Fixing Employers and Broadening Talent Pools With Judy Ellis From AMS

Introduction  (00:01):

You’re listening to the Recruiting Daily Podcast. We are recording from HR Tech in Vegas. Thanks to our friends and partners at Jovio. We are talking to some of the best minds in HR and business, and digging into the most pressing issues in the workplace so you don’t have to. Here’s your host, William Tincup.

William Tincup (00:20):

Ladies and gentlemen, this is William Tincup and we are broadcasting live from Jovio’s Booth in Vegas at HR Tech. We have Judy from AMS on with us right now. And Judy, first of all, introduce yourself. Tell us who you are and who you work for and all that stuff.

Judy Ellis (00:38):

Hi, as you said, I’m Judy Ellis. I’m the head of diversity, equity, and inclusion advisory at AMS. And in that role, I do predominantly shorter-term projects, usually a year or less with our global clients to help them optimize their talent management processes from a diversity, equity, and inclusion lens.

William Tincup (01:04):

Do you find yourself also doing that for AMS proper, or do they have a different team that does that?

Judy Ellis (01:08):

We actually have our own internal director of diversity, Paul Modelly.

William Tincup (01:13):

Good.

Judy Ellis (01:13):

Yeah. It’s too big a job.

William Tincup (01:15):

That’d be too much. Helping clients and especially consulting with them on metrics and what their goals are and fixing the pipeline and all that type of stuff. I love that. But it made me nervous when you first said that. I’m like, “Does she have to do both?”

Judy Ellis (01:31):

Yeah. Too big a job for just…

William Tincup (01:32):

Way too big a job. All right. So I’m going to hand you a magic wand.

Judy Ellis (01:38):

Thank you.

William Tincup (01:39):

And if you could fix anything in talent sourcing… You have your magic wand, what would you fix?

Judy Ellis (01:48):

I would fix employers’ understanding that talent comes from all kinds of pools. We’re starting to get the memo, so to speak on that.

William Tincup (02:04):

Yeah, sort of.

Judy Ellis (02:05):

Yeah, sort of, but I still find too many of our clients thinking that “There’s a secret pool of more talent, at this Ivy League”, or “If I could just attract talent from Company X to come here” versus having that broader perspective that there’s all kind of talent and it’s not that hard to find them or to get them included in your process.

William Tincup (02:34):

A Hundred Percent. And to diversify the top funnel of your pipeline. And I think we’ve made strides, which is kind of a backhanded compliment to all of us. I think it was a couple of years ago that HBCUs, we could go source from HBCUs… We didn’t know that already? Okay, seriously?

Judy Ellis (02:56):

And I’ve had someone recently ask, are HBCUs accredited?

William Tincup (03:00):

Oh no. That breaks my heart.

Judy Ellis (03:02):

Yes, they are.

William Tincup (03:05):

Yes, they are. Oh, that breaks my heart. But it’s like, okay, that’s a spoke in a much larger wheel of talent.

Judy Ellis (03:15):

Yes.

William Tincup (03:16):

First of all, I just love the answer, because you’re looking at talent. You’re saying, “Hey, like we do with ideas, great ideas can come from anywhere. If you open up your mind and your awareness to let good ideas… Can great ideas come from everywhere?” Talent’s the same thing. Great talent can come from everywhere, but you have to open up your mind and be aware and just let that talent come, or seek it out. And I think what we need to do now is more of the seek it out, go find it and bring it in. Thank you so much for your time and your wisdom.

Judy Ellis (03:48):

Thank you. Love being with you.

William Tincup (03:50):

You’ve been wonderful.

Speaker 4 (03:51):

You’ve been listening to the Recruiting Daily podcast. Live at HR Tech, graciously sponsored by Jovio. For all other HR recruiting and sourcing news, check out recruitingdaily.com.