Brian: This is Determination. I'm Brian Sheehey. My guest this week is Lloyd Nelson. And if there's one thing you can take away from this conversation, it's show confidence because they can't eat you. Lloyd is a former recruiter and salesperson. He's also run businesses. Currently, he's a career coach and career advisor and a coworker of mine. We get into his background. He comes from a music family, recruiting. Before LinkedIn back in the ancient times, and what people can do now in an interview to better prepare themselves to sell themselves to the audience that is listening. So let's get right into it. after this conversation, I'll come back and provide my observations. So here we go, my conversation with Lloyd Nelson on the Determination Podcast. Yeah, this is great. We've been talking about this for a while, so I'm glad we could connect.
Lloyd Nelson: So you know we're we're we're both ready. We've been looking forward to this.
Brian: All right. So I want to start before we even talk about recruiting and your career, I want to talk about growing up, your father's famous musician. tell us a little bit about that and and and some share some stories from from that era.
Lloyd Nelson: Well, he is a a Rock Roll Hall of Fame inductee from two thousand and one. He was lead singer with the Flamingos from nineteen fifty-three to nineteen sixty. if people remember the doowap era and they remember the song I Only Advise for You and also remember that song for recent movies, they'll know that that was him and his voice. From sixty to sixty-four, solo artist based in New York. In nineteen sixty four, he took over for Tony Williams and replaced Tony as the lead singer of the Platters.
Brian: And the platters, that's only you, Smoke in Your Eyes, The Magic Touch, The Great Pretender. Yes. E
Lloyd Nelson: Smoke gets in your eyes, yes. Yes, all of those. All of those.
Brian: every Marty Scorsese movie those songs seem to end up in.
Lloyd Nelson: Yep, and and and De Niro's as well.
Brian: And did you travel around? Did you go to shows? like how did that influence you at a young age?
Lloyd Nelson: Well, we couldn't necessarily travel around because we were in school. for myself and and my sisters. there were times there were times where he would put us up on stage when you know when we were younger years ago. but a lot of that travel sat sat in on his shoulders and and that left the bulk of a lot of the the home activity, you know, with mom running the show.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: So we moved a lot though. And so all the moves really happened as a result of where his work was concentrated. So I was born in New York, we lived in Philly for a little while, we moved to Atlanta, Georgia, and we moved up to New England. And so those moves all happened because of where he was working at the time.
Brian: Okay. Okay. so then you grew up in the New England area. how did you get into recruiting? And maybe what did you do before did you do anything before then before you got into to that area?
Lloyd Nelson: I graduated from college, Bryant University in in eighty-three. And so upon graduation, I already had work lined up in the hospitality industry in in the greater Boston area. And then saw pretty quickly that that was not a future that I wanted. So I had gone to a recruiting firm, and the recruiters talking to me and I'm answering questions. And then after that meeting, I thought, I could do that job. And so I reached back out to the recruiter who, you know, had to give me an update that she hadn't found any job opportunities for me yet. And then I asked, Did they have opportunities within her company? And she said, I was gonna ask you that myself. And so I interviewed with this particular company. and there was a theme that was followed for many, many Increments in my career, a company hired me thinking that I was gonna fall on my face and fail. there was a private meeting in this particular firm, and they used to hire people in bullpen groups. Basically, this particular hiring group that I was a part of, I was one of eight. And why my manager shared this with me, I'll never have any idea. But he shared with me that in their secret meeting, when they when these management and director level people were trying to figure out the probabilities of who was going to make and who wasn't, I was voted most likely to fail. After
Brian: Why is that?
Lloyd Nelson: I don't know, you have to ask them. After 90 days, I was one of two left.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: And I always say, I always say in all seriousness, you can't measure heart. And that's real that's
Brian: Right. That's
Lloyd Nelson: really what it comes down to. I have my theories, but the one that I stick with is you can't measure heart. You can't measure someone's desire to make it. You can't measure somebody
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: who will do anything it takes, and not just not just the saying, but someone who actually believes it.
Brian: Yeah, I think about that
Lloyd Nelson: I mean.
Brian: like like a pro sports. Pro sports is a good example of that. There's always a
Lloyd Nelson: Yes, it is.
Brian: player or two number one pick overall, or this is a top ten, this is a camp miss, and then it doesn't work out. And then there's somebody who goes undrafted who who makes it. And it's true. It's the
Lloyd Nelson: Yes, yes.
Brian: intangible no one can put their finger on.
Lloyd Nelson: That's right. And so that's how my career started with that intangible.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: And and and it's remained throughout my entire twenty nine years in the people business.
Brian: And w what about so what is it about the recruiting space that you liked that made you wanna kind of plant your flag there and and make that into a career?
Lloyd Nelson: Well, at the time, really what it was was that I loved it. I just loved it. and if I think about why, well, I also reached a point in my career where I didn't like it so much, which is why I left left it for a while and then coming and then came back to it. what I saw was I just felt like that I knew how to tell stories, I knew how to evaluate. The difference between where somebody was in their career and their life versus where they felt they should be in their career and their life. And that has stuck with me for my entire work career.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: But I saw it early on. Now, recruiting does require some level of finesse. I necessarily didn't have that when I started, but I I learned along the way. and and it kept my attention and I wasn't bored. and and that's a big deal with me to be able to stay engaged. And because of that, that's what helped me. On the other side of it, though, we didn't talk about my mother, but she was in sales in the 1970s at a time where husbands didn't want their wives to work.
Brian: Mm.
Lloyd Nelson: And she built a 40-year career in Mary Kay Cosmetics. And and it wasn't just about selling products, it was about showing women how they could really grow amongst themselves and become a person that maybe they had dreamt that they wanted to become, but never had any real support to think they could get.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: And so I always say that with with my siblings, we followed her much more so than we followed my dad.
Brian: Right. You didn't get into music or did you have a little bit of a music background?
Lloyd Nelson: we all had musical talent. none of us wanted to get involved in it. See, I saw
Brian: Gotcha. Gotcha.
Lloyd Nelson: I can't speak to my siblings, but what I saw was the dirty side of the music industry.
Brian: Sure.
Lloyd Nelson: And and I wanted no part of it. And I would still want no part of it because as I've gotten older I've learned even more of the dirt and the mess that goes on behind the scenes. Just did not interest
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: me.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. So then how do you go from the east coast? You end up out west. How does that move happen?
Lloyd Nelson: I was sick of Boston. and so I I packed up a car. My childhood buddy jumped in the front seat with me and we drove cross country, got to San Jose, California in six days. I had no job, but I knew where I was going. I knew San Jose, California was this place called Silicon Valley with a lot of companies. And with a lot of companies,
Brian: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I didn't know much. I thought I did, but I didn't know much. But I knew there would have to be a recruiting opportunity for me somewhere. And I landed a position three weeks after I touched down in San Jose.
Brian: And what was that?
Lloyd Nelson: It was a it was a a recruiting firm that was technology based, of which I knew nothing about.
Brian: Okay. Okay. And it and this is this is a fur this is a agency. So this is a f firm that's hired go ahead.
Lloyd Nelson: Well, they consider themselves yeah, they consider themselves to be a recruiting firm rather than the agency level.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: so that was where I started and as I say Am I glad I made the move? Yes. did I underestimate my ability? Excuse me, I overestimated my ability and underestimated the the road that you have to travel when you are uprooting your life and starting over. Because I only knew one person when I moved to San Jose. I didn't know anyone else. So I in effect had to start over. But it
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: was better for me than staying in Boston.
Brian: Okay. How recruiting now is very LinkedIn driven. That's not the only channel, but boy, that's a great channel if you're a recruiter. How was it back then? Pre-Linkedin? How are you getting how are you finding
Lloyd Nelson: Nowhere close.
Brian: out who's who? How are you getting people on the phone? How what what's the game like then?
Lloyd Nelson: Everything was as manual as you probably imagine it. so you're talking about what people would now know as old school, having to having to find and create contacts, reaching out to them on the phone. And you know, a lot of that is really issued by the younger generations of today.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: But it was it was grassroots, bare bones, reaching out to people you don't know to elicit interest in job opportunities that you had in your pocket.
Brian: Right. I I remember my first job out college being called at my desk by a
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm.
Brian: recruiter about another opportunity. And it was like, How did you even how do you even know who I am? Like, how did you even find me? And how are we talking on the phone right now where, you know, you almost want to duck bel duck under your desk to have that to have that phone call? but that's what you're doing. You're calling
Lloyd Nelson: I can't share the details with you. Yeah, I can't share the details because I don't remember them much anymore. But
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I can tell you that there are always there have always been ways to find people. Always. And so there is a a tactic that used to be used all the time, which is pr rarely used now called sourcing. And so back then it was about how can you be as Conniving as possible to source names. And that's really what it was. And I got
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: good at it.
Brian: Right. And then do you have Once you get the names, once you get these folks in, let's say you get five candidates for a position, maybe it's three candidates, or however many it could be, then you're building up your if you liked someone but they didn't get that role, you're keeping your you're keeping in in touch with that person for the next role that can that can come up.
Lloyd Nelson: Because I believe you never throw away a name. And that's how I built everything in recruiting. You never throw away a name because you never know. And I know in today's world it's not quite like that anymore. I don't know why these these these recruiters of of this century they just don't track individuals anymore.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And they don't track contacts and they don't track the depth of who they're speaking with. I don't understand that. And I don't try to understand it anymore. That's just the way that they do business, because they have resources that I didn't have. But at the time, resources I had is what I used.
Brian: Was it what year what years are we talking about here?
Lloyd Nelson: Talking about late eighties and early nineties.
Brian: Okay. Was it relatively easy to place people into tech companies? Was it where where were we early nineties? There was a little bit of a slowdown. but you're in Silicon Valley, which is growing and growing and growing. how was the business at that time?
Lloyd Nelson: Well, the business has always had peaks and valleys. and what I learned very early on, that should never be enough a factor in terms of the work you do. You forge ahead. So while a a marketplace may be slower than what someone desires, you put in the work, you can still make it happen. Most people in recruiting,
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: the reason why they never made it. Because they quit gave up too early. If you can just stick with it and hang in there, it has to work because what you're building, you're building clientele, you're you're building, as they say back in the day, the Rolodex, you're building contacts.
Brian: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And and so when you're working in an office with other people, that's a big factor too. You work with other people, they have contacts. This is how the synergy works. Whether it's finding job openings or whether it's finding job talent. You didn't see a lot of people on their own at at at that time period, th the the very late eighties, but you know, it it evolved. And it certainly evolved in the
Brian: Yeah. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: nineties.
Brian: Sure. Sure. So you you eventually get out of recruiting and go to well what did you do? After you leave recruiting, what did you do? And what when was that timeline?
Lloyd Nelson: I left recruiting in 2007. I had gone
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: to I had gone to a legal firm where I live here in Las Vegas and I was going because of my real estate investment pursuits. And I was fascinated by the work they did because they they dealt with corporate structures, corporate compliance, asset protection as related to both the courtroom as well as the RRS.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: they helped They helped these business owners develop business credit to separate the business wallet from the personal wallet. And they wrote real business plans. And they were involved in what people know of as a format of estate planning. And
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: so I went to this company for the fact that I was getting involved in real estate. I
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: was fascinated by the work. And that was at the same time where I was about sick of recruiting because I had had such a long run. And what I saw in this particular legal firm was to be able to dive deeper into business. And I really wanted that. And so you know, maybe similar to how I started recruiting in the first place. I went in, I went in as a client.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: I I I asked about opportunities. The president
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: and founder of the company took a liking to me and I joined. And and I became managing partner of that legal firm during the seven year run that I was there.
Brian: What did you what was your role there? You obviously weren't an attorney.
Lloyd Nelson: No, I wasn't an attorney. I was an attorney in fact, as they call it, because
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: we had attorneys on staff that that worked for me. I had five
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: attorneys on my payroll. But what I was doing was I'm talking to people about corporate structures.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: Meaning corporations, LLCs, for folks who are setting up nonprofits for various reasons. The compliance. Without compliance, you don't have a corporate structure to protect you.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And that's what the corporate veil is all about, is separating you from your business. When and when I started to the time I left, I helped clients form over 800 business structures.
Brian: wow.
Lloyd Nelson: I I also I ultimately directed the writing of complex business plans. I'm talking about the 180-page to 200-page varieties, the type of business plan that you could literally build from the ground up. And and that was fantastic as well. And I got involved in helping these businesses create and form business credit so that people didn't destroy their own in a business that they still had to work and not all of them really understood that you can't let it crash. So
Brian: Right.
Lloyd Nelson: how do you so how do you separate how do you separate the business world from your personal world? That's where business credit development came in and I took over that. part that's probably the most satisfying for me, the founder of this company is known as one of a handful of experts in the area of asset protection in the country. And
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: he's he's made it a point after the end of our business to let everybody know that he's the best that's out there. And he said that I was the second best.
Brian: Ha ha.
Lloyd Nelson: And that's not an insult. Yeah, that it's not an insult at all, you know.
Brian: take that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: the the the the business ended because when the rest of the country is going through recession in that tw that twenty eleven to thirteen time frame, Nevada was in the midst of a depression.
Brian: Totally.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah, yeah. So even though we had clients in eighteen countries, it didn't matter. because still we were based in Vegas and the business dried
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: up and You only hang on for so long. So when that happened, I'm a good friend of mine still of over 30 years. We had worked together, but this time she placed me. And for that I had to move from Vegas back to Northern California. And she placed me with a little itty bitty company called AutoZone. The software division, the SAS division is called All Data, it's in the Sacramento area.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And and that led to a multi-year journey of corporate sales. No one ever thinks as recruiters as being salespeople, but the fact of the matter is we always were. In fact, harder because because the sales are two-sided, not a one-sided. And so
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: and and so that gave me the experience in the whole world of of enterprise software. Starting with SaaS and then with cloud, moving from From all data autozone to Oracle. And then moving from there to a startup that specialized in green energy initiatives for California and Florida homeowners. So I actually picked up the quote unquote traditional sales that people think
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: of, but I already had it from recruiting. I just I just
Brian: Sure.
Lloyd Nelson: I just married them together. Now what's interesting about this is that where we work today. In 2007, I met a gentleman by the name of Ron Nash. In 2007. So all these years later, we finally had a chance to work together. Yeah.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. That's pretty cool. That's pretty cool.
Lloyd Nelson: But I remember meeting him saying, Who is this?
Brian: Ha ha ha
Lloyd Nelson: and I don't mean that in a negative. I mean it from the and I've never told him this. I meant it from the intimidation side. I just thought he was the sharpest tool I had seen in any shed. And I just told myself that one day I was gonna have to work with them. And here we are. Yeah.
Brian: And here here we are. Here we are.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: So so when you're in s so recruiting is a sales job because you especially when you were doing it, because you're cold calling, you're tr trying to con you're you're trying to convince someone to try something, right? Which is come along with me and I'll I'll let me put you in front of these people. and then you have to get them ready for, you know, this is your client, so you don't want to put anyone in front of them. So you also have to get that person ready. So you really have to
Lloyd Nelson: Right. Right.
Brian: productize them in a lot of ways too. and then people see that, or somebody saw that in you and was like, Well, you could do corporate sales.
Lloyd Nelson: Yes, they did. They did. Because I had I had the building blocks.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I had I had the building blocks for sales. And so to me the transition was not difficult.
Brian: Right. Right. I mean I gotta think recruiters,
Lloyd Nelson: I just w
Brian: it's up there with you know, the phone being hung up on you, it's up there with a lot of jobs where you have
Lloyd Nelson: Well,
Brian: to get someone on the phone.
Lloyd Nelson: well, listen, I used to tell people all the time, as a recruiter, we used to be hung up on 50 times a day. And that's not even an exaggeration. It was 50 times a day. At some point, if you don't get that thick skin, you'll never make it. But I don't believe you'll
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: ever make it in any business. But that's usually that's usually what wears people down. The combination of being hung up on because they take it personally.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: Plus the fact that they're not successful. You're not making money. You're not making money. My
Brian: What do mean? Right. Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: first, my first mentor was my first boss, and he had said, and I never forgot it, in the recruiting business, and today it's the same way for those external recruiters. You're about 150 steps, he used to say that you have to get them right 150 times. If you don't, you will not make that placement. But it will be impossible for you to try to figure out. Where did you fall short in the hundred and fifty steps? And I don't hear people talking about it like that anymore because
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: to some extent it's easier.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: but at the same time, what it requires is people understanding that recruiting is a craft. You don't wake up with natural skill and ability to do it. It it must be learned. And I think there are people who forget about that. And when I moved cross-country. One of the slaps in the face that I needed was the fact that I wasn't as good as I thought I was. And the first two years I failed at every turn you could think of. And as a result, I made a commitment that I was going to become a continual learner of my craft and not wait for any company to pay for it for me.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I wonder how much of that exists today, you know, but that's what I had to do. And ever since then I've been I've been a a sales nerd, an information nerd, a communication nerd. And it served me pretty well.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah, I think the industry gets a bad rap today. Maybe some of it self-inflicted deservedly so. I I once had a call for a position that was a no-brainer. I should have been the top candidate, if not a candidate. And
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: in talking to the recruiter, you could tell she wasn't really paying attention to what I said. she was distracted. There was a lot of background noise, and then at one point, She was like, hold on a sec, I'm switching trains. And it's like, okay, well, you're not l really listening to what I'm saying. If you're switching trains in the middle of a phone call, you're not whatever you're whoever you're talking to. and so, you know, I've had that experience. I've had the experience where the recruiter reaches out to you via email and then you respond and the you then you never hear from them again, which is always crazy.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah. Yeah.
Brian: I've had the experience of, you know, they don't know what the job is. They can't explain what the job is. so yeah, I've I've been through a few experiences where it's like, you know, these people aren't that good at it.
Lloyd Nelson: Well, I don't put all of it on the shoulders of the recruiters anymore. I I
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: I I put the blame on these company managers and the ownership because they're not training and developing people. You can only do so much. and if you don't have if you don't have strong leadership and particularly strong mentorship, you're going to get the results that you had gotten and the experiences that you had.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I was fortunate, never I never worked for anybody who was even close to that. So when I hear it, yeah, yeah, we've got we've got recruiters that are not good. And the industry has regressed, in my opinion. But I put it more on the owners of these companies. They don't know anything. And so if they don't know anything, how can their respective teams know anything either? Because
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: not everybody. Not everybody has the gumption to reach out on their own and figure out what they don't know and learn it.
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: So that's the way I look at this energy. Has it regressed? Absolutely. Absolutely. and
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: and then the other part is just like what we talk about, language and positioning. It's amazing,
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: it's amazing how ubiquitous that is in every industry, in every segment, no different than recruiting firms. And this
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: is why what I share with people about. Is understand who you're speaking with. And and just because they reach out to you doesn't mean what they have to talk about is legit.
Brian: Right.
Lloyd Nelson: When you come across someone that you know the lights are on, that have a level of higher narrative intelligence, that's who you stick with and that's who you work with.
Brian: Mm-hmm. So then you correct me if I'm wrong, you got back into recruiting after doing corporate sales. How did that happen?
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I did. I did. while I still don't know why. my theory is because of the owner of the firm in the nineties that I was with, and we were the largest privately held accounting and finance specific search firm on the entire West Coast.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: He had sold the business, got back into the business, and I had a chance to to basically reun reunite with him. And help him build a new business, which I did. And that's where I went back to. and it ran its course. And at that point I said to myself, I'm not doing any more recruiting. So a lady that I had hired during those days at this this accounting and finance search firm, she she left she left the corporate recruiting world. the a the what people call agency, but really we were doing retained search and contingency search. She left,
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: she went in into corporate, and she landed at a company called NVIDIA. And she asked me to join. And it took me about two seconds to say yes. Because that was the one piece of experience that I had did not have. I had everything else, never worked in a corporate environment. I joined
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: that corporate environment and and I'm proud to say I was a lot better than they thought I was going to be.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: So what was that like? What was working at In Nvidia? What was what year what years were
Lloyd Nelson: I I
Brian: that and and what was that like?
Lloyd Nelson: that was in 2022. I and then again in 2024. I enjoyed it
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: because it was it was a new experience. So
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: there I am back in a learning mode, which I always like.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And a NVIDIA gave you the opportunity to use your brain. And where I use my brain was bringing concepts that I knew worked. And had to had to show some people that yes this works in a corporate environment a corporate arena as well and you're just gonna have to trust me. I know that's bold but that's the way I felt.
Brian: Right.
Lloyd Nelson: And we created success in a pretty short period of time. And so it would that was great. and Nvidia at the time they were just getting their momentum to the Nvidia they are today. But they had momentum.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: the only difference was that if you called east of the Mississippi River, people wouldn't recognize what an NVIDIA was. That was the only difference. Great
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: firm then, great firm now. it was it was fantastic with the run that we had. And then I had a chance to go back. Now it was not
Brian: How do you how
Lloyd Nelson: the role that I should have gone back to because it was not the work that I was doing before, and I only went back because it was NVIDIA. And you could I can construe that as a mistake. But the good news is is that I've got NVIDIA chops.
Brian: Sure, sure. So that's a company that like a lot of people would want to work at.
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm.
Brian: And it shouldn't be I so I would from the outsider view be like, how hard can it be to recruit it NVIDIA? You must, you know, must have stacks of resumes everywhere. And I mean you just have to pick someone and they're gonna they're gonna, you know, run to the nearest office. Obviously that's not exactly true. But but what what is that like? What is that like recruiting
Lloyd Nelson: Right. I I'll I'll tell I will
Brian: for a company with that type of demand?
Lloyd Nelson: I will tell you it's not as easy as it seems, as you're thinking it is. First of all, when I was
Brian: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: there in 2022, in the prior year, NVIDIA struggled to hire 2,000 people. I underline the word struggled. So
Brian: Well they had a co th Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: they hadn't gotten their their sea legs underneath them. Second, the vast majority of NVIDIA hires, and I believe it's still this way to to this day, unless it's a couple of specialized knowledge based talent,
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: the people that they bring on board are contractors first.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: Not full time. So
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: there are a lot of people who are afraid of that even still.
Brian: Yeah, that's a different conversation to have with someone.
Lloyd Nelson: It's a very different conversation.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: now I know that in in recent times where previously the concept of remote work was pretty strong and compelling at NVIDIA. I know in recent times they've been bringing people back into the office. So that that wears some of the luster off of people.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: So Great great name. Yes. great great compensation, great benefits, and you've got to be prepared to work. And I don't believe everybody's that prepared to work. it's that's not that's not a place where you mail in your efforts. Also
Brian: Yeah, that's not for ever it's not for every
Lloyd Nelson: and then also the other piece to it is is that even though it's a relatively flat organization, it's it's still pretty layered in terms of the relationships internally. And
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: so what does that mean? Well that means is that it takes a while to really understand all the workings. within. It's not one of those where it's not one of those where sixty to ninety days you've got a down pat. No, no. And you know not everybody is prepared for that either. I I saw folks willed by the wayside as a result of I just had I had just reached a point in my life when I joined NVIDIA for the first go around was that I didn't have anything to prove to anybody anymore because I had done everything there was to do. I've been successful in all of it.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I have I have a track record, you know, in the business that we're in, I learned way back when how to talk about my achievements in quantitative terms. I could tell everybody what what I bring to the table and and what separated me from my peers. So
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: reaching that point, I walked in confident.
Brian: Yeah. That and that's that's eighty percent of it.
Lloyd Nelson: At least
Brian: is having that having that confidence. You know, my son's I don't think I've told you the story. My son's high school
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm.
Brian: hired a new principal for this upcoming school year. And
Lloyd Nelson: Okay. Okay.
Brian: they had finalists and they brought the finalists onto campus and they had a you know question answer with parents of the finalists. So you got to meet all the finalists if you win. So I was talking to my son and he goes, can any of these candidates s stop someone from smoking in the bathroom? And I and I n and when I thought about it that way, I was like, you know what? There is one candidate I think who could. And my dad was like, Well then I hope that's the guy we get. And it, you know, I can promise you that question never came up in any interview, in any situation with the school, but you could that person and they did end up getting the job, that person just had a presence of themselves as the when you met them, it was like, that's a principal.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah. I was told
Brian: And I think
Lloyd Nelson: I I was told that when I joined NVIDIA that someone went to my boss and said, He's been here a week and he's walking around here like he actually knows people and knows things. And she said, Yeah, that's Lloyd. Because I didn't wait for any Brian
Brian: Could see that.
Lloyd Nelson: Brian, I didn't wait for anybody to introduce me to anybody. I I
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: knew three names and I Reached out to the people I knew I'd be working with and say, you know, so and so hired me. you know, I've heard there this is who you are. I'm coming to introduce myself and understand how I can support you. What was I gonna wait for? And so, but
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. Of course. It'll never happen if you wait.
Lloyd Nelson: but but it it it was a surprise. It was a surprise to people in NVIDIA. I had done that at all data autozone and
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: really made a stink. when I did that. But it works.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: Because because from my days with the legal firm, the founder of that company said something very prophetic. They can't eat you. And and as and as goofy as that is, boy is it true. You know? In the corporate environment's the worst someone can say to you is no. And so and I didn't hear no too much at all. People were just they were just happy I introduced myself and knew a little bit about them. and it's it's really what it is is the way we need to communicate with other people. And I hate to say it, but the that skill set is rapidly deteriorating. Across the board in life. Across the
Brian: Totally. Totally.
Lloyd Nelson: board in life. And and what people need to understand is you don't have time to be shy. We're adults now. We're grown.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: There's no time to be a shy adult. There's no time to beat around the bush. And at the same time, it's inexcusable to be obnoxious. So can you just talk to people like a real person? Can you just do that? Seems
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: to be easier said than done. And that's all I did.
Brian: Right. So we work with people who are looking for new careers, searching for a new job, looking to up level. And what would you what do you think is the biggest struggle that people have when they are searching for that next opportunity?
Lloyd Nelson: There's a bunch of them, but I'll keep the list short. The first place is the fact that we are operating in what I've called the twenty-first century hiring market. This is not the 20th century hiring market that the people we work with have grown up in, and neither did we.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: What was successful up to about 2023 no longer works. We work with a gentleman who I th I thought he put it best. He used he used an an OS analogy. You've got people who they're still hanging on to the fact that their resume says they've got 25 years, 30 years, 22 years, and they think that that should be the ticket to walk in the door. Well, the fact is everybody else has that too. And so they don't have a strategy for this 21st century market. If you don't have a strategy, you don't have a plan. If you don't have a plan, then you have nothing to execute. That's the number one problem. And so how does that manifest? Very clearly. It starts with language and positioning. People do not know how to communicate in this 21st century hiring market to what the market wants. The market wants three things from tech leadership. Number one, they want to understand what are the problems that you solve. Number two, they want understand what have you. Done in your career that makes you special, specifically that that makes you stand out over everybody else. And number three is tell me what you've achieved. In recruiting, there was an old expression, and it was called throwing up on yourself. People are still throwing up on themselves when they try to talk about themselves. Nobody cares about that. What they care about
Brian: Mm-hmm. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: is give me fact of. What you have achieved, where I can look at that and project whether you can help us. I know companies didn't speak like that in years past, but they do now. And the market has not adjusted at all. The market has not adjusted to the fact that senior-level talent fall over themselves without articulating clearly clearly the problems they solve. people At even at this level, they are afraid to present themselves as special.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: and and so you hear this pushback of well that that sounds pushy, it sounds salesy, it sounds pompous. Well, you're wrong in all three. If you don't champion yourself, who will? And then the third part, in the in the the tech space, people aren't used to talking about their achievement. And they're definitely
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: not experienced to speak about what they've achieved, what they've overcome in quantitative terms. Businesses
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: care about the metrics. There's five of them. And so in in my role at GHN, I have to address all three of those areas with every single person that walks in the door. And every single person walks in the door needs work in all three areas. We have not seen one that has walked in the door ready made and ready to go, which is part of their problem.
Brian: Yeah. Yep.
Lloyd Nelson: That's the there's other things that we could get into, but if you can't conquer that on the front end. There is no back-end ideal next position for you. Now there
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: may be an what the hell? Let me take this job because I need one. But the ideal next role, you'll never get it if you don't work on clarifying your positioning, establishing a go-to-market strategy which spells out your brand, and and really being able to speak to a company about what matters to them.
Brian: Absolutely. Absolutely. We had a go go ahead.
Lloyd Nelson: And and that's where it starts.
Brian: Yeah. We had a former member of our group who and he was a guest on this podcast. He basically based on a friend's suggestion, said I'm a product guy. I'm sitting in these interviews telling people I'm a product guy. He's like, Maybe I should just start showing them that I'm a product guy. And so he starts playing around with new AI tools, starts posting it online, posting on YouTube, puts a little short into his LinkedIn profile. All of a sudden he has like this content that he's building. And I asked him when he did land a new gig, I said, Did they ask you about your videos in the interview? And he was like, Did they ask me? That's all we talked about. And so here's a guy that creates some content, makes it interesting. It's it's in line with exactly what he does. So it really sets his brand in a certain way. I think this is just like the perfect example. Then when he comes into the interviews, it's not tell me about yourself. It's not what problem can you solve. They've all seen these, that was cool. What did you think of that? What next he takes the conversation and then he's controlling it because they're talking about his content. He could tell he could talk all day about everything he created. And I still don't see many people doing that.
Lloyd Nelson: And and I'll even add to that, Brian.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I still think that he should have been prepared for the problem him as a problem solver and what companies actually call your superpower and and showing companies' achievement because that still matters. Now he may not have touched on it as overtly as we prepare people,
Brian: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: but covertly it still had to come up.
Brian: It still probably came up, sure. Sure. Absolutely.
Lloyd Nelson: even in those sessions. It's it had to. And so what he did was circumvented a bit
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: with the approach that he took. and so I'm glad he landed what he wanted. because companies are are are
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: are getting tougher and tougher in the interview stage, particularly when it comes to AI dialogue.
Brian: Yeah. And that's that's changing so rapidly from tell me what you know about AI of six months ago to tell me what you've built with it and how you've built it and what that was all about. And it's amazing
Lloyd Nelson: And
Brian: how many tech folks struggle with that.
Lloyd Nelson: And and how will you use AI to keep my teams? Because I don't want to lay off any of them.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: But what does everyone think? Everyone sees, you know, the the the big monoliths. Of course they're laying off people. It's just their the excuse they want it. But your small and medium-sized businesses, they don't want to get rid of anybody. They just want somebody who can bring in an AI sensibility and as a result be able to develop the people that they have that they already like.
Brian: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I believe that. I believe that. I
Lloyd Nelson: So yeah. Yeah.
Brian: there there's a handful of comp more than a handful, but there's a group of companies that just lay offs happen and that's what they do. And then there's the vast universe, like you said, where they don't want
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: nobody wants that. They just want people to be more productive. They want to use the tools to their advantage.
Lloyd Nelson: Mm. Yep, and and unfortunately, and it's always been this way, everyone's starry eyed about the big brand name.
Brian: It makes all the headlines.
Lloyd Nelson: This is this and and this is why I was fortunate being in NVIDIA when I was, because the the big brand name is not always what you think it is when you join them.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And the good news was particularly that first go round with me at NVIDIA, it was that and more.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. all right, we've gone a little bit over time, so I'm gonna end it right there. But
Lloyd Nelson: Okay.
Brian: Lloyd Nelson, thank you so much for joining me. This has been great. Now we gotta go back to work now.
Lloyd Nelson: No, thank you for having me. This has been exactly.
Brian: All right, that was my conversation with Lloyd Nelson. Lloyd, thanks for joining me this week. I just want to touch on a couple things that I found pretty interesting. The first is when he talked about working for NVIDIA, I have this assumption with all the large tech companies that, you know, there there's just rooms full of resumes, and they just walk into the resume room and they pull one off the pile. And they go, we're gonna bless this person with a job offer today from our great company. And I it turns out that's not the case. Surprise, surprise. But Lloyd talked about how he struggled when he was at NVIDIA to bring people on. Nvidia as a company struggled to bring people on. Now, now a caveat there is they like to bring in people's contractors first, kind of try them out. And then bring them on full time. And not everybody is up for that type of situation. I think anyone would be up for a 10 to 20x return on their stock options, but timing is everything. and so I I I do have this general assumption that these big companies, you know, you're blessed if you get an offer from them. And hey, they have their struggles too. On the flip side, Lloyd mentioned how small, mid to small size companies. In terms of layoffs, the the layoff noise is coming from the big companies. And we talked about this on last week's episode. Companies that invest in AI are actually increasing headcount. They're hiring more. They're investing more in people. There are some companies out there that are laying people off, and then they're making AI as an excuse or the reason for it. But small to mid-sized businesses, those are the ones that are behind the curve when it comes to AI adoption. And, you know, they they don't want to get rid of people. A small business does not want to get rid of someone. They don't want to go through that process. And so when it comes to AI, they just really want people who can bring in AI sensibility to their business and help develop people who they already have. And I think that's true. I think that's really true. And and so we're just seeing a lot of facts right now around layoffs and around AI. You know, it's today's news is what's today. Obviously, that could change in the future. But there is this idea that companies that are investing in AI are actually hiring. And I think when you look at the mid-size companies and the small size companies, that's really true. And those are the companies that need the most help. so I We we touched on that and I just kind of wanted to crystallize that idea. I also really liked how he said I I never throw away a name. Now I I work with Lloyd, so I I know that's the case. He has a Rolodex that has a Rolodex. but what a great practice, you know, in life. As you build your network, that's what this is all about. Don't throw away a name. Stay in touch with people. know, you don't have to spend all day on the phone with all everyone in your LinkedIn contacts gossiping and everything like that. But remember, people, stay in touch with people. That's where the jobs are. That's where the opportunities are. I think anyone listening to this knows that they've received an opportunity, be it a job offer or just something that came through somebody they know. I mean, that's just how it works. And so the way Lloyd put it of, you know, I never throw away a name, and that's that's Probably a good rule to live by for sure. This podcast can be found at determinationpod.com. That's the website. That's where everything lives. That's how you can access the newsletter. That's how you can listen to past episodes. You can also subscribe to Apple and Spotify and anywhere else where you listen to podcasts. We're there too. So go to the website, check it out, check out the newsletter. People have been sending me questions and comments. And so I I read it all and and I really appreciate it. So next week we have a real fun episode. I'm looking forward to that. I thank you for getting this far and I will talk to you next week.
Lloyd Nelson: So you know we're we're we're both ready. We've been looking forward to this.
Brian: All right. So I want to start before we even talk about recruiting and your career, I want to talk about growing up, your father's famous musician. tell us a little bit about that and and and some share some stories from from that era.
Lloyd Nelson: Well, he is a a Rock Roll Hall of Fame inductee from two thousand and one. He was lead singer with the Flamingos from nineteen fifty-three to nineteen sixty. if people remember the doowap era and they remember the song I Only Advise for You and also remember that song for recent movies, they'll know that that was him and his voice. From sixty to sixty-four, solo artist based in New York. In nineteen sixty four, he took over for Tony Williams and replaced Tony as the lead singer of the Platters.
Brian: And the platters, that's only you, Smoke in Your Eyes, The Magic Touch, The Great Pretender. Yes. E
Lloyd Nelson: Smoke gets in your eyes, yes. Yes, all of those. All of those.
Brian: every Marty Scorsese movie those songs seem to end up in.
Lloyd Nelson: Yep, and and and De Niro's as well.
Brian: And did you travel around? Did you go to shows? like how did that influence you at a young age?
Lloyd Nelson: Well, we couldn't necessarily travel around because we were in school. for myself and and my sisters. there were times there were times where he would put us up on stage when you know when we were younger years ago. but a lot of that travel sat sat in on his shoulders and and that left the bulk of a lot of the the home activity, you know, with mom running the show.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: So we moved a lot though. And so all the moves really happened as a result of where his work was concentrated. So I was born in New York, we lived in Philly for a little while, we moved to Atlanta, Georgia, and we moved up to New England. And so those moves all happened because of where he was working at the time.
Brian: Okay. Okay. so then you grew up in the New England area. how did you get into recruiting? And maybe what did you do before did you do anything before then before you got into to that area?
Lloyd Nelson: I graduated from college, Bryant University in in eighty-three. And so upon graduation, I already had work lined up in the hospitality industry in in the greater Boston area. And then saw pretty quickly that that was not a future that I wanted. So I had gone to a recruiting firm, and the recruiters talking to me and I'm answering questions. And then after that meeting, I thought, I could do that job. And so I reached back out to the recruiter who, you know, had to give me an update that she hadn't found any job opportunities for me yet. And then I asked, Did they have opportunities within her company? And she said, I was gonna ask you that myself. And so I interviewed with this particular company. and there was a theme that was followed for many, many Increments in my career, a company hired me thinking that I was gonna fall on my face and fail. there was a private meeting in this particular firm, and they used to hire people in bullpen groups. Basically, this particular hiring group that I was a part of, I was one of eight. And why my manager shared this with me, I'll never have any idea. But he shared with me that in their secret meeting, when they when these management and director level people were trying to figure out the probabilities of who was going to make and who wasn't, I was voted most likely to fail. After
Brian: Why is that?
Lloyd Nelson: I don't know, you have to ask them. After 90 days, I was one of two left.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: And I always say, I always say in all seriousness, you can't measure heart. And that's real that's
Brian: Right. That's
Lloyd Nelson: really what it comes down to. I have my theories, but the one that I stick with is you can't measure heart. You can't measure someone's desire to make it. You can't measure somebody
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: who will do anything it takes, and not just not just the saying, but someone who actually believes it.
Brian: Yeah, I think about that
Lloyd Nelson: I mean.
Brian: like like a pro sports. Pro sports is a good example of that. There's always a
Lloyd Nelson: Yes, it is.
Brian: player or two number one pick overall, or this is a top ten, this is a camp miss, and then it doesn't work out. And then there's somebody who goes undrafted who who makes it. And it's true. It's the
Lloyd Nelson: Yes, yes.
Brian: intangible no one can put their finger on.
Lloyd Nelson: That's right. And so that's how my career started with that intangible.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: And and and it's remained throughout my entire twenty nine years in the people business.
Brian: And w what about so what is it about the recruiting space that you liked that made you wanna kind of plant your flag there and and make that into a career?
Lloyd Nelson: Well, at the time, really what it was was that I loved it. I just loved it. and if I think about why, well, I also reached a point in my career where I didn't like it so much, which is why I left left it for a while and then coming and then came back to it. what I saw was I just felt like that I knew how to tell stories, I knew how to evaluate. The difference between where somebody was in their career and their life versus where they felt they should be in their career and their life. And that has stuck with me for my entire work career.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: But I saw it early on. Now, recruiting does require some level of finesse. I necessarily didn't have that when I started, but I I learned along the way. and and it kept my attention and I wasn't bored. and and that's a big deal with me to be able to stay engaged. And because of that, that's what helped me. On the other side of it, though, we didn't talk about my mother, but she was in sales in the 1970s at a time where husbands didn't want their wives to work.
Brian: Mm.
Lloyd Nelson: And she built a 40-year career in Mary Kay Cosmetics. And and it wasn't just about selling products, it was about showing women how they could really grow amongst themselves and become a person that maybe they had dreamt that they wanted to become, but never had any real support to think they could get.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: And so I always say that with with my siblings, we followed her much more so than we followed my dad.
Brian: Right. You didn't get into music or did you have a little bit of a music background?
Lloyd Nelson: we all had musical talent. none of us wanted to get involved in it. See, I saw
Brian: Gotcha. Gotcha.
Lloyd Nelson: I can't speak to my siblings, but what I saw was the dirty side of the music industry.
Brian: Sure.
Lloyd Nelson: And and I wanted no part of it. And I would still want no part of it because as I've gotten older I've learned even more of the dirt and the mess that goes on behind the scenes. Just did not interest
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: me.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. So then how do you go from the east coast? You end up out west. How does that move happen?
Lloyd Nelson: I was sick of Boston. and so I I packed up a car. My childhood buddy jumped in the front seat with me and we drove cross country, got to San Jose, California in six days. I had no job, but I knew where I was going. I knew San Jose, California was this place called Silicon Valley with a lot of companies. And with a lot of companies,
Brian: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I didn't know much. I thought I did, but I didn't know much. But I knew there would have to be a recruiting opportunity for me somewhere. And I landed a position three weeks after I touched down in San Jose.
Brian: And what was that?
Lloyd Nelson: It was a it was a a recruiting firm that was technology based, of which I knew nothing about.
Brian: Okay. Okay. And it and this is this is a fur this is a agency. So this is a f firm that's hired go ahead.
Lloyd Nelson: Well, they consider themselves yeah, they consider themselves to be a recruiting firm rather than the agency level.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: so that was where I started and as I say Am I glad I made the move? Yes. did I underestimate my ability? Excuse me, I overestimated my ability and underestimated the the road that you have to travel when you are uprooting your life and starting over. Because I only knew one person when I moved to San Jose. I didn't know anyone else. So I in effect had to start over. But it
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: was better for me than staying in Boston.
Brian: Okay. How recruiting now is very LinkedIn driven. That's not the only channel, but boy, that's a great channel if you're a recruiter. How was it back then? Pre-Linkedin? How are you getting how are you finding
Lloyd Nelson: Nowhere close.
Brian: out who's who? How are you getting people on the phone? How what what's the game like then?
Lloyd Nelson: Everything was as manual as you probably imagine it. so you're talking about what people would now know as old school, having to having to find and create contacts, reaching out to them on the phone. And you know, a lot of that is really issued by the younger generations of today.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: But it was it was grassroots, bare bones, reaching out to people you don't know to elicit interest in job opportunities that you had in your pocket.
Brian: Right. I I remember my first job out college being called at my desk by a
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm.
Brian: recruiter about another opportunity. And it was like, How did you even how do you even know who I am? Like, how did you even find me? And how are we talking on the phone right now where, you know, you almost want to duck bel duck under your desk to have that to have that phone call? but that's what you're doing. You're calling
Lloyd Nelson: I can't share the details with you. Yeah, I can't share the details because I don't remember them much anymore. But
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I can tell you that there are always there have always been ways to find people. Always. And so there is a a tactic that used to be used all the time, which is pr rarely used now called sourcing. And so back then it was about how can you be as Conniving as possible to source names. And that's really what it was. And I got
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: good at it.
Brian: Right. And then do you have Once you get the names, once you get these folks in, let's say you get five candidates for a position, maybe it's three candidates, or however many it could be, then you're building up your if you liked someone but they didn't get that role, you're keeping your you're keeping in in touch with that person for the next role that can that can come up.
Lloyd Nelson: Because I believe you never throw away a name. And that's how I built everything in recruiting. You never throw away a name because you never know. And I know in today's world it's not quite like that anymore. I don't know why these these these recruiters of of this century they just don't track individuals anymore.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And they don't track contacts and they don't track the depth of who they're speaking with. I don't understand that. And I don't try to understand it anymore. That's just the way that they do business, because they have resources that I didn't have. But at the time, resources I had is what I used.
Brian: Was it what year what years are we talking about here?
Lloyd Nelson: Talking about late eighties and early nineties.
Brian: Okay. Was it relatively easy to place people into tech companies? Was it where where were we early nineties? There was a little bit of a slowdown. but you're in Silicon Valley, which is growing and growing and growing. how was the business at that time?
Lloyd Nelson: Well, the business has always had peaks and valleys. and what I learned very early on, that should never be enough a factor in terms of the work you do. You forge ahead. So while a a marketplace may be slower than what someone desires, you put in the work, you can still make it happen. Most people in recruiting,
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: the reason why they never made it. Because they quit gave up too early. If you can just stick with it and hang in there, it has to work because what you're building, you're building clientele, you're you're building, as they say back in the day, the Rolodex, you're building contacts.
Brian: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And and so when you're working in an office with other people, that's a big factor too. You work with other people, they have contacts. This is how the synergy works. Whether it's finding job openings or whether it's finding job talent. You didn't see a lot of people on their own at at at that time period, th the the very late eighties, but you know, it it evolved. And it certainly evolved in the
Brian: Yeah. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: nineties.
Brian: Sure. Sure. So you you eventually get out of recruiting and go to well what did you do? After you leave recruiting, what did you do? And what when was that timeline?
Lloyd Nelson: I left recruiting in 2007. I had gone
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: to I had gone to a legal firm where I live here in Las Vegas and I was going because of my real estate investment pursuits. And I was fascinated by the work they did because they they dealt with corporate structures, corporate compliance, asset protection as related to both the courtroom as well as the RRS.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: they helped They helped these business owners develop business credit to separate the business wallet from the personal wallet. And they wrote real business plans. And they were involved in what people know of as a format of estate planning. And
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: so I went to this company for the fact that I was getting involved in real estate. I
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: was fascinated by the work. And that was at the same time where I was about sick of recruiting because I had had such a long run. And what I saw in this particular legal firm was to be able to dive deeper into business. And I really wanted that. And so you know, maybe similar to how I started recruiting in the first place. I went in, I went in as a client.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: I I I asked about opportunities. The president
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: and founder of the company took a liking to me and I joined. And and I became managing partner of that legal firm during the seven year run that I was there.
Brian: What did you what was your role there? You obviously weren't an attorney.
Lloyd Nelson: No, I wasn't an attorney. I was an attorney in fact, as they call it, because
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: we had attorneys on staff that that worked for me. I had five
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: attorneys on my payroll. But what I was doing was I'm talking to people about corporate structures.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: Meaning corporations, LLCs, for folks who are setting up nonprofits for various reasons. The compliance. Without compliance, you don't have a corporate structure to protect you.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And that's what the corporate veil is all about, is separating you from your business. When and when I started to the time I left, I helped clients form over 800 business structures.
Brian: wow.
Lloyd Nelson: I I also I ultimately directed the writing of complex business plans. I'm talking about the 180-page to 200-page varieties, the type of business plan that you could literally build from the ground up. And and that was fantastic as well. And I got involved in helping these businesses create and form business credit so that people didn't destroy their own in a business that they still had to work and not all of them really understood that you can't let it crash. So
Brian: Right.
Lloyd Nelson: how do you so how do you separate how do you separate the business world from your personal world? That's where business credit development came in and I took over that. part that's probably the most satisfying for me, the founder of this company is known as one of a handful of experts in the area of asset protection in the country. And
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: he's he's made it a point after the end of our business to let everybody know that he's the best that's out there. And he said that I was the second best.
Brian: Ha ha.
Lloyd Nelson: And that's not an insult. Yeah, that it's not an insult at all, you know.
Brian: take that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: the the the the business ended because when the rest of the country is going through recession in that tw that twenty eleven to thirteen time frame, Nevada was in the midst of a depression.
Brian: Totally.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah, yeah. So even though we had clients in eighteen countries, it didn't matter. because still we were based in Vegas and the business dried
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: up and You only hang on for so long. So when that happened, I'm a good friend of mine still of over 30 years. We had worked together, but this time she placed me. And for that I had to move from Vegas back to Northern California. And she placed me with a little itty bitty company called AutoZone. The software division, the SAS division is called All Data, it's in the Sacramento area.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And and that led to a multi-year journey of corporate sales. No one ever thinks as recruiters as being salespeople, but the fact of the matter is we always were. In fact, harder because because the sales are two-sided, not a one-sided. And so
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: and and so that gave me the experience in the whole world of of enterprise software. Starting with SaaS and then with cloud, moving from From all data autozone to Oracle. And then moving from there to a startup that specialized in green energy initiatives for California and Florida homeowners. So I actually picked up the quote unquote traditional sales that people think
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: of, but I already had it from recruiting. I just I just
Brian: Sure.
Lloyd Nelson: I just married them together. Now what's interesting about this is that where we work today. In 2007, I met a gentleman by the name of Ron Nash. In 2007. So all these years later, we finally had a chance to work together. Yeah.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. That's pretty cool. That's pretty cool.
Lloyd Nelson: But I remember meeting him saying, Who is this?
Brian: Ha ha ha
Lloyd Nelson: and I don't mean that in a negative. I mean it from the and I've never told him this. I meant it from the intimidation side. I just thought he was the sharpest tool I had seen in any shed. And I just told myself that one day I was gonna have to work with them. And here we are. Yeah.
Brian: And here here we are. Here we are.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: So so when you're in s so recruiting is a sales job because you especially when you were doing it, because you're cold calling, you're tr trying to con you're you're trying to convince someone to try something, right? Which is come along with me and I'll I'll let me put you in front of these people. and then you have to get them ready for, you know, this is your client, so you don't want to put anyone in front of them. So you also have to get that person ready. So you really have to
Lloyd Nelson: Right. Right.
Brian: productize them in a lot of ways too. and then people see that, or somebody saw that in you and was like, Well, you could do corporate sales.
Lloyd Nelson: Yes, they did. They did. Because I had I had the building blocks.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I had I had the building blocks for sales. And so to me the transition was not difficult.
Brian: Right. Right. I mean I gotta think recruiters,
Lloyd Nelson: I just w
Brian: it's up there with you know, the phone being hung up on you, it's up there with a lot of jobs where you have
Lloyd Nelson: Well,
Brian: to get someone on the phone.
Lloyd Nelson: well, listen, I used to tell people all the time, as a recruiter, we used to be hung up on 50 times a day. And that's not even an exaggeration. It was 50 times a day. At some point, if you don't get that thick skin, you'll never make it. But I don't believe you'll
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: ever make it in any business. But that's usually that's usually what wears people down. The combination of being hung up on because they take it personally.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: Plus the fact that they're not successful. You're not making money. You're not making money. My
Brian: What do mean? Right. Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: first, my first mentor was my first boss, and he had said, and I never forgot it, in the recruiting business, and today it's the same way for those external recruiters. You're about 150 steps, he used to say that you have to get them right 150 times. If you don't, you will not make that placement. But it will be impossible for you to try to figure out. Where did you fall short in the hundred and fifty steps? And I don't hear people talking about it like that anymore because
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: to some extent it's easier.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: but at the same time, what it requires is people understanding that recruiting is a craft. You don't wake up with natural skill and ability to do it. It it must be learned. And I think there are people who forget about that. And when I moved cross-country. One of the slaps in the face that I needed was the fact that I wasn't as good as I thought I was. And the first two years I failed at every turn you could think of. And as a result, I made a commitment that I was going to become a continual learner of my craft and not wait for any company to pay for it for me.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I wonder how much of that exists today, you know, but that's what I had to do. And ever since then I've been I've been a a sales nerd, an information nerd, a communication nerd. And it served me pretty well.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah, I think the industry gets a bad rap today. Maybe some of it self-inflicted deservedly so. I I once had a call for a position that was a no-brainer. I should have been the top candidate, if not a candidate. And
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: in talking to the recruiter, you could tell she wasn't really paying attention to what I said. she was distracted. There was a lot of background noise, and then at one point, She was like, hold on a sec, I'm switching trains. And it's like, okay, well, you're not l really listening to what I'm saying. If you're switching trains in the middle of a phone call, you're not whatever you're whoever you're talking to. and so, you know, I've had that experience. I've had the experience where the recruiter reaches out to you via email and then you respond and the you then you never hear from them again, which is always crazy.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah. Yeah.
Brian: I've had the experience of, you know, they don't know what the job is. They can't explain what the job is. so yeah, I've I've been through a few experiences where it's like, you know, these people aren't that good at it.
Lloyd Nelson: Well, I don't put all of it on the shoulders of the recruiters anymore. I I
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: I I put the blame on these company managers and the ownership because they're not training and developing people. You can only do so much. and if you don't have if you don't have strong leadership and particularly strong mentorship, you're going to get the results that you had gotten and the experiences that you had.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I was fortunate, never I never worked for anybody who was even close to that. So when I hear it, yeah, yeah, we've got we've got recruiters that are not good. And the industry has regressed, in my opinion. But I put it more on the owners of these companies. They don't know anything. And so if they don't know anything, how can their respective teams know anything either? Because
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: not everybody. Not everybody has the gumption to reach out on their own and figure out what they don't know and learn it.
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: So that's the way I look at this energy. Has it regressed? Absolutely. Absolutely. and
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: and then the other part is just like what we talk about, language and positioning. It's amazing,
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: it's amazing how ubiquitous that is in every industry, in every segment, no different than recruiting firms. And this
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: is why what I share with people about. Is understand who you're speaking with. And and just because they reach out to you doesn't mean what they have to talk about is legit.
Brian: Right.
Lloyd Nelson: When you come across someone that you know the lights are on, that have a level of higher narrative intelligence, that's who you stick with and that's who you work with.
Brian: Mm-hmm. So then you correct me if I'm wrong, you got back into recruiting after doing corporate sales. How did that happen?
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I did. I did. while I still don't know why. my theory is because of the owner of the firm in the nineties that I was with, and we were the largest privately held accounting and finance specific search firm on the entire West Coast.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: He had sold the business, got back into the business, and I had a chance to to basically reun reunite with him. And help him build a new business, which I did. And that's where I went back to. and it ran its course. And at that point I said to myself, I'm not doing any more recruiting. So a lady that I had hired during those days at this this accounting and finance search firm, she she left she left the corporate recruiting world. the a the what people call agency, but really we were doing retained search and contingency search. She left,
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: she went in into corporate, and she landed at a company called NVIDIA. And she asked me to join. And it took me about two seconds to say yes. Because that was the one piece of experience that I had did not have. I had everything else, never worked in a corporate environment. I joined
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: that corporate environment and and I'm proud to say I was a lot better than they thought I was going to be.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: So what was that like? What was working at In Nvidia? What was what year what years were
Lloyd Nelson: I I
Brian: that and and what was that like?
Lloyd Nelson: that was in 2022. I and then again in 2024. I enjoyed it
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: because it was it was a new experience. So
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: there I am back in a learning mode, which I always like.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And a NVIDIA gave you the opportunity to use your brain. And where I use my brain was bringing concepts that I knew worked. And had to had to show some people that yes this works in a corporate environment a corporate arena as well and you're just gonna have to trust me. I know that's bold but that's the way I felt.
Brian: Right.
Lloyd Nelson: And we created success in a pretty short period of time. And so it would that was great. and Nvidia at the time they were just getting their momentum to the Nvidia they are today. But they had momentum.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: the only difference was that if you called east of the Mississippi River, people wouldn't recognize what an NVIDIA was. That was the only difference. Great
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: firm then, great firm now. it was it was fantastic with the run that we had. And then I had a chance to go back. Now it was not
Brian: How do you how
Lloyd Nelson: the role that I should have gone back to because it was not the work that I was doing before, and I only went back because it was NVIDIA. And you could I can construe that as a mistake. But the good news is is that I've got NVIDIA chops.
Brian: Sure, sure. So that's a company that like a lot of people would want to work at.
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm.
Brian: And it shouldn't be I so I would from the outsider view be like, how hard can it be to recruit it NVIDIA? You must, you know, must have stacks of resumes everywhere. And I mean you just have to pick someone and they're gonna they're gonna, you know, run to the nearest office. Obviously that's not exactly true. But but what what is that like? What is that like recruiting
Lloyd Nelson: Right. I I'll I'll tell I will
Brian: for a company with that type of demand?
Lloyd Nelson: I will tell you it's not as easy as it seems, as you're thinking it is. First of all, when I was
Brian: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: there in 2022, in the prior year, NVIDIA struggled to hire 2,000 people. I underline the word struggled. So
Brian: Well they had a co th Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: they hadn't gotten their their sea legs underneath them. Second, the vast majority of NVIDIA hires, and I believe it's still this way to to this day, unless it's a couple of specialized knowledge based talent,
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: the people that they bring on board are contractors first.
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: Not full time. So
Brian: Okay.
Lloyd Nelson: there are a lot of people who are afraid of that even still.
Brian: Yeah, that's a different conversation to have with someone.
Lloyd Nelson: It's a very different conversation.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: now I know that in in recent times where previously the concept of remote work was pretty strong and compelling at NVIDIA. I know in recent times they've been bringing people back into the office. So that that wears some of the luster off of people.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: So Great great name. Yes. great great compensation, great benefits, and you've got to be prepared to work. And I don't believe everybody's that prepared to work. it's that's not that's not a place where you mail in your efforts. Also
Brian: Yeah, that's not for ever it's not for every
Lloyd Nelson: and then also the other piece to it is is that even though it's a relatively flat organization, it's it's still pretty layered in terms of the relationships internally. And
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: so what does that mean? Well that means is that it takes a while to really understand all the workings. within. It's not one of those where it's not one of those where sixty to ninety days you've got a down pat. No, no. And you know not everybody is prepared for that either. I I saw folks willed by the wayside as a result of I just had I had just reached a point in my life when I joined NVIDIA for the first go around was that I didn't have anything to prove to anybody anymore because I had done everything there was to do. I've been successful in all of it.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I have I have a track record, you know, in the business that we're in, I learned way back when how to talk about my achievements in quantitative terms. I could tell everybody what what I bring to the table and and what separated me from my peers. So
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: reaching that point, I walked in confident.
Brian: Yeah. That and that's that's eighty percent of it.
Lloyd Nelson: At least
Brian: is having that having that confidence. You know, my son's I don't think I've told you the story. My son's high school
Lloyd Nelson: Mm-hmm.
Brian: hired a new principal for this upcoming school year. And
Lloyd Nelson: Okay. Okay.
Brian: they had finalists and they brought the finalists onto campus and they had a you know question answer with parents of the finalists. So you got to meet all the finalists if you win. So I was talking to my son and he goes, can any of these candidates s stop someone from smoking in the bathroom? And I and I n and when I thought about it that way, I was like, you know what? There is one candidate I think who could. And my dad was like, Well then I hope that's the guy we get. And it, you know, I can promise you that question never came up in any interview, in any situation with the school, but you could that person and they did end up getting the job, that person just had a presence of themselves as the when you met them, it was like, that's a principal.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah. I was told
Brian: And I think
Lloyd Nelson: I I was told that when I joined NVIDIA that someone went to my boss and said, He's been here a week and he's walking around here like he actually knows people and knows things. And she said, Yeah, that's Lloyd. Because I didn't wait for any Brian
Brian: Could see that.
Lloyd Nelson: Brian, I didn't wait for anybody to introduce me to anybody. I I
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: knew three names and I Reached out to the people I knew I'd be working with and say, you know, so and so hired me. you know, I've heard there this is who you are. I'm coming to introduce myself and understand how I can support you. What was I gonna wait for? And so, but
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. Of course. It'll never happen if you wait.
Lloyd Nelson: but but it it it was a surprise. It was a surprise to people in NVIDIA. I had done that at all data autozone and
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: really made a stink. when I did that. But it works.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: Because because from my days with the legal firm, the founder of that company said something very prophetic. They can't eat you. And and as and as goofy as that is, boy is it true. You know? In the corporate environment's the worst someone can say to you is no. And so and I didn't hear no too much at all. People were just they were just happy I introduced myself and knew a little bit about them. and it's it's really what it is is the way we need to communicate with other people. And I hate to say it, but the that skill set is rapidly deteriorating. Across the board in life. Across the
Brian: Totally. Totally.
Lloyd Nelson: board in life. And and what people need to understand is you don't have time to be shy. We're adults now. We're grown.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: There's no time to be a shy adult. There's no time to beat around the bush. And at the same time, it's inexcusable to be obnoxious. So can you just talk to people like a real person? Can you just do that? Seems
Brian: Right. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: to be easier said than done. And that's all I did.
Brian: Right. So we work with people who are looking for new careers, searching for a new job, looking to up level. And what would you what do you think is the biggest struggle that people have when they are searching for that next opportunity?
Lloyd Nelson: There's a bunch of them, but I'll keep the list short. The first place is the fact that we are operating in what I've called the twenty-first century hiring market. This is not the 20th century hiring market that the people we work with have grown up in, and neither did we.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: What was successful up to about 2023 no longer works. We work with a gentleman who I th I thought he put it best. He used he used an an OS analogy. You've got people who they're still hanging on to the fact that their resume says they've got 25 years, 30 years, 22 years, and they think that that should be the ticket to walk in the door. Well, the fact is everybody else has that too. And so they don't have a strategy for this 21st century market. If you don't have a strategy, you don't have a plan. If you don't have a plan, then you have nothing to execute. That's the number one problem. And so how does that manifest? Very clearly. It starts with language and positioning. People do not know how to communicate in this 21st century hiring market to what the market wants. The market wants three things from tech leadership. Number one, they want to understand what are the problems that you solve. Number two, they want understand what have you. Done in your career that makes you special, specifically that that makes you stand out over everybody else. And number three is tell me what you've achieved. In recruiting, there was an old expression, and it was called throwing up on yourself. People are still throwing up on themselves when they try to talk about themselves. Nobody cares about that. What they care about
Brian: Mm-hmm. Right.
Lloyd Nelson: is give me fact of. What you have achieved, where I can look at that and project whether you can help us. I know companies didn't speak like that in years past, but they do now. And the market has not adjusted at all. The market has not adjusted to the fact that senior-level talent fall over themselves without articulating clearly clearly the problems they solve. people At even at this level, they are afraid to present themselves as special.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: and and so you hear this pushback of well that that sounds pushy, it sounds salesy, it sounds pompous. Well, you're wrong in all three. If you don't champion yourself, who will? And then the third part, in the in the the tech space, people aren't used to talking about their achievement. And they're definitely
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: not experienced to speak about what they've achieved, what they've overcome in quantitative terms. Businesses
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: care about the metrics. There's five of them. And so in in my role at GHN, I have to address all three of those areas with every single person that walks in the door. And every single person walks in the door needs work in all three areas. We have not seen one that has walked in the door ready made and ready to go, which is part of their problem.
Brian: Yeah. Yep.
Lloyd Nelson: That's the there's other things that we could get into, but if you can't conquer that on the front end. There is no back-end ideal next position for you. Now there
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: may be an what the hell? Let me take this job because I need one. But the ideal next role, you'll never get it if you don't work on clarifying your positioning, establishing a go-to-market strategy which spells out your brand, and and really being able to speak to a company about what matters to them.
Brian: Absolutely. Absolutely. We had a go go ahead.
Lloyd Nelson: And and that's where it starts.
Brian: Yeah. We had a former member of our group who and he was a guest on this podcast. He basically based on a friend's suggestion, said I'm a product guy. I'm sitting in these interviews telling people I'm a product guy. He's like, Maybe I should just start showing them that I'm a product guy. And so he starts playing around with new AI tools, starts posting it online, posting on YouTube, puts a little short into his LinkedIn profile. All of a sudden he has like this content that he's building. And I asked him when he did land a new gig, I said, Did they ask you about your videos in the interview? And he was like, Did they ask me? That's all we talked about. And so here's a guy that creates some content, makes it interesting. It's it's in line with exactly what he does. So it really sets his brand in a certain way. I think this is just like the perfect example. Then when he comes into the interviews, it's not tell me about yourself. It's not what problem can you solve. They've all seen these, that was cool. What did you think of that? What next he takes the conversation and then he's controlling it because they're talking about his content. He could tell he could talk all day about everything he created. And I still don't see many people doing that.
Lloyd Nelson: And and I'll even add to that, Brian.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: I still think that he should have been prepared for the problem him as a problem solver and what companies actually call your superpower and and showing companies' achievement because that still matters. Now he may not have touched on it as overtly as we prepare people,
Brian: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: but covertly it still had to come up.
Brian: It still probably came up, sure. Sure. Absolutely.
Lloyd Nelson: even in those sessions. It's it had to. And so what he did was circumvented a bit
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: with the approach that he took. and so I'm glad he landed what he wanted. because companies are are are
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: are getting tougher and tougher in the interview stage, particularly when it comes to AI dialogue.
Brian: Yeah. And that's that's changing so rapidly from tell me what you know about AI of six months ago to tell me what you've built with it and how you've built it and what that was all about. And it's amazing
Lloyd Nelson: And
Brian: how many tech folks struggle with that.
Lloyd Nelson: And and how will you use AI to keep my teams? Because I don't want to lay off any of them.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: But what does everyone think? Everyone sees, you know, the the the big monoliths. Of course they're laying off people. It's just their the excuse they want it. But your small and medium-sized businesses, they don't want to get rid of anybody. They just want somebody who can bring in an AI sensibility and as a result be able to develop the people that they have that they already like.
Brian: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I believe that. I believe that. I
Lloyd Nelson: So yeah. Yeah.
Brian: there there's a handful of comp more than a handful, but there's a group of companies that just lay offs happen and that's what they do. And then there's the vast universe, like you said, where they don't want
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: nobody wants that. They just want people to be more productive. They want to use the tools to their advantage.
Lloyd Nelson: Mm. Yep, and and unfortunately, and it's always been this way, everyone's starry eyed about the big brand name.
Brian: It makes all the headlines.
Lloyd Nelson: This is this and and this is why I was fortunate being in NVIDIA when I was, because the the big brand name is not always what you think it is when you join them.
Brian: Mm-hmm.
Lloyd Nelson: And the good news was particularly that first go round with me at NVIDIA, it was that and more.
Brian: Yeah.
Lloyd Nelson: Yeah.
Brian: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. all right, we've gone a little bit over time, so I'm gonna end it right there. But
Lloyd Nelson: Okay.
Brian: Lloyd Nelson, thank you so much for joining me. This has been great. Now we gotta go back to work now.
Lloyd Nelson: No, thank you for having me. This has been exactly.
Brian: All right, that was my conversation with Lloyd Nelson. Lloyd, thanks for joining me this week. I just want to touch on a couple things that I found pretty interesting. The first is when he talked about working for NVIDIA, I have this assumption with all the large tech companies that, you know, there there's just rooms full of resumes, and they just walk into the resume room and they pull one off the pile. And they go, we're gonna bless this person with a job offer today from our great company. And I it turns out that's not the case. Surprise, surprise. But Lloyd talked about how he struggled when he was at NVIDIA to bring people on. Nvidia as a company struggled to bring people on. Now, now a caveat there is they like to bring in people's contractors first, kind of try them out. And then bring them on full time. And not everybody is up for that type of situation. I think anyone would be up for a 10 to 20x return on their stock options, but timing is everything. and so I I I do have this general assumption that these big companies, you know, you're blessed if you get an offer from them. And hey, they have their struggles too. On the flip side, Lloyd mentioned how small, mid to small size companies. In terms of layoffs, the the layoff noise is coming from the big companies. And we talked about this on last week's episode. Companies that invest in AI are actually increasing headcount. They're hiring more. They're investing more in people. There are some companies out there that are laying people off, and then they're making AI as an excuse or the reason for it. But small to mid-sized businesses, those are the ones that are behind the curve when it comes to AI adoption. And, you know, they they don't want to get rid of people. A small business does not want to get rid of someone. They don't want to go through that process. And so when it comes to AI, they just really want people who can bring in AI sensibility to their business and help develop people who they already have. And I think that's true. I think that's really true. And and so we're just seeing a lot of facts right now around layoffs and around AI. You know, it's today's news is what's today. Obviously, that could change in the future. But there is this idea that companies that are investing in AI are actually hiring. And I think when you look at the mid-size companies and the small size companies, that's really true. And those are the companies that need the most help. so I We we touched on that and I just kind of wanted to crystallize that idea. I also really liked how he said I I never throw away a name. Now I I work with Lloyd, so I I know that's the case. He has a Rolodex that has a Rolodex. but what a great practice, you know, in life. As you build your network, that's what this is all about. Don't throw away a name. Stay in touch with people. know, you don't have to spend all day on the phone with all everyone in your LinkedIn contacts gossiping and everything like that. But remember, people, stay in touch with people. That's where the jobs are. That's where the opportunities are. I think anyone listening to this knows that they've received an opportunity, be it a job offer or just something that came through somebody they know. I mean, that's just how it works. And so the way Lloyd put it of, you know, I never throw away a name, and that's that's Probably a good rule to live by for sure. This podcast can be found at determinationpod.com. That's the website. That's where everything lives. That's how you can access the newsletter. That's how you can listen to past episodes. You can also subscribe to Apple and Spotify and anywhere else where you listen to podcasts. We're there too. So go to the website, check it out, check out the newsletter. People have been sending me questions and comments. And so I I read it all and and I really appreciate it. So next week we have a real fun episode. I'm looking forward to that. I thank you for getting this far and I will talk to you next week.
