Whatever part of the industry you are in, you will be facing uncertain times as we start to move through 2023. On top of the obvious economic factors, Talent Acquisition is heading into a period of dramatic reinvention right in the middle of a trend of TA layoffs, a conundrum at a time of continuing talent shortages and candidate-driven markets.
Whether you are looking for a new role, reinventing your existing role or getting promoted, confidence is critical. It’s also something that we don’t talk about enough, particularly when it comes to building more of it and dealing with imposter syndrome.
My guest this week is Jess Jones, an influencer, content creator and DE&I talent lead. Jess recently wrote a book about building confidence called “Own It”. Her experience in TA gives her a unique perspective on how we talk (or rather don’t talk) about confidence and resilience in our industry, and she has some great advice to share.
In the interview, we discuss:
• Confidence in the workplace
• Tackling imposter syndrome
• “Owning it”
• Empowering people to be more confident
• The snakes and ladders of work in 2023
• The five-second rule
• Does social media make things more complicated?
• The myth of perfection and the importance of being vulnerable
• Curiosity
• Showing up and leading by example
• AI & TA
• Internal mobility
• Using creators and influences to target specific pools of talent
Listen to this podcast on Apple Podcasts.
Matt (0s):
This episode is sponsored by Seek Out, the number one in talent intelligence and diversity recruiting software for enterprise companies.
Matt (28s):
Hi there This is Matt Alder Welcome to Episode 494 of the Recruiting Future Podcast Whatever. part of the industry you are in, you will be facing uncertain times as we start to move through 2023 On. top of the obvious economic factors, Talent Acquisition is heading into a period of dramatic reinvention right in the middle of a trend of TA layoffs, a conundrum at a time of continuing talent shortages and candidate driven markets. Whether, you are looking for a new role reinventing your existing role or getting promoted.confidence is critical. It’s also something that we don’t talk about enough, particularly when it comes to building more of it and dealing with imposter syndrome. My guest this week is Jess Jones, an influencer content creator and DE and I talent lead. Jess has recently written a book about building confidence called Own. It Her experience in TA gives her a unique perspective on how we talk or rather don’t talk about confidence and resilience in our industry. And she has some great advice to share.
Hi Jess and welcome to the podcast.
Jess (1m 47s):
Hello,
Matt (1m 48s):
It’s An. absolute pleasure to have you on the show. Could, you introduce yourself and tell everyone what you do.
Jess (1m 55s):
Yes, Do. you know what? Every time I get asked this I. never know what to say even though I do it all the time. I am Jess, I’m a mom of four. I always start with that one because I think that’s the biggest job that I do. Yeah, I have been in recruitment for the best part of 15 years, which I worked at this morning, which is a fairly long time. And yeah, I am a content creator as well. Online I do all sorts of stuff. I work in the DE and I space in recruitment. I’m a dog owner. Oh my gosh, right. Where else shall we go with this? There’s a lot of plate spinning, but I guess my three main hats are mum, content creator and DE and I talent lead.
Matt (2m 34s):
Fantastic. And we are kind of gonna talk about all of those I suppose in the conversation. But just to talk a little bit about the recruitment bit to start with, tell us a bit more about what you do and your background in recruitment.
Jess (2m 47s):
So I started at agency probably about 13, 15 years ago and I lasted about a year. The sales side wasn’t for me, but the people and the recruitment and all of that good good stuff absolutely was. So I went in-house quite quickly after that and have just been in-house ever since. And now really look at I guess recruitment, hiring and strategy really with the DE and I lens about how can we make processes more inclusive, are we really, you know, getting to all of the talent everywhere. And so yeah, that’s my focus now. So it’s still fighting the good fight in recruitment but with now a real focus on DE and I, what part of that plays, whether it’s part of the employer branding or you know, process.
Jess (3m 35s):
So that’s what I’m doing now.
Matt (3m 37s):
Now you mentioned the beginning there that you’re also content creator online and I actually came across you via your online content and I had no idea that you worked in recruitment. So it’s just kinda interesting that tho those worlds have collided. Tell us about your work as a creator. What, what you do, why’d you do it? How did you get to do it?
Jess (3m 57s):
I guess it’s a bit like recruitment. You know, when everyone goes, how’d you get in recruitment? And you go, I kind of just fell into it, which I think is like everybody’s answer. That was probably the same for me in content creating. So a few years ago, and it is a few years ago now, I think it was back in 20 16, 20 17, I always had something to say and a friend of mine said, why don’t you start a blog? And I was like, oh I dunno. And so I did and it initially just started with me pestering all my friends and family going, can you, can you share my blog? Can you read my blog? Can you look at what I’ve posted? And it kind of grew from there. And it started out just being, I guess I just wanted a place where I could be myself because I, I guess in its entirety, to give it some context, I talk a lot about confidence and self-development and I was in a place where I probably wasn’t that confident at the time and I wanted an outlet where I could probably be a bit more authentic and share a bit more.
Jess (4m 52s):
And so I created almost this alter ego I guess, and started sharing from there. And it grew and it grew and I shared my journey. I shared, you know, the journey of becoming a parent to more children and my life and it grew and it’s now become a, a pretty cool thing. To be fair, I’ve written a book now, I’ve got a really incredible online community. It’s learnt, kind of collided with my recruitment world as well. So I do a lot of keynote speaking around confidence and actually confidence in your career. And it has just probably done far more than I ever thought it would from the days where I was going, mom, can you share this with your friends? I’ve written this thing and it’s now pretty epic if I don’t say so myself.
Matt (5m 36s):
Absolutely. So tell us about the book because I’m, you know, I think that’s a really interesting topic in terms of how we can sort of relate, you know, relate all this back to, to to to recruitment for everyone listening.
Jess (5m 47s):
So originally, and, and this is where I, it’s probably a bit strange, but it really shifted into all making a bit more sense and really aligned. I started writing it because I wanted to feel more confident in myself, probably more around body image and, and you know, the pressure that we face to look a certain way. That’s where it all started. And I, I wanted this journey and then I realized quite quickly having more confidence in yourself and believing in yourself actually affected every single aspect of my life. Not just wearing a small dress, but actually it affected my career. It affected how I felt about my parenting, what kind of friend and wife I was, but it actually had the biggest impact on, on my career.
Jess (6m 28s):
And so I started to share more and more actually about not just changing how you feel about your body or your image, but just how you feel about yourself and Empowering yourself to have the confidence to make big decisions even when you feel like you can’t. I went through a phase where I had a really bad experience where I worked and I was bullied quite significantly and it was a really awful experience and it knocked my confidence and self-esteem massively. And this was just before I started my blog. I realized the changes that I was making in my life were having this really great positive impact on the jobs I was applying for and the jobs I was landing and how I performed in interviews and how I dealt with clients.
Jess (7m 9s):
It just had this huge impact. So it kind of all aligned, emerged into one. And so that’s kind of the basis of the why and how it all I guess is aligned to being one big thing rather than two separate things
Matt (7m 24s):
And what’s the book called?
Jess (7m 26s):
So my book’s called Own It and I try and take that with me in everything I do. And the reason why it’s funny cuz I wrote a, a post-it note years ago saying I wanna be the girl that owns it. And then when I got this incredible email about oh would you consider writing a book? We really think you’re someone who owns it and we’d love to call it something like that. And I was like, oh my gosh, I wrote this post-it note years ago about wanting to be this person who Own It and it’s about Owning every aspect of you, the parts of you that you love, you know the strengths that you have and really Owning those and being comfortable and confident in sharing them but also Owning the parts of you where you wanna develop more or learn more.
Jess (8m 7s):
And I don’t call them weaknesses cause I think they’re just areas of development, but Owning those parts of you too. The good, the bad, the ugly, whatever it looks like. And Owning yourself in your entirety so you can be your authentic self and bring that forward in your job in your life. Cuz I really have seen in myself the change that that can make to how, how your life looks and, and what your career looks like.
Matt (8m 28s):
I think it’s really interesting in the context of work because we don’t talk about Confidence in the workplace very often, if you kind of troll through LinkedIn and all the topic that everyone’s bringing up about the world of work, confidence, imposter syndrome, those things, they don’t come up as often as people actually are affected by them. If that, if that makes, if that makes sense. What, what’s your perspective on Confidence in the workplace?
Jess (8m 54s):
Oh, it has such an impact on everyone and I think it starts from the very, very beginning like have you got the confidence to even apply for that job? When people look at jobs and I did this years ago and you were looking at jobs saying, oh I couldn’t do that. Oh, I’m not sure if that’s right for me. Having the courage and the confidence to actually click apply starts from there. And then it feeds all the way through your career at work. You know, whether you are a person who has to present, whether you are a person who has to speak up in meetings, it has an impact on so much and so many people are so brilliant at what they do but are often overlooked because they haven’t got the confidence to say something or to, to kind of put themselves forward. And I realized that actually when I shared my journey and when I shared actually this is, this is the change that I’m making in my life and when I started to put my hand up in meetings and have the confidence to say, actually I’ve got this idea, it had such a huge impact on just my career in general and how much I could, you know, I don’t like saying make my way up the ladder but ultimately get a promotion and work on my career in its entirety.
Jess (9m 58s):
And I don’t think we talk about it enough. I think there’s an expectation we have that if someone’s in a certain role, they’re just naturally confident or if someone’s in a leadership position that, you know, they just know what they’re doing and they’re confident in what they’re doing. And that is absolutely not the case. Most people I know are going, I’m totally faking this. I dunno what I’m doing, I’m nervous, I’m worried. And actually we really should spend some time investing and Empowering people to feel more confident because I think when we do that and they bring their best selves, gosh it just makes such an impact on the work people deliver and how they feel about being at work. And I think that’s so important and we definitely don’t talk about it enough and
Matt (10m 36s):
It’s such a disrupted time in talent acquisition and I know lots of people listening will be, you know, they may have been laid off, they may be applying for new jobs, they may be looking for that promotion, they may be finding themselves in the job they’ve got doing things that they’ve never done before. So I I I think this is an, an issue that is gonna affect probably a large proportion of the people who are listening. How can we build more confidence? You know, are there tools or techniques or way of ways of thinking to be more confident?
Jess (11m 6s):
Yeah, absolutely. And one thing I always say to people is show yourself the grace to know that you’re not gonna wake up tomorrow and be a completely changed person. And this took me, and it’s not to discourage anyone, but it took me years to really build up the confidence and to, to feel empowered to do some of the things that I do. So I think the first thing is to show yourself the grace and the patience to know that it’s, it’s a pre pretty big change. I always used an analogy about snakes and ladders and I think with how the industry is at the minute and just the world, you can often feel like you climb up this ladder and then you land on a snake and kind of wish yourself all the way back down again. And that might be you apply for a job, you feel really great and then for whatever reason you don’t land it and your confidence takes a massive knock and you feel like you’re back to square one.
Jess (11m 50s):
And it’s in those moments to know that actually there are still ladders to climb and you will still be able to get to where you need to. One of the, the best things I ever did was I listened to a book by Mel Robbins called The five second rule and I swear by it for, for so much. And ultimately what she says is, when you want to make a decision, you often took yourself out a bit. And whether that’s speaking up in a meeting, applying for a job, you know, saying something in an interview, putting yourself forward for something. So she says, countdown from five and by the time you get to one you need to just do it. And so I started doing that at work in meetings. I would sit there and everyone knows this, you wanna say something, you talk yourself out of it and then someone else says it and you’re like, oh, I should have just said something.
Jess (12m 36s):
And you get really frustrated at the person who said it or the the moment passes and, and the point you wanted to make it, it’s just not worth making anymore. And I used to get so discouraged by that, so I thought, right, I’m gonna use this rule. So I’d sit in a meeting and I’d go 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and I’d just put my hand up or I’d say, oh you know, actually I’ve got an idea here. And the first time was absolutely excruciating. I was so nervous, I remember my heart feeling like it was gonna explode, but I felt so empowered and so proud. So wait, tell everyone five second rule. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Go for it. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Go for it and don’t talk yourself out. Don’t give yourself a chance to talk yourself out a bit. And that’s a real practical tip.
Jess (13m 16s):
I use it before I go on stage. I use it in meetings, I still use it day to day and I think it’s such a great tool and probably one of the other things is particularly with imposter syndrome, don’t kind of discredit the courage in the bravery it’s taken for you to land that space or to end up in that room. I think we often think, oh, everyone else in here knows what they’re talking about and everybody else in here is gonna be better than me. Or if you’re in an interview room or you know, naturally you’ll be nervous. But I think we discredit what it’s taken to get into that room in the first place or to land that role or to get that promotion. We discredit that so quickly and get so overcome with what we can’t do or what everyone else is better at doing.
Jess (13m 58s):
And so I think affirming to yourself, actually it’s pretty blooming awesome that I’ve got this far and I’ve been brave enough and courageous enough and confident enough to get myself into the room in the first place. And affirming that and really appreciating that from ourselves I think we often forget to do. And reminding ourselves of that can be really key.
Matt (14m 22s):
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Matt (15m 8s):
Absolutely. I think that process of realizing that no one else knows what they’re doing either,
Jess (15m 15s):
No one does do they, everyone always goes, oh yeah, I’m totally winging it.
Jess (15m 20s):
But I think, I think it’s worse now than it than it was in the past because you’ve got, everyone is kind of putting this kind of perfect branded version of themselves out on social media in terms of, you know, both in terms of the personal stuff but also, you know, you see on LinkedIn all the time with people running these amazing businesses and having these amazing journeys and and and all this kind of stuff. So, you know, I I think it it’s something that is that that that is probably even more difficult than it used to be.
Jess (15m 46s):
Yeah and I think I really try to bring my authentic self, whatever I do, and be really honest and transparent and that isn’t always easy because it’s a level of vulnerability that you have to be prepared to be, you know, you have to be ready to show that. And it’s not always easy, particularly if you’re in a leadership role, you know, traditionally we say leaders are strong, they know what they’re doing or, and you know, and yeah, you know, no one wants to get on a plane with a pilot who isn’t confident they can fly. It’s really important that people I guess understand that not everyone’s got the answers and it doesn’t make you any less good at what you do. I think having the confidence to admit that you don’t always have the answers but you are willing to go and learn them is, is brilliant.
Jess (16m 31s):
And I think we often don’t appreciate that enough. We wanna see the final product, we wanna see, you know, what everyone’s successes are, but no one wants to show the gritty, messy bit that it took to get to that point. And I think we need to do more of that sharing and I try and do more of that sharing. I try and be really honest and you know, I don’t have the answer for that, but I’m more than willing to go and find out so I can then share that information and knowledge with you and be willing to do that. No one’s perfect. I get really sick of seeing everybody pretend that we’ve all got it together and we all know what we’re doing, but I think being vulnerable is really difficult and most people shy away from that cuz it’s a very uncomfortable feeling, but it’s one we have to get used to in order to really create change.
Matt (17m 15s):
Yeah. And I think because of the pace that things move at now in terms of new technologies, new ways of working, all that, all that kind of stuff, it’s people have to do that to keep up with what’s going on. And I’ve, I’ve had a couple of other who’ve come on this to show before talking about the, the importance of Curiosity in terms of finding stuff out and, and all these kind of things. And I guess that that flip side of Curiosity is vulnerability to say, well I don’t know everything and I need to find out more about what’s going on.
Jess (17m 44s):
Yeah. And I think as leaders and people who are in in senior leadership roles, we come across this quite a lot. Particularly when, for example, if I’m doing a DE and I training and it’s across the board and you’ll have CEOs in the room, you’ll have, you know, junior staff in the room and most leadership teams will go, oh, we’re not sure we wanna be in that altogether because I don’t know the answers to that. And, and I say, well that’s the point. In order to, to create change, you have to be prepared to be vulnerable and show everyone in your business and everyone in your team that you are leading that it’s okay to not always know the answers, but what’s really important is that having the confidence to show up and to want to know more and lead by example, I think it’s really difficult.
Jess (18m 26s):
I even do it in my parenting. I always say kids, I dunno the answer to that. Why don’t we go and find that out together because we don’t all have the answers and I think it’s okay to admit that and, and really we need to kind of shake this if you’re a c e if you’re a leader, you have the answers for absolutely everything and you know exactly what you’re doing all of the time because that’s just not true. And we really need to kind of get rid of that and, and kind of open the doors to say, right, let’s all just kind of learn this together. And that’s not to say your team are gonna trust you because you don’t have all the answers. I think it’s how you handle that and how you show up about that that makes the difference about whether people still want to follow you as a leader or not.
Matt (19m 5s):
You mentioned your, your working d n I there sort of just I suppose, you know, changing gears slightly, what’s on your sort of radar for, for, for this year in terms of d and i and talent acquisition? What, what trends are you seeing? What should, how should employers be thinking about it?
Jess (19m 23s):
I think there’s, there’s a lot. I am really excited and I’ve kind of got really weirdly techy about how AI is gonna really impact talent acquisition in just how we work and what recruitment processes are gonna look like as people really navigate using AI to do so much stuff. I, I’m not a massive tech, I still pe I’m still really strongly believe in people and people and all that connection, but as it kind of grows and develops, it’s really interesting to see how that’s gonna impact how people recruit and, and what parts of the process are gonna start being automated and AI is gonna kind of get involved there. I think also there’s this massive shift and I’ve really seen this in some of the strategies that we’re doing and some of the clients that we’re serving and what they’re looking for is a real push on Empowering employees to really get that Internal mobility.
Jess (20m 14s):
I think we forget about that NTA a little bit because a lot of it is obviously reactive to Recruiting and you know, scaling up and getting people in or replacing someone when they leave. But there’s a real, I guess lack of focus sometimes on that Internal mobility piece and that is still all around managing talent and I think there’s gonna be more of a focus on how can we empower employees, how can we really make sure people feel like they belong? How can we really create accessible pathways within our workplace? And I love doing that stuff cuz I think that’s just so important and I think there’s gonna be a bit more of a focus on that. I hope there’s more of a focus on that because I think that’s really exciting and you get the retention, you get all that really positive stuff when people feel like they belong and can see those pathways but not just see them, they’re accessible to, to everyone because that’s the other part of it, isn’t it that or that people go, well we’ve got these pathways and we’ve got this and we’ve got that, but how accessible is that to the people in your business and actually can they see themselves in your leadership team?
Jess (21m 14s):
Can they see that pathway for themselves? So I think there’s gonna be a lot of leveling up on Empowering employees, employee wellbeing and really that Internal mobility piece.
Matt (21m 24s):
Just switching to kind of recruitment marketing, employer branding one, one of the, the things that I saw a number of organizations do last year, particularly in their college Recruiting, was really partner with creators and influencers to target diverse audiences, get more their organization, you know, really kind of get people thinking about their brand. Do you think as someone who works in recruitment and is a creator, an influencer, you know, I’m just really interested to get your perspective on that. Is that something that you think more organizations should be doing? Is it something that’s effective? You know, what, what do you, what do you think about that?
Jess (22m 5s):
Yes, no, everything and it’ll always be the same is who are you trying to target and where are they? And asking yourself that question, particularly for those early career pathways. So your apprenticeship schemes, your graduate programs, where are those candidates? And ultimately majority of them are online in the social media space. So actually that is probably where you need to target because that’s where your people are. but it depends on the role, it depends on on the brand. But I definitely think there should be more, I guess more of that. I, I speak to some of the brands that I work with in I guess more of a creative space, but I often say to them, I’d love to see more about who you are as a brand.
Jess (22m 49s):
Why don’t you get creators to come in and do you know, behind the scenes what does it really look like to work here and share that content out and share you know, what your culture’s like and all of this or really great positive stuff. And some have been like, yeah and others have been like, oh that doesn’t make really make sense cuz they’re two separate things but they’re not, they’re not in their entirety. If if the audience are in on social media, then actually they’re not two different things. So I think it’s asking yourself, you know, where are the people we’re trying to target? And yeah, if your people are going to be on social media, absolutely get more involved in that. I think people want to see the more authentic, real, you know, laid back version of it.
Jess (23m 31s):
Ver versus the kind of really polished, this is what it’s like to work here that we often see online. I think people just wanna see what the reality is and and see that from someone they trust and most people will trust the creatives that they see and and follow. So I definitely think it’s something people should consider.
Matt (23m 50s):
Final question, where can people find you and your content and your book?
Jess (23m 55s):
Oh gosh, where can you find me? LinkedIn, LinkedIn is is the first one Jessica Jones on any other social media platform and people always question me about my blog handle but it’s at the fat funny one, which I always say yes, no, no, that is, that is right. So it’s at the fat funny one. And also book-wise, any major retailer. So Waterstones to Rich Smith, Amazon, which I think is on offer at the moment is definitely check it out there. So yeah, any major retailer, but I think, yeah, that’s it. And of course on this episode you can find me
Matt (24m 31s):
Absolutely Jess. Thank you very much for talking to me.
Jess (24m 34s):
Thank you so much for having me.
Matt (24m 37s):
My thanks to Jess. You can subscribe to this podcast in Apple Podcasts on Spotify or via your podcasting app of choice. Please also follow the show on Instagram. You can find us by searching for Recruiting Future. You can search all the past episodes at Recruiting Future dot com on that site. You can also subscribe to our monthly newsletter, Recruiting Future Feast and get the inside track about everything that’s coming up on the show. Thanks very much for listening. I’ll be back next time and I hope you’ll join me.
