Episode 16 How a stop sign can cost you a job

Episode 16 with guest Sarah Renieri Kyle: Investment advisory services offered by Moneta Group Investment Advisors, LLC, an investment adviser registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training. The information discussed in this podcast is for informational and educational purposes only and any endorsements were those of the hosts and not a guarantee of employment. No compensation was provided. You should consult with an appropriately credentialed professional before making any financial, investment, tax, or legal decisions. And welcome to another edition of Wit, Wisdom, and What Matters Most. It's a podcast by Moneta's Gast Freeman Troyer Racen Team. My name is Kyle Luetters, an advisor on the team, joined by Danton Troyer, one of the partners. Uh, Danton, it is a new year. Everything's bright, shiny, fresh, new, and today's guest I think is someone that many folks, as they've gotten through the holiday season and have contemplated a full 12-months slate in front of them, potentially a job change is on the horizon and Sarah Renieri, who is the manager of talent acquisition here at Moneta, joins us today for a very far reaching conversation. Danton: Yeah. We'll talk about everything from how to use AI on your job search to how not to use AI on your job search, as well. Then everything again, from internship programs to a C-suite and what's the best steps to really lock down a job there. And, starting the new year, a lot of people will be either looking to hire and fill out a team and also maybe some RC suite clients might be, you know, looking to make a change as well into the new year. Kyle: And with that being said, here's our conversation with Sarah Renieri. And we are now joined by Sarah Ranieri here on Wit, Wisdom. and What Matters Most. Sarah, first off, welcome to the podcast and thank you so much for sitting down with us today. Sarah: Yeah, thank you so much, Kyle and Danton. I'm so happy to be here. I'm very excited to be here today. Kyle: Oh, perfect. We're going to cover a lot of topics today, but, but really before we get started, we like to dig into the backstory and the personal side of things. So, you are in talent acquisition here at Moneta. So how did you get into that? Because I don't necessarily remember going to orientation at college and that being one of the choices there. You know in all transparency, there was a guy that I knew that tested the windshields of airplanes by like firing chickens at them. That also wasn't on those, but how did you get into talent acquisition? Kind of give us the arc of your career. Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. So it's interesting. I listened to a podcast called the talent acquisition leaders podcast. Every person that they interview are experts, senior level in talent acquisition, and they all fell into it. That's always their story. And I would say mine is similar. However, something that's unique about my story is that when I decided I wanted to be in talent acquisition, I was very intentional. I knew that that was game changing for me. I wanted to go into that, that arena. So my story, I actually started within accounting. So I got an accounting degree out of college and I worked for a couple of different internal corporations. So I actually did work for a nonprofit organization; I did work for a large commercial real estate company, all within accounting. So, at the time I was really able to start articulating the type of company I wanted to work for. I got a really good exposure of all different arenas. And so that's what really brought me to Moneta. It checked all of the boxes for me in terms of the size of the company, culture, the structure that it provided, the training, and long-term career opportunities. So when I started at Moneta, I started as a client service manager. So I was helping to support financial advisors, such as yourselves on client-facing teams, managing existing client relationships and really becoming an expert at the foundational business of what we do. After doing that for about six years, I was actually given the opportunity, for my team specifically, to help with our recruiting efforts. And I loved that opportunity. I kind of volunteered. I raised my hand. I said, I'll be the one to vet the resumes. I'll be on the side Googling what are appropriate interview questions to ask these people. And the advisors on my team loved it. They really wanted nothing to do with the process; it's tedious, it's not their expertise, and they had better things to do. Their priority was the clients. And from that, an opportunity arose within the firm to help lead and develop our internal recruiting team. So I happily took that opportunity. It was a unique career path as most client service managers proceed into that financial advising path. But for me, I really knew that this was a really strong fit for me, given my skillset, what I enjoy doing, coupled with the expertise that I had grown up within the firm. I knew the culture, I knew the skillsets we needed to do all of the roles across the organization. This was also a time when Moneta was expanding outside of St. Louis for the first time. So this was about 2018, when we made that transition. So that was also really wonderful time and where I got to make an impact, not only for our hiring needs in St. Louis, but across the nation. So our first office in Denver is when I got a taste of how to, how to recruit for a company where no one really knew who we were, what we did. Kyle: Wow. And how long at Moneta now? Sarah: So it'll be 13 years this month. Kyle: Holy moly. Danton: Yeah. Well, I think one of the things that I found maybe a little unique and interesting was you're certified in the Workplace Big Five. And so maybe talk a little about that. And first off, you know, why that one? And then how do you really see personality fit and developing a team, and how does that really play a role? Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. So the Workplace Big Five is a personality assessment and it's one of those assessments that Moneta has used for a long, long time. It itself has evolved over the years. I actually - this was pre-COVID, I had just, I was celebrating my daughter's first birthday and I was actually, on her birthday I was traveling to North Carolina for a three-day seminar certification training to get this certification. So that was very memorable. It's something people aren't really doing that much of anymore, that kind of travel. And yeah, so it was very involved, very rigorous learning more about personality types and more importantly about people's motivations and competencies. So we all have kind of these natural tendencies, natural personality types, such as introversion versus extroversion, your ability to be curious, or maybe you're more narrow-minded and these all are just what come natural to you. But it doesn't necessarily mean that that's what you want or that's your motivation. It doesn't always correlate to the things that you want to be doing where you'll find fulfillment. So, the Big Five assessment is something that we do administer to all of our senior-level advisors, any kind of executive-level hiring needs. So we do use that to really dive into a candidate's motivation and skill set. For all of our candidates across the board, we do use the Wunderlich assessment. And that's another one that Moneta has always kind of consistently used over the years. And it takes it one step further. It's like a high level Big Five, but it also measures a candidate's cognitive ability. And we do, as a firm, we've always placed a lot of emphasis on the cognitive piece in terms of best fit and how long-term success you'll have in the role, given the challenges that we face on the day-to-day in terms of our analytical, critical thinking skill set. Kyle: I remember taking that test on the way in here going, wow, this is the same test they give the NFL quarterbacks at the Combine. Sarah: It is exactly the same one. Kyle: Perfect. I did reasonably well on it, but I don't have the physical attributes that they do. So that's why we do this. Danton: We didn't test your 40-yard dash. Kyle: Oh, gosh. Danton: I mean, we got the hallway going, though, right? Kyle: Yeah, we could do that. I just got to change my shoes. No, I mean, that's a fascinating way to peek behind the curtain, because one thing I will say, candidly, it is tough to get in here as a job seeker. So, you know, talk about how you go about recruiting for this firm, knowing that you're really looking for a very specific skill set. And that's got to be a challenge. I mean, there's a lot of people out there, but finding the right people to basically bring in through the door…walk us through the challenge of that. Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. And to give you more context on that, as a company, every year we typically receive about 4,800 applications to the firm. We typically hire about 100 people year after year. And so our acceptance rate, if you will, is right about 2.9 percent, which is lower than Harvard's. So we have a higher standard than an Ivy League school when it comes to the talent that we hire here at the firm. So, yes, it is an extreme challenge, probably one of the more challenging things about my job. And a lot of it is the partnerships we develop with our hiring team. So I've learned so much from our hiring managers in terms of what they look for and what's going to really make a successful hiring decision. So their feedback is integral into what I do. So I compile that feedback and I'm learning and growing with every candidate that I talk to, kind of hearing from the hiring managers what they're needing right now - and that market kind of shifts and changes as well; that evolves. Maybe they have several people on their team that have