If you’ve ever tried to grow a recruitment firm, you understand the crazy balancing act of being an effective billing manager. It’s extremely challenging to hire, train and manage a team while at the same time maintaining your personal production.
That’s why I’m especially excited to share this interview with Darwin Shurig.
In addition to building a team of 11 people, Darwin is personally responsible for over $1.2M million in 2022. Darwin founded Shurig Solutions Inc. in 2015; based in Plainfield, Indiana, specializing in recruiting regulatory affairs, quality and engineering talent for the medical device and pharma industries.
Darwin was listed as an MRI Top 10 Managing Partner for 2020 and is the number 2 cash biller for revenue as a franchise owner within the MRI Network in 2022. Prior to joining the recruitment industry, Darwin has a clinical background of over 20 years of sales, operations and management within medical devices, diagnostics, medical distribution, and sleep therapy.
Episode Outline and Highlights
- [04:48] Joining the recruiting game – what motivated Darwin to join the industry after 20 years of medical device distribution experience?
- [12:06] What is your WHY? Darwin explains the purpose that drives him.
- [15:11] Enormous success in a short period of time – critical success factors.
- [25:20] Darwin describes a typical day when he first started his business.
- [26:55] The value of content marketing when scaling a recruitment business.
- [31:00] Focusing on your DIG – discipline, industry, and geography.
- [34:14] The benefit of hosting webinars for your industry.
- [44:06] What is the expert interview strategy?
- [49:10] Darwin shares the most significant challenges he faced when growing his business.
How Darwin Achieved Consistent Growth in 7 Years
Never in a million years did Darwin imagine he would eventually become a recruiter. He joined the industry relatively late in his career – after 20 years experience in sales, management and operations roles in the medical device industry.
Darwin’s success in recruitment is astonishing given that he only joined the recruitment industry 7 years ago. Since 2015, he has incrementally increased his firm’s billings to $2.2m, with Darwin personally contributing $1.2M in 2022. At the same time, he has grown a team of 11 people.
I asked Darwin what he considers his success factors. Below is the recap of what he shared:
- Utilizing Digital Media and Automation
- Bringing value to other people that is not tied to revenue.
- Focus on your own skillset and what you can control – Attitude, Effort, and Focus.
- Clarity on your identity and sharing your value proposition.
The Importance of Adding Value to the Industry You Serve
Darwin mentioned one of the challenges in approach when joining the recruitment world is whether he wanted to be a generalist or a serious subject matter expert within the industry. He obviously went for the latter which resulted in leverage to scale his business. This is how he puts it:
“I think that is so important – you should never make decisions solely on money… You are bringing value to many people and I think that the Pinnacle Society is a great example of this… It is about what you can bring to the table and the value that you bring.”
Darwin shared how he started the SSI Educational Webinar Series as a way to add value to his ecosystem.
Related Podcast You Might Enjoy
- TRR#132 How to Break Out of a Slump and Bill an Amazing $420k in 5 Months, with Wes Ashworth
- TRR#28 Recruiter Midlife Crisis: Boredom, Burnout and Reigniting Your Passion, with Sharon Hulce
- TRR#142 How a Former Music Teacher Created Her Dream Life as a Top-Producing Recruiter, with Cathy Stewart
- TRR#80 How to Use Video to Attract Candidates and Grow Your Recruitment Business, with Joe Mullings