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The Elite Recruiter Podcast

The Elite Recruiter Podcast

By: Benjamin Mena
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The Elite Recruiter Podcast is where top recruiters go to get better.

Hosted by executive recruiter Benjamin Mena, this show dives deep into the stories, strategies, and mindsets of the most successful people in the industry — from $1M solo producers to 8+-figure agency founders.

Each episode delivers real, tactical insights for high-performance recruiting:

  • How elite recruiters build and scale
  • Tools, tech stacks, and sourcing strategies
  • Daily habits and workflows that drive million-dollar desks
  • Lessons from failure, breakthrough wins, and mindset shifts
  • What the best are doing next — and how they’re changing the game

If you’re in agency recruiting, staffing, or executive search — this is your new secret weapon.

No fluff. No recycled advice. Just the unfiltered playbook of the top 1%.

🎧 Subscribe now and start leveling up like an elite.

2026 Elite Recruiter Podcast Career Success Economics Leadership Management Management & Leadership Marketing Marketing & Sales Personal Development Personal Finance Personal Success
Episodes
  • How to Go Fully Retained Without Losing Your Clients

    How to Go Fully Retained Without Losing Your Clients
    Apr 16 2026

    The This Is Your Year Recruiter Summit kicks off April 27th — less than 2 weeks away. Free live sessions with the industry's best, including Mike Williams, Brianna Rooney, and Mark Whitby. Register now: https://this-is-your-year-recruiter-summit.heysummit.com/

    Most contingent recruiters think the hardest part of going retained is convincing their clients to pay upfront. Andrea Colabella thought the same thing — until she actually did it, and discovered the anticipation was far worse than the conversation.

    Andrea is the founder of Cardea Group, a fully retained executive search firm based in New York City specializing in legal and compliance professionals within investment management. She started cold-calling recruiting agencies in 2005 asking to be hired as a recruiter, found her first mentor, and spent the next 18 years niching further and further — from admin and HR, to software sales, to investment management broadly, to a single laser-focused vertical: legal and compliance at hedge funds, private equity firms, and family offices. She built Cardea Group in 2009 during one of the worst markets in modern financial history. She's a Pinnacle Society member, has placed over 500 professionals, and in 2023 made the full pivot to a 100% retained model.

    You'll also hear how she uses recorded video first-round interviews through Hinterview to cut five to eight hours of client interviewing time per search, how she runs weekly steering meetings with retained clients to manage expectations and protect the search process, and why building a reputation as the expert in the room — not just the recruiter who fills the job — has become her most powerful business development tool.

    Timestamps

    00:00 — Cold-calling her way into recruiting in 2005 Boston

    10:42 — Leaving the broad market to go deep in investment management

    12:37 — What bad firm culture taught her about running her own shop

    23:00 — Recyclability: why candidates in multiple processes all move at once

    26:02 — The contingent to engaged to retained journey

    30:05 — How retained pricing works: 40/40/20 on total comp

    31:43 — Why billing on total compensation changes everything

    33:22 — What white glove service actually means operationally

    37:26 — Converting existing clients: anticipation is worse than the conversation

    39:33 — Hosting in-person industry events as a BD strategy

    44:14 — Weekly steering meetings and defensive calendar blocking

    53:16 — The retained pitch and 52-day average time to close

    54:36 — Using recorded video interviews to cut client interviewing time

    Connect with Andrea Colabella

    🔗 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/colabella/ 🌐 Cardea Group: https://thecardeagroup.com

    This episode is sponsored by Atlas

    🤖 The AI-first recruitment platform that captures every conversation, surfaces candidates through natural language search, and has driven 40%+ EBITDA growth and 80%+ increases in monthly billings for agencies. Get your exclusive listener offer: https://recruitwithatlas.com

    Join the Elite Recruiter Community

    👥 Biweekly roundtables, sourcing deep dives, the Billers Club, and a split space to partner on roles — $49/month, cancel anytime: https://eliterecruitercommunity.com

    Register for the This Is Your Year Recruiter Summit — April 27th

    🚀 Free live sessions with the industry's best. Don't miss it: https://this-is-your-year-recruiter-summit.heysummit.com/
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 6 mins
  • The Diagnosis Method Behind $12B in Staffing Revenue

    The Diagnosis Method Behind $12B in Staffing Revenue
    Apr 13 2026
    Dave Veres started at Aerotech in September 1994. He was 22, fresh off four years as an all-conference shortstop at Michigan State, and he didn't know how to spell the company name. He got on a plane to Baltimore for training and called his parents after three days. They asked what the job was. He told them he didn't know — but it was the coolest thing he'd ever seen. What followed was 27 and a half years at one company. From entry-level recruiter to running national sales and enterprise accounts across automotive, defense, and government — while that company scaled into the largest privately held staffing firm in the country. This episode is the blueprint for how he did it. The through-line is what Dave calls diagnosis-based selling. Not transactional. Not even question-based. Diagnosis. The difference: question-based selling asks what a client needs today. Diagnosis-based selling understands where a client sits in their product life cycle, predicts what they'll need three months from now, and positions talent before the req ever exists. That shift — from reactive to predictive — is what made Dave the call people made when the stakes were too high. He breaks down how he cracked Toyota, Honda, and Hyundai when Aerotech already owned GM, Ford, and Chrysler — by becoming the expert in markets his own company didn't yet understand. He talks about stumbling into defense staffing almost by accident: a colleague drives past a shipyard, asks one right question, and six months later they're running $500,000 a week in spread with 1,800 contractors in Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan. He was grumbling about 4am traffic until he started seeing soldiers at the airport. That moment rewired something. After that, it wasn't headhunting anymore. He talks about the long game on relationships — the HR generalist you place today is the VP of People who calls you in seven years, and most recruiters blow that window without realizing it. He talks about navigating enterprise accounts where no single person signs the deal. And he talks about what it actually takes to build a culture where people stay and grow. Thirty years in. Still loves it. This is why. What you'll learn: The difference between question-based and diagnosis-based selling — and how to shiftHow to use product life cycle mapping to break into new industriesWhy candidates you place today are your best future clientsHow to find the real decision maker in an enterprise accountThe first three moves to make to change your sales approach in 30 daysHow AI should be used to keep recruiting human — not replace it Sponsor: 🎙️ Atlas — AI-first recruitment platform built to eliminate admin Atlas captures every conversation and turns it into something you can use. Ask your entire database questions like "Who mentioned they're open to relocating?" and get instant answers. Atlas customers have reported 40%+ EBITDA growth and 80%+ increase in monthly billings. Try it free → https://recruitwithatlas.com 🎯 This Is Your Year — Recruiter Summit (April 27th, live sessions are FREE) https://this-is-your-year-recruiter-summit.heysummit.com/ 💼 Join the Elite Recruiter Community — $49/month, cancel anytime https://elite-recruiters.circle.so/checkout/elite-recruiter-community 📬 Newsletter → https://eliterecruiterpodcast.beehiiv.com/subscribe 📺 YouTube → https://youtu.be/vA2pQmrkZc0 🔗 Connect with Dave → https://www.linkedin.com/in/daveveres/ 📧 Email Dave → dveres@sparkcompanies.com 🌐 Benjamin Mena → http://www.selectsourcesolutions.com/ 🔗 Benjamin on LinkedIn → https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjaminmena/ 📸 Benjamin on Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/benlmena/
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 20 mins
  • When Getting the Hire Wrong Costs Lives

    When Getting the Hire Wrong Costs Lives
    Apr 8 2026

    Most recruiting firms measure success by offers accepted. Jake Frazer watched that metric send unqualified people into a war zone. That was the moment he decided the industry was broken — and spent the next decade building something different.

    Frazer is not a recruiter. He is a government contracting operator who watched from the inside as one of the largest defense contractors in the world staffed programs the wrong way and paid for it in the field. He served in the Army, ran logistics at KBR pumping 2,000 people a month into theater, then built and sold a $200 million prime contractor. When he launched Precision Talent Solutions ten years ago, he made one decision that changed everything: he refused to run it like a recruiting firm.

    PTS does not hire traditional recruiters. Seventy percent of his 25-person team came out of govcon operations — people who have been on programs, who know what the mission costs, who have been ghosted by a bad recruiter and remember how it felt. They use a full assessment platform — personality profiling, cognitive scoring, custom video interviews — because Jake believes the resume, especially now, reveals almost nothing. He made hiring a P&L responsibility inside the firm because he learned at KBR that whoever owns the gate owns the outcome.

    In this episode Jake shares the framework that took him from a failed SaaS startup to one of the most respected executive search firms in the govcon space — including how he has placed over 50 transitioning generals, how he is positioning PTS for the European defense surge, and why he believes the recruiters who survive the AI wave will be the ones with the deepest industry expertise and the most genuine empathy. The ones who treat candidates and clients with the same level of care. The ones who understand what is actually at stake.

    In government contracting, Jake says, a bad hire does not just cost you a fee. Sometimes it costs something else entirely.

    🎙️ Atlas — captures every conversation, surfaces candidates instantly with MagicSearch. Clients report 40%+ EBITDA growth and 80%+ billing increases.

    https://recruitwithatlas.com

    🎯 This Is Your Year — Recruiter Summit (April 27th, live sessions are FREE)

    https://this-is-your-year-recruiter-summit.heysummit.com/

    💼 Join the Elite Recruiter Community — $49/month, cancel anytime

    https://elite-recruiters.circle.so/checkout/elite-recruiter-community

    📬 Newsletter → https://eliterecruiterpodcast.beehiiv.com/subscribe

    📺 YouTube → Details Soon

    🔗 Jake Frazer on LinkedIn → https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakefrazer/

    🌐 Benjamin Mena → http://www.selectsourcesolutions.com/

    🔗 Benjamin on LinkedIn → https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjaminmena/

    📸 Benjamin on Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/benlmena/
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 6 mins
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