Vegas Hiring Woes

ALERT: This episode contains explicit content. And... We apologize for the change in audio quality toward the end. We're still learning this techy stuff!

In this episode of The VegasStrong Revival Podcast, we dive into the challenges & best practices of the hiring process in #LasVegas. Whether you're an employer struggling to find quality candidates or a job seeker navigating the city's booming job market, this conversation is packed with insights. Britt and Desiree share real stories, tough truths, and practical advice on improving employee experience, fostering a positive #workculture, and finding the right fit for both sides. Don't miss out on this candid & thought-provoking discussion that every Vegas business owner and job applicant NEEDS to hear!

Key Takeaways:

1.    Employee Experience is Crucial: The success of a business hinges on how well it treats its employees. A positive employee experience directly impacts customer satisfaction and overall business performance.

2.    Hiring Challenges in Vegas: Many business owners face challenges in the hiring process, with common complaints about candidates not meeting expectations or lacking commitment.

3.    Promoting from Within Isn't Always the Best Solution: While it can be beneficial, it’s important that those promoted have the necessary leadership skills.

4.    Constant Hiring Process: Businesses should continuously be in the hiring mode, not just when they have an immediate vacancy.

5.    Group Interviews Can Be Effective: Conducting group interviews can save time and also allow employers to observe how candidates interact with others, providing insight into their teamwork skills and cultural fit.

6.    Transparency in Hiring: If the hiring process is taking longer due to competitive candidates, it’s important to communicate this to all applicants rather than leaving them in the dark.

7.    Respect in the Hiring Process: Applicants should never no-show for interviews, and employers should promptly inform candidates about their application status, whether they are selected or not.

8.    Avoiding Drama in Family-Run Businesses: Family-owned businesses should be careful not to let personal dynamics spill over into the workplace, especially in front of employees or potential hires. This can create an uncomfortable work environment and deter quality candidates.

9.    Preparing for Interviews: Applicants should know their non-negotiables and what they want from a job. Employers, on the other hand, should ensure the interview process is well-organized and that they are putting their best foot forward.

10. The Importance of First Impressions: Whether it’s for an employer or an applicant, the first impression is crucial. Small gestures like greeting an interviewee warmly or an interviewer being on time can make a significant difference in setting the tone for future relationships.

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Transcript

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La Critique believes in living a life full of experiences rather than possessions, which is why we designed a concierge service just for Vegas locals. We're all busy, and can any of us really keep up with all the changes around town? And yet, we still crave quality experiences when we go out and spend our valuable time and money. Now, imagine having a personal assistant whose credentials are quite literally hospitality snob and expert event planner. Seriously, leave all the details to us. Recommendations Personalized. Reservations? Done. More time enjoying our city and less time researching it? Absolutely. Subscribe today at LaCritiqueLV.com or give the gift of service by purchasing a subscription for your favorite person. Welcome to the Vegas Strong Revival Podcast. Buckle up because we're taking Vegas Strong culture to a whole new level this season. I'm Britt Whelan, your host, alongside co-host Desiree Wolfe, event professional and host of the Slightly Unfiltered Podcast. This season, the gloves are off and we're ditching the scripts for raw, relatable, and even shocking conversations, tackling real issues locals face, and bringing in voices from various industries like fitness, charity, aviation, and more. Don't forget to follow us on social media and visit Loughran Well, I'm so excited to be here with you today, Desiree, because you had a very recent hiring experience. Yes. You got a new job. I did. You went through the whole interviewing process. Yes. And today we're talking about best practices as an employer in the hiring process and best practices if you are a Thank you so much for joining us. Cannot get good employees. I'm struggling because they're not listening to my training. I'm struggling because they don't want to work. It's all them. You know, it's the employer pointing at the employee. It's almost like doing this weird blame game thing. Yeah, yeah. I was just having a conversation with somebody just yesterday about jobs and job descriptions and when people are hired and the, well, that's not my job whole thing that's happening. And it's just really interesting. I think you're right. I think it is an epidemic of the hiring vicious circle, employee versus applicants versus employers. And it's just a hot mess. Well, just like there is the customer experience, right? CX. Customer experience is one half of your business. Employee experience is another aspect of your business. If you are not promoting the best practices with your employees, you're not You're not making them feel valued. You're not making them feel wanted or rewarded or whatever it is, right? Like all the things. If you're not giving your employees the best experience of working there, guess what? Your customers aren't going to get the best experience either. Right. Because your employees are your number one asset. It's not the product or service you're selling, okay? Your employees sell for you. So if you're not paying attention to this stuff, you're missing out. All right. I think it was the late Tony Hsieh who had put out a comment and said, your first customer is your employees. If your employees are not happy, they will not be happy selling your product. Yeah. Period. And that's so true. So I think there's a lot of stigma that comes around hiring right now. Oh, here's one. Here's one. I'm going to throw Amazon under the bus right now. I for sure thought, I don't know, that they got an employee discount when they shopped on Amazon or at the bare minimum that they would get a prime membership included with their employment. Right. Right. Like at the bare minimum, if they work for the company, why can't they get two days shipping for themselves? Right. It would entice them to spend more money with Amazon. Like, hello, they don't. That's crazy. They get every calendar year, every employee will get$100 credit on Amazon.$100.$100. Okay. A prime membership of less than that. I was going to say. just give them the prime membership for crying. Oh my goodness. Well, let's, let's back it up even more to the, to before they even get the job. What are some of the things that you're seeing and hearing from, let's start on the employer side. What, what are you hearing employers say about the hiring process from the company? First of all, everybody's fucking hiring. Yes. Okay. Yes. Which I just want to put a caveat. When I hear people say nobody's hiring, I always, I just want to go, fuck you. Everybody's hiring. Every, Everybody's hiring. Yes. Like even if they're not advertising that they're hiring, they're hiring. So if you as a resident here in Vegas find a company that you're like, oh, I would love to work for them. You need to just reach out to the HR person or the manager or the owner or whoever. Yep. And you just need to say, look, I love your company. I love everything about your company. I love what your company stands for. I would rock it in that job. I would love to give you my resume. And even if you can't hire me right this moment, please keep me in mind. You know, like those opportunities are out there in Vegas right now, especially with the massive growth of sports. Okay. Our town is exploding right now. This is the prime time to get any job you want as a resident in Vegas. So that's first and foremost. Second, I believe the problem with hiring currently is that we lack a lot of leadership here in Vegas. I can't speak outside of Vegas. So I'm just going to talk about Vegas guys. We lack a lot of great leaders. It's really unfortunate. I'm not entirely sure how it happened. I think it's just kind of evolution over time when companies are stressed out. Our economy was so just in the toilet for so long after the 2008 recession. I mean, it took a decade. And employers got tired. Owners of businesses got tired. And they just started hiring. Whoever was conveniently there, right? Rather than spending the time and energy and money to hire the best person for the job, they just promoted from within because it was the easier route to do. I was just going to say, you know, companies for a long time used promoting from within as a selling tool when hiring an employee. Yeah, it's an incentive. Right. Yeah, growth. But I think it got to the point of it was just easier to move people to leadership positions that had no experience and frankly, no business being in leadership positions because they were already on the payroll. You don't have to train somebody on all the SOPs and the standard stuff of the company because they already know that. So let's just move them up. The team already likes them. They've already been there. Let's just make them a manager when really you should have brought in somebody with the experience to lead a team. And I would say, unfortunately, that's probably the majority of the time. Promoting from within is great if you have somebody who is either willing to learn or has a little bit of the experience that they can bring from the outside you know the thing is is that like when you're the owner of your business okay i think what's been lost is that true ownership it's okay i own the business but i hire so and so my my general manager to actually do the business because i don't want to be a part of it well guess what you still own it and your success your profit all of it Your name is on the line as an owner. And I have seen so many owners want to just step back and take their hands off of all of it because they're tapped out. And I would love to encourage that if you own a business here locally in Vegas, that you get a little bit more hands-on if you're not currently. Get more involved. Understand who your people are. Understand what motivates them. Understand how the operations and the customer experience could be better. Understand how you're in employee experience could be better because all of it will end up bringing money into your pocket your reputation will increase all of the things will happen organically when you put energy and time and focus on these aspects of your business 100 so knowing who your employees are is huge you might have somebody that you hired and in your mind you have a path for them but they might have a completely different skill set that you don't know about simply because you didn't ask them. Yeah, so I went, when I interviewed at the Bellagio, this is funny, this is a good story. So I interviewed at the Bellagio for catering sales. Yeah, sales, not services. And the person who interviewed me was the director of that department. And one of the questions he asked me was if you could have any job at the Bellagio, what job would you want? Being just like not really knowledgeable about what the job titles were at the time. Like, I don't know. I think I told him I'd want to be like the director of weddings. Oh boy. And he, I think he kind of chuckled because he knew that that wasn't like an actual position. That wasn't a thing. But yeah, that's what I said. And you know, it's, he knew that my, my heart at that time was passionate about weddings. I absolutely loved working at the Bellagio. They have an incredible internal culture. Everybody is a guest at the Bellagio. That's great. And that's not just the people who are paying to be there. That's the employees too. Front of house and back of house, if you work at Bellagio, you are a guest. It doesn't matter if you're the person collecting the trash. It doesn't matter if you're the person at the poker table dealing cards. It does not matter. You are a guest. That's great. Front of house and back out. And I loved that, you know, and I wish that more local businesses could embrace that because it's a culture that really makes everyone feel valued, you know, and important. Yeah. Doesn't, you know, it's not about your job title. So let's encourage more of that. First of all, second of all, in the hiring process, everybody wants to come. If you're an employer, everybody wants to complain. You can't find good people. I can't find good people. Okay. Well, when did you stop doing interviews? When did you stop hiring? Why aren't you always hiring? Always hiring. Yes. Right now, as already stated, a lot of people are hiring, but some people, the minute they find the employee that they want to hire to fill the one specific job, then they take all their posts down. They don't promote that they're hiring anymore. They don't continue the interview processes because they found their one person. Okay. Well, why? Why did you stop? That means that you got to start the whole process over. You're not going to build up your bank of potential employees when the next person quits, or you might have a position open. That's not the one that they applied for, but they might be a better fit. Yeah. That's what kills me. You have all these people who have shown interest. They want to work at your company. Yeah. Yes. They applied for a specific position, but keep looking at them because there, there might be another opportunity that actually happened with me with station casinos. I applied for a position at the same time they were hiring other people and they had made an offer to somebody at the same time they were interviewing me for the position. And the director of catering said, you know, we did just make an offer, but I think you would be a great fit for the team. We have another position open. It's not exactly what you're looking for, but I think you'd be a good fit for it. And I took the job. See, it happens. Yeah. Additionally, a lot of employers are hiring managers. Their excuse is that they don't have time to continue doing interviews, like say every week or once a month or whatever, because they're strapped for time. Well, hello, do a group interview once a month. Invite all of your applicants once a month to come and do a group interview. Group interviews are proving more and more effective anyway, because when you get a group of people in your space, you actually see how they interact with each other. I was just going to say, especially in the hospitality industry, that's crucial. You have to make sure that you're bringing people in on your team that know how to work with a team. I heard an activity, kind of like a icebreaker activity in a group interview. It was like a dance competition. competition. Everybody would take their 30 seconds and the best dancer won. So the exercise wasn't to see who was the best dancer because dancing had nothing to do with the fucking job. But it was to see who was cheering on the other people who are currently dancing. And those were the people that matched the culture of the company. There are lots of different ways to hire new employees and to also save your time, energy, and money in the hiring process. I love that more large companies are embracing having this internal culture within the company. I would say not a lot of local businesses, medium to small businesses are actually embracing that aspect. Can you think of any off the top of your head that are? No, actually, to be honest, I'm trying to think of what smaller companies and I don't. Somebody who worked for station casinos, I can tell you they do it very well. You are a member of the team. Like you're saying about the Bellagio, you are a guest. And everybody, back of house, front of house, for station casinos, is made to feel that way. And so I take my experience at some of the larger properties. I worked at MGM. I worked at Planet Hollywood. And the successful teams have that internal culture. And I think the smaller businesses can really learn a lot from that. And it speaks volumes when you look at... organizations like the larger properties, like the MGMs, the Bellagios, the Mirage family that are now looking for other roles. They are a family. Some of the people have worked on property for decades and there's a reason why. And it's that internal culture. Yeah. That's so crucial that smaller businesses need to be looking at why is this working? So when I'm in an interview, I haven't done an interview in a very long time, But one of the things that I always try to seek out is what is your internal culture like? How do your current employees treat each other? How do employees come to management with problems or situations that arise? You know, what's the communication line like? Is there an open door policy? Is leadership really strong in your company? Here's a great one. All businesses have challenges. Yes. We all have problems. We're all fighting fires, but is your company fighting fires all the time or trying to prevent them from happening? Yes. Are you guys proactive in problem solving versus just putting out constant fires? Because I'm sorry, life is stressful enough. I don't want to work somewhere where I'm constantly putting out fires that were preventable. It's exhausting. And it leads to burnout quickly. Oh, burnout. I know. Do we have our episode on burnout yet? We have not yet. And I think we've talked about it in almost every other episode we've recorded so far. So it's a hot topic in the hospitality industry. And, you know, we'll do a whole nother episode on it. But if your company is running at that constant, putting out fires and state of emergency, you're going to go through high turnover. What are some of your favorite questions as an applicant to ask the employer inside of an interview? How important is your family time is actually a question that I like to ask because you can tell a lot about how a company is run by how much time that the leadership goes home. Yeah. Because I'm no longer at a place in life where I want to be working 50, 60 hours a week. And there is a little bit of that pressure when I meet with either a manager or a business owner, CEO or whatever, and they don't spend a lot of time with their family or friends or away from work. That's stresses me out. The thought of that, because if you're constantly working, is that going to be expected of me as well? And I've got, you know, I'm a single mom. I've got two kids and one of them plays hockey for crying out loud. So, and it's, it's one of the rules that him and I made a commitment that we made to each other is I'm going to try and be at every game that I possibly can. It's important to him, which means it's important to me. So if I'm interviewing and they tell me, you work until 6pm and you know if you're not going to be here then that's going to be a problem well then this is not the job for me yeah and enter that interview knowing what your negotiables are and what your non-negotiables are if you're a parent and you require some level of flexibility then that is a non-negotiable it's a requirement you don't want to work somewhere where they are not flexible to specific needs that might arise in the future. Just like any time being a parent. You never know what's going to actually happen. You don't even have to be a parent. If you have things in your life that are important to you and you would really start to hate your job if you couldn't do these things because your job is eating up all your time, you might like to go running at five o'clock in the morning. But if your job needs you there by six, it might be impeding on the time you enjoy running. That That's a negotiable for you as an employee looking at these jobs saying, you know, that's great. I understand you need me here at six. Could I do 630? Yeah. Because it's important to you and you will start to resent your job if you give up the things that are important to you for work. Absolutely. Don't negotiate on the things that are really, really important in your life just to get the job because it's not going to end up being worth it in the end. Right. Plus the employer is going to sense every time you come in late because Because you were doing the thing that you love in the morning. You couldn't get there by the time that they said that you needed to be there. And then there's going to create all this tension. And then guess what? Your employment is not going to last very long. So yeah, do one way or another. You're either going to quit or get fired. Do yourself a favor and do the business a favor. Okay. As applicants, you also have to understand employers spend time, energy, and money to go through this process with you of interviewing you and how hiring you. Okay. As Vegas residents, we need to be respectful of that fact. We don't want to waste employers time, energy, and money by a no showing to an interview. Okay. Never fucking no show. Always give the employer a heads up. It's so rude, especially at this day and age. 99% of the people have a phone attached to their fricking hand. They have access. I don't, I don't care if it's a text, an email. It doesn't have to be a phone call because if you're like me phone gives you anxiety but send a text message hey i'm so sorry something came up not gonna make it yeah period i mean yes you know the employer might be upset but oh well you if you no show no call no show yeah okay to an interview you will never be hired there right period ever it's disrespectful it's rude and it's unnecessary just send a text call like do something okay don't no show it is so rude we have to do better ask As a community, we cannot be doing that bullshit. Don't do it. There's no reason for it. Now I feel like I'm lecturing a child on this. Oh my gosh, I'm a parent now. Okay, enough on that. Well, some of them need to hear it. Well, we didn't learn this stuff in school, right? That's right. The other thing, know what you want in the job that you're applying for. If you need to make a certain wage, hourly wage or yearly salary, know what that number is before you go into the interview If you get to a conversation in the very first interview about money, then you're already prepared. Some interviews are just a one-time interview, depending on the business, okay? You might only have one shot. And if the interview is going great and they love you and they say, okay, well, I can pay you$19 an hour, but your requirement to live is$25 an hour, that's a big discrepancy. They can't afford you, period. So in that moment, let's talk about negotiating. Yeah. Which I actually just went through in my interview process. Tell me. Yeah. So they, and here's, here's a big part of it, um, to go along with that is do your research, ask around what other people in similar positions are making use websites like glass door, um, and research what wages are in the area for that position. It gives you a slider of how much experience you have and what you can bring to the table. I mean, just do your research and know what you're worth and be reasonable about it. Realistic, realistic, reasonable, and don't approach it as, you know, don't you know who I am? I don't agree with that, but know what your reasonable worth is. And for me, I got the offer and I replied to them that it was very close to what I was looking for. And here's three bullet points on why it should be X, Y, Z more. And they replied with, we can meet you in the middle I said great because their middle was actually my goal good no because I asked for a little bit more knowing that they would come back with another number so that the number that they came back with was actually what I was really wanting or yeah yeah and and I've gone through similar conversations where I've said you know that's a little bit lower I'd be taking a pay cut and they came back and said unfortunately that's the best we can do and I said thank you but no thank you you have to stand strong in in confidence in your position of what you are a worth and what you need to live. No job is worth struggling unless you're like young and interning and you're just trying to get the experience to build up your resume. That's worth struggling for. I struggled to get to where I am. Guys, I got paid$10 a fucking hour to work my ass off at this DMC when I was in college. And before they even hired me, I did 200 hours of free interning. 200. 100 hours. Yeah. You definitely have to do your due diligence and serve your time to be able to get the experience. Yeah. If you are searching for employment, think about some of your personal goals. Long-term, not just short-term. You know, short-term, yeah, you might need a job because you got to feed your dog. Organic food. Yeah. But think about long-term, like where do you actually want to be? And is the interview that you just accepted over... at this company going to at some point help you? Is it truly a stepping stone or is it a space filler? Okay, so in your interview. Yes. Tell me if the company had any wow factors in the interview process with you. Specifically for this interview, the wow factor for me was when... Because I interviewed with the... He's the owner, the founder slash CEO. Because I have a sales position. He made a comment about how they're looking... something about marketing and I go, oh, marketing is actually a passion of mine. I've done a lot of my own educating. I've taken courses. I've studied with marketers for many years. I, you know, I did email marketing on the side for five years and he goes, oh my gosh, that's so great. I would love your input as we continue to grow the marketing team as well. So it was that conversation of here's something she's passionate about. It technically has nothing to do with her specific job duties, but I want her expertise you know and it really just value add yeah it really just spoke to me that he was willing to say we want your input on that and you know what he said to me too is I don't have a lot of experience in that so I would love somebody that I can bring on board that could help guide me and I thought CEO of a company opening their second location obviously a super smart guy just admitted to me in the interview that there's something he doesn't know and he looking to hire people that know more than he does on the topic. Was it an in-person interview? The first one, yes. Okay. And the second one was? The second one was via Zoom. Okay. Yeah. So your very first in-person interview. Yeah. Here's the example I'm going to throw out there of a story I heard that one company in the country is crushing. For every interviewee that comes on their property, they reserve a parking spot in the very front of the parking lot, like right by the front doors. Yeah. And they put their name on it. No. Okay. Welcome. Welcome, Desiree Wolf. Yeah. And then at the front desk, when they are greeted with the receptionist, the receptionist is like, oh, hi, Desiree. Welcome. We're so glad that you're here. Your interview is with so-and-so today. And let me take you to the conference room. Here's a bottle of water. That's fabulous. That's fabulous. That, that right there is a level of customer service. Yes. that is not currently happening. Yes. In that example, they are treating their interviewees as guests. They are VIPs. 100%. What? Yeah. You haven't even hired this person, but you're interviewing them and you put their name on their parking spot. And frankly, how much resource did that take? Five minutes of time? Right. A piece of paper instead of ink? I mean, hello? Yep. You're not spending thousands of dollars wooing somebody into them to dinner, you're putting their name on a piece of paper on a parking spot and using their first name when they walk in. And a smile and a greeting and here's a bottle of water. Like. Yeah. It costs you one sheet of paper and some ink. Yeah. A bottle of water and the employee you already pay to do the job. Right. That level of treating everybody who walks through your door as a guest. Yes. Is lacking in Vegas. I agree. We have to step it up. Period. And I think when I asked you, was there any wow factor I think that's the story that came to my mind. When you went and interviewed at this company, was there any wow factor that made you feel valued, important, wowed? Yeah. And this is actually a simple one. When he introduced himself, he took his phone out of his pocket and put it on silent. And I know that sounds so simple, but what it said to me was that his time with me was just as important as any message that was going to come through while we were standing there talking. And that I was like, I don't know how I feel about that. See, no, no, no, no, no. You know, you want to know why? Why? Because there is a psychological experience that happens when you are with another person. Even if I was just here with you on this podcast. Yeah. And I'm just holding my phone and I'm not looking at it and it's not on, but you don't know it's not on, but I'm holding it. Right. What does that tell you? That your mind is on your phone as well. Half, at least half of my energy is going to whatever is in my hand. Well, he put his phone away. But he pulled it out to begin with. It should have never been shown. It should have been off before you walked in the room. It should have never been even pulled out of his pocket. That's for me being prepared. I can see that. Because that psychological thought of I didn't think to do this before you walked in the room. Now I have to do it while you're standing in front of me? What? Well, and here's me playing playing devil's advocate how many people don't show up to interviews and he got his phone on silent waiting for them to show up why would his number be no I'm saying you know you take your phone out before somebody's supposed to get there and you put it on silent and they don't show up and now your phone's on silent and you forgot I'm just saying I'm just I to me it was a nice touch because even though he did it in front of me it still felt like the next few minutes were focused instead of his being interrupted. He took the opportunity of being interrupted away. If you're in an interview and the employer has their phone out and they're looking at it or whatever, and they're distracted by it, I'm going to say don't work there. Yeah, I agree. Because if that's their first impression with you as their boss, that will continue. You will never be the priority if you aren't even the priority for a 20 minute interview. I agree with up. There are so many creative ideas on how to just treat people who come through your door as a guest. Do you have any off the top of your head? I think the welcome, introducing them to other people of the team, that has gone away. And I do like to meet the people that I might potentially be working with. I'm not talking to that. I don't have to sit down and have an interview with them, but to be introduced. On a first interview though, we're only talking about first interviews. Yeah, actually. Yes. Yes. because I'm a first impression type person and I don't want to waste my time if I'm seeing somebody on the team, if I'm introduced to somebody who is rude or sloppy or I don't know, just somebody that I get bad vibes from. If it's somebody that I'm going to have to work with on a regular basis, yeah, I'm okay with meeting them on the first interview. Plus, I like to move kind of quickly in the interview process. Please don't drag it out, which that's a whole other topic we can talk about. I know. I think I had three separate interviews with Bellagio. Yeah. And on the third one, I got the act That's something too. Can we segue into that? The lengthy applicant process that these companies are putting potential employees through has gotten out of control. At the time when I was being hired by Bellagio or any of the other resorts, three interviews was really standard in the industry. Well, three interviews is great. What was the timeframe of those interviews? I believe three weeks. One each week? Yeah. I'm talking about I'm hearing from people that their interview processes are taking months. Oh, hell no. And I think that's disgusting. And I've had that experience too. I've interviewed with companies and I think this happens probably a little bit more. I would say just because it's my experience of tech industry can have a really lengthy interview process. But I'm hearing from people locally too who are interviewing with physical locations and they don't hear back for months. and then suddenly it's, oh, well, can you start tomorrow? I would laugh. I'd giggle and I'd say, that's cute. Yeah. Yeah, no. Guys, if you're hiring and you're hiring seriously, be transparent. Don't drag it out. If you really like somebody, but they do have some competition because you're actually thinking about hiring somebody else instead, you know what? Be honest about it. Say, look, surprisingly, we got a really good batch of applicants for you. for this job. And it's just taking us a little bit longer because we're having to do repeat interviews. Second, third, and fourth interviews are happening because it's just this position got really competitive. It's not that we're blowing you off. We are actually interested in you. We're just not certain who we're going to pick. There's a lot of that honesty. There's a lot of wait when you're transparent hiring applicants. I would be more apt to be like, oh, okay, I can wait a little bit longer instead of feeling like I got ghosted and then suddenly hear from them. Oh, this. So just as frustrated as I was about applicants, no showing, I get equally as frustrated with employers who interview people and don't follow up. Yes. If you're an employer and you interview somebody, you damn well better give them an answer. Yes or no. Yes. And you better give it to them in a timely manner because that shows integrity on your part and commitment to your level of employee experience yeah if you interview 20 people in a week you find the one that you want to actually hire send the message to the other 19 yes please give them a no please stop ghosting your interviewees don't do that it's so rude I interviewed with a company and three months went by and I finally got the oh thanks but no thanks I'm like I didn't even remember interviewing with them to be honest I was like I had an interview I was like oh Oh, I did have an interview with them. Oh my God. Like I can't even, I was like, this is ridiculous. Three months until I got the thanks, but no thanks, but no thanks. I've already moved on. Oh, oh my gosh. And you know what? You employers want to blame it on you. You ran out of time or you're forgot or this or that. I'm calling bullshit. Yeah. You're just a chicken. Oh, now I'm not even being nice about it. You're a chicken and you don't want to tell somebody no. Or you're so disorganized that you didn't remember or you didn't take the time to do it, which I call bullshit on because every applicant software out there has a feature where you can send thank you, but no thank you emails. Exactly. Like you don't even have to hand write it. It'll do it for you. Yeah. And it'll send it. Yeah. You just click a button. That's all you have to do. And you're waiting three and four months to send these. To me, it just says that you're disorganized and you don't have your shit together. You're probably did me a favor by not hiring me anyways exactly and if you're not delegating some of these tasks because you're you're too busy or xyz you're not performing to the level that your role requires maybe you shouldn't be the hiring manager you can't do these things if you can't do them to the level that they need to be done yeah you shouldn't be in that position maybe your first hire should be hiring somebody who can handle the hiring for you especially with these smaller companies you might have to spend a little bit more work with a recruit agency if you don't have the bandwidth to be able to handle the hiring process for your own company. There's no excuse on why you should be treating applicants. And it's not rocket science, right? It's not rocket science. As far as interviews go, you've been in a lot of them, I understand. You're like a serial interviewer. I have a friend who says I should write a book about the interviews that I've gone on. So yes, I went through a phase in my life where I think I enjoyed the interview process. I'm one of those people that I'm always keeping my options open. And I struggled a long time with what did I want to be when I grow up. So I went on a lot of interviews to weed out, well, I don't want to do that. But yes, I do have a lot of stories about interviewing. Tell me your favorite story. What's your worst interview? My worst is my favorite. Yeah. Okay. So you're ready for this. Yeah. So I, for a long time, I wanted to go into weddings. So ironically, just like you. And I had the opportunity to interview at a independently owned wedding chapel right off the strip. I will not say the name of it because it's still in business and she's actually very prominent in the wedding industry. You can tell me off air. I don't even know that I remember it. I think it's changed names a few times anyways. Whatever. So, okay. So I get to the interview. I'm, you know, 10 minutes early, like you're supposed to. I am greeted by the gal at the front desk. She offers me water, shows me, you know, kind of the front area and has me sit down with that. Okay, great. I'm sitting there and I'm waiting and she comes from out of the back room and she goes, oh, I'm so sorry. You know, so-and-so is running just a few minutes late. She's on her way. I thought, okay, no problem. I can be graceful. 30 minutes goes by and I'm thinking, okay, well, I took time off of work. I'm on PTO today to do this. So I have the rest of the afternoon technically. So I can wait a little bit longer. 45 minutes goes by. Then I said to the gal at the desk, I said, do you know how much longer it's going to be? And she's like, I'm so sorry. She was very, she was embarrassed. You can tell that that she felt bad. Then finally the owner's son slash photographer comes in and he's all worked up and he's like, my mom's always fucking late for everything. And this is my first impression of management, right? So, but with this, now I'm invested. Oh gosh. Now I have to carry through this interview process regardless of what the outcome is. Oh my God. Because I have the whole afternoon now. And now I'm going to add this to my repertoire of crazy ass interviews. It gets better, right? So finally the owner comes in and she gives me a whole tour and she says, all right, come back to my office. And we go out the front door and around the back to this weird little kitchenette. It almost looked like it was a casita. It had a kitchenette and a little living room area that she had her desk in. And she sits me down and she's going on and on and on about how long she's been in Las Vegas and how long the wedding chapel's been open and how great she is. And then her son comes in and walks right in, right in. And he was older, probably mid-30s. So we're not talking a young kid, right? Somebody who should know better at this point. And he comes in and he's talking to her about photos. And she looks at me and she's like, one minute, let me deal with this asshole. No. Yeah. They start getting into an argument right in front of me. Like I'm watching a mother-son argument about the turnaround time that he's taking to get these photos done and she's just going to hire somebody else and she doesn't know why he works here. And right next to her desk was a tall, fake plant. She looks right at him and goes, I thought I told you to get this fucking plant out of here. Britt, I'm not shitting you. She picks up the plant, chucks it across the room into the kitchen and says, you lazy ass, don't get anything done that I asked you to. And I'm now frozen in my chair because I feel like I should get up and leave at this point. But we're in the middle of an interview. Holy shit. Yeah. And so I've now sat in this place of business for close to two hours from the time I walked in and she just doesn't stop talking about herself the entire time. And so finally she asks me, so when can you start? No. And I go, well, can we talk about the pay? And she's like, oh, you know, it's blah, blah, blah. And it was something like$10 an hour, but you're going to make a lot of money in commission because we're so busy. We're so busy all the time. And I was like, okay, well, do you, do you mind if I think about it? And she's like, well, yeah, but I have to hire it pretty quickly. So I'll call you tomorrow and you can give me your answer. Okay, great. And I walked out and sat in my car laughing I thought to myself nobody's gonna believe this just happened I don't believe it happened it was crazy and she never even called me like I don't even know that she remembered that we had an interview like I don't know that she even knew my name she was so distracted by being pissed off and arguing with her son the entire time I don't know that she even asked my name while we were sitting there I don't think she ever asked about my background how long ago is this approximately Oh, I would say 17 years ago. It was a while ago. Okay. Still my favorite interview story. Unacceptable. Yes. Un-fucking-acceptable. It was an incredible experience. Something I have never, ever experienced anything like that in my entire life for a job interview. I understand family businesses, but any family business has a level of drama. Absolutely. And it's prevalent here in Vegas. We have a lot of family run businesses. But if you allow your family drama to be witnessed by any guest, that means employees and customers. Yep. If they can hear it, if they can see it, if they witness it in any regard, you are failing. Yes. You are not going to get the right hires. You are not going to get the right guests walking through your door. Right. Like that makes anybody uncomfortable. 100%. Holy shit. Like know what areas inside of your business you can have tough conversations in. Be the leader. If you overhear drama, if you overheard it, guess who else overheard it? Your customers. Your customers, your guests. Yes. And it is, let me promise you, it makes them uncomfortable. Yes. If you're making your customers uncomfortable, are they going to want to come back or are they going to question coming back at the very least? And I will tell you this, applicants, are customers because they have shown an interest in your business whether you hire them to work there or not they will remember their experience and they will share it with people well you just did I just did right exactly and that happened 17 years ago and I still talk about it it's still the most incredible interview experience I've ever had oh yeah I can't even imagine I I would have left though. I mean, at this point I felt like I became like I was watching a reality show. I had to see how it ended. Okay. Okay. But seriously though. Okay. In all reality, if you applied for the job and you, you weren't late, right? You were on time or you were early. Yep. And your interviewer is late. How much time do you give them? I usually have for any, for anything in life, I usually have a 15 minute window. I was going to say 15 minutes. Because 15 minutes feels like to me, if you're running late and you're more than 15 minutes. At this point, you've just disrespected somebody else's time and your own time. I feel like 15 minutes, there was a car accident, there was some traffic. I can forget 15 minutes. Anything beyond 15 minutes is now you're just being rude. And that goes for both sides. Both sides. Applicants, employers, if you're more than 15 minutes late, think about it. Restaurant reservations, medical buildings, they do give you a 15 minute window from your 15 minutes from your appointment time. If you are more than 15 minutes late to your doctor's appointment, they reschedule your ass. They don't let you in. If I'm interviewing for a job, if they are more than 15 minutes late, value yourself. Value your time enough to know that if this is their first impression, you don't want to work there. Period. They don't deserve you. I feel like we are having a very long, fun episode. We are. Almost an hour. Yes. Where Where did the time go? Wow. It's obviously something we are both very passionate about talking about. I love this. I love being able to help small businesses, medium-sized, whatever-sized business locally here in Vegas and have these tough conversations with the businesses and with the people interested in those businesses. I hope that everybody today found some value in this conversation. If you have input, if you have ideas, you want to engage more and tell us something that we didn't have time to talk about, oh my gosh, please reach out. That's what this is all about. This is our opinions. And without naming names, I'd love to hear other people's experiences, good or bad, that they've had with interviewing. Just because I think it's so interesting. I really do think this is an interesting topic that we need to continue to talk about as the economy and the growth of Vegas continues. I think we're going to continue to see shifts happening in the hiring process. And it's a conversation we need to keep having. For any employers here in And that's a wrap on this episode of La Critique LV. of the Vegas Strong Revival podcast. I hope you found our discussion engaging and even thought-provoking. A big shout-out to all of our amazing listeners for tuning in and supporting the show because it truly means the world to us, so thank you. Let's keep the Vegas Strong spirit alive. Share this podcast with your friends, family, colleagues, and just anyone who loves Vegas. If you have ideas, suggestions, or want to be a guest on the show, simply reach out online or feel free to text us on our super cool podcast hotline, 702-723- 2343 and of course don't forget to subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast platform so you never miss an episode let's keep pushing the boundaries and reviving our city's passion for authentic service together stay strong vegas