Andreea Lungulescu on Reimagining Recruitment in the Age of Change

Speaker A: In today's episode of HR Visionaries, you talk to Andre about how talent acquisition will change in the light of AI. Stay tuned. Welcome to HR Visionaries, the show where we discover the truth behind contemporary hr. I'm your host, Benjamin. Join me as I unfold today's talent ecosystem with HR innovators from around the globe. Welcome to the latest episode of HR Visionaries. I'm very much looking forward to my guest today. Andrea, it's great to have you.

Speaker B: Thank you. Uh, I'm happy to do the intro now. People will learn from the podcast that it was a bit of a hiccup. Uh, thanks for doing this. I think it's important to talk about the topics that we're talking about. I'm very happy that you're so passionate about it, and I hope that some of the information I can share and some of my experience would be beneficial for your audience.

Speaker A: It's lovely. Andrea, can you tell us a bit about yourself? Who are you?

Speaker B: Well, I'm Andrea. Uh, I'm a talent acquisition professional. I've been in the industry for 15 plus years. I'm originally from Romania, and I'm a human being like the rest of us, not a robot, not an AI. For the past, most of my career was spent in corporate, in EMEA region and consulting as well. And most recently I have ventured on my own, building my own consulting company and then on. I say on the side, but it's a very big part of my work is actually a passion project and that is building the community called TalentCrunch Berlin. It's a community of talent practitioners and professionals and leaders. Now it's global. We are around 4,000 people. And I run everything in relation to do with, uh, the community. Plus I support companies who are looking to build their first talent acquisition foundation. Um, and I help individuals with career development career archetypes. Um, I developed something called the career Operating system, or archetype. And I'm an absolute fan of tech. So I think that's what brought us together.

Speaker A: Right? Indeed. Um, well, of course we, uh, provide links to the community, um, in the show notes, um, that people can find out about it, in particular those who are based here in Berlin. Andrea, why are you passionate about talent acquisition? Why do you like that field?

Speaker B: Um, funny enough, after my first ever job in talent acquisition, which was back in 2010, I think, uh, 11, roughly, I came out of that job completely traumatized, literally traumatized. And I passed my probation and then he fired me two weeks later.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: And I said, I will never in my life do this job ever again. Anyway, 15 years later I learned that uh, it is, I feel a human um, responsibility for people around me. If I can help them understand their career, um, steps and if I can help them get into a company or understand why that company shouldn't be for them. It happened, it happens a lot. Um, it's something that I feel, I don't know, I feel it's a duty weirdly enough. Um, I love the networking aspect of it, um, the multitude of personalities and professions I have gotten to learn. I think it works with my brain and with the way I am. I think neurodivergence helps because, because I'm extremely curious about everything. So this profession turned out to be something I absolutely fell in love with and I think I became quite good at it in time. And that's why, I don't know, it's the diversity of things that you can touch and the real human impact you can have.

Speaker A: Well and also you impact uh, human beings life but also its creative critical for the company you're working for to attract the right talents, to retain the right talents. Very often one totally underestimates how expensive it is to get the uh, wrong people on board who then don't leave too quickly and to not get the right people in the first place.

Speaker B: Absolutely, yes. It's true. Uh, I focus on the human element but on the, the business side of things I have to say in, in all this time I've been working honestly the amount of money someone who is quite good at their job in talent acquisition can save a company. And I write a lot about the, where the companies drain money. What should they pay attention to? How you can solve those problems is something I really care about. And it's true there is so much money to be saved and made. I think this is what also people have a hard time m relating to. How can talent acquisition make me money? You're just a cost center. It honestly makes my brain boil. But truly it's not something that we talk enough about. And also I understand there is not sufficient education in the open space about how this profession or this domain, um, traditionally seen as HR or part of hr, at least how this can make a company money and we can make you money quite a bit actually. So. Yeah, but you're right, it's true. So it's individual side and business side for sure.

Speaker A: Maybe we can talk about this part indeed a bit since um, I think it's so incredibly important that HR speaks the business language and hr, um, and talent acquisition Become much more a function that is viewed from a business perspective not as a cost center as you said, but as a profit center.

Speaker B: Um, this is such a discourse which is repeated and uh, regurgitated over and over again. Because where do we start? Is it the, let's say the business suite's responsibility to enable HR or is it HR's response responsibility to push upwards? So it's like do I manage up or do I get managed or how does this even work? I don't know. I don't claim that I have the answer for that. But I have to say that if I look at at least Germany and some of the companies I've seen not uh, being an employee necessarily, but through the community, I know a lot of people in a lot of companies we are lagging behind severely and this mentality or old fashioned way thinking about things is there unless we understand uh, that we need to up our game either by let's um, say enabling the people already in the jobs to be forward thinking, harder to do or sorry to say, replacing them with someone with a, with a uh, vision, with a futuristic approach to work who understands that they need to read the reports, that they need to read the data, that they need to apply the data, they need to apply the tools and so on and so forth. I think it's going to be a continuous, very slow motion exercise. Um, and we do it all the time with our governments. I mean now is the time, right? Germany has a brand new, really a new outlook on government and the new chancellor. So we enough and we do it often. Why don't we do it in companies in really. And we have someone sitting there for 16, 20 years with the same approach to work. So I don't know the answer to your question who should drive what. But definitely um, this has um, cascading impact on everyone. Um, I will pull my data up again. Really? I, I found this fascinating.

Speaker A: You know

Speaker B: today 50% of employees are looking to leave their job. 50%. I don't understand, I don't think that companies understand what the number means. It's insane. And not to be replaced by AI, you know, globally blue color, white color.

Speaker A: So yeah.

Speaker B: I don't know. What's your view on this?

Speaker A: Yeah, I think um, I think first of all talking numbers, uh, I think what you just did, I think it's first of all super important because what. Uh, well I myself I'm from uh, from the banking industry. Right. And there's well everything is about numbers. And the great thing with numbers is that it's a universally understood language. So one can hardly say. Okay, well, we did like a, you know, a study when it comes to, uh, um, employee engagement. And our score, uh, went from 45 to 88. Okay, what does that mean? Right, so, so is. So what that, what do those numbers mean? However, if you can put a euro sign behind it, that is like a completely different story. And I think what, well, we are preaching. I, uh, think what you are preaching is, hey, you can make yourself much more relevant when you talk numbers, when you talk euros, since that is something everyone understands. Um, I don't necessarily think that a CEO understands the. Oh, uh, why would he?

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: So probably most people don't understand whether an engagement score or 45 or 88. So what's the difference? In terms of business, what is the business impact of that? Nobody necessarily understands. If you put a euro number behind it, everyone will understand. So you can put it into perspective in terms of cost and of revenue, in terms of profit. Okay. Now it's a number you can relate to.

Speaker B: Yeah. I think they should also be able to understand the percentages. But I agree with you in fact fact that at the end of the day money talks. Sadly, I mean, we, we chose to go down capitalistic route. Now we have to deal with it, I guess. Or we don't. We can just move. Um, but it's true. It. And I think this is where the talent profession or the HR profession falls behind. They. And it, it saddens me that they, they seem to accept the state, they seem to accept the fact that we are just seen as this. And I don't think it's the truth. Right. So it is a possibility to really look into, as you well explained, Translate those, uh, trends. Translate the data that you get from reports globally. Translate your own internal data, uh, into cash.

Speaker A: Exactly, translate it.

Speaker B: But you know what I found? Um, and this is a use case for AI. You know what? It's not so complicated. Try to understand. I've done this exercise once for a different purpose, but also it was to show the costs or estimate formulas for costs. I was like, think about interviewing. I was trying to change interviewing processes at a company I was working at. And of course, of course you need all the data in the world, what's on up, blah, blah. And then it wasn't even as advanced. It was last year. Year. And I did put the structure in. And then I came up with fake numbers of estimated salaries of everybody involved, how many people are involved, how many. And I calculated, I tried to calculate as much As I could just to show not only how many hours, but those hours are money and then everything else, right? The ats, the job board. So this, this, this, this, this. And I built this huge, humongous. It wasn't a spreadsheet. It was more of a formula. And then showing where the money goes, money and time. And then if I said if we reduce this and that and that, this is how much money we can save. Well, that's the easy way to talk. I. Am I that smart to build that whole goddamn formula? Not necessarily. So people who are listening at least use this one case and then help your business understand how you help them save money. It's basic in my mind. I don't know if you, if you feel the same way, but you're completely right. Translated to cash.

Speaker A: Yeah. Um, and, um. Well, you mentioned before that you're very passionate about HR tech and, uh, well, applying tech in the HR space. Um, what struck your mind over the last few months? What did you find most remarkable? Not in terms of product or in terms of, um, software, but like the use case you found, you found remarkable.

Speaker B: Can I have a controversial thing to say?

Speaker A: Of course you can.

Speaker B: Okay. I will answer this question by going back to the stuff that I read, uh, which I think will inform the rest of my answer. So, for example, in the Gallup, um, report about workforce satisfaction, and they were talking about 62% of the managers view AI as a tool to identify and remove bold, italic, underlying, remove underperforming employees. Okay, this is rubbish. So now I will go and answer your question. And there is something else about development. This is something I've been talking about in my employment forever. We didn't have AI when we were talking about this in one of my previous corporate jobs. But performance, no, career development and performance, um, management connected in organizations. I think that this is. This has the potential I haven't seen yet. A tool or I'm not the tools I have seen, I wouldn't say that they blew my brains away because I was doing the same thing in Excel a couple of years ago. So I wait for something and there are some things coming up. We'll touch on that. But I think this has the potential of really positively, hopefully impact people's lives and careers, actually, first and foremost. So career development and performance management connectedness in an organization. Now, in relation to tooling, this is where my maybe controversial opinion comes in. Every man and their dog today thinks that because they have vibe coding available and N8N and whatever other tools livable and What? Or not they can just whip out uh, an AI agent, wrap a GPT and come up with a brand new innovative product that will solve world hunger. And this is where I have a problem with it because corporates who have been building ATS or HRIS systems, not so different, right? They also have to stay in the game or ahead of the game. And either they buy such systems, save the world from hunger, AI tools whipped overnight, or they build some slower than others. But now it's uh, like everybody does the same thing and it's so fast. The user interviews the user research is skipped. That is my impression and that is what I've seen from speaking with small companies who are building. They go to market, which is fair enough as a startup. Go to market, right? You want to launch new feature, test it. Fair, great, fast, agile, fail, fast, perfect. But you overwhelm everyone, you miss the point and you aggravate the chances are they will aggravate the situation in companies. So I would love to love um, products which go out and help organizations in their career development and performance management because I think it is important and needed at the moment I fear that because there is not sufficient user research done or uh, it doesn't seem to be because they whip out every other day like mushrooms after rain. I wonder, do you understand the employees problem as well or are you just looking at the business because, because that's where you get your cash from. I don't know. So I don't have a favorite or something that I would say blew my brains. You know what I love? I love uh, AI note takers because they save me a ton of time.

Speaker A: I think the point you're making is very valid so that well the development around AI and the capability of AI to progresses so fast that ah, of course many companies are worried they will fall behind if they um, well if they talk too much to potential clients. If they talk to clients, of course they get uh, valid feedback. However um, it's of course then the question of well, how to consolidate that Feedback. Feedback and how to turn it into a product. Right. So um, it's not easy these days how to uh, conduct proper user research compared to 10 years ago when stuff was just like progressing in the linear way, not in an exponential way.

Speaker B: Yeah, I can totally see that. But then it's um, and it's not like it's anybody's fault. It's the world that we live in, everybody's running for money and everybody wants to make a quick buck. Who the hell would be, excuse my French. I would love to. I have an idea on the way here actually I developed this um, career archetype I was talking about earlier. And it's a massive thing that people would have to go through. And on my way here I thought to myself, why don't I use Lovable or Rapid or whatever, whatever it might be and build this into an AI agent that I can give to some. Of course, everybody and anybody. Did I test it with users? No. Will I probably test it and try to do it and put it out there? Maybe it sells. Yes. So you can't blame the people for trying to do this. However, when you look at this being embedded in organizations, these things being used in organizations and then used for the good or for the not, not so good for the people that they are looking at. And that's when I personally have a problem with that or a worry. Um, another thing is something that I noticed. I remember I was on a uh, webinar once and VP or director of talent acquisition at a large organization in Europe won't mention their name or the company. They said that they are hiring fantastic. But, but they want someone with AI experience and using a specific set of tools that they have in the company. And I thought this was maybe a couple, four months ago or something. So since then we had a lot more. And I thought to myself how? Why? And then I thought, and then I connected with the person and I asked, do you have access to tooling in your company already? Yeah, we have these tools. Will you keep them forever? We're testing them but you're trying to hire someone who has experience with these tools. This is horrible. And then you have the example of. I'm sorry, I deviated from the question but I thought, I remember the example of Claude, anthropic, um, anthropic, um, who developed Claude, AI and LLM just like GPT, they were hiring people and they told them they don't accept people who have worked on that application with AI. I thought you're defending against your own point, like what if I go and I use Claude to enhance my SQL agreement? So I don't know, it is such a. It's double standards. I think that's the word. Indeed.

Speaker A: And um, I was wondering what you think about the following. So I think in particular the incredibly fast paced things, um, moving. It also presents talent acquisition with a. Actually with a very big challenge. So um, like 10 years ago one um, would have. So let's say you are a tax advisor or an accountant. You were looking for someone over Here in Germany with I don't know, a few years of Dartev experience. However, uh, one doesn't know whether this will be a key skill in two years time or whether the technology also data for example works with will be that great that you don't need the skill anymore or you need different skills. And therefore I'm wondering what you think about this. So how does this velocity change how acquisition. Because well as you said, so you have like five years of experience in that. Five years of experience in that. It's probably not that necessary anymore.

Speaker B: Yeah, it's a very valid point of view and question if I'm honest. And I have two um, complementary ways of thinking about it. One is that first and foremost us as human beings, we are not taught enough or not at all of uh, how to understand our own skill set. And I think this is what drove me to push out the content that I pushed out. Because um, I believe people, we in talent or HR are a bit more fortunate because we work with this topic now. So for us it's easy or easier. But um, imagine any other profession, they don't know what actual skills they have. And I think it's important that people start to understand how to look at themselves and how to deep dive into their own human being, professional human being on all different levels and translate the skills that they have developed to something else that might be needed in the future. That's part one. Part two is um, there is a lot of discourse these days around the fact that the shift towards more, let's call the core or soft skills becomes more and more important and they are also the hardest ones to check for. Right? And there is a lot of discussion and push to skills based hiring as we know. And then coming back to what you just said, uh, the third part, okay, so we build now frameworks to test for skills, the hard skills, the technical skills. And when I say technical, I don't mean Microsoft Office or AWS Cloud or something. I mean the project management part. The harder the skills. These ones we build frameworks to test for them and then in a couple of uh, years, maybe months, they will be obsolete, some of them. So why don't we instead understand what is you have a job to do that needs to be done and you need to hire a human to do the thing to be done. Try to translate that into what competencies, what the individual really needs to act on so that in focus less on. You have to have experience with AI tool ABC or with Dative or with um, Microsoft Azure or GCP or AWS or coding and programming language ABC or whatever it might be. So these very specific skills, I mean, there will be professions where this won't be available, right? So I don't want a surgeon who doesn't know how to use a scalpel. But, but, uh, in some other professions, get rid of that stuff. Because if one person is able to use one thing and is able to think critically about using the thing, it can be replicated. I think it's a matter of how we in talent acquisition model this behavior in a way, and people understand how to translate their own skills.

Speaker A: And I think, first of all, we need to find a proper German translation for critical thinking. Since, um, uh, we like. I worked on a post over the weekend and I actually spent quite a lot of time thinking about, okay, what is the proper translation of critical thinking? Um, uh, for someone who speaks mostly German, since I think that's exactly what we're looking for. Right? So for people who challenge the outcome of an AI, who, uh, work with the outcome of an AI rather than, well, stuff, we were used from, well, SAS technology. Okay. If you program a program to do X, Y and Z, the result will always be the same. Yeah. Um, and that's very different in the AI world. But also you're talking to a creature rather than to a software.

Speaker B: But imagine this, what I noticed, and this is frightening for me, frightening. Honestly, I gave this, uh, the same idea, uh, in a different conversation I had. I thought in 2020, 2021, everybody rushed to hire all the engineers available on the planet, born or unborn. In 2024, 2025, and before, we laid off a lot of people and we now replace people. We let them go and we replace them with tools because we think they are out. They must be wonderful. So the expectations from these things are, uh, yeah, let's call them things. I don't know. Tools, whatever technology, software, whatever it might be, is tremendous without them being sufficiently tested or put to pressure tests by those who actually invented them, like humans. So, um, I worry that we let go of people who possess critical thinking. There is another thing which is important, which is creative problem solving. So if this doesn't work like this, I can, um, patch from all my experiences, little pieces, and come up with something that might sound bizarre, but it may work, and we replace all of that. We just, um, dispose of it to bring tools in without them being tested, and we go, we get a nice clap and a pat on the shoulder because we save the company money by relieving three people. It Feels mind blowing that people also don't understand how distrib whole circuit globally will affect. It just comes back. It comes back. But this is a way bigger discussion. I don't want to go into Trump tariffs.

Speaker A: Well, probably not today, but yeah. So when you talk about this in your community, uh, what's people's opinion? So is it also very broad range of, of opinions or do most people think, okay, what you just said, ah, what I, um, agree, uh, on, um, it is like, okay, so this is how things will develop going forward, if I'm fully transparent.

Speaker B: I don't think we spoke enough about artificial intelligence in the community yet.

Speaker A: Um, why?

Speaker B: Thanks for asking. I think it's important to clarify because a large portion of the community members work in companies who, even though they present themselves as progressive and transformative, have no tools whatsoever. Zero. A lot of them are German based and we talked about it a little bit before, um, some tools are experimenting with some things and they have for many years. So there were tools, artificial intelligence enhanced tools for many years. Now it's nothing but um, agentic AI. Bringing this in, bringing that in. People didn't have the chance sometimes to just experiment with more or less anything that's super new and um, evolved. A second part is a lot of people are unemployed and it creates um, a sense of anxiety thinking that I'm now unemployed because they hired a goddamn robot to do my job. And it creates. I don't want that anxiety in the community. However, um, it's also a matter of a time availability. So we prioritized human things to talk about the human things, the people that the people who have jobs can do to improve their talent acquisition or the talent functions, not just talent acquisition. Um, and we postponed the AI discussions, you know, but if you speak to people on Slack, for example, or if you see what they are talking about, there is uh, a sense of I, I feel a sense of calm. I didn't see a sense of urgency or distress, which worries me because as we said at the beginning, people maybe don't understand that this thing is here to stay and it's something you need to act on. Oh yeah.

Speaker A: Well, what I love so much about AI is if you work with AI, it can and it will become your superpower. And the way. So we talked about that accountant who is like a super pro in um, um, for example Dartif. So of course the salary portion he earns that is related to his amazing knowledge of Dartev is definitely there. Right. But going forward, people will have a significant portion of their salary being, well, relating to their ability to work with AI and to work with AI tools. And therefore I think it's such an important, amazing opportunity for people to use the moment. And the great thing is it's very much accessible. Right? So it's not like, uh, well, uh, you're enrolling to a, uh, uh, management course at Harvard University that costs you $100,000, but it's like, available for everyone. And now we all have the opportunity to learn. It's. Isn't that amazing?

Speaker B: It is amazing. And it is. I agree with you on the superpower piece. I think we have the chance to upskill ourselves. I don't need to use AI. Ah, to know how to use AI. I can ask AI how to use AI. Exactly. It is so simple. However, you said it's very accessible. I partially agree with that because I think, um, there are people who can afford some of the tools are free, um, but some of the tools are paid. And a lot of the tools are paid. And that, uh, raises a big question in terms of accessibility. But even before that, um, you need to have access to a strong, powerful enough computer. You need to as a human being, there are people, let's just face it and accept it, and it's fine, that don't have the curiosity or the drive. They're happy with the status quo that they're at, and they don't want to be taken out of their comfort zone. It's fair, right? Everybody, um, is different. And then you have individuals who are caretakers who don't have time. It is time consuming. It is hard. It's a new skill and not one. It's a few new skills you have to build on top of your current life. So accessibility, I agree to some extent because it is one widely available. But the rest, if you look at it in more detail, it's complicated. And then I go back to the chicken and egg. If some of these people or a large portion of these people we just touched upon are employed, what does my company do to enable me to become a super worker? And then again, looking at the data I pulled, I, uh, think it was 44% of management doesn't get trained. A full stop. And then it was something around the 70% have, would love to use AI but don't have access to it. It is limited in organizations. I wish I had the, uh, chart. In organizations, only the higher management or the execs use AI and the lower roles don't have access to it. How is this fair there and accessible? So yes, human element. Please, people understand. Yeah. It will help you tremendously if your living circumstances allow. Please go do it.

Speaker A: Mason, say something also controversial. You mentioned people are happy in their comfort zone. Um, is it fair to argue? Well, either you leave your comfort zone or you're dragged out of your comfort zone.

Speaker B: Uh, yeah, I think they will. I think they will feel it themselves at some point. I don't know for how long. Um, people will be. I still have conversations today with people also from the community to whom I have to. Ah. I ask and then I get my face explains my feelings. So I have translations live, you know, but when I ask you do. Did you ask ChatGPT about this? No. It's like how, you know, I'm so indignated by it. Um, so there are people, and it's not even GPT, which is the most basic of basics, you know, today, in my opinion, it's just like, can you use a. Can you use a phone with a touchscreen? Like, it's the most basic of basics. And I'm talking about people around our age. I'm not talking about. Right. It's important to make a difference between elderly people, people who have been through change, and change and change. And I'm not talking about them. I'm referring to people, the millennials, the Gen Zs, um, who have to adapt.

Speaker A: How do you get people on board if they are. Well, as I said, for example, in this example, so, well, hey, no, I didn't do anything, but I think it's as you said. So I think ChatGPT is a great way to start your journey since it teaches you the very basics. And there are, uh, well, there's no confidential data involved or anything, but this is a nice barracks, partner.

Speaker B: Your question was, how do you get them then to maybe move towards doing something.

Speaker A: Exactly. So those people who are like, nah, I don't want. And you're like, hey, but I'm sure you're making a mistake. You should actually embrace the change that we're facing.

Speaker B: The people that I've spoken with, that I've gotten this immediate reaction, you know, like what I asked. The first thing I would do is ask them why, And I would see if there is a rationale. Because as we spoke about before, there is accessibility, there is personal winningness. There are people who are honestly and true to them, um, conspiracy theorists, they are afraid. And I cannot argue against that. Right. It's a very personal thing. Whatever, skeptics, whatever the rationale might be, so understanding why, for me, it matters. Right. Okay. And the explanation I got in those cases was absolutely ridiculous. Such as? I didn't think about it. Oh, um, I just don't know. I don't know. I don't use AI tools because I don't know. I don't think it will give me a good response. Sometimes I got an answer like, I don't know how to prompt it. What should I ask of it? And depending on the answers you get from a human being, right. You then go and say, okay, it's like, are you familiar with what is going on in the market? Have you read any, um, articles, any press, any research? I am of the opinion that I am not able to necessarily influence you. Um, who am I to influence you, But I can send you information to influence yourself. So I'm like, this is what's happening. This is what's available. This is what you would get out of it. Um, it's your decision to. Whether or not use this to your advantage or not. Um, and then in the case that I would. Referring to cases, I'm referring to these people have to onboard themselves because it's not. In that case, it's not my role to onboard them. However, there can be, right? I mean, you gave me an idea for a master class to build. There are so many available already. Um, free. Free stuff. And I think it's what.

Speaker A: I think one needs to also appreciate the world we're living and the world. World we're entering. So the world we're living, um, well, you couldn't just start, right? But you needed, like a large setup, long, uh, implementation period, Ah, trainings. And now the world we're entering. And the example you gave is actually quite striking. What stops you from trying? What stops you from just using tools and just try and see what's possible, right? So it's very different from the world we're living, where everything was super complex and you couldn't just like, hey, I would like to try a new application, new ats, right? And it's like, okay, you know what? Let's try it. Okay, that was impossible, right? So it took like two years of implementation periods to get an ATS running.

Speaker B: Now.

Speaker A: Now it's just like, okay, why don't you try? And within a few minutes you see the result. And, well, how do you prompt. Well, find out. So maybe you find a great way yourself, right?

Speaker B: Yes, I know that the data and the accessibility is so democratized, and so everybody should have access. And that's where the other part comes in, where we don't talk about because it is sensitive and we don't want to hurt people's feelings. But the reality of it is that there are people who don't care. There are people with a drive, with, um, a different kind of personality. And they don't have to be type A, but just their approach to the world is progressive, is innovative. And there are people. I mean, it's this book, right? Radical Candler. I think in there it was the. You have people who are rocks and people who are stars and for a good reason as well. This is in companies primarily. I hope I didn't quote the wrong book if I happen. Um, but it's fine to have. You can't have only a players everywhere on the planet. And there are, and there will always be these kind of individuals who do not have a personal interest until it hits them in the face. And they will have to have an interest because there is no way around it. So you go, go, go until the very last minute and then you're like, okay, God damn it, I have to do it. You know, which is fine, except everyone.

Speaker A: Right, I agree with that.

Speaker B: No, but it doesn't matter.

Speaker A: Yeah, um, as I said, uh, it's probably best just to kick start. Uh, Andrea, I have one last question for you. Um, since you have been in talent acquisition for so long, what are your favorite interview questions?

Speaker B: Oh, God. Uh, did I generate it or did chatgpt generated.

Speaker A: Well, whatever you like.

Speaker B: Let, um, me try and think of specific interview questions. Um, my questions usually derive from one to another, but I like to understand things about conflict management. So I will ask questions such as, um, help me understand about a situation where you had a conflict with your, uh, superior or with a colleague from a different business domain. What was it about? How did you solve it? How did you go through it? This is one of the ones I, yeah, I generally use. I would say another thing that matters for me is about stakeholder management. You can argue that they go hand in hand and that is for me to test, um, also creative problem solving in a way. Because when you, uh, have difficult stakeholders, you have to find ways to fix things. And how do you go about doing that? Again, it would be kind of a competency based question in a way, trying to figure out or how they have actually done things. And I also like to ask, um, hypothetical questions, providing them with an example of something that I know they would encounter in the job that they are going for. And I know that they will have, for example, um, very limited budgets. And I can ask them, give me about an example, about how you have done it in your previous company. But the reality is, maybe they haven't managed. They haven't had that in the previous company. So they either will bullshit me or they will say I didn't have it. It's possible. So I would just. Okay, this is what's happening. This is not very popular in talent acquisition, if I'm honest, because they can waffle, you know, But I want to think how they think and where do they go first? What help do they ask? What again? Creative problem solving, critical thinking, problem solving in general. Um, understanding risks. These are the things I care about a lot in interviews, but I don't. I didn't give you the clear answer. Right. I just gave you some rough questions.

Speaker A: I love it.

Speaker B: Yeah. Cool. This was the last question of the session.

Speaker A: Indeed. Indeed.

Speaker B: Good.

Speaker A: Andrea, thank you so much for being our guest on Asia Visionaries. Like. Like our session a lot.

Speaker B: Yeah, thank you. Likewise. I think we forgot what time it is, and I realized I am very late now.