How To Build A $1.5 Million Desk With No College Degree

Benjamin Mena [00:00:00]:
In the last 12 months, has AI actually helped you make more money? Has it actually helped you make more placements? Or has it just been a lot of noise? I know we just got done with the AI Recruiting Summit, which was absolutely amazing. But here's the thing. I'm partnering with Seb Sharp, who's going to walk you through how to build a bunch of tools. 2 sessions, August 25th and August 26th. You want to make sure that you get signed up for this. He is going to show you how to build an autonomous lead agent. He's going to show you how to build a placement agent. He's going to show you how to connect your entire tech stack, your ATS, your CRM, all your sourcing tools together, how to build a free website to save hundreds of dollars a month with true infrastructure.

Benjamin Mena [00:00:41]:
And here's the thing. These are also going to have AI assets that you get to keep after these 2 days, recordings, templates, and a week of Slack access to Seb. So to answer questions as you're building everything for yourself, walkthrough, build along. And then a week of access. You do not want to miss these sessions. This is the perfect follow-up to the AI Recruiting Summit. This is your chance to like literally cut down a lot of your costs, do all the things that you've been talking about and actually make money from AI. This is going to be awesome.

Benjamin Mena [00:01:12]:
Make sure to get registered. I will see you there because I'm going to be in class along with you while Seb's doing this teaching. Coming up on this episode of the Elite Recruiter Podcast.

David Fishman [00:01:20]:
If you think this is an 8 to 5 job, you better run. If you think that these deals happen by accident, you better go. I know they say fit 58's the new 48. I know that people tell me, oh, you don't look 58. But when you start having people you went to high school with on a regular basis, like, they're gone. All right. My wife probably hates this conversation more. Like, I'm preparing for, like, the ending, you know, in a weird way.

David Fishman [00:01:44]:
And I want to continue. I feel like something's chasing me. Absolutely. And I think that's part of being a good recruiter. Welcome to the Elite Recruiter Podcast with your host, Benjamin Mena, where we focus on what it takes to win in the recruiting We cover it all from sales, marketing, mindset, money, leadership, and placements.

Benjamin Mena [00:02:09]:
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Benjamin Mena [00:02:38]:
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Benjamin Mena [00:03:41]:
But what's awesome is the recruiters that are elite but have been elite for year after year are doing something right. And here's the thing. This guest did not have a college degree. So he realized that he had to outwork everybody else in the room. And the funny thing is he probably makes more than most people now that have a college degree, but that's the, that's the capability. That's the possibility of recruiting. So David, I am so excited to have you here on the podcast.

David Fishman [00:04:09]:
Thank you so much for having me here on the podcast. I'm super excited about this time we're going to get to spend together and really talk about recruiting and how I've built a business over a 30-year span and what keeps me in the game, what knocks me out of the game at times, and how to stay persistent and keep your head down and working.

Benjamin Mena [00:04:31]:
David, real quick, a quick 30-second self-introduction.

David Fishman [00:04:34]:
All right. I'm David Fishman. I'm with Sparrow Company. We're an executive search and staffing company headquartered out of El Paso, Texas. I actually, uh, have a house in LA, Orange County area, but I regularly come here to our corporate office. And where I really like to be here most of the time when I'm working, because I'm in an office environment and it means a lot to me. Uh, I've been in the business for 30 years. Uh, started on a temporary desk, moved to an executive search desk when I was younger in my career.

David Fishman [00:05:06]:
And now I'm back with a temporary business here in the El Paso region.

Benjamin Mena [00:05:10]:
Well, that's exciting. So real quick, you do not have a college degree, is that correct?

David Fishman [00:05:16]:
Absolutely. I do not have a college degree. We joke around a lot because my twin brother is a professor in New York City and has multiple degrees. He went the degree route. I didn't go that route. I went the military route. I was in the Coast Guard for 8 years before I started recruiting, but I quickly learned as a person without a degree that I probably had to work harder at times or even be accepted with certain other companies when I was younger. If I, without that degree, I wouldn't have been able to get an opportunity.

David Fishman [00:05:49]:
So what I had to do, I had to build my own business, work hard, keep my head down and outperform.

Benjamin Mena [00:05:55]:
Did you ever feel that not having a degree gave you a disadvantage, or at least in the early days, a disadvantage in recruiting?

David Fishman [00:06:03]:
Absolutely, I did. And maybe that was my own chip on my shoulder, you understand? Maybe I'm working in a field that is filled with college degrees. Almost everybody we recruit on our executive search side of the business obviously will have a college degree, majority, not always. Okay. And when I was younger, when I first started Sparrow Company, I was still flirting the idea with working with maybe a national firm. And I would go to apply at that point and they're like, hey, no college degree required, whatever it might be. So yeah, at the end of the day, I think it helped me keep at it. Okay.

David Fishman [00:06:43]:
And I think now college degrees are less important, but there was a time in the early 2000s where majority of our customers and other recruiting firms were filled with people With university degrees, college degrees.

Benjamin Mena [00:06:59]:
When in your career journey in recruiting did you realize that you actually felt like you had to outwork everybody because of feeling like you were disadvantaged from not having a degree?

David Fishman [00:07:11]:
When I first started in the business, I was in a temporary desk. Majority of the people do not have college degrees in the temporary field. A lot. They do and they don't. There's a, there's a really good mix. In fact, in our In our business right now, I try to hire people without degrees and people with degrees. And I think it's a great mix to get some people. I mean, a degree is a very important thing, obviously.

David Fishman [00:07:33]:
Okay. And I'm not one to say that it's not important. It is important. But then I look at my children, some have degrees, some don't have degrees. And I think it really adds to a better team environment. when you have people from different backgrounds and different things that drive them and those type of things.

Benjamin Mena [00:07:56]:
For you personally, did that help drive your competitiveness?

David Fishman [00:08:01]:
Absolutely, it did. I don't think there was a day or a week that goes by up until about 2014 where I really felt like I was not on the same playing field, even though my numbers were there. Okay. I always still had that chip on my shoulder of like, well, I don't have a degree. They have degrees. And even when I first got into pinnacle society back in 2008, 2009, I would sit in a room with highly educated people, probably a majority with degrees and maybe a few that didn't have it. But I felt like my upbringing in this business was highly driven due to that one certain fact. Like I said, 2014 is probably when I said, I don't really, I don't want to say I don't care about it, but I started realizing that I really wouldn't need that under my name or on a resume.

David Fishman [00:09:01]:
Started Sparrow in 2009. By 2014, the recession was finally lifting this, this 2008 to 2012. And I could start feeling this 2014 that it was more about my team, myself and my team than it was about a degree from a university.

Benjamin Mena [00:09:24]:
The reason why I want to start with that is because I had somebody just last week asking me some questions, asking for my opinion because they did not have a degree.

David Fishman [00:09:37]:
Okay.

Benjamin Mena [00:09:37]:
And I know you've been in Pinnacle for a while and it, like, this is a business that if you put in the work, you follow protocol, follow a path, so much can happen with your life. But anyways, let's, let's take a few steps back. Let's rewind. How did you even end up? How did you even end up in this land of misfit toys recruiting?

David Fishman [00:09:57]:
Well, it was an interesting story. I was in the Coast Guard for about 8 years. I ended up had an injury in the military, which forced me out. I then went into selling industrial batteries in downtown Los Angeles. And it was a crazy business of having to walk into industrial operations in downtown and try to talk to the maintenance manager about if they needed electric batteries for their forklifts, whatever. That year I was the top salesman. I think I made $50,000 my first year out of the Coast Guard. And that was '89.

David Fishman [00:10:37]:
I mean, sorry, '99, '98, '99, though, you know, around that time. So I was highly driven. I didn't really know what I was doing. And then I decided to jump into the business. I was lucky enough to have a couple family members who were in the business. And some people say, okay, wow, he had family members in the business. That means everything was probably given to him. That was not the case with our family.

David Fishman [00:11:05]:
Okay? So, I had a dream about living in Los Angeles and I was going to work in recruiting. And oddly enough, I started a company called Pinnacle Employment Group. Okay? And it's just so odd that later on, Pinnacle Society was in my cards. And not a lot of people know this story, but I failed. I mean, I went and started this business and my mother, who was in the staffing business, who had gotten out of it because it's a long story, but I won't get into it. She came down, negotiated a rental agreement with a gentleman who saw some fire in me and said, hey, I'll give you a run at this, you know? And it was right in Beverly Hills area. And I was living in West Los Angeles. I was working hard, but unfortunately, I was probably going out too much at that time as well.

David Fishman [00:11:55]:
Okay. And it was pretty hard to sustain that lifestyle. After that, my older brother had a business up in the high desert of California. And I've told this story a couple of times. It was funny. He said, hey, I might have a spot for you here at my business. That was at the time of where you could still like do competition for business or for employees. So, I go up there to start and it turns out he has 14 candidates who were going to go through a 2-week like boot camp and the consultant was going to help choose who was going to make it and who wasn't.

David Fishman [00:12:33]:
Okay? It was like Survivor or something like that. And so, I had to excel in that. And I was one of 2 chosen to, you know, I'm like, wait a second. I came back to the desert and now I have to go through this competition. I still remember the lady. It was really interesting. But I then got a job as a temporary sales account manager for a very large business he was running. He's still in the business, by the way.

David Fishman [00:13:07]:
And he does very well. He still has that same business and he does a combination of search and staffing as well. But it was oddly enough, 6 months after joining, he sold the business. He rejoined the business later on. So now I'm getting through an acquisition, which led me to a very large national temporary company in California where I worked for a few years before Rejoining, uh, my brother in business in 2001.

Benjamin Mena [00:13:37]:
So I gotta ask, when did you make the decision to like, hey, I'm gonna go do this on my own? What spurred that?

David Fishman [00:13:44]:
Uh, I was naive probably when I, when I, the Los Angeles venture, I was probably naive. I think that in recruiting you have to dream almost every single day. Like I literally still wake up and dream about closing a big deal, or I dream about this or dream about that. I have a very vivid imagination, so that helps me get through any day. And I talk about recruiting through imagination and believing you're the best jockey, believing you— if I watch the Super Bowl, I'm usually watching the sports imagining like recruiting. And I talk about recruiting. I talk about if you want to get $100,000, you need those Hail Mary passes. You need a $30,000 deal.

David Fishman [00:14:28]:
You need a $20,000 deal. But those $6,000, when you're at $94,000 or $95,000 for the month and you score a $7,000 deal, you just made it, correct? And so, I think imagination helped me get started in this and being naive as well. And then I thoroughly love this business every day. So, when I first started in a temp business, I really loved what I did. I still, to this day, I love what I do. Yeah, I have bad days and I, My team goes, oh, he's grumpy today. I'm 58 now, or I'll be 59 this year. So I'm probably a little more grumpier than used to, but overall, I like what I do.

David Fishman [00:15:09]:
I love what I do. And I love— the byproduct of recruiting is helping people, correct? But really, I look at more as a, we're not helping people, we're assisting our client. Find the best talent.

Benjamin Mena [00:15:25]:
You just mentioned something that I think is super important. You, every day you dream.

David Fishman [00:15:31]:
Absolutely.

Benjamin Mena [00:15:35]:
Every day that you dream, how do you keep up that, that dream alive? And also, how do you make sure that it's also being transitioned into actual work so you're just not dreaming your life away?

David Fishman [00:15:47]:
Good question, because you can just— I, you could lay in bed all day and dream, correct? I think serving in the Coast Guard, the US Coast Guard when I was younger, really, really got me on a track of I have to perform. Okay? I always have to perform. And coming from a family where growing up in the '80s, early '80s, there was less work rules, correct? So, you know, having a paper route when I was 11 and 12 years old, cleaning fish at 14 and 15 at a trout facility in the desert for $2.90 an hour, working, leaving home when I was 16 going on 17 and never returning, correct? I think we had a lot of different drivers. That drove us. So I think you always had to dream. You have to dream, but you have to put your, but then you have to put the hard work in after the dream. The dream just gets you through the day, correct? Like I, I'm coming in, I'm working on a couple director positions right now, and I still work a desk every day as a CEO.

Benjamin Mena [00:17:08]:
All right.

David Fishman [00:17:10]:
And last week we found this perfect candidate. I'm excited. I'm already dreaming. I'm dreaming now. I'm like, this is the candidate. This is, you know, $45,000, whatever it's going to be. The next morning you get the dreaded text. I've decided to back out of the interview.

David Fishman [00:17:31]:
And I'm like, all of a sudden.

Benjamin Mena [00:17:33]:
Yeah.

David Fishman [00:17:34]:
Brakes come on, dream goes out the window. You know, at least I slept well, correct? At least I said, wow, I had a great night's sleep. I know that is, you know, we wrapped this up in 2 days from finding the candidate, presenting the candidate, giving a team's interview for the candidate. And then all of a sudden you get slapped in the face or punched in the gut, however you want to look at it in this business. It is relentless sometimes dealing with these type of things. But what do you have to do? You have to just move past it and move forward, correct?

Benjamin Mena [00:18:15]:
Yeah.

David Fishman [00:18:16]:
Move past and move forward and thank the candidate for God's sakes. You know, I think every majority of candidates who I work with, they'll say that I'm going to try. I tried to save this candidate. I tried to make this work and it wasn't going to work. And there's a point where you have to throw in the towel. There's a point where you have to throw in the towel, okay? And move forward and congratulate the candidate on his decision or her decision and just move forward.

Benjamin Mena [00:18:49]:
We talked about this in the pregame. You just had a streak of 10 presentations that turned into 10 placements. And one of the things that you've told me is like with your, your years of experience and all the years you've been working in, we're gonna talk about the customer relationships in a bit because 30-year clients is unheard of. But I wanna focus on this. You said your zone of genius is identifying the right candidates for your customers. What are you seeing in these candidates that other people are missing? And what are you seeing in these candidates? that these companies just keep on coming back to you year after year after year?

David Fishman [00:19:27]:
Okay. So I would say that when I'm looking at a— in the old days, we'd look at a piece of paper, correct? We'd have a resume in our hand. We could hold on to it. It took me a while. I think, you know, in 2014 plus where everything is on a computer, we stopped printing and holding these resumes. I sort of look at a resume as a Photograph, picture, and things come out at me very, very fast. I look at tenure, I look at qualifications, I look at who they are. We know if you are recruiting for a director of, well, let's say an operations manager.

David Fishman [00:20:11]:
Okay. A director of operations, whatever it might be. We know if they're working for a competitor and they have 8+ years working for a competitor. We already know that person's qualified for the position, correct? We know the person is qualified. Will they match all the boxes? Have they moved before? Just this morning, I'm looking at a resume. Gentleman went from Colorado, North Carolina, New York from 2000 to present.

Benjamin Mena [00:20:42]:
Wow.

David Fishman [00:20:44]:
Okay. I have a West Coast opportunity. I typically won't call a Boston person for a Los Angeles position. I won't call a Miami person for a Seattle position. Okay. But if I see movement in resumes, then I start going, okay, they're open to relocation, possibly with a possibility. So this, this streak I was on was the end of last year. 10 placements, 10 presentations, 10 deals, correct? The first person that we present gets the position.

David Fishman [00:21:21]:
I warn our clients lots of times too, Benjamin. I warn them. I say, hey, if I present the first person, don't be surprised that they're not the one. I try to prep our clients for this. I really don't want to send over candidates that Don't match. Yeah, we have recruiting tactics. We can all talk about— you dive deeper into recruiting tactics. You want to hold on to a job longer, you can get a candidate in there, maybe as a blocker candidate, I called it, or something like that.

David Fishman [00:21:52]:
As long as there is a way for that candidate to get hired, but you're really not 100% behind this candidate. Okay. You have to have other horses in the race or whatever it might be. But I'd much rather find the best candidate for the first presentation. I think that works very well.

Benjamin Mena [00:22:14]:
So I'm sure a lot of that requires a good intake call. Walk me through your intake and like, can you give me like, for the listeners, can you give me like 3 good questions that help shape your entire search that you asked during the intake?

David Fishman [00:22:29]:
Intake calls. A lot of my clients, you know, I love intake calls always when we get a chance. A lot of the clients I've been recruiting for so many years, they can literally say, we have a job we're working right now in Monterrey, Mexico. Okay. And this is director of operations for a multinational industrial minerals company. Okay. And they can say, David, We need, I could have the VP of HR or the CHRO in this case, call me and say, hey, give me a, find me this type of person. Okay.

David Fishman [00:23:07]:
And I've recruited for so many years for this company. I already understand the recipe, correct? Everything's a recipe. You know, I always get to look at the recipe. I understand their recipe. I understand about 8 of my clients that I've worked with for 20 years plus. What the recipe is. So the intake call, yes, it's important with the hiring manager. But remember, I grew up in recruiting more married to human resources than I was married to hiring managers.

David Fishman [00:23:38]:
Okay. In business, what I mean is the majority of still the jobs we work, we're dealing with human resources, whether we like it or not, we're dealing with human resources. We do ask permission. When the job starts going sideways, if we didn't have a correct intake call, let's get the hiring manager on there and let's talk about it. 3 questions. Okay. How long has this job been open? These are obvious. How long has it been open? And how many candidates have you interviewed before showing up to us? Okay.

David Fishman [00:24:13]:
Okay. If they say, I'm too busy to interview, You're it. Okay. Wow. Wind at our back, correct? If they say 15 candidates and we haven't found the right one, you need to downshift into, you know, 4-wheel drive and get through the mud and figure out exactly what they're looking for. Asking a hiring manager, what is the perfect fit for you, can be the most obvious question, correct? We know if it's a mechanical engineer, chemical engineer, electrical engineer, We know if it's an accounting position, we know if they, if you find a CPA candidate or if you find an audit candidate, you know, whether engineering, accounting, it's all the same recipe, correct? All right. We know what they're looking for, but really on the personality side, what are you looking for? What makes this the best fit?

Benjamin Mena [00:25:06]:
You said something to me that really just stood out. What's the year frame of your longest client?

David Fishman [00:25:15]:
I know that when I first— I get my dates mixed up as I get older. My kids laugh at me sometimes. I say I've been in this business more than 30 years. Well, I really can't. I'm 58. I got out of the Coast Guard when, you know, 27, whatever, you know. But my longest client I was filling temporary deals for When I first started, when I was 28. Yeah.

David Fishman [00:25:42]:
So I'm 58 now. I probably have filled hundreds of positions with this company. In fact, just today, we have everything from director openings down to temporary openings with this company. Okay? And I still, and I've navigated through Different VP of HRs. I've navigated through different HR managers. I navigated through different hiring managers. I navigated— you have to— and I've lost some of these companies for a 2 to 3 year stretch sometimes. Okay.

David Fishman [00:26:18]:
But I always tell young recruiters, I tell everybody like with a bullhorn, what is my key to success is patience. You have to be patient. When a new director of HR comes in or a new person comes into our organization and they say, we are now working with this other firm, it's like somebody just like gave you a slap across the face, you know? And you're like, oh my God, I've just lost this company. I've lost some of my companies 3 or 4 times, but guess what? You just go look at their LinkedIn profile. Okay. You look at their LinkedIn profile, you see every 3 years they switch jobs. You know, I always say people that jump a lot, they do really great in interviews, correct? Yeah. You have to be really good at interview when you have job.

David Fishman [00:27:16]:
And there's a way that they can move up to different levels very quicker that way too. There's all sorts of You see different things, but in this case, you're going to outlive their tenure at the company. And if you outlive the tenure at their company, you're back in. That's it. Patience. Yeah. And delivering candidates too. You just can't expect, just can't expect they're going to, hey, I want to work with Fishman because he delivers.

David Fishman [00:27:47]:
terrible candidates. I work with Fishman because they, his team, Sparrow Company, tries to give us the best possible talent.

Benjamin Mena [00:27:56]:
So you said something important, patience. Here's a question for you. For these companies, what did you do in your 30s that has paid off now in your 50s?

David Fishman [00:28:08]:
Wow. I could tell you that right away. And I think I'm, I think our younger recruiters are probably Guilty of doing something that I used to do. I'm guilty of doing something that I used to do. Okay. I learned from mainly my older brother that relationships were everything.

Benjamin Mena [00:28:29]:
Okay.

David Fishman [00:28:30]:
We would, in the older days, people liked to go out to dinner. They liked to go out to see a baseball game. They liked to go and hang out. It seems like now that ever since COVID people really like to be home. You know, they'd rather be home. They're more homebody-ish, you know? So if I say, hey, I'm flying into Dallas, let's have dinner. They'll be like, great. Uh, I'm glad you're flying to Dallas.

David Fishman [00:28:57]:
If you want to come by the office for a half hour, that's great. But I really don't have time for dinner. I got to know a lot of people and know them really well. And I started working with HR professionals. All right. And these HR professionals, when I started working with them, were HR coordinators, HR generalists, HR manager, director of HR, VP of HR. I don't know how many— I know so many VPs of HR now that I've been working with for 25-plus years. Okay.

David Fishman [00:29:29]:
When I started working with them when they were younger, I encourage our recruiters to get to know their client. Okay. They are in the Great Recession of 2009. It was like a diaspora of HR managers having to leave the client I was doing and landing at this company and landing at that company. And I had the ability to call them up and say, hey, so-and-so, I see you started here. It wasn't like I had to market them again. I had their cell phone, correct?

Benjamin Mena [00:29:59]:
Yeah.

David Fishman [00:30:00]:
And staying in touch with them, offering career advice. How many times do I talk to people I've placed or people that I work with who are now at the VP level, who are going to make a change, and they say, David, can we have a half-hour conversation? Can we talk? Because I'm really nervous about what's happening in our current company, that type of thing. offering. I mean, as a recruiter, you learn a lot about people, correct? And you learn a lot about what companies want and how to deliver that. And you also learn about friendships too. I think of them more as a friend than they think of me as a friend. You see my point? Yeah. Because I'm sort of raised very loyal to who I work with.

Benjamin Mena [00:30:49]:
You mentioned 2009. You mentioned like, People going everywhere. What happened to your business in 2009?

David Fishman [00:30:58]:
Well, in 2009, I was still working with the other, with my brother's company at the time. So we were, he sold the business. He restarted in 2001. We opened up a recruiting firm. By that time I was doing direct placement mainly. And it was around 2001, 2002. And I was building a book of business. I was running the, mainly running the recruiting side.

David Fishman [00:31:21]:
He was the CEO, but also running mainly on the temp side. Okay. In 2008, I started seeing a really bad trend where my current clients were not picking up the phone and calling me. We're talking about, we're seeing layoffs. So we're seeing, I remember, I think it was September 2008. I also placing a lot of HR managers helped my career too, because you get to know HR people, you start placing HR people. My last placement was September 2008. Okay.

David Fishman [00:31:58]:
We went from about 12 recruiters down to only a couple of recruiters. And at that time, I wasn't a partner with this company, even though there was family involved. And talk about like not having a degree and all that stuff. I had expenses. I'm living in Southern California. Okay. I have children, I have this and that. I have to eat.

David Fishman [00:32:21]:
Okay. And that's when I created Sparrow Company. I created Sparrow Company in 2009, and it was either that or potentially go broke. And I work every day realizing this is a for-profit business. Okay. And I had to make my own deals at that point. I had to make my own deals. And that's what I did in 2009.

David Fishman [00:32:46]:
Then I was cast into having non-competes at that time and having to go farm my own business. And nobody was hiring anyways at that time. It was completely, I mean, like shut down. So you have to get creative, correct? Luckily enough, I was able to hold on to and get new clients. In the beginning, I had to go to new clients and then build from there. So I talk about 2014 a lot as being a liberating year for me. That's where I was finally, I was above the clouds again. And I felt like I was in control of our business, of what we do.

David Fishman [00:33:27]:
It's a good feeling. I'll tell you right now, 2026, I have some of the same worries I had as a younger recruiter. Okay? The winds of change are blowing right now. People have to wake up and realize you have to recreate yourself a lot in this business. We have patience. You need patience, but you also have to learn how to recreate yourself.

Benjamin Mena [00:33:52]:
Yeah.

David Fishman [00:33:53]:
Regularly, because we do the same old tricks over and over again and we keep chasing our tail. It doesn't deliver dollars, correct? And if you go 3 to 4 months in there with a bad streak, you better wake up and realize you're doing something wrong. I don't care how much experience you have. You have to hire young people as well to bring creative, fresh ideas into your business. And you have to have older, wiser people, correct, as well too. who have been through, who have been beat up time and time again and are able to come back. Those people combined with a young workforce. Well, people always say, oh, the younger generation and the younger generation, they don't do this.

David Fishman [00:34:34]:
No, the younger generation is probably as bright as they've ever been, in my opinion.

Benjamin Mena [00:34:39]:
So I want to go back to 2009, 2010, because I personally feel like it's not the same as the COVID downturn because As soon as the COVID downturn got done downturning, it shot up like a rocket ship.

David Fishman [00:34:52]:
Correct. It was, it just went right up to some of the biggest dollars we've ever seen in recruiting.

Benjamin Mena [00:34:58]:
It turned into the golden era of recruiting.

David Fishman [00:35:01]:
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I was, it was crazy.

Benjamin Mena [00:35:04]:
But 2009, 2010, it didn't do that. Those years between those years before you felt like things were great in 2014. What did those years teach you about being a top biller that you still to this day use?

David Fishman [00:35:24]:
This could be a good self-reflection right here too, correct? Because maybe I don't use those same tactics anymore. Number one, you had to be a trusted advisor consultant to the people you work with. Okay. If you try to open a business up with no recruiting experience in 2009 and 2010, It could have been some of the toughest times you've ever been through. And there was no LinkedIn back then. There was plenty of marketing ideas though, correct? That you had it, you had a subscription to CareerBuilder or Monster.com. All these things that want to kill recruiters helped recruiters. I always say everything that was out there, this is going to kill recruiting, but just gave us more information.

David Fishman [00:36:06]:
Okay. So consistently staying in touch With people. All right. Number 1. Number 2, being a trusted advisor, even though you're in your 30s. I was in my 30s at the time. It was still like, I have to be— or 40s. I have to be a trusted advisor.

David Fishman [00:36:26]:
Okay. Number 3, patience. Once again, you have to be patient. Things will turn. Just give them time. Okay. And also staying in line with your clients. I read about our clients all the time.

David Fishman [00:36:44]:
Nothing, I don't enjoy anything better than picking up a publication at the airport. I don't read like I used to, a Fortune magazine or Harvard Business Review or whatever it might be. And seeing your clients in these magazines, you know, where they're talking about them. Knowing what's happening with their stock, knowing what's happening with their revenue, and seeing trends in the market. But getting back to it, all this sounds good, but really it's just putting your head down and work in 2009, correct? You had to face rejection on a daily basis. If you can't face rejection, you're never going to be The best recruiter. Okay? If you can't identify talent, you're going to have a hard time too. All right? I can get any recruiter up to speed in a short amount of time of what to look for in a resume to tell you that's the right person.

David Fishman [00:37:45]:
And now we have a couple recruiters on our staff who are always trying to go for that first place presentation, but some— companies want 3 to 5 candidates. Okay. And we have to deliver, you know, so really knowing what your customer wants, but putting your head down and work. That's 2009. The fear of failure every single day of 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, the fear of failure that chases me to This day, last night, I'm thinking not even about this podcast. I'm thinking, wow, I've been knocked in the teeth a few times this month. Uh, I had a meeting with some people, uh, with a group of recruiters yesterday, and I'm like, wow, this is, this has been tough. You know, it's been tough.

David Fishman [00:38:35]:
And, uh, what's gonna happen with that? I don't know, but I have to recreate. I gotta put my head down and work.

Benjamin Mena [00:38:42]:
You talked about recreating, you talked about putting your head down and working. Like before we actually hit the record button, you said that Last year you were focused on the numbers, the billing numbers. This year you've switched it to production focus. Why did you do that switch?

David Fishman [00:38:58]:
For my first 20 years in recruiting, I never cared about how much I billed. I just woke up the other day and we had a meeting a couple of weeks ago, our team, and I realized I don't know how many deals I closed last year.

Benjamin Mena [00:39:16]:
Okay.

David Fishman [00:39:17]:
As a single recruiter, it's just me working a desk. I would try for 30 deals a year. Okay. So, so those deals could be either $25,000, they could be $18,000. If you're 30 deals at $20,000, that's $600,000 in billing, correct? If we do 50 deals at $20,000 average fee, we're at $1 million. Okay. So I always looked at myself as a production recruiter. Okay.

David Fishman [00:39:46]:
I am not a retained recruiting person and we can debate till the— till we're blue in the face, what's better, retained. I think in this year, retained would be far more comfortable than what I put myself through. But I learned in the early days. Let's talk about being competitive too, correct? You have to be competitive. I want to be a production recruiter. I want to close 50 deals this year and we're at 13. Okay. And I want to keep focused on the number of deals because if you're closing the deals, the money will follow.

David Fishman [00:40:19]:
Correct? All right. You can have a good— we did last year, the first 6 months, we did $600,000 or something. Okay. And we're all focused on the dollars, dollars, and we lose sight of the deals then. Correct. If you're focused on $600,000 in June, you might get a little bit lazy. Correct? Hey, we did $600,000. We're so great.

David Fishman [00:40:43]:
Wow. How— look how wonderful we are. And then all of a sudden we wake up and it's the dog days of summer and people are going on vacations. Vice presidents are gone. They can't sign off on things. It has to wait till September, October. We, you know, I, there's these waves in recruiting. You have to catch.

David Fishman [00:41:02]:
And if you miss the October wave, you are screwed. You gotta make some money in October to push you to the next wave of January. Then you gotta hop on that wave again to get you to April through May to June. Okay? And these waves are always building in our business. And if you can't psych that wave, then you have a problem. Okay? If you just look at the, oh, we did $600, we're terrific. We're all patting ourselves on the back. Well, guess what? We woke up and we got punched in the face in September, October.

David Fishman [00:41:34]:
It's the same trap we fall into since I started this, looking at dollars. I'm going to look at deals. I want 50 deals at $20,000. That's $1 million. And I want 100 temporary employees. Okay. If I do the 100 temporary employees plus, you know, 50 deals, our team is doing pretty good.

Benjamin Mena [00:41:53]:
Talking about temp, like in 2023, you launched a temp side. Like, first of all, let's talk about that, but what spurred the idea of going, like, you're doing great contingent, you're doing great with your search firm, you're doing great with exec search. Why start a temp business also?

David Fishman [00:42:09]:
That's partly why we're here in El Paso. And actually I have a business partner on the temporary side who's terrific. His name is Manny Grotto. And I met him by stalking him on LinkedIn. When I came to El Paso, it was twofold. Remember, we're a US-Mexico business. I think it says it somewhere back here. We have recruiters in the United States and we have recruiters in Mexico.

David Fishman [00:42:31]:
I was, I had an office in Tijuana for years. I'm driving back and forth from LA, Orange County to Tijuana. It's always traffic going down the San Diego, unless you leave 11 at night, you know, it's always traffic, traffic. I started going to trade shows. Trade shows are big in our business. to. If you're not going to trade shows for what you recruit in, okay, you're losing money. Okay, for sure.

David Fishman [00:42:54]:
But they had trade shows on here on Mexico manufacturing in El Paso all the time. And so I would fly on an airplane, I'd say I get to El Paso, it's like the desert where I grew up. It's sort of exciting being on the border of such a, of a, of one region, correct? You know, I mean, you have Juárez and you have El Paso, and El Paso and Juárez are like one city. So it really fit well for our USA-Mexico business. All right. On the temporary side, I started on a temp desk. I have a love for temporary work and I always wanted— we've always had like 10 to 15 people of our clients, our close clients on our payroll. Okay.

David Fishman [00:43:35]:
So we regularly, you know, they have an accounting track accounting position. They have a logistics coordinator position, whatever. We always have like 10 to 15 people. So I wanted to have a home base. Remember in 2009 when I went on my own in Los Angeles, from 2009 to 2023, I had no office building. We were all— we were pioneers in virtual. All right. I never had a Teams meeting up until COVID, I don't think.

David Fishman [00:44:06]:
Okay. Yeah, it's so weird. We talk every day now on Teams, but I think it's better not to. I always say it's better that I don't talk to candidates and see them. I'd rather just, because then I start getting judgmental, correct? Just by natural.

Benjamin Mena [00:44:20]:
Yeah.

David Fishman [00:44:20]:
I don't want to be judgmental of people. I'd rather not see people. But anyway, so getting back to the temporary business, I found one of the top salesmen in El Paso and I invited him out to breakfast. Invite him out to breakfast, invite him out to lunch, whatever. And finally I say, hey, why don't you become a business partner? He's at the top of his game. Okay. And why would he, why would he, if he's making this much, doing very well for a national staffing company, why would he come and join Sparrow Company? Okay. On a, just on a whim.

David Fishman [00:44:57]:
So I said, hey, let's do a partnership. I, for years, I tried to expand and my head would explode, correct? Because you can only do so much. And you're like, oh, you're trying to run temp jobs, you're trying to run direct jobs, you're trying to run Mexico, where we have deals. And by the way, we are not a niche firm. We just recruited an HR manager for Monterrey, Mexico. It starts next week. We have an electrical engineer for Guadalajara. that we're working.

David Fishman [00:45:25]:
We have a project manager over in Saltillo. Okay. On the US side, we have completely different, you know, of everything from accounting managers, director of operations, or a person working as a temporary in a rock quarry on the east side of El Paso. So, I mean, there's a lot of, and by the way, our team all works together a lot. So literally we're working on, we do have people who are Focus on temp, but last night we get an order for 10 people. What are we going to do? We're all going to start pitching in to get these jobs filled. Number of deals, let's fill those deals. Correct? Who cares about— fill the deals, the money will follow.

David Fishman [00:46:05]:
The money will be— will just flow in your direction. I believe that.

Benjamin Mena [00:46:08]:
How did you actually convince Manny to jump in? Like, you know, we talked about partnership, but like, walk me through The conversation.

David Fishman [00:46:20]:
Yeah. I think he saw that I dream. Okay. That, you know, dreamers are great sometimes. Uh, Canada dreamers are terrible sometimes. You know, they're, I always say like, make sure they're not dreaming before we present them to a job in Los Angeles. And they haven't even told their spouse about their interviewing for a job in Los Angeles. I always say, make sure my wife, Maria, I just presume she's going to follow.

David Fishman [00:46:44]:
We just moved to El Paso. She's like, no, my dream is Los Angeles. living in Orange County and this, you know, so really check out your dreams before you, you know, vet those dreams before, you know, because you got to be careful with dreamers, correct? You know, this type of thing. In this case, I thought he could see that I was willing to put the hard work into making this work. Okay. And I told him, I still work a desk. I am not a self-removed owner. I know what's going on in business.

David Fishman [00:47:19]:
Since coming to El Paso, he can see my commitment to many of local organizations that we do work with and charitable organizations, with the hospitals, with different nonprofits that we work with. And I believe in donating when times are good to nonprofits of local Like in El Paso or in some other cases. I'm on the board of directors for the Haiti Reforestation Partnership where we replant trees in Haiti and we planted 16 million so far since our organization has been there. Okay? So, I believe in putting your money where your mouth is type of situation. I think Manny saw that. Okay? And I think he understood That I wasn't going to be just living in, though he might disagree. I've really, I've taken up golf the last couple of years and I really love to golf, you know, and he's, oh, what's he doing? Is he golfing again? You know, is this guy golfing again? But besides that, uh, I'm on an airplane every 2 weeks to El Paso. And he saw that my son Noah, he works for the company.

David Fishman [00:48:26]:
I have a, I have another recruiter, Brittany, who's my daughter, who's our top biller right now. She's, for once somebody's kicking my rear end and I hate it, but it is family. That said, we have a, uh, this is not a family business. This is a business, correct? And people perform. So I think he could see that I was all in on what I do. You have to be all in. And maybe one day you could talk to Manny. He's incredible on the temporary side.

David Fishman [00:48:55]:
He is just, you know, it's this constant business development. Staying in touch, correct? Being involved with the— I'm on the board of directors for the El Paso Chamber. He's the ambassador, one of the vice president of ambassadors for El Paso Chamber. So every ribbon cutting, he's there at it. It's dedicating yourself to community. When it comes to temp, you got to dedicate yourself to the community. And I think he saw that dedication.

Benjamin Mena [00:49:25]:
What has been, because you're active with a desk, you're active with a team. What has been one of the hardest parts about building something bigger than your own production?

David Fishman [00:49:36]:
Uh, hiring recruiters. I fail at hiring recruiters. What I'm good at is finding people to support my desk. I always say that my desk is good for $1.5 million regularly. Okay. No, uh, plus $300,000, $400,000 in Mexico a year. And being guilty of what we spoke about, not getting our team out, meeting these other young people who are, who are where you're planting seeds for the future. Because every placement you make could be a future placement, correct? You know, and really realizing the, how the tree grow, how the tree grows and how it takes water.

David Fishman [00:50:19]:
We talk about Haiti reforest, you know.

Benjamin Mena [00:50:21]:
Yeah.

David Fishman [00:50:21]:
It's about planting seeds all the time. And so I think when we lose sight of planting seeds is probably where we need to get back to the basics, always get back to the basics, you know? So I think that would be some of it.

Benjamin Mena [00:50:36]:
You mentioned that both your son and daughter work in the business, right?

David Fishman [00:50:40]:
Yes.

Benjamin Mena [00:50:43]:
That means that there's, the dream has been big enough. The vision has been big enough. for years, for them to join in with that.

David Fishman [00:50:52]:
Absolutely. Yeah. I love the fact that when I'm here in El Paso, I get to stay at a house where my son lives. I get to— he's 26 now. My daughter's 36. I have 3 other children, so I had 5 total. And there's another one that's been related. She's related to the accounting department.

David Fishman [00:51:16]:
My sister has done accounting for us for years. When I first came to El Paso, I said to everybody, if you want to move to El Paso, I'll visit you. She was living in Atlanta when our mother passed away. And I said, I probably will never visit you in Atlanta, but if you want to move to El Paso, I'll be in El Paso one day. And right then COVID happened. It was like, you're never coming to El Paso. You'll never see this and that. And my son was working for a very good client of ours in doing the tower, the windmill towers, wind generation business.

David Fishman [00:51:53]:
And he was climbing those towers and he was doing repair on the blades 300 feet in the air, being strapped in. And I told him, probably my son had to work harder than everybody. I said, you need to go be on your own for 2 to 3, 4 years. So he worked a manufacturing job. Then he got hired on. People go, oh, well, it was your client of years. Well, he had to go through the process and he proved himself. And after a couple of these wild times where he's swinging up in the air, 300 feet in the air, I said, you know, maybe it's time you come join the business.

David Fishman [00:52:25]:
He works at Temporary Desk. He works for Manny. He doesn't work directly for me. And they are constantly going out to clients and getting to know their business. And so there's a lot of joy. My oldest daughter, who's a recruiter in this business, just does a wonderful job and I'm so proud of her. But she will also tell you nothing is really given to her. She has to perform like everybody else has to perform, but she does a good job.

David Fishman [00:52:55]:
And last year I was a top biller. This year she's definitely it's going to be hard to catch up to her. Yeah.

Benjamin Mena [00:53:03]:
I love that your dream was big enough that they wanted to be part of it and they're help forming their dream. But do you ever think in the back of your head, like about legacy?

David Fishman [00:53:13]:
I do. And also without past the family members, we have our general manager who lives in Tijuana, Eduardo, who's been with our company since 2014. We have Marian VR, in Monterrey, Mexico, who's been with us for over 7 years. We have Samaritana in Monterrey, who's been with us for over 7 years. We have Lila in Saltillo, who's been with us for over 3 and a half years now. We have Zayda, our operations coordinator, who lives over in Juárez, who's going up on 3 years. We have incredibly tenured people. One of our top recruiters was an HR manager for a customer of mine.

David Fishman [00:53:54]:
And he lives in Ohio and he just celebrated his 8th year anniversary with our company. Okay. So we have an extremely strong 10-year team who has been through ups and downs and have to hear me bitch and complain when things are bad and have me happy as hell when things are good. So legacy, yes. I don't just think about family. I think about the team. I really do. And how much each one of these people mean to me and how they've really changed my life in so many ways.

David Fishman [00:54:28]:
And also have taken a risk like Manny took as well.

Benjamin Mena [00:54:34]:
By chance, did you ever see the Broadway play Hamilton?

David Fishman [00:54:40]:
No, it's always been on my bucket list.

Benjamin Mena [00:54:42]:
But so there's one of the songs or one of the parts of the play I think it's Eliza sitting there talking about Alexander Hamilton, like writing constantly like he's running out of time. He's running out of time. He's running out of time. He's writing like he's running out of time. During our pregame, you mentioned that you felt like you were running out of time, but you still have so many years left. Like, what is spurring that internal feeling of time is running out?

David Fishman [00:55:13]:
Boy, I forgot we spoke about that. I believe that something is chasing me on a daily basis. I felt that way when I was 32, 30, not 32, but 30 also. I think that's what drives me in business is like, I feel like time is running out and it only accelerates as you get older. I know they say 58's the new 48. I know that people tell me, oh, you don't look 58. But when you start having people you went to high school with on a regular basis, like they're gone. All right.

David Fishman [00:55:48]:
My wife probably hates this conversation more. Like I'm preparing for like the ending, you know, in a weird way. And I want to continue. I feel like something's chasing me. Absolutely. 100%. I think that's part of being a good recruiter because when I'm, when I've gotten knocked in the teeth over the last couple months, I've lost deals and I've just been second place. I hate being second place.

Benjamin Mena [00:56:09]:
Yeah.

David Fishman [00:56:11]:
I always question myself, is that me? Am I really— if— is that me getting slower? Is that me not being as good as I used to be? Correct? Is that me too stuck in my ways, even though I profess to everybody you have to change with the times? Those are the things. Those are the things that haunt me on a regular basis. Okay. And Yes, I do feel like I'm running out of time, but I know that there's more time in front of me. And I still dream to have a multi-office operation on the temporary side. I have accepted the fact that on the— I've accepted the fact on the direct placement side, when we hit $2 million, I'm happy. Okay. But I realize legacy-wise, sellability-wise, it's the temp side also.

David Fishman [00:57:10]:
It's a combination of both, correct? It is a combination of both. And I can guarantee you my dream on the temporary side is to have the I-10 freeway going from California to San Antonio and having an office in Tucson, Arizona, Phoenix, Arizona, San Antonio, and being dedicated and having our corporate office stay in this city I love of El Paso, because I love this city and I love being here and I love the sense of community and I love they've opened their arms to us and we've opened our arms to them as well. And so being dedicated to this community and bringing something to the— and when I talk about sellability, I'd rather, I'm not saying I would just want to make big to sell. But once you get to that level of temp where you have 300, 500, 1,000 people, I talk about being above the clouds in 2014. I feel like then I'll be above the clouds on the temporary business side.

Benjamin Mena [00:58:10]:
If there's a recruiter listening to this conversation with you, David, they're in their late 20s, they're in their early 30s. You feel like you're running out of time now and you've been in this game for a while. What would you tell that recruiter that feels like they have so much time in front of them?

David Fishman [00:58:29]:
I would tell them that anybody, I tell this to my children, I think I talked to my son about it last night. I mean, they probably get tired of me talking. By the way, I talk a lot. I think recruiters get paid to talk. You have to be conversational. If you're going to be good, you have to be a conversationalist, correct? You really have to create. I tell people I create conversations for a living. Okay? You have to jump on stage.

David Fishman [00:58:52]:
Here I am, David Fishman, recruiter, 58 years old, 30 years of business, whatever it might be. But getting back to a young person, I used to think that when I was 29, 30, that when I was 35, I would be old. Then I thought, And I woke up and I realized I am in the best ever age there is for work and professionalism and matching people. Okay. I started in the days where you could still see somebody in the 1960s, '70s, Vietnam era that you can still place. And now my resume says, you know, from '86 to present, you get my point? Now I'm the one where they're judging their resumes on the dates. I don't care what people say. People look at tenure.

David Fishman [00:59:44]:
They look at these types of things. It's just natural that we do that. I would say when they get to their 40s, it's only just begun. Okay. It really, the 40s are very liberating to me in so many ways because I realized that I'm still young in the 40s. Okay. Then here comes the 50s. And then you go into a board of directors meeting or you're working with a private equity firm and you're working directly with the CEO and they're 55 years old and you're 55 years old.

David Fishman [01:00:19]:
Of course, you get these young people that come up and they're 42 and they're CEO and this and that. We're talking real life though, Benjamin, real life. The 50 to 60-year-old crowd, Are at the board of directors table. You realize so many doors have opened up to you now when you're in the— so I would say that to a person in their 20s, you have the longest runway you can imagine. You can mess up still. You can change your career. You could, if you wanted to be a doctor at 35, you could still become a doctor. And if you got it by the time you're 45, Or 50, you still have 20 years of being a doctor, making cuckoo whatever and enjoying your life.

David Fishman [01:01:04]:
So realize that when you're in your upper 20s, you have room for mistakes and you have room to change. And if you work hard and you love what you do, then you'll be successful. And if you dream, so dreaming. Working hard and also monitoring your results. Yeah. You have to monitor your results.

Benjamin Mena [01:01:32]:
You've been part of the Pinnacle Society for a while now.

David Fishman [01:01:35]:
Yeah.

Benjamin Mena [01:01:36]:
What does the Pinnacle Society mean to you?

David Fishman [01:01:40]:
Wow. It is an organization that, well, I tell you, when I first got in, I had a chip on my shoulder. I still have a chip on my shoulder sometimes with degrees and no degrees and this and that. And, you know, I don't usually get jealous of other recruiters, but I do sit at a table with these people at the next conference. So if I think I'll be there, but if I'm not, but whenever we have a conference and I'm there and I go, I'm David Fishman, I built $1.2 million this year, you know, whatever it is. And then you have a young 35-year-old kid. I could think of some names. I won't name them, but They're just so freaking good at what they do.

David Fishman [01:02:26]:
And I remember being 35 saying, how does this guy do $3 million a year? And now I see these 35, we're talking about 35, 40, 45, 50, and they're kicking my ass. Okay. In terms of, we don't look at it that way in the meetings. I'm just talking about myself in my mind. I'm like, how does he do that? That's amazing. Correct? So really being around all these professionals that bill so much money is, wow. Correct? Yeah. Yeah.

David Fishman [01:02:56]:
So I look at them more like, and now I've been in it so long that I have some really, some, you know, we don't see each other outside of our conferences as much, but boy, when you see, I can name 10 people right now. When I see them, I will give them a big hug. I missed them. And I've learned so much from these people about recruiting and recruiting tactics and realizing we've all come from different walks of life. We all would. But at the end of the day, we have vision, we have drive, we look at our results and we see where we are and we have the ability to change on a dime. Okay. Because when you're going down a wrong path in recruiting, And you don't have the ability to stop, turn around, go back the other direction and go find another mine with gold or silver in it.

David Fishman [01:03:48]:
Then that, that can, so the ability to change with these people is just, wow. And they're just, they're terrific people.

Benjamin Mena [01:03:55]:
This is going to be my last question. And, you know, because, because you are part of the Pinnacle Society, you get a chance to talk to a lot of recruiters and I'm sure recruiters hit you up like, what's working BD-wise? Like, how did you build your company? How did you build your desk? I'm sure you get tons of questions, even from the recruiters on your team. In all the questions that you have gotten over the years, is there a question that you wish somebody would ask you, but nobody ever does? And what would be that answer?

David Fishman [01:04:24]:
That's a really good one. What does it really take to become a recruiter? What does it really take to become a recruiter? That's probably the most important question to Correct. If you think this is an 8-to-5 job, you better run. You better go to another— if you think that these deals happen by accident, you better go. Yeah, we have good economies where things match up so perfect and the deal comes together and you think you're like the top recruiter, you're placing the first candidate, and then you wake up in 2023, End of 2025, 2026, and you see the winds are changing and you think you can get away with 8 to 5, you're wrong. If you think that magic, that this magically happens, no deal is an accident. Okay? No deal is an accident. No deal that falls apart is an accident either.

David Fishman [01:05:23]:
It was meant to fall apart because it wasn't the correct fit. All right. And if you think you know better than your clients who are actually paying you, then that's another thing too. So what does it take to become a recruiter? Because it takes a lot. It takes a lot. And it takes everything from what we talked about, from dreaming. Once again, dreaming, putting your head down, doing the work, looking at the results. That's it.

David Fishman [01:05:52]:
If you could do that, you could be a recruiter. I'll end it. I've said this before on other things, but my older brother taught me something very powerful when I first started. He said, in recruiting or in staffing, he said under staffing, in staffing, you only have to work half a day. That's it. Just work half a day and you'll be fine. But he said, always remember to choose which 12 hours you want to work.

Benjamin Mena [01:06:19]:
Okay.

David Fishman [01:06:20]:
And I believe that. And I know when I get comfortable and I start doing less hours, I can tell my billing will go down. It really does take sending, uh, uh, you know, sitting out a candidate list on a Saturday afternoon. And last but not least, I tell this to every recruiter, you have to come in on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, work as hard and get as many submittals as possible. If you work those first 3 days a week, Thursday, Friday will bleed into the following week, correct? The minute you get too complacent on a Monday or Tuesday, you're not going to have enough momentum to get to the following Monday. So that's it.

Benjamin Mena [01:07:06]:
David, this has been an amazing interview. If somebody wants to follow you or connect with you, how do they go about doing that?

David Fishman [01:07:13]:
You can, uh, Sparrow Company on, uh, Well, David Fishman on LinkedIn, of course. David Fishman Sparrow Company. I also have Sparrow Company LLC on Instagram and Facebook. And I've been starting to drop some videos recently. I'm going to increase that too. As I get older, you talk about things chasing me down and those type of things. I do want to spread the word about recruiting.

Benjamin Mena [01:07:37]:
Correct.

David Fishman [01:07:39]:
I'm an evangelist when it comes to recruiting. I love what we do. I think it's the best job I could have ever had. And I'm so happy I fell into it. And I'm very thankful to the ones that helped show me the way. So they can find me on Facebook, on, on Instagram, Sparrow Company, and also on LinkedIn.

Benjamin Mena [01:07:58]:
Well, David, I just want to say thank you. One of the things that you so often do not see in our space is somebody that's been in the game this long, but still Excited every single day. But I know why you're excited is because of the impact that this career, this business, this desk has had on you.

David Fishman [01:08:20]:
Yeah. It's had a huge influence. And I look at it as my desk. I still say my desk. This is my desk. And it's been a good ride. And hopefully I'll keep outrunning the thing chasing me down, whatever that might be. But thank you so much, Benjamin.

David Fishman [01:08:39]:
I've, uh, I've watched your— watched this for a long time. And then I'm like, wow, I'm here. And this is one of the pinnacles of my career. So thank you, Benjamin.

Benjamin Mena [01:08:49]:
I'm excited that I cannot wait for this to go live. And for you listening, 2026, it is your year. Put the work down, put your head down. Make it happen. Atlas is a CRMx, a CRM that actually understands context. It captures everything you say, hear, read, and write. Every interview, client call, LinkedIn message, email, and WhatsApp automatically. Not because you spent the time entering it.

Benjamin Mena [01:09:18]:
It's because Atlas is always listening. Then it goes one step farther and tells you the next action to take. So when you need to fill a role, People Search ranks the best candidates and tells you why. No digging required. The same memory turns BD into a shortlist of who to chase and why. So you win more clients. Need to see your pipeline? Speak to your dashboards and Atlas builds a view automatically tracking whatever matters to you. Whether you place permanent or contract, Atlas covers both with a new contract suite.

Benjamin Mena [01:09:43]:
That means you never have to chase a timesheet again and live margin visibility on every single placement. And with its new MCP and API, Atlas plugs into your, your LLMs, Claude, ChatGPT, and the rest of your stack. The low-value work that keeps you from billing, Atlas does it for you. Atlas customers right now are saying that they're seeing a 50% higher candidate response rates. A 35% increase in new clients won, 15 hours saved every week, monthly billings jumping 85%, and agencies hitting 150% of their annual revenue target by building their business with Atlas. If you want more information, check out Recruit with Atlas.

David Fishman [01:10:21]:
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Elite Recruiter Podcast with Benjamin Mena. If you enjoyed, hit subscribe and leave a rating.