Recruiting Secrets: Creating The Best Candidate Experience In The Multifamily Space With Kane Madsen

Recruiting isn't just about filling positions; it's about creating an exceptional candidate experience that leaves a lasting impression. By treating people with respect and valuing their worth, we can reshape the future of talent acquisition in the multifamily industry. In this episode, we have the incredible Kane Madsen, Senior Recruiter at Monarch Investment and Management Group. Kane discusses the fascinating world of recruiting in the multifamily space and uncovers the secrets to providing the best candidate experience. Throughout our conversation, Kane emphasizes the importance of treating people with respect and compassion. Kane delves into why Monarch has become a leading option for jobseekers and tackles the obstacles facing the current labor market, offering practical solutions for overcoming maintenance talent shortages. Kane shares expert advice on catching the attention of recruiters and hiring managers, mastering interview skills, and effectively communicating the value they bring to the table. Join us on Multi-Family Chronicles and get ready to take your recruiting game to the next level.

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Recruiting Secrets: Creating The Best Candidate Experience In The Multifamily Space With Kane Madsen 

Our guest is Kane Madsen. Welcome to the show.

Thanks. I appreciate you. I’m happy to be here.

You're a Senior Recruiter with Monarch Investment and Management Group.

That's what I do. I love it. It's going good.

Please tell us a little bit about yourself, your background, professional, personal, and some things that you like to share with the audience.





That's fun because I always say it comes to recruiting in general. People start at different walks of life and you got to be open-minded to whatever they started out at. We don't jump into recruiting. I remember being at one of the main recruiting conferences a few years back and said, “Who in this room thought they’re going to be a recruiter?” There are probably 150 people there. Not one person raises their hand that says, “I'm going to do it.” It makes me think about your question there as far as we all start from different backgrounds but be open to people. Look at their character and run from that. We can into that later.

I grew up in a very small town in Northern Michigan called Grayling. I wouldn't trade it for the world man. It’s a small town about 2,000 or 2,500 people and I loved it. I learned a lot about life and growing up. We didn't have everything but we didn't need everything. It was about treating people right, working hard, and grinding. I loved that. I graduated high school from up there. I did do a few years of college and got an Associate's degree through Kirtland Community College, which is up North.

As far as work goes, I did the classic fast food to start. That wasn't for me. I ended up getting into the restaurant field for twelve years when it was all said and done. I worked at Brewery up North, then transitioned into one of the corporate sides of restaurants for Ruby Tuesday of all places. I did that for twelve years and out of the blue I had a friend say, “I think you should lease an apartment.” I said, “What do I do?” “I think you are a fun person. You got personality when you could transition into this.” At that time, twelve years in a restaurant was weighing heavily on me.

I can also say I wouldn't take that and trade it up for anything. Maybe for some of the holidays I worked, I could trade that. I learned a lot about how to treat people right, customer service to a tee, listening to people, and going above and beyond whatever it takes. I attribute that, incredibly, a lot to where I'm at. We talked about being thankful for stuff. It molded me into who I am and where I'm at.

Fast forward from that, you have a friend who said, “Come and lease this. The hours are better. Health and dental benefits and 401(k) match made sense.” A career in restaurants wasn't a long-term career for me even though played it on for a long time. I started leasing. I became a leasing manager and then ended up buying properties from Sterling Group. As soon as the new acquisition take over, I didn’t know what to expect. I met Chuck, Monarch’s COO. He is the coolest guy I've ever met in my life still to this day and I'll butter him up on the show. I love Chuck to death.

I met Bobby, possibly the future owner of Monarch. They took over and said, “Here you go.” Within one year they said, “We want to create a position for you doing recruiting.” I said, “Awesome. Once again, what do I do?” They said, “Take the ball and run with it.” I took the ball and ran with it. For a few years now, we've had a recruiting team. We had nothing. We had one person, Anthony Petrone, my colleague and friend who was in HR/employee relations/recruiting.

We started our recruiting department a few years ago with Monarch. Since then, they've put me into this senior role where I helped mentor and train our staff and team and try to do whatever it takes to be successful from job placement to sourcing techniques. What we even say on the phone was the playbook of recruiting that was on paper for how we recruit which was cool. It is probably the best thing I've done I think as far as contributions to Monarch.

We keep an eye on each other. We work together as a team. My team is absolutely phenomenal. We bounce ideas all the time. I'm definitely not a know-it-all either. People are cool. They like ideas and stuff, but we work together to do this multifamily housing recruiting. I’m happy to be here. That's a long story of my background but hopefully, it gives you some insight.

How large of recruiting team do you have?

We have an analyst off and on that help with reports and stuff. We have about a team of twelve give or take on. We try to borrow Drew as much as we can. He is our brain’s guy who does analytics. It's a big part of recruiting. You have to track how many hires you have, the cost per applicant and hire, where are you advertising, what's working or not working, and how many hires do you have in a month.

We track all those metrics in Monarch. If you don’t have that, it’s hard to walk with baselines. Typically, we run with a team of twelve and it's awesome. With Monarch, we can get into more detail down the road here, but we're the eighth largest in the United States for ownership, which is pretty amazing. We're in twenty states. We have different regions that we cover depending on the recruiter and where we're each property and different regions. We have a bigger presence. We split it out to break it down. I'm here to help with whatever I can to make sure we're doing what we should be doing.

How many apartments are you managing overall?

I wish I could keep track. In the United States, we have 74,000 the last time I look which is quite insane. We’ve grown quite a bit since I’ve been here. I’ll be coming up in total recruiting for 7 years with Monarch about 9 in 2023. It's a testament to our ownership and we only own and manage our property. There are no pigmented sites at Monarch. I think that’s awesome. It’s also been an internal recruiter by the third-party headhunter. I’ve embraced this whole entire mission of meeting Chuck the first person who is the COO to sitting down with Bobby and creating this vision for me that I didn't even know existed being recruiting. We're booming and doing well. I'm thankful to be a part of it, to be honest.

If I'm an interested party and I say, “Why Monarch? Why should I come to work for your company?” What are some great things that you could share right here with the audience that will maybe pique someone's interest?

First off, if it's you on the maintenance side, you get to work with me. Think about that first and foremost. The fact that we own and manage our properties and you can walk around our corporate office, it's jeans and flannel culture. This is not a suit and tie. We're bigger and better than our people on site. They absolutely realized the value of their employees on site, specifically maintenance. The COVID bonuses they threw and the maintenance stuff that were on site were absolutely incredible. I would leave it up to them to discuss how much but it was a very generous thing that they did. Honestly, the way we treat people is the difference. I know people say that all the time, but our quarterly bonuses are fantastic for maintenance.

You get $750 a quarter. It’s an extra $3,000 over the course of a year. That's based on merit. This isn't a property-based NOI. If you don't get it, you don't get it. This is saying, “If you're grinding and working your tail off, you're going to get it.” I think that's a cool approach to that. We'll get into a labor market being more creative. Our on-call bonus, we bumped up to $100 the week if you're on call. Even if no one calls you, you're going to get $100 right up front. That's thoughtful and shows people we care. That's not a fun thing to be on call after you've worked your tail off all week. If you've done this for many years, you get it for sure.

For any major holidays, a separate $50 bonus is on the maintenance side. I always say with cloth, $100 for boots, $100 for pants, and $250 for tools in the first year. After a year and a half, you go up to $500 in tool reimbursement. I think that's amazing. You have to have what you need to do your job and do it successfully. We want to take that headache away from you. We have annual raises of up to 5% every year. We don't cap out in any position.

We're in twenty states, you can grow a realistic career. That's a huge difference. If people don't ever feel stuck and being in Michigan here, they can go to North Carolina or Texas to get to warmer weather. I think gives people options that are exciting for them. We have $30 a month Blue Cross Health Insurance. That's absolutely fantastic for yourself. You can add others on. Insurance does go up with that, but we've made it incredibly affordable for people to get the top carrier.

That stuff is super important. We match your 401(k) at 3%. We treat people the way they want to be treated. The bonuses through COVID show the annual reviews of these boots and tools. We’re getting creative but also listening to our people. That's the other difference. They're in the trenches. The on-call was a problem. What do you do? You listen to what they're saying and you adapt to it. If not, you're going to be left probably short. The other thing I can tell you is if someone asked me why they should work for us, obviously I like to rattle off the perks.

Those are empirical ways that show we do care about the people. We have a Fish Friday event. It's an annual thing. 2023 will be the ninth year in a row. We run out of an entire resort in Michigan. It's up in Holden Lake. It’s close to where I grew up, which is funny. The Friday is paid off of work for any employee in Michigan. They can bring their entire family if they have one or significant other. If not, bring your best friend.

You could stay Friday and Saturday at no cost to you at this resort. We had over 500 people and their families in 2022. There's an indoor water park for the kids. We rent out three pontoon boats. Jermaine brings us jet ski, karaoke, volleyball, cornhole, and all the food and drinks you could imagine. I can firsthand tell you that it's probably the coolest thing I've ever heard any company do for their people. What other way can you show them that you care to say, “You've been in this industry for a long time? It's summertime. It's busy. Friday, get out of here. Don't worry about work. We're going to pay you. Stay the weekend at no cost to you.”

It's a mini vacation for every employee and their family. When you get to meet people outside of work and you get to mingle, it becomes more real. It's more empirical. It's not that person that works in Grand Rapids. That's Anthony Boone and Anthony's been a friend of mine and his wife's name is Elizabeth. That's 1 of the 49 properties in Michigan I'm rattling off. I know these people. We know each other and it's more real and you're more vested. When you can create a culture like that, I don't think anyone can hold a candle to that. What sets us apart is treating people the way that they should and showing them that.

I love your passion for what your company is about and also the benefits and the work environment that your company is providing to its employees. I had to commend you for that because I don't see that often. I could tell that you're very passionate. You enjoy being a part of that organization right there. I want to talk about the current state of the labor market in a multifamily space. How are we doing from a labor shortage standpoint?

May years ago, there was The Great Resignation. Society is trying to label certain phenomena that are happening in a market at any given time. We had that. We still have a significant shortage of personnel, especially on the maintenance side. I do want to ask you, if you compare this time with the times during COVID and pre-COVID, how do you see the current labor market from a maintenance talent shortage standpoint? How do we address that? How do we overcome that?

It's real-life stuff. To answer your first question, COVID was probably some of the toughest years I've ever had in recruiting. I'm not going to lie about it. It was incredibly tough all around, not many applicants and people were staying home and making good money not working. That's something that you can't control either. That always makes it a super tough challenge.

It's starting to open up a little bit better. Any recruiter multifamily is going to be lying to you if they say, “We've got a ton of people coming in the door.” Every day is a true challenge. Retention, in general, is a problem with the labor market with multifamily. Retaining people, retention, they talk about all time. We have a high percentage of industry turnover. You have to adapt and be absolutely as fast as possible with not only responding to applicants that come through. You have to source passively to find the talent, but say the right things to them and don't push them.



People don't need to be pushed. If they've got the skillset, tell them what's in it for them. When you ask me that question and I could rattle off things, that's what I focus on. That's what Monarch and our recruit team focus on. It’s more of a salesy approach to say, “The ball is in the maintenance field court. It's what can we do for them?” To get out of it, you have to be open-minded to change some of the things that you're doing.

Not be closed mind, “We haven't had an applicant in seven days. Why aren't we getting those applicants?” The pay has obviously been a crazy thing since COVID into this where people are paying whatever to get their talent in and then retaining them is the other part. I do think you got to pay above market 100%. I agree that that's a challenge every day, even with us. I'm not going to say Monarch is perfect with that, but we strive to be the best we can.

COVID was the toughest year I've ever had recruiting. Nobody was applying. I don't think people were motivated. Our world was sad. It’s a dark time. People are being a little bit more open to applying, but it's not booming. We're not getting tons of applications every time we open up a maintenance spot. You got to be open-minded. We've looked into high schools, which is awesome. I love that part of my job. We've looked into trade schools and trying to find people on the HVAC side that are coming out and give them a different avenue.

To bridge the gap or figure it out, you got to pay a little bit above market. You have to offer people realistic things that can benefit them because it's about them. It's about that maintenance tech. It's not about me. My job does not need to be Monarch. It’s the eighth largest in the US and we're awesome but it needs to be focused on, “This is what we can do for you.”

If you don't spin it about the candidate, why are they going to look at the ad? There are one million ads and places they could work. What sets you apart is aching it about them and being transparent. The amount of people that don't put in their ads drives me absolutely bananas is my biggest pet peeve. I literally say in my ads sometimes, “I'm going to be transparent with you. I'm going to lay out exactly what we can offer you and I'm going to let you decide what you think.”

It's a funny and honest approach but nobody does that. How many ads do you read? It's all the same thing. We'll get into my style of this goofball wrapped in a passionate guy. You got to offer goods and benefits, things that make sense for the candidate, and make it about them. Also, you got to be fast. If you get an applicant, you got to be on it right now.

I'm not afraid to call somebody within the first five minutes if they're a good candidate. As you know, they can work about anywhere. That first impression and how you respond to them goes a long way. We've got a long way to go as an industry as far as retention. Every company knows that. We got to start paying better and taking care of these people. I'm not battering you up either. I know you started off on the grounds and worked your way up to this awesome career, which I'm very proud of. I'm super happy to be here.

Thank you for even inviting me to this show. It's amazing. You got to take care of those people cause they're the backbone of every property and it's no secret. Let's make them feel valued. Sometimes going back to the basics of thanking them, treating them the way they want to be treated, remembering their birthdays, and bringing them a snack. It's not a pizza party on Fridays. It's let their family go to this Fish Friday. Take your family up and get away.

It's finding an empirical way that's true and genuine. How you deliver it is the other part of it, but we're working on that consistently. The market is tough before and still tough now. You got to be open-minded, creative, and not be afraid to pay. Stay as fast as possible as far as communication and be honest with the applicant.

I picked up on several things from what you said. Let me start with the first one. What you basically described when you said, “It's all about the candidate. It's not about you and what you could offer. It's about them.” I always say recruiting is sales. If you don't realize that, you're going to be in real trouble.

When you advertise an open position, you're trying to sell a product. That position is the product that you're selling. The potential candidates are your potential customer. You can't be out there and say people don't want to work because when you say that, you are blaming the customer for not buying your product. How many successful companies have you seen staying out there going on a market and saying, “Our customers are dumb? They don't know any better. They don't buy our beautiful products?”

If you don't make a good enough product, you got to go back to the drawing board and build a better product that's more attractive first. Secondly, you said, “Treat people like they want to be treated.” Everybody likes to say, “Treat people like you want to be treated.” I guess we're not thinking about, Not everybody wants to be treated like you want to be treated.” Take time and know your people. Know your candidates and treat them like they expect to be treated versus saying, “I want to treat them like I want to be treated.” Not everybody wants to be treated like we do. What do you say in regards to recruiting yourselves? Do you agree that that's what we do?

I can't disagree with anything you said. It's 100% sales and treating the people you want to do. How do you do that? By being honest with them. If they don't get that position, you follow up with them and say, “Unfortunately, we're in a different direction, but I'm going to tell you my goal is to keep in touch with you and I'm going to do everything I can to find you an opportunity. We're in twenty states. I appreciate your time going to this interview.” It is simple basic stuff. Not everybody wants to hear the same thing, but who wants to hear, “I didn't get the job.” That's not the best. Who wants to say, “I didn't get it, but thanks for interviewing.”



“Thank you. That's nice. Let's figure this out. Let's keep in touch.” That's what we can do as an industry. To be the best we can be is to go back to the basics. Inform them. Communicate even when it's not fun things. We talked about this even prior. It's not always perfect blue skies and everything is great. It's what you do in those tough times and what you say to those people that don't get the jobs. That what makes you different or better than other people. It's taking the time to go through the trenches with these people. It's not always perfect, but I think if you battle with them, you show that you're vested in them as a candidate truthfully and you communicate overly with them they can feel that.

That's the difference between a great and a good recruiter. Somebody who's not afraid to fill a seat. Being internal, “I want you to be successful. I want to get the right person for the property.” We're on the same page as far as it's a sales position for sure. You got to make it about the person and you have to have something that's going to grab their eye. The companies that say, “Nobody wants to work. What have you done on your own? What passive search?”

Every month, we look at our Indeed sourcing techniques. What are we saying to candidates? What are we pitching to candidates? How many are replying, “I'm interested,” or “Thanks, but no thanks.” We keep track of all these metrics at Monarch. At the end of the day, if I'm the recruiter and I've got ads up but I'm not getting much, I could relay to the hiring team, “Still not much coming through. I've called the first few people that seemed okay. We scheduled one. We're on day twenty and I only have seven active applicants.”

We look on Indeed, I've headhunted 100 people I've reached out to about this specific position and they're replying, “The pay isn't there.” Keep track of how many on-hold comp issues you have. Present that to your team and say, “I found eight people that are terrific at maintenance. They're all saying we're not paying enough.” You present that and it's that recruiter-hiring manager battle we all have, but at least you have something empirical to present.

I'm doing what I can on my end. Even if they're not applying, because like you said, maybe your product isn't that good or you're not offering something that's going to make somebody apply for it. That's a reality strike. Sometimes we have to fight with our hiring teams, but on the back end of the recruiter, what am I doing behind the scenes to at least try to make this happen? I do think people are willing to work. I think they need to have something that makes sense.

I want to pick up on something that you said in the last response and the one prior to that. Let's take LinkedIn because that's the number one professional network. Most ads that you see on LinkedIn, honestly, there is just some canvas stuff with plastic content. I used to call it plastic because it doesn't smell or taste like anything. I think it could look pretty, but it has no soul. It is soulless. How many of those we see flooding the internet? It gets to a point where you scroll through your feed and if you're looking for a job, they don't even get your attention because they all look the same. They're changing a couple of colors and panels here and there.

Sometimes, I even confuse management companies because their canvas is about the same. With that being said, when we first connected on LinkedIn, what attracted me about you was that you do your own ads and make your own videos. You put them and yourself out there. You're taking the chance to be criticized or ridiculously people say, “What is this type of video?” Me, personally, I love it because it shows your creativity, passion, and desire to show something different face of, first of all, the fact that you're a human. Secondly, you're a person that has humor, and third of all, you don't want to settle for what the rest of the industry is.

Tell me a little bit about how did you come up with those ideas and how do they work within your company culture? Don't you have someone saying, “You shouldn't be doing this because that affects the brand?” The reason I'm asking you is I even have a hard time with certain companies when I invite people from institutions, companies, and groups to the show. They're saying, “I can't show up to your show because we use a PR firm. It's about brand protection and everything.” I said, “You're a leader of your company. and if they don't trust you enough to go public, make some statements, and show how great your company is, how do they trust you to oversee hundreds of millions or billions of dollars worth of real estate?”

Even a service manager is part of managing $50 million, $60 million, or $80 million worth of real estate. If you don't trust them enough that they could speak, they would not embarrass you as a company. You're afraid that they're going to affect your image. How do they act when they interact with your customer or resident on site? Are they the right people? That's a take. I understand brand to some extent, but when you go to those lengths to put a ban on people showing on a show or expressing themselves on social media, that's on a whole other level. I'll let you speak to that. How did you come up with the idea of creating your own ads and how is your company reacting to that? What is the higher-up reaction to those videos that you're putting out there?

First off, thanks for the kind words and you hit the nail on the head. I've never been a person that likes mundane, obvious, boring, the same newsfeed, and the same job ad. Growing up in a small town, I was always kind of a guy who did my best to treat everybody the same. I’m trying to be cool with everybody. I played sports, but I also was in a band so I had a mixture of different people I hung out with. What I'm getting at is I got to be myself. I'm going to treat people with what I do. I wasn't afraid to have my hair in a mohawk. I also play hockey and am in a band. I was inspired to not be like anybody else.

I was proud of who I was. I molded myself into this guy that says, “I think it's okay to be a little bit different and be original” I'm a goofball. My mom was a huge goofball, by the way. I wish she was still alive because she was legendary to who I am. Readers will probably laugh because I'm a spitting image of my mother. She was fantastic. but she was different. She was goofy, fun, and didn't care. I remember her wearing goofy clothes and we were going to the grocery store, “What are you doing?” She's like, “I don't care.” She would talk to every single person and people loved her for who she was. She's a huge role model to start on how all this happened.

Fast forward, I've always been influenced by bands that are different. 311 is my all-time favorite band. They're original and they got guitar riffs. They'll mix reggae, rock, funk, and disco. I've always been attracted to things that are different or not the same. Fast forward to this recruiting thing, I was in the shoes like you were. I was looking at all these ads and I was like, “I'm not a mundane person. I don't want to portray that.” Going back to your branding thing, it is ridiculous for somebody to say they wouldn't want to do that. I have my own brand of recruiting. That's what it's all about. You're a recruiter. You don't have to stick to any specific trend.



If you want to stand out in anything, be a little different. I had one guy respond to me and said, “I had a goofy filter on my face.” It was ridiculous. I've got the fist on the head. I've got a vampire's face. Truly, it's my spin. We talk about life hacks. It's my way to hack the boring. You do get occasional people that this one guy is unprofessional. I wasn't mad at him. I said, “It's called having fun. I recommend you should try it sometime.”

I honestly think our world since COVID, nobody wants to have fun. I preach this to my team too. Not that I'm better than them by any means because some of them are probably better than me. We have a great team. I encourage them to be their own personal brand. Be yourself. In a world full of similar stuff, be you. Being me is me doing a goofy face, then do it. If it's whatever you got to do to be you, do it. You don't have to be Kane and do goofy faces, but be yourself. With the guy respondent, I do have some criticism, but it's not usually anything too crazy. It's people going off.

I've had people come up to me at events but nothing like you, Mr. Celebrity. Everywhere you go, there are pictures. I love it. You're like the guru of it. Thank you for letting me even come on here. It's been awesome even taking time with you. I got cleaned up. I figured you'd be proud of me there. If we do this like once a month, I can dress appropriately. You're awesome at what you do.

I had a guy come up to me and said, “Are you that goofy guy that does all the goofy things?” I said, “I am.” He said, “I think it's awesome.” This was a very high-end person at one of the Glass Star events. I thought about that. I looked at it two ways, and I think you know the answer, “I'm being me and I'm not going to change who I am.” I took it as an awesome compliment. You get that mixture of feelings, but I also don't care about the people that don't like it because if this company allows me to be myself, how amazing is that?

What company says, “You can go make a song.” I created a song based off of desperation. I needed a property manager and I was incredibly saddened that I couldn't find it. We were paying well and had a good pitch. I grabbed my guitar one day. It was truly a sad song about how I need a property manager in Kalamazoo.



Afterward, I thought, “At least I'm doing everything I can do.” If somebody doesn't at least laugh at that, I don't know anybody else that's done that. That's what inspired me to do that. My upbringing inspires me to do these goofy things. Also, just to be different than everything I see inspires me to do these goofy filters and fun things. The stuff that's always inspired me is being a little bit different. I think that's okay. Having fun is the back-burner thing. People are afraid to have fun. People like to laugh. Who doesn't like to laugh? Our world needs more of it. Thank you for thinking it's awesome and fun. It's what I am so I'm going to do it.

To answer your question, I have never had one of the higher-ups at Monarch ever reach out to me and say, “You need to cut it out. You don't need to do that. That's too far.” I've had people suggest things on the marketing side. You got to see the reasons. Kathy Nichols, the owner's wife has reached out and loves the videos that I do. To me, that was the coolest thing ever. I'm like jumping in a pool and I’m being me.

If anything, they've embraced it. I'm not saying this because Kane is funny, goofy, or different that I want to work for, but I would think that that's got to be a company that at least is a little bit fun. Maybe that's not bread and butter, cookie cutter, and somebody that appreciates originality. In our world, we need to be more open-minded. How judgemental is our world as a whole? It's terrible. It's okay to branch out. I've found my niche and I'm going to run with it. I wouldn't trade what I do. Some of the stuff is ridiculously funny and absurd, but at the end of the day, it's a call to action.

If it can catch your attention like that guy that was negative about it, at least I caught his right. He took time to comment. I must have done something. I appreciate you noticing that. It is something that I've never had a kickback from the higher-ups. I think they encourage me to be myself and if I ever did anything too overboard, they'd probably tell me. It shows our humble culture. It's jeans and a flannel. We all know each other. I'm thankful for that because you're right, it could be, “Kane, take that down. You can't do that.” It's awesome. I get to run with however I feel or whatever I think is the best thing to do at the time.

Keep being different and awesome because I love your brand. I watch who you are and what you stand for. This is the very first time we connected on LinkedIn. I'm glad that you accepted my invitation to be here and chat. It's a treat for me.

It's a mutual feeling. I love the way you treat people. Everybody, there's not one person I've ever met or encountered that is like AD. The testament is to you. You should be proud of who you are and how you treat people. You don't do it for fame. You're not doing this for you. If anything, you're probably doing this for me, which I also appreciate. The fact you even considered me humbles me. Thank you for all you do for the industry. It's mutual for sure, 100%. I hope we get to do it more.

It's very kind of you to say that. I've done things in the past that I'm not super proud of as a manager or supervisor. I came to the realization that at the end of the day, you have to be good to people first. The rest is always going to work itself out. I wasn't always that person but I learned from my mistakes. I try my very best. I try my hardest to make up for the mistakes that I've done in the past. I know that this is the only way, at least for me. Try to do good with people's help without expecting anything in return.

You don't have to worry about the rest. The rest will always work itself out. Some other people might say differently, but that's my personal experience. It worked out for me in ways that I can't even imagine. I'm humbled by the level of attention and nice, kind things like what you said. At the end of the day, I had to stay real because you can't get high on your own supply. Don't get too full of myself because that's also a dangerous thing to do. You had to stay and keep your head down and keep logging along because it's a long journey. It's a marathon. It's not a sprint. Don't get too impressed with yourself. I don't take myself seriously. Sometimes, I do funny or goofy stuff and post about that type of stuff.

I don't think we should all take ourselves too seriously, regardless of the positions that we're in. Thank you for your kind words. The next topic that I want to touch on is career coaching. You're a recruiter, but I'm sure that you could be a career coach with many people you've met throughout your career and seeing things that they might do that they're not the best things for themselves in their best interest. With that being said, I'd like to ask you, what advice would you have for someone that is ready to elevate their career to move up the ladder?

I always say there's no timeline. Being in Monarch in twenty states, you're going to have opportunities to grow. Get in and grind. It's not going to be given to you. If you're educated and you come out of college, it's not their fault. You want to have a good job. You want to be the next analyst in Monarch. The analyst works right under Ethan, our Asset Manager with acquisitions, dispositions, and the whole nine yards. The advice I'd give them is there's no time clock. Don't expect in a year or a year and a half that you're going to be bumped up. If you are, it's because you deserved it and you've earned it. Keep in mind, it might be 2 or 5 years from now, but I tell them this and it's the absolute truth because I lived and breathed it. I've seen a lot in the many years I've been with Monarch.

There's no time clock, get in and grind. That's the thing. Work your tail off. Be the first person. I love that I'm usually the last person to leave work. I'm the last person out of this office. I'm not always the first one here. In doing those little things that go above and beyond, no one can tell you how hard you're going to work. In your heart, no one can ever take your heart and passion. I say embrace that but apply it. Stay late. Volunteer for an event. Do something that shows your character outside of obvious things. I go back to the role we talked about. Don't do it for the benefit of, “I volunteered at that, I'm a good person. I'm going to put it online that Kane volunteered.”

“I should volunteer. I should do more,” but do it for the right reasons. To answer your question, no time clock but embrace that. It might be five years from now, but get in, put in your time, do empirical things that make a difference, stay late, help somebody out unconditionally, volunteer your time, and offer to pick up on different projects in whatever you can. Those are the main things. Stay humble. Always learn. Be open-minded. Go grab a certification. In our industry, it's amazing how much we pay for. Don't close the door either. If you think you're doing a good job, keep it open and keep getting certified. We'll take care of people at Monarch.



In general, be open-minded, aggressive to learning, and also take chances. As you were saying, “Kane, do you want to hop on this show?” I said, “Absolutely.” Anytime those opportunities are presented, I highly recommend them. I've told this to one of my best friends. I said, “If something comes at you, take it. Take the chance at least.” I’m not saying jump jobs. That might be something that could get them going, but stay educated and stay hungry. We can't place our heart or passion in somebody. We can't make you stay late. If you embrace those things, good things can happen. That's what I would tell somebody.

Next, on average employers and recruiters, they're looking at resumes for 6 to 7 seconds. That's all they spend on the resume. What practical advice do you have for a candidate who wants to be noticed by recruiters and hiring managers?

The cover letter is a thing of the past but here's what I love about cover letters. It gives you that quick five separate seconds from the resume that says, “Dear hiring manager. Dear Monarch Investment, I might not have all the qualifications you possess, but I guarantee you I'm going to show up on time. I'm going to work my tail off and I'm going to do everything I can to benefit your organization. I would love it if you would consider me. I don't think you'd be disappointed.” Something like that. A pitch on a cover letter can change the whole tempo. Even the aesthetics of a resume or for maintenance, silly enough, you don't have to have a whooty doty, but maybe a different color or design.

Go back to our rule of being a little bit different. Something that's different. You see the same thing. Make sure it looks presentable. I've always thought putting a picture is always a cool thing. Put a little picture in the corner of your resume so I can put a face to a name and go, “Cool.” It almost feels like you already know this person. That's a cool little hack I like. If it's not the cover letter, then a brief summary. You got your name something quick but different like, “I want to be the next top person, top leasing agent at Monarch. If given the opportunity, I'm going to do everything I can to be the next best leasing agent for Monarch.”

Something that grabs me because I’m always excited when I talk to people. If you're not excited, it's hard for me to be super excited. Grab my attention with something unique. A quick paraphrase, a structured resume, and maybe a picture on the side in a genuine cover letter of your intentions. If you want it, present it and run with it.

My team probably going to laugh at me, but it's always like dating. It's not much different. It's how you treat people and that first impression. In my life, my first impression is I'm going to treat you awesomely and I'm going to try to be a little bit different. Trying to brand yourself in that quick little snippet is hard with those 7 to 9 seconds we're looking at them but getting a little bit creative is my last thing. Have a little fun with it and try not to be like everybody else.

I’ll go a step further. At 6 or 7 is not dating. It's speed dating.

I'm spending way more than that if it's a maintenance resume. That's a funny story I can go. We have a technician, Harold, that still works for us. He is absolutely phenomenal guy. Every time I see him, I give him a big hug and he's my fun story. His resume said a quick little sentence, “I can paint and plum. I can do whatever you need me to do for this position.” What did I do? Like my mom taught me in the small town. I'm not going to judge anybody. I'm going to treat everybody the same truly. I called up Harold and said, “It is not the most fancy resume I have ever seen, but I love that you're honest. You said you can do this. If you can do this, let me ask you this.”

I come to find out that he's one of the best technicians we ever hired and it goes back to that golden rule of what you're saying about recruiters. If they're only spending 7 to 9 seconds, we do glance and get a good coverage of what we're looking at. We got to be spending way more time with that if we truly care about that applicant. I am not being corny when I say this. I look at every applicant as, “Thank you for applying.” I'm going to give you the time, but you got to grab me for sure. Being open-minded, not judgemental, taking more than 7 to 9 seconds. Make it one minute.

Are you giving them adequate time? We talked about when we first started this conversation, people come from different backgrounds. I came from restaurants. You're telling me somebody that evolved into a senior recruiter is somebody you should overlook for leasing because they worked in restaurants. That'd be a mistake. Somebody like you that was a groundskeeper many years ago, if you're going to overlook them, they'd make one of the biggest mistakes they could.

It always goes back to that football thing. I always bring up Tom Brady. He was almost the last pick of the draft. He's the best that's ever played the quarterback position. There are always those hidden gems. I encourage recruiters to spend a little bit more than 7 to 9 seconds. The reality is that's pretty much what it boils down to. We need to be better as recruiters making that even double or a little bit longer.

A lot of candidates, especially maintenance candidates, don't have advanced interview skills like the gentleman you mentioned. You mentioned resume-building skills, but I want to talk a little bit about interviewing skills. They don’t know how to sell themselves. What advice would you have for someone who is preparing to go to an interview? Any specific advice for a maintenance technician candidate? That's the most sought out position that we're at times missing out because the candidates are not versed enough in interviewing skills to sell themselves so they could communicate how much they have to bring to the table.

Have them focus on the KSA, which is all that matters, Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities. As a maintenance tech, you don't need to sell yourself and go, “I'm so much fun.” They're like, “That guy was awesome.” I can have that maintenance technician focus on what they can bring to the team, their actual knowledge, skills, and abilities. Not the personality. When he leaves as a true recruiter and genuine professional if we're equal opportunity employers, we're supposed to do this and look at the knowledge, skills, and abilities. Remind them, not everybody has to be a talker, but also reinstate your knowledge, skills, and abilities.

If you're not a super talker and nervous to say, “This is what I can do. I'm comfortable doing this,” be honest. Maybe say, “I'm not the best at interviewing.” Have them use the honesty card because that's going to put the person in their shoes if they're a good person, which most of us hopefully are. Be honest and say, “Interview isn't my top suit. I thank you for letting me come in. See my resume. If you don't mind, focus on what I can bring on the skill, knowledge, and abilities. Maybe I'm not the best at interviewing or with the internet, but think about it.” The maintenance techs don't have to be the most talkable person. Sometimes, it's better if they don't talk.



Sometimes we get our techs on-site to talk too much, but somebody can grind. I would encourage them to focus on their knowledge, skills, and abilities. Focus on being honest in the interview if they're uncomfortable to say, “I’m not the best at this, but I'm happy to be here and I don't want you to feel like I'm not going to be a good fit.” Being upfront is never a bad thing. One of those things you could ask for advice. Sometimes people ask me and I always say, “Dress to impress.” You can always control what you dress like. It's always okay to dress to impress. It's always a first impression. They get lost in the transition of, “Did I like this person or will they fit?” How do you know if they're going to fit?

Do they have the knowledge, skills, and abilities? If they do, then we should be strongly considering them. It's not always about how much you like them or how well they feel. They might be uncomfortable. Maybe they have anxiety or things that trouble them every day that they're not able to be as professional as they want to be. Let's treat them like humans and give them a fair shot. Have them be proud that they're in a field. As recruiters, remind them, “You're interviewing for this job that is in high demand. Please don't be overly intimidated. Be yourself. Dress to impress is never a bad thing. It's a first impression. If you get uncomfortable, be honest and tell them, ‘I'm not the best at this,’ and then focus on what you can do for them.”

There are maintenance tests. We stay consistent with what we do. Some people aren't test takers. I've had some of the best technicians and they're like, “That test was crazy? I'm not a test taker.” At that point, hand in that test. If you're the guy I interview, say, “I know this sounds like a thing that you might hear, but I'm not the best at taking tests. Take me to a unit.” At that point, why don't we walk them around? We've done this. We need to do it more. “Show me how to swap out ballast and a light fixture. Why don't you replace that garbage disposal and jam it for us?”

Give them some actual technical stuff and let them show you. It would be a good thing we could do to make it even more fair for the people that do have a hard time interviewing. I think we need to be more open too. I don't think it's always about, “That person didn't interview well. They're not prepared for it.” Are we treating them the way they should be treated? It’s that golden rule.

I want to keep you in a candidate's corner. Be a coach for your candidate. How do you get the best offer? What advice would you have for candidates on salary negotiations? How to get the best out of themselves who they are and their skillset?



Don't settle for sure because you're in demand, whether they know it or not. Great maintenance techs could work about anywhere. What I would do is look at the market. I would take a half hour to look on Indeed and look at what other companies are paying. You can look all this up. Figure out where your base pay is and what your worth is. I wouldn't settle for anything that doesn't make you feel valued. I would look at reviews on the company and the culture of the company before I made a decision if I'm that candidate.



I would get a good market survey of the area of what people are paying. At the end of the day, I would go with how I was treated truthfully. I might personally take myself, but everybody is different. Take a $1 or $2 pay hit for a company that treated me good when I walked in the door because if they don't, somebody else will treat you better.

I would try to get a market survey of the area of what other things are paying. I also know my worth. Everybody knows an idea ballpark of what they want to make, but I also wouldn't be afraid to push back. If you think it's an unfair offer and it's a good company, I would say, “I think we couldn’t be beaten.” That confidence boost of, “The ball is in the maintenance court.” You would fight for what you think makes you feel valued.

The next topic is counter offers. I want to start by asking you roughly what percentage would you say for your candidates that you're making offers to are coming back and saying, “I have accepted a counter offer from my current company and I decided to stay there.” What percentage? I wanted to ask a second question. What is your personal opinion or advice for the candidates for taking counter offers or not?

I wouldn't think it's everyone. I'd say maybe around 20% to 25%, 1 in 4, that might say, “My current company mastered this or that.” I also felt like with COVID, it was more than that. I don't know if it was a matter of, “I can do what I want,” kind of thing, a mentality from the candidate's standpoint. Probably about 1 in 4, we see that pushback on that side.

What do you advise if you were to be their coach? You will coach them. They're not interviewing you. They're interviewing basically someone else. They got a solid offer. They went back. Their current company is doing a car offer. If you were their coach in their corner, what would you advise? Should they take the car offer or not?

I would say, “How do you feel about both situations? One, you've already worked at. You have a feel for the culture and stuff. The other one is you like and they're giving you an offer.” I would question them as a coach to say, “Why didn't that first company take care of you? Why do you get to go elsewhere for them to counter your value?” I would question that highly. Much on the current company, you shouldn't have to fight for your value. That's one thing I would coach them. I'd also say the grass isn't always greener on the other side.

You might have a company that offers you $25 an hour as a tech than you're making $22. You might be walking into a totally unorganized mess, older unit counts, and bad plumbing. You've done this for a long time. If it's somebody personal I'm coaching, I would say, “The grass isn't always greener on the other side.” I’ll remind them of that, but I also say, “I don't think it's bad to explore other opportunities. What do you want? What does your heart tell you?”

I know that sounds corny but, “What's your heart telling you? Is it saying, ‘I should take this offer or I should stay?’” At the end of the day, I would consult the people that are closest to me, run everything by them, and maybe do a pro-con truly. I wouldn't factor in the fact that the past company hasn't made them feel valued enough for what their market value is in their position. That's something I'd reiterate. I'd also ask them what their heart says and, “What do you think you're worth at the end of the day?” It's okay to fight for stuff, but that's a tough one. It does happen. It's a very real and good question, but you shouldn't ever have to question your value. You shouldn't have to even look in the first place if you're feeling good.

I have several more questions that I want to go. Are you ready for some rapid-fire questions?

Absolutely.

Let's start shooting. What advice would you have for a young person coming out of high school or college and getting ready to enter real life? What would be the very valuable piece of advice, in your opinion, that you would share?

I would come in early and stay late at whatever job I got. I would go above and beyond to thank everybody from the person that cleans the bathrooms to the person that you see at the pantry. Everybody is exactly the same because people are going to start talking about how you're treating people. Your character is based on what other people say. It's not when you think about yourself.



Thank everybody unconditionally on odd days. Be the first and the last one to leave if you can. Also, realize that time clock. There's no time clock that says, “You're going to be here or there.” If you do these things, you show up, work hard, work your tail off, volunteer, and do something that stands out, but don't expect things to happen overnight would be another thing. Get and grind, work hard, thank people, and take chances. If someone gives you an opportunity to run with it and do it.

In the past few years, what do you believe behavior habit has most improved your life?

In my personal life, I'm big. I've got a very young son. He's my life. His name is Ace. He's awesome. I've got a beautiful wife, Amy. I've been realizing that, through COVID, it was this tough time. I've been trying to be the best I can be, even outside of work to be a better person. I've always treated people I think pretty well, but I haven't changed any behaviors. Realizing the gift of life and how fortunate we are to have the things we have. Being more grateful in every facet of life whether it's my home, my son, my wife, my job, or my friends. I'm pretty fortunate. We need to be thankful for those things.

When you lose focus or feel overwhelmed, how do you get back on track?

Music is my uplift. I listen to a positive band. Saves The Day has been rocking me with old-school punk-pop stuff. Neck Deep is a new band I've been listening to. Music brings me out of slumps. It gets me going. Even if it's a change of mindset, I like happy music. Upbeat pop-punk stuff has lately been awesome. Sometimes that brings me up out of it. I've talked I want to give Andy Newell, our CFO, a huge shout-out This is a huge company. He reached out to me and said, “I know you've been dealing with some health stuff. What do you need? Do you want to talk to me?”

How amazing is that? Realizing you do have outlets and people that do that are the people that you need to reach out to. Also being not afraid to say, “I've had a crap day. It's been tough.” On those funk days, I go back to my basics and my family too. I go home, appreciate them, look at what I have, listen to fun music, and be thankful for the people that reach out that says, “When you're having a rough day, let's meet up.” I've got a lot of great friends. I'm super fortunate, to be honest.

It is been an incredible pleasure to have you here to chat with you. Time flies by when you have fun. In closing, is there anything that you'd like to add? Maybe answer a question that you wish I would've asked and I didn't or say something in closing or anything for the audience?

No, I don't. I can't thank you enough. It has been fun. It's all-natural with you. That's pants off to you. You're great at what you do. You're such a huge positive influence. As you said, it's awesome. You're honest about your past. We've all had things that we've done, but you're a phenomenal individual and the way you treat people. I've never seen anybody, ever in my life, that goes walks around to trade shows and people want to get pictures. You're the celebrity for us. Everything you're doing, keep doing it. You're fantastic and I truly mean this. Hopefully, you can tell I'm pretty genuine and passionate, but thanks for allowing me to come on here. It's a true honor and it's been awesome.

That's definitely there. As far as questions, you've been in the trenches for many years of the maintenance side. I think it's time we start paying you guys a little bit better. We also need to try to take things away. You got to make the noise go away. For on-call, we need to figure out. When you're done with work, the last thing you want to do is work.

We got to figure out a way to do on-call better. We have to pay better. I also think snow removal in a lot of our regions is hard on our guys. If you don't mind if I can pick your brain on that. What are your thoughts on overall for maintenance? Are we paying enough? What are your thoughts on on-call and should we get more creative in snow removal? I’m curious what your thoughts are on that from being in the trenches. You've lived and breathed this. I've just been on the recruiting side.

We're not paying enough. I do wage comparisons, at least quarterly, for the markets that we're in. There's still a significant gap between what we pay. Not just the company and workforce but what the industry pays and the trace, for example. We had to close that gap and make it more attractive for individuals to want to come to work for us.

The second reason after payment will be on call. Do we have to get more creative with on-call? Yes. Do we want to service our residents? One hundred percent. I would like to offer them the white glove service. Ultimately, if I don't have the personnel and enough people in place to offer that type of service, what do I do? The first thought is I'm going to go and outsource, which we are as an industry. You got to find that balance. How much do you want to outsource?

Is there maybe a better way to do this as a middle ground? I think there is. If you limit after-hour and weaken emergencies to fire, flood, or blood and contract some of that work, when is possible and when it makes sense? That helps tremendously. That's one thing. Secondly, paying as much as you can and incentivize the time that they spend on call.

First of all, don't send them home earlier because they came in the middle of the night for three hours to handle a flood. Don't send them home the next day because there's no incentive. They end up making an extra trip, spending extra money on gas purely for the company's benefit and they're not benefiting from anything. They ruin their night. They didn't get a full night's sleep and they still got to show up the next day to work.

Pay them for the time that they spend out there. Also, maybe throw another incentive. I heard up to like $250 per week that companies are paying for someone to be on call on top of the hours that they get from working. You're going to get $250 for being on call. It makes it to where you turn the tables from people hating to be on call to fighting to be on call because it's extra income. With inflation rates and everything that's going out there, wages are shrinking like real buying power shrinking. That's a real way for them to make up for the inflation for the lost wages. That's not a small thing.

Snow removal was the third one. I never oversaw states where snow removal is think and think, but I will say this. Like anything else, you had to work and look at the workload. It goes back to the on-call situation. In most of the polls that I do on LinkedIn, people that complain about work in general and maintenance in particular, they're saying, “We're overworked and underappreciated.” Let's start over there. Why are they overworked? What can we do to release the pressure, relieve some of that burden, and lighten the load for them so they don't feel like they're always working themselves to death?

One way is to look at is making it possible for them when they're short-staffed or whatever to outsource some of the snow removals. Not necessary to pay to outsource it all, but when they have that opportunity to outsource, you'll be surprised how people are taking ownership and not taking advantage to outsource everything. Make that an option for them when they're short-staffed, overwhelmed, or the property is too large for them to cover a house, or it might take them a week to remove that snow. Kane, it was a real pleasure having you here. I still had a lot of questions unanswered. I’m hoping that this is a segue for us.

Let's do it again whenever you're ready.

It’s my opportunity to bring you back in for a second conversation. I truly enjoy it.

I had an amazing time. Thanks for everything and for everything you do. It's been awesome.

Everybody, thank you very much for reading. I hope to see you back here soon on the next episode. Have a great day.



Important Links

• Kane Madsen –LinkedIn
• Monarch Investment and Management Group
  



About Kane Madsen