In this second half of her story, Holly Bond comes full circle—returning to the recruiting world she once left behind, this time to rebuild it from the ground up. At Facets, she’s proving that scaling a business doesn’t require sacrificing soul. From her pay structure to her candidate experience to her team’s human-first process, Holly is quietly leading a revolution in executive search. She also drops some of the best job-seeking advice on the show to date—especially for Gen Xers navigating reinvention in an AI-shaped job market. Why She Said No for Two Years“I wasn’t going back unless I could build it on my terms.”Holly shares how she turned down the offer to lead a recruiting division—until the company agreed to let her rewrite the model with empathy at the core.From Commission to Compassion“I spent 90 minutes with a man in crisis. And someone called it non-revenue-generating time.”That moment made her walk away. Now, she leads a team that’s paid to care—not just to close.Human-First Headhunting“We’re not built for speed. We’re built for connection.”Facets was founded to serve both candidates and clients—not just fill roles. The process is slow by design, and that’s the point.Can’t-Miss Advice for Job Seekers“Keep your resume on your desktop—like a living will.”From networking mindset to real-world resume tips, Holly offers grounded, no-BS advice for job seekers of all ages, especially those in their 40s, 50s, and 60s.What AI Can’t Replace“We use AI to be more efficient—so we can be more human.”Holly explains exactly where AI fits into her recruiting process—and where it never will. Emotional nuance, creativity, and human connection? Still 100% analog._________________________Connect with us:Host: Vince Chan | Guest: Holly Bond --Chief Change Officer--Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself.Open a World of Expansive Human Intelligencefor Transformation Gurus, Black Sheep,Unsung Visionaries & Bold Hearts.EdTech Leadership Awards 2025 Finalist.15 Million+ All-Time Downloads.80+ Countries Reached Daily.Global Top 3% Podcast.Top 10 US Business.Top 1 US Careers.>>>150,000+ are outgrowing. Act Today.<<<
Chapter 1: Who are the hosts and what is the show about?
Hi, everyone. Welcome to our show, Chief Change Officer. I'm Vince Chen, your ambitious human host. Our show is a modernist community for change progressives in organizational and human transformation from around the world.
In the last episode, part one, we heard Holly's story of being a mother of two and taking 17 years to earn her college degree, all while starting and building a successful fitness franchise business. Now in part two, Holly will share with us why she decided to re-enter the recruitment industry. This time, she is the boss heading up a head-hunting business.
She will tell us about her human-first approach to serving not only her corporate clients, but also the candidates themselves. She will also offer valuable down-to-earth advice to job seekers. Holly, you've come full circle. You started as a recruiter, went through numerous transformations and challenges, and now you're back in recruiting. This time though, you're doing it your way.
What made you decide to return to recruiting? And how do you want it to be different this time?
Chapter 2: Why did Holly Bond return to recruiting after 20 years?
Yeah, when I talked to my friends, when I told them that I was going to do this, they all were shocked and they all laughed at me because I was a recruiter 20 years ago and there was elements that I really liked about it, but there was a lot that I didn't and I left. And I left because in recruiting, we're dealing with people.
People with families, people with emotions, and people are complex, right? At the end of the day, what we always have to remember as recruiters, people are very complex. And the parent company of my company is Royer Thompson. And Royer Thompson's been around almost 30 years. And Kim West is the president of Royer Thompson. And about seven years ago, she bought the company and she rebranded it.
She breathed a new, more innovative breath into it. And they're spectacular. The process is very filled with empathy and curiosity. And I have known Kim for years. And Kim came to me and asked me if I would open a new division of Royer Thompson, open a new, basically a new company. Royer Thompson does the C-suite, board and academia.
And when they were successfully conducting the searches, they would inevitably be asked to work on other searches, executive directors, senior managers. So that intermediate manager to more of a VP role. So we play in that space. And when she came and asked me, I said no. And I actually said no for almost two years because I remembered what it was like when I was a recruiter before.
And many recruitment companies work almost like real estate agents here in Canada, where they're paid 100% commission. So recruiters, not only do they go out and get the business, so they have to find the client. And when they find the client, that doesn't mean the client's going to give them a search. So they find the client and they have to network and build that.
When they do get a search, they place candidates and then they send the invoice and they probably get 50 to 60% of that invoice, whatever the company allows them to get. So it's very commission-based and you can make a lot of money. When I did it 20 years ago, when I was leaving, I was making a lot of money. It's very compelling, right?
And the more you do it, the more network you have, the bigger network is, and the easier it is to do the searches. I remember one day I was in my office speaking to this man. He was, I remember it exactly. He was 42 years old. He did not have his degree. And at that time, I did not have my degree. I was close, but I didn't have it.
And he didn't have his degree and he was working with his company for over 20 years and he was let go. They did a restructuring and he was let go. He had a wife and a daughter and every morning they would go off to school and work. He had been traveling 80% of the time for his work. So he was getting depressed and anxious and he was frozen. He was frozen, like in a panic.
He didn't know what to do. He's in my office and he gets very emotional. And then I talked to him about how to find a job. I was going through all the steps. This is what you're going to do. And he was leaving and he said, I feel so much better. Thank you so much. He said, but I know tomorrow morning I'm going to feel like rubbish. It's this wave of panic I can't explain.
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Chapter 3: What problems exist in traditional recruiting models?
So I realized that wasn't the space for me. So fast forward a couple, four years ago when Kim West comes to me and says, can you open a new division? And I said, absolutely not. I never, no. I know recruiters have a bad reputation and because they are commission-based, Their focus is on pleasing the client, not the candidate. We had these conversations on and off.
And then finally she said, what would it take? And I said, what it would take is for me to do it different. Hire people. I will not pay commission. We will hire people and pay them a wonderful salary. And we want them to do the job because they love it.
helping people find the place that they need to be and that they put that time in and have the empathy and the curiosity and they just do it because they love it. And so she said, okay, do that. For a lot of companies, this is what they want. And that's okay. I'm not saying the contingency recruiting is bad, but it's not for me.
But what recruiters in contingency say is, Vince, I can find that person for you, but I'm going to charge you 22, 25% of first year salary. But if I don't find that person, you don't have to pay me. So you have nothing to lose, Vince. Why wouldn't you use me?
But what that means internally to me as a recruiter, it means, Vince, I'm going to look, and if I can't find somebody really quickly, if it's really complex, if it's hard, and it's taking up all my time, I'm not going to do it because I'm not going to get the money because I'm on 100% commission, right? To me, it doesn't work when you're dealing with people.
So I came on board, I did focus groups and Vince, everything that you can possibly imagine somebody saying about a recruiter was said in that focus group. So I had 25 to 50 year olds in a focus group. They answered anonymously the questions that we had. And so the first question was, What words would you use to describe a recruiter?
And I knew it was going to be negative, most of them, but I thought it was actually quite funny, tragic, but the words that they were using, bloodsucker, just the worst words, selfish, high commission, you name it. It was, they were just not good. I had an analogy of somebody saying, a recruiter treats you like a canned good in a pantry.
They will reach in the very back of the pantry and grab you like you're an old can of beans, blow the dust, wipe the dust off the top. They will present that to the client, and if the client doesn't want that can of beans, they'll put it back in the very back of the pantry, and you will never hear from them again. And I thought that was... So when I started the company, I said, okay, that's easy.
We won't do that. That's very simple. That's easy. We'll treat candidates with the respect that they deserve and we will answer them when they email. We will answer them when they call because they don't get... answers, right? And so, yes, so we started FACET. We launched it almost two years ago.
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Chapter 4: How is Holly’s approach to recruiting different and more human-centered?
And I said, no, no, you, this, I want you to talk to me about this rule. And she said, me? And I said, yes, read it again. You could do this. And she called me and she goes, oh my gosh, I can. I could do it. She said, but I'm in my 60s. And I said, nobody cares. I don't care. We don't care. Age is a number. You're so wise. You've done this job a million times. You can do it.
But she was hung up because she's in her early 60s. And I wanted to tell people, That doesn't matter. That's when you're just, you have so much mind share of what you're working on. And those are the people that I just love it. To find people that haven't really pictured themselves in that role and then to tell them the reasons why they should.
Just a few weeks ago, I released an episode where I talked to a good friend of mine, Mary Shea, who is now partnering with an AI-driven HR tech company. They help corporate recruiters and executive search firms locate desirable candidates, not just for transactional positions, but also for unique senior opportunities. In that interview, Mary explained how the technology works.
I also shared my experience at age of 51, having job interview with some corporate recruiters that felt completely dehumanized. We discussed how AI might make the experience more personalized for experienced workers. Anyone interested can check out episode four in season two. But back to you, Holly, you're very much a people person, human-centric in your view.
Not to ask you to be at Oracle, but I would like to know in your opinion, how might AI technology add value to your process of searching for the right candidates? On top of that, what do you think is the competitive advantage of you as a human recruiter that AI cannot replace?
Yes, and that, of course, is the hottest topic, I think, in every sector and every organization. And certainly with this one and both Royer Thompson and Facet, we are very aligned. I think if you're doing mass recruiting,
I think that AI would be extremely helpful, you know, so if you're, for many reasons, but I, for example, if you're opening a new Walmart in a new city, I think AI would help you immensely. If you have to hire hundreds of people, I really do. And I think AI, we are using AI at Facet. We are not built for speed. We have a process and it works and we go through that process.
So each of our searches take about 10 weeks and we have it down Perfectly. But there are places in those phases, so it's four phases that we go through, and there are certainly times where AI will help us, especially help us not miss anything, help us become more efficient. Every month we have an efficiency meeting and we always talk about AI. So with LinkedIn Recruiter, for example, that uses AI.
We will use that to help source candidates and add to our pool. You've received this, Vince, where you get a message on your LinkedIn inbox and it goes, hi, comma, and then it'll have somebody asking you if you're interested in a job. And they've sent it out to 3,000 people. That's not us. We will never do that.
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Chapter 5: What is Holly’s vision for building a recruiting company with empathy?
And that's why if you put in the Boolean search for your AI tool, they would never have picked me up. I would have slipped through the cracks. You need to have a human eye. And if you only look to use AI to source individuals, you are going to miss some of the most incredibly talented people for this role. So... We understand and respond to emotions, right?
And we have years of nuanced understanding. So we have this intuition that has developed as we have those trips around the sun. But AI relies on data patterns and they will miss that. There's also so many gray areas. Human beings are meant to navigate complex dilemmas and work in the gray area, but an AI can't.
When I look at a role, when we, I shouldn't say I, when we look at a role, we will say, what adjacent careers would this person have had that, and I'm going to use think outside the box, like thinking outside the box, where else could this person be? Instead of we're looking for a senior director of finance, Where else could they be? Senior director of marketing in the ocean tech sector.
But where else could they be? Could they be in the agricultural sector? Thinking outside the box and offering creative solutions that go beyond any algorithms. And then to me, the reason why you get into recruiting or the reason why you get into doing podcasts like yours is the personal connection. Building a personal relationship is uniquely human. You can inspire people.
You can transform people. You can change the trajectory of their life because you care that AI cannot. So AI to me and to my group, it should be used to make us more efficient so that we can spend more time on personal connection. That's what we're using AI for. more time with people. And you have to be a job seeker in an AI-driven market, right? So you need to know how to balance both now.
Now, you've just brought up the final question of the day. Job seekers, whether they like it or not, have to navigate an AI-driven recruitment market. Personally, I still believe in the creativity, the human creativity you mentioned. as well as the human elements that make someone stand out as a desirable candidate.
But not every recruiter is like you, and not every firm has policies and approaches like yours. So if you could give advice to job seekers, regardless of age or culture, what would it be? especially for those in their late 40s, 50s, or even 60s, who might have been in one industry for a long time, but whose skills and experiences could be applicable across different sectors.
for candidates seeking changes and new opportunities? How can they position themselves better and stronger for this new norm?
It's really back when I was a recruiter, I would put a job in the paper and then come into work in the morning and I'd have resumes on the fax, like people would fax their resumes in. It's so funny how things have changed, isn't it? Half the people listening don't even know what a fax machine is. I think it's not funny. So one of the things that we do at Fastest is building your network.
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Chapter 6: How does Holly’s team treat candidates differently than typical recruiters?
So we have networking events that we've created where people, A, learn how to network, especially through COVID. Those skills have declined. And younger people who went to university and graduated through COVID, they didn't really learn how to do that. So showing them that networking is an art form and that it's an easy one, but it's an art form.
And it's something that you need to devote time every week to. and do it in a genuine way. Because personal connections, they are invaluable. You have to attend... What is your favorite industry? Attend those industry events. Go to the webinars. Put your camera on. Networking groups to build those relationships and get insights into the job opportunities.
Vince, I can't tell you how many times I am working with a client. They tell me the strategy. And in that strategy, they will say, next year we're going to hire this role, this role. And so I know...
these organizations and what they're going to be looking for when I'm talking to somebody I can say oh my gosh you know what next year this person is exactly who they're looking for and I will contact my client and I'll say look I know that you don't have the job right now but I have somebody that is perfect for the culture of your organization you would love them can I make the introduction and they do
And then they offer them a job that they've created a year early. So not all jobs are posted. And when you... This is going to sound a little bit out there, but I do believe that we are on a journey. And when you put it out there, the universe will conspire to get you what you want. If I want to move into another... kind of sector, then I will attend those industry events. I will talk to people.
I will think about it. I will read about it. And I will tell people, look, I'm looking for a job in this industry. Do you know any roles? And then you have informational interviews. Could I have 20 minutes of your time? Just to learn about you. Everybody loves talking about themselves. Tell me about you and your journey.
And then after you're done, do you know two other people that you could introduce me to? And then they will. And then you keep and that's how you network and you keep building it and they will give you two people. And then you just know who they are next time you're at an event or, you know, embrace lifelong learning in technology, AI.
It just shows adaptability and a commitment to growth and make sure that you update your resume. I tell people when I hire people and it's really funny because I see their faces when I say it. The first day at the job, I go, okay, you know the very first thing you need to do? And they say, no. I said, you need to get your resume and put it on your desktop.
You have the job description now because I just hired you and this is the job description. Update your resume. And they look at me like, do you want me to leave? I'm like, always have your resume on your desktop. Because when you have that big sale or you improve efficiency by 30% or whatever it is, go into your resume, make the change, and then it's always up to date. It's like a will.
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Chapter 7: What advice does Holly give about age and reinvention in the job market?
She didn't demand anything. She didn't call and leave a message on my machine. She just said this. And I said, can you talk right now? And I talked to her for 15 minutes. She took the risk. She just put herself out there. And I said, I'm going to put you forward. I haven't even interviewed you. I don't even know you. But I get such a great sense from you.
I'm going to put you on the list and tell them about my conversation and that I think that they should consider meeting you. And they are. She's going to get an interview, even though it was really shut down. So it's putting yourself out there and going after. So if you see him, you wouldn't believe how many times I say to people that are looking for jobs, I'll say. I've been here my entire life.
I have not left the east coast of Canada. And so my network is very deep and broad. And I will say to people, look, before you apply for a job, contact me. And just in case I know somebody there, because I can make a warm introduction. And very few people take me up on that. And I'm always interested. Because they know me, they know I'm genuinely meaning this. Very few people do.
And I'm always curious as to why, because I'm happy to help them. So if you're going to apply for a job, go into LinkedIn, see who you know that's connected to anybody in the company and go that route first. Find out, do research. Don't just apply for the job. Do your research first and get in and find somebody who knows somebody. Then work your way back from there.
The most important thing though is to be genuine, Whether you're writing a cover letter or interviewing, it's like any relationship. If I'm genuine and I'm telling you what I'm great at, what I love to do, what I'm not so great at.
And what I don't really like to do, and I'm telling you the honest truth, and the client is telling you the honest truth about their culture and how you can help them, and you're both telling each other, you're both being genuine, then you're going to develop a relationship based on honesty, just like any other relationship, any other human relationship.
It'll be genuine and honest, and it'll work. If you pretend that you know how to do something that you don't, if you are not genuine and honest...
like any relationship it's going to be rocky right and so i think it's that and networking i can't stress it enough the ai is out there but it's not a person and people will help you and you just need to expand the network and have fun doing it and make it part of your daily weekly routine. And you learn so much by having these conversations. But you know what?
I forgot one of the best things about networking. One of the best things about having a very large network, it's easier to help people, right? So it's not just networking so that you have
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Chapter 8: How does Holly use AI in recruiting and what can AI not replace?
I feel honored to be on your show and I felt honored when you sent me a message to be on your show because I've listened to the podcast. Your guests are phenomenal and I will continue to listen in the future. But it's so important. And your podcast is, it's different. I was listening to a podcast the other day. There was like three people on a panel.
And I had to turn it off because everybody's talking over each other. And it was like, it was just frustrating to try to listen to. And yours are... and the questions, you're asking the right questions. The questions that, if you ever listen to a talk show or an interview on the news, you're like, ask them this, ask them this, but they don't ask it. Yeah, or gender, because, you know.
Yes, exactly. And even Oprah Winfrey, I'm like, I asked them this question, why aren't you asking? But you ask the exact questions, and they're talking, and then I'm like, oh, what about this, though? And then you ask that question, the next question. It's like you're in my head. Yeah, I just love it. I've had interviews where I'm going through my career, but that's different. This is different.
This is walking through my journey and talking about it in a very human-centric and emotional way. And I just feel... I feel different. I feel so... It's like cathartic for me. I feel like I just had a therapy session and it made me stop and think about why did I do what I do? So... Thank you very much. That is the value.
That's the huge value for the people, your guests on your podcast, is that you give them the opportunity to think about things that they're busy people. Everybody's busy, but they're busy doing what they're doing. But you give them an opportunity to reflect on why they're doing it. And that is an incredible gift. That's the gift that you're giving people, Vince. So thank you very much.
Wow, this is truly amazing to get this kind of feedback from a guest on the spot during the show. I'm very, very grateful, Holly. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for joining us today. If you like what you heard, Don't forget, subscribe to our show, leave us top-rated reviews, check out our website, and follow me on social media. I'm Vince Chen, your ambitious human host.
Until next time, take care.
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