Dr.Jim Kanichirayil: Building Trust and Credibility with HR Buyers

Sourabh:
Just for a moment in 2023, help us... Most of our attendees today, we've got folks that sell to HR leaders. We've got agencies who both sell to folks that sell to HR but also maybe doing employee branding. So a number of different folks that are our discussion... In 2023 lay out for us: Who is the HR leader? What's the ideal customer profile or target customer persona?

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Dr. Jim K.:
So it depends on really a lot of the product that you're selling. So my background is in HR tech and specifically in talent acquisition. So depending on the complexity of the product and the problems that the product solves for, that's gonna have an impact on who I'm targeting as the buyer. Generally speaking, if I am in the talent acquisition space as far as what the solution does, my buyer is probably gonna be at a director or VP level of TA. Depending on the complexity of the product, that might drill down to the manager level. But with that being said, it's still under the umbrella of HR. So as a seller or marketer, you need to make sure that you're engaging the committee that purchases. So you need to be involved with, in some cases, marketing some cases, product, some cases IT, and certainly the CFO or the operations leader to bring them into the cycle at some point.

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Sourabh:
‍Perfect. I'm, I'm actually going to have you dive a little deeper into the HR buyer, and let's stick at the director level for a minute. What would you say right now, categorically are the leading pain points for HR buyers?

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Dr. Jim K.:
I think regardless of the product that you're selling, I think the most important thing that a seller has to understand about the buyer's world in HR is that every... A lot of HR buyers are being told this as their mission: “Do more with less”. And how that shows up, their spend has been reduced, their staff has been reduced, and they're expected to either meet or exceed the same level of production that they had in macroeconomic situations where, it was stable or positive. So you have to understand that at a fundamental level. And then, you know, my expertise is in the talent acquisition space. And in general, when you're talking to HR and TA, what are the two problems that they're looking to solve? The two problems that they're constantly dealing with is they're tasked with finding more people and secondarily, keep the people that we have. And if you look at it from a problem statement perspective, we can't find enough people and we can't keep the people that we have. So you have to be deeply oriented to those three things. One: understand that HR leaders are being tasked with doing more with less. And two and three: they're constantly struggling to find the people that they need to fill their staffing requirements and they're struggling to keep the people that they have.

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Sourabh:
Now, these are rather big disruptive problems, right? If you're VP of customer success or your director of sales gets up and quits and then someone else follows. Okay, that's a bit of a shock, right? To the team, to the system. And if you've been looking for someone in engineering for three months and you've never got past a second interview,. People keep turning you down and taking other roles. You're starting to worry. These are big problems for the organization, right? How does an HR director— how do they identify that part of that solution would be a technology or a new solution? How, how do they know that?

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Dr. Jim K.:
So this is the part... It's a great question, and this is where I tend to irritate sales managers. So if any sales managers are listening to this, put your earmuffs on because you're not gonna like this. So when you're faced with a scenario where you have all of these systemic problems, and you described a specific use case where a position's been open. It's for an engineering role, it's been open for three months and nobody's making it past the second interview, I would challenge anybody that says that, “Hey, there's a technology solve for this”. And that's the common mistake that happens across the B2B tech space, is that we move into our buyer universe under the assumption that everything has a solve through technology. Typically what I do

Is when I'm engaging with somebody that I have never met before in the HR tech space or in the TA tech space, I'm looking to understand what your current process looks like, what your current people scenario looks like. Because I take a transformation lens to the problem that the HR buyer is dealing with. And if you're trying to execute a transformation, a successful transformation is the combination of a people process and technology solution that's being brought to bear. And if as a seller, you're going to the marketplace and you're automatically assuming that just because somebody's talking to you that a technology solution is gonna solve all their problems, you're likely going to get that person fired. And unless you've diagnosed what the process and people landscape looks like, you're gonna cause that person to burn a lot of resources for nothing. Because if you have a crappy process, if your people aren't lined in the right seats and you're applying technology to it, you're likely gonna make the current situation worse.

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Sourabh:
Okay. I'm gonna build on this because we're getting very technical now, both from the HR perspective, but also from a product marketing, right, or content or demand gen perspective. Let take these two separately, right? Before you solve for tech, like you said, you've gotta solve for process and people. Now. we are very fortunate. Lead2Pipeline, we work with some of the biggest and well-known tech companies in the world. And I would say a lot of the marketers we work with, they have developed their content and their position beyond the tech to the process that it's built upon. And the process that it optimizes and the ROI, right, or KPIs that delivers. The part that's really tricky, Jim, is how the heck do you get your customers to talk about their people? That's a very sensitive area to be used in from a marketing perspective.

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Dr. Jim K.:
Yeah. That's a great point that you bring out. I think the way that I approach it from a people lens is I actually start at the process and then work towards the people. So for example, in the use case that you just mentioned, you have an engineering role that's open. It's been open for three months. Nobody is making it past the second interview. So I already know that there's a process gap there. Because if it's three months for you to get to a candidate, to a second interview in engineering, due to the pace of the candidate marketplace, especially in technical roles, there are way more technical roles open, and the demand for technical talent far exceeds the supply. So if you're taking three months to get somebody to a second interview, there's a prop process problem there. Then I would look at, “Okay, let's talk about why does this process problem exist. So tell me about who is in charge of posting these positions out? Tell me in who's in charge of sourcing the right candidates? Tell me a little bit about who do you have that is responding in a timely manner to an application and then moving them to the next stage in the process? What's the timeline there?” So you tie—

You have to understand the overall process that you're operating in. You don't understand the business process that exists that your technology solves for. You're never gonna be able to talk through the people part of the equation. So you have to understand what a recruiting process looks like, what a candidate lifecycle looks like, what an employee lifecycle looks like, because that will help you communicate in each segment of that process. “Tell me about how this works. What are the blockers? Who owns it, and what are the challenges that that person who owns it is facing?”. And that's how you get to the people part of the conversation is tied to the process.

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Sourabh:
Perfect. And I love this because I think you're right. I think even though you may understand the people, right, and you may be able to solve for it, like I was saying, it's very hard to message that from a privacy perspective. But there's an angle on process changes that were enabled by people that can still be used to craft a story for other prospects or potential major ABM accounts, target accounts you're going after is, “Look, this other client did these things. If you just go down this path, you can achieve a similar, you know, success”. I'm gonna take this into one step further. Let's say we have, right, for our HR tech solution, let's say we have a number of interested leads. We've got directors of HR or talent acquisition or retention or employee experience across the board that have engaged with us. So lots of top of funnel leads. We're not very clear on their intent, but they've gone cold. So this is now an expert selling question, right? We've got them in our database, they see our emails, they see our campaigns, but they're no longer engaging the way they did initially. What have you found when you're talking to HR leaders is a way to reengage trust or excitement or urgency towards what you're trying to bring them to towards the best practice.

Dr. Jim K.:
‍So there's probably a couple of things that I would recommend, and one of those things happens at the initial moment where they've expressed some interest. I think where a lot of sellers go wrong is just because somebody has raised their hand for a conversation doesn't mean that they're even problem aware or solution aware or any of those down funnel things. So the key discipline at that initial conversation or early stage conversation that people need to be able to exercise is this:

You need to be able to clearly articulate what are the core problems that you and your company solves for. So for example, we solve three problems. We help you find more people, we help you find more diverse candidates, and if you're a federal contractor, we help you remain compliant on your obligations. We're having a conversation. “So I'm glad that we had the chance to meet Sourabh. Would you mind telling me which one of these three problems is most critical for you to solve right now?” So if you're not opening those conversations with that and then digging in further, there's a lot that you can do here, but you're not digging in further, you're setting yourself up for a ghosting situation down the road.

Then let's say you didn't do that, and then that person has become non-responsive to your outreach. I would approach that person as if they're problem unaware and lead with content to them and say, “I'm working on X, Y, and Z topic that is relevant for people at your level. I'd like your expertise on solving this problem for the broader audience. Would you mind contributing or at least having a conversation where we can push your thought leadership out?” That creates the space for you to have a deeper conversation and bridge from somebody that is disengaged from you. Get them reengaged by leveraging their expertise. So the fundamental lesson there is, with a disengaged prospect, you have to go back to basics, which is fundamentally, you have to approach this environment and make your buyer the star of the show. And how do you do that? This is an exercise in making the buyer the star of the show, the hero of their story. And you do that by putting them on a pedestal and catching their expertise. That's how you get them reengaged.

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Sourabh:
‍I love it. I love it. I'm gonna switch gears because I got a question, and I gotta respond to the audience here, right? So the question is a little different than what we were discussing, but I think it's great for you, Jim. So HR buyers are often seen as “guarded”. This is an air quotes: “guarded”, right? Is social selling a viable channel and reaching out via social. Is that a viable channel for HR buyers? And I'm asking you, Jim, because this is actually pretty true, this perception of guarded buyers, for many industries that our clients sell into. What do you think?

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Dr. Jim K.:
I mean, you just said it right there. It's not unique to the HR buyer. If your buyer, regardless of function, doesn't know you, you can't approach that relationship directly. So this is where the future of sales relies on integrating both sales and marketing motions with a education mindset first. Because if you look at 100% of your marketplace and you understand the data behind it, 100% of your buyers are out there, but only 3% are actively in a buy cycle. So your responsibility as a seller is to build affinity relationship awareness across your entire buyer universe. So if you're not educating and inspiring that buyer universe to at least listen or build some affinity with you, you've already lost. So yes, if you haven't stood for anything, if you haven't established a point of view, if you haven't demonstrated some sort of subject matter expertise in an area that you operate in, obviously somebody is gonna be guarded.

Sourabh, you and I have... If we never talked and you asked me a question like, “Tell me about what your deepest, darkest priorities are for this year, and let me hear it”, I'm gonna look at you like, “Who are you and why am I gonna even answer that?I don't know you, I'm not gonna tell you that”. Well, I might because I kind of run off at the mouth, but most people won't. So that's the thing that you have to kind of keep in mind. Your first responsibility is looking at your buyer universe and asking the question, “How can I build relationships, affinity and trust across the entire buyer universe?” The answer to that is you have to be deliberate in educating and inspiring them with a point of view that you're pushing forward.

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Sourabh:
Perfect. I have two questions. I'm gonna take them quickly because we are gonna run out of time. And if we run out of time, I'll follow up with you, Jim. We get people answers. The first is what you said around subject matter expertise, and we have absolutely seen this, running campaigns, is the more touches, the more intent, the much, much better that lead is, right, going into the SDR, BDR, or if it's ABM, going into a designated account rep, we need those extra touches. A form fill is not gonna do it anymore, right? So that subject matter expertise, that content, that learning, that education that we can provide, right? For HR buyers, do you feel that has to be validated by a third party brand? Or can you produce that by yourself and be credible?

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Dr. Jim K.:
I think the best scenario is if you're integrating both approaches. If you're taking a self-serve education model, I think the best thing that you can do as a seller is niche down into a functional area of expertise or at least a market segment area of expertise and say, “I've talked to X amount of CHROs in this sector and they've said they experienced this problem, this problem, this problem”. And you can use it to pivot. Typically what I do in that scenario is I'll follow up and say, “You've been in this space for a while, it doesn't appear that you're dealing with this particular set of issues. I'm curious how did you solve these things?” Because that's a subtle shift, but if you take that approach, people are always eager to tell you when you're wrong and they will never admit if you are accusing them of having a gap in capability.

So that's why take the approach of, “You've got this solved, or at least I think you have this solved, tell me a little bit about how you solved it”. That opens the door for a conversation. So if you're doing it yourself, niche down into a micro segment versus trying to be an expert on everything. If you have some added resources, you can easily find third party resources that add it. You just need to frame it in a certain way. “Hey, I saw this, I thought it was interesting. This Gartner report points at some issues that they're dealing with. You look like you have this figured out based on your tenure at this organization. Tell me how you did it”.

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Sourabh:
Yeah, I love that. And especially for tech sellers, when you sell technology, one thing you are flush with is data. And like you said, niches in our world are features. So we have tons of data of feature usage and non-usage and feature adaptation, which to your point, points to processes, which bubbling this right back to the beginning. Now is coming to one of the key pain points is “How is that process affecting new talent acquisition or retention?”. I love this. Okay, the second question I have the follow up here was around data. So as tech companies and as tech sellers and marketers, we have tons of data, right? But how do HR buyers in today's world, where everyone's throwing reports at them and everyone's throwing trends and they probably have too many KPIs. To be fair, it's been a very rough two years for HR leaders, right? How are they currently viewing data? Do they want more data or do they want more insights and learnings from it?

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Dr. Jim K.:
That's a really good question, and I don't know if I can give a blanket answer, but what I can tell you is the way to leverage data appropriately and having it be meaningful for an HR buyer is to take the data that's available and tie it to an unseen or underappreciated insight that you're gonna bring forward. So for example, organizations are spending X amount of dollars on talent acquisition and talent acquisition tech. So because of my expertise, I know that on the retention and turnover front, for every person that you lose through turnover in your organization, you're gonna likely spend up to 200% of their first year salary and replacement costs to backfill that role. So what's the problem? The problem that I often talk about is if you're spending all of your attention on talent attraction without creating the proper infrastructure to retain your employees and develop them, you're throwing your money out in the street and setting it on fire. So that's the connectivity that you need to bring forward is tie it to the thing that people are probably less aware of or unaware of that lets them view their world slightly differently versus just sending them a report with 500 data points. That's not gonna be valuable.

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Sourabh:
Right? And especially

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Dr. Jim K.:
‍in that latter

Sourabh:
‍case. If you're throwing the data at it, then the work is being done by the buyer. And I mean, honestly, as a brand, that's actually not good for you if you can't even cater the story. Okay. So another question, and this might be one of the last ones. We're running outta time here, is around the complexity of buying in HR. Everybody has HR needs, now everyone's struggling, right? From a talent perspective even the world's top 10 loved companies are struggling. So am I right in assuming— and our attendees. Are they right in assuming that the number of buyers for a particular purchase has grown? Have the committee sizes grown? That's why it's taking longer? Or is it the same number of people, they're just not making a decision?

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Dr. Jim K.:
Wow, that's a really good question. So the short answer, and in the interest of time, I'll answer it two ways. One: you have to realize that any spend really above $500 is gonna get scrutinized in an organization. So the idea that you can single thread this and deal with one buyer... You're setting yourself up for failure, so you need to understand who's involved in the decision making process and bring all of them into the conversation as early as possible. And you can certainly leverage HR to kind of be your ally through the process. So you'd be foolish if you don't do that. The second part of the answer is that if you're not articulating the cost of staying put, if you're not getting that out from your buyer— and this goes back to the prioritization thing that I mentioned, we solve for three things.

“Which one of these is the highest priority? How does that manifest itself? Okay, what does that mean from your day to day? If this continues, what does that result in terms of your job?” And if they don't say, “If this continues for six months or 12 months, I'm gonna lose people”, or, “I'm gonna lose my job”, it's not a high enough priority to solve. So that's the other part of it is you have to be able to pin down the cost of the status quo. Otherwise, it's a nice-to-have and you wanna make sure, then here's the key point. If it's not a critical thing to solve right now, you need to get out what is a critical thing to solve right now and refer to one of your partners that can solve that, because that actually builds the goodwill and puts you in a consultancy role versus a transactional seller role. So that's all I gotta say about that. I'm Forrest Gumping that part of the answer.

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Sourabh:
‍No, but I really do love it. I think it's often overlooked, especially by tech marketers, right? Especially by US tech marketers. It is definitely overlooked that one of your biggest pain points is the status quo. You've got to attack the status quo. But to your point, it's got to be something that they can articulate, right? And hopefully in dollars, if not in dollars, then in timeline, or some combination of the two.

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