How does a one-man recruiter close 22 executive searches in a single year? In this episode, Craig Picken breaks down the exact mindset and strategies that helped him dominate executive search—all without a team. If you want to become the recruiter clients seek out (not avoid), this is the blueprint.…
EPISODE SHOW NOTES — The Outbound & Discovery Playbook: How Elite Recruiters Close More Deals (with Conor Kline) (The Elite Recruiter Podcast with Benjamin Mena) 1. EPISODE HOOK Most recruiters think their problem is lead generation. Conor Kline reveals the truth: your real bottleneck is your sales process — and…
The Pro Athlete Mindset That Creates World-Class Recruiters What happens when a former professional athlete brings elite discipline, visualization, and competitive fire into recruiting? You get a recruiter who treats the desk like a sport—and builds a fast-growing search firm in record time. In this episode of The Elite Recruiter…
In this powerful episode, million-dollar biller Emily Audibert breaks down how she went from six months without a single placement to becoming one of the most sought-after recruiters in the go-to-market tech space. Her turning point wasn’t a new tool or technique—it was understanding the balance between masculine and feminine…
Is your recruiting desk—or your entire firm—running on chaos instead of systems? You’re not alone. Most recruiters feel the turbulence daily… but the top-performing firms operate differently. They run on an Operating System that eliminates chaos, drives consistent billings, and creates scalable growth. In this episode, Ben sits down with…
What does it really take to grow a recruiting business to $300M, scale contract staffing revenue, and execute a profitable exit—while keeping your team together? In this high-impact episode of The Elite Recruiter Podcast, host Benjamin Mena sits down with industry veteran Jon Davis, who reveals the exact strategies that…
If you loved Part 1, get ready for the blueprint. In Part 2, Derek Pittak returns to break down how recruiters can actually use EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System) to scale—with simple, powerful tools that drive accountability, clarity, and focus. We cover everything from documenting processes (without 75-page SOPs) to running…
Recruiting is chaos—and few people know how to tame it better than Derek Pittak, CEO of Lingo Staffing and certified EOS Implementer. Before joining the world of staffing, Derek worked inside the Department of Defense and a regional bank. Then one life-changing conversation pulled him into recruiting, where he went…
What happens when a $900K-a-year recruiter decides to stop building for others—and builds her own AI product instead? Jessica Oliver didn’t have a tech background. No coding degree. No startup team. But that didn’t stop her from vibe coding her own SaaS platform for government contracting—all while running her recruiting…
