The Resilient Recruiter

What does it take to raise your fees, win better clients, and rebuild your recruiting business from the ground up? In this episode, I speak with Randee Staats, founder of S4 Search Partners, who went from losing everything — $250K in debt and $500 left — to rebuilding a seven-figure desk within the following year. Randee explains the decisions that nearly destroyed his business, the turning point...

Why do some recruiters struggle for traction while others build demand engines that bring clients to them? My guest, Tom Froggatt, made that shift after three days of calling 600 people with no results. Tom is the founder of Singular, a biotech search firm and one of Europe's leading specialists. Six months after launching the business, he hit a breaking point that changed everything. Instead of d...

Why do some recruitment founders build seven-figure businesses while others plateau despite working just as hard? My guest, Ollie Scott, discovered growth doesn't come from hustle alone. It comes from strategic bets. Ollie is the founder of Unknown, a talent growth consultancy that's worked with over 500 brands including Nike, Apple, and Disney. Six years ago, he started with £13,000 on a credit c...

Why do some recruitment business leaders triple their revenue while others plateau despite working twice as hard? My guest, Martin Herbst, discovered the answer the hard way. After hitting rock bottom with burnout, he rebuilt his leadership philosophy from the ground up — and within five years, JobAdder tripled its revenue and client base. Martin is the CEO of JobAdder, one of the world’s leading...

How does a professional touring musician go from the recording studio to building a $1.2M recruiting firm without ever making a single cold call? In this episode of The Resilient Recruiter, Justin Levinson, founder of Coming Up Creative, reveals how he blended creativity, authenticity, and smart systems to grow a seven-figure recruitment business serving the world’s top entertainment and gaming br...

The hardest part of business development isn't effort, it's consistency. Most recruiters know what to do, but struggle to do it every day while juggling clients, candidates, and placements. You know you should be reaching out to prospects daily, but between managing active searches, candidate interviews, and client meetings, your pipeline suffers. The solution? Build automated systems that generat...

Why do some recruiters struggle to break $300K while others hit seven figures in their third year? My guest, Tito Caceres, spotted a $160 billion industry that most recruiters have never even thought about. And he built a thriving business there with nothing but a credit card and relentless hustle. Tito grew up in his family's landscaping business and swore he'd never work in that industry. Ironic...

What if getting fired 20 times wasn’t failure, but the perfect preparation to build something meaningful? In this episode, recorded in London, I talk with James Rowe about what it really takes to build a six-figure solo recruitment practice without office rent, payroll, or management headaches. James shares how experienced recruiters can keep more of what they bill using smart systems, automation...

Most recruitment agency owners hit a wall around 10–20 people. The culture that made you successful starts to crack, and the personal touch gets lost. Nicholas Barton didn’t just avoid that wall he redefined what scaling could look like. From packing boxes in a warehouse to leading a 100-person global firm, Nicholas built The Barton Partnership into one of Forbes’ “World’s Best Management Consulti...

AI isn't coming to recruitment. It's already here. And the gap between recruiters who know how to use it and those who don't is widening fast. My guest today has data proving it: recruiters adopting AI correctly are seeing up to 30% increases in GP per desk. Manan Shah is CEO and co-founder of Recruiter Flow, an AI-first recruitment operating system built for search firms, agencies, and solo pract...

What happens when you sell a 100-employee company at 28 and decide freedom matters more than settling down? Lauren Fernandez didn’t just dream about working from anywhere—she made it a reality. But this isn’t a glossy “digital nomad” story. It’s the unfiltered truth about building a recruiting business while navigating serious health challenges, redefining success, and realizing your best life mig...

Most recruitment firms stall at $1M revenue. Greg Fischer broke through by building a high-retention offshore team, embedding himself inside client organizations with RPO, and using LinkedIn commenting as a smarter BD strategy. As Co-Owner of AMI Network, Greg scaled from $1M to $4.2M revenue and $1.4M profit sustaining 30–40% margins. His model: hire offshore staff directly, integrate them as equ...

Andy Dunne thought other agency owners were the enemy. They'd steal clients, poach candidates, copy ideas. Sound familiar? Then he joined Team in 2014 just to save £130 a month on job boards. Eleven years later, he's their managing director, overseeing 500+ agencies that split over £6 million in fees last year. What changed? Andy learned that protecting everything actually kills more business than...

What if you could run your recruiting firm on autopilot while launching a completely new business? Brian Gabay has mastered this balance—his 5-person team makes placements without him while he builds a tech startup. Brian founded Brian Simon Associates (BSA) in 2016, specializing in PR and marketing recruitment. He built systems, transforming his business from constant attention to running indepen...

Johnny Campbell drops a bombshell: "Can AI recruit better than humans today? Hundred percent better than humans on average." He's got the data to back it up. Johnny explains why half of all recruiters will be gone within the next decade—and how to be in the half that thrives. Johnny runs SocialTalent and has trained over a million recruiters globally. He survived launching an agency during the 200...

Most recruitment agencies waste £50+ per cold call meeting. Anthony Lewis found a better way to scale from startup to 50-person team. Anthony's team made 1,500 cold calls for just 27 placements. That 1.8% conversion rate would panic most agency owners. Instead, he built a candidate experience system that turns rejections into revenue. What You'll Learn: How to build agency growth without expensive...

Fired in 3 days, Dario Furman rebounded to bill $6.5M. Learn his recruitment growth strategies using relationships, niche focus & AI. Fired three days into his first recruiting job, Dario Furman could have walked away. Instead, a bold “second chance” email to the CEO got him rehired and launched a 17-year executive search career placing 500+ professionals and billing $6.5M at StevenDouglas. In thi...

What if your job board wasn’t just a place to post jobs—but the top of your sales funnel? In this episode of The Resilient Recruiter, Jordan Whilden shares how he scaled Ministry Hub, a faith-based executive search firm, by transforming a niche job board into a predictable lead generation machine. Fueled by a cold email campaign that delivers a 17% reply rate, Jordan’s model shows how recruiters c...

Tired of the outdated “thirds” model in executive search? Andrew Mears was too. That’s why he co-founded Lead Candidate—a niche search firm serving the pharma and bio-outsourcing sector—based on a transparent, fixed-fee subscription model that’s up to 30% more cost-effective than traditional pricing. In this episode, Andrew reveals how Lead Candidate went from break-even to 133% revenue growth by...

What does it take to build a recruiting firm that survives three recessions, operates across borders, and thrives without retainers? In this episode of The Resilient Recruiter, we spotlight David Fishman, founder of Sparrow Company—a bi-national executive search and staffing firm based in both the U.S. and Mexico. David shares how he rebuilt after nearly losing everything in 2009 and developed a r...

How do you move from being a contingency recruiter to winning retained searches consistently? And how do you scale your desk without doing it all yourself? In this episode of The Resilient Recruiter, industry veteran Carol Wenom shares the exact mindset shift, client messaging, and team model that helped her make that leap and increase her billings by 70% in one year. With over 40 years in enginee...

What does it take to transform a 500-person staffing company and restore profitability while maintaining high engagement and renewed purpose? In this episode of The Resilient Recruiter, you'll hear how one leader rebuilt culture and strengthened organizational performance through people-first leadership, without sacrificing values or authenticity. After joining the company as a trainee in 2001, Ma...

Why has your LinkedIn reach dropped even though your content is better and your audience is growing? You’re not imagining things. LinkedIn changed the rules in 2025, and in this episode, LinkedIn algorithm expert Richard van der Blom breaks down exactly what’s changed—and how recruiters can adjust to stay visible and competitive. You’ll discover why organic reach is down by 50%+ for most users and...

What if your growth path wasn't adding more clients, but working fewer, higher-quality roles with people who genuinely value your service? Allicia Birch, founder of 4tify Recruitment, built a six-figure recruitment firm in her first year — without cold calls, without compromising on fees, and without chasing every job. Her success came down to discipline: working to a structured 12-hour day in 15-...

How do you grow a high-margin recruitment business without hiring a big team—or chasing every lead? And what happens when you go all-in on yourself, right before a global pandemic? In this episode, I’m joined by Jordana Matsos, founder of Higher Equity, who shares how she launched a solo sales recruitment agency with no prior agency experience—and grew it into a $500K+ business by being radically...