Mastering the Art of Recruitment: Lessons from David Perry's 1600+ Executive Placements Part 2

Intro [00:00:01]:

Welcome to the elite recruiter podcast with your host, Benjamin Menna, where we focus on what it takes to win in the recruiting game. We cover it all from sales, marketing, mindset, money, leadership, and placements.

Benjamin Mena [00:00:19]:

This is part 2 of the interview with David Perry on the Elite Recruiter podcast. If you have not listened to part 1 yet, Make sure to go dive into part 1 because that was absolutely phenomenal. And once again, listeners, thank you guys so much, and keep crushing it. I wanna kinda dial in. So do you have a a team of researchers?

David Perry  [00:00:38]:

Yes. So so the team so here's what happens. Right? And we're We're on vacation, and, what actually, the client is about an hour and a half drive from where we were. So we went and met him, And, and his team asked the questions, came back, and I said, okay. We can't fit the profile yet. It's almost done. But, it's gotta be here's where I need the research done. And it was gonna take me a couple weeks to get this stuff out of CEO so that I could go out with the profile.

David Perry  [00:01:06]:

So I told Corey What I need, he picks the researcher. And so what the researcher does is go out and find me the names, titles, phone numbers, email addresses to the best ability Of every single person in this geographic area in that vertical and produces a list. That gets put into VINCIER, And it pops up on my screen. Got 3 screens in front of me. Pops up on my screen, and, I called them all. And I introduced myself, and I don't think I have had anybody hang up On the I hate 10 or 12 years because I always say, Lee, my name is David Perrine, and I'm the author of Criminal Marketing for Job Hunters. I'm also the managing partner of Perry Martell International, which is up. Boom.

David Perry  [00:01:46]:

Okay. So you have a and I love this because you

Benjamin Mena [00:01:49]:

have a team of people that Do the research so that way you could spend the time actually having the conversations.

David Perry  [00:01:54]:

My time is optimized. And then people say, tell me about the job. And I say, no. I said, I do not have the verbal acuity. I'll say it over and over again. I don't have the verbal acuity to do justice to this role, But I got a 7 page overview. Happy to ship it to you. Oh, great.

David Perry  [00:02:13]:

Out it goes. And this, by the way, is all This is detailed. All of this is detailed on our website in the, a brochure called the inside out approach. Anybody can download it and, and for free. And I know many recruiters who call me after things like this, say, are you sure? I'm absolutely sure. Skip Freeman and I. Do you know Skip? Nope. He's written a couple of cookbooks.

David Perry  [00:02:38]:

What I publish, use it for god's sake. You know, because I'm standing on the shoulders of giants. All the people that have gone before me, I'm standing on their shoulders. You know, help yourself to my stuff. So I send them I said, listen. I can't I don't have the verbal acuity to justice. I'm gonna send you a 7 page overview, and, you read it. You got some quiet time? And call me back and tell me why you're interested or, you know, how I missed the mark by a country mile.

David Perry  [00:03:05]:

And they laugh, and I send it.

Benjamin Mena [00:03:06]:

Well, okay. So that that this that's about ready to jump into another question I have. So let's to take a pause on that. What does your typical day look like as a big bowler?

David Perry  [00:03:17]:

I do everything That closes on money that day. 1st Okay. All the calls to candidates, All the calls to the clients, any difficult conversations I have to have are out of the way. My day normally starts. When I'm really slacking, 8 o'clock. When I'm so that's a typical day. I'll get all the the hardship out of the way, and then I'm typically following up conversations to set coffee meetings, set appointments. And then if I have time left over, I will have conversations with candidates who I know are great, that love their jobs, that I'm not gonna need To to move for anywhere from 6 months to a couple years, and that's my day.

Benjamin Mena [00:04:09]:

Awesome.

David Perry  [00:04:10]:

Close the deal. I sent it to Anita. She bills them, and Corey calls the research team and says thank you very much, and on to the next one.

Benjamin Mena [00:04:17]:

So, another question I have is, what does like, you like, you said, you've kind of have this on your website for recruiters to the to kind of take a look at. But what does your process look like from client outreach to closing that placement? Include, like, the researcher talk and all that stuff.

David Perry  [00:04:34]:

So, Odway, everything is in that brochure. It's 8 pages, 3 minutes to read. You got everything. Outreach is typically nowadays, so there's 2 ways. I'm either answering a question or answering the phone call because someone phones and, hey. We heard about you from we'd like to talk to you. And then it's a, you know, a phone call. Hey, David Perry returning your call.

David Perry  [00:04:52]:

You know, you heard about me from so and so. What can I do for you? You know, what what's the best use of the next 5 minutes of your time? Now when's the last time a recruiter said what's the the best use of 5 minutes of your time? Because if a recruiter gets a prospect on the phone, he just wants to get a job order. No. I wanna save my time. You know, if the guy says, well, I'm not really sure. I said, well, then, you know, either we, Let's take a couple minutes to talk about why you're not sure, or you can call me back when you are. It's my time. That's all I sell.

David Perry  [00:05:22]:

Right? And, you know, and I I got this ruthless after the stroke. You know, when you have a stroke and you wake up, you know, a couple days later, And, it takes you several years to be able to have a a more than a half an hour conversation, because it did. You know, I had 40 minutes of time that I could use to talk to clients and talk to candidates every single day. That's it. After that, I was in the fog, and I was useless. So I got really ruthless, and I learned it from reading another book for another sales guy. I got ruthless about my time and the questions I asked in getting to the point. And, Canadians don't like people to get to the point, so I do more business with Americans than I do with Canadians.

David Perry  [00:06:07]:

Thank god. US buck. Yay. So I'll have that conversation, or I'm gonna do an MPC call. And I'll phone up now or I'll send an email. I sent 1 last week. I sent an email to a guy I've never met. And I said, I got a guy who's gonna come off the bench in the next 3 or 4 days.

David Perry  [00:06:30]:

He's four x the company. He's Where he's at now on the on the assignment he's been on been on. That's why I call it assignment. And, I think you should meet him because he could do this, this, and this for your business. Are you interested? And then I detail what the fee arrangement was right there in the email, And I sent off a note. And he, like most people that get this kinda email or a phone call, call back and say, hey. Thanks for thinking of us. You know, I know we've never met and no problem with the fee and blah blah blah.

David Perry  [00:07:01]:

Great. That's all I wanna know. And when I send an email, it's because in the email footer, You know, right at the bottom of the footer are 3 or 4 of the books I printed, a a a a link to, either a Wall Journal article or a a Time Magazine or an Inc article, just below my signature and phone number. So that's my typical day. If I've got an assignment, I'm, gonna take 5 or 6 minutes and maybe 10 to read the research, make Make sure it's all lined up correctly, and then I'm on the phone. I got a headset. You know? I got a Plantronics headset. Can't live without this thing.

David Perry  [00:07:39]:

It's wireless. I had the first one that was wired to go to the dog. I'm hoping a 20 a postage cord. Yeah. Absolutely. Right? And I, I'll make 5 calls. I'll leave 5 voice mail messages because nobody talks to anybody. So unless I've got a a, Someone's cell number.

David Perry  [00:07:55]:

I did this a couple weeks ago. I called a CEO I've never talked to before, and he answered. Got a call to cell. I said, oh god. I wanted to leave a voice mail. I said, no. Tell me. I said, no.

David Perry  [00:08:03]:

It's Let me call back. I'll call you back in 30 seconds, and I'll leave the voice mail. Why did I do that? Because I didn't wanna pitch on the phone because he didn't know me. And when I'm pitching, my voice goes up about an octave, and I hate it, but I can't, Stop it. So I said, no. I'll call you back just to lunch the call. Click. Boom.

David Perry  [00:08:24]:

I got his voice mail. Left a message. He called me back couple couple hours later. Right? And, we're having we're gonna continue this conversation. That's it. I'll get through all the calls I have to make. Sometimes it'll take me half an hour. Sometimes it'll take me 5 hours, but I'll sit and call and leave voice mail.

David Perry  [00:08:42]:

Called, I'll leave voice mail. I don't automate any of that stuff. I don't automate you know, I don't do call drops with here's a message. Every single one of them is personalized. That is well, personalized. I know their name. I know what they do, and I personalized the message that I'm gonna leave. You know? Because if I'm gonna if I'm gonna leave 3 paragraphs of information, You know, the 1st piece is personalized as much as close as I can get it, and the research researchers know what to do.

David Perry  [00:09:08]:

And then I go and have lunch, and I probably do some, reading or writing. The last year, I have been working on 2 books, revolutions need leaders, And that is I'm doing it with with a partner, and that book will be up sometime next year. I haven't chosen a publisher yet. Actually, I haven't finished Rite Aid. He's done his stuff. I'm I'm the slacker. And, that, that book, Revolutionist Need Leaders, will Reset the entire recruiting industry because I go really it's my last book, and I'm more interested in solving a problem that we have. We can get it that anytime you want to.

David Perry  [00:09:51]:

Then, make it maximizing the money. And do you know why I'm interested? Well, actually, they kind

Benjamin Mena [00:09:59]:

of, like we're gonna take a pause on the question I just asked because I goes into the next question I was gonna ask you. What motivates you to keep going? I'm alive here.

David Perry  [00:10:08]:

I'm alive, and, I and I don't say that lightly. I mean, you've read the book, so you know that, I was on death's door, when I was living in Colorado Springs, Colorado, my father was in Canadian Navy. So, of course, we got stationed at the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. While he was there as the only Canadians working for the, on loan to the US government during the Vietnam War. And he was also at NORAD, which was Just down the corner. Right? And the day we arrived, next day, my mother had a a heart, ends up in the hospital for 9 months. She's gone. They take care of her In the hospital, my citrus are flown out to, Nova Scotia, and, my dad's got a pretty big job there.

David Perry  [00:10:52]:

So we lived in a cluster, and there was about 15 houses in this cluster. And, I don't know how he did it, but, I was farmed out, not farmed out. I was taken care of by a a a different family every single day. You know, I go to school, but I come home and I'd be at, You know, Johnny's house or Susie's house or whatever. They, you know, take care of me, Phoebe, make sure I do my goddamn homework. And and, my dad would pick me up about 10 o'clock, put me to bed. So this went on for quite a while, and then, I had a heart condition that they discovered. And, and it was rare.

David Perry  [00:11:25]:

And, in the end, they they I was on, seaward on the 4th floor in Denver, Colorado with All of the rest of the terminal patients, all the Vietnam vets had had, you know, multiple holes in their head from shells, took their helmet off, and Arm is missing. I I made some great friends. I learned to play poker, all kinds of stuff. But what I really learned was How Americans I may I may get a little crumbly here. How Americans really take care at that time, and I still think you're capable of doing it. How Americans really take care of each other. Seriously, like, I've never seen in the whole world, and we travel all over the world. You know that.

David Perry  [00:12:04]:

So, I'm in the hospital. I'm not going to school. My dad's been interviewed by the newspaper. People tell their friends all over the world, and all of a sudden, I got these stamps. That's why they're collecting stamps. These stamps being sent in from all the bases the US has around the world to the hospital. They used to deliver envelopes or bags every day. Seriously, I'm 11 year I'm 10 years old when I go in.

David Perry  [00:12:27]:

I'm 11 when I come out. They did the heart operation, but it was Richard Nixon's cardiologist that they flew from Washington to Denver to do, and there's a whole bunch of, like, a 100 plus surgeons in attendance in this auditorium as it Did this thing obviously, I lived. It was the 1st time the operation had ever been done in in Amer in North America and lived. My point is, you know, why do I do it? Because I'm alive, and I have a debt. I mean, they took care of me. They took care of my family. We stayed for three and a half years, almost became an American citizen that close. Dad got a medal from Nixon, and they sent him home.

David Perry  [00:13:05]:

This is before he Had his crash. Got a a medal from Trudeau when he got back. And for me, it's always been payback. But what has it has been trying to get To do my part to get America back to what I experienced. Because, you know, I'm there with another family 7 days a week for almost a year and every single day besides doing homework and all that kind of stuff. On the weekends, you know, can I watch cartoons? Oh, god. No. Know, there's so many evangelical Pentecostals that I got stuck with or what that I stayed with.

David Perry  [00:13:37]:

And and they stick them in a car, You know, the big, long station wagon that, you know, you think the Lincoln lawyers Lincoln is long with these station wagons. They were built like, you know, Humvees. Right? And we'd go out, and we'd we'd we, you know, we'd direct school or paint a barn or dig ditches or pick up. I did that for, you know, for 2 years. That's, that's what I lived, and I loved it. You know, you come back to Canada, we don't have that kind of Comradery. You know, Canadians like to and don't don't get me wrong. I love Canadians too.

David Perry  [00:14:10]:

But Canadians like to talk about how different they are from Americans. Really? A, we're not, and we're not better. Don't I hope no no Canadians see this podcast, but, really, Americans know how to take care of each other. They've been doing it for, you know, 250 years. It was a great experiment that's still going on. And push comes to shove. You know, you all rally around the flag, and it gets shit done. So what I'm hoping, with doing Work Insight and my new job hunt is that I can get people back to having time.

David Perry  [00:14:46]:

So People land a job that they get to keep or they're in control of their life so that, people can turn around and start to help solve The bigger problems in the world, that's where we're headed. That's my payback. So why do I do what I do? That's it. And and and And that's what I put in the in the epilogue of hiring greatness. I mean, you've read it, so you know it's there. That answer the question?

Benjamin Mena [00:15:10]:

Perfectly. Abs. Well, let's, let's jump over to the action side of, the podcast, the quick fire questions. And I know these are questions I've I've I've asked you before, but, you know, even if it's the same advice, Let's fire. And what advice would you give to a brand new recruiter that's just starting off in this industry this year?

David Perry  [00:15:28]:

Go and write Five pieces of help, aimed at candidates and 5 pieces aimed at recruiters. If you don't have a blog, start 1 and put up you know, here's, 10 ways to assess a new job Or 3 things you have to do, to make sure your resume is read by recruiters. Write those articles and Publish them. If you have to do it on a blog, great. If you can put if you can push them out through a community newspaper, all the better. And new recruiter, you have Give where you get to.

Benjamin Mena [00:16:06]:

Full stop. And if you don't have a blog set up, you can also, on LinkedIn, write, articles.

David Perry  [00:16:12]:

Yep. Yeah. And and write it, and you don't have to worry about SEO in it. If it's a good article and it's helpful, you know, when you put a couple of hashtags at the back, it's not hard to figure out what the hashtags are, folks. People will find you, and you give before you get. You give before you get.

Benjamin Mena [00:16:31]:

I think that's actually a great piece of advice. You know, I wrote a article about the cleared search Probably three and a half years ago, maybe coming on 4 years ago, I had, you know, companies reach out to me from it. And I finally, like, asked the company. I was like, hey. Like, why'd you Reach out I literally said it was like, hey. Like, why'd you guys reach out to me? Like, what's going on? And they're like, well, this article that you wrote is the number 1 art trending article if you search this in Google. And I'm like, oh, okay.

David Perry  [00:16:59]:

You did the right thing. You had zero expectation probably, But she did the right thing. I mean, writing career guide for the high-tech professionals and writing guerrilla marketing for job hunters, they were stunts, Really, because they were designed to get people to stop calling me. I've only got 4 phone lines, and you're dre jamming me. Well, it took off on its own. You know, and when I did guerrilla marketing, the 1st edition, I wrote the whole book. I sat back and I said, you know, no one's gonna fucking believe me. No No one's gonna believe me.

David Perry  [00:17:31]:

So that's why I reached out, and you you know the figures that don't mean. I reached out to the blue cricket community and he said, you know, I read your article about this. You'd be really good in my book. I wrote this. I think yours is better. So every single one of these books, the 3 editions, have had my stuff pulled And other people's stuff put in. Now don't get excited, folks. If a book's got a 100 it's got if a book's got 95,000 words in it, 90,000 of them are mine.

David Perry  [00:17:56]:

So, no, nobody else wrote my book, but I gave everybody credit. You know, Rand Thorne, Shelley Steckle, just a gym, Durbin. Just Hundreds and hundreds of people. Well, hundreds of hundreds. Probably a 100 recruiters over the last 3 editions have put stuff in the book, and it's Brought them business. Brought them notoriety. More power too. In fact, I actually wrote a guide on for gorilla, So for people that participated in that, I wrote a guide.

David Perry  [00:18:28]:

Here's how you promote your piece in the book so that you get on the radio, so that you Get More, advertise it. And I don't care if they sell books. I don't you know, I think I make 28¢ every time someone buys a book. Whoopie. Seriously. And and then in fact, the last 2 editions, I took no advance. I said to the publisher, I said, Forget the advance. You know, it said, here's your $20,000 back.

David Perry  [00:18:55]:

I want a better I want a better rate. And And Jay called me. He said, are you insane? Because 50% of the the advance is his. Right? I said, Jay, Jay, Jay, the book sells. We make a fortune. He goes and and and my my agent was went bananas because he's used to getting his piece for the advance, but, We got essentially 5 x terms of percentage, back from what, we would have normally gotten. And I took the book to to drag people to the website, Guerrilla Working For Job, I'm sure GMforTH.com, And we sold stuff on that site. Well, I sold 21,000 people I didn't know.

David Perry  [00:19:34]:

Stuff from a $9 Audio to a 1,000 doll actually, 1500 a $9 1900, job search package. So That's how you end up getting multiple streams of income. We've talked about this before. This is why we do it. We do it we do something once, And now it's even easier with AI, especially you know this. You do something once and you can recast it, reformat it, and send it out. I'm looking forward to that. I got a a 1000000 words in print

Benjamin Mena [00:20:04]:

The 2nd IDSP actually, like, talked about his AI program. The so the first person I thought about was you. Awesome. Next question. What advice would you give to an experienced recruiter that wants to continue to have success?

David Perry  [00:20:19]:

Get before you get. Again, especially an experienced recruiter and and, a bunch of the people that are probably gonna listen to this podcast are experienced recruiters, and I know them well. And they're going, yep. Yep. Yep. Now is the time, if you're an expert in whatever, To meet with association presidents, to meet with principles of schools, whatever university and go, okay. Here's my expertise. Put me on stage.

David Perry  [00:20:47]:

You know? Let me write an article. Expect nothing for it other than if you speak, Do yourself a favor and pay $1,000 and grab a videographer. If you're on stage, wherever you go, grab a videographer and have them capture it. And if you're on stage and you can't afford to do that, get a, a digital micro a recorder and, and record it Because you could use that information over and over again. I'm far you know, when Kevin Donlen and I used to speak, because Kevin Donlen and I did, Talks all over North America from New York to San Francisco, and we're on stage together at the same time. Never been done. I did that because the 1st speak speech was in Detroit. It was shortly after I'd had my stroke.

David Perry  [00:21:34]:

Nobody knew about the stroke. I mean, k. Not quite true, but that's another story. But I wasn't sure I could stand for more than 20 minutes and talk, so I asked Kevin to come with me. So we did, and what we ended up doing was we ended up quite accidentally. Not even splitting the not even splitting the slides, But he was a dry guy, and I was a color commentary. And we argued and talked about 2 and a half minutes. I talked for 2 and a half minutes, And he'd interrupt me and go, folks, folks.

David Perry  [00:22:01]:

What he really meant to say was and so we've kept that up, for 10 years now. And when I speak in Romania, I was in Romania with Anita where I, a talk from about 900 HR people actually. And, kind of psych at a psychometrics conference, And we're on opposite ends of the stage. She's here, and I'm here, and the audience is out here. And before we start, she goes so she starts walking towards me. I figured, you know, come over, you know, wish me luck or, you know, give me a kiss or something. Right? She and she gets here, and I lean in, and she grabs The clicker. And she goes walking across the the stage.

David Perry  [00:22:36]:

She stops in the middle. She looks at the audience. She says, you'll thank me for this later. Exploded. Right? I think and and, you know, it's so much easier to give information when people are laughing. And, you know, and and that would be the other thing I would say to, you know, whether it's a seasoned recruiter or a new recruiter. Yeah. Go in and go and give a talk at a local chamber of commerce or school or whatever.

David Perry  [00:23:00]:

Have your notes, but do it al fresco. You know, just get up there and speed ball it. Just talk. Everyone anyone who's been in this business for more than a year is an expert. You know, the the life expectancy of a of a recruiter is still Measured in months, sub ten. Okay? The guy that I went to I mean, you know the story. I opened an executive search division For a, a, a secretarial group. Got married, came back, guy fired me because 3 of my deals had closed.

David Perry  [00:23:38]:

He owed me 80 he owed me 50% of 84 Fran said I got lucky, told me to fuck off, and threw me out of the office. So I went home, you know, day after my wedding. I went home. Hey, Henny. Guess what? I can paint the I can paint the house. It's great, and we can't afford to buy any paint on it. Anyway, if you've been in this business for more than a year, you're an expert, and people need What you have and what and people now, especially now, are in great need. So, give As much of you as yourself as you can, and and limit it.

David Perry  [00:24:12]:

You know? Say I'm gonna if I got a 60 hour week, I'm gonna spend 5 hours doing this, And stick to that because the rest of it has to be for you and your family or you and the business. But you do that, you'll see great rewards, and you'll get better and better at your craft Because people will ask you questions. I mean, I've been at places where people have asked. We we pay, we we play whenever I speak. I we play stump the recruiter. And I state I'd say to people in the audience, I said, okay. What about Steph the Rooter? You ask me anything. Anything.

David Perry  [00:24:41]:

Something about my sex life. Anything. Recruiting recruit related, job search related. And if I can't answer the question, you got $50. No one's ever Collect it. It's 50 US. It's real money. No one's ever collected the $50, and I had 1 girl stand up in San Francisco at a college.

David Perry  [00:25:00]:

And, she said, well, I'm a convicted felon. And I said, oh, did you kill anybody? No. Oh, but you're up now. She said, yeah. I said she said, well, how am I gonna do a job? And I said, I I don't understand the question. Ollie, what you gotta do is you're you're studying this. She said, yeah. I said, so go volunteer at a couple of of, places, including a women's shelter.

David Perry  [00:25:25]:

I said, well, she said, why would I do that? I said, well, it's good for your soul, but after a year, you're gonna finish there, and you're gonna need people to be your reference. Wow. The people that volunteer at women's shelters and at other organizations in cities are usually the spouses, if not the, usually the spouses of people that are well off, and so you're gonna use them as references. No one cares what you've done as long as you didn't care kill anybody. You need a good reference. These people will be your reference. So the girl turns around and looks at the 2 teachers who obviously put her up to this question. It's a whole big long longer story.

David Perry  [00:25:59]:

And they went, yeah. So that's the worst I've ever had. That's the closest I came to answering a question, but boom. Done. So when people do this, when you do this as a recruiter, you'll you're gonna have fun. You're gonna get better at what you're doing. People are gonna talk about you, and that's what you need. Lincoln Lawyer all over again.

David Perry  [00:26:20]:

You need people to recognize you're an expert in something. I've given you at least 5 ways to do that today. You know? If I was listeners, I would grab all of them, put them in a list, And do the hardest one first and and then and then finish the list.

Benjamin Mena [00:26:38]:

Do you have a favorite tech Recruiting tech tool at the moment. Tech tool at

David Perry  [00:26:44]:

the moment. No. You know, does my phone count?

Benjamin Mena [00:26:48]:

I think that's a perfect one.

David Perry  [00:26:49]:

But that's been my favorite tool forever. You know, we we jokingly say, you know, I leave voice mail messages. There are only 2 people in the world, Ben, that I've never been able to connect or for you or have never Return to phone call. When was the pope? Yes, folks. I actually it wasn't a phone call. I wrote a letter to the pope, and I made an offer. Doesn't matter what it was. And he didn't call, but someone from his office did, and they followed up with a letter about 2 months later.

David Perry  [00:27:23]:

The only other person was, the former president, Trump. This is back in 2000 And 6 or 8, I can't remember. And I simply wanted him to write the forward for Guerrilla Marking for Chopp Hunters 2 point o. And I, you know, I should've done it months earlier, but I I was on deadline. I had, like, 6 days to get this done. And, 8 8 calls, and finally, his secretary accused me of being, Stalker. And I said, forget it. I said, I'll have I'll have Darren Hardy, Success Magazine.

David Perry  [00:27:56]:

I'll have Darren Hardy do it. So I phoned Darren. He said no. I said, oh, For god's sake, listen. I'm gonna write it. You're gonna read it. You're gonna go, oh my god. You're gonna sign it, and it it both copies.

David Perry  [00:28:06]:

Boom. Done. You know, I had to do the work for them, but that's okay. You know? So yeah. Phone phone. Phone phone phone.

Benjamin Mena [00:28:13]:

Awesome. If you could go back to the very beginning of your recruiting career And sit down and give yourself advice, what advice would you give yourself? That's a great question,

David Perry  [00:28:24]:

and I would say don't take it Personally, the rejection the rejection was extraordinary. My first phone call, was to a guy who ran a big real estate company, and He screamed at me and said, well, I'll do business with flesh peddlers and hung up on me. Sounds so stupid. Right? I'm like 20 Five nothing. The time when I I picked up the phone, and I called him back. And I said, Ben, David Perry got cut off. He got cut off. I I hung up on you.

David Perry  [00:29:02]:

He slammed it down again. And so I phoned back again. I said, Ben, David, I I don't get it. What's a flesh peddler? That's what you are. Blah blah blah blah. I said, oh, okay. So so you see no value in people like me. None.

David Perry  [00:29:13]:

Fine. He's not a client. Everybody else in town became a client. He became a source. I mean, it's a famous story. You know, the 2nd phone call was to a guy who essentially did the same thing, and we had I broke through it. We had a conversation. He said, oh, I need this kind of person.

David Perry  [00:29:29]:

So I I went out to the search, hired a property management guy for him. And, somewhere along the the lines, he said oh, yeah. That's it. He phoned me up to gloat after he closed the deal to tell me I was never gonna I was stupid. I was never gonna get paid. So what are you talking about? We had an agreement. I I said I sent you a paper. Fuck.

David Perry  [00:29:46]:

You don't know who I am, do you? I said, clearly not. So I called the candidate, told the candidate what had happened. I said, you can take the job. Not gonna stop you, but, that's the kind of business you're going so he didn't take the job. Okay? I actually put him somewhere else. No. No. Here's here's the piece of that matters.

David Perry  [00:30:04]:

About 3 months after that, I needed to set up an accounting department, a department For a new construction company in Ottawa, and I did my first that I got paid for, lift out. Took the whole department out of this company, Thomas Asley and Sons. Okay? No longer around. I took I can't I was trying to remember their names the other day, But I took the supervisor accounting, the controller, the accounts payable, accounts receivable, and then I took the property manager who I put in another company. So all 4 people Went to this new company. None of them knew. I wrote the letter of resignation, and, I still use the res letter today. And none of them knew about each other until they went out for dinner to celebrate.

David Perry  [00:30:45]:

They got new jobs, and they all find out they're going back to the exact same jobs they had. Can't can't lie about this. Can't can't exaggerate. Exact same jobs they had with a new company all with the same structure. Right? I mean, I hired I was trying to remember. Yes. I think it was 84 people For that company over the next 3 years. I mean, to the point where, you know, after about 30th one, I would call them up and say, listen.

David Perry  [00:31:08]:

This is who we hire who this is who I we hired. This is why I hired him. Done the references. He starts on Tuesday. They didn't even interview them, Ben. I mean and we built, you know, well over $1,000,000,000 of real estate. I had a black card before a black card was popular. And they had a I mean, talk about Getting spoiled, right, between the ages of 26 and 29 before I finish with these guys.

David Perry  [00:31:32]:

And if I could go somewhere like San Francisco or I had to go Buffalo, they would send the jet. You can't they would send the plane to pick me up because it was faster to get me down there to to the meetings and back. So that's the kind of fun I've had. So why do I do it? Greece, where else can you possibly do this? Where else can you take a nobody like me, you know, and let me build a business so that I get to do what I've done? Like, It's been a fantastic life. You know? So I get to the end of it, quote, not quite, but, you know, I'm on the tail end. Right? I'm I'm on the second half of the, the 100 years And, a 118. And I'm giving back because I know that giving back, people are gonna get to me and or they're gonna pick up the mantle, and they'll go and do it. You know, I I jokingly said that I wasn't joking.

David Perry  [00:32:27]:

When I test texted the other day, I said, you know, we should do and I've said this to David. We should do a seminar. You know? And, and and have everybody that wants to come pay $1,000 to come. We have it in Miami or Florida or whatever. There's me. There's you. There's David. There's a bunch of other people that come and people can learn from.

David Perry  [00:32:47]:

But what's the money for? Well, it's to keep out the lookie loos. But more importantly, I I would call up Seth Godin and ask him to come down for a day or two, bring his latest book, and take us through His thinking I've learned more from him probably than anybody else. I mean, I've been really, really fortunate. You know, Stephen Covey endorsed the 1st book. Seth Godin endorsed the 1st book. You know, Zig Ziglar and I before he passed away, I got one of the last letters he sent, and I went back and forth on different things. I get to talk to these people. Me, nobody.

David Perry  [00:33:23]:

Because I'd done this book or they'd heard about me Where I had the balls, as one of them said, to, pick up the phone and call. We should all get together, Share some secrets, make each other better, but bring in someone like Seth. He costs $80,000 for a webinar, but it's a private and the reason I know that is because I was gonna do it here in Ottawa, and, he agreed. Is it gonna be a 2 day thing? And, then Then I went out to the the community here in Ottawa, and I said, I'm gonna bring Seth in. It's gonna cost $80,000. I said, how much are you in for? I said, I got There's 200 tickets. I'll give you whatever. There's 200 seats in the auditorium.

David Perry  [00:33:59]:

Well, you know, I'm thinking so you've got tons of money. Well, you know, so everybody will do stuff for free. It's a Canadian thing. A lot of people will do stuff for free, but they won't put their money where their mouth is. And we talk about DSP And his chat GPT stuff and his omnipresence. Everything he has produced, I've bought. Why? Because I wanna seize what I don't know. And, usually, I know, you know, 90%.

David Perry  [00:34:27]:

Just learning some some new trick or something, helps me do my job, and and it makes me stop thinking, what's the other guy doing? Or what am I not doing? So I invest in myself out in the team all the time. Most recruiters don't. So what would I tell a recruiter, new or used, You're or myself back then, I would say keep investing to eat yourself because I've done that, consistently. I don't wait for someone else to send me on a course. You know, I take x percentage of every fee that comes in, and it goes in a kitty. And then I'll go, okay. Well, now like last year, we had actually, in the kitty, I said to Anita, I said, you wanna go to Ireland? Said, yeah. I said, what? Well, someone's inviting me to give a speech.

David Perry  [00:35:15]:

Oh, really? They gotta pay it with no. I said, we'll take it out of the kitty. We'll fly. We'll give the speech. She said, then what are we gonna do? Said, well, then we're gonna take the next 14 days To travel Ireland that she'd never been. So I tracked her. We went over. We we we we stood on stage.

David Perry  [00:35:32]:

We talked for about an hour and a half. And then we ran like hell from Dublin to the train station to get to Belfast so we could get up at 6 in the morning to do the game of throne tours the next next day, and then we did everything junkie. I mean, you do this. You go to Paris with your wife. Right? Yeah. So, you know, this job Gives you immense freedom and immense power, especially over your own life, and most people don't have that. So if I had known that back then, I probably would have worked 3 times as hard because there'd been a bunch of times that I just Should have thrown in the towel. I mean, after the stroke, everybody said, no.

David Perry  [00:36:13]:

Just take it easy. Get better. Get better. No. No. No. If I don't Work, we don't eat because the insurance company pulled a fast one on us. So within I was speaking words about groups of words within 5 days of having a stroke.

David Perry  [00:36:33]:

I could not use my hands for probably, like this for probably 7 months. You know? My wife came into my office. I got a whiteboard on the On the the desk reader top me here, it's 4 by 8. And, she came into the office one day, and I said I just gotten off the phone with my Editor at Wiley had convinced her that we should do the 2nd edition of guerrilla marketing for job hunters. And, she comes in. She said, what are you talking about? She said, you can't Can't even use your hands. You can't think. You can't re couldn't read at that point yet.

David Perry  [00:37:05]:

I said, don't worry about it. It comes in the next day, And she looks at my whiteboard and says, what's that? And I just looked at it. She goes, oh, I I couldn't couldn't write, But I could draw. So I had drawn out the 12 chapters of the book, and then it was a function of, okay, What do people need to know now that's different from when I wrote the first one? Who do I know that can help me with this? I didn't tell any of the recruiters that I called. Maybe Rayanne was the only one probably, that I had the stroke, and, I got them all to contribute to the book. And they probably contributed 10,000 words to a 95,000 word book. Made it a much better book. It made it more believable because otherwise, it was just the rantings of this Crazy man.

David Perry  [00:37:54]:

And did the same thing with the 3rd edition, and I'll do the same thing with the 4th edition.

Benjamin Mena [00:37:59]:

Phenomenal. The question. Probably It also did. Edit this stuff. So I'm typically pretty light on the editing. The thing about

David Perry  [00:38:06]:

No one's gonna listen to this whole thing.

Benjamin Mena [00:38:09]:

The thing I if you wanna get laugh at, I'll this part, I'll probably edit it out, but I most time, I edit out, like, the you does, the ums, and that kind of stuff. But yeah. Hey. David, this was a phenomenal interview. Once again, I always love speaking with you. Before I let you go, is there anything else that you would love to share with the listeners?

David Perry  [00:38:27]:

I'd like the recruiting industry to internalize one fact. We are in the recruiting industry's golden age, and there's never been A better time to be in the industry. Everybody is looking for solutions to problems. Some of them don't even know they have the problems. If you can keep your wits about you, that shouldn't be a problem. And do other things other than go begging wrong term. That was, I should never have said that. Please delete that.

David Perry  [00:39:06]:

Don't go never appear hat in hand Because you have solutions in terms of your skill sets that employers need, and they need it Desperate. You know, this next book of revolutions, Needly Ask, is all about how North America Needs to change how they manage, talent so that they can beat China and everybody else in the 4th industrial revolution. 1st 3 have gone by, steam, electricity, computing power. The winners were all, western civilizations. There's no guarantee that, who's gonna win the 4th industrial revolution? The first 3 were all about eliminating people from the equation. You know? Putting the machines around people, all that kind of stuff. 4th industrial revolution is not about it. It's not about bits and bytes, Leads of Seeds is all about the talent and and how you find talent that understands how to Bring talent together.

David Perry  [00:40:16]:

I mean, Steve Jobs has talked about this for years. You know, hire smart people, get out of the way. Everybody oh, yeah. And then they don't do it. Companies that are succeeding today find leaders who understand how to build common cause, Get people to believe themselves, get people to believe in their team, and get people to work for the common good, the common cause. Those people are rare. They exist. They're not looking for jobs.

David Perry  [00:40:48]:

They're not. They all have jobs. And when they are available, It's for a microsecond because when people find out, they go after them. You know, it's like finding out that Gretzky wants to return to the ice. Think anybody have an interest? Yeah. Got that right. Right? Michael Jordan, same thing. Right? You know? Football players, same thing.

David Perry  [00:41:07]:

Finding people that can lead people and lead them well in the 4th industrial revolution is the key to winning. How you find those people is not through the typical tactics that that recruiters and companies use because it ain't about money. It's about much more than money. And you need to figure that out, and you need to get good at it. Because once you do, you can make a difference in that company you're working for, And you win as they win. And as they win, the economy wins. And as the economy wins, North America wins. The the, the other side of that coin is if we don't do this and this is what I'm doing.

David Perry  [00:41:51]:

This is what the book's all about. If we don't do that, then it's a race to the bottom to provide the most for the least. And we we, Humans will become cogs in a wheel. I mean, I just got finished reading for the 2nd or 3rd time the most depressing book I've ever read, which is George Orwell's 1984. If people haven't read it, You should. Because as recruiters, it might be just enough for you to go, oh, no. I wanna be part of the other side of the revolution, not this. So probably not what you wanted me to end with, but do you know, this is a golden age.

David Perry  [00:42:32]:

People can make a fortune. They can make a real difference. They can set themselves and their children and their communities up for life. You know, we talked about the schools I helped build. Wasn't the building the schools. That was the exercise. The goal was to build capacity in the people. I trained 30 other people over the 14 years I was chair of that board.

David Perry  [00:42:56]:

Thirty other people to ask good questions And to be able to figure out how to assemble people. I sent 3 people out of the world the unsuspecting world. I spent 3 people out there We actually understand how to get stuff

Benjamin Mena [00:43:11]:

done. Phenomenal, David. David, once again, like, I know I've had you on here before. I'll bring you back on again. You're all always an always an incredible guess. But yeah. Definitely, for the listeners, I hope you guys enjoyed this. David did a great job.

Benjamin Mena [00:43:30]:

1, talking about the The job board for recruiters built by recruiters. Also, like, not too many people do a good job breaking down what they do. And I know this was a a a quick podcast. David actually has some books where he's literally broken down his exact process, Everything he has done. So, definitely, I would recommend picking up hiring for greatness and executive recruiting for dummies, like, where he's done the hard work. And you just gotta have all all you have to do is literally just pick it up at Mark. So once again, David, thank you for coming on. And for the listeners, keep crushing it.

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