1518 – What You Can Bring to The Table with Talents Ascend’s Robyn Grable

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0:58with us right now it's robin grable robin you are the ceo of talents ascend you were found on the web at talents ascend.com robin thank you so much for joining us thank you josh pleasure to be here and you and i have been friends for years um we've kind of connected through a military influencer conference and just doing nice stuff in kind of the veteran business owner community. And I think we crossed paths that way originally. But Robin, give us just a quick overview of what Talents Ascend is. Well, we're really a skills-based hiring strategy, helping employers really build a talent strategy around diverse talent from the military community, disability community and the justice-involved communities, and really helping employers think about talent differently and looking at skills they need for their organization and where to find that skills in the underserved talent.

1:56Yeah. So speaking of that, and you mentioned three different populations that provide, I mean, they present opportunities, obviously not just for the candidate themselves, but I mean, the background gives them a perspective that could be very valuable. Absolutely. And the population in these talent groups are very ready to work, ready to bring their skills to an organization, but they're getting filtered out. They're not getting opportunities to get to an interview. And employers are missing out on great talent that would do great things. I mean, there's so many studies out there that'll tell you if you hire people with disabilities, how much more value that adds to your organization, how much more productive.

2:42Military, I mean, there's just so many things that military veterans and military spouses bring to the table that are just overlooked because people don't understand what they've done in the military. They see gaps in their work history, all of these things. So we don't use a resume in our program. We really want employers to focus on the skills they need for their organization. And we're going to help you find the talent that has those skills. Yeah, when we're talking about talent, are there any particular roles that you're typically, are you primarily sourcing for more entry level positions?

3:17Are you kind of staffing the middle? No, it's all over the board, Josh. It really is because when you think about the military and people with disabilities, you know, there's a lot of misperceptions around each one of these categories of talent, right? But one in four Americans identify as having a disability. So think about that in terms of the number of people that you're missing out on. And not all disabilities, 70 % of those disabilities are hidden. They're invisible disabilities that you don't even see. So you're missing out on that talent. But it's really about traversing across industries, across all levels of experience.

3:59We have very junior enlisted military people, very junior people in disability space, all the way up to executives. So we can help employers match to candidates across their organization. And one of the things that we do in our program that a lot of don't is we match to every open job instantly using our AI. So a recruiter, a talent acquisition person can see how one candidate could match to 100 jobs in the blink of an eye because of their skills. So we don't have any limitations on the talent that we can find for organizations. You know, that makes a lot of sense. I mean, a resume itself can be pretty deceiving.

4:45And you can really say and do about anything. it's almost, it almost, some of it feels like a little bit of just a game, you know, how resumes work. And really what I want is I want someone with the soft or hard skills that are going to be a good fit. I don't really, you know, some of that stuff on the resume, I, I think could absolutely bias me or against based on, I don't know what you're supposed to. Okay. I'm looking at this, where they were geographically, and I'm starting to build this picture. And that's irrelevant. Or it, you know, I might look at it as a negative when in fact, it's actually a positive, but because of my biases, I'm not recruiting for my company objectively, to truly find someone who's absolutely the best fit from a skills perspective.

5:41I get it. I get it. That makes sense. And but when you think about it, I mean, talent acquisition and HR, very stressful job there. They have a lot of demands on them. So time is not their friend. Right. So they're looking at the best way they can quickly decide if this resume fits into their organization. So they're going to instead of saying, how do I fit you in? How do they're saying, how do I get you out of the pile? So that's what's happening. And we want to reverse that. We want people to look at what can you bring to the table? and for my organization specifically, not what sets you out of the list.

6:19So when you look at a resume, you're looking at name, you look at gender, ethnicity, I get their address. You're looking at their previous title that may not match what they're applying to. You're looking at the previous employer saying, well, you haven't worked in my industry. You can't be qualified for my job. Or they're looking at gaps in your work history. Military spouses fit into that just horrendously, right? Because they're being moved around the country, supporting our nation's service members. They have gaps in their work history. And it's just human nature, unfortunately, the way we've been developed, to look for the negative and get you out of the pile instead of looking at what you can bring to the table.

7:01And that's what we do at Talents Ascend. We highlight the skills, the experience of a person without chronological work history. So you don't have to even think about that. It's a whole different conversation. And recent survey, recent study said that 56 % of people stretch the truth or flat out lie on their resumes. Yes. So how do you even trust the conversation? Whereas we're translating experience into skills profile. So our candidates don't know what they match to until that employer reaches out to them. So they're not curating anything. Their actual experience is being translated to skills and then matched to an employer so they can have a real conversation about their skills.

7:47Don't ask me if I've chopped down a tree before because I can tell you yes or no. But if you ask me, do I have these specific skills that would make me qualified to chop down a tree, whole different conversation. And that's really what we're trying to drive. Yeah. Well, can you tell me a little bit more about how the skills assessment works and why this beats scanning a resume and referring to our bias? Absolutely. So first of all, it's not really an assessment. It's a translation. So we built translation tables because as an HR professional, I am not a fan of assessments. How I answer a question on a test doesn't represent who I am.

8:36I have anxiety around answering questions on a test. So I play mind games with myself. Oh my gosh, how do I answer this question? Throws off that assessment completely. What we do is translate occupation. So a military person puts in their military occupation, MOS, NEC, AFSC, all those ratings. And we translate that into skills. So we built those tables from scratch to say, if you're an 11 Bravo in the Army Infantry, these are the skills associated with learning that job and doing that job in the Army. So there are things like, everybody thinks security, infantry, all they can do is security work because if you type in 11 Bravo and other translators, you get a long list of security guard, police officer, private investigator.

9:25But if you actually look at the skills required of somebody in the infantry, there are things like operational planning, equipment maintenance, team leader, human resources, logistics. There are so many equipment maintenance. There's so many other skills that that person brings to the table. So we translate that into skills. They can edit it if they don't want to do what they've done in the military. Again, take out specific skills. And civilian occupation. So if you're an administrative assistant, you type in administrative assistant. We translate that to a list of skills. And then we're matching that to employers' job profiles where they're picking the exact skills they need for the job.

10:04Not the tasks they need done, but the skills they need to do the tasks. And then our algorithm, our AI, matches them together. So we don't use a resume. We don't have them try to fit themselves into a box. They're truly translating their experience into skills and then getting matched to jobs and employers who need those specific skills. Yeah. And who have you worked with historically employer wise and what have you helped them create and do? Gosh, we've got a long list of great employers that use our program. And I used to be able to tell you, Josh, right off the top of my head, all of them. Fortunately, because we're doing very well and helping a lot of employers, it's a long list.

10:51But there's people like Watco, a great railroad company that's very military-minded, that is using our program to find military talent, because they value the skills that a military veteran brings to the table and a military spouse brings to the table. But creating that opportunity to know exactly what you did in the military and how it fits into my organization can be confusing, can be time consuming. So not being able to do that, they're missing out on that talent, not because they don't want to hire them. It's just time is again a factor when you're thinking about trying to to create roles and and fill those roles so what we're doing with employers like Watco like IQVIA is another example another large company and small construction companies just all across the board we've got employers coast to coast but really what we're doing we're working with them to create that talent strategy that says I want to be inclusive of these talent from these communities.

11:59How do I do that? So we're taking out all the barriers. So if somebody doesn't have any military experience, it doesn't matter. You're looking at a skills profile and talking to a military person who you know is very skilled. Now just tell me about your experience in operational planning. Tell me about how you used equipment maintenance. What maintenance did you work on? That type of thing. So it's a totally different conversation versus I look at a resume of somebody who has gaps in their work history. And how do I, what do I even ask you? How do I even begin this conversation? That is, if you get through the filters to the human being, right?

12:39So it's a totally different conversation and it sets the stage for better onboarding, better interviews. As an HR person, I don't have to worry about, I don't know what 11 Bravo is. I don't know what a data processing technician is. But now I look at your skills list. Now I can have a conversation one-on-one with you without those barriers, without that bias, because it's just not there. It's just not present. And it's a totally different conversation. Now, what do you, I mean, obviously you've kind of got eyes and ears on the ground in the future of hiring and HR. And if you were to look into your crystal Paul, and we think about, you know, some of the, I mean, amazing possibilities with AI.

13:24On hiring, I think it's just like, I feel like we're, you know, maybe just scratching the surface here of what's possible, but what do you envision for the future of hiring? Well, you know, AI has been around for a while, but unfortunately it's being used to exclude people because as it rolled out, it was, it was a, it's a much faster way, you know, AI can, And algorithms can do things much faster than humans ever will be able to. And that's the whole point of it. But they don't replace the human part of hiring. Because there's always going to be interviews that you need to do, onboarding you do, talking to that person and being human across the table.

14:07But AI can save time if you use it positively. And that's our whole point. We need to use AI to be inclusive, find what's right with the person for your organization, matching them to what you need versus excluding them or filtering them out, which is what AI has traditionally been used for. So I see AI, I mean, it is the future of HR. It's the future of hiring because there's a talent, you know, there's a war for talent and you've got to find the talent you need for your organization. Not what somebody tells you 56 % of the time that isn't true, that they fit into your organization. Employers need to find the talent for them quickly and efficiently.

14:56And AI can do that. But it needs to be used in a positive way to be able to tap into these underserved communities of the military disability community and justice involved. There are 70 million people in the U.S. that have some level of justice involvement. They're ready to work. They're ready to be loyal, dedicated, hardworking individuals because they need a job. They need a place to build their next part of their life. Same with the military. I mean, they come out of the military. They need to be able to provide for their family. And unfortunately, a lot of times they take the first job that comes along because they've got to put food on the table.

15:42And then they have turnover. So AI is definitely the way of the world because it's so fast and it can do things humans just cannot do. Like match one candidate to a thousand jobs in a blink of an eye. A human just cannot do that. No offense to us humans, but we just can't do it. And once you see that that candidate matches to multiple jobs in your company, now you instantly know that they're a great fit for the organization. You're going to have a conversation with them. That's where the rest of the process takes over and humans will still always be a part of. Yeah. I think about even selfishly, if you are willing to spend just a little bit more effort to figure out what other employers, they're just being way too snapped, they're missing out on opportunities.

16:38And if you can hire, you know, you can get diamonds in the rough that other employers, because they're just not savvy, they're completely missing. And so you may find that you get a, you know, you get a bigger bang for the buck, potentially. Absolutely. And beat your competition. And it doesn't take a lot of effort to really turn and reverse, you know, being inclusive versus filtering out or exclusive. so it doesn't take a lot but the roi when you hire military veterans and all that those skills think about all the money that your taxpayer dollars went into to pay to train that person you've already invested in a military veteran and a lot of times a military spouse as well when you think about what the military provides but so you've already invested so why not be able to take advantage of that and bring that into your organization because they're going to be more productive.

17:35They're going to be more innovative. You're going to have better morale. It's just, there's so many things that you can get from hiring military. Same thing with people with disabilities. People with disabilities know that when they're hired, they're going to stay longer than the average person will stay at a position. They're going to work harder because they value and appreciate the opportunity that they've been given. So there's just so much good that can come out of taking a few extra steps and being truly intentional? That's the key. A lot of people put on their websites, we hire veterans, we hire people with disabilities, but do you take the extra tiny step of making sure that your hiring process is inclusive, that your job descriptions, that we don't use them, your job descriptions, resume, all those things don't filter people out.

18:29how do you include people into your company it's going to exponentially pay you'll beat your competition every time your website robin is talents ascend.com so talents with an s ascend.com who needs to get their lickety split who needs to get on and get connected with you everyone first of all it's free for candidates any candidate can create their profile absolutely for free, takes less than 10 minutes, and then you're in it to win it, as they say in the lottery. Employers, if you are hiring more than five people this year, it's definitely cost effective and worth for you to look at it. If you're thinking about a talent strategy that's inclusive of military disabilities and justice-involved candidates, we can help you build that.

19:15We can help you go down that path. Large corporations that really want to build a brand around hiring those diverse talent, we can help you as well. So we're here to help organizations. We're here to help our candidates. Yeah. Robin Grable, again, founder, CEO of Talents Ascend, your website, talentsascend.com. Robin, thank you so much for being a guest and thank you so much for the work that you do in the world. My pleasure, Josh. Thank you so much for having me on today.

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