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Archives for June 2026

In Conversation with Michael Ang

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In Conversation with Michael Ang is the CEO and founder of JobElephant

What is the most overlooked metric in recruitment, and why does it matter?

Michael Ang:

The most overlooked metric in recruiting is not time-to-fill or even cost-per-hire. It is source quality and source accuracy. Most organizations still cannot reliably tell you where their best candidates actually came from, and that creates a massive blind spot in hiring strategy and especially spend.

The fact that nearly every application still asks, “How did you hear about this job?” tells you everything you need to know. That question is a relic from the newspaper advertising era, yet it survives because most recruiting systems still struggle with true attribution. Over 50% of the applicants select a source that is not accurate. The result is that HR teams are often making budget decisions using incomplete or inaccurate data.

Clicks are easy to measure. Applications are measurable. But what actually matters is which sources consistently produce qualified applicants who interview well, get hired, perform and stay. Too many organizations optimize for volume because volume is visible, while quality is much harder to track.

The fix is straightforward, but it requires discipline. Treat every source as an investment, not a line item. Measure application starts, completed applications, qualified candidates, interviews and hires by source. Then compare those outcomes against actual spend.

Once organizations start looking at recruiting through that lens, the data becomes very revealing very quickly. Some sources that appear “expensive” produce exceptional hires. Others generate lots of activity but very little value. Without accurate source tracking, companies often continue funding channels that create noise instead of results.

Source of hire is not just another reporting metric. It is one of the foundational inputs for making smarter recruiting, marketing and workforce decisions.

When budgets get cut, recruitment advertising is often the first thing to go. What is wrong with that approach?

Michael Ang:

Cutting recruitment advertising under budget pressure is like turning off the lights to save money and then wondering why no one can find the door. The candidates you need do not disappear just because your budget did.

What many HR leaders miss is that reducing advertising does not reduce reach evenly. It reduces visibility selectively. Active job seekers on the major platforms may still find you. But many of the most valuable candidates, including faculty researchers, public health leaders, specialized engineers and other hard-to-reach professionals, are not spending their days scrolling large generic job boards. They follow niche publications, industry associations and specialized communities tied directly to their profession. The moment an organization cuts those channels, it often disappears from that talent market entirely.

The smarter approach is to audit before you cut. Identify which channels consistently produce qualified applicants, strong interviews and actual hires, then protect those investments first. High-traffic platforms with low conversion rates are often better candidates for reduction than highly targeted niche sources with smaller but far more relevant audiences.

Organizations that treat recruitment advertising as a measurable performance investment instead of overhead make better decisions under pressure. More importantly, they maintain access to the talent pools that matter most while competitors quietly disappear from view.

What do mission-driven organizations consistently get wrong about recruitment advertising?

Michael Ang:

Mission-driven organizations often make the mistake of treating recruitment advertising as an expense instead of an investment, and that mindset changes everything downstream.

These organizations usually have a real advantage because purpose matters. Strong missions attract attention and create emotional connection with candidates. But many HR teams mistakenly assume the mission alone is enough to carry the recruiting effort. They post jobs on a few large general platforms and expect the right people to find them. Then they are surprised when the applicant pool feels shallow, misaligned or lacks the diversity and specialization they hoped to attract.

The mission creates interest. The strategy determines who actually applies.

Every search is its own marketing campaign with a specific audience. A faculty role in marine biology requires a completely different outreach strategy than a nursing position, a public health leader or a public policy director. Different audiences consume information in different places, trust different sources and engage with different communities.

The organizations that consistently outperform are the ones that approach recruiting with precision. They define the target audience, identify the right distribution channels, measure performance and adjust based on outcomes instead of assumptions.

Mission is powerful. But mission without strategy is rarely enough to consistently produce the hiring outcomes organizations expect.

If you could describe the current mood of the workforce in 2026 using just one word, what would it be? Why?

Michael Ang:

“Cautious.”

That word captures what we see in real-time job ad data every single day. Across higher education, nonprofits and public agencies, the sectors we serve, hiring activity has not rebounded the way many predicted. In 2025, roughly one in eight of our clients posted no new roles at all. That is not a pause. That is a freeze. The last time we saw that level of decline was 2009, during the Great Recession.

The signals driving that caution are structural, not emotional. Policy uncertainty slows budget approvals. Grant delays stall research hiring. Tariff swings make workforce planning feel like a moving target. Even employers who want to hire are waiting for clearer signals before they commit. Optimism is healthy, but it has to match the operating environment. Right now, the data points to “wait and see,” not “go.”

We talk a lot about “gut feeling” in hiring. How are you using data to challenge your own biases, or the biases of hiring managers, when it comes to hiring, retaining, or promoting underrepresented talent?

Michael Ang:

Gut feeling is a luxury that underrepresented candidates cannot afford. When hiring managers rely on instinct, they tend to hire people who look and sound like them. Data is the antidote to that pattern.

At JobElephant, we use applicant tracking system integrations to evaluate how targeted, niche job boards perform compared with generic platforms, so hiring decisions rely on reach and results rather than assumptions. Our analysis of 439,599 job postings across 370 publications showed that ads placed in specialized publications generated 4.3 million impressions and 2.8 million clicks in 2024. Those numbers tell you exactly where your message lands and who is paying attention.

The business case for inclusive hiring is equally data-driven. Companies that build inclusive workforces report 19% higher innovation revenues and are 35% more likely to outperform their competitors. That is not a talking point. That is a competitive advantage hiding in plain sight. When hiring managers push back on broadening their candidate reach, the numbers move the conversation forward. Feelings fade. Data sticks.

What is the biggest myth about working in HR that you wish would die?

Michael Ang:

That posting a job means candidates will come. They will not. Not automatically, and not the right ones.

After 25 years of working alongside HR teams, the single most expensive assumption I see is that a job listing on a major platform is a hiring strategy. It is not. It is a starting point at best. The real work is understanding which channels reach the specific talent you need, how your message performs in real time, and what the data shows about where qualified candidates are actually coming from.

HR professionals deal with disconnected technology. Job boards and applicant tracking systems operate in silos, which means critical data falls through gaps. Organizations end up making hiring decisions based on incomplete or unreliable information, and they do not know why the right candidates are not applying. The question “How did you hear about this job?” remains standard in 2026 only because modern systems still cannot reliably track where candidates originate. That is a technology failure masquerading as a process.

The myth that posting equals hiring costs organizations time, money and top talent every day. The sooner HR leaders treat recruitment advertising as a living, data-driven campaign rather than a checkbox, the better their results will be.

What is one task AI will never be able to replace in your people strategy?

Michael Ang:

Trust. AI cannot build it, and it cannot repair it when it breaks.

Every interaction a candidate has with your organization creates an impression, from the first job posting they read to the final offer conversation. AI can optimize the language in that posting, predict which platform delivers the best reach, and score resumes with more consistency than a human reviewer. What it cannot do is make a candidate feel seen, heard and genuinely valued as a person.

The most telling moment in any hiring process is rejection. A candidate who receives a thoughtful, human response after being passed over can still walk away as a brand advocate, a future applicant or a referral source. A candidate who receives an automated form letter walks away with a story to tell. That story lives on Glassdoor, in professional networks and in every conversation they have about your organization going forward. No algorithm manages that outcome.

At JobElephant, we built our technology to handle the analytical heavy lifting, so our people have more time to focus on the relationships that data cannot build. That balance is not a feature. It is the strategy.

Michael Ang is the CEO and founder of JobElephant, a recruitment advertising technology company serving higher education, government, health care and nonprofits. Michael Ang launched JobElephant in 2000 and scaled it nationally by pairing proprietary ad tech with high-touch service. Michael Ang focuses on simplifying hiring through smarter job distribution, predictive recommendations and clear performance reporting, so HR teams can see what works and move budget accordingly. Michael Ang still works directly with accounts to ensure every campaign delivers measurable results.

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In Conversation with Dr Kathryn Page

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In Conversation with Dr Kathryn Page, Leadership Partner at ByMany

HR has been through the wringer lately. From being the ‘bad guys’ during layoffs to the ‘fun police’ during RTO, a lot’s been happening. If you could clear the air right now, what is the one thing you wish every employee understood about HR?

Dr Kathryn Page:

HR professionals often get a bad rap – and often unfairly in my experience. Most HR professionals (and I put myself as an organisational psychologist in this bucket) care deeply about people. It is often why we were drawn to the profession.  What is difficult however is that we often sit in the middle of tensions that don’t have easy answers. We are navigating the needs of employees, leaders, customers, regulators and the business all at once. Many days it feels like trying to solve a rubiks cube (minus the YouTube videos that explain exactly how to solve them!)

 HR requires a weird mix of skills. You have to be part lawyer, part therapist, and part data analyst. If we stripped away the job title, what is the one ‘superpower’ you rely on most when the office is on fire?

Dr Kathryn Page:

Sensemaking.

In my work, I spend a lot of time helping leaders navigate complexity, uncertainty and change. The temptation in those moments is to rush to solutions.  I’ve learned that the most valuable thing you can do is slow down long enough to understand what’s really happening.  Often the issue presenting itself (or that others are adamant you need to solve) isn’t the issue that needs solving. The ability to listen deeply, spot patterns, challenge assumptions and help people make meaning together is invaluable when organisations are under pressure.

If you could describe the current ‘mood’ of the workforce in 2026 using just one word, what would it be? Why?

Dr Kathryn Page:

I’d say ‘Stretched’.

People are being asked to deliver more, adapt faster and absorb constant change, often without removing anything from their plate.  AI, transformation programs and economic pressures have increased expectations, but many organisations are still operating with assumptions about capacity that no longer hold true.  The challenge for leaders isn’t helping people squeeze more into the day. It’s designing work that is sustainable in a world that never stops accelerating.

It is a common notion that an HR team is called upon by leadership only during times of crisis. Have you ever felt that pressure to be the ‘fixer’ in a broken system?

Dr Kathryn Page:

As an advisor to HR leaders, one pattern I see repeatedly is the expectation that HR will solve problems that were never created by HR in the first place. A great example of that is burnout or engagement issues – two issues that leaders often expect HR to deal with. But both of these issues originate in the way work is designed and led at the business or work group level.

One of the most powerful shifts I see in leading organisations is moving from asking, “How do we help people cope?” to asking, “What are we asking people to cope with?”

What is the biggest myth about working in HR that you wish would die?

Dr Kathryn Page:

That HR are responsible for employee wellbeing. Yes, we can influence this and maybe run more programmatic responses. But programs alone (and therefore HR people) can’t make people more resilient, productive or adaptable. I would 100% agree that those skills matter – in fact, I would say they are absolutely vital for work today. However, I also know from my two decades of research in organisational psychology and public health that work itself is one of the strongest drivers of mental health, engagement and performance.

In my view, the future of HR isn’t helping people survive work. It’s helping organisations design work that is good for people in the first place.

 HR is often described as a thankless job—you’re the villain when things go wrong and invisible when things go right. Why do you stay? What is the specific feeling that reminds you, ‘This is why I do this’?

Dr Kathryn Page:

Because work matters. We spend more of our waking lives working than doing almost anything else. Work shapes our health, confidence, relationships, identity and sense of contribution. It is, as I alluded to in my response to the previous questions, a social determinant of health

What keeps me passionate about this work is seeing the ripple effect. When a leader changes how he or she leads, a team might start having better conversations. When conversations improve, someone might feel safe enough to speak up. When people speak up, a source of frustration that’s existed for years might get redesigned and removed.

Those moments may seem small, but these small moments compound. And when we improve work, even in small ways, we improve lives.  

What is one task AI will never be able to replace in your people strategy?

Dr Kathryn Page:

AI will help us analyse work. It won’t replace our responsibility to decide what good work looks like. The most important questions organisations face are fundamentally human ones: What kind of culture are we creating? What trade-offs are we willing to make? How much is enough? What does success look like?

Technology can help answer operational questions. Humans still need to answer moral ones.

 What is one book every leader in HR should read?

Dr Kathryn Page:

I’m biased, but I would love leaders to read my book, Good Work: Transform your work from the inside out.  I have written this book partly for HR Leasers as a bit of a distillation of two decades of knowledge into a blue print of sorts. Outside of this, I’d encourage leaders to read broadly beyond traditional HR texts.

One book I’d recommend is The Good Jobs Strategy by Zeynep Ton. Its central argument is that investing in better jobs isn’t at odds with performance and can be a driver of performance. At a time when many organisations are trying to balance productivity, wellbeing and adaptability, that’s an important idea for leaders to wrestle with.

If you had an unlimited budget for one year but could only spend it on one area of the employee experience (e.g., wellness, learning, compensation, physical space), where would it go and why?

Dr Kathryn Page:

Work design. Without hesitation. In fact, I wouldn’t spend it on wellbeing programs. I’d spend it on improving the quality of work itself. The way work is designed (i.e. things like workload, autonomy, role clarity, connection, learning opportunities and recovery) shapes almost everything else. It influences performance, engagement, wellbeing, retention and innovation.

I’d invest in helping leaders redesign jobs, teams and systems so that good work becomes the default, not something employees have to fight for. In my experience, the highest-return wellbeing strategy isn’t a wellbeing program. It’s better work. It is not as easy to do as implementing a program but over time, I genuinely believe creating better work will help to create a better world.

Dr. Kathryn Page is an organizational psychologist, author, and leadership partner at ByMany, who has spent her career asking one big question: What makes work good for us? Based in Melbourne, she has worked with leaders across industries to design work that protects people, fuels wellbeing, and unlocks performance. Her clients include some of the world’s largest companies and health systems, and her research is cited broadly. Her new book, Good Work:Transform Your Work from the Inside Out (Wiley, May 11, 2026), shows how leaders and teams can design work that’s both human and high performing. Learn more at bymany.com.au

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In Conversation with Matt Poladian

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In Conversation with Matt Poladian, Chief People Officer, Liferay

Thank you for joining us, Matt! Let’s begin with the current ‘mood’ of the workforce in 2026! Using just one word, how would you describe it? Why?

Matt Poladian:

“Fearful. And I don’t say that to be dramatic. I say it because I think it’s honest.

There’s real anxiety in the workforce right now, in tech and outside of tech, and a lot of it is being driven by what people are saying about AI. Some CEOs have said publicly that people should watch out because AI is going to take their jobs. Other leaders have talked about how people can be quickly left behind if they don’t get “on board.” I don’t think this is particularly helpful. When you tell people to fear something, their imaginations take over and they start filling in the blanks themselves. Mercer reported that 40% of workers now fear losing their job to AI, up from 28% two years ago, so the impact of these narratives is measurable and consequential.

What I keep coming back to is that the antidote to fear is knowledge. I recently read an excerpt from a letter written by a farmer in the 1800s who was afraid the industrial revolution would take away his livelihood. Of course, with hindsight, we know that the industrial revolution also expanded economies and helped create new kinds of opportunity. I’m not saying I have a crystal ball. I’m just saying leaders have a responsibility to help people be a little more measured in how they think about change.”

Have you ever felt that pressure to be the ‘fixer’ in a broken system?

Matt Poladian:

Absolutely. A lot of the pressure on HR leaders today comes from managing digital transformation.

HR leaders used to spend most of their time on culture and the employee lifecycle. Now, the head of HR is often one of the biggest owners of an organization’s internal tech stack. I am the executive sponsor of   a dozen or so SaaS tools, and IT-related decisions now take up close to 20% to 25% of my decision-making space. That shift happened quickly, and a lot of people in HR were never really trained for it.

So you end up being called in to help solve problems HR didn’t necessarily create: systems that don’t talk to each other, tools employees aren’t adopting, or frustration from people who feel like technology is being done to them instead of for them. None of that starts as an HR problem, but HR often feels the impact when the people side breaks down.

HR leaders don’t need to become technologists overnight, but we do need the right relationships early with IT, legal, procurement and project managers, so that when we’re brought in to solve something, we’re not doing it alone.

What is the biggest myth about working in HR that you wish would die?

Matt Poladian:

That being a “people person” and being tech-savvy are somehow opposites.

I still hear HR professionals say, “I don’t deal with tech, I’m a people person,” and I don’t think that holds up anymore. Technology is part of the employee experience now. The tools people use to collaborate, manage performance, find information, get support and communicate with each other all shape how work feels. And AI magnifies all of that.

That doesn’t mean HR leaders need to become engineers. But we do need to understand enough about technology to ask the right questions, choose the right partners, and make sure tools are actually helping people. Because when technology is implemented well, it can create more human connection, not less. We saw that clearly in 2020, when platforms like Zoom and Teams helped people see each other’s faces at a time when many felt isolated. Technology can deliver real human warmth when it’s used thoughtfully.

If you could ban one corporate buzzword forever, what would it be?

Matt Poladian:

“AI will take your job.”

I know that’s more of a phrase than a buzzword, but it has become its own kind of corporate currency, and I’d love to retire it as quickly as it emerged. The language we use around AI is doing real damage to how employees relate to it. When people hear that framing, they start “protecting” themselves from AI instead of learning how to leverage it in their careers.

What I try to do instead is show people the tangible upside. We’ve built AI into parts of our product, and it’s helping us open new conversations with customers. That’s something to celebrate, as long as we’re using it responsibly. The conversation needs to shift from “watch out” to “here’s what’s possible.”

What is one task AI will never be able to replace in your people strategy?

Matt Poladian:

The personal relationship required to reach someone who has completely shut down.

We’ve been looking at a five-stage AI adoption model, and we actually added a “stage zero” because there’s a category of employees who aren’t just slow to adopt, but have folded their arms and decided, “this isn’t for me.” No policy, webinar, or AI-generated communication is going to reach that person on its own.

What reaches them is their colleagues and their manager. Someone who knows them, has built trust with them and can understand what’s underneath the resistance. That kind of human relationship is what helps people move from fear or avoidance to curiosity.

What is one book every leader in HR should read?

Matt Poladian:

Quiet by Susan Cain.

It’s a book about introversion and extroversion, and how people show up differently in group settings. But when I read it, I kept thinking about something beyond what the author originally intended: virtual and in-person participation has become its own version of that dynamic.

In a hybrid meeting, the virtual participant can sometimes show up like the introvert in the room: present and engaged, but structurally disadvantaged by the environment. That insight shaped how I think about hybrid work. At Liferay, I’ve recommended that virtual meetings happen on the days when everyone is remote, so no one is the person on a screen looking into a room.

To me, that’s the mark of a great book. It gives you a framework you can apply beyond the exact situation it was written for.

If you had an unlimited budget for one year but could only spend it on one area of the employee experience (e.g., wellness, learning, compensation, physical space), where would it go and why?

Matt Poladian:

Learning. Specifically around helping people understand and adopt the technology that’s already available to them. A McKinsey study found that 80%+ of organizations using AI haven’t seen enterprise-level impact yet, so there is clearly a deployment-vs-adoption gap.

I look at what companies are spending on AI tools and then I look at how people are actually using them. Right now, a lot of usage is still glorified Google searches, or expensive “rabbit trails” that drain token usage. We’re not getting close to the full value these tools can deliver.

If I had an unlimited budget for a year, I’d pour it into closing that gap. Not just webinars, but hands-on, gamified, practical learning experiences. McKinsey finds that organizations using gamified training see up to a 50% improvement in engagement and retention rates. We ran a competition on my team where people had to find a real AI use case that solved a problem they were facing at work. We got 18 ideas back. People built things, recorded presentations, and competed for a chance to attend a conference together. That kind of learning sticks. It improves productivity, but more importantly, it changes how people relate to the technology. They stop seeing AI as something to fear and start seeing it as something they can use. You can’t put a number on what it’s worth to have a workforce that is curious instead of fearful.

Matt Poladian is the Chief People Officer at Liferay, a global technology company. In that capacity, he is responsible for all areas of HR across the company's worldwide offices and several hundred remote employees. Before joining Liferay, Matt held various HR business partner and HR manager roles at large companies, most recently within Disney's Animation studios. He has degrees from UC Irvine (MBA) and Claremont McKenna College (BA). Matt keeps busy outside of work holding several non-profit leadership positions. His most important role is as husband to Jenny and dad to their three young kids.

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In Conversation with John Younger

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In Conversation with John Younger, JobElephant Talent Acquisition Team

Thank you for joining us, John! HR has been through the wringer lately. From being the ‘bad guys’ during layoffs to the ‘fun police’ during RTO, a lot’s been happening. If you could clear the air right now, what is the one thing you wish every employee understood about your job?

John Younger:

I wish employees understood that HR is only as strong as the operational systems behind it. In my role working with PEOs, HROs and HRIS platforms, we sit in the infrastructure layer that supports payroll, benefits administration and workforce data. Most decisions are not personal or arbitrary. They are the result of how those processes are designed to function and what systems they require to stay accurate and compliant.

HR requires a weird mix of skills. You have to be part lawyer, part therapist, and part data analyst. If we stripped away the job title, what is the one “superpower” you rely on most when the office is on fire?

John Younger:

Pattern recognition through people.

Not policy. Not process. Not even data. People.

When things start going sideways, most organizations immediately reach for rules, workflows and dashboards. Sometimes that helps. Often, it just creates more noise. The better approach is usually figuring out what is actually happening underneath the surface.

What is the person really worried about?
What are they not saying?
What problem are they trying to solve that nobody has named yet?

That’s where emotional intelligence matters. Not as some soft HR buzzword, but as the ability to quickly read a situation, lower the temperature, and help people think clearly again.

The irony is that I spend a huge amount of time around recruiting technology and AI. AI can rank resumes, score candidates, predict behavior and automate massive parts of the hiring process. But in the moments that actually matter — the difficult conversations, the trust issues, the judgment calls, the “something feels off here” moments — human intuition still wins.

Curiosity is a huge part of that. The people who ask better questions usually solve problems faster than the people with the strongest opinions.

When the office is on fire, the superpower is not panic management. It’s helping other people become calm enough to make good decisions again.

 If you could describe the current mood of the workforce in 2026 using just one word, what would it be? Why?

John Younger:

“Recalibrating.”

I do not think workers are disengaged or lazy or checked out the way some headlines suggest. I think people are trying to figure out where they fit in while AI changes the rules underneath them in real time.

The questions candidates ask today are very different than they were even two years ago.
Will this job still exist in three years?
What skills actually matter now?
Is this company investing in people, or quietly trying to automate them away?

That uncertainty changes everything.

On paper, the labor market looks more stable because people are moving around less. But I think a lot of that is caution, not loyalty. Many workers are staying put because the market feels unpredictable and because they are still trying to understand what the future of work actually looks like for them personally.

That creates a huge opportunity for employers and recruiters who can communicate clearly.

The companies winning right now are usually not the ones offering the highest compensation. They are the ones telling the clearest and most believable story about where the organization is headed, why the role matters, and how the employee grows along with the business.

People can handle change. What they struggle with is uncertainty without context.

We talk a lot about “gut feeling” in hiring. How are you using data to challenge your own biases, or the biases of hiring managers, when it comes to hiring, retaining, or promoting underrepresented talent?

John Younger:

“Gut feeling” is often just pattern recognition with confidence attached to it.

The problem is that people tend to define “qualified” as “looks like the last person who succeeded here.” That is where bias quietly enters the process.

Honestly, I think the resume itself creates a huge amount of bias before a conversation even starts. Names, schools, job titles, employment gaps, formatting — humans react to all of it instantly, whether they realize it or not.

That is one place where structured AI tools can actually help if they are designed correctly.

Instead of screening people based primarily on resumes, we see much better results when candidates answer role-specific questions tied directly to the actual work. The system can evaluate responses against predefined criteria instead of superficial signals that may have nothing to do with performance.

But the important part is that AI should support human judgment, not replace it.

One technique I use a lot is intentionally testing my own first impression. If I immediately think a candidate is exceptional, I look for contrary evidence. If I initially think they may not be a fit, I force myself to look for signals that I may be wrong. Most hiring managers do not naturally do that.

The goal is not removing humans from hiring. The goal is reducing the noise so humans can focus on the things that still matter most — curiosity, adaptability, self-awareness, resilience and the ability to grow.

Those qualities rarely show up cleanly on a resume, and most algorithms still struggle to measure them well.

It is a common notion that an HR team is called upon by the leadership only during times of crisis. Have you ever felt that pressure to be the ‘fixer’ in a broken system? 

John Younger:

“Culture fit.”

I think it has probably done more damage to hiring than almost any phrase in recruiting.

The problem is that “culture fit” sounds objective when it usually is not. In practice, it often becomes a vague veto that nobody has to explain. A candidate can clear every measurable hurdle and still get rejected because someone says, “I’m not sure they’re a fit.”

That is where bias hides.

Usually what people actually mean is one of three things:

  • This person communicates differently than we do 
  • This person challenges the status quo 
  • This person does not remind me of the last successful employee 

None of those automatically predict poor performance.

The better approach is defining what success in the role actually requires. What behaviors matter? What working style matters? What values matter? Then ask every candidate the same questions and evaluate the answers consistently.

That is a hiring process.

“Culture fit” is often just a vibe check pretending to be a business strategy.

If you could change one legacy process that currently causes the most friction for employees, what would it be?

John Younger:

The job application process.

It is still one of the most broken experiences in business, and somehow everyone has accepted it as normal.

We ask candidates to upload a resume and then spend the next 20 minutes manually re-entering the exact same information into disconnected fields. From the candidate perspective, it immediately signals that the company values process over people.

And that is before the real technical problems even start.

Most recruiting systems still do a terrible job sharing data cleanly between job boards, career sites and applicant tracking systems. Information gets lost, recruiters duplicate work, reporting becomes unreliable and qualified candidates disappear somewhere in the gaps.

What is amazing is that none of this is actually a hard technology problem anymore. It is mostly an integration and prioritization problem.

The companies creating the best candidate experiences are usually the ones treating recruiting like a connected system instead of a collection of disconnected vendors.

The goal should be simple: one clean flow from first click to hire.

Every unnecessary step costs candidates, recruiter time and ultimately good hires.

What is your formula for handling “brilliant jerks,” people who hit their numbers but damage team morale?

John Younger:

Most “brilliant jerk” problems actually start as hiring problems.

Organizations usually overvalue measurable output and undervalue the hidden cost of team damage. The spreadsheet says the person is performing. Meanwhile, everyone around them is exhausted, disengaged or quietly looking for another job.

That math eventually catches up with you.

The best way to handle brilliant jerks is to avoid hiring them in the first place. But that only works if you evaluate behavior with the same seriousness as technical skill or revenue performance.

Too many interview teams treat collaboration, humility and communication as “soft skills” and then act surprised when the team culture deteriorates.

I prefer defining behavioral expectations in observable ways:

  • Can this person disagree without becoming destructive? 
  • Do they share credit? 
  • Do they create clarity or chaos? 
  • Do people actually work better around them? 

One thing that also helps is collecting interview feedback individually before group discussion starts. Otherwise the loudest person in the room often shapes everyone else’s opinion.

And if the person is already inside the company, the answer is still fairly simple:
Name the behavior.
Define the expectation.
Set a timeline.
Hold the line.

High performance should never become immunity from accountability.

John Younger serves on JobElephant’s Talent Acquisition Team and blends deep technical expertise with hands-on recruiting leadership. John Younger earned a math and computer science degree from the University of Notre Dame and completed MIT’s AI program. John Younger founded six companies, holds multiple patents and has built AI-driven hiring solutions that speed up screening while preserving the human connection candidates expect. John Younger focuses on objective evaluation, structured interviews and candidate experience, helping teams hire faster with better signal and less bias across the full recruiting cycle.

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