In today's edition of people behind the brand, the series where you get to know the Orbis team, we catch up with Managing Consultant Ryan Brown, who heads up our work in the Nordics region. We chatted about lessons, challenges, the ‘click’ in his sales career, and changing lives in tech.
Let’s dive in.
Tell us about your journey to recruitment…
After school, I planned to down the medicine route and become a doctor, but so much time is required. When I finished studying I’d have been 30 or 32 and making about the same amount as a waiter does. For me, that didn't add up!
I worked part-time in a bank where the office environment was miserable. I hated every second of it except for the sales aspect. I came across a door-to-door sales job where I could improve that skill set.
There was no base salary, 100% commission. At first, I was shocked. In my first six weeks, I made no money. And then something clicked. I went from struggling and hating life at nineteen years old, to my team being top three in the UK by the time I was two and a half years in.
Though I wasn't naturally good at it, I was able to make it happen over time.
From there, I was looking for something closer to home and stumbled into recruitment through that sales background.
What was it that clicked?
I wasn't relaxed enough. I was very rigid.
I was doing zero sales for a few weeks, which was horrendous. You're in an environment where people are celebrating wins every day. So I felt like crap for a long while.
What clicked was when a manager observed me - actually without me knowing - and said I was too robotic.
I realised I needed to be able to become a chameleon and adjust how I approach people based on their personality types. People only buy from you when they're really comfortable.
And that’s a key skill in recruitment too…
Gauging someone's excitement level is. You have to account for each individual as unique, and meet them at their level. If they are quite reserved by nature, and you go in too strong they’re immediately not going to buy into you.
What's the best part of the job?
In door-to-door sales, I wasn't changing anyone's life.
The most rewarding thing about working in recruitment, hands down, is that when you get someone a role, that’s going to influence their life for some time.
Their gratitude makes you feel that this is a sales cycle people want and value and need. That's a much better space to be in than just feeling like you're pedalling something to anyone that comes past.
What's the biggest challenge?
In the best way, showing that you're not a schmuck.
There are so many recruiters out there who’ve been told to tell everyone they’re a specialist when they're a month into recruitment and don't know technology. So they’re blindly pitching people all over the place.
How do I differentiate myself from those who don't understand the geographies, cultural nuances, and language barrier factors of these European countries?
That's something I'll bring right into the very start of my conversation. ‘Don't worry, I know about Swedish recruitment. I’ve been doing this for ten years.’
What’s something you wish you’d known at the start of your career?
I hope this won’t make me sound arrogant, but it is the most valuable lesson and something I often teach people.
Before you work on a job or a project, weigh up the likelihood of you placing it and how much money you're gonna get out of it.
Is it the best opportunity cost? For us as a company? For me as person?
What could be equally or even more productive? What's going to get an extra 5 or 10k in that month?
Sit back, evaluate and assess where you're spending your time. Have the confidence to stick a pin in something and know when you’ve dedicated enough energy to it, and it’s time to move on to something else.
Close off a window of time and if you don’t achieve what you wanted to in that time, that tells you one of two things: Either you need to work better on your time estimation or just work on simpler things.
In another life... If you weren't a recruiter, what would you be doing?
Honestly, working in technology. Doing tech recruitment has emphasised this for me.
When I did my options in school my mum recommended I consider IT. Great idea, but because mum recommended it I wasn’t going to do it! I disregarded it, stuck with my guns and did science and maths.
In hindsight, I would probably be a tech specialist because I'm passionate about computers and technology, plus now that I see the opportunities and how lucrative this job market is, I think I'd be stupid for making some of the assumptions that I did do when I was younger.
Why do you enjoy working with Orbis? Why did you choose to pick up your desk and plonk it in our office?
Orbis has a much healthier view of customer and client experience. The way other businesses have wanted me to manage my Nordics desk is to sack off a client that’s not giving me a full 360 placement every month. There’s so much potential in what can be seen as ‘bad clients’, it’s just not the right timing.
Orbis have a healthy view on account management versus delivery. It’s not too rigid and restrictive. Which is good in terms of maintaining a seamless relationship.
Orbis gives you the freedom to make mistakes, if you need to, to learn. There’s no blame game here either. There’s no micromanaging or expectation to justify what you’re doing to the person hovering over you.
