The Human Touch: Standing Out in the AI-Driven Job Market (6-14-24)
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​[00:00:00] 

Donna Serdula: How are you doing today, Isaiah?

Isaiah Hankel: Good today. This week's been ~a lot of fun. ~A lot of fun. I know we were talking yesterday about, ~um,~ some of the challenges ~in the, ~in the job market. I think, ~you know, ~one thing you said to me a few sessions ago is, ~you know, it can be, ~it can be tough when you hear a lot of people's tough stories.

Donna Serdula: Oh

Isaiah Hankel: And so ~you have to,~ you have to be, ~um, ~very kind of positive and can do while also being realistic with the person.

~How do you, ~how do you navigate that?

Donna Serdula: You know, ~I, and there's, ~there's two pieces of this, right? There's ~the, ~the personal piece, for us, we, ~sure I, I, ~I assume ~you're, you're, ~you're similar to me in that I take on my clients fears

Isaiah Hankel: Sure.

Donna Serdula: have to, I have to stop myself and say, wait, that's what they're experiencing, but I can't take it on.

I used to take it on and it was, ~that was very, ~very heavy, ~um, ~to do so, ~but ~on the flip [00:01:00] side, you know, I, I also. I always want to let them know that don't, it may be ugly out there, in the darkest of days throughout history, People still got up, they provided for their family, they made a living, even in the worst of times it was possible. And we look around and ~we're, ~this is an amazing time and we can't lose sight of

Isaiah Hankel: That's true.

Donna Serdula: business continues to take place. Business continues to happen and ~there will Always be, ~there will always be opportunity for people who can get the job done, who can step up to the plate, ~who can, ~who can solve issues, who could see the bigger picture, ~who can, ~who can make things happen. So, and that's the one thing I don't want anyone to forget. And that's something that I do try when I talk to my clients. When I talk to people who just call me cause they need help and it's not even my clients, but need some motivation. They need some inspiration. ~That's, ~that's something I [00:02:00] do try ~to, ~to impart to them. ~Um, ~how about yourself? I mean, ~you're, you're, ~you're in it with me. ~What, what ~it's ugly out there. How are you helping people? ~Yeah.~

Isaiah Hankel: think, ~um, ~when you say that I have. So my, I was thinking of my grandma, my grandma was born in the UK. And I always remember the story she said about during world war two, when they got bombed, ~uh, battle battle of Britain or whatever triggered. ~Anyway, I'm just like, we're not getting bombed.

I mean, some people in the world are, but we're not getting bombed as we're going out and trying to find a job. And the people, it depends on what kind of personality type that you're working with. You have to find a way to reach them. Like some people, they will want to challenge you. It's almost like they want you to say, you're right.

There's no hope. You should quit. It's over. ~Like, ~I'll actually use that as kind of like a joke to change a person's state. Sometimes when we're, ~you know, ~teaching ~or something to a, ~to a larger group, because they'll get into that mode of like, no, I can't because of this. Well, my situation is different. ~I can't, ~I can't.

And then they're mad at you for trying to be positive. Like that's her initial reaction because they're like, no, it's, There's no positivity [00:03:00] here, but ~the only, ~the only other option is you either race to the bottom and focus on all the negative things ~they're there, ~or you try to find solutions. ~So~

Donna Serdula: Yeah.

Isaiah Hankel: trying to get them to a point, like even just explaining that rationale can help.

Here's what I'm doing. ~This is bad. ~Data is not good. You have these challenges, but we have to focus on solutions and people have with a very similar combination. You know, overcome that too. So trying to put it together in that way,

Donna Serdula: Yeah.

Isaiah Hankel: ~but yeah,~

Donna Serdula: you've got to put your blinders on. And I think there's ~some, ~some good truth to that. People are always going to give you advice. People are always going to tell you what it looks like and you almost have to put your blinders on and just keep going down your path. the vision that you're heading towards. ~And, ~and just steadfast move towards it. And, ~you know, here's, ~this is something that I love. I get this often. ~Um, ~I'll say, they'll say, Oh gosh, it's ugly. It's terrible. ~You know, ~I don't know what I'm going to do. ~Uh, ~and I'll say, tell me about your job search. What [00:04:00] does it look like? What have you done? I I've put in three applications.

Isaiah Hankel: it's true. It's true thresholds. So thresholds matter. Like if your expectation is to put in three applications and get hired, expectations will kill your motivation and de energize you. But ~if somebody, ~if somebody came along, we talked about this before, that's just psychological anchors. If somebody said, you're going to, no person will ever get hired without uploading 1000 targeted applications.

~First, ~If that was like a rule that people just, it was a set rule that became codified, all of a sudden you'd be like, Oh, I sent in three, like, of course I'm not hired yet. And people don't even know like ~the real, ~the realistic numbers, there's some good numbers out there. None of them can be completely accurate because the job search changes so much.

But you know, I try to tell them like, look, there's a range of usually if a resume is high quality, like 20 to 80 resumes. Meetings about 50, ~even just knowing that some people, I don't even, ~and then you'll get the other crowd. That's like, I uploaded hundreds of resumes. I'm like, but did you change any of the resumes?

No, I just spammed them everywhere. And those [00:05:00] it's so there's, it's always a quantitative game and a qualitative game. So, but if you describe that rationale in a way that again, people will understand they're looking for hope, but it's like, they want to challenge you and kick your shins as you're giving them that hope until that, but you do have an effect.

Yeah. Like, I don't know if you have siblings ~or, you know, you might have, as you grow up, you talk to them, you know, I was the oldest, ~you talk to them and try to motivate them in certain ways and they're your siblings. So ~they're like,~ they're like, you stop talking, I've heard everything out of your mouth before because you can't reach them, but then you see, ~maybe, ~maybe it takes 10 years.

That they take on some of that advice, and so they were actually listening, so I think when you're trying to help people in any way, that's what you have to do, and you gotta ~be a very, you have to ~be very strong, I think, mentally to do that, because ~otherwise you will take it on, ~otherwise you'll start questioning your own belief system and be like, man, maybe they can't do it.

~Maybe there is no hope. ~Maybe what I'm doing is useless. So you have to be strong enough ~to, ~to have your own belief system and not let it be limited.

Donna Serdula: you know, one of the things that I've been hearing from more and more people and [00:06:00] I think it's ~that~ That shift where there are so many ways to spam. And you said this, like, you know, spamming out ~these, ~these applications, spam out, ~um, ~your resume to all these recruiters, spam out, ~um, uh, ~invites on LinkedIn to people, out, ~uh, ~you know, in mails or messages to everyone in your network. ~What I've ~what I've been seeing and what I've been hearing. I was just speaking to Ryan Johnson yesterday, and he said you know what? ~I changed my, ~I changed my whole mindset with LinkedIn. You know, I had hired a company. They were going out there messaging. He said, and you know, like I got some stuff from it.

He said, but now am being ~very, ~very thoughtful in my approach to reaching out to people within my network, ~look~ commenting, and then looking at the people who left comments ~and, and, ~and messaging them, you know, again, thoughtful. You know, really making sure that this is ~the, ~a good person, someone who there's synergy ~and, and, ~and just being really human.

[00:07:00] And he said, ~like, ~just doing that has made a huge difference. ~And, ~and in some ways I think of it like, ~know, ~the change from cold calling to emailing. And now it's almost like you can pick up the phone and call people because no one calls. So it's almost like you've got to do the opposite of what everyone else is doing.

Isaiah Hankel: I was just going to say, yeah, you got to zig when they zag. That's what you're speaking about. A really practical level is this always comes up. This is like your neck of the woods of the, the green open to work circle. You have like the camp that says always put it up. And then you have the camp that says actually do the opposite.

~And like, if it's. ~If it's a job market where everybody has it up, take yours off. If it's a really hot job market, put it on. You said ~there's, there's, ~there is that qualitative and quantitative approach to both. And then there's the zigging and instead of zagging. ~And so I think, I think ~I believe it too, because if you look at AI, the promise of AI in a job market or in contacting or marketing or whatever is reach a lot more people, less effort.

I mean, I still see all [00:08:00] these dumb videos. I had a friend send me this video. Just some tick tock person on like, ~uh, ~trying to help freelancers ~and ~they're, they probably didn't even do this. ~Right. ~And I'm not hating, but I'm just saying like, you see so much of this with AI and they say, okay, here's what you do.

I have, I've gotten all of these clients on my own without doing anything at all. And here's what I do. I have a spreadsheet that I've linked up to AI. If I have any lead comes in, I've trained AI to speak just like me. And they, AI creates a response that's just like me for any of these leads that come in and whatever they say, it responds exactly like me and it will take them all the way to the close and actually close and make the sell.

And I'm like, this is the biggest BS. Like, that's the dream that a lot of people I think are selling for job searching too is like, Hey, just turn AI on trained to speak like you and it's going to go out there and it's going to talk and have these conversations. It'll actually get you hired. And I think hiring managers have that dream too.

~The problem is, is that.~ Human beings adapt on both sides of the equation, just like you can sense a [00:09:00] spam message now at a ~much more, ~much better than you can.

Donna Serdula: Mm

Isaiah Hankel: years ago,

Donna Serdula: Yeah.

Isaiah Hankel: an AI message now, right? Or you or you'll just automatically know that AI is out there. So you want, you're like, I need to see you in person.

Like, I need to talk to you by video at least. If not face to face, if not with multiple things to verify that you're real. So ~the, the, ~the guideposts kind of move like people's understanding. And I think we've all had this, we've all had this epiphany. If you've ever been around somebody who hasn't been caught up, like, I don't know, like I have, ~uh,~ I have, I'll just say it's a parent that I've seen, like see something and they're like, this is real.

This person messaged me. ~Yeah. And it's a, ~I'm like, this is a spam message that's sent out to everybody, but they're not aware of the spam messages. So people adapt. And that's why this AI dream will never work. And that's why this blanketing of AI has broken. I think the job board system, it's broken hiring and it's broken people's experience in the job market.

For sure.[00:10:00] 

Donna Serdula: And I think we're going to have to pivot so much more and so faster because of it. I mean, just, I, I just celebrated on LinkedIn how, ~um, ~you know, I put down when I, as a, as a public speaker, ~uh, ~June of 2009. So this is my 15th year as a public speaker.

Isaiah Hankel: 15 years. ~Congrats.~

Donna Serdula: Of course I've ~been, I'd ~been speaking prior to that, but that was just like ~the, ~the stick in the ground that I put on

Isaiah Hankel: Yeah. ~Yeah.~

Donna Serdula: at any rate, so ~I, I'm getting, ~I'm getting avalanched in these messages from people, you know, congratulations, 15 years. ~I must've gotten 15. Now the very, ~the first message that I got had this really cute little message like, Oh, Hey Donna, I see that ~you've, ~you've gone around ~the, you know, ~the earth one more time.

And ~I just need to pop in here. And it was, ~it was really cute. It felt very natural. ~and ~I responded to the person, Hey, thanks so much. You know, it's great. What's going on in your world. ~And oddly enough, I never, ~I didn't receive an immediate response or anything from this person. Then I got another 14 messages with the exact same

Isaiah Hankel: Wow.

Donna Serdula: [00:11:00] exactly.

Isaiah Hankel: Yeah. See?

Donna Serdula: tells me they're using some service and the service just plops in the exact

Isaiah Hankel: Yeah.

Donna Serdula: same

Isaiah Hankel: Script. So you're the parent in my story that didn't know it was spam and then you learn. And now you know. And so what you, what you're going to do now is you're going to be very on guard against these kind of like BS messages. They're not real. That's what, I mean, for now, like, unless I see somebody is mentioning something that nobody could have really known about me.

That's why you have to be so specific in a subject line, like so specific. Like if you're reaching out on LinkedIn, I mean, again, you're going to have way more strategies on this, but I'm always like mentioned something they've posted in their feed specifically like very, or else they're going to think it's an AI message because it's too easy.

Donna Serdula: to be ~their spe their ~their feed, because they're already grabbing things from the profile.

Isaiah Hankel: Exactly.

Donna Serdula: stagnant.

Isaiah Hankel: Exactly.

Donna Serdula: they're grabbing already, ~so it's gotta be the feed.~

Isaiah Hankel: It's got to be. It's the only thing. So that's and so we'll adapt to that, right? And then I'm guessing I will eventually [00:12:00] adapt to looking at people's feeds and then we'll have to adapt to something else to always differentiate ourselves is like this was us because it goes back to quality versus quantity.

You have to show them like people value quality. If they know that you spent the time to send that message, particularly that resonates with the person. And if they think that it would, if people recognize effort, that's what it is. That's all it comes down to. They recognize effort. ~If they know that you are not putting an effort, they don't want, ~look how big online courses were five, 10 years ago,

Donna Serdula: Yeah.

Isaiah Hankel: because people, they recognize like, Oh my God, there's so much effort to putting in this course and all this different stuff.

But then it became easier and easier because of all my tools. And so people ~You know,~ immediately have a course that's garbage. And so you can't, ~and, and you could, ~there's all these online, you know, like teachable, whatever else where anybody could have an online course. And so it just democratized it, the effort disappeared, like the, ~unless it's, ~unless it's very clear that this is something totally different.

~Like they go, ~like we see people in art, ~like ~they go to the big, ~uh, like, uh, what are the ones ~like the Tony Robbins and the Dean Graziosi guy [00:13:00] they do with a big circle and they had this huge. And so there's something you can see and you're like, Oh, this takes more effort or more money or whatever. So if they can't see that, ~like, ~and on a practical level, the job search, like you said, if they're not, see you.

~You ~making a call, they know that's more effort. They know it's a message where you're mentioning things about the person deep in their past, a feed or, or whatever.

Donna Serdula: ~was even just saying this the other day. I might have said this to you. ~I believe that the introduction. Is going to become so much bigger now than ever before, you know, and at one time, I'm sure you remember back in the day, introductions were really big on LinkedIn. You could ask for an introduction and you could,

Isaiah Hankel: Oh yeah, that's cool. It's like a little tool where you

Donna Serdula: it was really embedded into the LinkedIn interface. And then they got rid of it. ~They got rid of it, which I thought was a shame, but I don't think people were using it as much as they then. ~But now if I'm going to introduce someone to you. Isaiah, you're going to take notice, right? I

Isaiah Hankel: could For sure.

Donna Serdula: because it's

Isaiah Hankel: It's a big deal. That's

Donna Serdula: you know, there's, there's,

Isaiah Hankel: true.

Donna Serdula: to that ~and, ~and I think we're going to [00:14:00] see ~and, and, and if, and, ~and anyone listening, start using those introductions.

I mean, really start asking for them and maybe even spend some time to really craft introduction for yourself that you can give to other people. Right? That's it. This is how I'd like you to introduce me. You know, help me out here. I need these introductions and I mean, I'm not saying of course not spamming, but you know, be really thoughtful and deliberate because I think that's what's going to get you through the door.

That's what's going to get you noticed now because it's overwhelming

Isaiah Hankel: Um, I love that. I love that. And I think you're going to have to do that yourself. I mean, I think being very bullish on just Human to human relationships and whatever. ~It was kind of like trendy to say that it's always been trendy to say that. ~But I think now with AI, it's going to be necessary. And I don't think you can look to the tech platforms to necessarily help you with that because they're, they're playing to the lowest common denominator.

They want you to get on. That's why they have the easy apply button, not because it works, but because it'll keep you on there and get premium. And you feel like you can press that as many times as you want. And you did something, you get a dopamine hit. That's why they test this stuff on kids, [00:15:00] right? I mean, I'm just saying like you can use stuff to your advantage, but ~you're ~just because they're putting in front of you doesn't mean it's the new way. LinkedIn's owned by Microsoft. I always try to remind people of this. Microsoft is pretty clear that they want to, you know, basically turn humans into androids. I mean, in a sense, like they want the tech, ~they, they, they're not trying to, ~they're not there for the human to human relationships.

They're really there to advance the tech. That's why they all but own OpenAI, like it's a partnership to avoid a monopoly, but they basically own OpenAI. So I keep telling people like LinkedIn and OpenAI, it's going to keep being like this. They want you to feel like you have to do no work, no effort. So you buy their service and it does all the AI for you.

Donna Serdula: ~are they, ~what are they doing? What are they selling? The hope and the dream,

Isaiah Hankel: Yeah,

Donna Serdula: the solution.

Isaiah Hankel: it's true. No. And so my only point with this is like it's effort. So like you have to look for ~like where most people are looking for, like, where can I spend less effort to get more done? Yeah. You have to actually look ~like, where can I spend the most effort on something that's the highest impact where other people aren't doing it?

And that is the cold call. That is the introduction. That's the deeper [00:16:00] conversation. I

Donna Serdula: it. Isaiah, always interesting. Thank you so much.

Isaiah Hankel: made it happen. All right. Thanks, Donna.

Donna Serdula: Talk to you later. Bye bye..​