 And so excited to start our Monday with Ms. Katie Warnick, CEO of Staffing Boutique and one of our amazing presenting sponsors. So thank you so much for joining us and kicking off our brand new week here. We of course want to think, oh, sorry, this is our topic, recruitment strategies and a tight labor market. So that is what Katie's going to nerd out with us today. She's super passionate about this topic and has a lot to say. So I'm excited to dive into that with you. But we always start our show by saying thank you, thank you, thank you to all of our presenting sponsors. Many of them have been with us since the beginning, so March of last year. And we are just so grateful to have their investment not just in these episodes, but truly in the sector at large, because each and every one of these companies are here for your mission driven purpose. So they're here to help and support you, do more good in your communities. Just like Katie Warnick is right here, CEO of Staffing Boutique. And really looking forward to today's conversation. Thanks to Julia for saving this seat. If you joined us in the chitty chat chat. In fact, last week before I left, I said, please save my seat. I want to make sure that I come back and I still have a J-O-B, not really a J-O-B, but this is a lot of fun. So Julia Patrick, the CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. I'm Jarrett Ransom, nonprofit nerd. I still have my glasses, so really excited to be back today. CEO of the Raven Group. So Katie, today's topic and again, welcome back. Julia and I always love to have you on the show. You're like a sister to us, you know, like we're really comfortable with you. You've been a part of the show since the very beginning. And you have truly seen the labor market take these shifts over the last 18 months, I'm going to say. So our current labor market status in the nonprofit sector is today's episode topic. And I'm thrilled to learn from you. Awesome. I'm happy to be here again. Well, OK, so when we were talking in the chitty chat chat, when we first met you, we were like, oh my God, what do we do to keep our jobs? You know, what should we be preparing? And now we're like, holy cow, the number of people that are reaching out to us, saying I can't find anybody is just huge. So we've done this major shift in the short period of time. What is the current labor supply looking like? Wow. I wish I had an answer. It's so weird right now, right? And I've kind of been saying that, but it's definitely gotten more weird. Clients are calling me that they can't find good staff. People are aggressively looking for new jobs. There are a number of jobs that can't be filled. What is going on? And it's not just nonprofits. You know, you see about these articles all over the place, all over LinkedIn. There are jobs and there are not bodies to fill them. And there I think are a couple of reasons for that for sure. So I guess one thing I would say is if you do have good staff, retain them, right? Work on that. Work on retention first. You don't want to be backfilling positions if you have them happily filled right now. So look at that first. Look at your current staff and making them happy. I would say lead with that. But with everything else, let's talk about it. Well, it's really an interesting thing because I, you know, I'm one of the things that I'm thinking about. Like, is this a short-term issue? Is it just because people are kind of tiptoeing back into the marketplace? Or do you have a sense that we're going to be in this place for a while? I feel like we're going to be here for a while, probably through the holidays, I would say, through Jan 1. Wow, where do we begin? Right? Well, let's let me ask you this question. And let's let's kind of drill down a little bit. I mean, we know the lot that the labor market's tight. So let's talk about how the current labor market is impacting job searches. I mean, are people like going to the mat with the first job offer that they're given or are they negotiating more? How is this impacting the actual dance of doing the job search? I think jobs are filling quickly. So I think that if there are positions open, I think that a lot of my clients, nonprofits have just, you know, wisened up a bit and are realizing that there is a demand for good talent so that when positions or when they're interviewing, they're moving, which is a good thing. It's such a shift from, well, who else is out there? Who else is out there? I also think that people that were sort of holding tight in their positions and getting, you know, to here, you know, over the past 16 months have recognized what they are not getting at their current organization. And they're pretty quick to jump to seek that. So, yes, if hiring manager is hiring companies, hiring organizations have been wise and have been reading what's going on. They are looking for good talent and accommodating what new hires want, listening and giving them that within the offer. And that goes back to that whole flexibility thing that we talked about in the last episode, you know, that I was on, being flexible. One of the things you had mentioned, Katie, and I cannot remember the episode because you've been so gracious to us with your time and your expertise, is really like, what is the timeline of applying for a job in actually day one? What does that look like? And I'm curious if you've seen that time shorten or lengthen. Yeah, I think it's shortened. I think that, you know, in a normal job market, from the time a job posting goes up to, you know, interview phases to resignation to, you know, the two weeks notice that whole thing. I think we're looking realistically at about a 10 week process if we're doing good. Could be longer, could be shorter, kind of depends on the level. I think that now, you know, it's hitting about eight weeks, which is quick, which is good, which is really good, especially for the industry that I work in, you know, doing staffing. We want to see things close quicker, obviously, and just in general. You know, keep in mind the longer a position has a job posted, the more it's a red flag, you know, something that I used to go on huge tangents with with clients is, you know, I have large organizations that have large development departments, you know, maybe 25 to 30 people fully staffed. And when they just constantly have a director of major gifts position posted and it's constantly coming up on idealists, you know, every two weeks, every three weeks, and it looks like it's been just kind of updated, you know, that's kind of a red flag to the job seeker. So it's a nice thing to see positions filling and then coming off of the job boards. That's a good sign, right? I think that's fascinating. OK, now let's shift a little bit and talk about the recruitment piece of this. And is it realistic to think that we can recruit in the for-profit sector for some of these nonprofit jobs? Wow. How often do we talk about this a lot, right? Like, I've been talking about it. It's it's always it's always a great topic because it really totally is dictated by what's going on in corporate, right? Like, why does everyone want to leave? Is it is it a good economy? Is it a bad economy? You know, and it's one of those questions I get a lot. And, you know, my answer is always I do not place career changers. I take nonprofit professionals and I place them in other nonprofit jobs. It's something that I say a lot, right? Here's the thing. There are not enough people right now in the job market to fill the vacancies that we have. So my advice and I am saying this hoping hoping that I'm like dictating the future of recruitment in the nonprofit sector is I would say look at the vacancies that you have available right now. And this I would say to sit down with your executive director, your director of HR, you know, whoever is leading these searches and say which one of these positions or which few of these positions can we actually recruit from corporate? Which you know, which requires nonprofit experience and which one doesn't? And I would say start to be flexible, start to be collaborative on what you're doing and where you're getting these people from because there are jobs that can be filled with people from corporate. You know, there really are. I do work a lot with hospital foundations and one of my clients recently did have a director of individual giving search open and they didn't wind up going with one of my candidates. They took an internal referral and the person did not come from nonprofit. The person came out of corporate sales. So they had a fully stack, like a fully well-developed development team that they felt confident that they'd be able to assist with that transition for that person and they like the person enough. So that doesn't happen a lot. You know, I don't see that a lot, but I thought that it was great that they're doing that. It gives someone who wanted out of corporate probably so desperately a transition into nonprofits and it's a good thing to do. You know, that's one of the questions I get a lot is how do I switch from for-profit to nonprofit so much so that I created a video on it so that I could say, that's a great question. And here's what I have to say about that. Right. It's on my YouTube channel. But yeah, I mean, so really, I do think this is a great opportunity to really make a list for those maybe that are looking to make that change into the nonprofit time and what I'm hearing you say and maybe our market in general is there are so many vacancies for our social profit sector that now might be a great time to find and land an opportunity. And so one of the things I say is really identify what are some of those skill sets that you bring to the table that are interchangeable like the sales. You know, I mean, that's perfect because as we talk about, you know, a fundraising academy cause selling, it really is about building those relationships, which again have a lot of crossover skill sets. Yeah. And to piggyback on just what I do and how I'm successful, you know, I have spent 10 years building my database of nonprofit professionals. Right. So if there is a hiring manager watching this or an HR professional watching this that is internal at a nonprofit that is struggling to fill these positions. And you keep in mind what I just said, look at the ones that you'd be open to taking your career changer. My first place to start with recruitment would be to go to my applicants that have applied to your organization directly, you know, work here or whatever and email blast them, email, blast them with the vacancies. Ask them for updated resumes because at some point those candidates had an interest in your organization, in your mission, touch base with them first. See who's available. See who's still interested in working in a nonprofit and then qualify them that way. Rather than posting a new add on ideal list, you know, it would be really a great way to streamline your recruitment to people who have already been interested in your organization over the past five or six years, whatever it may be. Great tip to piggyback on that thought is, you know, I just read an article on LinkedIn, maybe you guys thought it was the great resignation where so many people are just so fed up with their jobs right now. And they, you know, their boss is telling me I have to go back into the office as like July 14th or whatever it is that people are just I don't care. Like I'm leaving. So, you know, you might be email blasting those people that are just in that situation that they're just so desperate to not work in their current employment situation that they can jump now and maybe even make less. They don't care. So that that's that leads me to the next big question. And that is to your point. And I have been reading that as well and seeing that information, the great resignation work from home. It seems to me like the labor market is saying, I don't need to do this. I had such a mind shift during COVID with myself, with my family, with my work and technology, with my space, with my health. I could go on and on and on that it does seem to me that they are willing to say I can work for less. I can do with less. It's such a social change. It's such a social impact. Yeah. And I mean, I could talk about this from 18 different points, right? But I would say a couple of things. As we've sort of gone through this transition, post pandemic and all the other things that we've gone through in the past 18 months as a society, as a country, as a world, right? We're talking a lot about mental health issues. And we know that if we're paying attention to that right now, more than ever, what is going to make people happier? A short and four-day work week would certainly be a good place to start. So I would say if you're going to be flexible, go to a four-day work week. The thing with work from home. Yes. Is it necessary that the person is in the office? Does it make sense that everyone is there? Does it make sense that if a whole team is there, yes, we should all be there? Where are we with that? So looking at those points of view. And then the other thing on top of that, if, and again, I have a lot of small organizations that I work with in New York that completely gave up their office space and they are 100% remote and they are fully functioning. Obviously, these are organizations that offer at this point remote programming or whatever it might be. But there are so many organizations that gave up office space. If those types of organizations are having trouble firing or hiring staff, finding staff, they can take their recruitment efforts out and start to look. They don't need local in New York anymore. They can look at Philly. They can look at Minnesota. They can look at Kentucky because they're probably going to stay remote, I would say, for the next year or two. You know, that's definitely in their in their plans. So, yeah, opening up your recruitment efforts outside the vicinity that your organization is based out of. I have had also so many professionals come to me and one of the offers I do is executive coaching. But due to the pandemic, right? And really just how individuals were coming to me and wanting some coaching. I decided to do a one on one leadership coaching. And it's kind of a pay as you go. But the majority of these clients, Katie, are literally these people you're talking about. They are nonprofit professionals that are like, I'm done. I'm ready to change, you know, I want to be in a different culture. I want to move back to where my family is. I want to be, you know, 90, 75 percent remote and really looking at these various opportunities. And so that has been fascinating for me to really learn in here. Now, you know, I too, I love the digital nomad. I love having that opportunity. And I really, you know, I don't know. I feel like that that lifestyle, that digital nomad lifestyle has become much more embraced in the last 18 months. Because as you said, with this client in New York, your clients are fully functioning from a remote environment. It is possible, right? So even those naysayers have become full believers because they've seen it. They've experienced it and they've been a part of it. So really working with these up and coming leaders, our leaders looking to transition into another community, how they're navigating the market has been fascinating and echoes everything of what you're saying thus far. Yeah, it's been cool to see. Jerry, do you think that this is a leadership shift that is going to move forward and is not just a reaction to the pandemic and the work from home that this is going to be the way that these leaders move forward and with the trajectory of their career? Absolutely, absolutely. You know, but the question that is, and I know we're not going to get into it into this conversation, is really for the nonprofit, right? We exist because there is a problem in our community. So how do we define community, right? Is it local? Is it city? Is it geographic by way of regional, national? And that, I think, is going to be really constrictive as to how our leadership will be able to allow this space. Because let's say, you know, we're looking in, you know, a certain Chicago based community. Well, we may not want someone, you know, that cannot be physically present on occasion because they're really not then in that community. So I think that is going to be the determining factor. For sure. Yeah, interesting, interesting. So Katie, you alluded to this and as we, we don't have that much more time with you, which is a shame because I have like a bajillion questions. You mentioned this very briefly, but I think it's a central theme and that is how do we retain our staff? I mean, if we're, you know, just, oh, we can always get somebody better or we can replace them, which was old school thinking. What are some of those things that are going to help us retain our staff from a labor factor? Yeah. And again, this is something, Jared, I know that you you obviously talk about a lot. I mean, I think that if you have a recruitment plan, the priority is actually your retention plan. So that actually is what should be the plan, right? Is retention not recruitment? It should be retention first and then recruitment. So what does that look like? So obviously, this is a great time to ask your current staff. Are they happy? What do they like? You know, just asking them what they want, opening up the conversation. So many staff members are so scared to say what they want. You know, some people want to go back to work. You know, the people that have kids, have have have dogs, have animals, want to want to get back to it. You know, they're interested in getting back into the office. However, some people who live alone that don't have headaches, you know, have really embraced getting on their peloton at 10 a.m. and, you know, I mean, I'm I'm a I'm a fitness person. I go to the gym every morning between 8 30 and 10 30, you know, which is typically not pandemic at a very empty gym time. I really don't like to be around crowds. And, you know, the gym is packed at that time because so many people are working from home. So I mean, I want, yeah. So so what do people want? They want flexibility. They want I don't even think that more money is on the table. You know, when you're asking people right now what they want, I haven't heard salary increases or more money. I think that everybody has gotten a taste of what actual work life balance feels like, and they're craving that and they want to settle into that. You know, and and Jared, you know, Julie, you know, you you've had your own business for a long time. It's great. Right. It's great to get a manicure at 11 a.m. on a Monday. Absolutely. There's no one fighting. Absolutely. What about, you know, I think one of the things you talked about, Katie is title. Sometimes that is a negotiation tool or something that a staff desires, right? So in our sector, as you're saying, maybe, you know, it's not even when it comes to that financial resource, it really is maybe a career move. Maybe it's a title change. Maybe it's that, you know, four four day work week. Some of those, you know, opportunities that really provide that quality of life. I'm huge on quality of life, right? Like we have one to live, let's live it well and let's empower others to live their their best life as well. And if we can afford that afford, not only just financially, but culturally, if we can afford to empower and provide our rock star staff, truly what it is that would make them a little bit happier, happier and to stay with us for the longevity, that to me is a win win. And I think we need to be having those conversations. Yeah, that for sure. And just like you said, you know, maybe it's just managing a staff member or managing the interns, you know, allowing the people that are currently on your staff to be happy to take on more responsibility. I think it goes a long way. Absolutely. Now, understanding that every title or every job is is available to do that, you know, and I think that's that's something important to consider. But I do think there could be a leadership conversation of, OK, what does this look like? But I agree with you, Katie. Let's ask our team first and foremost, you know, are you happy? What what are some things that you would like to see added or changed or benefits? And I think that's really important because everyone is different. Yeah, and one thing working with the charter school space where, you know, they operate as nonprofits, but they also have very high turnover. You know, the stat, it's a real burnout sort of industry, if you will, for the teachers. They work long days, long hours, longer than public education. And one of the things one of my clients did up in in the Bronx a few years ago was they just sent out a survey because they really wanted to focus on retention. And they said, do you see yourself working at this school within the next two years? And everyone said no. And then they said, do you see yourself working as a teacher within another public or charter school in the next two years? And they all said yes. So it was really a place where they said, wow, like we're screwed up. Let's let's bring it back to the drawing board. And they have done great changing. You know, they, they set up a whole advisory board just on retention to work on really, you know, keeping their staff and they've done so many things knowing that all of their staff wanted out. Like that's not a way to run a ship, right? And I think that's a great place to start. Do you see yourself working in development? Do you see yourself working in development in this organization? No? Okay. Well, what do we have to do? Yeah. You know what? I appreciate the bravery that it took to say, yeah, we're going to hold the mirror up and we may not like what we see. Right. Exactly. One other, I don't know how much time we have left, but I did want to point out something else too that has sort of been trending on LinkedIn. It's mined the gap. So, you know, from as a recruitment professional, you know, when an HR person or hiring manager sees a gap in a resume, it's always such a thing. For me, you know, it's a hard sell for sure. You know, even though I understand it, but you know, a lot of my clients are very old school, old school mentality. And I think that if we're coming off of this pandemic we have to start to realize like there's going to be a lot of gaps in resumes and let's let that stigma go. You know, there could be so many reasons not just in women's resumes anymore and men's resumes too, whatever. So let's let the gap in the resume go. Let's stop questioning it or thinking that the person is a bad employee or just has a bad work ethic because of that. And then that was the one thing I wanted to say. And the other point was I was reading in corporate they've established a return ship program in some corporate organizations. So basically or companies, basically what that is is gathered essentially in a community within a current company. And they said, we're going to start almost like an internship program for people who've left the workforce or want to get into the sector and specifically have a group of new hires work understanding the sector, understanding that company and sort of bring them on as a training program but they're paid and I know that nonprofits don't all have the budgets to do it but it's something that I would urge it's a great way to sort of train someone who's probably already highly skilled in your organization, you know and they're coming there with no nonprofit experience just maybe corporate experience or something else. I think it's a great place to start when you're looking for staff and those are the people that want to be there. You know, that's great because that's just culture building. You know, that's just, I mean and that's even just a great idea for even somebody that's moving from one sector within the nonprofit, you know, landscape to another. Let's say you're from health and human services to culture. I mean, you know, culture in the arts to learn what's going on, that's brilliant. And yeah, that's super smart. Wow, well, you know, Katie we always appreciate what you have to say. We always are like, what would Katie say? What would Katie do? We always want to know what your thoughts are. I think you see things before the rest of us do in many ways because of that HR component. So you're right on that wave leading us in and so we're really, really appreciative that you share your knowledge and your time. Here's Katie's Information CEO of Staffing Boutique. You have really been impacted by the pandemic because you really started to lean into the educational side of things too, right? Yeah. You touched on that, but can you explain just a little bit more about that? Yeah, well as someone who does staffing for nonprofits I also started to really work with the charter school space back in 2007 and they again operate as fully functioning nonprofits. So I do teacher recruitment for them and then I typically work with schools that are under five years and then once they get their charter renewal I work on what their development and fundraising plans will look like after they hit their five year mark. So I started to place their development consultants and it really is pretty organic as I start to learn more and more about organizations. There is a teacher shortage nationally just in general right now, now more than ever. So if you know any teachers, send them my way. Teach for America alums, whatever. Those are the people that are gold for me. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely, we love Teach for America, that's for sure. What an amazing thing. Well, here's Katie's information. Definitely reach out to her. Again, I'm Julia Patrick, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. So happy to say Jared Ransom is back with us, CEO of the Raven Group, also known as the nonprofit nerd. I must witness to you, boy, did I ever realize how much I don't know as when you were not here? Oh, no! No! No! Because I was like, hmm, I wonder what Jared would say. No, it's been really cool. It's been really, really cool that... Well, it feels good to be missed, so thank you. Yes, you were definitely missed, but we are delighted that you could take and enjoy time with your family and away. And so part of that is also coming back to our sponsors who love us, who we love, who've shared their insight and their treasures with us so that we can continue on this journey. You will see Staffing Boutique, for those of you who don't know, Staffing Boutique was one of the first people that reached out to us. And I remember like, oh yeah, we have a sponsorship, right? I mean, I was so shocked that anyone would wanna join us on this journey. And because we did think it was just gonna be such a short journey. Two weeks. Okay, yeah. I mean, I... We didn't have sponsorships for those two weeks, but now we know. Now we know. So anyway, I do say from the bottom of my heart, Katie, you helped shift this vision that we had and shipped a lot alive, so thank you so much. We wanna remind everybody that we have started a new program called Fundraising Events TV, really exciting opportunity just to drill down into the event side of things. So we always say from golf to gallows and ballrooms to barns, we got you covered. Hey, everybody, thanks so much. It's been a great way to start the week. Katie, you inspired me as always. Jared, great to see you back. Thank you. Thanks everybody. Good to see you both. Have a good one. We will. We wanna end today and remind you to stay well so you can do well. We'll see you back here tomorrow.