Hi, welcome to The Talent Trade. This is Stephanie Maas, Partner with ThinkingAhead Executive Search. Today I am super excited to have one of our greatest with us today. Cathy Moll leads our life sciences practice and has for many years. Cathy, we are super excited to have you here. Before we dive in, tell us a little bit more about your practice your background, etc.
Hey, Stephanie. Hi, thanks. So glad to be talking with you today. And let me just take a minute introduce myself. I am with the life sciences practice, which I started with thinking ahead 26 years ago, almost 27 years, and we cover everything in the pharmaceutical medical device and biotech industries in terms of research and development and everything on their commercial side.
Wow. Sounds like you work with a bunch of underachievers. So one of the reasons why I am excited to have Cathy is, again, when you've been in this business, whether it's you know, 15 minutes, 15 years, or 25 plus years, the way thinking ahead does our search business is it is just as important to us to maintain relationships, as it is to go out and find and build new relationships. And Cathy has proven through the years that she is a master of all
relationships. So Cathy, I would love for you just to share with us just how you do some of what you do in terms of building, maintaining, developing, etc, anything relationship oriented, whether it's clients, candidates, everything in between? How do you do what you do?
So we'll start with how I joined thinking ahead and why I joined thinking ahead, I was actually a client for thinking ahead. And I worked with one or two people and developed a very strong relationship with them. Part of the reason that I joined was because I felt like they knew who I was, they understood what I was looking for. And actually we became friends, I had been in the search field previously didn't love it, frankly, because I felt like the way that I was
treated was very transactional. And in dealing with the folks from thinking ahead, I didn't get that feeling at all. So what ended up happening is my husband was offered a job, which was going to require relocation and at that time, there was no such thing as work from home, I actually approached this individual and asked him if he could help me find something. And he said, Have I got a deal for you, what I would like for you to do is think about starting a practice with our
organization. And because of the way he treated me and the relationship that we develop, I got into conversations with him. And so fast forward 26 years I'm here. And here's what I think it comes down to is a sincere interest in the person that you're talking to a client candidate, or just someone you're helping because they've called and said, Do you have a
few minutes to take a look at my resume. And rather than thinking about everybody as an end to a means I really am genuinely interested in what they have to say, I don't think there's a magic to it. I think I just look at a person as someone who is interesting. I mean, I've learned so much from people over the years because of what they have shared with me about their background and their life experiences. And I'm truly
interested in all of those things. I was thinking about this this morning, long before we had different tools to remind us of when somebody's birthday was coming up or an anniversary, I listened to what people said, I talked to them about their kids, I talked about them about travels that they were going to do. And when birthdays came up or anniversaries came up, I always send a card because it's important to be remembered that's a special anymore because everybody has reminders that
come up. But I can probably tell you some of my top five clients and candidates who I've worked with, I can tell you their birthdays before you know looking it up. It's just really about having a genuine interest and staying in touch with people reaching out to them if something has happened in their lives and acknowledging that I'm a little bit nosy about people
as well. And so I think it's just managing those relationships how I would like to be dealt with treat others like you want to be treated.
Super helpful and I appreciate that you say that hey, there's no real magic here. But for a lot of us this does not come natural. You know how do you handle it when you get on the phone with somebody? I'm not gonna say this not interesting because you know beauty is in the eye of the beholder but How do you manage when people are difficult? Or you're having to pull teeth to get them to open up and share? What could or possibly be interesting?
Another great question, I think there are moments of silence in my communication with people, I don't feel like I have to be the person who is always talking. It's more about listening. Not that everybody is easy, for sure. But it's really just kind of digging and finding out what it is that motivates that person. And then asking them questions about that mean, we deal with a lot of people in our
industry who are very numbers oriented. And so they're not as apt to share a lot personally, but they're super excited about what they do. And for me, if I let someone know that one of the reasons I'm calling them is to learn to learn a little bit more about what it is that they do, and how it can affect, I mean,
I'm dealing in the pharmaceutical industry. So how it can affect people, people love to talk about that they may not love to talk about themselves, but they do like to talk about what it is that they do, and how it can have an impact on I guess, the greater good, especially in pharmaceutical, anybody who knew me in high school, if they knew that I was doing anything at all that had to do with science, they would be shocked. I am not a science person and not a math
person. So truly, I learned from every single person that I talked to, and I let them know that they are helping me to get better at what I do, as well.
Very cool. I heard two things there, I just want to make sure we reiterate that I think are super valuable is you commented several times on being a high quality listener, and then also to the opportunity to learn. And I do think to your point in a very sincere and authentic way, when we ask people to help us learn it that does generate an openness in them. It's so funny, I think when people are in sales, you know, I You often hear you used to hear like, Oh,
you've got the gift of the gab, you'd be great for sales. But what we hear thinking ahead really talk about is, you know, that's actually not what makes us good, we really talk a lot about is listening idea. So for somebody that maybe isn't as good of a listener or thinks that they could improve their listening skills, which let's face it, that's probably most people. What are some of your tricks of the trade tips, if you will, that help you be a better listener?
Again, I don't know that it's a trick of the trade. I think when I first got started, I had a note in front of myself that said, listen, and let the person answer the question. And so in building habits over the years, he just sort of do that. I tend to be that person who talks over people, because I'm excited about what they're saying. So I will tell someone in the beginning, if I'm talking over
you, you need to tell me. And it's only because I'm super excited about what it is that you have to say, or I'm curious, I think when I ask someone a question, or I engage in a conversation with them, the way to demonstrate that I do really care about what they're saying is to just kind of dip it and let them answer the question. And when they answer the
question, I can then build upon that and ask more questions. So it's a real curiosity about what this person has to say, and whether I'm going to end up working with them directly or not, the more I know about them, the better, I am able to help them out. And I just keep that in mind.
Through your years, not only have you been consistently one of our absolute best recruiters, you've also hired and trained some of our top producers as well. When you're working with a newer person, what challenges do you see them face in building and maintaining relationships that you find that again, we're all human, we all have strengths or weaknesses. But for the newer folks, what do you find having to train or teach them as it relates to building and maintaining relationships?
I think that a lot of people that we hire come from a sales background. And I think the hardest thing or one of the biggest obstacles that they have to overcome is that this is not a transactional sale. And they can get frustrated because what they're accustomed to is they call on somebody and they're looking for a sale. And what we have to help them to understand is that the sale could be that you just want to set up a time to talk with them, or that you want to spend time learning a
little bit more about them. And so I think the the biggest obstacle has been just really understanding that this is a long term sales cycle. A lack of a better term, and that they're planting the seeds to begin with, and the tree will grow. But it won't grow. If what you're looking for is what can you do for me today, again, you just have to have a sincere interest in that person and understand that long term that's going to pay off for you. And I have a story, you know,
everybody's gonna freak out when they hear this. But I had someone that I had been calling on for seven years, several times a year, I would reach out to her and talk to her and she continued to move up, and she moved into new roles. Seven years later, she called me and said, We're having difficulty with two senior level positions, I want you to talk to the folks in HR, and we're gonna put together an agreement, and I want you to work on them. Because you have been so
consistent. I don't want anybody to think it takes seven years it doesn't. But really, and truly, it's just, if you're willing to just kind of take a step back and understand the process, those relationships that you've built will come back to you. And people will try to help people that they've known and built that relationship with over the years.
It sounds like obviously, they like you. But there was also such a respect for how you did business. And much like how you came to thinking ahead, hey, there was a way that we just did business, authenticity, and even curiosity about the person. Again, it's a business, we're all here to, you know, do what we need to do. But bringing that human element sounds like really has an opportunity to pay off down the road.
I think that's true. And the thing I learned a long time ago is that people can like me, but if I don't produce for them, that doesn't really matter. It is a business relationship. But everybody likes doing business or talking to people that they like, but you have to do the job.
Yep, you got to produce. That's the way it works. So share with us as hopefully it will be kind of fun. When you started in the business. What was your you know, "I went to school, walked 10 feet of snow uphill both ways". What were some of your "well back when I started in search" shares, some things that you use that don't exist today or anything funny from 26 years ago?
So you know, I grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin, so I really did walk three miles uphill, to get to the globe. This really dates me in 1997. When I started, I actually had a candidate who I was talking to on the phone who said the following to me, have you ever heard of Google? And I said, No. He said to me, oh, my gosh, you have got to gotta find it. I mean, we barely use computers. At that time, I'm not gonna lie.
We faxed resumes to people, we fax resumes to clients candidates and to sneak into their office and when nobody was around and back their resume to us, which was better than prior to that when you had to mail everything. So the internet was really just getting started, you still had to do research on companies, people didn't have website. I mean, right now, it is so easy for a candidate to find out who they're going to be talking to, or find out more about the company, you know, and
we provide a lot of that information. But we always suggest that they do research as well, well, 26 years ago, that research meant that they literally had to go to the library and then had to look up what they could about the client, and you really couldn't necessarily find out information about who was going to be interviewing them. So honestly,
I'm just thinking about this. Now, the fact that I would spend time with the hiring manager and talking to them and getting to know them, at that point was incredibly useful to the candidate, because I could share that information that they weren't going to be able to find anywhere. And so funny stories, I had to fax an interview schedule to a candidate at the fax number she gave me and she immediately called me like 10 minutes later and said, Oh my God, you back this to our human
resources department. Oops. And I said, Here's the phone number that I backed it to. And it turns out that when a fax in a department was busy, that it automatically rerouted it to human resources. She happened to you know, somebody, I think picked it up and gave it to her without looking at it. But those are some of the challenges that we ran into.
That is crazy. Fast forward to today. Now we have all this information at our fingertips. How do you still provide value when there is so much information so readily available?
I still think that what we can provide to candidates and to client is what we've learned about the company or the people they're going to be talking to or the candidate by spending time with either the candidate or the hiring manager, sort of like looking at a resume, you get an idea of what somebody has done, but you really don't know what makes that person who they are. And I think that the amount of time
that we spend with everybody is priceless. You know, a candidate can say to me, Kathy, I need to make sure that I have a good work life balance, because I have kids, and they play soccer. And I say, and you know, one of the things that they're not going to find, by looking up the hiring managers that the hiring manager has kids who play soccer as well, so that she or he will understand that you need to take some time, and you have to spend
time with family. And here's why. So you can look up a company, and you can look up a person, but what you can't look up is their personality, or what's important to them. And I think those are the things that we can share on both sides of the equation.
Absolutely. How long is the longest relationship candidate or client that you've had?
So I won't name a name, but there are probably three people that I can think of that I started working with, I think I placed one person in maybe 2000 2000 is somewhere around 2000. And she and I talk regularly, and I placed her again about four or five years ago. But we stay in touch with each other about everything, and to other people who actually placed in one organization who have since moved on to different places, but both have become clients along the way, helped me
to get into new companies that they had joined. So probably the longest is I started in 97. So probably 9099. And the funny thing is, when you talk to them, you of course know if they have children, you know, their children were either not around at that time and are now graduating from college, or they have since gotten married. Yeah, it's pretty interesting. And it's a lot of fun.
I love that. And I think too, when you can really learn to enjoy people and meet them where they're at. It's a weird kind of byproduct of how fun this job can be. Without a doubt.
Yes, you have to have fun with this, I have always said that our product is people. And so often we can see how capable they are or what a great opportunity they're going to have if if we introduce them to something but what we don't know is necessarily what's going on for them 100% of the time personally, and they may make a different decision, they may come to a whole different set of reasons why they are or are not going to move ahead. And so you need to have fun with this.
Because there's you can get really disappointed really fast. And you just need to understand that people are going to make decisions or what is important to them. So I try to have fun every day.
Awesome. Well, we hear it thinking ahead are super thankful for your 26th and counting years, they know our listeners are super thankful for your time as well. Anything else that you want to share for the good of our search community? Before I let you go?
No, I guess the only thing I would say is this. It is an incredibly fulfilling job. When I take a look back at the numbers of people that I've worked with and talk to and see some of the opportunities that we've helped introduce them to that they may not have taken a look at before and all of the things that that has opened up for them and for their families. It's just an incredibly rewarding thing that we do. So have fun with it and just accept all the good that comes along with it.
Absolutely. All right, Cathy Moll.
Thanks Stephanie.