Sean Mullin: Turning a Passion for Education Into a Unique Career (Recruiter at CPA Ontario)

foreign [Music] could you share a pivotal moment in your own career Journey that led you to become a recruiter public speaker and Coach absolutely so I mean my journey was a little bit different than maybe some of your other guests in that you know really took me a while to kind of navigate and figure out what kind of career I wanted to have you know I started out in an office sort of admin procurement role with an organization following University and I just kind of felt like this wasn't it for me and I really had

an itch to travel and so my partner and I finally decided to go and teach English in Korea for a number of years and it was there where I really found a spark for education and teaching and learning and obviously working with people and being up on not sort of stage but you're in the classroom you know you really are putting on a show and you're trying to you know engage your audience and you know being mindful of learning outcomes and watching students learn and grow and develop both in their confidence and their skill set

was a a pivotal moment I thought this is what I want to do I want to be a teacher and so then I came back to Ontario Mario and I got my teaching license in Toronto but at that time there were no teaching jobs in the market so I went back overseas and taught in China for a couple of years and that's where we had our first daughter and we decided okay well let's come back and transition and see how it goes because it's the first grandchild we need to come back but there was still

no teaching jobs in Canada and through some of my network I found an organization that actually recruited teachers to teach internationally and I thought this is a perfect fit I have the education background I also have worked internationally and I found that experience so transformative and inspiring like this is a great career to encourage people to do the same and so you know in that role I had a little bit of the business side of things in terms of the recruitment stuff the HR stuff but still have my sort of feat in the education and

then again through my network someone approached me with an opportunity at CP Ontario where I work now in one of the roles that I'm in and they said look you know you're pretty decent public speaker you're good at relationship building come and check it out and at the time I didn't know much about the CPA designation but through the process I thought this was a really good fit as a natural next step in my career and as I started in the job you know you had to do your orientation you're going around to to build

relationships with people and you're sort of reading off a menu of offerings that you know that you'll be trained up on and will eventually do but as I was meeting with post-secondary Partners we sort of said hey I'm Sean I'm in this role I'm your campus lead and you know we offer training workshops and all of this stuff not knowing that a couple of months later the director of alumni Affairs at Schulich School of Business would call me on a Saturday I still remember where I was I was driving down the QEW past Oakville and

I answered the phone and says hey Sean I remember you saying that you do workshops well we have an MBA orientation that we do as part of a mentorship program that every MBA student has to go through and the vendor that we hired has canceled last minute would you come in tomorrow to give our MBA students a workshop on kind of personal branding relationship building and professional etiquette and for whatever crazy reason I said yes despite the fact that I had no experience whatsoever to do so and so in 24 hours I quickly hodgepodge some

items together some Workshop materials some key personal brand new stuff I consulted with some of my colleagues and I just dove in despite the fact that I felt like a massive fraud MBA students are one of the top Business Schools without having a business background and I did the workshop and and they loved it and it was a pivotal moment realizing I mean I look back on the content and of course it has developed so much more since then but I look back at that moment and realized that's when I finally discovered what I want

to do I want to be a career coach I want to be a speaker I want to be a facilitator and they invited me back and I've done a couple sessions with them which really helped develop my skills and I've really expanded that to fit to the role I had both the CP Ontario and another external role that I have with an organization called skills camp that was the pivotal moment and so you know in terms of advice just say yes sometimes you never know what's going to happen awesome thanks so much for sharing and

that is truly wow an adventure that you have come as well and so my next question to you is as a recruiter what qualities or skills do you personally value the most when assessing potential candidates and are there any specific qualities that have made a lasting impression on you yeah absolutely so I've I've done this from sort of both sides my previous role with the education recruitment was specifically employment recruitment my job title now is recruiter but the job is more around having students transition into careers with other organizations who actually will partner with recruiters

from some of the big four firms and Banks and larger organizations to help them recruit students into the accounting profession and so what that allows me to do is sit on on literally hundreds of events and presentations and conversations hearing from them what they are looking for in a strong candidate and my job now through the workshops that I do in the one-on-one coaching is to pass that information on to students and to really start to watch those who go through the process and have their Top Choice of employer and what is it that they

have that stands out and the first thing that stands out to me is evidence of the growth mindset someone that really thrives on taking risks trying new things embracing learning and sees failures and opportunities for growth who welcomes feedback also you know we talked a lot of employers and you know particularly in the accounting industry in finance where I work there's yes there's some technical skills that are needed but ultimately these are not the priority in the recruitment process they know they can teach technical skills anyone can learn IFRS can do a a data analytics

Workshop over the weekend but what we hear over and over again that is so difficult to find in the recruitment process are these human skills these soft skills collaboration critical thinking problem solving communication where do you get those there was a great quote I heard from one of the Academic Deans that said what got you here won't get you there and I think a lot of times when students who are you know really academically successful they think okay well I got into University with some really good marks and I got to continue to do the

same well the game has changed it's not just about good marks you're competing with students all across Ontario and all across Canada that also have good marks your transcript is not enough so when we look for where are the evidence of these communication collaboration skills well it's not on your transcript where is it it's from the extracurricular involvement student clubs volunteering you know part-time work these are where you develop those skills and those evidences to be able to support you know give me a time when you had conflict give me a time when you were

being a leader give me a time when you know you had to show integrity and so all the evidence tends to come from those types of experiences and not necessarily your transcript so when we're looking at a strong candidate it's holistic yes you need to show that you have evidence of learning yes you need to know have certain marks on your transcript but those that really stand out in the process are the ones who are comfortable in their own skin who are developing real skills Who Are Taking Chances and ultimately when it comes to meeting

you in person you know the real goal of networking is to stand out in the crowd so how do you really do that well it's those who show a little bit of Personality without being personal so be yourself you know we're trying to find Common Ground wherever we go and networking is not a perfect science you're not going to have gold rapport with everyone but those are going to share your interests and your principles and your values well you might as well be as much of yourself as possible so it does take some practice to

do so and that's kind of the workshops that we do but in terms of standing out at someone that you know is confident in who they are who's not afraid to talk about their interests and their hobbies and what makes them different to show some personality being personal and who are really embracing that growth mindset and taking advantage of every opportunity outside the classroom to grow develop and make connections amazing thank you so much for sharing and yeah I think you touch on you know such a different point that in the past few couple of

years we couldn't focus on the grades and the transcripts but now we kind of see the shift in terms of how you stand out it's really the soft skills that you're able to develop too so yeah thank you so much for sharing on that and so Sean I would like to shift the focus back to you as well and so in this highly competitive market how have you managed to differentiate Yourself and Stand Out in your own career I think the thing that was hard as I talked about the growth mindset now they're being honest

it wasn't something that I had personally embraced for much of my career this is a New Journey for me and I'm really starting to see the event of it's really really quickly and so it really comes down to just saying yes to things is there an event that is in your industry is there an event where some key stakeholders are there is there an event there you can practice the skill set like relationship building is there a volunteer to be an emcee or present or you know are you struggling with communication go to Joint Toastmasters

let's look at where your skill those are and say yes to opportunities to practice them and so that's my first thing that really stood out to me and I told you the story about about Schulich where I said yes that opportunity well from there you know the opportunities kept coming I had local associations people that saw me on LinkedIn and said would you come and this was all voluntary but I wanted to grow my brand and my exposure so I just kept saying yes yes yes and you do that enough time the word of mouth

really will spread relationships are key you absolutely need to prioritize relationship building and everything that you do it is probably the most important skill set maybe besides communication but of course they go one in the same so think about those who are important stakeholders for you and start asking you know what can you give them there is a sort of false narrative that is you know to be successful in business you'd have to be a go-getter but you know in my mind a go-getter is someone that is out there to go and take and go

and use and manipulate who's only out there for themselves so I encourage students to be a go Giver think about how you can give to people in your network and it could be as simple as commenting on a LinkedIn post you know adding something to someone's post to help the algorithm boost up their profile by contributing conversations by you know liking you know or simply students often ask me well I'm talking to this big wig executive and I don't know what to say to her I'm just a first-year student you know what do I have

to offer well you can offer your interest you can offer your questions you can offer your curiosity and you can offer your tumbleness to be able to you know receive that information and if I see it in the work I do all the time you know thousands and thousands of well-accomplished professionals lining up to mentor to volunteer well they're not getting paid what are they getting out of it they love to give that advice and give back and so you as a student or someone who's young in your career you actually have a lot to

offer that conversation which is you know asking for advice and I always say if you go around asking for a job you're going to get advice instead but if you go around asking for advice you know sometimes you get a job because the goal in building relationships is to you know leave a lasting impression and a feeling because they ultimately won't remember much of what you said anyways but remember what does it feel like to talk to you and it feels great to give advice and you get to hear my energy right now I'm giving

advice it feels wonderful so you know you have to be curious enough and humble enough to go and meet somebody and say I want to learn about you not learn about the company you work for but I want to know about you and your story and so that's really just been the biggest shift for me because I used to approach relationships with oh if you're going to think Sean Mullen is interesting or valuable or worth your time then I need to sell myself and talk about all the accomplishments and interesting things that I've done but

that approach really was not effective for me for a long time because I was out there being a go-getter and so my Approach has been to let everyone I talk to try to make them be the center of attention in the conversation be a good listener ask them questions that I'm genuinely interested in and two things have happened as a result one I actually have got really good insights from them and learned about them and found them interested in had built great friendships around that and two is the relation it becomes much stronger because they

remember Sean as someone that has invested in them and who's being a go-giver and that increases their likelihood tenfold to accept a coffee chat request maybe a volunteer request or something that I eventually need from them if I've been giving giving and giving and seeking that as my goal in those relationships the response and return will come in time thank you so much for sharing I absolutely love the idea of a gold Giver that is such a refreshing and New Concept as well and so to you know touch based on the whole idea of networking

as well can you share a personal story or experience that showcases the power of effective networking and building meaningful connections yeah absolutely I actually have two stories that come to mind here you know the first is we often think you know I host these Network events all the time and a lot of time there'll be students who are there networking for the first time and we bring in these big published professionals to tell their story and I remember an event in Waterloo this year where I watched the students walk into the room they had their

little their little glass in their hand and they were looking all nervous and you know back and forth and not sure where to go and then I watched all the experienced professionals come in and they were doing the same thing they walked in with their glass they didn't know when it didn't know where to go so I think there's this misconception that because we're a professional that they're just comfortable naturally but everyone's worried about an event will anyone talk to us and I had an event where I saw a CPA sitting alone I thought okay

I'm going to go over and chat with them and lo and behold I was right they were so grateful that someone came over to talk to them and it happened to be a partnered a company called mnp and we just started chatting and talking and I remember he said something we were talking about CPAs and Recruitment and he said something that I'll never forget he said you know Sean the most important skill in business is decision making can this person make a better decision than this person with the exact same data set and I thought

this is great for my information sessions and my promoting of the CPA which I do every day and of course you know we ran into each other two or three more times at an event and one day he took me out for lunch and I told him I said you know you said a quote to me that really stood out to me and he was blown away that I had remembered that word for word and so networking really is this about listening and remembering if networking is not 15 minutes to get a job it's 15

minutes to start a 30-year relationship and so it's understanding that this is a long game and I think students hope they're going to walk into some event say the right thing and get a job that's not how it works so through that we just developed some really strong personal connections and some common ground we kept in touch he invited me to one of his staff events and then because I knew he was developing his public speaking skills and I had opportunities I invited him to a bunch of Keynotes and he was really grateful for that

opportunity exposure and then his recruitment team was going up for the fall and he invited me in for a workshop and how to help the recruiters communicate better and promote better and so over time this actually turned into a job offer for me not that that was my goal but I think really you know if you're going into it thinking your job is your goal then you're really going to struggle because people are going to feel that you're just using them that this is transactional so if you take that job out of the equation you're

actually increasing your likelihood and so the second story I'll tell really quickly is when we did come back from China partner and I were looking for for work in the business sector because there were no teaching jobs at the time and she ran into someone at Starbucks that she had been on student council with 12 years earlier back at Western and I was like oh my gosh very doing I haven't seen you in so long and they got to chatting she's like wow you know you're looking for work well I remember what it was like

to work with you on student council I remember your your work ethic your integrity you know how intelligent you were well let's have a meeting my team is looking for someone right now and she's been with that organization the last nine years so the point that I'm making as a as a student who's entering the market or someone who's Young starting to network your network is not just out there with recruiters and employers and professionals you have to network with your peers right now because they will be that Network that will stick with you throughout

your career so those are my two stories and every interaction with someone whether it's the first time or the thousands time is a chance for them to know you better like you more and trust you further and so you know whether it's someone you work with every day or you're just meaning this is the opportunity to grow because if somebody knows you and likes you and trusts you and they know about a job they're gonna tell you you don't have to ask awesome thank you so much for sharing that was definitely so insightful as well

and so I just wanted to touch about you know your coaching and mentoring Journey as well what is one success story that you hold dear to your heart and how did you help that individual achieve their career goals good question I mean I'm so lucky to be able to be with students on their journey and so as I share this story I want to make clear that ultimately it was the student that did this it was the student's Choice it was their grit their resilience and their real drive to be able to learn and so

I want to give them a lot of credit but I remember there was a student his name is Tony and he came from a really small post-secondary institution so why I say that it's not one in which you have a lot of employers coming all of the time and there's lots of huge events to really develop this stuff it was really incumbent upon students from that school to you know go outside of their school be it virtually in person to get those learning experiences and I remember him at an event and he was trying really

hard and he had a suit jacket that was you know four times too big for him and he had a shirt that was you know barely collar to tie those untucked and I kind of approached them like not that I'm the fashion policeman I was like Tony look you know I can see that you're coming out to some events that I really applaud your drive you know are you open to some feedback and he said absolutely I really want to get better please help so I said no problem so look here's what we're going to

do and I gave a recommendation to the Taylor that could help his suit to the right size and recommended you know a different sort of look for him and then I reached out and connected with him with one of our CPAs that was interested in mentorship we put a little goal setting plan together for a couple of different meetings and what that would look like and then from there you know I really shadowed him into some networking events we came in we said okay who do you want to talk to here are some good questions

to ask and then after that we said what did you learn from them so let's walk away from every conversation with a couple of notes you know here's what man said here's what stood out to me here's the advice she gave and then let's follow up on LinkedIn and say reach out with a note hey man great to meet you at that event yesterday you said this that had real impact on me I'd love to follow up with you and he actually started getting so much confidence that he applied for and was successful to join

our team as one of our Board of ambassadors where he took on even more of a leadership role at the school helping students to do that to get involved and encourage them which was again so important at that small school and what was fascinating at the end when he you know gave some presentations to our ambassador team is that I could not believe two years ago if you had told me that I'd be in front of classes at events emceeing public speaking and you know it's still a long journey I have a long way to

go and but I'm so much more confident now and I know you know what it's like to step out of my comfort zone take some risks and he's doing really well now professionally and it's it's great to see his journey but again this was yes I helped with some framework but what the joy was it was him that did that work and ultimately it's his accountability and I gave him a ton of credit well thank you for sharing and you know I know that you also mentioned that it's part of the work that he did

as well but I'm sure that you know without your support and your encouragement and you know even helping out with his tailoring office suit as well like even such small details without that support you know he wouldn't have had that direction too so thank you so much for sharing such an encouraging story too and so my next question is in your own career how have you utilized storytelling to make an impact you know this is a great question and really for any aspiring public speakers out there right now let me tell you that storytelling really

is the secret to engaging your audience and compelling them to connect and to act and the reason for that is quite simple it means storytelling is just how we as a human race how we communicate with it is the fundamental you know Acumen to human understanding it's how we make sense of the world and we love a good story we absolutely do and the reason for that is that stories connect us you know we don't all share the same experiences but we do share the same emotions and so storytelling helps us to connect with you

on an emotional basis and and you know PR advertisers marketers they know this they know you have all you have to do is watch a commercial these days and they can be anywhere from hilarious to fun to exciting to a really emotional like think about those Olympic ones where they show like the parents in the crowd cheering their kid on as they fall down get up and down the Olympics and I'm sobbing well you know that really makes us feel connected and it motivates us to act now what is act it could be to you

know accept my coffee chat request it could be to hire me it could be to think differently on a subject or accept our business plan right storytelling is a part of everything that we do and it can be something that we do every day in business as well the other thing is our brains are not hardwired to remember logic and details we remember feelings and I do workshops on storytelling and I always start off the workshop with a story and it'll be a story around me having to knock on doors to get to get sponsorships

for a charity that was doing when I was a kid and I talked about the feelings that I had how nervous it was I got to knock on the door but then I'd give all these great details like how many houses there were what the cost was the name of the street that I was on and I tell that story to start the session and then 40 minutes into the session I go back okay okay who remembers how many houses on the street who remembers how much the candies the sponsorship was who remembers the name

of the street and no one can I say who remembers exactly how I felt going up to that door everyone puts their hands up so we remember things like feelings we take that with us and your personal brand is a feeling you know there's a great quote from Maya Angelou which says people will forget the things that you say and the things that you do but not how you make them feel and you know if you think about it when you go down the street and you're at the mall or the train station you're like

oh I know that person oh I recognize that but I forget their name or where I know them from you remember the feeling that they are really kind or they're a jerk right that's just how our brains are so if you're thinking about your personal brand out there remember that your brand is a feeling and that's why it all ties into asking for advice let the other person be the center of attention listen very well you know this is what storytelling is all about and so when I get together we've all been to some weddings

and we've all heard speeches that are just horrible and speeches that are amazing when I write a personal speech I just have four jot notes and each one is just the name of the story because I'm trying to read a script or I'm trying to memorize something you're going to falter but what I'm telling a story you know that story you know it in here and so it becomes so easy to speak naturally to your own personal experience and of course you're going to engage the orange much better so storytelling is really the secret of

every good public speaker and presenter and I encourage everyone to do the same you know whether it's an interview or a coffee chat or whatever awesome thank you so much for sharing your insights about that and so you know just to touch base on the Recruitment and job search process as well I would like to know what are some common misconceptions or myths about the job search process that you personally encountered at head to the bank yeah absolutely I think when it comes to you know Making Connections you know people know that a network is

really important and the common phrase you often hear is networking is who you know and I'm going to tell you a story there's a professor that I get to speak in his class at Rockman School of Management it's the intro to business he has three sections of 300 students so 900 students in total and he's been teaching this course for about you know 15 years so naturally some of the students he knows from 15 years ago are now senior Executives and partners and they reach out to Michael every fall and say look we need somebody

we need a good intern we need someone that you can recommend who's a top student who's standing out and you recommend someone for us now if networking was who you know well all 900 students know this professor wouldn't they get the recommendation well of course not networking who gets the recommendation it's the people that sit up front the people with their name cards the people that participate put their hands up who stick around after class only those 12 or 15 people in the front row are who get the recommendation so networking is not who you

know networking is who knows you so in the recruitment process when you're looking to make connections ask yourself who knows me and how are they going to know me well no one's coming to your house to knock on your door you've got to be out there you've got to show up you've got to go to events you've got to volunteer you got to follow companies and Recruiters on LinkedIn you're gonna be a goat giver and participate bring discussion into their forums and all of that great stuff second thing I would say is that you don't

need to have the best transcript remember they're looking for a holistic person a partner once said to me Sean there's two things I'm looking for when I'm hiring somebody can I put you in front of a client so can you communicate and are you professional number two can I sit next to you on an airplane for eight hours what she was saying was the technical stuff we can teach you what we can't teach you is to be someone who we want to work with every single day for 40 50 hours a week who can think

creatively who can color Outside the Lines bring New Perspectives who has a bit of Personality without being personal so how do you show them that you're that person well you need a well-rounded resume that talks about volunteer experience that talks about extracurricular stuff and of course for students you know you're going to be applying for a job or a role that you've never had before if you're applying to be the director of finance and you've been a manager of finance for 10 years that's easy but you're applying to be an accounting associate or a financial

analyst and you've never done that before you might be thinking well I have no chance at this for this entry level job because I've never had this well you got to start thinking about those transferable skills did you work at Tim Hortons when you were 16 okay what does that have to do with being a financial analyst well you know how to be a Frontline brand ambassador you know how to communicate to different customers to problem solve to think critically on your feet to follow a process to report to multiple managers these are transferable skills

are you into Esports what does Esports have to do with being an accounting associate well do you have to work as a team do you have to think strategically do you have to respond to changing information in real time and pivot you know are you competitive do you like to win as one these are good skills that are transferable so one of the biggest myths then is people think I don't have what it takes for the qualifications that are needed now it will be up to you to have connect those dots in conversation but remember

the resume is not trying to get a job the resume is trying to get an interview so the interview is the time to connect all those dots and bring those transferable skills and again last thing is that your goal in networking can't be to get a job I mean when I was younger there was this thing called speed dating where people would go to a big room and you would sit at a table talk to someone for 10 minutes and go over sit a table and talk 10 minutes and move on well you would never

sit down to someone for 10 minutes and say you know would you marry me that's crazy right but why would you talk to someone you met for 10 minutes and say would you give me a job would you hire me on your team it's it's the same thing the networking has to be about building your brand building connections getting people to know like and trust you more and if you do and you do that right you're going to actually increase your chances of getting a job awesome thank you so much for sharing anything that's such

amazing advice too all right and so we've come to our last and final question for you today and so I would like to know what are the top three pieces of advice you would give to your younger self when it comes to succeeding in your career and finding fulfillment in your work yeah absolutely fulfillment is really important you know you really need to trust your gut I had wished I'd gone overseas sooner we had the opportunity in 2003 to do it and I was just nervous I was kind of comfortable like kind of like I

don't know if I should I should and then eventually in 2006 we did it and of course I fell in love with the experience and I regret not doing it sooner so you know really you have to trust your gut and and sort of Part B of that you know as I was starting to develop this this public speaking Workshop part of my career in the last few years that I really like I mean I've been very grateful in my network to have a lot of different opportunities whether it be in admissions whether it be

academic advisement whether it be in recruitment I've had a lot of different offers come my way but I knew in my part that I wanted to stick with what I'm doing now because it's it feels right and so trust your gut the second thing is I have discovered later on in my career so many different career paths now that I did didn't know existed back then and I'm happy where I am now I'm not going to change but if had I had known about those roles or what it really looked like and felt like day

to day I might have chosen a different path and so you know my daughter's a foodie and she had a birthday a couple of weeks ago and of course we don't just walk down Queen Street hoping to get lucky and find a restaurant we're going to do some research let's look at the menu let's look at the reviews what other people saying about it what I like it too well this is your career go and talk to the people who are doing these roles and even if you are you know dead sent out of career

in finance and you happen to be you know set up for a conversation with a VP of marketing well you'd be surprised what insights and information you can get don't just narrow your focus onto one particular career path because you think that's what you want to do go and talk to as many people as you can because a it's going to help you practice your networking but it's also going to give you those important insights and inspiration and I always love to say you know who should I talk to next you know what do you

recommend and when we ask people for advice you're giving you're letting them know how they can help you and so I think as a student the less you know what you want to do the better position you're in because then you can go up to somebody you know I don't want to come up to you and say hey I'm looking for a career in sustainable fintech can you give me some advice on how it went into the blockchain well you've got this much room and for those who can't see I'm like a tiny margin where

someone can give you advice but if you reach out to someone and say hey I'm an aspiring CPA or I'm thinking about going into HR or marketing or whatever and I have no idea what I want to do but I'm really excited I'm reaching out to you because you know you might have some advice to me great well someone is much more likely to say yes to that request because they know that they have a wide open plate and that you have a blank canvas so it's okay and it's great that you don't know what

you want to do and you don't need to know your whole career when you're 18 19 20. I was 40 when I finally found my love of what I want to do so there's no rush take your time the last thing I'll say is that you know we all suffer from fraud complex this feeling like I don't belong in the room everyone else is going to find out any day that I shouldn't be here but what I have found overwhelming in my experience with everyone that I've talked to whether this CEOs business owners multi-multi-millionaires is

every one of them also feels the exact same way fraud complex is something we all share and you need to get over that there's a really great quote from Amy Cuddy who does the power post body language stuff and she says fake it until you become it and that's exactly what I did I kept coming to those sessions training people on on professionalism and professional etiquette and workshops and before long I was just there it's kind of like when you come in from a rainstorm and you're soaking wet and then do you remember the exact

moment that you're dry no all of a sudden you just eventually are and that's really my advice to people just keep saying yes keep showing up keep trying new things embrace the growth mindset before you know it you'll already be there awesome thank you so much Sean and now we've only come to the end of our podcast the cast and really thank you so much Sean you know for sharing all your insights and your knowledge and you know it's just so insightful as well and I believe that our students will be able to benefit from

all this wisdom that you have shown to us today so thank you so much for your time Sean thank you very much [Music]