The Elite Recruiter Podcast

Meghan Hanson did what a lot of recruiters did this summer. She bought the AI tools. Tested sourcing platforms and BD tools. Even started learning to build AI agents. It sounded like every recruiter needed them to stay competitive. Her desk had never looked busier. More candidates interviewing than ever. Client meetings everywhere. And for the first time in almost 7 years, she went more than a month without a placement. Activity and progress are not the same thing. This is the talk recruiters voted onto the stage at the Finish the Year Strong Summit. I pulled it from the Elite Recruiter Community replay library because a lot of you are living this right now. Meghan is a former CPA and PwC alum who built Influential Search to 7 figures in revenue within 2 years, placing accounting and finance leaders in the San Francisco Bay Area. She didn’t build it with AI. She built it on focus. And this isn’t an anti-AI talk. Meghan uses AI. One of the tools she tested even survived. It’s about what AI can’t do for you, and what happens when you let it decide where your time goes. In this episode: Why more activity can feel like progress while your billings stallThe two questions to ask before you start your dayThe 5 fundamentals Meghan built her firm onWhy 5 real conversations beat 500 generic emailsHow to ask for exclusivity, and why matching other firms’ fees is a discount for nothingThe search she knew she could fill, why she walked away, and what showed up the next weekHow AI creates a false sense of capacity3 moves to make before the year closes out Timestamps 00:00 Firm Leader & Owner Summit, Nov 16 to 18 01:20 Why this talk came out of the community vault 04:11 Who here bought an AI tool? 06:55 From CPA to a 7-figure firm in 2 years 09:46 More interviews than ever, no placements 11:19 Activity vs. progress 13:32 The two questions to ask every morning 15:26 The 5 fundamentals 20:54 5 conversations beat 500 emails 26:07 Why client commitment decides the placement 27:43 Concessions should buy commitment 28:45 How to ask for exclusivity 31:39 The search she walked away from 34:07 AI’s false sense of capacity 36:07 The right job for AI on your desk 38:37 3 moves to make before the year ends Firm Leader & Owner Summit, presented by Crelate. November 16 to 18. Free to attend live: https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com/ Every summit replay, biweekly roundtables, and the Billers’ Club. Join the Elite Recruiter Community: https://elite-recruiters.circle.so/checkout/elite-recruiter-community Connect with Meghan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meghanmhanson/ This episode is brought to you by: ATLAS Atlas is a CRMx, a CRM that actually understands context. It captures every interview, call, email, and message automatically, then tells you the next action to take. With its new MCP and API, it plugs into Claude, ChatGPT, and the rest of your stack. Atlas customers report 50% higher candidate response rates and 15 hours saved every week. Check out Recruit with Atlas: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ GREG FISHER I lost thousands trying to offshore and swore it off. Then I did an episode with Greg Fisher on why 7 out of 10 firms blow it, and I’d done every single thing on the list. Greg’s talent is real: recruiters out of the same Brazil and Mexico offices Korn Ferry and Michael Page built. You pay them directly, no middleman. And if you’re not ready, he’ll tell you no. Find Greg Fisher on LinkedIn and tell him The Elite Recruiter sent you. Hear my full episode with Greg: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4Qhcw6rsxKVdtp6RfHif62?si=Nlf6yci7RvivTRM-_MGXSg

Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas, the CRM that actually understands context: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Hiring offshore recruiters? Talk to Greg Fischer: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ Part one was the desk. This is the board seat. Mike Walmsley has chaired and advised recruitment firms through growth and exits, and here he answers the question every owner should ask: what can’t you see from inside your own firm? It starts with the money. Most owners skip budgets and variance analysis because they are boring. Mike’s fix for the owner who swears he runs a tight ship: pay the bookkeeper to find the savings. Then the firm he chaired that grew from roughly $6M to $100M in revenue. Mike is quick to say they would have gotten there without him, but he walks through what was in place: training at the core of the business, board meetings where nobody once showed up without their actions done, a marketing hire within a month of the idea, and live metrics on a screen in the office that he says lifted profitability 30 percent. Then KPIs. Firms now brag that they do not have a KPI culture, and Mike thinks that is madness. You cannot control billings, but you can control activities, so he renamed KPIs predictive success metrics and measures what actually leads to placements, like candidate referrals and verbal references, instead of call time and resumes sent. He walks through his 15-minute one-to-one, including the blank sheet of paper that gets an underperformer to diagnose the problem themselves and still walk out feeling good. Plus the 30-minute weekly learning lunch that, as Mike puts it, takes zero time. Then the exit. How the founders of that $100M firm walked away clean, with a management tier built in-house and an MD who was already running the business by the time the buyer showed up. How a firm making £2M a year in net profit, as Mike tells it, funded a management buyout through its bank. The 14-day clause hiding in most terms of business, and the check-in call that turns recruiters into the front line of credit control. And backdoor hires: the third biggest biller at one of the UK’s largest firms, as Mike tells it, was not a recruiter at all. His full-time job was catching clients who hired around the fee. Plus why so many firms never grow past 10 people, the Friday referral competition that ran on a £25 bottle of wine, the top biller who nearly walked over one comment about her timekeeping, Mike’s approach to hiring great recruiters, and why a 7 out of 10 hire does not give you 70 percent. What You’ll Learn: The financial blind spot most owners have, and the bookkeeper move that fixes itWhat a firm had in place to grow from roughly $6M to $100MWhy Mike renamed KPIs, and what owners should actually measureHow to run a 15-minute one-to-one that coaches instead of scoldsHow founders get a clean exit without being locked in after the saleHow a profitable firm funds a management buyout through its bankThe credit control call that moves your invoice to the top of the pileHow to catch backdoor hires before the fee disappears If you missed part one, go back for the biller side: the reference call talk track, Mike’s 10-point referral plan, and how to pull a vacancy out of a client who says they are not hiring. Connect with Mike Walmsley: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikewalmsley/ Recruitment Training: https://recruitmenttraining.com/ Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Greg Fischer, offshore recruiter hiring: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ Elite Recruiter Community: https://elite-recruiters.circle.so/checkout/elite-recruiter-community Newsletter: https://eliterecruiterpodcast.beehiiv.com/subscribe

Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas, the CRM that actually understands context: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Hiring offshore recruiters? Talk to Greg Fischer: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ What separates a $100K biller from a $1M biller? According to Mike Walmsley, it usually is not effort or personality. It is the opportunity sitting inside the conversation that one recruiter catches and the other walks right past. Mike has trained more than 20,000 recruiters by his count, cashed in a million in his own best year as he tells it, and was the third person in a firm that grew past 100 people across London, Dublin, Sydney, Auckland, and Bangkok before it sold. Steve Finkel sent him my way, and this is an episode to replay with a notepad. We start with what that early firm did that most founders skip: a minimum of 20 client meetings a month, including with companies that were not hiring, closing each one on a commitment to call Mike exclusively for the next vacancy. He shares the follow-up email that keeps that promise alive. Then the reference call, which most US recruiters treat as a compliance box. Mike treats it as the best business development call in recruiting. Never say the word reference. Ask for help. Then ask the question that turns a hiring manager’s quiet frustration into a dollar figure: on a scale of 0 to 100 percent, how productive was this person for you? He gives you the exact words, the off-the-record reassurance when they hesitate, and the soft close into a meeting. He is also giving away his reference form free to anyone who connects with him on LinkedIn and asks. Candidate referrals get the full 10-point treatment, starting with why “do you have any friends looking for work?” falls flat. As Mike tells it, teaching this one skill doubled a UK firm’s monthly revenue in 3 months. You get the “you about 2 years ago” framing, why you hold off on asking for the phone number, and the second ask almost everyone forgets once they have the first name. Plus the replacement-hire technique for pulling a vacancy out of a client who just told you they are not hiring, which a recruiter Mike coaches in Bangkok used to double his billings in 12 months. And what a coach actually gives a biller doing roughly £2.5M a year, why “I’m too busy” is Mike’s favorite objection, and the traits he sees in every million-dollar biller he has worked with, including a protégé who went from billing $300K to $1.8M, as Mike tells it. What You’ll Learn: The small conversational misses that separate a $100K desk from a $1M deskHow to win exclusive commitments from clients who are not hiring yetThe reference call talk track, word for word, including the 0 to 100 percent productivity questionMike’s 10-point plan for candidate referrals, including the multiple-referral askHow to walk out of a “we’re not hiring” conversation with a vacancyHow to close “I’m too busy” into a meeting before the call endsThe three traits Mike sees in the million-dollar billers he has worked with Part two drops tomorrow: the board seat. What owners cannot see from inside their own firm, from the KPIs they measure wrong to the cash sitting in client bank accounts and the backdoor hires they never catch. Connect with Mike Walmsley: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikewalmsley/ Recruitment Training: https://recruitmenttraining.com/ Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Greg Fischer, offshore recruiter hiring: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ Elite Recruiter Community: https://elite-recruiters.circle.so/checkout/elite-recruiter-community Newsletter: https://eliterecruiterpodcast.beehiiv.com/subscribe

Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas, the CRM that actually understands context: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Well Oiled Machine, proven offshore recruiters you pay directly, no middleman: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ Part 2 of 2. Part 1 gave you the first three steps of the offshore playbook: function, region, and compensation. This is where it gets real. Steps four and five, finding the person and supporting them, which Greg Fischer says is where most of the 7 out of 10 failures actually happen. Greg says the quiet part out loud early: you do not need a firm like his to do this. Then he shows you how. The best offshore talent does not apply to job ads, the same thing you tell your own clients. Skip Upwork and onlinejobs.ph entirely. Headhunt on LinkedIn with Boolean searches, and learn the local titles first, because a great recruiter in Mexico might show up as headhunter or reclutador. Greg interviewed 32 candidates before making his own first hire, and he walks through the 3-step interview process he recommends, including why a true solo should bring in an outside advisor for round two, and the practical assessment that exposes a weak candidate before you pay them. Then the step everybody treats as an afterthought. Support. The 30, 90, and 180-day milestones you map before you hire, including the quantitative floor Greg uses, like 12 submissions from a sourcer by day 90. Weekly meetings built around roadblocks. Why your international hires belong in the all-hands, the engagement survey, and the quarterly roadmap. Plus the question I could not stop thinking about afterward: what your offshore team figures out about you in their first week that you do not know about yourself. Greg's answer involves the biases they quietly spot, and the lifeline exercise he uses to build real connection with every hire. Steal that one even if you never hire internationally. And the case study. A solo biller doing $650K, completely burnt out, no time to work on the business. His first offshore recruiter billed $120K in placements within 4 months, as Greg tells it. The second billed $60K in her first 60 days. He is now on hire number four, on pace to more than double his best year, and went from solo operator to running an actual firm. What You'll Learn: Where to actually find top offshore recruiters and the job boards to avoidThe 3-step interview process and the practical assessment that filters out the bottom halfThe one interview question that reveals how a candidate thinks about performanceResume red flags a US owner will not recognizeThe 30-90-180 day milestone map to build before you ever make an offerWhy BD and client-facing work usually stays onshore, and the $800K exceptionThe lifeline exercise that builds loyalty with any hire, offshore or not Missed Part 1? Go back for the first three steps and the real 2026 salary numbers. Connect with Greg Fischer: https://www.linkedin.com/in/offshoreisasuperpower/ Well Oiled Machine: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Elite Recruiter Community: https://elite-recruiters.circle.so/checkout/elite-recruiter-community Newsletter: https://eliterecruiterpodcast.beehiiv.com/subscribe

Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas, the CRM that actually understands context: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Well Oiled Machine, proven offshore recruiters you pay directly, no middleman: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ Part 1 of 2. I lost thousands trying to offshore. Did every single thing wrong, swore it off, and avoided this topic for two years. Then I sat down with Greg Fischer, who built an 18-person international team inside his own firm while scaling it from $1 million to $4.2 million, and recorded the conversation I wish I had before I spent a dollar. Greg says 7 out of 10 firms that try offshoring end up worse off than if they had never started. Not because the talent is not there. Because they skip the playbook. This is the first half of that playbook, and it covers the first three steps: function, region, and compensation. We get into why "I want a cheap recruiter" is already the failure, and what to hire for instead. Greg breaks down the full menu, sourcers, researchers, 180s, 360s, and SDRs, and why a dedicated sourcer behind a solo biller doing $400K to $600K has produced a 30 to 50 percent revenue lift within a year, as Greg tells it. He also shares why a sourcer hire works about 8 out of 10 times while the admin assistant hire most owners start with works about 3 out of 10. Then the part nobody says out loud: the big firms are already doing this. Greg estimates 80 to 90 percent of the major players have international practices, and about half of boutique firms in the $1M to $3M range have at least one international team member. You just do not see it on LinkedIn. The compensation section alone is worth the download. Real 2026 numbers, not vendor markup numbers. What a sourcer in the Philippines actually earns. What a LATAM associate recruiter costs. What a true A player who closes $500K a year expects in base and commission. Plus the PTO mistake that insults candidates before they start, and the payment platforms Greg recommends and the two he would avoid. What You'll Learn: Why 7 out of 10 firms fail at offshoring and the one word that separates the 3 that succeedThe five-role menu and which role a first-timer should never start withThe rainmaker math: what a dedicated sourcer does to a solo biller's revenueGreg's region cheat sheet: Philippines, LATAM, and South Africa, and which jobs go whereThe 50 percent overlap rule for time zones and why 4 hours is the floorReal 2026 salary bands for offshore sourcers and recruiters, base and commissionHow to structure commission, PTO, and payment setup without getting burned Part 2 drops right after this one: headhunting the person, interviewing them, managing them, and the case study of a burnt out $650K solo biller whose offshore hires changed his firm. Connect with Greg Fischer: https://www.linkedin.com/in/offshoreisasuperpower/ Well Oiled Machine: https://www.welloiledmachine.co/ Firm Leaders Summit (November 16-18): https://firm-leaders-and-owners-recruiting-summit-2026.heysummit.com Atlas: https://recruitwithatlas.com/ Elite Recruiter Community: https://elite-recruiters.circle.so/checkout/elite-recruiter-community Newsletter: https://eliterecruiterpodcast.beehiiv.com/subscribe