Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / Maigread Eichten on the One Thing 29 Out of 30 Job Applicants Get Completely Wrong

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Maigread Eichten on the One Thing 29 Out of 30 Job Applicants Get Completely Wrong · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast,
0:08
where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
0:11
their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
0:14
adversity. My name is Anthony Kotaspodi,
0:17
and today's guest left one of the most prestigious jobs in
0:21
corporate America to work in a warehouse packing groceries
0:25
until midnight. She walked away from a plush
0:28
Pepsi office with a sculpture garden and a secretary at the
0:32
door to join a start up where water dripped on her head.
0:36
That choice set a pattern she has repeated ever since.
0:40
She has chased chaos into some of the most turbulent corners of
0:44
business, from a grocery delivery pioneer that collapsed
0:47
in the.com bust to an energy drink company entangled in one
0:51
of sports history's most complicated legacies, to a
0:55
cannabis company she ran. Even though she doesn't
0:57
personally use the product. Each chapter ends and a new one
1:02
begins. Her name is Marie Eichte, and
1:05
she is the founder and CEO of Career Expedite, A concierge
1:09
career coaching firm that gets college graduates hired.
1:13
Her coaches are former executives and operators, not
1:17
resume writers, and she has built a 99% success rate working
1:22
one-on-one with young people navigating the hardest job
1:26
market in a generation. She spent eleven years at
1:29
PepsiCo, built a new business division that generated over
1:33
$450 million in revenue, and has LED companies across food and
1:39
beverage, health and technology. She built a career on betting
1:43
that the hard Rd. was worth it. This conversation today is for
1:47
anyone wondering whether they should make that same bet.
1:51
But before we get into all that good stuff, today's episode is
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2:51
All right, back to our guest today, Founder of Career
2:54
Expedite, Marie Dikton. Thanks for making the time to
2:57
Share your story today. Well, thanks for having me.
3:01
I'm thrilled to be here. So Marie, I got to call out your
3:05
name to start with because it took me a while to wrap my arms
3:09
around it. There's a silent G in the middle
3:12
of this. It looks like my greed, but it's
3:16
like it's pronounced Marie de with AD on the end of it.
3:20
Now, I want to go through this because they're going to be
3:23
folks who want to reach out to you and they're going to want to
3:24
know how to pronounce your name correctly.
3:26
But tell us a little bit of the etymology.
3:28
What's the story behind your name?
3:30
So I'm the oldest of six kids and my parents named all the
3:36
other kids very typical names Chuck, David, Bob.
3:39
But there was a Catholic nun in my family's circle of friends
3:44
that they really liked. I So I was named after this
3:48
Catholic nun. As a teenager, I wasn't so
3:52
thrilled about this. Seemed like very a big
3:55
aspiration to be so young and to be named after a Catholic nun.
4:00
I found out later, though, that she was my grandfather's buddy.
4:05
What does that mean? That means she hung around in
4:07
his Cadillac drinking whiskey and going around all of his
4:11
businesses. So it has quite a storied past.
4:15
I think I'm the only one on Google so I should be really
4:18
easy to find. MAIGREAD pronounced Marie.
4:26
OK, so absolutely. So let's stay on the name stuff
4:29
for just a second, and then I promise we'll move away from it.
4:32
But you started your career at Pepsi with the last name at the
4:36
time of Martinez, so that must have been your married name.
4:40
And so you would walk into these sales meetings where I
4:44
understand people were expecting something very different.
4:48
Yes, actually, I was in marketing and then I was in
4:52
sales, so I was calling directly on customers.
4:55
I would typically walk in the room and they would ask who I
4:59
was. Typically they were looking for
5:01
a man, Marie, It's not clear, you know, male or female, but
5:05
certainly they were looking for Martinez.
5:08
Somebody looked very, very different than me.
5:10
And back then there wasn't a lot of women in sales.
5:13
I was the only women executive in sales at Pepsi at the time,
5:17
so I was just so unusual. And you can guess that was very
5:22
difficult at first. But one of the greatest things I
5:26
learned out of that is you got to lean into who you are.
5:30
I can't change it, can't change my name.
5:33
I want to be Elizabeth. That didn't happen.
5:36
I, at the time, I was Martinez. I look like this.
5:39
And I think leaning into who you are, especially as we talk more
5:43
about how you are unique in the workplace, is a really important
5:47
thing and can be really hard. Yeah.
5:50
So for those folks who are listening to the audio vision,
5:53
Marie has fair skin and blonde hair, so not what everybody is
5:57
expecting when they see the name of Martinez.
6:00
So let's get into some of the work that you did because as we
6:03
referenced in the intro, at Pepsi, you built a brand new
6:08
business division that ends up generating over $450 million a
6:12
year in revenue. Talk us through that.
6:15
Yeah. So I came to Pepsi from Business
6:18
School in a marketing class, which is very traditional at the
6:22
for Pepsi Cola, marketing is the path everyone wants to be in
6:25
marketing. I did that for a couple years
6:28
and I had to admit to myself that I was not great at
6:32
marketing. There were people in my peer
6:34
group who were outstanding and went on to be CM OS at some of
6:38
the largest companies in the country.
6:41
So I got moved to sales, which at the time I was quite
6:45
depressed about. But what I found was sales as a
6:48
perfect match for me and it's been very valuable in my career.
6:52
What was going on at the time was Pepsi had just moved to
6:57
expand their portfolio out of soft drinks into tea, water and
7:02
juice, and resealable bottles had just come out.
7:05
Those two trends were very interesting to me because that
7:10
made possible for consumers and for Pepsi Cola to put new
7:15
products in different sort of outlets.
7:17
So those of you on the phone are listening to us.
7:20
You don't remember this, but back in the day you could get
7:23
soft drinks at the grocery store and a restaurant.
7:28
There was no convenience stores. There was no Home Depot.
7:31
There was no mall. There was not like it is now
7:34
where beverages are everywhere. And that was the crux of the new
7:38
business, because every single one of those placements was a
7:41
new sale for the Pepsi Cola Company and incredibly
7:45
profitable. Timing.
7:48
And so your new division was basically going out and selling
7:52
into these different channels and selling these new products?
7:56
Yes, the team and sometimes there was a marketing
7:59
partnership Blockbuster at the time that was the video store
8:03
where you could go get your video.
8:05
Again, a fantastic opportunity for Pepsi placement because you
8:09
were there getting your entertainment for the evening.
8:13
But yeah, the. So my marketing background came
8:16
in to be very helpful because I understood the target consumer
8:20
and what was happening in the market.
8:22
But it was that sales experience that really made a big
8:25
difference. Anytime you can be on the
8:28
revenue side of a business, you will do really well in your
8:33
career. You're generating money for the
8:35
company and that's what that was.
8:37
And it most of it was timing. It was.
8:39
It was timing. But you were initially depressed
8:43
to be moving into this role because the the cool kids were
8:47
all doing the marketing and it felt like maybe you weren't cool
8:50
anymore. Oh, my God, That's so.
8:53
That's so perfectly said. Pepsi at the time was doing
8:57
entertainment marketing with big celebrities.
9:01
One of my peers went on the Michael Jackson tour around the
9:05
world. Somebody else was working with
9:08
Madonna. Yeah, I this was this was not a
9:11
popular assignment and it. But it turned out really, really
9:17
well for me. And I loved it.
9:19
I loved it. So what was the thing that we
9:22
mentioned in the intro? The energy drink company
9:25
entangled in one of sports history's most complicated
9:28
legacies. So I was at a tech company,
9:33
which was not the best fit for me, and somebody that I knew
9:38
mentioned a energy drink company down in a beach town at the
9:44
called Galita. It's right next to Santa
9:46
Barbara. So I went down there to talk to
9:48
the founder and he's told me about how they had this healthy
9:51
energy drink with a supplement ingredient.
9:55
And he casually mentioned that on the board.
9:59
And a major investor was Lance Armstrong.
10:03
Now, Lance at the time had retired the first time and was
10:08
pretty much just being a socialite, but very, very, very
10:13
popular with the cycling community.
10:16
And so not only was he a board member and an investor, I went
10:20
down to this little beach, each town, literally, we were on the
10:25
beach, a couple people in a building and became the CEO of
10:28
that company. And Lance then fortuitously,
10:33
nothing to do with us, decided to come back.
10:36
So that's when he launched his comeback tour.
10:39
At the same time, we were starting to throw this healthy
10:43
energy drink. So Lance, fantastic.
10:46
This was the early days of Red Bull.
10:48
Energy drinks were incredibly popular and there was nothing on
10:52
the market like ours which was in this healthy space.
10:58
And what was the brand? The brand was called FRS.
11:02
When I got there, it was called FRS, an antioxidant health
11:08
drink. I did not know what that meant.
11:13
I'm embarrassed to say. That I didn't know what
11:14
antioxidants were, no. Idea was an antioxidant.
11:18
This was back when this was way less familiar and I just really
11:23
struggled with what am I going to call this thing because of, I
11:26
don't know what it is. There's going to be somebody
11:28
else on a grocery store that's going to look at and say, I
11:30
don't know what that means. And healthy people understand
11:35
that healthy energy tied into the energy market and the growth
11:40
we were seeing with Red Bull and the like.
11:42
And it was a super unique positioning.
11:45
And the brand took off. Took off where?
11:50
Plus Lance. Where was this in your career
11:54
history? Right.
11:55
We were at Pepsi. Yeah.
11:56
When when did this come in? So that's a good question.
11:59
So I had gone from Pepsi to Webvan, which was an online
12:03
grocer, A brief stint there that was a youknow.com casualty.
12:09
I was a CMO there. And then I went to a tech
12:11
company called Verisign and I had the opportunity to run a
12:14
very small business. At the time it was $1,000,000 in
12:18
revenue. The idea was to sell global
12:21
brands, domain names internationally.
12:26
And again, this was as the Internet was just just really
12:29
picking up speed and kind of in a broad sort of way I.
12:32
What's the time? What was the year?
12:35
Let's see, I was at Verisign 2000.
12:37
I started in 2000. I went through the.com crash
12:41
there, great learning and I left there in in 2007 to do the
12:47
energy drink. OK, So what was it that took you
12:50
out of the comfortable job at Pepsi and into this Internet
12:55
startup of Webvan? I got to tell you that that was
13:00
a crazy decision that my entire family and friends looked at me
13:04
and said, you're nuts. I had just become AVP at Pepsi,
13:09
which is a phenomenal level. I had a office with a couch in
13:17
it. I always think about that, a
13:19
couch in it. It was big and I could look out
13:22
at the beautiful gardens outside.
13:24
I mean, it was and I was head of sales of the East Coast.
13:28
I had a, I had tickets to every single thing you could possibly
13:31
think of. It was a great job and Pepsi is
13:33
a phenomenal company to work for.
13:36
They really focused on employees and developing employees.
13:40
And but I got a call from a headhunter about this grocery
13:47
online grocery store in San Francisco, which is where I'm
13:51
from. So that was attractive to me and
13:53
I flew out to see him. You want me to run a
13:57
distribution center? And I got there and I said, OK,
14:00
well, I'm not doing that. And I would be horrible at that.
14:03
But I said you really need to think about who's the point
14:08
person with all these big brands, because if you have an
14:12
online grocer, Pepsi, Craft, General Mills, they're going to
14:17
want their products front and center on your online store.
14:21
And you could make sliding fees and you could make money off
14:25
that. Well, the guy running it at the
14:27
time was a guy from Goldman Sachs.
14:29
He had no idea what I was talking about and why that would
14:32
be. They hadn't even thought about
14:34
that. And so I pitched them on, I
14:37
think this is millions of dollars, I think you should hire
14:40
me to do this and kind of created my own job that just
14:45
seemed super fun. You know, and for those folks
14:49
who don't remember, you know, or weren't around for the early
14:52
days of the Internet, like Webvan was a big deal and then a
14:56
big bust. And as you look back at it now
15:00
and it occurs to me that it was just a little too early.
15:04
Do you see it that way or were there other structural?
15:06
Problems. So that's structural problems.
15:08
So here's what because from that biz dev job, I went on to be the
15:12
CMO, consumers loved online grocer and that's why you knew
15:18
that it was eventually going to happen.
15:22
But where Fr, or excuse me, where Webvan went wrong was they
15:27
had an automated warehouse. Now today an automated warehouse
15:31
is a commonplace thing, but back then was way too early and it
15:36
used to break down. So we'd get a call at 9 O clock
15:40
at night that we all needed to go out to the distribution
15:43
center and pack groceries and we would pack groceries all night
15:46
long. That's, and that was at least
15:49
once or twice a week, which at the time we thought that was
15:53
just a load of fun, but that was not a sustainable business
15:57
model. But the but the core consumer
16:00
idea was very, very strong, Very strong.
16:04
And so why do you think it didn't work at that time?
16:06
Was it that the robotics, the automation was not ready yet or
16:11
were there other? Factors so grocery margins are
16:13
very slim and so the cost of the distribution center was one
16:18
challenge the the robotics were not there to get the cost out.
16:21
But then the other thing is direct store delivery,
16:25
delivering things to your doorstep that Amazon does so
16:27
successfully, that is also a big cost.
16:32
And the reason Amazon does it so successfully is they're
16:34
delivering all this stuff to you, right?
16:37
And that's where Webvan wanted to go.
16:39
Louis Borders, the guy who started it, that was his vision.
16:43
And again, timing in the market, as I learned at Pepsi with the
16:48
new business thing, what I saw at Webvan, timing is timing.
16:53
And sometimes you're right on it and you will be a success.
16:57
You still have to work hard. That's worse.
16:59
And other times it's not the right time.
17:01
And Webvan so sad, not the right time.
17:04
Yeah, So you went on to be ACEO. I'm going to use the word
17:09
interim. Tell me if that's right or wrong
17:12
at multiple different places. I've got a kombucha company, a
17:17
chocolate company. What else am I missing here?
17:21
I did a protein drink I so after the healthy energy company,
17:28
which we'll talk a little bit about how that how I ended
17:30
there. I was the person that investors
17:34
called when the founder was scultering and they needed
17:39
somebody to come in to sort of assess what do we got here.
17:44
And sometimes the answer was wow, you have a phenomenal
17:48
product and you just need infrastructure.
17:50
I did a toy company for a founder.
17:53
They needed an inventory system, they needed a financial model,
17:57
CFO, etcetera. And other times, like the
18:00
kombucha company, there was actually a product quality issue
18:05
that could not be fixed. And unfortunately, in that case,
18:08
we had to shut the company down. So that's really what I was sort
18:11
of a firefighter, was super interesting, met lots of
18:16
interesting people and really learned that some things are
18:20
fixable and some things are not. And recognizing the difference
18:25
is hard because I'm very positive, like all
18:28
entrepreneurs, very enthusiastic sort of thinking you can always
18:32
figure it out, but sometimes you cannot.
18:35
And there's a walk away point. And investors like knowing that
18:39
before they what do they call it?
18:41
Money. Good, money after bad.
18:44
OK, so let's come back to FRS, the energy drink company.
18:48
How did that end up playing out? So when I got there, we were
18:53
about $1,000,000 in revenue all online and we were really
18:58
selling supplements. And with my background, what we
19:01
did, you know, built out the team actually moved the company
19:05
to San Francisco and started to build out the retail business.
19:09
We got into Safeway, we got into Kroger.
19:15
We were really having success. And again, we were also riding
19:19
the coattails of Lance. The product was used by Rd.
19:24
Cyclist, but also by mountain bikers.
19:28
We had a huge community there. And mountain biking again was
19:31
just really starting to get super mainstream.
19:34
All these factors are critical because again, timing, timing,
19:37
timing. And we went from $1,000,000 and
19:41
then the next year was 8, the next year was 30 and we were on
19:45
track for about 45, which in consumer land is very unusual in
19:51
beverages, it's really unusual. Beverages grow fairly slowly.
19:56
And this again was Lance was back in the news.
19:59
Lance was competing, he was doing really well and then.
20:06
I was interviewed by the New York Times.
20:08
I remember it was a Sunday edition.
20:11
I was super proud of this, very excited.
20:15
I was, you know, mostly, mostly so I could send that article to
20:18
my dad and my kids. And that was a Sunday.
20:22
And the next Monday, I walked in and the chairman of the board
20:25
was sitting in my office. And I was like, what are you
20:28
doing here? Like, but we don't have a
20:30
meeting. And he closed the door and he
20:33
fired me. Because of all this incredible
20:38
growth, what was the reason? What?
20:41
What did this article say? Well, the article had really
20:45
nothing to do with it they so this is a good learning.
20:48
So a very common thing in venture capital land.
20:53
I had raised $25 million from a very prominent VC in the Valley.
20:59
And when you do that, you take a lot of money and they see
21:04
initial success. I was a first time CEO.
21:07
They want to come in and bring in somebody that's more
21:10
experienced that they feel can really take this thing to the
21:14
next level. And so it's pretty classic.
21:17
I of course thought it was completely personal.
21:20
What had I not done? But you know, in hindsight, I
21:24
look at those facts and that investor, to his credit, years
21:28
later called me and actually apologized and said, hey, we
21:32
that was a mistake. The new person did not work out,
21:35
which is a whole nother story. But at the time, I mean, you can
21:40
imagine it was absolutely devastating.
21:42
I had never had that sort of failure in my career.
21:47
And of course, then you start going through your mental math
21:50
of, well, what did I not do? I didn't do this or I didn't do
21:53
that or I didn't do this. But it doesn't sound like it was
21:57
performance related. It was just looking at her
22:01
resume and this is her first time kind of being at this
22:03
level. I think we need somebody else.
22:08
Right, absolutely. I mean, again, in hindsight, I
22:11
can see that so clearly. I mean we were being approached.
22:15
I was courting both Pepsi and Coke to buy us.
22:19
I mean, the company was on a tear, Lance was on a tear, the
22:22
product was on a tear. And if you're an investor, a
22:26
professional investor, you want to optimize that outcome.
22:30
So now it's very easy to understand.
22:32
And at the time they brought in somebody and they wanted me to
22:35
stay and work with this person, but the, the new CEO definitely
22:40
did not want me around is also very common.
22:44
And but it was, it was tough. It was really tough.
22:51
How'd you get through it? So I was really mad and but I at
23:02
the time was a single mom and I had a son, an older son who was
23:07
trying to figure out who's going to go to college.
23:09
He was a senior and I had twins that were about to enter high
23:13
school. And, you know, I've been
23:17
commuting and traveling and doing all this press, and it was
23:20
really hard to spend time with them.
23:23
And so in a weird way, this worked out great because now I
23:28
started doing some consulting and I was around and I was
23:32
around when they came home from school and I really got to spend
23:35
time with my kids. And again, with hindsight, it's
23:39
the best thing that ever happened to me.
23:41
The best thing I had four years where I was at home a lot.
23:45
I was gone some, but not with the same sort of stress.
23:51
So it was really I have a great family and that really.
23:55
But I will tell you and I get have so much empathy for people
23:58
who publicly get fired because it's public.
24:00
If you're doing a lot of press and you know, I try never to
24:06
judge, you never know the situation of what what happened
24:10
in most cases. And so in your situation, were,
24:14
I don't know, you getting side glances from people or folks
24:18
calling or emailing or, you know, were you hearing sort of
24:22
rumblings about people making up their own conclusions on what
24:25
happened? Oh, yeah.
24:26
I mean, you know, there were some people, there were some
24:30
people that I counted on as mentors and friends who
24:35
definitely were like, well, you must have done something wrong,
24:38
What happened? And then there were other people
24:41
who were like, Hey, I know her and you know, but it's a good,
24:46
it's a kind of good thing to go through.
24:48
I, I feel like that was one of the most defining things in my
24:51
career, being able to stand on my own 2 feet and say, Hey, I
24:54
know I did great work here. I'm confident in, in, in and
24:59
people can choose to think whatever they want.
25:02
It also, I lost all desire to ever be in the press, which I
25:06
also think is just a healthy thing.
25:09
That's just a, that's a losing game.
25:11
So losing, it's a very losing, losing game.
25:15
And yeah, so but man. That's a gut punch, especially
25:21
when the performance had really been there.
25:23
So one company we briefly mentioned but didn't get into
25:26
details, you were at a cannabis company for a bit and it was,
25:30
you know, the time that you were coming out of there where you
25:34
had this moment of asking yourself what it was about
25:37
running a company that you really loved.
25:40
Tell me about that thought process, what it got you to.
25:43
Yeah. So I had an opportunity to run a
25:46
cannabis company and I got to build my own team.
25:49
Is the same sort of thing, investors saying, hey, what
25:52
should we do here? And I inherited, as you always
25:57
do, a lot of young people in this company.
25:59
Cannabis is a market that attracts a lot of young people
26:03
and not the sort of people that come from Pepsi necessarily,
26:07
especially at the more junior levels.
26:08
These were folks that went to Community College in my company.
26:12
Some of them went to college. A lot of them were going to
26:14
college at night, but a lot of young people.
26:17
And what I really thought about after that was that's what I
26:21
liked, helping them along their career, because some people have
26:27
mentors, but a lot of us don't. And if you have mentors, your
26:33
whole career trajectory I think is enhanced and it's more fun
26:38
because it's somebody that can both support you and give you
26:41
confidence, but also give you the hard truth of, hey, this is
26:46
where you need to change. And I just really enjoyed all
26:50
those, all, all those young people and other people in the
26:53
company. And that's when I decided I
26:55
really wanted to focus my time and attention on.
26:59
And so that is how the idea for Career Expedite was birthed.
27:03
Yes, yeah, I mean and, and, and also, you know, I'm was asked
27:10
pretty regularly by people I knew.
27:13
Hey, I, I'm looking at this new job in a different city.
27:17
What do you think? How, how can I maximize my
27:20
salary negotiations? Oh, I'm, I'm thinking about
27:24
changing functions. I want to go from marketing to
27:26
sales. How do I do that?
27:29
I'm in a I'm on Wall Street and I'm at a very high end financial
27:34
firm. I wanted to make a move, give me
27:36
some advice on how to do that. And so it started informally,
27:39
just working with folks and then their friends and their friends.
27:43
And then a couple years ago I decided to really formalize it
27:46
and OK, what's my process and how is it that I'm going to do
27:51
this? And specifically, can I get
27:54
people jobs? Because at the end of the day,
27:56
that's what people want. Advice is great, but the people
27:59
that are really serious are I need a job.
28:02
And so I sort of doubled down on that and experimented with a
28:06
bunch of things. And now a couple years later, I
28:10
feel, you know, I, I know how to get people jobs.
28:13
And so who is it that you mostly work with?
28:16
Is it folks that have that are in the workforce and they're,
28:21
you know, trying to move up or they've been laid off or is it
28:23
folks right out of college? So I started and I do work
28:29
generally, as I would say across the entire spectrum, but I
28:33
focused the last 18 months on a group of people that I feel the
28:37
most empathy for, and that's clients that have recently
28:42
graduated from college, are about to graduate.
28:45
The market is tougher than it's been in decades.
28:49
This is also a cohort that for the most part during COVID was
28:54
sitting at home. They weren't in high school, you
28:57
know, they weren't in person in their high school.
28:59
So they went through that. Then they struggled to get into
29:02
college. Getting into college is, you
29:04
know, exponentially more difficult than it used to be.
29:07
And now they're coming out and the market for, for entry level
29:12
positions is, I mean, it's horrid.
29:14
It's really rough. I mean, the, the colleges are,
29:19
you know, they do, they do surveys of how many of their
29:21
grads don't get jobs. They're a little dubious stats
29:25
because that includes I went to Starbucks, right.
29:28
Well, I'm a marketing major, but I'm working at as a Starbucks.
29:33
So and so that number at minimum, it's 30% of the
29:37
graduating class last year didn't get a job in their field.
29:41
And my gut it will be, it will be higher, unfortunately, this
29:45
year. Why do you think that is?
29:48
Is it the economy is in a slump? Is it AI?
29:52
Is it something else? So my, I spend way too much time
29:57
looking at and following economists and really trying to
30:01
dig into this, right? Because this helps me figure out
30:03
how to help folks. I think the uncertainty of the
30:07
last couple years is causing CE OS and business leaders to hold
30:13
on hiring. And part of that uncertainty is
30:15
definitely AI, right? Can AI do this job right?
30:19
But I think that's a factor. I don't think that's the driver.
30:22
I think it's the uncertainty and having run a business, if I, you
30:27
know, I went through the downturn in O8, what did I do?
30:31
I cut costs. I could not see the future.
30:35
If you can't see the future, you are not going to hire an entry
30:38
level person. You are not because that means
30:41
you see growth and you see potential and you know which way
30:44
to go. And I remember O 8 being, I'm
30:47
going to hunker down and we were doing great.
30:50
The, the, the, the, the recession really didn't hit our
30:53
energy drink business that hard, but I still cut back because I
30:57
didn't know. And so that's what I think is
31:00
happening in the marketplace. We need stability.
31:05
And once we have stability, I think the market will open up a
31:08
little bit. But that has not been the case
31:11
for a good year and a half, two years.
31:14
And then there's all the AI uncertainty, of course, and
31:17
that's hitting certain functions harder than other functions.
31:22
So I hear a lot of this uncertainty talk as well, and
31:26
I've heard it over the last couple of years.
31:28
You know, as long as I've been doing this, show it.
31:30
It's a common refrain, you know, whether you want to call it
31:33
political or economic, tariffs, interest rates, inflation, yet
31:40
people don't know which way things are heading.
31:44
And so they're just kind of in hunker down mode or just, you
31:50
know, we're just going to sort of maintain for now.
31:54
And so you're talking about AI. And I think what's interesting
31:56
is that in your business career expedite, you tried the AI
32:01
route. Tell us about that and why you
32:04
eventually moved away from it. Yeah.
32:07
So I had the opportunity to partner with somebody who was
32:12
very, very deep in AI, and his thesis of the business was,
32:18
we're going to optimize everything in the job search
32:22
using AI, and that's going to get folks jobs.
32:25
So what does that mean? That means we're going to use AI
32:28
to optimize your resume, we're going to use AI to optimize your
32:30
LinkedIn, we're going to use AI to help you with your interview
32:34
skills and so on and so forth. What I saw in the results though
32:39
was, well, AI has a role and it can be helpful.
32:44
The process of finding a job, yes, AI is going to a system is
32:49
probably going to scan your resume for sure.
32:53
But at the end of the day, humans hire humans, period.
32:58
Somebody that I, I can't think of any time where a human at
33:02
some point isn't going to say, I want to hire Anthony.
33:07
And that is an interpersonal interaction that AI, at least
33:12
today, in my opinion, cannot solve.
33:16
And that's really building your story, building the ability for
33:21
you to speak and resonate with that human.
33:24
When you get to that point, to me that's the skill and then of
33:30
course the networking that you're going to need.
33:33
Again, this is an old, old fashioned thing.
33:36
People get jobs through people they know.
33:38
That is not changed. That is still the same.
33:40
We all hire people from referral if we can because that's a
33:46
trusted relationship. So we talked in the interim read
33:51
about a 99% success rate, which is as pretty close to perfect as
33:57
you can get. What is it that you're doing in
34:02
your process that makes this so effective?
34:04
What does this client engagement look like?
34:06
Talk us through it. And and I want to start with,
34:09
you know, that is why I do this. I want to get people jobs.
34:14
I charge money because, you know, we value things more if we
34:18
pay. But that is important to me that
34:23
I can be effective. And what I have found is the
34:27
first step is this is all interpersonal.
34:29
It's one-on-one. So I'm working with a client.
34:33
The first thing I need to figure out is I need to establish trust
34:38
that they're going to listen to me and take action.
34:42
By the way, that's super hard. I have a triathlon coach.
34:46
She tells me all the time to take a rest day.
34:48
And every day, every time I get a rest day, I start thinking, I
34:51
don't really want to take a rest day.
34:53
Why should I listen to her? We all do this.
34:56
We all do this. So the trust is step one.
35:00
Then I got to figure out what is the problem if you're not
35:04
getting a job and most folks are coming to me after they've gone
35:08
off and tried to do this themselves.
35:10
They've worked with their college Career Center, they've
35:12
worked with people in their life.
35:14
It hasn't worked. So I got to figure out what's
35:17
the what's the core issue? And then once I figure that out,
35:24
then we can hone in on actually improving whatever that
35:28
challenge is. And there is a process because
35:31
there's things in the job search you need to do.
35:35
You need to establish your resume and then you got to get
35:39
your LinkedIn in good order and, you know, work on interview
35:42
skills and so on and so forth. But just like being a CEOI don't
35:46
think the hard part is the what to do.
35:50
The hard part is I'm going to do it.
35:54
That's the hard thing for all of us as as humans.
35:59
So you talk about, you know, it sounds like your process is very
36:03
customized, right? You go in and you've got to talk
36:06
with that person. You've got to understand what's
36:08
going on. What are some of the most common
36:12
problems? Common challenges.
36:14
What's the the thing that's wrong most often that you say Oh
36:18
my? God I'm OK now.
36:20
Try not to be too passionate about this.
36:21
I'm so passionate about this. I just interviewed 30 young
36:27
college grads for a job in my own company.
36:31
It was really interesting. Out of the 30, only one could
36:36
tell me in one minute why they could add value to my business.
36:42
1 right there. That is the key thing.
36:46
If you're hiring someone, it's because you have a business need
36:50
and you need them to be able to articulate.
36:53
I'm the person that's going to solve your business problem.
36:57
And then let me show you through my experience.
37:00
Portfolios are great for this. We all love visual depictions of
37:03
things. This is how I'm going to do it.
37:07
And what I find most of us give. Hey, I'm a, I'm a graduate from
37:12
this college and I majored in this and I took these classes
37:15
and I had this internship that was my 29 people.
37:21
Well, you lost me. That took you 10 minutes.
37:23
And I'm like, plus, I don't want to do the work.
37:27
I don't want to think through. Well, you worked at Patagonia
37:30
and like, how would that help me with my business?
37:36
So it's really the core thing that you're pulling at right
37:40
here is being able to articulate what it is that you can do for
37:44
them. Not this sort of long rambling
37:47
resume, but you know, under put yourself into the employer's
37:51
shoes. They're looking for somebody to
37:54
fill a role. They have a need.
37:58
How can you prove to them that you are the person to fill that
38:01
need? Yes.
38:03
And getting back to being human, you know, if I'm working at
38:08
PepsiCo, I am passionate about beverages and I'm super into
38:12
that. And if somebody comes to me and
38:15
says I'm passionate about beverages and I can help you
38:18
drive more water sales or soda sales, that resonates.
38:22
It builds trust, it builds an interest.
38:25
And I just find that that is, again, there's all sorts of
38:29
steps to that, but that is sort of the first thing.
38:33
And unfortunately, recruiters spend about 30 seconds, maybe a
38:37
minute making that decision, whether they're interviewing you
38:40
or also important when they look at your LinkedIn.
38:46
I'm very passionate about using LinkedIn properly and there's a
38:49
huge opportunity there that most people, not just college grads,
38:53
are not utilizing. They're just not utilizing it at
38:57
all? Or are they doing it
38:58
incorrectly? So here's the thing.
39:01
Back when I started, LinkedIn was a resume service.
39:05
You put up your information. What's changed is LinkedIn now
39:10
is an algorithm and is a social media company just like
39:15
Instagram or anything else. So you want to be able to have
39:19
use LinkedIn understanding the algorithm.
39:22
So there are, I mean, this part of my business is actually very
39:26
data-driven, very factual. There's a way to put your
39:30
headline in there. There's a picture, there's a way
39:32
to have your picture. There's a way your experience
39:35
should be listed. You'll put your portfolio on
39:38
there. There's a whole methodology that
39:40
I take all my clients through because it's a very
39:43
straightforward, just do it this way because you want the
39:46
recruiters, you want to come up in the search results.
39:49
So the recruiter sees you. And then the, the, the real
39:53
like, let's call it the, if you get to the graduate level of
39:55
LinkedIn posting, only 1% of the billion people on LinkedIn post
40:03
every week and they post effectively.
40:07
And that if you want to reach out to the companies that you're
40:11
interested in and you want to get the jobs, you get the
40:13
recruiters posting is very, very effective.
40:17
But again, it's very different than posting on Instagram or
40:20
Facebook or TikTok. What is a potential job
40:25
applicant supposed to post weekly on LinkedIn that's going
40:28
to help their chances? So let's use an example.
40:32
So I have, I work with lots of folks that want to be marketing
40:38
people. OK, If you're a marketer, the
40:42
biggest thing in your year is the Super Bowl.
40:46
People spend millions and millions of dollars on Super
40:49
Bowl ads. And even if you're not
40:51
advertising on Super Bowl, you're watching to see what
40:54
other marketers are doing to try to figure out what are the cool
40:58
things. Last year it was AI.
41:00
Every year it's sort of different posting after the
41:04
Super Bowl on what were those hot things that went on this the
41:08
the halftime show, what were the Easter eggs in there?
41:11
What did they need? That is something marketers care
41:14
about. And then you can look at other
41:16
companies you're interested in, whether they're ad agencies or
41:19
consumer product companies, whatever it is, and you can
41:22
repost and comment on what because now you're in the
41:24
conversation. Now you're in the conversation
41:28
to this is what marketers care about.
41:30
And I use that just as an example of a way you don't want
41:34
to. You're not going to post what
41:35
you ate for dinner. You're not going to post where
41:37
you went on vacation. You're not frankly, back to
41:40
where I started. You're not going to post about
41:42
you. You're going to post about them
41:46
and try to engage their interest.
41:48
And I had a client do this very effectively and she got 2
41:53
recruiters that reached out to her about junior marketing
41:55
worlds. Reached out to her.
41:58
Reached out to her. That's what you want because
42:01
recruiters are using LinkedIn as a sourcing function.
42:06
They put in all the information here's what I'm looking for
42:09
here's and then what pops up LinkedIn profiles that have been
42:12
optimized for the algorithm. And then if you're effectively
42:17
posting, that's the personal side to me, that's the, oh, this
42:21
person's interesting. They have a point of view maybe
42:24
I hadn't thought of. So I'm trying to connect the
42:29
dots and a bunch of the things that you're doing, a lot of it
42:32
is related to LinkedIn, making sure that your profile is set up
42:35
correctly so the algorithm likes it.
42:39
You're posting, you're helping folks, maybe you know, structure
42:45
their resume correctly, helping them get ready for an interview,
42:48
helping them communicate, you know their value to that
42:52
company. What else?
42:55
What am I missing here, Marine? So, so I kind of think about it
42:59
as you know, Step 1 is what are we doing here, right?
43:03
What do you want to do right? Because you got to be focused if
43:07
you're going to take all these steps.
43:09
And then we do the I think of the LinkedIn and the resume is
43:12
sort of they need to be AI ready because AI is going to read both
43:16
and also human ready. So we, we do all the materials.
43:20
Sometimes we do a portfolio also, but the probably the
43:24
biggest way you're going to get a job is through networking.
43:29
And this is what's tough when you, when I have clients that
43:32
come to me after they've graduated and they've been out
43:35
of work for a year. In a perfect world, you want to
43:39
start networking freshman year in college because you're not
43:44
networking to get a job. You're getting to know people.
43:48
You're doing informational interviews to see what jobs are
43:51
out there, what are people doing?
43:53
And I find that this is a hard thing for all of us because
43:58
we're kind of embarrassed. We don't want to take up
44:00
people's time. But I have found, and I've had
44:03
some very shy clients that used to tell them this, People love
44:06
talking about themselves, right? And if you're interested and
44:11
curious people will take time, they will, they'll have a coffee
44:15
with you, they'll do a video chat and you will resonate with
44:20
some of them in a deeper way. And my goal?
44:23
My rule of thumb is about 30% of them will actually help you.
44:27
Wow. So I want to go through kind of
44:30
a mini case study here because I understand there's a young man
44:33
that you worked with. He'd spent nine months after
44:37
graduation looking for jobs, no offers, started working with
44:41
you, and within six weeks he had two offers.
44:46
What changed? So that was an interesting 1 and
44:50
it kind of gets back to the the customization.
44:53
This is a young man who had an incredible network through his
44:58
family. Both of his parents were in
45:00
tech. He was looking for a job in
45:02
tech. There were many opportunities of
45:05
people that would help him. We did all the typical things
45:10
about getting his resume and LinkedIn set for what he wanted,
45:14
which he knew. But the piece he was missing was
45:18
how do I reach out to these senior people that my parents
45:22
say I should talk to? What do I do?
45:25
And I think that's very, very fair and very daunting, right?
45:31
How do I reach out to them if I'm in his case, they he
45:34
actually was at a Christmas party with people and we kind we
45:38
practice. How do you break into a
45:40
conversation and chat with people, show interest, make a
45:45
connection and make an ask? Hey, I'd be really interested in
45:49
that SDR role that you have. Could we meet later on, Killer?
45:54
How do you follow up not with an e-mail that's three paragraphs
45:58
long, succinct to the point some folks you can even text, depends
46:05
on the relationship. So it was all about how do you
46:07
maximize, maximize those network opportunities.
46:12
And frankly, once we got that nailed down and that also fueled
46:17
the elevator pitch and the, you know, how am I going to meet
46:21
with all these people? What do I do when I actually get
46:23
the interview? I mean, I'm so excited for him.
46:28
He nailed A phenomenal job. And yeah, that's why I do this.
46:34
That's that's the payoff for me. I can see your face lighting up.
46:38
So on the other end of it though, Marie, I know that
46:41
you've fired clients before. What does someone have to do or
46:45
not do for you to fire them? Yeah.
46:51
So I cannot personally get a job for anyone.
46:55
I tell this to clients. I tell this to parents I'm
46:59
they're not employing me so I have to have a client that is
47:04
willing to do the work. This is a ton of work.
47:09
You know, it's so funny because I have these weekly sessions
47:12
with people and then they have homework of things they need to
47:15
do. And I always preface, look, I
47:17
know this is a lot. It's a lot that you have to do
47:20
to get a job in today's environment.
47:22
And sending out 500 applications is not the work we're going to
47:26
be doing. We're going to be very focused,
47:28
but you're going to have to cold call people, you're going to
47:31
have to follow up, you're going to have to do the work.
47:34
And I fire clients that are not willing to do that.
47:39
Now I'm cool with going at their pace.
47:42
Some folks like the young man you mentioned, was all in, did
47:46
all the work and nailed it really fast.
47:49
Other people take months to figure out what do I want to do?
47:54
How do I build my story? How do I get comfortable
47:57
interview? I have infinite patience to, to
48:00
help you along your journey. And some of us like for all of
48:05
us, right? And I'm an athlete.
48:07
I know this, it takes, it's taken me a long time to get my
48:09
running where it needs to be. So I could do a half half
48:12
marathon, but I can swim for hours and hours.
48:15
We're all like that. And so there's a part of the
48:17
process that's harder for some of us.
48:19
And I'm OK with that. But I'm not OK if you won't do
48:24
the work because again, I can't get you the job and you're going
48:28
to be frustrated with me if you don't get a job.
48:32
So that's kind of the the the pact I make with the clients on
48:38
day one. So as I understand it,
48:41
recruiters have told you something about what's actually
48:45
happening with job applications right now that a lot of
48:48
applicants and parents are not aware of.
48:51
What is it that you're hearing? So I talk to recruiters all the
48:55
time. The first thing is they're 100%
48:58
overwhelmed. You know, they're getting
49:00
hundreds if not thousands of applications for any job they
49:05
post regardless of where they post.
49:09
And so I had one so bluntly say that if there is not a referral,
49:17
that application goes in the trash.
49:19
The numbers are overwhelming. There is no other way for them
49:22
to do it. Now before you say, Oh my God, I
49:25
don't know somebody at Nike or wherever, what's interesting and
49:30
what I've experimented with my clients is very effective is
49:33
using LinkedIn to reach out to people.
49:37
We've seen about a 20 to 25% response rate to doing a cold
49:44
link out link to somebody in a company where you're interested
49:49
in working. Now there's tactics around that.
49:52
That's not everybody. That's typically not super
49:56
senior people, it's people more junior people who have the role
49:59
you're currently interested in. And then can you build a
50:03
connection with that person? I went to the same school, I
50:07
have the same hobby, whatever it is.
50:10
And we do a lot of work on that. Because if you think about it, a
50:16
20 to 25% response rate, if you can get a, you can get somebody
50:21
to speak with you, odds are they'll refer you for that job
50:25
and now you're at the top of the pile.
50:28
And so I found that to be super. I'm it makes me feel good about
50:32
humans. People will help so, but but
50:36
walk me through, OK, so I send out 10 LinkedIn requests, maybe
50:43
get two or three folks that, you know, reply affirmatively.
50:47
Now how do I take that connection there and turn it
50:50
into something more meaningful? Well, it's a numbers game,
50:55
right? So I tell my clients you're
50:57
going to reach out to, let's call it 10 people.
51:00
Let's back off a minute, right? You've done the work to know why
51:04
you are the right person for this job.
51:07
You know why you're the right person in this company.
51:10
You are able to articulate your pitch of why you're going to
51:14
help the business in one minute and all your materials are going
51:18
to tell that story. So just let's assume all that's
51:21
done because when you reach out to somebody on LinkedIn and
51:24
says, Hey, I'm interested in the SDR role at this tech company,
51:29
right? The first thing they're going to
51:31
do is looked at your LinkedIn. And if your LinkedIn says, I'm a
51:34
biology major at so and so college, they're going to be
51:37
like, OK, so that's an important thing to, to, to think about.
51:43
And then the, the link has to be some connection you make with
51:48
who they are. Back to what I said before,
51:51
people love, love talking about themselves and they love it when
51:54
you're interested in them. So you do, you have to do
51:58
research. You have to figure out what is
52:00
interesting about this person, what is interesting, What's my,
52:04
my connection. You can be an alumni, but it
52:07
needs to be a little deeper than that.
52:10
Hey, I noticed that, you know, I swam on the swim team and you
52:14
were on the diving team and, you know, something like that.
52:17
Or I see that you, you know, started your career at XYZ
52:22
company and that was a company that my parents worked at or so
52:25
on and so forth. Again, back to the work.
52:28
Takes a lot of work, but it's golden.
52:32
Is the goal in this strategy in particular to get a phone
52:37
conversation with that person? Yes, yes.
52:41
And that's a good point. This is not, hey, refer me for
52:44
the job. This is a step process.
52:47
First step one is can you get them on the phone?
52:50
And again, what I have found, I'm so happy about this.
52:54
About 25% of the time they're going to say, yeah, now you got
52:59
to reach out to them. This is all my clients hate this
53:02
at least three times and I do this myself.
53:06
I don't know, people are busy. The first time I don't even
53:09
answer because I'm like, well, they'll ask me again.
53:12
The second time I might miss it. It it takes three times and
53:16
that's hard for all of us because we it's hard not to take
53:20
that personal. Well, they looked at my LinkedIn
53:22
and they don't like me or they think my name's weird or they
53:24
don't like blonde hair or blah blah blah blah blah.
53:27
Three times you'll get 20 to 25% you get on the phone.
53:31
And when I most my clients have wonderful phone conversations
53:35
because if people say they're going to talk to you, they've
53:39
already said yes. So usually those are delightful
53:43
conversations. And I would say a reasonable
53:46
percentage, I'm shocked again that those folks you have a
53:49
conversation with actually, then we'll go to the recruiter or the
53:52
hiring manager and say, hey, I, I talked to Sally and I think
53:56
you should consider her. Powerful.
54:00
It makes me so happy to be honest.
54:02
I just I just. Faith in humanity, I love it.
54:04
Yes. OK, so let's shift gears now.
54:07
Marie I want to explore one of the hardest things that you've
54:11
had to overcome personally and understand what you learn going
54:16
through that. So many hard things that happen
54:23
in life as you go along in your career.
54:28
But I would say that. So I was at Webvan as we
54:34
mentioned. And though Webvan didn't
54:38
survive, I had a great nine months there and I ended up
54:41
landing at this tech company which was great with slow
54:44
business. And I had been there.
54:46
I got there in 2000. I had been there maybe nine
54:49
months and the.com crash occurred and my stock options
54:56
were at $84. I remember this so distinctly,
54:59
You know, I thought, I'm going to get rich.
55:00
We all think this. And the the stock plummeted to
55:04
$5 and the CEO called a company wide meeting and he was a very,
55:12
so you have to set the scene. He's a very large Greek, very
55:16
masculine, very stoic kind of guy.
55:20
He calls a little company together and he breaks down
55:23
crying that we're not going to have enough cash to keep the
55:27
business afloat. And I'm thinking, what the heck?
55:32
I have, I'm a single mom. I have 3 kids.
55:35
They're small. I left my cushy job at Pepsi.
55:39
Oh my God. Like this is like really bad.
55:43
And for anybody that lived during that time period in the
55:45
valley, there were no jobs. Like a lot of companies went out
55:49
of business and it was a bloodbath.
55:54
And I remember just thinking, OK, I'm going to hunker down.
55:59
The business I was running at the time, we had too many
56:03
employees. I had to do AI, had to lay off
56:06
50% of the people. And the good news was I figured,
56:11
OK, if I get this business to profitability, they're probably
56:15
going to keep me. They need, they need money.
56:17
They need not top line, they actually need profit.
56:22
And we did that and I did survive and the company did
56:26
survive. And those those options never
56:30
got to be $84. But I had a job and I was there
56:36
for quite a long period of time. But going through that was so
56:41
valuable because you realize that as a entrepreneur and a
56:45
leader, you got to balance growth with good business sense.
56:51
Nothing goes up and up forever. Nothing and making money.
56:56
If you're at a company and you contribute to the bottom line,
57:00
that is a great position to be in.
57:03
And I always stress this as I work with clients.
57:07
Let's find you a company that has a financial flywheel that is
57:11
solid because if a market downturn occurs, you want to be
57:15
in a position where the company can continue to survive.
57:21
This is a recurring theme here. This is something you mentioned
57:23
earlier in our conversation about if you can be in a role to
57:28
drive revenue for a company, man, you've just made yourself
57:32
super valuable. People always CE OS.
57:37
Again, this is where being an operator is helpful to my
57:39
business, myself and my coaches. We are all ex operators, we've
57:45
all run businesses so we know what recruiters want and what
57:49
the jobs are that are valuable to a company.
57:53
We are not coaches and we try not to be therapists because we
57:56
are not trained. That is not our thing.
57:59
We are operators. So how do you or provide just be
58:04
able to demonstrate you a value to a company and then get in a
58:09
role where you are delivering value?
58:12
And especially, you know, we talked about how right now the
58:15
economy is very uncertain. CEOs are very uncertain.
58:18
Business operators are saying, hey, I'm only hiring if I know
58:22
that this role is going to stay and that it can deliver for me.
58:27
And we go through cycles, right? During COVID, it was bring your
58:30
dog to work, work remotely. It was very, very different.
58:34
Now we're in a situation where no, every employee needs to
58:39
deliver and demonstrate it to me, which is why I'm also
58:42
passionate be in person. Remote is so fun.
58:47
Remote is fun, right? We all want to take our dog for
58:49
a walk and sit in the sun for lunch and blah, blah, blah.
58:52
But you know, remote employees, it's hard to see what they're
58:57
doing. And so in a tough environment, I
59:02
stress, get a job in the office and the data bears that out.
59:08
College grads that take a remote job, 50% are out of work in a
59:12
year. Oh, is this?
59:14
Is this a current stat? Like right now this is.
59:17
Current stat 50%. And you think that's because
59:23
there's this uncertainty between the employer and the employee
59:26
about what that person's doing? I, I think that's human nature
59:30
right now. I also don't think it's great
59:32
for the for the new employee because again, back to how did
59:36
you get your job? You got your job because of a
59:38
network connection. You build networks by being in
59:42
person with people and going to lunch with him and see him at
59:45
the coffee pot and so on and so forth.
59:47
So I think there's a lot of reasons to be in person for your
59:50
career. You also learn, but the stat is
59:54
overwhelming. So for whatever reason, it's a
59:58
risky thing to do as a new employee.
1:00:04
Marie, what is the thing in your role now with Career Expedite
1:00:08
that you most want to be remembered for?
1:00:14
What a great question. I want to be remembered that I
1:00:22
helped people early in their career get a job and get be able
1:00:28
to take that first step out of college into the workforce with
1:00:33
confidence. Probably not going to be the
1:00:36
perfect thing. You may decide in a year you
1:00:38
want to go do something else but be able to take that first step
1:00:44
because just like being a freshman in college, that first
1:00:47
step is the hardest. It's tough.
1:00:51
And I think a big part of what I'm hearing from you today just
1:00:54
sort of encapsulating the whole conversation is that the job
1:00:58
market is brutal. There's no denying that,
1:01:00
especially for recent college grads.
1:01:03
And at the same time you are also finding folks job or you're
1:01:08
helping folks to find their job. Yeah, And this is the balance,
1:01:13
right? I mean, you got to recognize
1:01:14
your reality. It's back to the, you know, I'm
1:01:17
blonde. I'm from California.
1:01:19
My last name used to be Martinez.
1:01:21
That that's my, that's who I am. You got to be realistic.
1:01:24
The market's really difficult, but there are jobs and there's
1:01:28
tactics to get you a job. And if you're willing to do the
1:01:31
work, it can, It can happen. It will happen.
1:01:37
Marie, I've just got one more question for you today.
1:01:39
But before I ask it, I want to do 3 quick things for the
1:01:42
audience. First of all, anybody who wants
1:01:44
to get in touch with Marie other than Googling her very unique
1:01:48
name is go to our website careerexpedite.com.
1:01:52
That's a whole lot easier to spell.
1:01:54
Career expedite.com. It will be in the show notes if
1:01:58
you miss it, but Career expedite.com.
1:02:01
And if you're enjoying the show today, please take a moment to
1:02:04
subscribe wherever you're listening.
1:02:06
It also sends a signal that helps others discover our
1:02:09
podcast. So thank you for taking a quick
1:02:11
moment to do that right now. And as a reminder, you can be
1:02:15
the advisor that delivers a huge value add by showing your
1:02:18
clients how to give their employees access to therapist,
1:02:21
doctors and prescription meds that counter intuitively
1:02:24
increases their net profits, real gains that can change how a
1:02:28
business is valued. So contact us today at AD back
1:02:30
benefits.com. All right, Maureen, so last
1:02:33
question for you. A year from today, what is 1
1:02:36
very specific thing that you hope to be celebrating?
1:02:42
I hope to be celebrating that all the clients I'm working with
1:02:45
have jobs and I, I didn't mention this, but I often hear
1:02:50
from folks, you know, a couple months in, at first I don't hear
1:02:54
from them. They're busy, they're getting
1:02:55
settled. And then I hear from them a
1:02:56
couple months in. And that just brings me great
1:02:59
joy. And I've had folks that I've
1:03:02
been, you know, I've got at least one young lady right now
1:03:05
who's looking for a new opportunity and we're working
1:03:07
through the next thing. So it's really this relationship
1:03:12
that I hope that goes on for a period of time.
1:03:15
We all need mentors and people that are in our corners.
1:03:19
I love it. Marie Aiktan from
1:03:21
careerexcusemeexpedite.com. Do that again.
1:03:26
Marie Aiktan from careerexpedite.com.
1:03:29
I want to be the first to thank you for sharing with your time
1:03:31
and your story with us today. I really appreciate you being
1:03:34
here. This is great, I really loved
1:03:36
it. Thanks.
1:03:37
Folks, that's a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories
1:03:40
podcast. Thanks for learning with us.
1:03:42
And if one thing stood out, put that into action today.