Get Social - The Connected Leader Podcast - Toby Babb

Michelle: Hello and welcome to the Get Social Connected Leader Podcast, where I ,Michelle Carvill, interview business leaders around the practicalities of how, in this hyper connected digital age, they are embracing digital technologies to tune in and connect and communicate. You can find all the episodes of the podcast, together with show notes via our website, carvillcreative.co.uk/podcasts.
Michelle: In this episode of the Get Social Connected Leader Podcast, I'm delighted to interview Toby Babb. Toby is the founder and CEO of Harrington Star and North Star, two multi-award winning international recruitment brands in the finance and technology space. He produces the Financial Technologies Magazine, chairs the Fintech influencers community, and hosts two YouTube channels, Recruiter 360 TV and FinTech Focus TV. He has recently been named the Entrepreneur of the Year in the recruitment industry, following recent recognition as Agency Leader of the Year and Most Influential CEO in FS Recruitment. Toby is a regular commentator on business and employment for the BBC and a passionate leader in the recruitment sector.
Michelle: So, hi Toby. It's wonderful to have you on the podcast.
Toby: Michelle, it's great to be here. Thanks for inviting me on.
Michelle: We've talked before, Toby, when I launched Get Social, you very kindly had me on your YouTube show and that was brilliant. And we had a chat. And at the same time, if you remember, I interviewed you and I said "Actually, Toby, can I interview you for video as well, because I think your inspirational around how you are such a social CEO." So that's really why I wanted to get you on the podcast to talk about what you're doing and how you're doing it.
Toby: Of course. Yeah, and I'd love to.
Michelle: So, let's start then with a little bit about how you started using social media and indeed why.
Toby: Yes, so I've been in the recruitment industry now, for 20 years. And for the vast majority of that, social media wasn't even around. And professionally, I think it sort of caught my imagination. So, I was a longtime resister of things like Facebook and any other social media whatsoever. And then when we started this business back in 2010, we had no clients, no candidates. And we needed to make sure we had a [inaudible 00:02:37]. and social media to me creates a great opportunity for us to stay connected. And look in our business, it's all about communication. There are only so many people you can speak to on a day by day basis.
Toby: But I very quickly realized that if you created a community, particularly via tools like LinkedIn, you could be speaking people all the time. And it became a bit of an obsession to learn about it and read from various experts like yourself and many others about just what you could do and how to do it. And it wasn't just about sort of talking about yourself or [inaudible 00:03:15] We're a recruitment business just talking about jobs all the time. It's about adding value to a community and helping people and looking at issues which they hadn't, given your thoughts on the subject. And then very quickly through Instagram, I realized it could be quite good fun as well. And the-
Michelle: I love your Instagram.
Toby: But you can just have a bit of fun and show a bit of personality. And from our social channels, from an employer branding perspective, if people can connect with you and see who and what you are, I think it can become pretty compelling to want to get involved in that. And that's the sort of psychology of social media, isn't it? People to look at it and say I want to be part of that business. I want to be a part of that tribe. And very quickly we realized that we could reach a lot more people more consistently by doing this sort of thing. [crosstalk 00:04:05] made sense. And then it became something which not only does it make sense commercially, there's also great fun and you can have some real genuine ROI off the back of it too.
Michelle: Talk to me a little bit about then, because I know that you are active on, you said their LinkedIn and indeed I see your Instagram. Because it is a little bit more playful and it's much more about behind the scenes. How do you feel, or is there a way that you manage that kind of personal life, professional life? Because there is a bit of your family on there as well as the professional. So how does that fit with you? What's your position around that? Because I know it's an area that some people say, oh I don't want to put my whole life onto social media. I don't want to be out there. So from a professional, personal perspective, how do you strike that balance?
Toby: One of the things I think I always prided myself on is to have a persona that's just who I am. So I don't see it necessarily, I don't come in and play a different role when I'm at work. I don't go in and play a different role when I'm at home. And I think the two of them are side by side. I'm not doing things for, when I'm putting stuff up about my family and my life and all that sort of thing. It's not that I want people to know about that per se, but I just wanted to have a stream of things there which I think are good fun and not overthink it. Just be where I am.
Toby: There's a difference between LinkedIn and Instagram and Twitter for example. On Twitter, we're sort of much more informative. On Instagram, both in the Harrington Starr and my personal accounts it's a little bit more fun and playful. And on LinkedIn it's more business. And I think you've got different strategies for each different social mechanism about how you want to get those messages across. But the Instagram pages is something that which is a great way of me communicating with the team and it's a great way communicate with my friends and great way of showing what we're about and what I'm passionate about. I think if people know what you're passionate about, they can relate to you and understand you little bit more as well.
Michelle: Absolutely. I think that's such a valid point about being the human being as a leader. Because as much as you are driving and leading that organization, like you say, you have this team of people that... You want them to know who you are. And it was interesting, actually. Just last week I gave a talk at the Engaged Employee Summit. And it was really, mine was all about the connected leader and the importance of that leader being connected.
Michelle: And there's such a big body of research that talks about that disconnect, where the team don't really know the leadership team. And they don't really know in many cases what they do. They know their titles, but they don't really know who they are or what they're doing. And yet they have to follow and be enthused by, and yet there's this huge, in reality, this huge kind of basic human disconnection between the leader and the employee. So do you feel that... For me, I think that social media gives leaders the opportunity to kind of walk the floor at scale. That's some of the things I talk about. These technologies allow you to have conversations that you wouldn't ordinarily be able to have conversations with because of geography or because you know of hierarchy. You just wouldn't ordinarily be able to do that and they allow you to do this at your fingertips.
Michelle: So how does that play out for you, Toby? Do you agree with that?
Toby: Yeah, I think there's two or three things about that. The first of which is difficult for leaders sometimes, because you hear it all the time, don't you? About I don't know what our leader did or they just sort of sat there reaping the rewards of our hard work. The way of showing what you're doing and how committed you are is a responsibility, to be perfectly honest. It's not about contriving that, but showing your commitment and your passion for your business and what do you do for a living is absolutely something which I think that you can do through social media and such like.
Toby: The second side of that is that we've got 20% of our sales team who are in America. And my way of communicating with them is quite often through social media. So it would be quite easy for them to be a business which is almost separate, running independently. And I can't speak to every single person out there every single day. But quite often I'll be chatting to the guys and be interacting over various bits and pieces with the guys to something we've seen on Instagram or something which I've posted, something they've posted, et cetera, et cetera. And it gets us...
Toby: When I go out there, which is four times a year, it's like they know me and I know them. And that's a massive win [inaudible 00:09:09] I know a little bit about what they have been doing. I'm able to talk about them and their lives, et cetera, et cetera, a little bit more. And on an international scale, it helps massively. On a domestic scale, I think it's all about being close. I love looking at leaders who are very entrenched in their team and their people and interested in people. And I like to think that's what I can be through that. When you know a little bit more about your team through those things. And social media, it allows you just to have that, I think, greater levels of connection sometimes. So absolutely, I think it is a positive product of it.
Michelle: Yeah. And it's interesting, isn't it? Because if we think about networking and these social networks, and if we think about networking, we often don't think about networking with our own teams. We often think about networking externally. Don't we for partners or you know, business development. But actually, it's just as important to be networking internally.
Toby: Oh 100%. And I think back to the company where, or a couple of companies where I worked where the CEOs or MDs of the business were these mythical creatures. They garnered some respect from what they've done. But there were people on the teams who were working with me who had zero interaction with them. I mean literally no relationship whatsoever. A walk through the office and a pat on the back and "How's your day? Yeah. How's your, mom or your dog, whatever it is." There's just no connection. It's completely independent. They wouldn't know who that person was. That person would only know them by reputation and a patron induction. I think that's difficult. I think it's a dangerous way of running a business. I think we're scaling all the time. We aren't hundreds and thousands of people yet.
Toby: But I always want to make sure that there's a connection where there is that human aspect and to be able to do it through social media is, I think, something that helps a lot as well. And we've spoken a number of times about some, I'll pronounce the surname wrong [inaudible 00:11:16]. And yeah, how he does it at the very extreme of everything, [crosstalk 00:11:22]. But you just see what it does and how customers are going over because of his brand and his personality. I think that's fascinating. I think it's a fascinating thing that there is that tribalism around a brand and a person in what is effectively quite a banal industry. And that, to me, becomes very interesting as well.
Michelle: Yeah. It is interesting. And what was also interesting is he only has to say something like, "Oh, I hope the induction goes well. He sees a new team member talking about, "Oh, I've got my induction training." And their mind is blown that the CEO is actually saying, "I hope your induction goes well." And you see then the threads of people saying, "Was that really John [inaudible 00:00:12:06]. Say, "Oh my goodness, did the CEO just say good luck on your induction?" Because it just ordinarily doesn't happen, yet that person is working for that person. It's a bit crazy, isn't it? So, well, let's get to the impact then, because you talked about ROI right at the outset here. How do you feel that communicating via social... You've talked about how useful it is for you and your teams and for you personally to be connected with your team and to have that interaction and to engage with them, so you are very much that connected leader and it's a human relationship and you know them. What about other positive aspects that it's having for your business?
Toby: The use of social media full stop, and how it's been beneficial?
Michelle: Yeah.
Toby: So for me, it's the cornerstone of everything that we do within the company. So if I look at our three main sets of people who we need to interact with, there's clients, there's candidates, and there's consultants as a recruitment business. So we need to constantly be growing and bringing people and attracting people into our business. You've got massive ROI off people knowing about our brand and wanting to join it because of what they're seeing. Be that awards, be that the culture we portray through social media, be that the conversation, the depth of marketing insight that we provide into the market place and seeing people. So again, as a brand that is known now, without our investment in social media, people wouldn't... We would probably be doing all right, but people wouldn't know about it. And because they know about it, they want to join it. And it's helped us double head count in the business over the last couple of years.
Toby: The second part of it is in the candidates and interacting with the community and building trust within the community off the back of that. Candidates are our products, effectively. And we need to make sure we're constantly finding new people who we can find jobs, because of the insight we were delivering through social media, people are investing and interacting with that, knowing the brand, liking the brand, and then trusting it. And getting involved in it off the back of it and then recommending other people off other things they see to say that you should be speaking to them if you're looking for a job. So it increases our stock, so to speak.
Toby: And the third part of it is our client base. And that's people who want to be working with us and we want to interact with. So by targeting that and involving them in various awards that we've done or listings that we've created or giving them access to provide content for our digital and physical magazines, interviewing them on our social media channels, on YouTube. I've got friends at Focus TV, et cetera, et cetera.
Toby: It's constantly looking at various different things that does it now. Clients that become skeptical of an industry with a poor reputation, which is what recruitment is. They start to see the fact that you're credible, that you're looking to help them. That you're investing in their business and helping them grow their brand. Then all of a sudden that skepticism goes to partnership. And when you're in partnership and you're able to become a trusted advisor to your customers, they'll do that. As someone who we haven't worked with before, who is finding yes, they are looking at some advice on the valuation of his business. Now I can give various bits and pieces, but I can also then introduce and he'll think he's done that because he's learned to trust our business through events and insight and magazines that's come through social media.
Toby: I know ultimately, as he was talking about yesterday as part of that investment brand of him moving a business from 30 to 60 people, we'll be in pole position to be looking after that growth of 30 [crosstalk 00:15:41]. ROI comes into it. So across all three of those channels, or those stakeholders, social media is a crucial part of our strategy from to growing in all parts of it.
Michelle: That's amazing. And so it is clearly a big part of what you do for not just growth, but also that retention and that getting people to know you, like you and trust you. I mean, you're very active, so there must be some kind of, this is the normal then, throughout the whole of the organization. Your team are encouraged clearly to be on these channels as well.
Toby: Definitely. And look, there'll be some people who are more comfortable with it than other people. Certain people will embrace it and do really well with it. There is a girl in the office, Kathy, who is superb with it and she goes through various iterations. She put herself out there very bravely, was doing regular videos, and took a bit of trolling at various stages from the usual idiots that are out there, braved through that. And by the end of her 18 months in the business, out of again, 40,000 agencies, she was voted the best newcomer, most inspiring newcomer to the industry. [crosstalk 00:16:55] last year. Predominantly because she was getting out there and giving a message and had a personality. She would be out in the city and people would come up to her and say, "Oh, you're that girl from LinkedIn."
Toby: And people in client base have seen that and know about her. And everyone I've been speaking to who are in the network know about her and think she's great at what she's doing. And that helps her from it. And other people will be prolific in various other areas and doing quite clever things and working out how you can do various different things to stand out and other people would be a little bit more traditional.
Toby: But look, I think in a business, if you want people to be doing this and if you want people to to see social content as an important part of the job, which it 100% is, that makes the job easier for them. Then they've got to see you invested in it at the same sort of stage. I can't sit there and say, "All right, everyone do this." And not be doing anything myself. You can't sit there and say, "Right, this is what you have to do." And have zero social presence. And if I'm there and being passionate about it and can spread that through to other people, then I think that can cascade further as well. And it becomes normal with the business and have people who are really trying new things and pushing the envelope and and succeeding off the back of that.
Michelle: Yeah, I mean 100% agree. And whilst we agree on that, Toby, there was a lot of research that I took to the talk that I did last week around not only the amount of disengagement, but the amount of, that leaders when they're not involved, the employees just won't get involved. And a lot of digital transformation that ironically is coming out of board rooms, fails due to the fact that the leaders just aren't really invested in it themselves. And so it's kind of, they're not actually using the tools to roll out those programs. They're not leading by example. And so therefore, you get this huge level of disengagement. And they put costs onto this. It was an Ernst and Young report and they put us some costs around, well, what does that cost an organization? It was like 80% of digital transformation fails. And they looked at what these front runners were doing. And the front runners, in 72% of cases, it was where the leaders were leading by example, extolling the benefits of digital technologies directly. And so it makes total sense, doesn't it? You've gotta be walking the talk.
Toby: I think it's fascinating, that. So it doesn't surprise me a little bit that statistics are that compelling. It's been a big change over the last 10-15 years. Right? So it doesn't surprise me that people in that position is still chasing it a little bit. Not everyone's going to be comfortable with doing this sort of stuff. I think embracing it. I heard this phrase a few years ago, which was talking about whether you had a digital strategy was the question a couple of years ago. I think it's moved from do you have a digital strategy, to making sure you have a strategy that is digital alongside it. I think it's that compelling at the moment. And I think in terms of complacency, there'll be some people who move backwards because of a lack of investment into that. The classic example, which everyone looks at, so I feel slightly unoriginal, is the failure to embrace it from Blockbusters through to Netflix's absolutely investment into that particular area.
Toby: My sister has been the editor of ASOS Magazine for a long time. And when you look at how ASOS has grown into the powerhouse that is, it was content and digital strategies that allowed people to invest in their business off the back of it. So well all the way you look at business in the moment, wherever you look at it in any industry, I think there's pioneers there who are understanding the power of social and the benefits it can give to you and your business.
Michelle: Yeah, 100%. And I think it'll be interesting. I'm going to ask you the question around what advice you would give to leaders that are feeling a little bit out of their depths with it all. Because like you say, there's a lot of people that do feel uncomfortable with it. And I think sometimes they feel uncomfortable with the idea of almost like external facing social networks. To be on Facebook, to be on Instagram, to be on Twitter, they don't feel comfortable with getting onto those channels. And maybe for some organizations where the sensitivities, privacy issues, that could be a very good reason for them not to be external facing. For me, I think it's almost inexcusable not to be internally using some form of social connected networks and connected communication. So that leader are networking with their own employees as such and really harvesting the greatness that goes on that often gets missed. So what would your advice be for somebody who's not quite there with it and feeling overwhelmed with the whole thing, what would you say?
Toby: I think overwhelmed usually comes through from overthinking, doesn't it? Whenever I think sort of stuff, people who have spent so much time worrying and thinking about stuff rather than just sort of just diving in. And I know it's a relatively simplistic way answering that. But by and large, when you overthink things, the problem becomes bigger. When you jump into something, you can learn on the job with it. I've read countless things. And your books are great, and there's other ones out there that talk through and it's not an overly complicated thing. And you can strategize and you can think about it a little bit more. But my view is just have a bit of fun with it and don't over worry about it too much.
Toby: People worry about what people think and then people worry about this, that and the other. What if someone says so. Whenever you're out there, there's going to be an idiot with an opinion and it doesn't mean their opinion's right. And it doesn't mean your opinion's right. Means it's just there. And there's been a couple of occasions where someone's had to look proper about something. My view is always to kill with kindness on that because it makes them look a massive idiot. Don't go down that... And you can just see how much you would annoy someone if you're-
Michelle: Graceful. Gracious.
Toby: Laugh these things off. Sp my take is, do you research and read the books. Read your books, read other books that are out there on the subject. There's plenty of them. Have a look at what people are doing. Have a look at what you like and admire about people who are out and doing stuff out in the marketplace at the moment. And take that and don't copy it, but start to think, okay, what could you do that would add add value to what's out there. How can you cherry pick the best of it and create it into yours? There's some things there that we've done taking off all sorts of things from all sorts of areas. The awards that we've done that have been massively fruitful for us, were inspired by LinkedIn. And they did a Most Socially Engaged... We did that. I liked the way they approached it all the way through. And I thought, right, that is something which we can do and build into our marketing strategy. There's various images that we've used that I've seen at various stages as well that have fun with some of that too. So there's lots of different things you can do and throwing yourself at it can be a bit of fun as well.
Michelle: Brilliant. So, before we round up with some quick fire, learn about the leader questions that you haven't seen. So I'm just going to by those at you in a minute, Toby. Finally, in our discussion, what would you say has been your biggest learning so far?
Toby: On the subject of...?
Speaker 3: All around social media and digital.
Speaker 3: Is there anything you wish you'd known at the outset that would have made life easier, simpler?
Toby: I just think it's evolving all the time. So I don't think there's something there which I would ever say this has been the massive revelation. I think the key to it is consistency. Absolutely. The biggest thing I've learned is you can't do something and then go missing for a little while. People notice it when you're there and you're consistently there. Amazon's the classic example for me. Amazon is the ultimate digital marketer. Every day, most people who've ever bought anything off them will have something in their inbox and you won't disengage with it. Because it's relevant all the time. They're putting stuff in front of you that is relevant to what you've done in the past. TESCO did it brilliantly with clubcard. Again, putting information that is relevant to you in front of you consistently.
Toby: And for me, if you can look at Amazon, you can look at Tesco club card, you can look at these various things and keep that consistency and think about what you're doing from a consumer basis, from a consumer standpoint. Look at people's problems and be delivering content that's useful to people and then put a bit of personality into it. That's the secret as far as I'm concerned, which isn't a revelation at all.
Speaker 3: Perfect. Love that. So I've got these three quick fire questions. Learn about the leader. So away from you, Toby, being the social CEO to actually being you. But I feel that you're all that anyway. So these are just questions that I'm going to fire at you and let's just see where we go with them. So they're quite big questions, but it's just, [crosstalk 00:26:35]. Yeah. We're not gonna get too deep with them, but we could. So if you could change one thing in the world, what would it be? Oh no.
Toby: I'm going to say the most immediate thing that came into [crosstalk 00:26:53]. And this is probably inspired by something I was reading this morning. And it'll probably make me sound pretty fuddy duddy about it. But there was an article in the Times today about Danielle Steele and her thoughts on the modern day workplace in it. And I think it was inspired by a trip she had to the Amazon, funnily enough, where there was a dog park on the roof. And then it talks about Ticketmaster with their slides and in the office. And she talks about her sons and they aren't working potentially as hard as she did, doing 20 hour days and working.
Toby: And like if I could have, I interview people every single day and have done for 20 years. And the thing I hear more than anything else is about how hardworking people are and how they're ready to commit and they want this and they're money hungry, et cetera, et cetera. But actually what I see is people who aren't at all and come in and expect a lot for very little. And if I could change one thing, this is not particularly gracious and I'm not talking about world peace or anything like that. If I could change one thing, it would just be to get people to understand that if you want to be successful at something, you've got to really work for it and to put a little bit of extra oomph into the workplace environment.
Michelle: Yeah. Okay. I think that's a fair point.
Toby: As it may be.
Michelle: Well, no, I like it. And what about books? Because I know you like to read. So which book have you read recently that's inspired you?
Toby: Cool. Look, there's loads that I read. I'm turning around as I'm speaking to you, looking at the bookshelf behind me. I'll obviously say yours because it was brilliant. But a book I read recently... I love the correlation between business and sport. And there's a book by a friend of mine, Damien Hughes, which looks at culture and how you provide standout cultures. And he wrote a book about Barcelona called The Barcelona Way. And he came into the office and he spoke to the whole company and made a big impact on the company about where it goes. So The Barcelona Way, unlocking the DNA of a winning culture is fascinating in terms of how effectively getting the right people into your business, having cultural architects instead of cultural assassins, and having a bunch of great people and having core values allows you to create a great environment. And it's so translatable into any business that you're working in. The lessons that got a team into the legacy it's become.
Michelle: Fantastic. So that's called The Barcelona Way?
Toby: The Barcelona Way by Damien Hughes. A really good read.
Michelle: Lovely. Fantastic. And last but definitely not least, what's the best piece of advice you have been given to date?
Toby: Yeah. So I've been lucky enough to be surrounded by some amazing people my whole life. And when we started the business up I had no experience of having started a company. I've worked in fairly large organizations, I've worked in startup organizations. But I hadn't done a lot of the things which we're going to do and I was very fortunate to have my father-in-law who invested in the business at the start of it, who's been in business for the best part of 50-60 years. And so I meet with him regularly and talk to him about it. And the best piece of advice he's ever given is obviously is the simplest bit of advice you'd ever hear, which is to make sure you've got more money coming in then you spend. However-
Michelle: But it's real, isn't it?
Toby: [crosstalk 00:30:35] ridiculous and obvious that seems. It's quite easy, particularly in this day and age. There are so many millionaires who've never actually been in profit. That I like to make sure we are a business that is grown with profitable growth. And I don't like to ever have a situation where I feel worried about the state of the business. So that's echoed through to make sure that yes, we're ambitious. Yes, we are a fast growth business, and yes we want to be super growth business, but I also don't want to mortgage the futures of everyone in this company off the back of ego or hubris or anything like that. And so that concept there that I always think about is let's make sure that we are responsible on the back of that and thinking of that very simple mantra in most things I'm doing.
Michelle: Love that. Absolutely brilliant. A gem for sure. So Toby, it's been wonderful to chat to you as ever and I have really enjoyed having you on the podcast, so thank you very much.
Toby: Always an absolute pleasure. Thanks very much for having me on.
Michelle: You've been listening to the Get Social Connected Leader Podcast. Thank you to my guest and indeed thank you to you for tuning in. Please do feel free to share the podcast with colleagues and friends who think will enjoy it and indeed subscribe to tune in for more episodes. You'll find the podcast on all the usual platforms. And all episodes are also on our website, carvillcreative.co.uk/podcasts. You'll also find some really useful digital and social resources on that site too, so be sure to check those out. So for now, from me, Michelle Carvill, your host on the podcast, thank you so much for tuning in and goodbye.
Michelle: Oh, PS. If you're a business leader with something to share around digital and social technologies, and you're keen to be a guest on the podcast, then I'd love to hear from you. You can email me michelle@carvillecreative.co.uk.