The ZIZO Effect

Culture, Challenges, and Change with Daniel Gebre

• ZIZO Technologies Inc. • Season 2 • Episode 1

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Welcome to Season 2 of The ZIZO Effect!
This season, we're diving into the diverse perspectives of agents, managers, and executives from call centers, exploring the unique insights and lessons they've gained.

Episode Overview:
In this episode, we chat with Daniel Gebre, an expert recruiter who shares his journey from working in a shoe store to managing a call center and eventually becoming a leader in recruitment. Danny discusses the challenges of building and maintaining a strong workplace culture, adapting leadership styles as companies grow, and the importance of mental health in today's work environment.

Discover how startups can balance work-from-home flexibility with in-office collaboration, and learn actionable strategies to boost team engagement, improve employee retention, and foster a positive company culture. If you're curious about workplace dynamics, this conversation is packed with valuable insights and real-life stories.

Timestamps:

  • 0:00 - Workplace Culture Insights and Impact
  • 8:03 - Culture in Growing Companies
  • 22:09 - Generational Differences and Remote Work Benefits
  • 30:38 - Workplace Mental Health and Culture Fit
  • 39:42 - Employee Well-being and Workplace Benefits
  • 45:58 - Team Cohesion in Remote Work Settings
  • 51:48 - Corporate Culture and Employee Engagement


Guest Information:
Daniel Gebre - Expert Recruiter and CEO at HAKENYA. Connect with Danny on LinkedIn.

Engage with Us:
Don’t forget to subscribe, like, and comment to join the conversation. Check out our other episodes and follow us on our social media pages:


Don't miss this engaging episode filled with humor, expert advice, and practical takeaways. Tune in now to The ZIZO Effect - It's Game Time!

Andrew J. Reimers:

Welcome back to the ZIZO Effect podcast. Season two is all about perspectives. We'll be exploring the minds of agents, managers and executives from call centers to hear their unique insights and experiences. This season we're uncovering the stories that shape their work and the valuable lessons they've learned. Today we have Danny Geb, an expert recruiter, who's here to share his journey and the insights he's gained along the way. It's an engaging conversation that you won't want to miss. Get ready, it's game time.

Jimmy Chebat:

Welcome to the ZIZO Effect podcast.

Andrew J. Reimers:

My name is Jimmy Chebat founder and CEO of ZIZO Technologies and co-host of the ZIZO Effect podcast, and I'm Andrew J. Reimers, also co-host of the ZIZO Effect podcast and Director of customer success here at ZIZO.

Jimmy Chebat:

And today we have our guest, our wonderful esteemed guest, Daniel Gebre. Daniel, welcome to The ZIZO Effect podcast, thank you. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. I know that you and I have a very long history together, but before we get started into our podcast, why don't you tell our audience a little bit about yourself?

Daniel Gebre:

yeah, sure. So I am from Rochester, New York. I was born and raised there, moved to Buffalo, which is where I met you. I moved here for college, lived in Buffalo for a few years and then eventually moved to New York City. I've been in New York City for almost 10 years now. I'm recently married.

Jimmy Chebat:

I was at your wedding. It was a great wedding in Puerto Rico. We had a lot of fun there pre-wedding, Yep and a good group of people and of course I know we also did the bachelor party in Miami we did.

Jimmy Chebat:

We did A lot of fun Probably something we can't really talk about. You're buying this bad out. Yeah, we don't know if Shai's going to be watching this later on. Tell us a little bit about your history, and you had mentioned you moved to Buffalo. Yep, you came to work for one of my organizations, one of my call centers, but you've been working with Titus for a lot longer, and Titus, for people who don't know, titus is my brother-in-law and I've known him since. We've been best friends since we were 12, 13 years old. He's married to my sister and we started working together in 2010. And those types of relationships don't last that long very often so. But you also have a very long relationship with Titus. He was he was the master of ceremony, not master of ceremonies. What would you call him? The?

Daniel Gebre:

the priest efficient right, yeah, at your wedding efficient at my wedding.

Jimmy Chebat:

So tell us a little bit about that history and into your work, history yeah, so I met.

Daniel Gebre:

Titus was my first boss in high school. I worked at a shoe store. I was 16 years old. He was my boss. We didn't talk for like two months when he first started. Sounds about right. Yeah, it's very, very fitting. Yeah, we worked at a shoe store together through high school into college. When I moved to Buffalo they opened up a new store. He recruited me to be his assistant manager. So I transferred colleges, came to Buff State. We worked together, you know, for years. He got recruited by you to work at your organization. Titus recruited me to come join you and now I'm a recruiter.

Daniel Gebre:

So clearly I've learned something through this process, so you came in 2010.

Jimmy Chebat:

Yep, and initially you started as an agent yes, got promoted too, but the journey, the path, was that you were going to be the manager Yep, and then, along the lines as we grew, you became a director of operations 2010,. When did you leave? Remind me when you left, how long were you with the organization? For Four years. I'm going to say around four years. I can't recall the exact date. I think it was like four years, but I think it was 2014, 2015,. Somewhere around there, possibly. And from there you went and you went right into recruiting.

Daniel Gebre:

Yeah, for the most part. I mean, we're going to get super detailed. I was dating someone else, moved to Philadelphia, that's right. Philly was your first, yeah, so I was in Philly for about a year. And then I moved to New York. What were you doing in?

Daniel Gebre:

What were you doing in Philly? I worked at a trampoline park.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Oh, I know, I just wanted you to say it out loud. Yeah, yeah.

Daniel Gebre:

So that's you know, love is a crazy thing and, spoiler alert, that is not my wife now. It did not work out, but, yeah, I moved to Philly. After Philly we broke up, I moved to New York, got into recruitment and I've been in recruitment since. Similar story right Started as an individual contributor working for like a huge company, moved to a different organization, different industry, within recruitment smaller UK based company. From there I got recruited to recruit recruiters and I built out the US presence for a UK based company and then, about two and a half years ago, I quit to start my own company.

Jimmy Chebat:

Yeah, doing the same thing, pretty much so, from a recruiting standpoint. You recruited tech right Medical.

Daniel Gebre:

I've done tech recruitment, life science like pharma, biotech, and now recruiting recruiters.

Jimmy Chebat:

So in your recruiting have you had to learn a little bit, kind of from an HR perspective, about the needs of the organization, some of their culture fits and things like that or are you just looking for the best qualified candidate based on their resume and their experiences?

Daniel Gebre:

No, that's a good question. It's definitely a culture-based thing, because the clients that I work with are either startups usually like VC-backed startups or small boutique agencies, right Like. I don't have a client, that is, you know, thousands of people. Like it's very niche, very small. A lot of them are growing, so like the culture is super important because they're literally creating something out of nothing.

Jimmy Chebat:

You know it's a. It's a good segue into one of our topics here, which is culture, and we'd love to get your definition of what you think culture is and how it's created.

Daniel Gebre:

Culture is the heartbeat of the organization, it's how the organization runs, it's how they operate, it's what they believe in and the culture generally starts from the top right and that's ZIZO You know, with my business, I'm very specific with who I work with. I you know, right or wrong, I will not work with a business unless I have access to the decision maker, the founder, the CEO, whoever, because with small organizations the vision is coming from that person. So unless I can work with that person, understand what they're trying to create, then I'm just sending out resumes and just guessing, which is not the type of recruitment that I want to do, and it's not why I started this company, yeah, and you've done some recruiting for us as well, and you know, you understand, you've been around in our organization from 2010.

Jimmy Chebat:

So you know almost a decade and a half now. How would you define the culture that you, that we procured here in our organization and which I think we've extended into Zyzzo? I don't think we've changed much in what we think and believe and want our the culture that we want to foster.

Daniel Gebre:

The culture here is you know, it's a very typical startup culture, right. It's very collaborative. Everyone kind of rolls up their sleeves. You have like ownership in things and things tend to move fast, right. Like if you have an idea, you just run, you move with it, like you attack right away, which is the draw for me with startups and like growing companies. Like there's not a lot of red tape, you don't have to wait around and get approval. You just have an idea, have a vision and you just run with it.

Jimmy Chebat:

We work primarily with call centers Yep, usually larger. We do have smaller clients and we see that same thought process and also decision making is much faster with smaller companies. What do you think changes as companies grow and evolve and how do you think that impacts culture?

Daniel Gebre:

That's a really good question because it's tough to do anything at scale and there's like the law of like diminishing returns right, Good at a certain point, at a certain, because it's very tough to say this works for this person but it doesn't work for that person. So when you're at scale, you lose that individual touch, the ability to really dive in on each individual person and what's important to them.

Jimmy Chebat:

So that reminds me of a section of one of the books that was mandatory reading when you were part of our organization, good to Great, by Jim Collins, of a matrix that they had. And we have the book coincidentally here, which let me see if I can find it which talks about that difference between a skilled, enterprise-sized company and then smaller startups or entrepreneurship. So in the book Good to Great he's got a matrix which is called the Good to Great Matrix of Creative Discipline, and on the bottom axis it talks about the ethic of entrepreneurship, low to high, and on the up and down matrix is a culture of discipline, and then low to high, where you know where you have low entrepreneurship and low discipline, it's a bureaucratic organization. I would compare that to, maybe government right, where you have a low or a high ethic of entrepreneurship but low culture of discipline is the startup organization which you just mentioned. You can pivot, you know there's not a lot of processes, policies in place already, and where you have high, uh, discipline but low entrepreneurship.

Jimmy Chebat:

That's a hierarchical organization. You know, I would put banks in that category. They're very disciplined, they're very conservative, a lot of regulations, so they have to ensure of that. But the great organization is where you get the combination of both Discipline and then entrepreneurship Culture. We talked about how it's a lot easier to really establish culture early on in the startup process, but as you scale it gets more difficult to maintain and manage. You've been in a call center. You've been in a smaller call center where you have been able to maintain it, so can you speculate like what are some of the things that start to fail from your perspective and your experience understanding other people's organizations that as it scales, and especially in high turnover industries, I think the hiring method is completely different.

Daniel Gebre:

Right, if you have a high turnover industry, you are expecting attrition, you are expecting people to leave. So your hiring methods are different. You will take more risks on people, you will expect people to leave. You will, you know, not qualify people as quickly because, like that is built into your plan, whereas if it's a lower attrition thing, you'll be more strategic with the hiring process. It might be a longer process, it might be, you know, higher pay. So I think your thought process changes completely based on the industry you're in and it's. I don't want to say you get what you put into it. But to some extent there, if you have lower expectations because of the industry you're in, like you're going to be okay with, like that churn, Well, I wanted to take you back in time.

Andrew J. Reimers:

The year was 2011. As you stated, titus was going around recruiting people for these new call centers and I was one of those people. And Jimmy, you're opening up across the street smaller agency and we were to your point. People were specifically picked based on personal relationships, of course, but the quality of their intellect, their motivation, their work ethic, and I was proud to be a part of that. So, myself, brittany, rj, levon, all those people. When we came in and started that and you were running things, man, you were literally on an island in the middle looking down on all of us.

Andrew J. Reimers:

We did do a raised island yes.

Andrew J. Reimers:

And it was amazing because the job was collections. It was hard. It was. We talk about all the time the different style of KPIs. Of course, in collections, your ultimate goal make money, but how do you make that money? The behavioral KPIs, the effort KPIs, all of those.

Andrew J. Reimers:

And the thing that I was really impressed with when we first started was the culture in there, because we knew that we were selected for a reason. We were all in it together and we wanted the company to succeed. And one of my issues became uh, as we grew, that culture completely went away. And I think you bring up a really good point because, of course, we got to make more money. That that's why you're in it. You know we, we talk about it all the time. No one's doing collections for the love of the game. It just doesn't exist, you know, but that was one of the reasons I left. I was burnt out from just. You know, there was a lot of negativity coming from the people, the people that I was talking to. I'm curious, from your perspective, what were the biggest challenges in trying to maintain that culture as the company grew, or did it even cross your mind?

Daniel Gebre:

It definitely crossed my mind because, to your point, I was super proud of it, right, I thought when we first built that office we all enjoyed each other, like we had like a real common goal to just be successful. And there's, there's the balance, as you progress in your career, between growing and scaling and maintaining that culture, which is very, very tough to do, which is why you see it and you hear it all the time the company's not what it used to be. Every single company will say that. And it's a very tough balance because in order to keep that culture, you have to be specific, you have to take your time, but there's the, you know, director executive approach where it's like we need to scale, we need to grow.

Daniel Gebre:

So finding that balance, I wish I had the answer. I just I really don't have it. It's very tough to do and that's why I think in my role now, I stick with, like, startups and smaller companies, because that's where I'm comfortable. You know, there is more of that hunger, that passion, which I appreciate. But it's to your point, it's something that I thought about. It's something I try to balance consistently, but it's very, very tough to have both.

Jimmy Chebat:

Yeah, I don't think we're going to solve the problem here, but would love to get you know a recommendation from you, and you know you have the experience being part of, as you put it, a startup that grew and had to scale and started to kind of lose some of its original feel, that nostalgicness, right, that people always kind of crave hey, can we go back to the way it was? And it's hard, it's difficult, it's impossible. Um, would you, would you say that investing in the beginning when you hire people and you put it hey, when you've got a large company and you expect churn, you're gonna, you're not gonna invest as much because you just can't afford it. You're just going to increase the cost of a new hire. Yeah, because of the training and the. But how much should be invested in developing the cultural aspect of it? Is it something that you can train and coach and mentor, or is it something embedded in the personality in the person you hire?

Daniel Gebre:

I think it's both. I think, from a leadership perspective, it has to be driven home every single time, and you have to look for that in the people that you hire. But it just has to be a consistent message, right, and that's where I think leadership is really important. Because if you have a leader that drives that point home over and over again and that's all they're talking about everyone else is going to understand. This is how this works, this is how this company operates. So you have to find it in the people, but it definitely comes from the leadership and just instilling that over and over and over again.

Jimmy Chebat:

Perfect transition Leadership. It's one of our topics that we want to get to. In terms of what good leadership is. What do you define as good leadership? I think you answered some of it just now, but what would you define as good?

Daniel Gebre:

leadership. Consistency is probably the most important thing In a leadership position. Right, all eyes are on you. You are setting the tone, you're driving the direction. Things get really bad, things get really good and people are leaning on you. People are looking at you for that stability, that direction. So I think a consistent message, a consistent approach you know, having a model where people are like this is what we're getting every single time is super important from a leadership perspective.

Jimmy Chebat:

Can you share an example of somebody that is in the past, thats been one of your leaders, that has exemplified good leadership?

Daniel Gebre:

This is where I please so, Jimmy Chebat. He makes us read this book all the time. What?

Daniel Gebre:

that book right there? What that book right now? No, I think a lot, of a lot of people you know throughout my career have have established that presence and that like consistency. Um, you obviously were one of them. You have a vision. You've always had a vision. You've always thought bigger than most people can imagine. But that's that's what you need in a leader. You need someone to look at something that you don't think is possible and drive that point home and get people to believe it. I've got a client now. A really good client of mine has a recruitment company. He has three locations across Europe and the US. He interviews every single person that joins his organization. He makes it very clear whether you are a recruiter, director, sourcer. He drives that point home immediately, like culture is important, this is what I expect, and he sets that tone right away and he's super busy, but he prioritizes that and I think with leadership, if you set that tone, if you make it important, then everyone else is going to follow suit.

Jimmy Chebat:

That's a really good point, and no, I wasn't thinking about myself. I mean, titus probably played a more direct role in leadership with you and you know one of the things that you know you had said earlier that you know. I would say that one of Titus' greatest values is his consistency. He doesn't change whether you like it or not. He is who he is and I do believe he's grown a little bit more empathetic over the years, and it's not in his DNA and it's not forced either. I think genuinely he does care, but I think he's just built to just not show anything.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Yeah, I would agree. You mentioned earlier starting to work with Titus I as well, because we're just one big family. I met Titus when I was 17 years old my first full-time job coming out of high school at a record store and same thing he didn't talk to me for weeks and we had a stereo where we'd play music. It was a record store, we'd play music and we had CDs and I would go put something in that I wanted to listen to and play for an hour or so and he would just look at me, look down, walk by me, walk over and take the CD out of the CD player and put in whatever he wanted. And yeah, he's consistent, that's for sure. Yeah, he's consistent, that's for sure.

Andrew J. Reimers:

But I wanted to transition over and again to go back to you know where we were in that call center. Because, believe it or not, I look back really fondly on those years. Surprisingly there's there's so much that I was able to do in my life because of that job. It was the first time I felt like I was doing something professional, I was doing something important, having that that startup feel, not just being another number, another spoke on the wheel, but really feeling like I was making a difference, but one thing is for sure when it comes to call centers is it is full of personalities. For better or worse, they're different, and it isn't a one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to leadership. So that being said, danny, I'm curious your opinion, whether you want to take from that experience or anything you've learned since then. How do you balance different management styles to fit individual needs?

Daniel Gebre:

It's a great question, and I always hate when people say I have one management style because that just doesn't work right. As a manager, your job is to get the most out of each individual person, and the key to that is individual person, like when we work together. Right, I don't want to say their name, but there was someone that literally retired. It was a Friday, they clocked out and they just never worked like they were at an age where they were retired like, can I say it, you?

Andrew J. Reimers:

know what was what.

Daniel Gebre:

MGM. No, perry, oh okay, like the man retired, right? So talking to him he was. He was older than both of my parents substantially. So the way I'm going to motivate him is going to be way different than the way I would motivate you, right? So you have to take it upon yourself to understand each individual, figure out what gets them to tick. Some people are motivated by competition, some people are motivated by competition, some people are motivated by positive reinforcement. Either way, you have to figure out what each individual needs and cater your management style towards that. I think that is critical.

Jimmy Chebat:

It's very difficult to find somebody who can do that and be consistent, because you have to be somewhat flexible in your capabilities but again, treat everybody equally. So difficult challenge there. I want to shift slightly. There's a topic that isn't on our topic list here but would love to get your take on it. Generationally speaking, there's a new generation entering the workforce today.

Jimmy Chebat:

you know gen z and we love them we, we do love them, we promote them all the time, we're advocates for them. It may come off as sounding critical, but they are unique and they are quite different. Uh, I'm in gen x. They're millennial. Um, you're kind of closer to the cusp there, right, well, I'm 36, so I don't know what that. Yeah, you're a millennial. You're a millennial for sure.

Jimmy Chebat:

Gen z is different. You know, it's the first generation born into technology. Like, when you were born, you weren't given an ipad, you know, and learning an ipad. But they were., amongst other technological advances, uh, shifts, just overall, play, right, we used to to kind of put together our own teams and you know we would stay out until all hours of the night. We just had to be on the block, you know, once those streetlights turned on. Modern generation they're networked, their video games are networked, so they're sitting, they're networked. Their their video games are networked, so they're sitting at home on by themselves, although they might be, you know, working or playing with their friends, they're not outside as much anymore. How that transitioned into work. Do you see a difference? And I don't know if you're working or recruiting Gen Zers, but do you see a difference in from a yes?

Daniel Gebre:

100% with every single generation. It's not necessarily a bad thing. I think the issue is being able to evolve and being able to change. A lot of my clients will use work from home, for example. Some people are just super against it we don't want to work from home this and Some people are just super against it we don't want to work from home this and that.

Daniel Gebre:

But the reality of it is like you have to adapt to the way the world is now, what needs people have, what demands they have. So there definitely is a difference, just like there is individuals, like there's very big generational gaps and the clients I work with you know the CEOs, the founders, they are. You know your generation, right, and then the people that I'm finding are typically Gen Z, millennials, like. So finding that balance and figuring out what makes sense and being able to evolve and grow and change what you're doing is super important Because, again, you have to motivate your staff, you have to get them interested in it. So I always hear like oh, this generation's lazy this, that Are they lazy or are we not adapting to their current needs?

Jimmy Chebat:

Great point. Great point. And you mentioned work from home and you know there's a lot more of that. Obviously, post-covid normalized working from home. Everybody had to work from home. A lot of companies decided, hey, this is great. I think early on it was some of the most productive years in some of the organizations. And then you know that productive productivity started to tail off and then now we've kind of climbed completely out of that. But work from home has become one of those benefits or requests from people. Where do you see a lot of people like where are the demands to work from home coming from? Is it the employee or the employers?

Daniel Gebre:

It's definitely the employees, it's always the employees and it's different people, different stages. Like there are some candidates I speak to, they want to work from home because, like I live in New York City, the commute sucks, like it's it's a lot and if you can get an hour and a half, two hours back in your day when you have, you know, a young kid or this or that, it makes sense. There are some that just have only known work from home right, they got into the workforce 2020, so they don't know the nuances of being in the office. You know learning from other people. So I definitely hear more of the request from employees and it's for different reasons that are better, always valid. I think you don't work with large companies.

Jimmy Chebat:

You work with primarily startups and you know, of course, if there's a focus on culture and experience. You know yourself. By restricting the search geographically, do you find that people are opening that geographic restriction because of the work-from-home option, or do you feel like more and more people are first starting their search locally to try to find that fit so they can bring them into office, even if it is in a hybrid fashion where it's one or two or three times a day or per week, as opposed to full work from home.

Daniel Gebre:

It definitely depends on the client. Most of my clients are in bigger cities right, new York, la so in those big metropolitan areas it's a little bit easier because you have a bigger pool. But there are some clients that are specifically targeting work from home because they know it opens up a bigger pool right like as big as new york is. There's eight million people you can pick from. But if you open it up to the US there's 300 million people and financially you might be able to find someone just as good who lives in a cheaper cost of living place Buffalo, buffalo, right.

Jimmy Chebat:

It is definitely a smaller cost of living but a much smaller pool of talent. Of course. I think when we work with you we always try to hey, can you find somebody here in Buffalo? Because we do value the in-person experience and we feel that productivity is definitely increased when we have people in office. But that search always turns to like hey guys, I can't find people. Can you extend your search? And we've tried it right. And so it's very difficult as an employer trying to find the right people in your city, in your geographic location where they can come into office, switching gears. But similarly home, distractions, right, Distractions, disengagement. Of course when you're working from home there are more opportunities for distraction. Talk to us a little bit about your experiences you know you work from home, right, but also your viewpoint on distractions working from home and does that lead to disengagement? And then we'll get into kind of what disengagement means for you.

Daniel Gebre:

My experience working from home is great, but I have to work hard because if I don't like, it's over, so you work for you. Yeah, it's, it's different for me. I would say that we're very early on in the work from home era. Like it's it's only really been four years that I think personally it's just too much of a contrast and we haven't found a middle ground right. Like work from home alleviated a commute and travel time and being away from your family and not being able to do like laundry or little things that like will not cut into work, like water cooler talk would. Like water cooler talk would.

Daniel Gebre:

But there's too much of a contrast, I think, because it's so early on that people haven't really invested into common ground. Like we can work from home. But why don't we spend a lot more time on recruiter, communicate more often or set up specific, just culture building moments in the calendar? So I think work from home has a ton of potential to alleviate a lot of the benefits of it, but it is early on that it's very black and white now, where there is some nuance and some gray that could be beneficial for both employers and employees.

Andrew J. Reimers:

To that point because we did touch on culture a little bit earlier and, of course, smaller companies, startups, and it's easier to maintain that culture. But I am curious from your experience, especially now as a recruiter experience, especially now as a recruiter, do you have any advice or could you sort of talk about some of the strategies that you've seen companies implement in the work from home era that helps to maintain the team cohesion and morale remotely?

Daniel Gebre:

Yeah, I've got. I think there's always going to be an element of being in person. That's, that's important, right? Like I meet people in person and they're like, oh, I thought you were taller, I thought you were shorter. Like there is, there's just these subtle little things that are important.

Andrew J. Reimers:

It's the first thing I said to one of our salespeople when I met him in Austin. I'm like oh, you're taller than I thought you were.

Daniel Gebre:

Oh, yeah, like just these little things that like are lost behind the screen and I think finding a little bit of that and implementing into your system is super important.

Daniel Gebre:

Like I've got clients that are fully remote but every I don't know quarter every other month they will fly everyone into the same location and just work together right For a week, a couple of days, because you don't need to see someone every single day to build that culture, build that camaraderie, and it is nice to look forward to seeing someone spending time with them. And, like I've seen businesses ride that momentum for a while and it doesn't get old. It's like they get excited to like work together and they look forward to it. So I think the companies that I've worked with that do it the best are like we are work from home 95% of the time but we are going to be deliberate and intentional about spending time together, flying everyone to New York, going to a Yankees game, doing this, doing that. So I think you can do both, but you just have to try, you have to be creative, you have to be thoughtful and make it a mission of yours to implement that.

Jimmy Chebat:

I am going to echo your point there. I work with an advisory board and one of my advisors, a very intelligent and experienced individual, said the same thing. He said look, if you're remote, you have to have that personal time together. Unfortunately for us, we have a team that's in Ukraine that can't leave the country, and, of course, we can't go into a war-ridden country ourselves. But it is something that he had said. You have to be intentional, you have to be deliberate with your agenda when you go there. It's not just hey, let's all see each other in person. It's we're gonna do these team-building exercises, we're gonna work on these projects, we're going to brainstorm, you know, have brainstorm sessions about all of these different things and maybe set the goals for the next quarter and such. So I completely agree with that. I think that's very insightful of you with respect to how to bridge that gap, because you're also very right we are very early.

Jimmy Chebat:

I don't think it's going away. People are fighting it. I think employers are fighting it from one direction and employees are fighting it from the other, and there has got to be a middle ground, because there are benefits for both parties by doing it that way, going back to distractions and disengagement, or engagement quickly, how do you define engagement in an organization Like workplace? Engagement is such a huge buzzword and everybody's talking about increasing engagement increasing engagement, including ourselves but just want to see from your perspective. What do you consider engagement in the workplace?

Daniel Gebre:

Caring, having a vested interest in what's happening, asking questions, being inquisitive, like taking ownership in the process, the product, like the organization.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Love that yeah, caring beyond the paycheck.

Jimmy Chebat:

Yeah, you know. Yeah, how do you, as an employer, how do you get people to engage, be engaged more?

Daniel Gebre:

I think you have to have ZIZO open conversation, right, like to Andy's point, when we worked together, it was what do you guys think when it was small, like that core is like what do you guys think Should we do this, should we do that? So really opening the dialogue and having people, you know, kind of voice their opinion and share what they think, as opposed to we're doing this. Right, if people feel like they're invested, they were a part of the process and their input was taken seriously, then they're going to care more. But if it's just like do this or else and you don't explain the thought process, the rationale and really paint the big picture which you didn't really ask this but I think that is the problem with a lot of organizations is bridging the gap between what the individual contributor wants and thinks is important versus what the business owner is looking for and their different viewpoints.

Jimmy Chebat:

Yeah, I mean. What does this stand for? You know, everyone knows it's zoom in, zoom out.

Daniel Gebre:

What do you mean?

Jimmy Chebat:

and that that's the point that you just made. It's different perspectives, right, when you're zoomed out, you're above the forest and you're in the clouds you see things much differently. I always use the analogy and I also bring it up on screen Google Maps, right, as you say, I got to get from point A to point B and there's a line that's going, let's just say, from Buffalo to New York. You can see the roads that are taken, but you don't know those individual details that are happening, and when you're all the way zoomed in, you have no idea what your target destination is.

Jimmy Chebat:

And I agree with you I we've done that where we have kind of a state of the organization meetings where we say here's what's happening, ZIZO what's going on, here's what we're dealing with, here are the ZIZO goals or objectives. Let me remind you of our core values and our vision and our mission statements, and I get a lot of feedback that come out of it. Like you know what, I didn't understand that, now that I, I feel more invested, and so I think you're right to the point of hey, you don't always have to necessarily ask for what do you guys think or what do you guys want, although asking those questions and saying those things are important to feeling, because not everybody's going to have an answer for you. Anyways, right, they're not going to say, well, here's what we want, and here's what you need to do, and here's. There might be some people like that, but just the asking of that question, I think, is critical it is the difference between telling somebody the what without including the why.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Yeah, and that is, you know, when it comes to team engagement, that's huge. But even when it comes to talking to people about ZIZO, you know, we can show them. Well, here's everything that ZIZO does. But in order for them to really buy into what we're doing, they need to understand the background, the history and the philosophy and the psychology and the why we do it. We don't just do it because it looks fun. There's a reason behind everything that we do, and that's as important. And same thing when you're talking working with people yeah.

Jimmy Chebat:

We have a very important topic that we want to make sure that we address. That's becoming more relevant in the workplace, and not just the workplace but in the entire world. But there's a place for it in the workplace mental health Right. Where does mental health come into play? You know, take all of your experiences. Maybe you know more current because, of course, it's become more mainstream now and discussed than it has ever in the past. But what is your perspective on mental health in the workplace and the roles and responsibility of the employers as part of incorporating mental health in their management styles?

Daniel Gebre:

I would argue that a lot of mental health issues come from the workplace. So I think it's super important to incorporate it, and I've got clients that they have like mental health days, they offer counseling, like they. They are so bought into it that you start to realize like these perks and the overall care and well-being of these individuals outweighs a lot of money, right. Like I've got clients that may not pay top dollar but they have amazing maternity and paternity, they have mental health days. They have like all-encompassing packages that are not just financial. That tells the employees we care about you, like we want you to succeed, and they're willing to take less because they know that if I'm going to spend, you know, a third of my time here, like they're going to care about me, they're going to look out for me. So I think it's like you really see the difference between companies that can attract the best talent and companies that are just going to go through a ton of attrition.

Jimmy Chebat:

From what you just mentioned, it seemed to be more of a global policy in organizations where some may take it and individualize it where it's not like, hey, there's a policy, there's a benefit, there's this program that is available to everybody, but it's still embedded in their culture, where somebody needs a mental health day and you know that they are given and afforded that privilege or that right to take a day and seek help. And whether the help is offered or just the time given to go seek their own help, Do you feel like it's something that should be standardized within the organization and broadcast and promoted for everybody? Or where's that?

Daniel Gebre:

balance. I mean, mental health is obviously a very serious topic and a lot of times, people run into issues because they don't feel like they can express themselves or they can talk about it. So I think it's super important to broadcast it, to say like this is what our organization believes in, this is how we will support you, because it allows the employees to feel like I do have a voice, they do care about me, like this is a safe space and that's ultimately what you want to create in your environment.

Jimmy Chebat:

Yeah, I mean, I come from a generation where I was raised by hey, deal with it, right, don't cry, deal with it. And I think, as as we evolve as a society, as humans, you know you, we're starting to become more and more empathetic. You know, some will argue, especially my generation and older. Like hey, stop being babies, Like you're babying people and you're enabling them to, you know, ask and take more. But I do feel like, just with everything else, there's a balance, right? I always teach my kids everything in moderation. You can't overdo one thing or the other. You have to find that balance.

Jimmy Chebat:

I do want to move on to one of our final topics and you had just mentioned it in terms of your compensation packages. It's not always about pay that. Sometimes the package includes benefits like mental health days, like paternity leave and maternity leave, health days like paternity leave and maternity leave. Where do you think the balance is and what do you think is more important in today's age? Compensation? I'm going to include benefits, because you mentioned that. But we talk about incentives, right, and incentives could be looked at in a multitude of ways. You were looking at Zyzo, potentially, as you are thinking about expanding and growing your company and building that incentive program in there. What is number one? Can you describe the difference from your perspective, the difference between compensation and incentives?

Daniel Gebre:

compensation, I think, is more more of like a flat setup, like a flat number, like it's more set in stone, whereas incentives incentives will vary by the person, by the individual, especially when it comes to like bonuses, like it's usually directly tied to effort or output results. So there's definitely a lot more creativity and opportunity when it comes to incentives, whereas compensation is generally just standard across the board, for the most part More contractual, yeah.

Andrew J. Reimers:

I mean, look at football. I always think of football players as they get older in their career and they're looking to get on a team and while they might value themselves at a certain number and say I deserve 20 million dollars a year and the team's going to look and be like we'll give you five, but if you rush for 1250 yards, or if you have 17 sacks, or if you show up to practice every day, there's an incentive. Uh, it is really interesting and I think a lot of people are still motivated by that. Uh, we see it all the time. You, you know where, if you're willing to go, okay, no, that's fair, it is performance-based.

Andrew J. Reimers:

But we had a conversation with an agent of ours who actually was really surprised by his answer when we asked him the same question about you know, how do you view compensation versus incentives? And he was actually incentivized by his paycheck, which sort of threw us around. We were like there's no wrong answers on this podcast. But we're like, oh, okay, we weren't really expecting that. And then, when we talked more about it because he does use the ZIZO platform and we asked him flat out are you incentivized to push a little bit harder at your job to earn Z bucks and he was like, well, yeah, of course you know, but some people are incentivized just by their paycheck and that, I think, is directly related to, maybe, that culture and how they feel within the organization where, hey, I'm here to get my check, you know? That's cool. I'm going to do exactly what I need to do to not get fired and that's all I need.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Where other people, who I'll bring you back to 2011, 2012, 2013 collections. I am not going to lie, I resented you a lot. It wasn't anything.

Jimmy Chebat:

It's all coming out now Nice.

Andrew J. Reimers:

And it wasn't anything with you personally, but because we were a small organization and I knew what I was capable of, but I could see there was no path for me to move up anywhere. So I had to work harder to prove my worth. But then you guys started incentivizing me where, okay, I win this contest, I can win an iPad next month. Okay, top of the office, all right, I want another iPad and I sold it. But whatever, I used that money and you know I had to be incentivized to continue to do the very best because, left to my own devices, I was just aggravated because I'm like why am I coming in here working so hard every day and there's no path for growth? So I needed that personally, but not everybody is motivated that way.

Jimmy Chebat:

Yeah, and some of the again incentives is part of compensation. I want to make sure that we clearly define that. Commissions are contractual right. Incentives. From my perspective, in the way I'm looking at things, is something above and beyond. It's not demanded, it can't be, it's a luxury, it's a nice to have, not a need to have. You are looking at ZIZO potentially and trying to build that into your growth model. Do you have a commission-based model that ties into compensation? And then were you looking to enhance that as well with an incentive-based model to just drive competition, and what was the reason why you were looking at ZIZO?

Daniel Gebre:

I've always had the thought that this will be a fully remote organization, right Like I think that's where the future is. I might as well just prepare myself for it. So I think for me I wanted to provide as many different avenues for employees as possible to find their motivation right. To like Andy's point, he was like this wasn't motivating me, but this was so for me if I can find as many different avenues to motivate people and figure out back to the individualism right, figure out what motivates you versus you or whatever. So for me it was just very important to add as many layers to hopefully get the best out of everyone.

Jimmy Chebat:

That's a great point More tools in your tool belt to account for all the different types of personalities and motivators Exactly Great point. One of the things and I know that you're a big part of the evolution of whiteboard to what turns into ZIZO, and I recognize that because you were very invested in how the whiteboard, the whiteboard helped you manage and hold people accountable and you would request can we do this, can we build this report? Can we build that report? Can I see it this way? And a lot of those had to do with those flags. You know, the ability to really analyze and get the insights that are actionable immediately right For the whole entire office across all KPIs. You were the one responsible for developing that full office report.

Jimmy Chebat:

If you remember, just something that we're building into our manager experience currently, but with remote, and one of the things that I feel helps organizations is when you tie work from home, when you tie the distractions together, when you tie the different individuals who are either motivated in different ways but hiding in the shadows is one thing that I hear quite frequently which is when you're at home and if you're not communicating on a regular daily cadence and maybe multiple times a day, it's very easy to kind of hide, especially with larger organizations where it's much more difficult to keep a tab on everybody and a lot easier to hide. What are your thoughts on the transparency of that information and how that helps people manage but also stay engaged?

Daniel Gebre:

One. It holds people accountable right. It's out there, it's transparent. It lets people accountable right, it's out there, it's transparent. It lets people know like these are the expectations, this is where you're at, and hopefully it gives people an opportunity to self-monitor themselves right and strive towards certain goals, kpis, whatever the case is. I do agree that it is obviously difficult to manage that at scale, which is part of why I like working with smaller companies and startups, but it's tough to find that balance or that connection, I guess. I think for me, at the end of the day, it's a job, whether you are doing it from home or doing it in an office. So there are expectations that you need to hit to stay in your job or be successful or whatever the case is With remote and needing tools like this, it helps guide that process, it helps keep people on track, it helps people focus on what's important and what's not important.

Jimmy Chebat:

So I think you need to do more and add in more tools to your tech stack or whatever to maintain that level and kind of offset what you may or may not be missing if you're fully remote versus in office follow-up question, because this is a tool that is is being used and there's uh it's definitely debated as to whether it's both either effective or, uh, viewed as invasive, invasive cameras, cameras on people's desktops, laptops, to track their activity and from working at home. What are your feelings on that? What are your? I don't know if you've worked with organizations that have implemented that and then, what are the employer and employee perspectives?

Jimmy Chebat:

None of my clients do any of that, but again they are smaller organizations right.

Daniel Gebre:

None of my clients do any of that. But again, they're smaller organizations, right, and with a smaller organization there's more on your shoulders, right? If it's a 10-person company, one person's gone. That is theoretically 10% of the production and at least the people. So it's very tough to hide lack of a better term with the clients that I work with.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Well, danny, as much as I could sit here and talk to you forever. It is great to see you and we're so happy to have you here in studio. But, as you may know, the ZIZO Effect we're all about gamification, and what would a gamification podcast be without a game? So if you wouldn't mind taking a buzzerer, if you could hand jimmy a buzzer, this season we are doing rapid fire trivia and we are going to see so you're sort of an innocent bystander to all of this jimmy and I are actually competing against each other while competing against our guests. Okay, we put a lot of thought into this. It was the best way to go about it, and I am going to be reading don't cheat, I'm the sacrificial lamb, all of a sudden.

Andrew J. Reimers:

What is he me? So I'm going to throw some questions out to you. The first to get to five points. You get one point per question. I'm going to make an executive decision here and say let's not dock points, because that's really why this took forever in our previous recording. So, emma, I'm going to ask you to please keep track of the points for both teams, if you wouldn't mind. And when you are ready, I'm ready. So you good, let's go. You're good, I'm good, all right. Question one Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll Were the first words spoken. On what cable channel that launched MTV? Mtv is correct.

Daniel Gebre:

One point for Jimmy Didn't even finish the question.

Jimmy Chebat:

Hey, Rock and roll. First word spoken TV cast Makes sense. Okay, that's logic, yeah.

Andrew J. Reimers:

I like it. Okay, rapid fire, let's go. Question two Some of our favorite collective nouns for animals include a congregation of alligators, a business of ferrets and a gaggle of what f***? Geese, geese is correct. Jimmy up, f***. We're going to give Danny a point for the first F-bomb on this social effect podcast. I love it. Okay, question three what food manufacturing company headquartered in Battle Creek, Michigan home of Rob Van Dam, by the way? Okay, Tyson.

Daniel Gebre:

I finished the question, I just had to guess, all right.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Jimmy, what food manufacturing company headquartered in Battle Creek, Michigan, uses several animal mascots to sell its cereals, such as Newton the Owl, Tony the Tiger and a rooster named Cornelius General Mills? That is incorrect.

Daniel Gebre:

I know it.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Wait, Kellogg. Let's give it to him. Kellogg. That is correct. I thought Kellogg was. Let's give it to him, Kellogg. That is correct.

Jimmy Chebat:

I thought Kellogg was a subsidiary of General Mills man. What was I thinking?

Andrew J. Reimers:

An important ratio that helps homebuyers determine how much house they can afford. Dti stands for what in real estate parlance DTI. Debt to income, that is correct, which is the highest grossing R-rated film in North America.

Jimmy Chebat:

We got to take R-rated film. What was the one with Jesus, now that you said it, where he had to wear the throne and Mel Gibson directed it? Man Path, do I have? Is it that movie?

Daniel Gebre:

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Andrew J. Reimers:

We're not doing that. I can't remember the name Passion of the Christ, oh f***. Passion of the.

Jimmy Chebat:

Christ.

Daniel Gebre:

That's the movie. I knew it. It was the movie I didn't.

Andrew J. Reimers:

All right, I got one here. In which city is Studio 54 located? New York, you're welcome. How old was Rose in the Titanic movie when she was recounting her story?

Daniel Gebre:

89. Incorrect 90.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Incorrect 100. What, jesus? What is the longest running Broadway show? Cats? No. Phantom of the Opera Correct. Wow. All right, this could be for the win. It is 4-2-2. Yep, bad guys. I love how I can't remember this. What magic duo performed at the Mirage Casino in Las Vegas? Siegfried and Roy. Siegfried and Roy. All right, let's go Coming back. 4-3. Mickey Mouse almost went by a different name. What was it? Michael Mouse, no, mortimer Mouse, yeah, I don't know if that would have been as catchy. In which country did the first season of?

Jimmy Chebat:

Survivor take place Jamaica.

Daniel Gebre:

Malaysia?

Jimmy Chebat:

Oh, that's not what I was thinking. What were you? Jamaica, malaysia? Oh, now I got that. That's not what I was thinking. Okay, what were you?

Andrew J. Reimers:

guessing Australia, all right. Who won the first season of American Idol?

Daniel Gebre:

Ruben Studdard.

Jimmy Chebat:

No, what's her name? The blonde country singer.

Daniel Gebre:

Yeah, you're wrong, it was Kelly Clarkson. It was, but you're thinking Carrie Underwood.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Potentially for the win Before he was the front man for Foo Fighters.

Daniel Gebre:

Dave Grohl was the drummer of which band?

Andrew J. Reimers:

Nirvana, that is correct.

Daniel Gebre:

Uh-oh, where are?

Andrew J. Reimers:

we.

Jimmy Chebat:

Four Four Jesus, yes.

Andrew J. Reimers:

For the win, do it. What singer holds the most Grammy nominations?

Jimmy Chebat:

Michael Jackson.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Incorrect Beyonce. What is the universal donor blood type?

Daniel Gebre:

Danny A positive Wrong.

Jimmy Chebat:

O positive Wrong.

Andrew J. Reimers:

O negative. Wow, I thought you were going to have that one. Which galaxy is closest to the Milky Way galaxy? Andromeda. Jimmy is our winner. Yes, congratulations. That was a hard-fought battle. What a comeback. That's all right. You did great, danny.

Andrew J. Reimers:

I'm proud of you. It was a lot of fun, danny, your insights and just your mind, man. It meant the world having it here. I think people really learned a lot and look forward to talking to you again down the road. Those of you watching along at home and listening at home, we really want to thank you for tuning into the ZIZO Effect and Jimmy.

Jimmy Chebat:

Before I say it's game time, I want to give Danny an opportunity to plug his company, which I think people can benefit from. If you're looking for a recruiter of recruiters, so tell us a little bit about your company real quick.

Daniel Gebre:

The company is called Hakenya, been around since 2022. Again, work with small companies, startups, a lot of VC-backed startups or boutique recruitment agencies across any industry. And, yeah, we primarily recruit recruiters. How do they find you Give a website address? Yep, so Hakenyacom. It will be updated soon, but Hakenyacom LinkedIn as well. Just my name, danny.

Jimmy Chebat:

Cabret, danny, thank you so much for coming on the show and, as always, it's game time.

Andrew J. Reimers:

Wow, it was really interesting to hear Danny's perspective on the importance of culture and leadership in the workplace. I loved learning about his journey from a call center agent to running his own recruiting company. Danny's story reminded us all of the value of adapting to change and staying true to your core values. We found this discussion incredibly insightful and we hope you did too. Remember we release episodes every other week, so stay tuned for more engaging conversations and insights. Get ready, it's game time.

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Andrew Reimers

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Jimmy Chebat

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