Debra Young is Co-Founder/Managing Partner of Sheer Velocity, LLC a global retained executive search firm with headquarters in Denver, Colorado. Debra started Sheer Velocity in 2012 and has grown the business into a global organization with offices across the country and reaching 40 countries around the world through INAC Global Executive Search. Sheer Velocity is hired by organizations to find very specific executive leadership talent. Through Sheer Velocity's proprietary search process, they have solidified themselves as a thought leader in the executive recruitment space.
- CEO Hack: Staying open and humble, having a growth mindset
- CEO Nugget: Life and business is all about relationships – look at how you can help someone else
- CEO Defined: Being me, living out my passion, and changing lives for the better
Website: http://www.sheervelocity.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/debra-young-phr-shrm-cp-16810b7
Twitter- @debrajyoung
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Transcription
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[00:00:02.20] – Intro
Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast. Hello.
[00:00:02.20] – Gresham Harkless
Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast. Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast, and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Deborah Young of Shear Velocity LLC. Deb, it's awesome to have you on the show.
[00:00:39.60] – Debra Young
Thank you so much, Gresh. I'm excited to be here. I love your podcast.
[00:00:43.89] – Gresham Harkless
Yes. See, you already got my day started off really, really well by saying that. So, before we jumped in and heard about all the goodness that I'm doing, I wanted to read a little bit more about Deb because, you know, she's doing so many awesome things. Deb Young is a co-founder and managing partner of Share Velocity LLC, a global retained executive search firm with headquarters in Denver, Colorado. Deb started Share Velocity in twenty twelve and has grown the business into a global organization with offices across the country and reach in forty countries around the world through INAC global executive search. Share Velocity is hired by organizations to find very specific executive leadership talent. Through Share Velocity's proprietary search process, they have solidified themselves as a thought leader in the executive recruitment space. Deb, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?
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[00:01:31.40] – Debra Young
I am. I am.
[00:01:33.20] – Gresham Harkless
Awesome. Let's do it. So to kick everything off, I wanted to kinda, I guess, rewind the clock a little bit, and hear a little bit more on how you got started. Could you take us through your CEO story? We'll let you get started.
[00:01:43.59] – Debra Young
Sure. Sure. So, I fell into recruiting. Most people fall into symphony musicians. Mhmm. So, anyway, in my former life, I was a flutist. I was a symphony musician.
[00:02:00.40] – Gresham Harkless
Mhmm.
[00:02:00.90] – Debra Young
And life took a turn on me, and I wasn't able to do that anymore. So I had to reinvent myself, so to speak. Right? So I got recruited by a single gentleman who wanted to start an executive search firm. This was almost twenty years ago. And he wanted to open it in Denver. So here comes me. He followed me on Indeed or something, right, or Career Builders. And, anyway, we met and I asked him, I said, so what is it that I need to do? And he told me and I said, I can do that. Right?
[00:02:37.40] – Gresham Harkless
Mhmm.
[00:02:37.90] – Debra Young
Come to find out, I had zero relationships in corporate America. Zero. None. Because I was a musician, right? We weren't out in corporate America.
[00:02:49.09] -Gresham Harkless
Right.
[00:02:50.09] – Debra Young
So I had to do a lot of cold calling and a lot of pounding on doors, and I was actually quite successful at it. I built that office to the point where I became a partner with this gentleman, and we started to open other offices around the country.
[00:03:05.90] – Gresham Harkless
Awesome.
[00:03:07.00] – Debra Young
Four years into it though, I got recruited to a top five firm, which was really exciting. And I thought this is, you know, great for my career. So, I joined the top five firms, then I was there for about three years. I found out that it really wasn't for me, from the big company perspective. But what I did learn was the methodologies of how to self-search from a big firm and a boutique firm. So, about three years into it, my business partner whom I met at the big firm, and I started Sugar Velocity in two thousand twelve and started our own business. So we've been around, like I said, eight years now and have grown to have offices in Chicago, St. Louis, Denver, Seattle, and then through our global partners, Enoch Global Executive Search. We are, they're the very first consortium of boutique executive search firms around the world.
[00:04:06.90] – Gresham Harkless
Mhmm.
[00:04:07.50] – Debra Young
The first ones to have come up with that business model. So they somehow found us, and they did not have a US partner at the time. So long story short, we ended up joining the firm, and what's cool about it is we have partners in forty countries around the world, boutique firms in each country that we refer and exchange business with. But I don't have to oversee those international offices, which is really nice.
[00:04:36.39] – Gresham Harkless
Yeah. Absolutely.
[00:04:37.89] – Debra Young
So that's our story.
[00:04:39.89] – Gresham Harkless
Nice. I love that, and especially, like, creating, you know, that partnership as you kinda spoke to, you get that opportunity to have, you know, those same kinda like-minded, I guess, values and the organization be able to combine together, to to to make those opportunities exist for so many people. I absolutely love that. And I don't know. Do you find that this is kind of like a random question, but do you find, like, you being a flutist before, has that helped you in a lot of the work that you're doing now?
[00:05:06.60] – Debra Young
Yes. It actually has because, I was a performer, and I could get up in front of us, a room, you know, hundreds of people and perform from memory, big concertos and all that kind of stuff. And so getting up in front of a client, potential client, and trying to sell your business, you have to be able to have that outward personality, that, you know, ability to connect, across the table, so to speak, or across an audience.
[00:05:38.19] – Gresham Harkless
Yeah. I absolutely love that. Yeah. I love that perspective, and I always wondered that, but you're absolutely right. I think, you know, I say the same thing about communication is where, you know, communication is at its best when you understand who you're talking with and you're having that kind of back and forth. As you said, if you're performing, you also have to have that awareness of what's going on while you're still, you know, staying true to those things that you practice and be able to do. So I love to hear kinda how that transition is over.
[00:06:00.80] – Debra Young
Sure. Sure. I loved performing. It was mine I loved it.
[00:06:05.89] – Gresham Harkless
Yeah. I bet so. And, so I know we touched on it a little bit, but I wanted to hear a little bit more about sheer velocity. So can you take us through exactly, like, what you're doing for your clients and how exactly that process works?
[00:06:17.10] – Debra Young
Sure. We actually, have designed a very, proprietary search process, which has been our secret sauce, so to speak.
[00:06:28.39] – Gresham Harkless
Mhmm.
[00:06:28.89] – Debra Young
It's about looking at candidates from a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree perspective while having listened to, our client's needs, wants pains. Right? We have to find out from them what exactly is it that they're looking for. What does that individual look like? What kind of DNA does that person have that they believe is going to help them, again, grow? And at the end of the day, you know, drive the bottom line of their organization. So our job is to go out and find these individuals. So we created this process that looks at dead candidates from a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree perspective. We've got, upfront, very heavily technical skill set, of course, because if they don't have the technical fit, then there's no sense in starting.
But we have our own proprietary cultural alignment that we created that gets at, the things that are important from a cultural spec perspective at the leadership level, like teamwork, innovation, empathy, competitiveness, decision-making, financial execution, and management style, those kinds of things is what our alignment gets at. So we have candidates complete that and the client complete that at the same time. And so we have a baseline of the client compared to the candidate, and we can see degrees of separation and responses because what's the next biggest buzzword to Starbucks right now? It's a cultural bid. Right?
[00:08:00.50] – Gresham Harkless
Yeah.
[00:08:01.00] – Debra Young
So my mentor early on that I talked about taught me technical fit here, culture of personality leadership is here. Whereas everybody else has had it reversed all these years. So now culture is kind of coming to the top. So, that's part of our process. It's unique to us. And then we also do a written questionnaire on the top four must-haves that are nonnegotiable to our client from a technical perspective.
So we can, see truly, sometimes opportunities or are simply opportunities, skills that don't come through on a resume as much as they come through when you ask the behavior or any good question around a certain topic or skill set. Tell us the time and place when you did x y z. What were your challenges? What was the how did you achieve results? And so we ask, a behavior interviewing question and all four of the top must-haves from our client. But what's what's nice is you can either see if someone has their experience, right, because it comes shining through. Maybe not on a resume, but you look at the response and you're like, oh my goodness. They have what we're looking for Right? Or they don't.
[00:09:11.79] – Gresham Harkless
Mhmm.
[00:09:12.00] – Debra Young
The other thing that is really critical is being able to see how a leader communicates in writing. Right? Because you got you're gonna be communicating, you know, with your boss maybe or your board and seven eight throughout your organization. So you have to have great communication skills written. So we do that, and then, obviously, we do our, very unique behavioral interviewing questions. We're good at really creating good questions, and they're not cookie-cutter questions. They're unique to each search because each search has a life of its own and has its own needs and wants and whatnot. So, you know, we do the behavior interviewing. And then when we get to our top, you know, three, four candidates, we put them through the Hogan assessment, and I'm certified in Hogan.
So I've been doing Hogan, oh, gosh, for a long time. I'm certified in its administration and its interpretation, so you have to go to Holden School in order to get that. But it's an assessment of personality at the leadership level, and it gets at the seven characteristics of occupational, success. The eleven derailers are the dark side. We all have a dark side. Right? More so than other light others. Colorful, dutiful, bold, mischievous, excitable. So some of us derail quicker than others and are under stress, so this is what this is all about. And then the third is a motives and values and preferences inventory, and it gets at what environment aesthetically motivates you. Right? Is it recognition, power, altruism, hedonism?
So when you look at this person's assessment, you get a full reader across the board of their personality leadership skills. And the beauty of that whole thing is is it's designed to be used at the very end of a search process process when you're getting to your final candidates. And we provide, behavioral interviewing questions that were red flags in that person's Hogan assessment to be probed in the final interview for the hiring manager to help them make a better final hiring decision.
What's great about the process is when someone walks through the door on their first day on the job as a new leader because they just got hired, They've been through this process, and they know they should be set up for success. Right? All the i's were dotted, all the t's were crossed, and the client should know that they should be set up for success. And then, you know, it's it's a very robust process. We've had clients that have picked and chosen what they want, and what they don't want, but I believe I really believe strongly that if you have a good process, the end results cannot help but not most likely be good. Right?
[00:12:17.39] – Gresham Harkless
Appreciate you for sharing that and and, of course, the secret sauce. And so I wanted to switch gears a little bit, and I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app, a book, or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?
[00:12:31.29] – Debra Young
Well, first as far as business grows, and success starts happening with your business, you need to remind yourself to really stay open and humble, I believe. So going from being a young and really hungry entrepreneur to this industry superstar, so now what? Now what happens? How do you keep that fire lit to continually be challenged? And I think it's always having a growth mindset and as an owner, keeping your people engaged. Because the higher engagement I did a lot of studies on engagement, and the more your people are healthy, like in our firm, our belief is that our job is to set our people up for success. Right?
[00:13:13.60] – Gresham Harkless
Mhmm.
[00:13:14.50] – Debra Young
And if everybody felt that way, things you know, good things are always gonna happen. If your people are engaged, they're set up for success, they're whole financially, mentally, health, physically, and you look at that whole mindset, anything you can do to help that, I think, will really help your businesses continue to grow.
[00:13:38.50] – Gresham Harkless
Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. So I wanted to ask you now for what I call a CEO nugget. So that could be like a word of wisdom or piece of advice, or if you can happen to a time machine, what might you tell your younger business self?
[00:13:49.29] – Debra Young
Well, I think life and business are all about relationships, and that's what I have learned. You know, relationships we're in the relationship business. Everyone is in a relationship. Right? And if we can help each other out, be a net giver. We talk we all talk about going to networking events and meeting new people. The key, I believe, is to not always be looking at what's in it for you, but rather at how can you help someone else.
[00:14:15.20] – Gresham Harkless
Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. And now I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. And we're hoping to have different CEOs on the show. So, Deb, what does being a CEO mean to you?
[00:14:25.89] – Debra Young
So being a CEO to me to me, allows me to be mean, live out my passion that's very dear to me, and watch you grow into something meaningful that changes lives for the better. Because what we do really can be so impactful to say a com a family that really could use a little bit more money and a husband or wife needs a better opportunity. They need to be, you know, in a different kind of role or in a different geography.
[00:14:56.39] – Gresham Harkless
Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Well, Deb, truly appreciate that perspective, and I appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional you want to let our readers and listeners know, and then, of course, how best they can get ahold of you and find out about all the awesome things your team is working on.
[00:15:11.60] – Debra Young
Well, we do have a book out called before onboarding. It's written by our colleague, Michael Burrows. He's now a retired executive recruiter. He was with our firm for many years, and, he's doing executive coaching now, but we still use this process. One way to get ahold of me is on LinkedIn under Deborah j Young at on LinkedIn. Sheer Velocity's website is w w w dot Sheer Velocity dot com. That's s h e e r, velocity dot com, or you can reach me at 03:03 nine 09:01 five one eight.
[00:15:49.60] – Gresham Harkless
Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Thank you so much again, Deborah. We will definitely have those links and information in the show notes so that everybody can follow up with you. But, I truly appreciate you, for for providing, that hack as well too because I think so many times we sometimes forget about that onboarding process and how important it is to, as you said, make sure that, you know, not only our organization is successful, but the people within it are successful as way as well too. And I think that book and so many things that you guys are doing are, definitely helping so many organizations do that. So truly appreciate that reminder, and I appreciate your time even more. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.
[00:16:22.39] – Outro
Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.
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