35 --> 00:13:37 <v John Ahlberg>And then they start and go, what did you sell me?
00:13:37 --> 00:13:38 <v John Ahlberg>This isn't it?
00:13:38 --> 00:13:40 <v John Ahlberg>if it's a technical person, we give them a tech test.
00:13:41 --> 00:13:42 <v John Ahlberg>it's our homemade tech test.
00:13:42 --> 00:13:44 <v John Ahlberg>It's more of a.
00:13:44 --> 00:13:51 <v John Ahlberg>Test for us in the sense of how they think that we just created, I don't know, 50 different help desk questions.
00:13:51 --> 00:13:51 <v John Ahlberg>How do you do this?
00:13:52 --> 00:13:53 <v John Ahlberg>We give it to them.
00:13:53 --> 00:13:54 <v John Ahlberg>We say you got 30 minutes.
00:13:54 --> 00:13:58 <v John Ahlberg>You can use any resource you want and end of 30 minutes.
00:13:58 --> 00:14:02 <v John Ahlberg>Just go to this last section and say, why did you answer the ones you did in what order?
00:14:02 --> 00:14:05 <v John Ahlberg>So we want to know how they think they'll never answer all 50.
00:14:06 --> 00:14:07 <v John Ahlberg>We do that on purpose.
00:14:07 --> 00:14:08 <v John Ahlberg>We've only had one person
00:14:08 --> 00:14:09 answer all 50.
00:14:09 --> 00:14:09 Amazingly,
00:14:09 --> 00:14:10 <v John Ahlberg>they got them all right.
00:14:11 --> 00:14:12 <v John Ahlberg>So we're not too sure how they ended up doing it.
00:14:13 --> 00:14:14 <v John Ahlberg>But usually they don't.
00:14:14 --> 00:14:17 <v John Ahlberg>They'll do 25 or 30, but then they have to explain what they're doing.
00:14:17 --> 00:14:21 <v John Ahlberg>And then our CIO and other techs will look at it and go how did they answer questions?
00:14:21 --> 00:14:22 <v John Ahlberg>Was it wrong Wrong answer?
00:14:22 --> 00:14:23 <v John Ahlberg>Some of them are basic.
00:14:23 --> 00:14:24 <v John Ahlberg>Some are more.
00:14:24 --> 00:14:25 <v John Ahlberg>Complex.
00:14:25 --> 00:14:30 <v John Ahlberg>But by the end of that, we're in a good space to figure out, would they be a good person or not?
00:14:30 --> 00:14:31 <v John Ahlberg>We vetted their talent.
00:14:31 --> 00:14:32 <v John Ahlberg>We vetted their culture.
00:14:32 --> 00:14:34 <v John Ahlberg>We vetted their skills.
00:14:34 --> 00:14:36 <v John Ahlberg>But the good thing about it is, we can hire a position.
00:14:36 --> 00:14:37 <v John Ahlberg>We end up.
00:14:37 --> 00:14:41 <v John Ahlberg>Only spending time to physically interview, probably 3 or 4 people.
00:14:42 --> 00:14:49 <v John Ahlberg>We're not interviewing dozens to find the right person because we've already weeded that out and made sure that the process goes.
00:14:49 --> 00:14:51 <v John Ahlberg>So that's how we do it.
00:14:51 --> 00:14:51 <v John Ahlberg>That's worked.
00:14:51 --> 00:14:52 <v John Ahlberg>Great.
00:14:52 --> 00:14:54 <v John Ahlberg>We've been doing it that way for 10 years or more.
00:14:54 --> 00:14:57 <v John Ahlberg>And, rarely do we find someone who's not a good fit.
00:14:57 --> 00:14:59 <v John Ahlberg>The only time we find which we can't do is OK.
00:14:59 --> 00:15:02 <v John Ahlberg>You bring on a frontline tech.
00:15:02 --> 00:15:05 <v John Ahlberg>He doesn't have a ton of experience, but he's showing that everything's good.
00:15:05 --> 00:15:11 <v John Ahlberg>After a year, if they're not advancing on their tech skills, it's okay.
00:15:11 --> 00:15:20 <v John Ahlberg>so we're walking through that and, some people in tech just hit their limit, whatever that is, and, they're good at what they're doing, but they're never going to be the network administrator.
00:15:20 --> 00:15:20 <v John Ahlberg>They're never going to be.
00:15:21 --> 00:15:24 <v John Ahlberg>Doing different things and, as a company we go, okay, great.
00:15:25 --> 00:15:35 <v John Ahlberg>Are we okay with that person just stalled in this position and they're happy and we're happy or, do we, for their own good, push them out to go find something better, or do we.
00:15:35 --> 00:15:37 <v John Ahlberg>Push them to advance and do a different role.
00:15:37 --> 00:15:50 <v John Ahlberg>Again, we usually find a bad hire if there is one months and months later, because we can't figure out how to predict how they're going to be in six or eight months, but there's still good culture fit and everything is there usually.
00:15:51 --> 00:15:52 <v John Ahlberg>So it feels bad.
00:15:53 --> 00:15:57 <v Carrie Richardson>Oh, is there a difference when you're hiring someone in a non technical role?
00:15:58 --> 00:15:59 <v John Ahlberg>Yeah, not really.
00:15:59 --> 00:16:03 <v John Ahlberg>Like right now, we're doing project manager and we want some technical knowledge, but
00:16:03 --> 00:16:04 they're not a tech and we do
00:16:04 --> 00:16:05 <v John Ahlberg>the exact same thing.
00:16:06 --> 00:16:07 <v John Ahlberg>Natalia, you've met.
00:16:07 --> 00:16:09 <v John Ahlberg>She's marketing and we did the exact same thing.
00:16:10 --> 00:16:11 <v Carrie Richardson>50 tech questions.
00:16:11 --> 00:16:13 <v John Ahlberg>No, but we gave her 12.
00:16:13 --> 00:16:14 <v John Ahlberg>Questions.
00:16:14 --> 00:16:14 <v John Ahlberg>We stripped it.
00:16:14 --> 00:16:22 <v John Ahlberg>We left them all except for the last three that were tech and just put him in for, what, what project management tools have you used or, tell me a time when a marketing thing you did failed.
00:16:23 --> 00:16:24 <v John Ahlberg>So we just replace those.
00:16:25 --> 00:16:29 <v John Ahlberg>No matter what the role is, we take the 1st, 1s that are kind of culture.
00:16:29 --> 00:16:31 <v John Ahlberg>And then it's the last three, they're about the position.
00:16:31 --> 00:16:34 <v John Ahlberg>We just replace them and we do the exact same thing.
00:16:34 --> 00:16:36 <v John Ahlberg>We asked the same interview questions.
00:16:36 --> 00:16:39 <v John Ahlberg>There's usually not a test, so marketing didn't have a tech test
00:16:39 --> 00:16:43 <v Carrie Richardson>imagine trying to fill that out as a sales rep, like this.
00:16:43 --> 00:16:46 <v Carrie Richardson>I guess I'll just make up all the answers and see what happens.
00:16:46 --> 00:16:51 <v John Ahlberg>That would be funny though, and weird going, okay, I know you're not a tech, but we do tech.
00:16:51 --> 00:16:54 <v John Ahlberg>Answer these 50 tech questions see what they do.
00:16:55 --> 00:16:56 <v Carrie Richardson>That sounds very stressful.
00:16:58 --> 00:16:58 <v John Ahlberg>A little.
00:17:00 --> 00:17:07 <v Carrie Richardson>Are there any other pieces of advice that you would give to MSPs that are looking to hire great technical talent?
00:17:07 --> 00:17:09 <v John Ahlberg>The first advice is don't settle.
00:17:10 --> 00:17:14 <v John Ahlberg>I learned that a long time ago, where it's oh, we really need a tech, really need a tech, really need a tech.
00:17:15 --> 00:17:17 <v John Ahlberg>And then you're not really happy with anyone to go.
00:17:17 --> 00:17:17 <v John Ahlberg>Okay.
00:17:17 --> 00:17:20 <v John Ahlberg>Bob's the best that we talked to.
00:17:20 --> 00:17:21 <v John Ahlberg>We think they'll be okay.
00:17:21 --> 00:17:23 <v John Ahlberg>We just don't do that.
00:17:23 --> 00:17:24 <v John Ahlberg>So we might be
00:17:24 --> 00:17:25 desperate for a tech and we'll
00:17:25 --> 00:17:27 <v John Ahlberg>spend 3 months to find the right person.
00:17:27 --> 00:17:28 <v John Ahlberg>Always.
00:17:28 --> 00:17:34 <v John Ahlberg>Because inevitably the wrong person, doesn't fit, there's problems, there's cleanup, and you're looking for another person anyway.
00:17:35 --> 00:17:37 <v John Ahlberg>So just do that, treat it seriously.
00:17:37 --> 00:17:43 <v John Ahlberg>The challenge with smaller MSPs, and I was there, is when do you hire?
00:17:44 --> 00:17:48 <v John Ahlberg>And it was always when I hit this threshold, we can afford it, we'll hire.
00:17:48 --> 00:17:53 <v John Ahlberg>But that threshold is usually past the time when you really should have brought someone in.
00:17:53 --> 00:18:01 <v John Ahlberg>Cause when we bring someone in, we know there's going to be three months of ramp up and learning before they're in a good productive spot.
00:18:01 --> 00:18:02 <v John Ahlberg>you absolutely need someone.
00:18:02 --> 00:18:06 <v John Ahlberg>And if I find someone tomorrow it's going to be three to six months before they're making a good impact.
00:18:06 --> 00:18:08 <v John Ahlberg>So it has to be a, I get it.
00:18:08 --> 00:18:09 <v John Ahlberg>I'm willing to accept that.
00:18:10 --> 00:18:12 <v John Ahlberg>And, hold out for the right person.
00:18:12 --> 00:18:19 <v John Ahlberg>And again, my advice is the right person is culture fit, talent, and skills and experience.
00:18:19 --> 00:18:23 <v John Ahlberg>And as techs know, because, I explained it to techs, it's like this every day.
00:18:23 --> 00:18:24 <v John Ahlberg>You don't know what that is.
00:18:24 --> 00:18:26 <v John Ahlberg>You don't know what's changed.
00:18:27 --> 00:18:27 <v John Ahlberg>Yeah.
00:18:28 --> 00:18:37 <v John Ahlberg>You need the talent to be able to figure that out, so why would I hire someone for static skills that, in two or three years are going to be meaningless.
00:18:37 --> 00:18:38 <v John Ahlberg>They need to be able to move for it.
00:18:39 --> 00:18:47 <v John Ahlberg>So that's why I anchor off of the talent side and talent is, it's actually easier than you think to interview for most people are like, Oh, you can't do that.
00:18:47 --> 00:18:51 <v John Ahlberg>For me, it's stories, tell me a story when you're fixing something and blew up on you.
00:18:52 --> 00:18:56 <v John Ahlberg>If you're on the other side of the table and they're saying all the right stuff, you're going, yep, you get it.
00:18:56 --> 00:19:00 <v John Ahlberg>Tell me a time when you were thrown into something you didn't know and you had to figure it all out.
00:19:00 --> 00:19:01 <v John Ahlberg>You get it.
00:19:01 --> 00:19:03 <v John Ahlberg>It's good indications of, where talent is.
00:19:04 --> 00:19:06 <v John Ahlberg>And again, we hire culture talent and skittle second.
00:19:06 --> 00:19:16 <v John Ahlberg>People don't want to leave, we do lots of fun stuff at work and treat them like family and know their person and give them flexibility and, it's a win.
00:19:17 --> 00:19:17 <v Carrie Richardson>All right.
00:19:17 --> 00:19:19 <v Carrie Richardson>I think that's a great place to wind down today.
00:19:19 --> 00:19:26 <v Carrie Richardson>I want to thank you for joining us yet again here on WIN and sharing your knowledge with the rest of the IT channel.
00:19:26 --> 00:19:32 <v Carrie Richardson>Wish you a lot of success in the future and hopefully we'll think of another topic and get to do this again real soon.
00:19:32 --> 00:19:33 <v John Ahlberg>Sounds good.
00:19:33 --> 00:19:34 <v John Ahlberg>Thank you.
00:19:34 --> 00:19:34 <v Carrie Richardson>Thanks, John.
00:19:34 --> 00:19:35 <v Carrie Richardson>Have a great day.
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