Latest / The Tech Matchmaker / Why Hiring AI Engineers Is So Hard Right Now | Milan Batinich
Transcript
- Gina Gibson: Good morning, everybody. Today we are chatting with Milan Batinich Director of Business Development from Saige Partners. Milan, welcome back to the podcast. It's great to have you with us again. Milan Batinich: Gina, thank you so much for having me again. I had such a great time the first time, I was like, you know what, let's try this again. Gina Gibson: Do it again. Why don't you update us on what you've been up to since we since you were last with us? Milan Batinich: Yeah, yeah, so lots of things. And I'll get into Saige Partners, but first my that I wrote was published. What's the worst that could happen? So overcoming the fear of being your authentic self, thank you. ⁓ that was a couple months ago. And then, yeah, ⁓ joined a couple months ago, Saige Partners. So really excited to be on staff here, ⁓ working in sales. ⁓ so we are a, go ahead. Gina Gibson: Why don't you tell us little bit about your role and the company and give the elevator pitch for Saige Milan Batinich: Yeah, perfect. So we're based in Iowa, but we have reached in all 50 states, Canada, as well as a few other countries. ⁓ We are a recruitment firm ⁓ that specializes ⁓ across all industries, but really within three verticals. So first vertical is engineering. mechanical, ⁓ electrical, ⁓ manufacturing, type of ⁓ positions we specialize in. ⁓ Second ⁓ is ⁓ IT. So ⁓ AI engineers, developers. anything that deals with software, hardware, embedded, AI, all of those, all of the above. ⁓ And then the third is professional services. we handle recruiting for sales roles, marketing, administrative, professional, C-suite, VP, director level, think positions, mid-level and above. ⁓ I'm still doing a lot of work in the CX space ⁓ helping BPOs look for VP of sales and those types of roles. ⁓ But we really don't. ⁓ put our focus or our energy into like agent level so we don't really do any recruiting for those entry level type of roles. Gina Gibson: Makes sense. And I know we both have a lot of friends right now going through layoffs and being laid off and looking for work. What types of tech rules are you seeing the most demand for right now? Milan Batinich: Yeah, so number one is AI engineers. And it's really interesting because a lot of people don't have specific training in that. So I know a lot of tech companies are willing to train people that maybe have ⁓ software development or software engineering experience, which is good to see. ⁓ But I would say AI engineers is definitely the top ⁓ job. And then, of course, sales. Seems like whether it's a BPO, a brand, an end user, a technology company. Everybody wants to go to market as quickly as possible and in the most efficient way possible. So everybody's looking for salespeople. Gina Gibson: Yeah, now you brought up AI being the biggest and AI's impact. How is it changing both the jobs that you're kind of looking for, but as well, like how you look for people, like going back to kind of those people that are in our network that are looking for help, what kind of tips or tricks would you tell them that to employ, let's say? Milan Batinich: Yeah, no, that's a great question Gina. So I would say the biggest thing right now is, you know, 10, 15, 20, 25 years ago, you would just apply for a job, your resume would get reviewed, and then you would get a call back or you wouldn't. But now because to your point, there's been so many mass layoffs, companies are seeing an influx of resumes by the hundreds, even thousands. You know, I was talking to one company ⁓ out of Winnipeg, Canada, they posted a job for a customer success manager. And in less than 24 hours, they had over 600 resumes. And so they're like, so they said, I'm sure, well, they told me we didn't see any qualified people. And I'm like, did you not see any qualified people or did you not look at 600 resumes? Because I'm guessing you didn't look at the resumes. And they're like, you're right. Maybe there are qualified ones in there. We just don't have the time to step away from our daily job or daily duties to review all these resumes. So I would say if you're looking for work, the key is to differentiate yourself. yes, submit your resume so that way the company has it. But then your research and find people maybe you're connected with that's also connected with that company. ⁓ I mean, that's how I got into Saige Partners. I ⁓ sent my resume, but then I also saw, I researched and found the CEO of Saige Partners. I him a LinkedIn request, LinkedIn message. ⁓ I on Apollo, found his email address, emailed him. Pretty much did everything except, you know, drove to his house. Didn't do that. ⁓ But the best way to get in somewhere is to be referred in or recommended in. ⁓ So, you know, so yes, send your resume, but then try to see if it shows who the hiring manager is or if you can see ⁓ through your research who works there. And then if you're not connected with somebody there, do you have mutual connections that you can reach out to that can maybe help you ⁓ get your foot in the door? Because Gina Gibson: Bye. Milan Batinich: Otherwise, if there's one opening but 600 resumes, the odds of you getting it even if you are qualified is very low. Gina Gibson: triangulation, right? Use your network, your network's network. Exactly. Yeah, it's a great tip. Thank you. For the companies that you were mentioning that are looking for IT, you know, specifically, are you finding... ⁓ that it matters which platform, is it in the contact center space, like is it Genesis or Nice or Five9, like is there anything kind of standing out or are they prioritizing the broader kind of cloud and software engineering skills and integration skills versus, you know, siloed? Milan Batinich: Yeah, I would say it's more broad ⁓ based on, you know, do you have cloud experience? Unless it's one of the very large companies. So, you know, a lot of companies will say we need somebody that has Salesforce experience in order to, you know, be successful in this role. But outside of, you know, like Salesforce or Oracle, I don't really come across too many companies that are saying specifically you need to have Genesis or Nice or, you know, those types of experience. It's more so on the integration. Gina Gibson: Mm-hmm. Milan Batinich: and having the experience with ⁓ cloud or having experience with a C-Cast or a UCast or a CRM ⁓ type of company, having that type of specific experience versus having the experience with that actual company. Gina Gibson: Right, and going back and it might be the example of the Winnipeg company, but what is the biggest mistake you see companies make when they're trying to hire people? Like is it being too vague? Is that why they're getting 600 applicants or is it just that the job market is that tough right now? Milan Batinich: ⁓ my gosh, that is, how much time do you have for that, for me to answer that question? ⁓ man, that is a great question. I think it's a mixture of both. ⁓ I think there's just so many candidates, and a lot of candidates don't read the job ad. A lot of times. Not everybody, but there's many that just see, ⁓ I've done customer success, this role says customer success, let me apply, but they don't see that you need to have five years of specific experience. ⁓ Gina Gibson: Yeah. Hmm. Milan Batinich: And then I would say that for organizations, yes, being too vague or sometimes just being too detailed. So it could be both ends of the spectrum. Either they're too vague with the role or they're so detailed that, nobody's going to take the time because they're applying for as many jobs as they can in the amount of time that they have because they need to find work that they don't read through all of the detailed information. ⁓ So I think it's kind of a mix of both. Gina Gibson: Let's go. And how does your, like how does it work at Saige Partners? So like I said, we both have a lot of friends that are out of work. Do send you their resumes so that you have, you build up a book of people how do you, how would you like to get sources? know, how do you get your sources? Milan Batinich: Yeah, yeah, definitely. would say the biggest or easiest, most efficient way is emailing their resume to myself and then I can get it in the hands of our recruiter. So we kind of have, we're one company, but we have two different areas of expertise. My area of expertise is sales. So finding companies that need the people. And then we have a team of recruiters that find the people to match with the companies. ⁓ So yeah, so emailing their resume to me and then I can you know, find the appropriate recruiter based on expertise to get their resume to. ⁓ But my primary role is finding organizations that need the people and then the recruiters find the people. Gina Gibson: Excellent. Now, do you want to share a success story with us, Milan, about maybe it's a particularly challenging tech placement or something where you were able to then help them find the right role and right resource? Milan Batinich: Yeah, definitely. would say, going back to that one in Winnipeg, I think is probably the greatest success. ⁓ So not only did we start our own search for candidates, ⁓ we also were able to receive access to their 600 plus resumes and applications. ⁓ And our recruitment team was able to go through all of them ⁓ quickly, because the recruiters are well trained to be able to spot, ⁓ is this a good candidate for this specific role or not very quickly. So we were able to go through those 600 resumes fairly quickly. We were also able to post out. I actually posted out to my network on LinkedIn saying this is the type of person we're looking for. Put out some details of the role. It's remote in the United States or Canada, work from home. within 48 hours. of us receiving that opening, we had four candidates. Two came from the 600 resumes, two came from my network, just posted on LinkedIn. And out of the four, they interviewed all four, then interviewed three, then interviewed two, and then ended up hiring one. And ⁓ he's loving it there so far. And ⁓ he's working from home in the Carolinas on the East Coast for a company out of Winnipeg. Gina Gibson: Nice, that's great, that's great. Is there anything else about Saige that you'd like to share with our audience before we move on? Milan Batinich: ⁓ You know, I would just say that if you're an organization or a person looking for work, and if you're struggling to find work or struggling to find people, reach out to us. ⁓ Partners is an EOS company, so I also like to share that just because ⁓ EOS companies prefer to work with other EOS companies, so entrepreneurial operating system ⁓ is kind of our structure. ⁓ understanding that and knowing that is helpful as well. and ⁓ that you know we're nine-year-old company and just growing growing growing like crazy right now which is which is good Gina Gibson: That's a great time to be a part of it then, that's wonderful. As you know, I like to wrap up the podcast ⁓ with a little bit of James Lipton and rapid fire. So ⁓ tell me, noise or sound do you love? Milan Batinich: Yeah. ⁓ My three-year-old son giggling love it love it Gina Gibson: What noise or sound do you hate? Milan Batinich: The first, I'll just go with the first one that popped in my head. The, ⁓ the team's ringtone. When somebody rings me on Teams. ⁓ Gina Gibson: Ha ha! What profession other than your own would you like to attempt? Milan Batinich: Um, so ever since I was a kid, I always wanted to be a meteorologist. So I will go with meteorologist or chef. Oh, I also, oh yeah, I would love to be a chef too. Gina Gibson: Perfect. And Milana, if somebody wants more information about working with Saige Partners, who should they reach out to? Milan Batinich: they can reach out to me. So they can either reach me on LinkedIn or my email is really simple. It's ⁓ so the initial of my first name and then my last name, mbatinich at saigepartners.com. Gina Gibson: Excellent. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Milan. It was great having you back and ⁓ it's interesting to hear. And I love that this can not only help our customer listeners, but also our friends in the industry that are out of work and searching right now. ⁓ So yes, reach out to Milan and get them your resumes and hopefully we'll be able to help out in some way. So thank you so much for your time today and we'll talk to you soon. Milan Batinich: Thank you so much. Sounds good. Thanks for having me, Gina.