Why Gratitude and Empathy Drive Real Business Results
Tiffany Thompson built DaMar Staffing Solutions on a foundation of boutique service and deep relationships. With 18 years in recruiting, she’s watched technology transform how organizations find talent. The shift isn’t just about new tools. COVID changed candidate expectations around remote work, communication preferences, and what makes a company worth joining. Thompson sees a recurring pattern: firms either chase quantity through automation or maintain quality through human judgment. Her approach combines both. AI handles resume screening and scheduling. Her team handles the conversations that reveal whether someone will thrive in a role. The result is efficiency that doesn’t sacrifice the personal touch candidates and clients expect.
The challenge extends beyond placing candidates. Thompson trains her recruiters to use ChatGPT and other AI tools as extensions of their expertise, not replacements for it. She’s created a library of prompts that lets junior recruiters deliver results comparable to industry veterans. But she’s clear about the limits. Executive placements still require direct outreach and relationship building. LinkedIn conversations and referrals matter more than applicant tracking systems at that level. Entry and mid-level roles benefit from automation in sourcing, but the phone screen and in-person interview remain non-negotiable. Thompson insists on seeing candidates face-to-face for office roles because virtual interviews miss behavioral cues that predict cultural fit.
The biggest mindset shift isn’t about technology adoption. It’s helping both candidates and hiring managers understand that hybrid work is a business tool, not a lifestyle perk. Thompson counsels candidates who resist in-office requirements to calculate total compensation, not just salary. She works with managers who’ve let remote policies erode team standards. Her advice to hiring managers: conduct a talent audit. Assess skill gaps, culture health, and whether your mission comes through clearly online. Candidates research companies as thoroughly as companies research them. Your web presence either reinforces or contradicts what you claim about culture. Organizations that use technology to amplify human connection instead of replacing it will win the competition for talent.
https://youtu.be/xP\_sNT0nNdU?si=2IqPFBD\_oW\_SY87d
Episode Summary:
Join Cody Lents as he speaks with Tiffany Thompson, President of DaMar Staffing Solutions, about navigating the intersection of AI automation and authentic human connection in modern recruiting. With 18 years of experience, Tiffany shares how her boutique staffing firm uses technology to enable deeper relationships, why in-person interviews still matter, and what candidates really want in today’s hybrid work environment.
Key Topics:
-
Use technology to handle repetitive tasks so your team can focus on meaningful human interactions
-
In-person interviews reveal real-time behaviors and problem-solving skills that virtual calls often miss
-
Candidates are shifting from demanding fully remote work to welcoming hybrid arrangements for collaboration and mentorship
-
Executive-level recruiting still requires direct outreach and relationship-building rather than automated systems
-
Modern job seekers research companies as thoroughly as companies research them—your digital presence is your culture showcase
Connect with COVI:
Instagram | Facebook | Website | FREE IT Strategy Analysis
Links to The COVI Way Podcast
YouTube | Apple Podcasts | Spotify
Episode Transcript
The COVI Way Podcast - Episode with Tiffany Thompson
Welcome to The COVI Way, the podcast where we break down the intersection of people and technology because IT shouldn’t just be about fixing problems. It’s about enabling people to do their best work. I’m Cody Lents, the VP of Sales at COVI. And today I’m speaking with Tiffany Thompson, President and Executive Recruiter at DaMar Staffing Solutions. With over 18 years in recruiting and staffing, Tiffany has built her Indianapolis-based company around boutique services and deep personal relationships with both clients and candidates. We’re exploring how changes in technology and hybrid work are fundamentally reshaping how organizations attract, recruit, and ultimately retain talent at every level.
Cody: Tiffany, thanks for coming. I appreciate you joining us.
Tiffany: You’re welcome. Thanks for having me here.
Cody: I remember a little bit of your origin story and how DaMar and everything got started. But can you remind me, because I’m probably way wrong about some aspects, and just let me know how you came into the company and then your journey through that time till now.
Tiffany: Fantastic. I would say, Cody, it was one of those things a few years ago. I used to always say I was an accidental entrepreneur. But I tell you, it was a podcast that changed my life because what happens is when I joined the team in 2010, I was completing my master’s and I was actually going to law school. So it was one of those things. If you would have said almost 20 years later I will be in the position that I’m in as president of the organization, I would have said no way. But I took advantage of an opportunity. The previous owner retired at 52, founded DaMar in 2003 and decided that she was ready to retire again and thought that I was the best person for the job. And I said okay. I was the youngest, least experienced, but I took advantage of an opportunity. And you would say now in 2025, we’re still taking advantage of opportunities at DaMar.
Cody: Yeah. How nervous were you when you jumped in?
Tiffany: Very. Just imagine. Well, DaMar was only my second job, so I literally have only had two jobs. And it was one of those things. I didn’t get a promotion to supervisor. I didn’t have any leadership coaching. I literally made a decision to buy the business by a pro and con. I had conversations with a couple people, did a pro and con check and said okay, I’m gonna do this. And I have continued to move forward. And I would say that I have relied on a lot of great relationships along the way, mentors, meeting people like you, getting in contact with Sandler. And that has really helped me get to the position now to where almost 20 years, have a successful business. We still are able to serve a lot of great people and we haven’t looked back.
Cody: That’s awesome. One of the things that I just do this in life, because I’m weird or I’m just interested, I don’t know. But at COVI, intentionally, we always want to understand what’s unique about you as a recruiting and staffing organization or the manufacturing organization for a different client. And that just helps inform us how to make appropriate recommendations instead of just make the best tech presentation when it doesn’t really relate to you. And I remember when we were doing that early on, that you were very focused on two key points, which was the relationship is what matters and we’re going to be more niche and boutique than what has traditionally been in the recruiting and staffing space. So can you enlighten us on what it means to be boutique and kind of how that relationship focus has impacted the journey over the last five or 10 years?
Tiffany: Absolutely. And we are committed to providing ridiculous personalized service and even with the uptick in technology, we still take that we-human approach. And what that means is that we want to sit and understand those pain points. We want to know how you tick so that we ultimately can make the best solution. And it’s not a one off. We are tapped into our clients 365 days out of the year. And even when they don’t want to hear from us, guess what? You still are going to hear from us. And we have been able to leverage technology platforms, but still maintain that we-human approach, because to me, that personalized touch an algorithm cannot replace.
Cody: Yeah, that is a pretty hot topic right now in the world since AI jumped in and has continued to just iterate and iterate. How do you do that? How do you leverage the technology but still stay engaged and focused on the humanity?
Tiffany: Great question. So it’s a couple of different things. Well, for technology platforms, whether it be our CRM system, now we have web-based phone system. We utilize some AI tools, and it’s for efficiency. And what that does is those tools allow for the recruiter to focus more on that human touch, going on site to a client, picking up the phone and asking some of those difficult questions. Because when you think about sourcing and recruiting, sourcing is the actual process of going through resumes and then recruiting, picking up the phone. That is a 40 plus hour work week. So those platforms allow us, applicant tracking systems, now in the technology world, in the staffing world, they talk about those AI bots that allow you to build code that then allows the actual end user to feel like that they are talking to someone and getting that email response. That allows us to be more efficient.
Cody: Those are updates, those emails. What’s going out when you’re sending this? Give me an idea of what’s going out.
Tiffany: Well, what’s going out now. It used to be a time, and I’m aging myself. When I got into the business, I would literally probably send out hundreds and hundreds of emails with the same message to different people. You’re doing the copy paste, copy paste, copy paste. And that leads to error. But now when you can build code or even have some type of email blast that can do that work for you and you put it on a schedule, now it limits the error of the user. Because it makes me think of my sourcer, love him to pieces, but he’s not strong administratively. So it’s like, do we really want him copying and pasting hundreds of emails or now when he’s doing text messages, we’re relying on him to data input text messages. No, we don’t want him to do that. We leverage tools to be able to do the work and really decrease the error.
Cody: So the tools are, like you said, decreasing the error. So it lowers your risk of creating an unpleasant experience. And then it’s also adding the efficiencies that are letting, like you said, your sourcer focus on more meaningful work, which I’m guessing would be a 3D conversation on the phone or Teams or Zoom or whatever.
Tiffany: Absolutely, absolutely. And one of the things that you realize with people, even as a recruitment firm and a consultant division, it’s hard to find good people, right? And it’s hard to find people that understand how to do the work. So now more than ever, with the client demand asking what is the average turnaround time to get a placement, they are really putting the pressure on even agencies to be more efficient. But if you can’t find the team members in the training time, then that’s where the tools become really important.
Cody: So what are other agencies doing then that you see out there? Especially if it’s different than what you’re doing.
Tiffany: Absolutely. So I will say most agencies now, and it’s funny Cody, because I am a part of an agency owner peer group. And our whole conversations have shifted from people to now, what’s your tech stack? And I can recall a couple of years ago, I’m sitting there and they’re like, Tiffany, what are you doing? And I’m like, you know, we’re still somewhat manual, a little automated. Agency owners of all sizes are really relying on technology because for them it’s quantity based. But my business model is more quality based, which allows us to still have that we-human. But if you’re an agency that’s needing to hire a thousand general labor people, you don’t have the time to put out. You have to rely on technology.
Cody: So you’re placing candidates in different roles than that quantity approach?
Tiffany: Yes.
Cody: Gotcha. So we don’t do much general labor at all. We’re more office professional level. So in that industry, you have to have somewhat of a more personal touch. Is that because, not that soft skills are not always important, but that because they’re more important in that type of culture and environment that those roles are being placed into?
Tiffany: Absolutely. And I never forget, just imagine even virtually when you interview people, you see them virtually. But let’s just say an office is looking for a front desk person. You expect this front desk person to be the first point of contact, to be very pleasant. Virtually, you kind of get that. But just imagine first day that person walking in and you realize that they don’t have that personality and they don’t have anything and you may have just had a phone call with them. That’s where for us, we still do locally a lot of in-person interviews. And the reason is because in-person versus virtual can be different from some, especially when you think about entry level to middle level type professionals where they’re interfacing with client more. You really want to put your eye on them.
Cody: And what differences do you see between candidates that you have to do virtual or you do in person? What do you get to pick up on more when they’re there in the room?
Tiffany: What we see is that in person, you get to see real time the little behaviors that exist with people. And you find at times that people are more nervous in person because we shifted with COVID to a more virtual world. So people to me at times could show more virtually. But now when you’re sitting in front of this person and they’re on the spot pretty similar to this podcast, you expect a person to be able to deliver. And what I have noticed is that at times people say, hey, does it matter from entry level to executive level? To me, in person still puts a person on the spot. So you get to see how they think and their problem solving skills.
Cody: Absolutely. So when you’re virtual, what is it that gets in the way of seeing that?
Tiffany: Well, I think a lot of times is that, and I will speak for myself, I don’t believe that I am always focused virtually because at times I’m sitting at my computer, I have two screens, I can be looking at another screen. And with that being said, for me, I’m more likely to be on auto drive when I’m interviewing someone.
Cody: Oh, so it’s your side of the screen that is different. I get that. We always say that all of our clients and us, you experience most of the world through a screen because this is what your work world is and then this is what your personal life world is. And so getting to understand how that works in your world is pretty cool. So you prefer in person because you know that you are on your best game.
Tiffany: Absolutely. Absolutely. And it for me, I like to be able to hear people breathe.
Cody: That makes sense.
Tiffany: It’s as interesting enough as that is, I just like to be able to hear people breathe. And I also like to be able to gather people’s sense of humor. And even virtually at times it’s like, relax. And I do think people are more relaxed in their own environment, but now take them out of their environment. Are they going to be able to perform? Because that’s where you’re going to place them at is out of that environment.
Cody: Absolutely. Sometimes. Gotcha. And I noticed with my employees that are hybrid or even field employees, when they’re on virtually, totally different people. They come into the office, at times they may not even speak and I’m like, whoa, what are you doing? Hello. Good morning. But they’re so used to being in their own environments or doing something different, they don’t even think. And it’s like you are around people.
Tiffany: Was that like that before COVID?
Cody: No, it wasn’t. And I think it’s the market of the new age professional. I think of one of my program coordinators, I have to force her to speak and we have a very family-oriented culture. She probably hates coming to the office because now I’m in her face and she always looks at me like, why are you talking to me?
Tiffany: So just preferring a message versus a conversation?
Cody: Absolutely. Cody, quick story. My program manager and my project coordinator, they were literally five steps away from each other and they were chatting via Teams. So I got with my program advisor and was like, why are they chatting when they’re five steps away from each other? That’s weird.
Tiffany: Is it an open office concept?
Cody: Yes.
Tiffany: Okay. I’m just thinking of whenever I, because we’re down in the middle layer of our building and I’m messaging people upstairs instead of, mostly because I don’t want to walk up. She literally could have turned around.
Cody: Yeah, I get it. My kid will text me. I will be watching a movie as a family in the same room eating popcorn and she’ll text me from the foot of the couch and I’m at the head of the couch. She’s about to be 15. So I’m sure that there’s, is that something that you see generationally with younger people only, or is it just kind of after COVID, it just kind of got that way in general?
Tiffany: I think after COVID it got that way. It still freaks me out. Even when you talk to me about some of the technology things, I’m still like, huh, why? But then I do understand that in order to be competitive in the world, you have to adopt some of the technologies and the automations and be okay with some of the, I will say, things that I consider inconsistencies. It’s just the norm of the direction that the world is going in.
Cody: Yeah. I mean, that’s true. I think one of the things we say often is we work with leaders who know that you have to use technology to be successful. You have to have good cybersecurity to survive, but they’ve invested all this money into things and they’re just not working the way they think they’re supposed to be working or that they should be working. And a lot of times we come in and we align things to process and recalibrate and all sorts of cool little marketing trendy things I can say right now. But it is the reality of the world. If you don’t use technology, you better have a really good reason to not be using technology because everyone else is using it. And there’s a lot of advantages to it. In your industry, when you’re placing people, entry level or management level or executive level, does it change? Does the technology requirements from a skills perspective change for them? And then I’m going to ask the same question about what they’re asking for. That’s changed since COVID.
Tiffany: Good question. I would say for entry level and middle management, you can leverage technology a lot and you will be able to tweak it to get a nice pipeline of candidates. But when you think about executive, whether it be your C-suite director level, those individuals are not typically utilizing technology. And usually, even their resumes, the best candidate is probably not going to be pulled via a CRM, some type of system, because they’re not always used to those buzzwords and being able to attract and brand themselves. So it does require having to go out and find that person. So for executive level positions, we rely on referrals and we do a lot of direct recruiting. I love LinkedIn because typically when I reach out to people on LinkedIn, they respond, which is great to be at a level to where you get the response level. But for executive level placement, you really need that. For entry level, middle management, we leverage tools totally to be able to get that pipeline of candidates that we need. And what you hear from the job seeker now is that it’s less personal. They know when they’re getting an automatic response. And they can tell. They know when they get a call and it’s an AI generated response. They know. They know when people say, how can I get my resume seen? But what the job seeker doesn’t understand is that when you start playing around with some of those AI tools you utilize, you lose really being able to market yourself on paper because now it turns into literally a resume. And you can tell when someone tries to pull out all the buzzwords, but then it doesn’t correlate with what their actual skillset is.
Cody: And what are you doing to separate that wheat from the chaff at DaMar? If that doesn’t give any secret sauce away or anything like that.
Tiffany: We use a mixture of automation plus the we-human approach, because now from a sourcing standpoint, we utilize automation from a sourcing standpoint. And then we have an actual phone call, phone interview. Then we go back to automation with the responses and then even with scheduling it’s automation. And then the interview is live.
Cody: So you’re using the automation to move the mundane or repetitive tasks that can’t, a system can do for you, which is probably just in my world analyzing rows of a spreadsheet to find certain things. And then you put those over and then you make your phone calls. That’s something that you’re saying the system can do all that for us. The system can do the scheduling, look at our calendar, get their input and let them self-schedule, whatever it is. But you need to be there for the initial phone call to figure out who they really are, and then the interview to get even deeper into that.
Tiffany: Then one of the things that I’m training my recruiters on now is, I will say over the last few years, I’m sought out as a headhunter recruiter, but in 2025, I’m more on my consulting side of my business. So it’s trying to still leverage my team, although they don’t have the skillset that I have to be able to identify talent. And we do that as we put resumes in AI tools and we create some little bit of coding to say, would this person be a great fit for this role? If so, why? And that helps the recruiter out. Now put together some interview questions that you can ask this person, whereas someone like myself, I don’t need to do that. But I’m only one person and I’ve tried to duplicate myself and I have not been able to do that.
Cody: So instead you’ve created a library of AI prompts and processes that allows you to basically extend yourself from a time perspective. You’ve created tools that mimic what you do so your team can basically have access to your brain.
Tiffany: Absolutely. That’s absolutely. And it’s so many different tools out there. But I would say I’m an advocate for ChatGPT. I utilize it and I’ve been trained internally on that now from a sourcing and recruiting standpoint and really getting the team to adopt it and understand you’re not plagiarizing, you’re being able to move the candidate process along in a timely manner. And it also helps people that are entry level in the industry be able to still get similar results as someone who has been in the industry longer.
Cody: Yeah, because you’re basically explaining to them that it’s a tool. You’re not doing anything wrong. You’re just instead of typing it all out in Microsoft Word, you’re letting this type it for you. Like an executive from the 1970s has an assistant who’s transcribing everything on a typewriter.
Tiffany: Absolutely.
Cody: That’s pretty cool. If we switch sides of the story from a technology perspective, remote work or mobile phones or anything like that, what are you seeing candidates want at the negotiation table that’s different than it was before COVID?
Tiffany: Well, if you would have asked me this two years ago, I would have said that most people want to work remote because they really have built a lifestyle of working remote. Whether it’s now I don’t have a vehicle, now my children are not in daycare, now I get to be able to cook dinner on the clock at four o’clock. But what we’re seeing now is that many individuals understand that some organizations are wanting to require people to report in person or even hybrid schedules. And they welcome it because they realize that they have missed some of the collaboration that takes place in-house. And you also miss some of the mentorship that goes on in-house. And you just miss the whole people, being able to talk in the lunchroom. You don’t get that when you’re at home. So what we’re seeing even from an entry level and executive level, people are welcoming it. Those that are not are the folks that understand, oh my gosh, I’m saving $20,000 a year plus because I’m at home. But what they don’t realize is certain positions, especially in the state of Indiana, you’re going to have to report back to work in one way or another. And how you do that is up to you.
Cody: It sounds like you have to kind of educate candidates from time to time.
Tiffany: Absolutely.
Cody: Do you have an example of one of those where you had to really help someone with a mindset shift?
Tiffany: Absolutely. So here recently, I was working with one of my recruiters, a sharp program manager. She recently had a baby coming off maternity leave and she’s like, well, I only want 100 percent remote. And it’s like, well, we have a great opportunity for you, but it’s going to require you to report to work or at least be open to hybrid. Well, I can’t do that because I don’t have a sitter yet for my newborn child. And it’s like, you do understand that from an employer standpoint, we don’t hire people so they don’t have to pay for daycare. Now you’re in a situation to where you have to understand that remote work is really a benefit at times for the employer and the individual. But your mindset can be that I want remote work because right now I don’t want to have a sitter and I don’t want my child going out to a daycare. And it was one of those things to where when she was having that conversation with my team member, she was very adamant. But when I had that conversation with her, she’s like, well, let me do some research on this and see what I can do. Because I told her, if your compensation is higher and you now have to build into the budget of a sitter, would that make sense for you to go obtain a daycare? And she said yeah.
Cody: Yeah, she’s just moving money around.
Tiffany: Yes.
Cody: So does that mean that you see some candidates who are kind of digging their feet in on these employer requirements, but with the wrong motive or reasoning? It’s less about, in this case, it was less about needing to be at home and it was more about needing to save or have the money for this $600 or $1,200 a month for daycare.
Tiffany: Absolutely. And it’s always down with the candidate. It’s a lot of I. They believe they can negotiate pay, but they don’t understand the total compensation is based on skill set. Your life sale may say you need this amount, but if your skillset doesn’t warrant that, then there’s no way to bridge the gap.
Cody: Yeah, unless you upskill. Yeah. What about on the other side when you’re helping companies find recruits, do you have an example of if you had to help that HR leader, whoever it was, reposition their mindset for something that was more realistic? From going from saying yes to remote or?
Tiffany: I mean, that’d be a good example. It could really be anything, but I just know a lot has changed in the space in the past five years.
Cody: Because I think about one of my clients where they’re still 100 percent remote. It’s so interesting. We will hop on meetings with executive team members and their cameras are off and it’s weird. So as being able, we’ve educated them, it’s like for executive team members, we need cameras on. And if you’re in a position to where you can’t do that, let’s reschedule. So what happens is you have many departmental managers that pretty much set the standard for their team. So if they’re abusing the policies, then they’re okay with their team members abusing the policies as well. And for us, when we’re in a situation where we’re co-managing teams, you have one manager that’s relaxed, but then when they’re working with one of our managers, we’re like, hey, this is the expectation. Now the lines, there’s that gray area. So it’s times where we’ve had to educate the manager. Hey, we don’t care what your lifestyle is. But you do understand when you have people reporting to you, you have a duty to make sure that you’re setting the standard, which is based on what the organization has put in place from a policy standpoint. Because when you don’t, you would eventually start seeing a decline in productivity.
Tiffany: Which is why the policy exists in the first place.
Cody: Absolutely. Gotcha. If you were talking to a room of hiring managers, I’m literally thinking about AI prompt language here when I was thinking that. But no, if you were talking to a small group of hiring managers, what would be your number one recommendation for how to attract and retain talent? Here’s what you’re seeing in the world that is the greatest impact.
Tiffany: Great question. First, I think every organization should consider doing a talent audit. And that is a process of being able to understand where we are today, what skill gaps exist, what tools do we need to implement, what policies do we need to put in place, and who do we really need to go out and hire? And that is so important. And it also gives you a complete understanding of where your culture is. Because some organizations think that they have the best culture ever. But when you haven’t had to hire in years and you have people that have been in your environment for a while, what worked 20 years ago just is not gonna work today. And it’s hard for organizations to understand that because a tenured employee is gonna have a different need than someone who’s a new hire. And even at DaMar, we have experienced that. And you have to get good at being able to offer professional development opportunities, mental wellness incentives, and being able to create a positive culture to where you’re supportive and where people feel like, hey, I do matter. I am adding value. And when people can hit on professional development, positive culture, mental wellness, and being able to really communicate what the value is and bring their mission and vision to life, that’s how you retain top talent.
Cody: So it’s having kind of that benefits adjacent perks. Is there anything different than that? We’ve talked hybrid work and we’ve talked remote work and we’ve talked compensation and we’ve talked about those little benefits with mental health and what you just listed off. Is there anything else that would make a company stand apart for someone who’s out job hunting?
Tiffany: Well, I would think also leveraging technology. One of the things, and we’re probably an organization, but you will find now more than ever that we spend a lot of time really bringing our mission and vision to life. People want to know what your organization stands for. They want to be able to visually see your culture come to life. So we do a lot of being able to showcase that because people want to know if I say yes to this company, what am I saying yes to? And they also want to know about those testimonials where you have a happy employee and they want to know about those testimonials where it’s a happy client. Because just think years ago, people really didn’t understand that research tool of being able to research the company just as much as they’re researching you. But now, an average job seeker can do all the research they want. They can go look at your Google reviews. They can go to your website. They can see all of that. They can actually go to your Facebook page if they wanted to and it was open. So when you’re now out in the open and people can literally be on their phone and find you, you want to make sure that you’re clear on what they’re finding and does it match what it is that you’re really marketing and branding as an organization.
Cody: So it’s different than when your web presence before was either it was there to drive inbound leads or product purchases or some type of revenue, or it was there to show that you were real, that you were authentic and that it was like, yes, if I don’t have a website, I’m not a company. Now you’re saying it’s also a representation of the culture.
Tiffany: Absolutely. Marketing and branding is so important. DaMar, we literally have had an advertising agency on record for many, many years. But it’s one of the things that we’re doing now is SoundCloud. It’s being able to take a whole meeting or training and bring it to life via SoundCloud. That’s something new that we’re doing. I’m like, ooh, we can do this. That’s cool. This is cool. But then what we do is we send the links out to the employees. Now you can click on a link that says this is the DaMar brand. Oh, we just had a meeting on policy. Go back and listen to this so you can be clear if you weren’t clear on what our updated policies are.
Cody: Oh, gotcha. That makes sense. So it sounds like you’ve evolved a lot since you jumped in and took that risk and bet on yourself. What’s next for DaMar? I know you’re pivoting towards consulting a little bit, but what do you think the next year or five look like?
Tiffany: That is a great question. I would like to get to a point to where we again just continue to be committed to the ridiculous personalized service. As a leader, now I’m spending more time working on the business. And even now, just being out more, just having those interesting conversations with individuals, because when I’m able to do that, that really drives the business forward.
Cody: If there was one top priority or top major roadblocker challenge that you’re facing right now to go into that next phase of your organization, what would that be?
Tiffany: Well, coming from an organization that one of the large service offerings is staffing and recruitment, it’s really staffing. It’s very hard to find those rare individuals that fit into our culture and that also could even be trained to do what we do. I just think this year we’ve hired maybe three to four people on our staffing division and I can be transparent, none of them worked out. And part of the reason is because many of them were very relying on behind the scenes emailing. And no one understands that when you’re in a people world, you have to like people. And even when we, I would say we have a recruitment process in place, we have the tools for personality, all those types of assessments. But at the end of the day, when someone is in a people business and really likes to hide behind technology, they are not a great fit for us. So now we are struggling with identifying those we-human people that really can adopt that philosophy.
Cody: And that’s not something you guys can train in.
Tiffany: Well, we have attempted, but the market is different now, Cody. When you think about the job seeker that’s out there when they have been in environments to where they are able to hide behind technology. And now you’re saying, hey, go meet with this person at their location, they struggle with that. And at times just knowing how to communicate. So we’re all about training, but we also have gotten to a point as an organization to where we want to make sure that early on we understand the behavior. Speaking Sandler, the attitude, the technique. And if we see it’s not there early on, we’re not going to spend a lot of time trying to upskill because it’s not going to work.
Cody: Gotcha. Are you seeing that across all age groups and all industries where people are just hiding behind a screen instead of using a screen to connect?
Tiffany: Absolutely. And it’s just a new phenomenon. And I don’t believe any organization has totally figured it out because when you think you figured it out, then it’s something else that pops up and it’s like, ooh, how can we get over this?
Cody: Yeah, no, it is. I’m making mental notes. How do we elevate the experience within technology to help facilitate connection instead of de-prioritize it?
Tiffany: Absolutely.
Cody: Well, that leads us to our tech tip because we are almost out of time. And I thought of this whenever I was talking to you on the phone last time, early in April. But a really good tip that you can use and you can use tools for this if you want. Tools out there would be Loom or you can record yourself with Teams or Zoom. But you can also just grab a smartphone and just record an asynchronous video of yourself. That way, when you’re trying to be seen by someone who’s looking for talent, they can actually learn who you are instead of look like the same resume that ChatGPT wrote for everybody else. And it goes the other way too. When you have a candidate that is in your pipeline of interview and qualification process, have your direct, the people that they will be reporting to, record a quick video to say hi and let them know that they’re humans all the way up to the executive level. And that’s it.
Cody: Tiffany, thanks for joining us today.
Tiffany: You’re welcome. This was fun.
Cody: Yeah, it was great. I really loved it. See you again.
Cody: Tiffany’s insights reveal that successful recruiting in our hybrid, technology-driven world isn’t about choosing between high tech efficiency and high touch relationships. It’s about strategically combining both to create authentic connections at scale. Technology should amplify human judgment, not replace it. Hybrid work has shifted the conversation from location flexibility to holistic work-life integration, and organizations that understand how these changes affect different employee levels differently will have a significant advantage in both attracting and retaining talent. The companies thriving in this environment are those that use technology to create more meaningful human connections, not fewer. Learn more from Tiffany on her LinkedIn page and about DaMar Staffing Solutions at damarstaff.com.
