I recently decided to devote some time to understanding agencies and their talent acquisition/retention challenges. I happily met with Chris Schermer, President of SCHERMER, to hear his story and what advice he would give to other agency owners dealing with turnover or engagement issues. What was meant to be a 30 minute interview turned into 90 minutes of laughter, story sharing, and insight from an inspiring agency owner.
These are some of my favorite quotable moments from my interview with Chris:
“[Hiring is] kind of like dating – on the surface things look great, but when you peel back the onion, you find out someone might not be what you thought they were.”
“Today there are two questions I always ask someone in an interview process:
1) What do/did your parents do?
2) What did that teach you about work?”
“I’ve found that [pairing up employees] allows others to expand their perspective and it also holds people accountable. I’ve also found that creating cross-functional teams allows us to solve or anticipate our client’s problems faster.”
“We do the best we can to publicly acknowledge the successes of our employees and celebrate them. Those are the things that allow people to come to work with a sense of satisfaction – knowing they are fairly compensated and recognized/appreciated for their work.”
“I’m not perfect but I’ve found through trial and error that the more I give up, the more I get. I don’t tell people to do things (all the time) but rather empower them to make decisions.”
For the full interview (and more great agency insight from Chris Schermer), read my full blog originally posted on the AdFed MN website.
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