The Hiring Confessional
Hiring Confessional isn’t your typical career advice podcast. This is where we dig into the good, bad, and ugly of the hiring world—bad interviews, candidate horror stories, company blunders, stealth replacements, resume spam, and everything in between. Hosted by Michael Hayes of Momentum Hiring Solutions, each episode pulls back the curtain on the hiring process with raw commentary, industry guests, and stories that employers and employees are usually too polite to share.
The Hiring Confessional
The Talent Pool Every Employer Is Ignoring (And Why They're Better Employees)
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Finding qualified employees has never been more challenging—but what if the solution has been overlooked all along?
In this episode of The Hiring Confessional, recruiting expert Michael Hayes sits down with Jeff Swanson, CEO of One Step Beyond, to discuss why employers should rethink where they search for talent.
Jeff shares how adults with intellectual disabilities are becoming dependable, hardworking employees across industries, why retention starts with hiring people who genuinely care, and what businesses often get wrong about recruiting today.
The conversation also explores nonprofit leadership, internships, AI in recruiting, hiring trends, candidate experience, workplace culture, and why employers need to move faster if they want to attract top talent.
Whether you're a recruiter, HR professional, business owner, hiring manager, nonprofit leader, or job seeker, this episode offers practical insights that can change the way you think about hiring.
In this episode:
👥 Why employers are overlooking an incredible talent pool
♿ Hiring people with intellectual disabilities
🔥 Recruiting for passion instead of perfect resumes
🔄 Why retention is more important than constant hiring
❌ The biggest mistakes companies make on Indeed
🎓 How internships create stronger employees
🤖 AI, hiring, and where technology falls short
🤝 Creating an inclusive workplace
🏆 How nonprofits compete for talent
🌟 What great employers do differently
🔗 Connect with our guest:
🎙 Guest: Jeff Swanson - CEO, One Step Beyond
🔗 LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/jeff-swanson-284a016
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/one-step-beyond-inc/
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/onestepbeyondinc/
🌐 Website: One Step Beyond, Inc. ( https://osbi.org/ )
🔗 Connect with The Hiring Confessional:
🌐 Website: https://lnk.bio/thehiringconfessional
🎧 Subscribe for more conversations on recruiting, hiring, leadership, and workplace success.
#Hiring #Recruiting #HumanResources #Leadership #Business #TalentAcquisition #HiringTips #Recruitment #Careers #Management
Hello, this is Mike Hayes with the Hiring Confessional. Today we have a great episode to talk about a local nonprofit that I think you'll enjoy and go into a little bit about what they do and how they're helping the community. But before that, let's talk about some advice this week. And remember, you're not paying for this, so you get what you pay for. The thing that I always talk about, you're always telling me to bring up this AI stuff. Now, what I want to tell you that I've learned something with working with AI programs is their first answer is not necessarily their best answer. Do yourself a favor, next time you're working with an AI program and you ask it to do something for you, ask it if that's the best effort that it can come up with. And you'd be shocked. On ChatGPT, it will give you, if you keep asking at it, it keeps giving you more and more better revisions. And even though I argue with it, it still does the same thing. So don't take the first answer as gospel and make sure you know something about it. Don't just copy stuff off the internet because you know that gets you in trouble. Number two, job seekers. Uh here's a good tip for you when you're doing an interview. Say the interview's going halfway decent, and you're like, why? I really feel like I got a shot here, and it comes up to the questions. First of all, you better have some questions. Second of all, here's a question that I always like to ask as the applicant to a person. What does this what does success look like in this job in six months? And you just shut up. That will give you all the information that you probably want to need because everybody wants to talk about what they think it is. Now it might not actually be that, but it's going to be close enough. And then when I go to close, I'm going to highlight most of those things the person talked about. You will find out that people will like you a heck of a lot better and they'll think you're really smart. And the other thing I'm tired of hearing about, people always call me and talk about, let me hire a rock star. Please, the you got that commercial on from Billy Idle that makes fun of people always using that. And by the way, you're not going to get a rock star for 18 bucks an hour. So as soon as I hear rock star, I always ask, Well, what is the rock star getting paid? Well, they're getting paid like the guy that's building the stage. So do yourself a favor, drop that term. Just say qualified employee or applicant or whatever you want to do. Okay. Enough ranting today. On to our guest. Today's company that he works with is one step beyond. I'm going to let him talk all about it. It's Jeff Swanson, CEO. How long have you been in the spot now? CEO role, about four months. So how's that going?
SPEAKER_02It's going good. I got a little more gray hair, but uh it's a great organization. So I love what I do. I don't I don't feel like it's a J-O-B. I think it's my chance of giving back to the community. And it's been a good ride so far.
SPEAKER_01Now, how did you how did you take that turn? Because you obviously went you talked to when you went to GCU twice. I went there twice. And baseball?
SPEAKER_02Baseball guy from I played there 02 to 05. Okay. Dating myself a little bit, but yeah. And that university has exploded. I mean, it's been really fun to watch the growth, but a little bit different than when I was there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's it's yeah, it's massive computer. And it's getting bigger by the week. It is, but it's fun to see too. Yeah. It's a good co it's good competition in town for people. It is. I know, and they advertise like nobody's business. Absolutely, and they should. And so you didn't you work, did you work for the Diamondbacks right out of?
SPEAKER_02I was in their front office for about 12 years. Um so I I played, obviously, I pitched at Grand Canyon and uh had a great career. Uh, had some opportunities to play beyond that. Uh, but I I found the woman I wanted to marry and and chose to instead of the minor league baseball route. I thought, you know what, I'm gonna I'm gonna pursue a master's degree, so I finished that in 06 uh and then uh went to work in the front office. So it was kind of a way to marry both passions, right? The I had a business background and then also, you know, a former athlete work in the front office uh for a great organization too. The Dinebacks are top top topics.
SPEAKER_01What do they have you doing over there? You name it.
SPEAKER_02Uh anytime I was there 12 years, so anytime you're an organization that length of time, your plate kind of grows and morphs and expands and changes uh anything from kind of a little bit of marketing, a little bit of finance, a little bit of alumni relations. You know, that organization was was founded in '95, um, started playing in '98, had a lot of success really early. I still think they're the fastest franchise to win a World Series.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um, and so then it was kind of the idea of telling the story and and making Diamondbacks fans, right? Because I was I'm a native. I you're a native too. There was no major league baseball team here when I was growing up.
SPEAKER_01So uh we're still waiting for a football team. Still waiting for football, right?
SPEAKER_02And a good one, right? Yeah. Um, so anyway, uh alumni relations kind of came into the picture a little bit later. Um, former players engaging them in community, uh, bringing them back to work in the front office, uh, special events. So, you know, we had a a big, big guy uh that went to the Hall of Fame in 2015. I was a part of that process, and uh just a lot of good things, community stuff that I'm very proud of my time with the Dinebacks.
SPEAKER_01Then um, how did you transition to one step beyond? And then give us a background of what exactly that it does. Because a lot of people, there's a lot of great nonprofits that people know absolutely nothing about. Thousand percent agree with that.
SPEAKER_02And I knew nothing about one step when I joined them. So I left the Dimebacks in fall of 2016. Uh, I had I had two little guys. I still have two little guys, actually, they're bigger now, but uh they were seven and three at the time, uh, and I was missing too much of their growing up years. I was gone, I was traveling, I was I was in Japan, I was in Dominican, I was at some of our minor league affiliates. Uh great, great opportunities, and I wouldn't trade any of that moment for anything, but I was missing too much of their you know, little league and and parent-teacher conferences and that kind of stuff. So took a step away from there. Um, I did some consulting work for another local great nonprofit, the Be Kind People project, led by uh Andy and Marcia Meyer. Um, and then I'm not a social media guy. I know that sounds weird, but uh I do LinkedIn and that that's it. Um so a woman, uh her name is Carol Morris, uh, she found me on LinkedIn and said, You gotta come work for me. And I said, I appreciate the offer. And I had Mike, I had a lot of people reaching out to me. I can sell ISO and Eskimo if I believe in something. So, you know, marketing and sales roles, financial stuff. Nothing felt right. You know, I was looking for that. What what what's the next step for Jeff? Like what how can Jeff impact an organization? So when Carol called, I said, give me a day to do some research, let me figure out who One Step is, right? Um, and I was blown away. I I did some research that one of their locations in the valley is very close to my home uh in the Arrowhead area, uh West Valley, and uh they serve adults who have intellectual disability. And so nothing I knew anything about, quite literally. And uh she kind of talked me through the organization, kind of what they were looking for. It was a director of development and communications role. So it was kind of telling the story of the organization and then asking people for some financial help to support it, like every nonprofit does, right? Uh they are state funded from Arizona through something called DDD, which is the Department of Developmental Disability. Uh, it's these are Medicaid monies at the highest level and they flow through the states. Um, so there's a good amount of money that supports that, but it's about 80% of what we need. So uh I quickly started raising funds uh from individual donors, some corporate contacts I've got, uh grants and foundations, that kind of stuff. But it's all designed to support people with intellectual disabilities. And you're kind of giving me a look. I need to go a little bit further on it, I guess. Uh intellectual disabilities are things like Down syndrome, autism, stream palsy, right? Uh not a lot of ambulatory wheelchair type stuff, but more uh intellectuals. You would never know looking at some of these individuals if they have a disability. Uh we only serve adults, so you have to be at least 18 to attend our program, but there's no maximum age. We don't kick people out at 25 or 45 or 55. But uh the majority of them, there's a really strong youth transition program in Arizona high schools. So some of these individuals are graduating at kind of a decelerated pace. Like maybe we finished high school at 17, 18, something like that. Uh they're finishing at 21, 22, 23, and their families are looking for what's next. So there's other great, you know, I would call them sister agencies that do similar things to one step, but we do things that are one step beyond, right? Um, so we don't use the word no a lot. Sometimes we'll say not right now, we got to go find money for a project or whatnot, but a really strong life skills program. So that's kind of continuing education after high school. Uh music, recreation, uh, arts, fitness. We have a special needs hockey team, you name it, we have it. Uh pre-vocational, which is a job readiness-based volunteer program. And then the long-term goal is connecting these individuals with meaningful employment, right? Because that's that's a big deal, and you know all about employment. Um, and I don't want to tell them what they want to do. I we we're trying to get it out of them like what's their interest, what's their passion, what um, what is it that they want to do long term? And obviously, a paycheck is part of that process, but what is it that they want to do? They want to work in a in a in the sports industry, do they want to work you know in the hospitality world? Do they want to work in finance? Like, what is it that they're motivated to do? And it's it's an organization that's been around since 2002, so we've grown substantially. Uh it started in a house with four people. Now we have eight locations across two states, and it it's gonna keep growing because there's so much need for what we do. So uh I'm I'm blessed and happy to be a part of it. Um I don't I don't feel like I'm really the CEO. I feel like I'm I'm just I'm in a position to support the people we serve, and that's that's really important to me.
SPEAKER_01How do you find people? I mean, how many employees do you directly have?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so I mentioned we have eight campuses, so there's five in the Phoenix metro area. Uh we have three in the Bay Area, San Mateo County, California, about a half an hour south of San Francisco. Uh we have about 425 staff, not all full-time. You know, there's a mix of full and part-time, um, some 1099 contract, like a grant writer, things like that. Um, how do we find people? That's a great question. Uh, it's hard. Um, we I have a full-time HR director and you know, part recruiting hat, part HR hat. Uh, in the nonprofit world, you have to kind of divide and conquer. I don't have the resources sitting around and rooms full of cash to pay people to do things. So a lot of it's word of mouth. Uh, a lot of it is if you find people that care, we can teach them anything, right? If they don't care, it doesn't matter how much I can teach them because they're serving a vulnerable population and uh a population that sometimes gets taken advantage of. And so we've got to find passionate caregivers, number one. And then number two is the financial side. Um, you know, it's a family-based nonprofit through and through. So, you know, we try to provide a lot of grace to our employees and um, you know, make sure they want to stay and retain. And retention is a giant deal. And we could talk for days probably about retention in your world, but um, finding quality people that care is number one, and then going through the process of training and investing in them. Um, you know, we have things called like level up program, which is kind of like a you know, you take a little more training and it gives you a chance to work your way up in the organization. Uh, and that's what I'm focused on is I I don't want to have hiring classes every two weeks of 10 people. I I want to keep quality people.
SPEAKER_01Do um so I would what's the background of a lot of these people? Are they new out of college? Are they somebody that had this type of uh study in like a place like GCU, the social skills that they have or the social jobs that they have over there? Where do you where do you look and what are the best type of candidates?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so um that's a really good question. And there's not one answer to it. There's probably about four, right? Um there's some family that work with us, that they have a loved one who has an intellectual disability, so a brother, a sister, a son, a daughter, uh, and they want to be around to support them as best they can. Uh, we have kids fresh out of high school and college. Um, you mentioned GCU, another great partner is GCC, uh, Glendale Community College, that they've got a really strong behavioral health style program that um, you know, they're looking for internships and things like that, so they can kind of see the, you know, there's a big difference between book smart and and kind of quote unquote street smart, right? Um, that, you know, actually you're hands-on and you know, is this something you really want to do type deal? Uh, and then there's an older population and and people that that are looking for a second income that maybe Social Security is not enough. Uh, so they've got a part-time driver role, they've got a part-time, you know, culinary kitchen role, they've got a part-time, we call them LSAs, which is a life skills advocate. It's like a DSP, a direct support professional. It's a caregiver. That's what they're doing in the classroom space. Uh, but really part-time, full-time, more flexibility that we can provide. I've learned that you can find more candidates like that. Because let's be honest, in today's economy, people are working one, two, sometimes three jobs just to get by. And so um, being flexible has been a game changer for us. And not saying it's a Monday through Friday, eight to four, it's what's what's best for Mike, right? Does Mike want four days? Does he want a three shift schedule? Does he want Mondays off? Like, what is it? And we try to meet the candidate where they're at.
SPEAKER_01So, do you would like for a retiree, would this be something if they're I mean, obviously they gotta be get be able to get back and forth and have a clean driving record. That's a big deal. Um, because they're gonna be driving your vehicle.
SPEAKER_02I mean, yeah, so we we provide a nice fleet of Toyota Sienta minivans and and and you know, uh, yeah, we provide the the the vehicle, the gas, the insurance, all of that. Yeah, and M VR obviously is is really important. Uh the other thing that's important is we're dealing with vulnerable population, right? So you have to have a level one fingerprint clearance card. I know that sounds weird, but it's like working for the FBI. Uh, because if you have any sort of abuse or neglect in your past, and I mean, I'm I'm not here to judge anybody, but if you have that, you're not gonna be qualified to work at a place like OneStep because the people we're taking care of and supporting um, you know, sometimes get taken advantage of, unfortunately. So that is a requirement that you have to have that level one fingerprint clearance. It sounds more rigorous than it is uh if you've got a clean background, uh, it's through DPS, the Department of Public Safety that runs it. And uh you can get it as long as you know you haven't had any major incidents in the past.
SPEAKER_01Has there is you know what I've always found interesting is I mean, I went to an you know three schools in Arizona, and what the heck is up with um when you're trying to find people uh I think when the nonprofit space, you all kind of compete in the same pool. Because there's this I don't know if there's as many new people coming into that. So you're probably just trading names around a lot more than you'd probably suspect.
SPEAKER_02Does it is that a fair you know that that's that's a fair um I don't want to say assumption, but I it probably is an assumption. Um especially on some of the roles like development, you know, fundraising style roles, grand sales job. Exactly. I mean, so what what we normally find, I shouldn't say normally, but what we often find is um someone that's been in the development role for a sister agency that you know they've kind of tapped out their market and they're looking for something new. Um we we do see some of that. Um our development person right now, uh she came from Soldier's Best Friend. She's amazing. Um, and so she had it kind of changed passions from you know supporting vets and and connecting them with service animals and whatnot uh into the disability world, and and she's been great. So yeah, I I would agree on on a cursory level that uh there's some back and forth, if you will. Um, but again, if you can find people that are passionate and care, I can teach them all to book smart stuff.
SPEAKER_01It's like the the banking business, these guys they hire and fire the same 20 guys all over town. Like I I know a dude in town that probably has 40 business cards, and half the banks don't even exist. Yeah, so it's a little bit like that. Yeah um the other this is a uh a question I would I just popped into my head, and that's always dangerous. So, how because you're working in that vulnerable space, and then how do you you you probably worry when the stuff's going on in Minneapolis and stuff for people that are doing this and then they're hosing the government down, you don't want to get thrown in that bucket. Correct. So are you guys being proactive about that? Because I think that's a big danger, because you know people are like, oh, I'm done doing that, and yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02And so the short answer is we do things the right way, right? Um, I I don't think we want to get into a political conversation or whatnot. Uh there's a lot of uneasiness and and just in general, it doesn't matter what side of the aisle you're on, there's people are nervous about what's going on. Um, but there's so many different audit processes that are in place that while I can see how it happened, I you've got to be really um un in in integrity, if that makes sense. Like you you've got to be someone that's just you're and and to take advantage of a system that's supposed to sort support the people that we do. Um, I'll just I'll be honest, that's sick. I I I I don't have much um much sympathy for those individuals that that got caught. Um and I'm sure there's more out there that haven't got caught. Uh, but yeah, we've got such a strong uh we're required to maintain a certain ratio based on our our contract with the state of Arizona. I take that stuff really serious. I I don't there is no mixing uh right and wrong for what we do. Um and I don't want to lose that contract because number one, the people need our services, but number two, it's a big chunk of our revenue. So it's really important to me.
SPEAKER_01Do you think a lot of people know about this program or some or is there people that don't know about it? I mean, I sometimes people don't ask the right question or they don't ask the right person.
SPEAKER_02You know, I'll be honest with you, you probably heard of the Arizona Charitable Tax Credit, right? It's been around, I I don't don't quote me on it, probably 11, 12 years or whatnot. And then when the state of Arizona said we have too much money, we want taxpayers to choose where their dollars go. Uh, number one, it's amazing, right? And I want to take advantage of it as long as we can. Uh, but if you go to that website and look at all the different qualified charitable organizations, there's a lot. And when when the head of HR called me almost nine years ago now, I had no idea who OneStep was. Now, I don't have an individual in my family who has an intellectual disability. So I wasn't necessarily looking for something like this. But yeah, there's a lot of nonprofits that operate in Arizona and beyond, I'm sure, that we have no idea who they are. So that's part of my job is telling the story and making people aware of it. And and obviously asking for some financial support because without the financial support, we can't do what we do, right? Um, but yeah, I I I firmly believe there's so many great nonprofits that operate in the state of Arizona on very different levels, right? You know, maybe you have a charity that you're passionate about that supports people with cancer or a pet charity or whatnot. Um I I I want people to do the research and find them because um number one, the nonprofit world, we all have to operate so financially efficient, there's not a lot of waste in it.
SPEAKER_01One of the things that I a good question that I get, because I you remember I used to work, I contracted with a nonprofit, so I work down on the on the uh the campus down in uh middle of Phoenix, which is a real eye-opener. If you ever have a chance, anybody go take a look at that when you feel bad about your life, because it'll feel great by the time you walk out of there. Do you has there ever been an outreach from you know colleges or universities about, hey, is there any way we can do like an internship cross back and forth or stuff for your students? Because I have always complained when I'm in teaching is that these kids don't have anything going on. Like they haven't worked zero. And I'm like, I I think a lot of times is because it's not facilitated properly. Yeah. So do you have any of those type things, or or is that something that's kind of hard to do or put together?
SPEAKER_02You know, uh yes, we have some. Um obviously the connections I've got at Grand Canyon. I go there and speak at business clock college classes and uh share with the students the reality of what's next, right? And I I think college students today are are pretty isolated. Um, you know, I I don't even want to talk about cell phones and social media and that kind of stuff, but just understanding what's out there, right? Uh and and different career paths. And I'm I'm living proof of that. I mean, I worked in a great organization with an IBAX for a long time and kind of pivoted myself, and and now I found I found a calling that um goes a little bit beyond. So um the short answer is yes. Uh Grand Canyon, we've we've done some things with. Uh, I mentioned some of the requirements of working in our organization. And by the way, it's not just working. If you're gonna volunteer with us, you have to have all of these background things done. So uh that that's been a little bit of a hurdle, if you will. Uh, it's not as easy as just saying, hey, come volunteer at this event. You have to spend some time in the background process. Um, with our media production, we've had some great relationships with the Cronkite School at ASU in downtown Phoenix. Um, and you know, there there's been a handful of opportunities over the years, and um definitely something I want to do more. I I'm when I was at Dinebacks, I had almost two or three interns a year for a long time. And I think that's really valuable experience that I don't, I guess we shouldn't call them kids, but they are kids that um you know, the the again I talked about earlier with the book smart versus street smart. Um in the Dimebacks organization, I'll go there first. A lot of kids just wanted to get their foot in the door. And I I can't stand the term getting the foot your foot in the door because it tells me that you don't know what you want to do, right? So I would always encourage them, hey, just come come work for us and and get a sense of you got an accounting degree, you got a business degree, you got a social degree, whatever it is. See if that's really where your path is, right? If that's really what you want to do. So uh yeah, the internship program it wants to have, I want to expand, I want to grow it uh because I want to give kids a real world experience to see is this really the field you want to be in.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, my and I've tried this at a couple different places. It's just not, it's all the universities. They're way behind in this. And what they do is they put usually uh very minimal career services people that kind of block the street, and there's all these requirements rather than what I do in my class when people want interns, they'll go, Well, who do you have? And I'll say, I've got a couple people, yeah, and then they'll they'll talk to them, and usually all of them get a job.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, make the connection, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I but I'm not involved, right? So it's but it would be nice to be able to have, okay, here's these 10 businesses that are coming in a day. By the way, they're hiring interns, right? You should go down there and talk to them. But I'm staying out of it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01So you can report that they got one or whatever, but a lot of times they want the hours and then they want, oh, we need this because other person can get credit. And I'm like, people just don't have that time, right? They want to do that, right? You know, I want to hire the thing now, right? Wait I'm two months.
SPEAKER_02Well, and the other thing, and that's a good point. The other thing on the internship side is there's kind of this false perception that if you're an intern, you're gonna get a full-time role. Right. Where honestly, usually that's not the best case scenario. The best case scenario is they get in there, they they work hard, hopefully, they show up, right? Uh they get the experience that that is important for them in their career field of choice or whatnot. And then maybe they get an offer, but maybe not. And sometimes that maybe not opens a lot of different horizons, right? And so uh I think that's always kind of a misnotion with internships in general, is that it's gonna lead to a full-time role. Um, and while it might, I don't want the student or the business thinking that that's the best path, right? Because it might not be.
SPEAKER_01I'll tell you, if we could ever figure out a way, I've pitched that to a lot of people on the campus. Yeah, and everybody, oh, that sounds like a great idea. The same thing with manufacturing, you can do with almost everyone, right? But I think it allows, well, first of all, your campus would be people would be attracted to go to school there. Exactly. Because they're gonna hear about it. Well, that's what I want to do. Exactly. The other thing is, like a place like yours, I'd be telling somebody, hey, listen, if you could get in there and do an internship or even just work, you hang that on your resume. I don't care what you're doing. Exactly. Somebody's gonna ask about it, right? Right. And then you're gonna tell them, and then you're gonna be talking all about that, and nothing about anything else. Exactly. And oh, why did you oh I felt I wanted to give back, and I was very interested in to see how that side of a business works. Right. This gives you a lot more to talk about. And I've I always pitch that go find something. Uh why don't you go work at a church, food uh, you know, like a food pantry, yeah, like Mary Sue Bank or not?
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_01But I don't think people for some reason think, oh, no, that's not a real thing. Right. And I think the direct opposite that it's more than a real thing.
SPEAKER_02I agree with that a lot because um, you know, most internships are not really well defined, and that's by design. Because again, back in my Dynamax days, when I had interns, I their job was not to make copies for me and go get me coffee. I wanted them to be a part of the team, an extension of what we did. So they were exposed to a lot of different things in the organization, whether it was sales or marketing or or you know, some of the alumni stuff or special event type stuff, and it gives them a well-rounded experience. And I like what you talked about with the experience side on your resume, because this relational thing is something that this generation, and it makes us sound old, if you will, but they can't do this, right? They want to hide behind a computer, they want to hide behind a text message, they want to hide behind a cell phone. And this is what's important is being able to have a normal conversation with somebody, uh, create some sort of relationship. Relationship is what jobs come from, in my mind, right? Um, yes, there's an interview process, there's a hiring process, there's all of that stuff. A resume tells a little bit of a story, but if I can't have a good conversation with somebody, they're not gonna be on the top of my list.
SPEAKER_01It's interesting because just a little bit not too far off off talk, but I just read something in the in the Wall Street Journal. People are now uh using um uh AI to have an in-person conversation. Well, not a not a oh, so I can't see you, you're across town. I'm gonna be using it while we sit here. And I'm just thinking about what kind of psychotic idea is that? And why would anybody think that that's normal?
SPEAKER_02I'm not an AI guy, I'll be honest. So it's hard for me to talk about AI too much. Um, but even like Chat GPT, like I can tell emails that were written with that um and they make no sense. And if I know the sender and it it's it's a Chad GPT email, I can immediately tell that they don't write it because they wouldn't use words like that. And at the end of the day, all it does is make the email way too long. And it'll the substance of it is gone. I would much rather have one or two really specific sentences than four paragraphs of fluff that I have to spend time sifting through. And I'll be honest, Mike, a lot of times if I see that, I don't even read it because it's a waste of time.
SPEAKER_01I agree because I'll never forget one back in the early 2000s I worked at Wells Fargo. One of their big things was after that anybody talked to you, they would send you an email because it was a cover my ass email. And so every day there was 300 cover my ass you know emails. And and I used to tell people if you send me something more than three lines, I'm gonna call you. Yeah, I don't want to talk, I don't want to type it out, it's too boring. And I think people just oh, I gotta send this because then I'm okay. It's in writing, it's been documented. And we spend all day doing it. Uh and you don't do anything. So unproductive. What'd you do? Oh, I didn't do anything. Completely unproductive. Um so how are you how are you navigating today's person? That's you know, because it's very different. Lots of people, I and I've and people go, well, where do you get all these opinions from? I go, well, because I've been teaching these kids for since 2016 or whatever, except for COVID. And I watch what they do right and I listen to how they respond to things and what they think is normal behavior versus what they think is you're a boomer idiot or you don't know what you're doing. Um some of the people will say that on quotes on our Instagram and stuff when I say something. I don't even read them because I don't care. But I I just always ask myself, what are you doing?
SPEAKER_02Yeah I mean, so uh I don't think there's a direct response to that. Because it's an opinion, and I share a similar opinion, Mike. Um it really depends on the role, right? Um, our CFO moved out of state about a year and a half ago, and we needed to find a replacement, right? I chose not to hire a CFO, I wanted to hire a controller, which it's similar, but it's not the CFO role in my mind, and I think you would likely agree, is more long-term strategic planning, you know, maybe growth initiatives, things like that, where the controller is more buckling down on finances and making sure that we've got you know cost containments and all that kind of stuff in place. Um, and so I wasn't recruiting a controller through something like Indeed, right? Um we did hire an executive recruiter, uh, someone that our board had recommended that was a personal friend, gave us a good deal on, yada yada yada. But and it worked. We got a fan fantastic controller now. Uh he came from an organization called Food for the Hungry, uh, which unfortunately was negatively impacted by all the stuff that happened in the political world. But uh actually for us it was good because he came to us, right? Uh however, uh those roles don't come open a lot in organizations. So that's a really specific role that we're looking for. Uh when it comes to some of the entry-level roles, I mean, it is college job fairs, it is job fairs in general. Uh, some of our nonprofit partners that we go to and ask, you know, if you guys are having hiring events or whatnot, uh, indeed, you know, indeed works. Indeed, is a lot of sifting and a lot of resume screening and a lot of uh initial conversations and things like that. But um, you know, organizations like One Step, I think there has to be a passion behind the rule. Um, and so I think that that kind of separates the candidates from, you know, again, and I tell people this if anybody asks me to send an interview, number one, I don't I don't read resumes. I tell them I can read, right? Um, so don't read me your resume when we're interviewing. Like tell me something I usually ask them about their bucket list or something like that to kind of you know ease them into the interview or whatnot. Um, but I want to know what's not on the resume. I want to know why they're sitting with me. I want to know what it is about one step that drew them to one step, right? Uh I tell them from the very beginning that we'll pay you as much as we can. And and cash is part of compensation. But there's so many other buckets in compensation. Uh, the one that we can fill at one step is that you feel good about your day. You you feel like you did something good for somebody. Um, and so that's a big deal for us. So if someone's looking for only the cash side, go work at Amazon. Go go work at In N Out. I mean, you look at some of these starting wages of some of these businesses, it's mind-boggling. I mean, my and I'll date myself again. I worked at a small Mexican restaurant, Los Capadres on 7th Avenue, and I made $375 an hour. Yeah. When I was starting out, but you're now saying minimum wage is north of $15.
SPEAKER_01It's I know the same people that are wanting a higher minimum wage are then complaining about the prices are higher. Which I'm like, you're just paying it out the door and you're not getting any extra money.
SPEAKER_02And I I'm not a fast food guy. Um, but you know, you you see things in business journals and whatnot about you know they're replacing people with computers because they can't afford to pay $15 an hour. Otherwise, the cost of a I don't even know what the McDonald's burger is called now, but you know, it's gonna be more than you're willing to pay because and and whether it serves a purpose or not, I don't know. But um it it's it's it's crazy. Um and it always makes me smile and kind of chuckle a little bit when people talk about I can't support my family on minimum wage. Like that that was never the intent of minimum wage, ever.
SPEAKER_01Did um when you when you guys, what's your marketing plan kind of in town? What do you how do you do that and how does that work?
SPEAKER_02So uh at one step it's a little bit of a challenge uh because um the people we serve uh they come to us from a handful of different sources, right? A lot of it's word of mouth because we've been around a long time in the valley, we've grown quite a bit. People know what one step is. Um, and so when you talk about marketing, the hard part of marketing is the marketing that I need to do is on more of the development and fundraising side, hiring side a little bit. Um I was initially leading development and communications, like I told you earlier, and kind of fundraising and whatnot. Uh and then when all the pandemic craziness hit, uh, that's when I was asked to shift my efforts into more admin, HR, recruiting, finance, IT, that kind of stuff across Arizona and California. And at that point, we had 125 vacancies across five campuses. That was rough. Um, no nonprofit will tell you they want to be fully staffed. Uh we have to operate in like a five to eight percent vacancy so we can pay the bills and whatnot. Um, but 125, that was about a 35% vacancy. So that was hard. Um, and so you kind of shift your focus on who you're looking for at that point. They still have to care, but you talk about kind of if there's a 10-point checkbox, you know, which of those 10 are you willing to, you know, kind of give on, if you will? Uh, maybe they don't have a lot of experience in your industry, but they've been in a world that they are caring for people. Maybe they came from like an assisted living home or something like that, right? Um, on the culinary side, you know, we're not looking to hire executive chefs in our culinary operation. We're looking to hire people that obviously care first, uh, have a little bit of a background in culinary, are willing to come alongside of our individuals and teach them and show them. Um, so on the marketing side specifically, uh development, telling the story, candidate referrals, and that kind of stuff, but we've got to be careful because every one of our campuses has a waiting list. So we don't necessarily want to market on a wide scale because we don't have the room to take all these people on right away, right? I mentioned the ratio way we we kind of we we operate in our normal ratios four and a half to one. Uh yes, we have some enhanced ratios like one-on-one style services and whatnot, but uh if we do too much marketing, that wait list gets longer. And that frustrates me because our mission is to grow and serve, right? So we've got to be, I don't want to say double-edged sword, but it kind of is uh in terms of telling the story of who wants to, because I don't want to turn people away, right? Um, and if we can't hire, we can't enroll people. Uh if we can't fundraise, we can't enroll because we can't support them on the level we want to support them on. So um there's not a wide-scale marketing, it's more specific based on the need we have at the time.
SPEAKER_01The you mentioned indeed, and since what a lot of things that I do is I manage the the company's Indeed page. But what is interesting is I always tell clients, I go, you're spending too much money because indeed they they change a lot of stuff all the time. I mean, they change boxes and stuff that just drives me crazy. But they do it because they want you to spend more money. Right. So um, if you keep filling your stuff, um, well, that I'm not gonna get paid. Right. So, and then my other question is nobody knows how many clicks you got on your ad. I mean, who's providing that information? And who cares? Honestly, here's your well, give me, prove it to me. Well, I can't. I mean, if you ask somebody, you're paying somebody to paint your house, and then they said it was painted, and they never bought any paint. Right. So I get, I get I get this. I I try to have this conversation, and I go, listen, we gotta change the way we post. We got to make stuff sound like it's a human, not a doctor's prescription.
SPEAKER_02Yep.
SPEAKER_01And make it easy so we can try to find those people. And then you're still gonna get a hundred, a hundred and a half of people that have no business applying for these jobs.
SPEAKER_02And and even if you have uh a really specific you know requirements of the job, you still get people that are applying that clearly don't fit. And that's frustrating. All day. I mean, that that's that's a colossal waste of time. And you know, if if I'm if I'm a hiring professional or if I'm an HR person, you know, you kind of, and I I say this in tongue in cheek, but you kind of want to hit them on the side of the head like what what what are you missing? Like it's black and white. So then can you not read? Is it is there some other thing I'm not I'm missing or whatnot in the role? But um, yeah, I mean, recruiting's hard. I don't tell you that.
SPEAKER_01You've you've lost all your hair at this point like on purpose. Um they now it's funny you ask that because I used to call people all the time when I first got in the staffing business because I wanted to try to understand why they would apply for something. And this was the kind of what I got out of it. They think if because you your company, so they look at it and they say, like, I was doing um reefer techs for truck drivers. Okay. So I got people that never even turned a wrench. I mean, I turn a wrench more than that, and if you know me, I don't even know which end is the one you use. Okay, so I'm telling them, um, why did you apply for the show? No, absolutely zero. And they're like, Well, I thought maybe there was another position. That's kind of the mentality. I'm just gonna spam my thing all over town, and then they'll go on, you know, TV shows and stuff where they get interviewed and they'll go, oh, nobody wants to reply to my stuff. And 40% of those ads are BS. Most of these companies just float ads out there because they're looking for this thing, it's called, and one of my customers uses it, unicorn. Yes. So the unicorn hits my ad, and now I get to get them. But the 50 other people that came in, maybe one of those was halfway decent. We just we just got rid of it. It's like they're throwing spaghetti in the ceiling and just like it. But then they think, I go, do you know if they see this ad up for six months, they're gonna think one, you're not paying enough, or two, you're a crappy employer.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. You have to you have really high turnover, maybe or whatnot.
SPEAKER_01And that's one of the things that I try to explain to customers because a lot of companies think they're the greatest business in the world, and everybody wants to work for me. And I'm like, No, you're not. If this guy, if we talk to him today and he's a qualified person, and you don't call him for a week, he's gonna have another job. They're moving on. Yeah, you you can't wait. How quick are you guys? Do you guys try to respond fast when people within 48 hours?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, and I I think that's fast. And even it's it's it's three days better than most people. But even that, Mike, people are moving on quicker. Yeah, and and I it's it's hard because you can't blame the candidate. Like they're they need maybe they need a J O B. And and I I said earlier, one step is not a J-O B because there's more of a passion behind the work we do and whatnot. Um, and and one step is not a perfect organization. Number one, I don't believe any organization is perfect. On some level, there's something that you can find wrong if you look hard enough, right? Um, so I I never claim to be the best or or whatever. I think we're really damn good because I've seen the other options in the valley. And and again, I don't believe there's any competition of what we do because we serve people, that's what we do, right? Um, but in in terms of the the candidate, if they're applying on a Monday and you're not reaching out to them until Thursday or Friday, number one, they've probably applied to seven or eight positions already. And if one of those seven or eight are quicker than you, guess where they're going. One of those seven or eight. If if they're looking for an entry-level role that pays, you know, in the in the $15 to $19 an hour or whatever the the dollar number comes out to be. Um, and so that that's important. And um again, back in the in the 2021 time frame, the when the kind of again, whether the COVID craziness was getting bigger or changing or whatever, when we had the high vacancy rate, um, it had to be way quicker than 48 hours. I mean, it and I was I was on my recruiting guys like, listen, initial contact is really important because they're gonna move on very quickly. And so we were able to get out of that, thank God.
SPEAKER_01But that's what most the thing that they I think companies forget is that um I gotta pay for my belt or I gotta pay, I gotta get money for my car or gas or whatever it is. And they're not sitting around pontificating on whether you're gonna be a fantastic place to work. Yep. The other thing, when I had my um I had students on here that used to be students with me, and you know, we talk about the five interviews, you know, or the four interviews, you know, and the constant grinding of the gears. And you almost probably never get your first choice because they're they're they're in the door. Right. Um, I'm sure you've tried to avoid that because that's just a killer.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So what I did when I was leading admin uh, you know, hands-on, if you will, um, is gave hiring managers authority to make decisions right away. Because if you tell them we'll call you tomorrow or we have one more step in the process, they're gone. Like quite literally. So I don't want I didn't want my hiring people to to settle. I'm not I'm not saying that. But if you had a quality candidate in front of you, offer them, tell them when the next onboarding class is and get them going. Get their paperwork done. Uh that's important. It's it's like landing a hook in a fish, right? If if they bite three or four times at some point, they realize it's a hook, right? So if you don't hook them right away, you're gonna lose them. They're gonna get off the line, right?
SPEAKER_01Well, especially in years because you're competing in an area where that person might go down and work on the campus downtown or some other thing. They're already applying in all these places. So somebody picks up the phone first.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And I've learned that, and I hate saying it like this, but uh it's true, and I I think you would agree, people are not loyal. The the sense of loyalty is gone.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_02I mean, you know, that you know, you you the the old the old adage of you know, the the janitor becomes a CEO because he's been there 35 years, I don't think those stories are gonna be around anymore because people are always looking for the next, whether it's another buck, whether it's uh work from home, the remote style stuff that got has gotten way out of hand in my mind. Um and so uh finding finding people that are loyal, I think you have to kind of throw it out the window. I I don't I don't see that ever coming back, to be honest with you. Um you mentioned not the specific term, but work ethic, right? People that want to come on time, show up, do their job, clock out, and go home. I I think a lot of that's gone too. People are always looking for the next thing. So where I was going is that even while people are working in some of these entry-level roles, they're applying other places. They're not they're not giving two weeks' notice, they're not waiting for a new opportunity, they're always looking for the next opportunity. So the other side of the hiring side, if you will, is making sure people want to stay and retaining quality people and treating them the way you should be treating them so that you don't have to keep hiring over and over and over again. I know you don't want to hear that as a hiring professional, but that's a really big deal for organizations.
SPEAKER_01Well, for me, I like it because people tend to use you more and then they tell other people.
SPEAKER_02Yes. And go back to marketing. Yeah, word of mouth is the best you can get. I mean, I you know, when you hear direct from somebody, and I I go to all of our onboarding classes and introduce myself to the new hire staff and let them ask any questions they want. I'm I'm an open book. You can ask about my former life, whatever. But um I always ask them how they heard about it. And I tell them if the answer is indeed, that's fine. And I understand Indeed works. Like I get it. Indeed is is definitely a tool that is beneficial, right? But something on Indeed told them to look at one step. And something on that that that job description or or whatever the post was or whatnot, something spoke to them, right? And so I think that's really important that organizations treat their staff the right way. Um, again, it's not perfect, Mike. We do the best we can. Sometimes we make mistakes on both sides, and the candidate's not truthful. There's so many different scenarios that come to it, but uh at the end of the day, if you if you treat people the way you want to be treated, you're gonna have something.
SPEAKER_01The other interesting thing is I got a resume the other day, speaking of weird resumes, for a guy that had remote job all through the top of the uh post and was for a driving job. I was now old Mike, I would I was getting ready to call that guy just because I go, Hey, did you know you you want a remote job and you applied for a driving job? Um, so I and you know what's funny? I have this conversation about stuff like that, and then it's like, hey, do you know your phone number's not on your resume? And then you got to go back into their system and look for it, or they don't have their address. Oh, and they're like, oh, and they always say this, oh, I updated that recently and it didn't take. I said, if I had a buck for every time I heard that, I'd be a millionaire. Absolutely. So that's why that place, and indeed's got a 50, 40, 50 percent of just what they call the ghost ghost posts or whatever they are.
SPEAKER_02So you get international people hiring, uh you know, seeking jobs. I'm like, I I I don't know how to help you.
SPEAKER_01Oh, put your and then put an uh put an ad on LinkedIn and look what you get from people from all over the world.
SPEAKER_02Right, willing, willing to relocate for entry-level role.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and yeah, or they're gonna wash cars. And I'm like, okay, so that doesn't really make any sense. But then you're getting you're they should first of all, we shouldn't be charged for that. Second of all, you the um and and the rules sometimes be that you have to ask these questions and they don't have to be asked, make it worse for everybody else. Right.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I I agree with you. The the the common sense world not very common.
SPEAKER_01Now, do you um do you work with any companies that look at your some of your people for employees? Or do or do they basically get prepared and then you guys kind of steer them to ones that are friendly for, you know, that might be working with somebody that might have minor disabilities or something?
SPEAKER_02That's a good question. So we have a vocational team that their job is to go find businesses in the community that are looking to hire, and specifically to hire the people that we serve. And if If you don't know much about people with disabilities, I'll tell you a couple things. They show up, they work hard, they'll smile on their face, and they'll get the job done. Like, period. You can talk about anything else you want to talk about, right? But employers are looking for people that show up and just get it done. That's who we have, right? And they'll work hard. Sometimes they need a little bit of help. You gotta coach them. You gotta maybe, you know, give them a little bit more training, if you will. But that's one thing that we've excelled at is we have a job coach that goes with them to the business to ensure success. And one step pays for that. We pay for the job coach and we pay for the transportation to and from the business. And so we've got great employment partners, people like Top Golf. We have people working at Top Golf out in Glendale. We have people at Royal Oaks retirement community out in Peoria on Bell Road. Uh, we've got places at BW Parts, we got people at the City of Surprise Fire Department. Just like I said at the beginning, it's it's we want to connect these people with what they want to do. It's not what I think Mike wants to do. I want to get Mike to tell me what Mike wants to do and try to find that connection. And on the employer side, you're getting quality people.
SPEAKER_01Does the retail business big into that? Because you notice that a lot at the grocery store.
SPEAKER_02You'll see some of it, you know, on the bagging side and and and some of the some of the quote unquote back of the store side. Uh and and that's that's great. If that's what the individual wants to do and wants to work in the retail grocery world, let's find a way to connect them with that. But we also want to go one step beyond that and see what it is the individual wants to do. We we use something called person-centered thinking, uh, which again is what I want Mike to tell me what Mike wants to do, not what Jeff thinks Mike wants to do, and and put them in a situation that they're not having a good time and and they're they're just it's a paycheck for them. While the paycheck is a good piece, I mean I want them to be passionate about what they do.
SPEAKER_01Do they um and I would imagine, because I know there is for like military people, people that are in prison, there's got to be a tax credit for hiring people. I would imagine there's some incentives on the business side. Yeah, yeah. And I don't know if you know, a lot of times people spell that out because that I know companies that look for that. Right. Because they like to, you know, they can get a big tax credit for it. Yeah, and it's expensive to hire.
SPEAKER_02Obviously, it depends on the business and then taxes and all that kind of stuff. It's kind of like the tax credit. I can't tell you how much you can give because your your income and your your you know tax or your uh tax liability is none of my business.
SPEAKER_01Is that a big part of your funding? Is doing the the Arizona tax credit?
SPEAKER_02You know, uh it's a it's a good chunk. Uh it's probably between three and four percent of our annual revenues. Um, and it doesn't cost people anything. Like I I I haven't found it's kind of like solar on the top of your house. Like, I haven't I don't know why every house doesn't have solar. I don't get it. I know that's not a solar interview, but like this unless you believe the sun's not gonna be there someday. Like, and maybe that's the truth. But um, the tax credit's the same way. You're gonna pay these taxes anyway. Why wouldn't you choose an organization that you want to benefit from it? Um, especially because I believe everybody has a passion about something, right? Um, it could be something that's in your family that's been for a long time, or it could be you know an organization you know nothing about. Um I I think the marketing side of the tax stuff, I think, and I don't I don't think the state of Arizona doesn't do enough or does too much. I I think they do the right amount, but uh it's not in front of people's face enough, right? And I don't think enough tax people talk about it enough because it's important.
SPEAKER_01I it is. What do you what's the what do you think the place is gonna look like in the next five years? One step? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02It's gonna be bigger. I promise that. Um, one thing we haven't talked about yet, I don't know how much time we have left, but we've got a couple minutes. The the real challenge that we're facing right now, uh, separate from funding, because every nonprofit will tell you they need more money. Because money, and I don't believe money solves everything, but uh when you have the right funds come in and you can you can change your program and you can support things that you really need support for, it does make a big difference. But uh we've got an initiative right now called Nikki's next step. Uh Nikki uh next step is a housing community for people with intellectual disabilities, and there's other ones in the valley uh that are great. Uh some of them are lease-based, uh, some of them are are home uh you know secured by a mortgage or whatnot, home ownership. Uh that one specifically is very expensive. Um here's the challenge, Mike, is that we've got, and these numbers will sound really big. Uh there's 40,000 people that need uh affordable homes that have intellectual or developmental disabilities, IDD, uh, and 10,000 of them live with a caregiver over the age of 65. That's scary. Uh I'm glad your eyes went like that because it's something that no one's talking about. Um, and it's something that that we got to figure out. And when I say we, I'm not saying just one step, just like societally, right? I don't like the term affordable housing. I don't, because affordable depends on who you are, right? Affordable to you versus me, the guy in the street, the executive at Chase Bank, whatever. Affordable is a different term, right? So I'm using the term submarket. We're trying to sell these because a lot of our individuals that attend one step are are people that qualify for something called SSDI, Social Security Disability Income. And they're making $700 to $1,200 a month. You can't find an apartment for that kind of money. So about three years ago, uh one of our board members came to us and said, hey, we got to figure out this housing thing, right? And it's always been in our contract with the state of Arizona to provide affordable housing if that's what we wanted to do. And there's like group homes, there's there's foster care agencies, there's ADH, that kind of stuff. But the the vision we have is independent living. We want these individuals who can with some support, not zero support. We're not gonna put them in a room and hope it goes well, right? But um HCBS is home and community-based services, things like respite, attendant care, habilitation. Maybe they need help getting ready in the morning, maybe they need help at night, maybe they need help administering meds, whatever that looks like. We'll be there to support them. But uh we've secured a piece of land, we had a really generous donor, buy it free and clear, donate it to one step, restricted for this use only. Uh, it's roughly 67th Avenue and Bell Road. Uh, we had to rezone it because it was zoned more single family style. Uh it was a family that owned it for five generations in the valley, and they were looking for a reason to sell it that had a purpose behind it. And so this Nikki's next step project was that. So we're gonna build uh about 60 units, which doesn't sound like a lot, but it's gonna serve about 110 people, a mix of one and two bedroom units. Um, and we're trying to sell them affordable. Uh, the reason selling them is important because the family wants to know where their loved ones are gonna be long term, not a lease-based thing where as long as we can afford it, they have a home. It's no, this is their forever home. And so that's a really big initiative they're working on right now. We launched a capital campaign. I'm trying to raise a big amount of money, and as soon as we raise it, we're gonna start construction. And the goal is to have that done in the next two years. So Nikki's next step is a big, a big piece in our next five-year plan. Um, I get asked almost daily. I know it sounds weird, but will you come to the East Valley? Right? Because there's, I believe there's people with special needs everywhere, and wherever there are, one step should be. Like I believe that. And it's not a big chess thing or or whatnot that I think we're the best. I think we're very good at what we do. Um, and I believe that we have a mission to grow and serve. And so our first campus east of the I-17 was Scottsdale. We opened that in 2020. Hindsight, obviously, looking back, probably the worst time you could open a new expansion when when the the pandemic craziness is happening. Um, but you know, places like Gilbert, Chandler, Quinn Creek, Mesa, uh, they need the same sort sort of services that we provide. Uh Flagstaff, Yuma, uh, we've been asked to move to San Diego. Um, there's there's so much opportunity to grow, uh, but we've got to do it responsibly. We we're our nonprofit. We don't have unlimited resources, right? And we've got a really small admin team because we don't like investing in things that are not the program or services. So I I feel like in the next five years, number one, Nikki's next step will be open. We'll have a we'll have a community of of residential services for people with disabilities. Uh, and then I think we're gonna be probably in the Far East Valley, we'll be somewhere at Queen Creek, Gilbert, Chandler, uh, Mesa in the next five years as well.
SPEAKER_01Well, Jeff, it's great having you on here. Appreciate the opportunity. I'm glad we had an opportunity to talk. It's one step beyond, look it up, check it out. And as I always like to say at the end, there's a lot of people that are depressed out there. People that might even be your friends. If you haven't talked to somebody in a while, why don't you give them a call and take them for a coffee? This is Mike Hayes from the hiring profession uh hiring confectional. Have a good day. Thanks, Mike.