hey everybody andy here happy thursday
or maybe you're watching this on a
tuesday
doesn't matter to me when you're
watching it every day as long as i'm
here as long as i'm alive helping you
build a career you love
we never close we never go home because
i don't ever want the lights on your
career going down
all right hey got a fun package today
we're going to be talking about
references and everything you need to
know
about references i'm going to run
through a lesson
where i'm going to explain to you kind
of what what this is all about
and then when that little package is
over i'm going to go into 16 of the most
common questions that i get asked i'm
going to blitz through those
so i finally am going to put something
on the internets where every time you
ask me questions about the references
i'm just gonna say
go watch that thing where i'm in my
bright yellow
volt color polo shirt
that's the one okay get in say hi if
you're here with me live
let me know who you are let me know what
you do let me know where you're from
let me know what you need put some of
those question marks in front of your
questions so i can find them when we go
to the q a
after this all right what's this all
about all right so
most of you gotta provide references
when you get into an interviewing
process and a lot of you
are providing references even before
anything starts so it can get confusing
uh everything from i'm not sure who to
provide or are they going to call them
and all that good stuff
i'm going to demystify all that right
now so i'm just going to take you
through kind of the
timeline of what i what i see
and what i would do at each stage and
then we'll clean it up at the end like i
mentioned all right so
before you start okay got that got the
cards today actually got kind of fuel
quite a few of them uh before you start
you you do want to collect your
references
okay this let's let's let's get to let's
get the remedial stuff out right away
i want you to collect the names of the
people
i want you to alert them that i am job
searching
or can i for life always use you as a
reference
get their updated contact information
i know it sounds silly but a lot of
people change
email addresses sometimes people change
phone numbers
sometimes people want to be called on
their newly gifted work
cell number that they've been given just
make sure you're reaching out to people
and you're letting them know
you don't need to get into a whole lot
of stuff it could be a simple email
it could be a simple hey andy remember
when we worked back
in the day together and i loved you
because you're my favorite boss ever i'm
job searching
would you be open to serving as a
reference should i need it
just something like that okay you can
text them you can fax them you can tweet
them
it just but just make sure that they are
aware all right
that's the first thing the second thing
is
you should collect a bunch of them i
know you're gonna ask me
andy who and how many these are my
favorites
remember here you have not been asked
for your references yet
we're just talking about getting you
ready so the hip pocket references that
i would always want to have and this
will vary depending on what it is that
you
you do but supervisors are always great
your managers or your bosses but it
doesn't have to be your direct boss
i have served as a reference many times
for individuals who reported to somebody
who reported to me
okay so senior managers or anybody it
could be the ceo of your company i don't
really care who it is
but i would get somebody in senior
management
that could speak on your behalf other
people that would be really good to know
customers maybe you're in a sales
position or
somebody that you're supporting a
partner a vendor partner or something
like that
or people on your team it's okay to have
peers
and it's okay to have staff or
subordinates i don't love the word
subordinate but you guys know what i
mean
if you're a managerial resource and
you're interviewing for a role
where you know you could be managing
people oftentimes they will ask you
you know can you give me a supervisor
can you give me a peer or customer and
can you give me
somebody who reported to you now just a
general
just a general guideline doesn't have to
be these okay
but these would be the ones that i that
will will come in the most handy
and it's not like you need one of each
or anything but
if i'm going into my job search i would
probably want to have
five to six references you won't provide
all five
i would just want to know that i can
turn to five people
that i could say hey okay you know what
you're the right one for this
would you would you kind of step up step
up to the plate here for me
and the other thing is you just never
know somebody might not be around
somebody might be on vacation somebody
might be out of town who knows but you
just you want to have
um you want to have a good number of
them just so when you
are asked you know you can provide
individuals that the organization can
call and get in touch with
immediately all right so so i would
three minimum
but six is better you got ten that's
great
okay but just these are the people who i
would go after
now here's i get this question a lot
well annie then okay i'm about to fill
in the application
why are they asking me for references
right away this is to shortcut the
process later don't you worry i'm going
to explain all this
about about what i would do but if i'm
if i'm actually filling in an
application now when i say filling in an
application
this is what i mean some way somehow
you've been asked to go to the applicant
tracking system
and put in your application or you've
already attained the interview
and the organization says now that
you're here for our face-to-face
interview hopefully we're getting back
to a lot of those would you mind
filling in your information in our
corporate portal
please use this link anytime you're
going in online
anytime early we're in early in the
process just put the three damn
references in don't worry don't sweat it
don't hem and haw don't agonize just put
three people you wanna put three
supervisors fine you wanna put two
supervisors
and a customer fine you wanna put two
teammates in a supervisor i really don't
care
put three names and you wanna put my
name in go ahead and do that
okay just put them in and then what you
want to
you don't need to sweat this they're not
going to call them right away
should you get an interview or in or if
you are doing this
you know a little bit out of order
meaning i've got the interview
don't worry they're not going to call
them right away you can mention to them
should you be lucky enough to actually
get an interview if you went through the
applicant trashing system
and you had to fill this in and by the
grace of god you were chosen
and you go in for an interview in the
screen i want you to say
i provided references please do not
call them until you let me know
and it would be better if you know this
works out well if you would if
if you're going to give me an offer and
you would like to call them
at that time i might want to either use
those that i provided
or if i learn more through the
interviewing process
i will i would like to be able to
provide you the references
that could most closely speak to or work
with me closely on
the the projects the insight the
experience the things that matter most
to you so those would be more
appropriate
but i will confirm my references before
you
call any of my references okay so stop
they should not be calling most
companies will
not call your references without your
permission i i'm gonna use the word most
and when i say most i'm talking over 95
percent
okay just put it in and just tell them
do not call they're on the do not call
list
okay but i've provided the information
and remember make sure the information
is accurate
make sure that the phone number is
accurate make sure the email is accurate
okay do not call all right now you go
through the process
you're in the process we're gonna call
you in play
now you're getting serious okay andy
you're doing great
uh we'd like to make an offer we're
gonna give you the offer
and we're gonna go through all that
stuff but we want you to know the offer
is contingent upon a reference check
andy we're going to give you an offer
before we'd like to give you the offer
we'd like to check your references
any of this stuff anytime throughout the
process
usually down at the end you say okay
hang tight don't call those people i
want to trade two of them out
because you seem to be very interested
in my ability
to serve the customers and i provided i
provided references
earlier that could speak to my project
management experience i think these
other two
would be better for you to speak to let
me give you their information
but do not call until i adjust and give
you the three
you want or the three you requested or
the types of people you're looking for
or whatever okay this is believe me
we work with over 200 companies on a
recruitment basis i and and
this is how it this is how it works and
if if if you're deviating from what i'm
telling you
something's alright okay so so you'll
have a chance to
to intercept that all right now next
question is well what information should
i provide
now in the in the application they're
going to ask you some stuff
name email that kind of stuff maybe they
ask your relation
here's the five magical pieces and if
you were not able to fill this in on the
application
this is what you want to give them well
of course the name
give them an email address that will get
them the fastest
okay so don't go giving them andy's
gmail email address you want to give
them andy's milewalk email address kind
of thing
so you might want to you might want
might want to move to a corporate email
address or just whatever email that they
check
you know obsessively you want to give
them the phone number you want to make
sure
the damn phone number works you want to
tell your references uh
hey make sure the voicemail box
isn't full okay so like all that stuff
you you need to make sure that you now
alert them
okay this is getting serious they're
gonna call you okay so please make sure
that they can reach you when to call you
when not to call you don't call me
saturday morning when i'm out on my
seven hour bike ride okay kind of thing
all right so just don't ever call during
these times during these days
don't call andy on thursday at 11
o'clock because he's doing his live show
that kind of stuff okay and then you
want to tell them the relationship to
you
okay what does this do well i worked
with so and so
over at such and such but so and so is
now over at that company over there now
so just to be really you know you don't
want to be confused
i worked with andy when he was at in
forte and he ran
the us region for the blah blah he was
my
boss's boss at that time and he can
speak to my whatever
kind of thing okay so just you always
want to make sure that you're giving
them
uh the relationship and hopefully
you know i just put smiley faces there
because i didn't want that dead piece of
white space on my note card okay
all right so so that's that that's it
that's the whole process okay uh in in
you know in in 10 minutes
that you got the whole thing but now
you're going to have a whole bunch of
questions
and i'm going to run through what i
think are our are
the really good ones how how's everybody
doing we enjoying this
can i ask for the thumbs up right now is
that too early have i have i
have i done enough to deserve the thumbs
up yet
okay all right let's run let's run
through the biggies
all right should i put references
in emails like andy i want to do
boss hunting ally your boss hunting
technique andy i want to send a cover
letter in
to hr i want to go with the no job
opening cover letter and i'm going to
hit the recruiter
and i'm going to try to see if there's
anything there should i send
any references in with the emails
no never final answer don't give any of
that stuff
next question letters of recommendation
should i
should i send letters of recommendation
on in my emails or should i send letters
of
recommendation or letters of reference
on my applications
when they ask for all this stuff never
no final answer okay no one wants to
read your four
sentence cover letter they really don't
want to read four paragraphs
from a person who wrote a letter on your
behalf who is going to speak glowingly
to
about you who you have a greater than 50
percent chance of
of of knowing that it was penned by you
not them
okay so so most of the time letters of
reference are not written by the author
or the whoever signed the letter they're
written by the person who's requesting
it because anybody who asked me to
write a letter of reference for them i'd
say go write me a letter of reference
for you and then i'll edit it and then
i'll sign it kind of thing
this is very common we all know this so
don't don't bother and if you're shocked
by that
uh you know just think about it i i i
don't have time to call back my friends
let alone write
you know letters of recommendation for
people so don't
they carry no weight like zero as in
they probably have a negative effect i'm
not being funny because i don't want to
open it i don't want to read it
okay so you're just giving me more stuff
to do okay really honestly please don't
just say no don't ask
don't unless you are requested to get
them
never send them on an unsolicited basis
okay
what's next okay i talked to an
executive recruiter
the executive recruiter wanted
references from me
in the first phone call so the executive
recruiter reached out to me
we're gonna hit we're hitting it off and
he has an opportunity or she has an
opportunity
and bang they slip in can i get three
references
under no circumstances are you ever to
give an executive recruiter
references in the first call in the
second call
in the third call don't do it
what they're gonna do is they're gonna
take your references and they're gonna
go call those references and try to
recruit them
if they're asking you at the beginning
okay now you had a nice call with andy
at milewalk he's the executive recruiter
and he
brings you into an organization and you
smoked it
because you were because i'm a good
picker and i'm a good supporter and i'm
a good helper
right we're going to get you through the
interview process you're going to get
down to the end
and what the company that you're
interviewing with is going to say to me
andy
can you go get tommy's references for us
we'd like to check them
i call you i say tommy go time
give me three what do you want give me
three supervisors that's what they're
looking for
great you give them to me i give them to
them i don't check them i don't wanna go
check your reference i don't wanna i do
not wanna spend one more minute of my
life
if i've already presented you to my
client i know you're you're the bomb
right so i'm not gonna go doing all that
stuff
i already vetted you i spent hours and
hours and hours with you
interviewing you i spent hours prepping
you and debriefing you i know who you
are
okay so that's the way that should roll
now most of the time
most of the time the company you are
going
to is going to check the references why
sorry
let me back up when when requested
and when handed via an executive
recruiter i want to be explicit because
we've got some other things that i'm
going to clear up here down the road
in this case the executive recruiter can
check your references
or the company can check your references
you
likely are going to get the company
checking the references why if somebody
asks me
to check your references what am i going
to do i'm going to call the references
i'm going to say just tell me he's great
great
hang up the phone and i'm going to say
to my client oh that everybody
everything's fine
right that's what most executive
recruiters will do so
most of the time the organization to
which you're going to be
coming is going to check those however
they might have some of the executive
search firms do this
if they're doing that then the company
is essentially saying
we are not checking your references
meaning i don't care what that recruiter
comes back with
right because i'm basically checking a
box because somebody on my end is going
to ask me
did we check the references and then i'm
going to say well andy over at milewalk
checked them
okay that's what's happening all right
dead serious about this all right okay
well let's get to the next round then do
companies actually
check these and then how do they check
them do companies actually check them
now i don't have a valid statistical
number for how many companies actually
check references so i'm not going to say
to you it's 83
i'm going to tell you that of the over
200 and company a 200 companies
that milewalk my executive search firm
has recruited
for i would say that
probably half of them did a light
reference check meaning somebody some
admin
on their staff in hr called around
just to make sure that nothing
was awry okay it's a quick phone call
can you tell me a little bit about so
and so what did you like about them
you know was there any opportunities
from most people are ineffective
at getting juicy information when
they're checking references
so a lot of companies that are doing
this are doing it more out of a
formality
if that company has spent 10 hours with
you interviewing you and something comes
up in a reference check
that's a little bit surprising so do
they check them
sometimes yes sometimes no assume they
will right the statistic itself is
irrelevant it doesn't matter if 20
of them check it or 98 of them check it
just
assume they will okay and then how do
they do that
most of the time not all of the time
most of the time
they have somebody from their
organization actually
call the people whose numbers you've
given them occasionally
if they're hiring a lot of people maybe
they're a large organization
they might outsource it to a to a firm
who does that
that those people will need to call your
references so just just so you
understand
how that works now some of you might ask
me well is that different than a
background check
all right let's take the background
check it is different a background check
is usually a systematically
run check against your in the us social
security number but you get the idea
they're checking you for different
things not all background checks are the
same
some will check your work history some
will check where you've been paid if you
provide your co
you know a company your social security
number in the united states you're go
it's going to come up on your
employment check they might check
criminal records they
might check i say might they might check
um
financial records sometimes when you're
in a position of handling money are you
the chief financial officer are you the
controller are you an accountant
right or are you a salesperson might you
right we want people
who are conscientious about this stuff
have good track records
related to money so each company is
different there are services that check
these things
most of the time like 98 of the time
it's being done
by a system okay but sometimes companies
will call around
all right now that's different than a
reference check
now this is the big one that i'm going
to get asked a lot what can employers
say when the references are checked
if they're verifying employment okay
i'm talking about in in a check here so
when they're doing a background check if
somebody is going to check
your employment because now i'm going to
assume you are all
especially because you hear with me
listening to this smart enough
not to give a reference who's going to
say anything bad about you we know this
right
so you're more concerned with andy well
when they call my
old company well i didn't leave on great
terms
i'm talking about that now what can the
employer say
well i got good news for you i got bad
news for you let's give you the bad news
first
first thing is i don't know how every
country works
all right but i have a feeling it's very
similar to the way the u.s
works in the united states there are no
federal laws
it's state-driven each state has its own
set of criteria of what an
employer can and cannot say here's the
punch line
you go in you're going to get this new
job i'm milewalk i'm going to call your
old employer just to verify
employment because sometimes employers
want to verify
the employment part they don't want to
go into the criminal records and all
that other stuff they'll have a system
do that
if if somebody calls me in illinois for
example
i could actually say tommy was fired
because he stole something off my desk
i can say that i can say just about
anything i want to say
if it's true okay i am not liable
what does that mean that means you would
have to prove what
i said is actually not accurate
so i said well tommy was fired for cause
and his performance was kind of poor and
he was kind of lazy and he didn't really
pay attention to the details
i could say that okay now that's what i
could say
but no employer is dumb enough to do
that
if i mean if for the most part because
i'm not
obligated to say anything and so what i
would actually do
now that's what i could say but what's
the expression just because you can
doesn't mean you should
so most employers will not say that most
employers will say
tommy worked here from november of 2018
to december of 2020. yes he worked here
yes he was that
and that's it name rank and serial
number why because i don't even want to
bother
with tommy coming back to me suing me
whether it's frivolous or not i don't
need to
waste my energy waste my resources or
anything dealing with that and employers
just don't want to deal with it they
figure you know what that he's your
problem now
i'm not going to spend a lot of time you
know bad mouthing him for and run
the risk of of him coming back it was
bad enough he stole stuff off my desk
right kind of thing all right so you
need to check
what your state will allow or this
or and i don't know if it's you know
state you're going to or state you're
coming from or whatever but basically
in in in these cases assume that the
company
where you worked if they are calling
into that organization it's going to be
that
state's laws that they're going to have
to adhere to
okay so that's i know that's a that's a
biggie and then what if i'm
how about this one what if i'm still at
the company
okay if you're still at the company hey
i still work for milewalk i'm trying to
leave this andy guy
i don't want you calling andy most
employers will get that
they most of them every single
organization that we we had clients
candidates interviewing with our clients
we never let the client check the the
candidates
current company unless the candidate
wanted to give them somebody from the
current company
we met with no resistance whatsoever so
all of our
all of our clients would say okay fair
enough right we don't we don't want
anybody getting out or anything to
happen to this poor person
if we're calling to try to verify
whatever okay
so so if you're still at the company you
don't necessarily
need to provide those references we'll
get into kind of
who to provide and all that good stuff
what
what's this one what they want to call
my boss okay
under no circumstances should you let
them call your current boss i'm talking
about people
who are still employed you do not need
to do that you can
believe me you can say to them you know
i'm sure you know i know my boss would
speak highly of me but
obviously this is very sensitive i don't
want to actually
alert anybody now there's one exception
to this about the boss if you've been
let go
or if whether you were surgically fired
whether you were
a reduction in force where there was a
massive whatever
maybe your your company decided the unit
you were in wasn't strategic and they
sold it somewhere or they outsourced it
or whatever
in those cases it would work to your
favor to say
well i was let go from mile walk but but
i would
love it if you called andy so you could
understand that he decided
he didn't need seven recruiters anymore
because he wanted to be a career coach
kind of thing right and he he would be
happy to speak to my performance
in that case it will work to your
benefit
to do that all right how about this one
well i've been at the company a really
long time
i've been there 14 years i don't really
know anybody
else okay in those cases you get do two
things
number one you say you say to the to the
company
i've been at the company 14 years i've
been at the company 20 years
now it's a lot of the bosses that i have
are still there i don't want to give you
them
can i give you somebody else perhaps
people who left
you could do that or or i have
i have a close friend who is used to be
my boss
and she could discreetly do this i would
like you to call her
not you know these other supervisors
that i have companies get this
okay now you have to remember something
you are at a stage
in the process where if they're gonna go
to this trouble
they want to hire you okay they're not
going to hold up hiring you
because you've been at a company for 14
years and my guess is you've been at a
company for 14 years because you really
enjoyed it and you're a good worker and
they love you
and you just decided you want to move on
for whatever reason it's not going to
get holed up don't agonize over this
don't start emailing me hey i'm just
starting my job search oh my god
no just don't worry about it just find
somebody you can you can you can put in
and then do i actually need a current
company reference you do not
you do not and in many cases i would say
don't
do it actually get people you used to
work with
that you no longer work with whether
they have left that company
or you work with them two companies ago
okay you do not need this
and if they insist on it then you say
well then i want you to check it after i
start or after i resign
because i don't i don't want to be
alerting anybody that i'm leaving
okay so so know that how about these
couple here
you're gonna have to make do i lost
touch with them go find them
google them linkedin hunt them down
you can find them don't give me any you
know i've never worked with anybody who
can't speak on your behalf
and i don't have any references go find
some
get personal references if you have to
okay but you got to get somebody to
speak to whatever and i don't care if
you're a
25 year old and you want to go get
somebody who's
you know summer job you had doing retail
sales at the whatever
okay you gotta you gotta draw some up
you gotta scraping together
okay all right now do i prep them
all right do i prep them okay so you
went through the process you alerted
them
now you're getting down to the end okay
hey annie we want to check your
references
no problem i want you to call these
three people you immediately
call those three people and you say okay
through the interview process
they were really hung up on this you
might want to speak to
how i'm such a badass at that okay yes
you want to prep them
you want to alert them they are going to
call you can you please call back
because they're holding my offer until
they talk to you
whatever you need to say to them you
tell them okay
you need to you need to do that and then
if if they cannot get a hold
of your reference what i would do in
that case
is i would say to them all right i'm
giving you these three references
i will alert them that you're going to
be reaching out
to make themselves available if for some
reason you have
any trouble reaching any of them would
you please
let me me know and then i'll do one of
two things i will either nudge them
or message them or whatever or
i will supply you another more
accessible one something like that
alright so just make sure that they can
and under
no circumstances should your references
be taking time to fill out a form online
for any company who requests it i am not
taking my time as your reference to fill
in
anything that i have to type okay that
is it is completely
inconsiderate it is absolutely
ridiculous
it is borderline archaic that i would
have to do that and i understand that we
live in a digital world and we live in
the digital age
but there is absolutely no reason i'm
going to stop what i'm doing
to go fill in a form on your behalf now
if somebody wants to talk to me that's a
different thing
okay so if they ask you to fill in a
form you say no you want my references
you got to call them
they would appreciate they're very busy
they travel a lot they do whatever i
don't really care if they work two hours
a day it doesn't matter
okay it would be more effective if you
call them
right but what what is typing that's
like a letter of reference you're doing
on the back end
all right so i'm not going to recap all
this but i just want to make sure
i do recap the front five okay so
because i want to make sure
that you know you know how to roll
through this all right make sure to
collect them get the get the updated
info
and alert them the best people to have
in your hip pockets
supervisors senior managers customers
team members
staff if appropriate on the application
do
not sweat it and tell them do not
call them until we confirm that those
are the ones i want you to talk to
all right when you're in play you get
down to the end hopefully you get down
to the end
they check the references then you say
okay those three
good to go or i want to swap these one
two or i'm swapping all of them out
right then you alert the people right
you make sure you provide
name email address phone number when to
call them and when not to call them
and what your relationship is all right
how'd i do
30 minutes love it okay hope you guys
enjoyed that
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in the us where i'm right as rain they
go out every week all right
you guys if you're here with me live
we're going to the q a if you're
watching me on the recording
i'll see you next week
you
