Confessions of a Recruiter
Confessions of a Recruiter is a podcast built for recruiters who want more than surface-level stories.We’ve stepped into a new era with a sharper look and a stronger voice. This rebrand isn’t just about a new logo. It reflects our commitment to real conversations, genuine insight, and a brand that matches the impact we’re making in the recruitment industry.If you're keen to be part of the journey, email us at [email protected]
Where to focus your time | COAR S3E15 Snippet
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Michael Johns | A Decade at Michael Page, Four Years Solo: What Actually Wins the Work | COAR S3E15
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Setting expectations for quality results | S3E14 Clip
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Ross Clennett | 38 Years in Recruitment: What the Industry Forgets, & What Still Works | COAR S3E14
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Recruitment has never had more technology, yet most desks still rise or fall on the same old inputs: quality conversations, sharp judgement, and the discipline to do the work that actually drives fees. We are joined by Ross Clennent, a recruiter since 1989, coach to agency owners, and the voice behind Recruitment News Australia, to unpack what’s changed and what stubbornly hasn’t from the landline era to today’s AI rush.
Ross takes us back to London in 1989 where a “candidate database” meant a manila folder of CVs and the KPI was si...
The Trap People Fall For | S3E13 Clip
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Christy Moses | State Director to CEO in 11 Months: The Calculated Risk That Paid Off | COAR S3E13
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We sit down with Christy Moses CEO of Miller Leith, to trace the moments that shaped her leadership style, from early sales training at Enterprise Rent-A-Car to building a long recruitment career across a global agency, a fast-growth startup, and an established boutique.
We get practical about what makes recruiters successful over the long haul: choosing a market you genuinely care about, building a name people trust, and learning when to push for new opportunities that don’t fit the usual “consultant to manager” ladder. Christy breaks down key account management in recr...
It's never gonna be the right time | COAR S3E12 Clip
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Luke Cotterell | Fired from Construction, $1K to Start, $80K a Month: What Happens When You Just Give It a Crack | COAR S3E12
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He got fired from a construction job, drove around for hours before he could face going home, and then made a decision: if recruiters won't return calls, he'll build the kind of agency that does.
Luke Cotterell is the Director of Primebuild Recruitment, and his story is a straight-shooting look at what it really takes to go from zero recruitment experience to consistent results in construction.
We cover the scrappy start: setting up an agency for under $1,000, learning contracts and terms of business the hard way, and generating early...
The Biggest Mistake New Managers Make | COAR S3E11 Clip
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Simon Marks | What Nobody Tells You About Moving Into Leadership | COAR S3E11
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You can change agencies, cities, even countries, but there's one thing you carry into every client meeting and every candidate call: your reputation.
Simon Marks spent sixteen years at Michael Page, Future You, Sharp & Carter, and Troocoo, finishing as General Manager before relocating to the United States. In this episode, Ed sits down with Simon to unpack how a recruitment career really grows when the market is messy, the desk is new, and the title does not automatically match the responsibility.
They cover the big moves recruiters hesitate to...
The Reality Of Running A Business | COAR S3E10 Clip
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Leadership Level Advice | COAR S3E9 Clip
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Brianna Hoy | From Million Dollar Desk to Managing Director of Her Own Agency | COAR S3E10
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A recruiter can build a monster desk and still feel stuck. Brianna Hoy did exactly that, earning the nickname “Millie" for Million Dollar while running up to 450 contractors on a high-volume government desk, only to realise the work had slipped into autopilot and the satisfaction was draining away.
We talk through the full arc: door-to-door sales across Australia, the raw “numbers game” that builds resilience, and the ROI mindset that turns activity into consistent billing. Brianna explains what recruiters don’t always see coming when a temp book gets big, you become th...
Debbie Davis | 2026's Most Influential Businesswoman in Staffing & Recruitment | COAR S3E9
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Debbie Davies takes us right back to the start, when recruitment meant Yellow Pages, walk-in candidates, business lists on CDs, and learning by doing. From there, we dig into the moments that shaped her leadership: the work ethic and resilience she developed growing up on a farm, the impact of experiencing a management style that didn’t align, and the decision to stay true to her values, especially integrity.
We also explore how leadership changes when you step into CEO-level responsibility, where strategy, profitability, continuity and decision-making can’t be avoided and w...
Sophie Mieglitz | The Habits Behind Back-to-Back Record Years | COAR S3E8
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Recruitment can look like hustle from the outside, but the best results usually come from something less glamorous: clear expectations, repeatable habits, and the courage to be human. Sophie Meaglitz from Frontline tells the story of jumping from Melbourne retail into agency recruitment during COVID lockdowns, backing herself when the industry is closed, and still setting clients up for the rebound. The payoff is huge, but the real value is how she explains the choices and behaviours that make the numbers possible.
We talk about the moment you realise you are...
"People work with people. Not with businesses." | COAR S3E8 Clip
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Leading teams without micromanaging | COAR S3E7 Clip
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Matthew Munson | The Leadership Lessons Nobody Tells You | COAR S3E7
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Matthew Munson, Managing Director NSW at Talent Group, came to recruitment the long way round. A campervan trip around Australia turned into a decision to stay, and a phone call about a job in tech recruitment changed everything.
He landed in 2006 with no idea what a .NET developer was. First six months, he hated it. The language was foreign, the role was a step back from where he'd been, and his ego took a hit. After six months, something clicked. Two years later he was team lead while billing at the...
Dana Sarkissian | How to Become the Go-To Recruiter in Any Niche | COAR S3 E6
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Dana Sarkissian, Associate Director at iPharm Consulting, started in recruitment in 1999, back when shortlists went out by fax and couriers on bikes collected printed resumes off your desk.
Twenty-five years on, she's the go-to recruiter in clinical trials, running a 9,000-member industry community on LinkedIn and taking calls from clients who want her advice before they want her candidates.
In this episode Dana talks through the early years on a desk that never fit, why she left the industry without another job lined up, and what brought her back...
"You don't need a psych degree to see where a deal's going" | S3E6 Clip
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Chris Barr | No Rooms, No Excuses: The Cold-Calling Rule That Built a Career | COAR S3 E5
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Your career can look “successful” on paper and still feel wrong in your gut, and that’s where this chat with Chris Barr lands straight away. Chris is State Director Queensland at Six Degrees Executive, and he’s refreshingly honest about what it really takes to build a recruitment career in Australia: making the calls when you’re nervous, doing the reps when you’d rather hide, and sticking with the long game even when the market turns.
We walk through Chris’s path from running 51 supermarkets in the UK to starting recru...
The team one-to-one cheatcode | COAR S3 E5 Clip
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The Reality of Starting Your Own Recruitment Agency | COAR S3 E3 Clip
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Rikki Tiwari | From Selling Timeshare to Running His Own Recruitment Business | COAR S3 E4
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Rikki Tiwari became a recruiter purely by accident. He arrived in Sydney with $500 in his pocket and no plan, having spent his early UK career on corporate sales floors, then in sales coaching and NLP training.
Robert Half in Sydney threw him straight into it, and year one tested him hard even when he was doing everything right. His first major placement came from a move most recruiters avoid: meeting a client when there was no live job at all.
From there it was Ourpath, then in February 2020, walking aw...
“The safest bet you’ll ever make is on yourself” | COAR S3 E3 Clip
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Max Kozin | The Blue Collar Recruiter Who Bet on Himself | COAR S3 E3
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He landed his first deal within days of launching Trade Plus Recruitment. No inherited database. No clients waiting. No one telling him what to do next.
We sit down with Max Kozin to talk through the part nobody glamorises: payroll exposure, insurance, health and safety compliance, and the mental load of starting a blue-collar recruitment agency from scratch.
We get into the systems he built to move fast. Max uses Loxo to send candidates a structured pre-screening form that updates his database automatically, so when a client needs carpenters...
Every Recruiter Falls for This Trap | COAR S3 E2 Clip
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Rav Prasad | From Selling Gym Memberships to Founding His Own Agency | COAR S3 E2
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A recruiter who still loves picking up the phone after 16 years is either wired differently or has figured out something most people miss. Rav Prasad joins us to unpack how he went from selling gym memberships to thriving inside major agencies, then stepping out on his own and building Humanistics in Brisbane. Along the way we get into what the Michael Page environment demands, why standards and internal reputation can shape your career, and how those early years harden the skills that matter when markets turn.
We compare agency cultures and r...
Redundancies: The Hardest Part of Leadership | COAR S3 E1 Clip
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Darren Buchanan | The Man Behind Hays Queensland’s Rise to #1 | COAR S3 E1
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You don’t often get to hear from someone who’s spent 32 years inside one of the world’s biggest recruitment agencies and still has a clear view of what matters. Darren joins us to share how he “fell into recruitment” in early 90s London, survived the boiler room pace, and eventually helped build Hays into a powerhouse across Queensland.
We dig into the real differences between UK recruitment and Australian recruitment culture, especially in Brisbane and regional Queensland. London can be transactional and outcome-first, while Queensland recruiting often rewards relationships, trust and...
Theo Elliott - Rover Recruitment | COAR S2-E6 Snippet
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Mastering Candidate Experience: Blue Collar Recruitment | COAR S2-E6
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We sit down with Theo Elliott from Rover Recruitment to unpack the real first-year story behind a fast-growing labour hire desk in Brisbane and the Gold Coast, including the ugly parts recruiters don’t post about: rejection, cashflow stress, and learning suburbs on the fly while still trying to win work.
We get practical about what moved the needle early. Theo shares why he doubled down on manufacturing, warehousing and logistics recruitment, how he approached market mapping, and what it took to do 1,000 business development calls in two weeks. We also dig...
Dan Newberry, Shadow Gate Partners | COAR S2 SPECIAL SNIPPET
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Defence, Intelligence & Space : Dan Newberry, Shadow Gate Partners | COAR S2 Special
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The defence industry is hard enough. Now try recruiting for intelligence missions where the best candidates cannot be found on job boards, some people barely exist online, and you are not even allowed to talk about certain details in public. In this special episode we are joined by Daniel Newberry, founder of Shadowgate Partners, to get a rare look at what modern intelligence recruitment and space-related hiring actually involves.
We talk through Daniel’s path from internal talent acquisition at major defence primes to launching his own specialist recruitment agency, then de...
How Candidate-Led Business Development Wins Real Search Work | COAR S2-E5 Preview
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Mastering Candidate Experience: Creative & Digital | COAR S2-E5
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Ghosting, dropouts, slow feedback, messy shortlists, and clients who “just want the CVs” aren’t random problems. They’re symptoms of a process that doesn’t build trust early and doesn’t make the work visible. We’re joined by Ryan Kelly from Creative Natives to talk about candidate management and candidate control in a way that’s practical, human, and built for the 2026 recruitment market.
We get into employer value proposition and employer branding that actually moves the needle: turning a role brief into a 30-second video, distributing it on LinkedIn, and us...
If You Want The Best, You Have To Pay For It | COAR S2-E4 Preview
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Mastering Candidate Experience: Technology | COAR S2-E4
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A near million-dollar blue collar desk, a life jump to Japan, a return to Melbourne during COVID, and a pivot into tech and enterprise accounts, Ena Colo has lived the full recruitment rollercoaster. We sit down and unpack what actually works when you’re trying to build a long-term career in recruitment, not just hit this month’s number.
We talk about the difference between reactive recruiting and a true account director approach: becoming a single point of contact, earning trust across talent acquisition and line managers, and doing the relentless grou...
"Building a leading Recruitment Brand on LinkedIn" | COAR S2-EP3 - Preview
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Mastering Candidate Experience: Insurance industry | COAR S2-EP3
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Most recruiters treat candidate experience as an afterthought. Nathan and Jett from Impact Talent have made it their competitive advantage.
In this episode of Confessions of a Recruiter, the co-founders of Impact Talent break down exactly how they've mastered candidate experience in one of Australia's most relationship-driven industries — insurance.
From the moment they make first contact to the final offer, Nathan and Jett share the frameworks, conversations, and mindset shifts that have helped them build a reputation where candidates actively want to work with them. We cover wh...
