HR Conferences: A Deep Dive

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Episode Summary:

Season One | Episode 21

"HR Conferences” is our love letter and side-eye to the events that are supposed to move this industry forward. Desiree and Ashley break down what conferences should be about community, real education, and true innovation, and why too many of them have turned into overpriced vendor parades with celebrity keynotes no one asked for.

We talk about safety (especially for women), inclusion, accessibility, and what it actually looks like to come home with something you can use at your desk on Monday, not just a hangover and a swag bag.

Catch the full episode below and hear how Desiree and Ashley are challenging HR conferences to do better for the people who keep this industry running.

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Desiree Goldey (00:23)

welcome to another episode of Talentless. Woohoo! Where we get into the real talk of recruiter talk, educating you, with my co-host Ashley King. And today we are going to talk about HR conferences. Ooh, It's very tricky, right? We went to HR tech

and then we went to rec fest which we had an amazing time thank you jamie lennard but we

Ashley King (00:50)

I mean, medium thank you, Jamie Leonard. I still have yet to

Desiree Goldey (00:55)

but yeah so but we do want to talk about the the outcomes of these things and like and what you should learn from them and

How you do it responsibly? think, you know, HR conferences are something to be able to take on that amount of vendors, that amount of speakers, that amount of everything. You really have to get in the room and have a plan and figure out what your goal is. Am I incorrect?

Ashley King (01:17)

No, so that's what I was gonna say is like first we need the audience in town

What is the purpose of a conference? Like what was the problem that it was created to solve? Why do we have conferences? And in my mind like three things I think come to mind and that's gonna be community, obviously. The people that you meet, the people in your wheelhouse that can help you and build community, there's that. I think that it's inspiration. So the speakers, the people, like are they actually

Desiree Goldey (01:37)

Yes, absolutely.

Ashley King (01:49)

teaching you? Are you getting educated? So there's that educational lens. And then the other one is the innovation. So maybe that's actually inspired. Maybe it's, you know, education that inspire. Well, but also the innovation that comes from once you have community, once you have all these things, now we can create an innovative space. ⁓ And that's where, yeah, it's done well.

Desiree Goldey (01:59)

Yeah, it's the Inspire. It's the Inspire. Thank you, RECFEST, for that stage.

Right, right. And for me, that innovation is like,

what did you take from that conference and are you doing anything with it? Right? Like, what did you come home and sit at your desk and be like, I just traveled for four days. what did I get out of it and how can I put that into practice?

Ashley King (02:22)

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (02:32)

I don't think we're doing that. We're not doing the follow up action as much as we should. Right? I think me and you did, but like, is everyone doing that? let's start back at your first one, Which is community. Let's start there.

The people you meet, I I think that is essential for me. I believe it or not, people call me a recluse in my house, but I'm actually a community person. I want to see you in real life.

Ashley King (02:45)

Yeah.

I mean, I'm not gonna lie, IRL Desiree scares me. Why? Because anytime we have to go do anything, she is like out with the people. She is like, shaking hands, kissing babies. And I am just like, stop, no, leave them over there, leave them over there, leave them over there. And then you bring them here and I'm like, hey, and I have to literally, that's I think how we got the peanut butter shots. I was like staring at the ground, shout back out to Jamie Leonard. Now y'all can connect the dots.

Desiree Goldey (03:02)

god!

Ha ha ha!

Yes! ⁓ my god, the peanut butter shots, Don't, I know,

please don't ever do it.

Ashley King (03:26)

But yeah, you're not gonna wanna connect those dots. But the point

is, that I think community is what brings you back to the same one. So like, it's not gonna be because of the speakers, it's not gonna be because of your vendors, it is the community. And that's what I think we've established through RecFest, it's just.

Desiree Goldey (03:34)

Yeah, yes, right. Yes.

Right.

Absolutely.

Ashley King (03:45)

instead of all the other conferences that are like, ⁓ let's have Matthew McConaughey and Joe Biden, little Joey B. Yeah, come tell us about HR. And it's like, we're such a joke. Do you think that doctor conferences invite like Meredith Grey? No, because they're not a joke. And so I hate what we allow because it's just like, what silly billies.

Desiree Goldey (03:50)

And they're cool kid man! And

No!

I want to be in the space of all these people that I've been talking to on LinkedIn, who I've been, doing this over some online weirdness. And now we get to

see each other in person and say oh my god you're like a real live human right like you know oh my god it's so amazing oh i know

Ashley King (04:26)

Yeah, seeing the icons come to life, like that is like the longest Tinder date you'll ever be on, Seeing Kat Kibben in person, I was like, you are so tall. Like always,

it's a height game for me, man. I just wanna know how tall the people are.

Desiree Goldey (04:44)

it was a revelation for me at RecFest and we are planning to do more conferences in 2026. So please look out for talentless. But I will say that like one of the things that was super important to me was to like find those people, right? know, Tejal, know, Joel, Mike, you know, all of those people that.

Ashley King (04:54)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (05:09)

were really important to me was really important to find them. Danny, like it was really important for me to like say, Hey, we're together. And that was super important for me. Yeah. Yo, Tamika, Tara, Rocky, like, my God, we just saw so many amazing people. I know. What's so bad? We're, ⁓ my God. Fangirling over here. So let's move to education now.

Ashley King (05:11)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, that's how I felt about Tamika, Tara, ⁓ Rocky. Yes, like I'm such a fan girl. Yeah, Anessa, like all the...

Just all the goodies. Lift up, lift up.

All right, let's pile on it.

Desiree Goldey (05:38)

Because I think this is where you get to the

real deal, right? You know, let's talk about education and what these conferences do or don't do. What do they do?

Ashley King (05:44)

Yeah.

Well, and because I think

that it's the answer to this is embedded in the community. So like, if I'm surrounded by numb nuts, then obviously the education I take from this isn't going to be great if whenever I leave the talk and get inspired and go sit out at a table with a whole bunch of nincompoops that either don't understand or can't apply or don't see the relevance. There's like that piece, but then there's also like that front piece. So like that scenario can only happen if I'm inspired by the talk.

Desiree Goldey (05:50)

Right.

Ashley King (06:14)

the speaker is a decent speaker, if it's someone who's actually educating me. And it's wild because I I think about the Matthew McConaughey's I think about the this and the that's and I'm like, what do you know of, people working minimum wage and a tritting every single day with, recruiters who have to have KPIs over 200 % because of how many replacement roles they have to do like, what could you possibly know and maybe that's some of me being like,

selfish, maybe that's some of me just wanting to have more reverence for our space and see like demand of respect that I think it deserves. But I do feel like the education piece is lacking. And I think that's because of reason number two, a lot of the people that they see as innovative are people who are tool people or tech people or AI. And so they're using all these company people like people who still again have nothing

Desiree Goldey (07:03)

Yeah, right.

Ashley King (07:12)

to do with recruitment, they just work around a recruitment product and because they're a vendor need to make money and they profit off of your practice dysfunction, they get the talking point and everyone thinks ooh ⁓ I want to see practitioners, I want to hear people solving people problems actually handling recruiting hiring managers actually handling like all this stuff.

Desiree Goldey (07:31)

Yeah.

Yeah. One of the great

people on our stage was Aaron Matthew. So shout out Aaron. Yeah. She did talent intelligence, right? Like you're a data nerd, right? So like, I know. like those living in those moments that you're actually teaching somebody how to do something that they probably didn't do before is so essential. But I want to go back to the one point that you said that was, I think for me,

Ashley King (07:41)

⁓ yeah, she did great.

Yeah.

I know it.

Mm-hmm. ⁓

Desiree Goldey (08:03)

stands out. It's the reverence of talent. Like if you don't hold it, if you don't think we're important, we put a bunch of BS in front of you, Right? And we continue to do that. We continue to say let's put the Matthew McConaughey's, poor Matthew is going to be on the show and be like, please stop talking about me. I know. But

Ashley King (08:07)

Yeah.

Yeah, just tell Priya I say hey

Desiree Goldey (08:27)

The thing about that is like, if you really hold this function dear and you're building a conference, you should build it around education of what is missing, not on the fluff, right? Yes, you can have a big lead name doing that like psychology of the universe, but I need the rest of that to look like you are doing something for me to go back to my desk and make sure.

Ashley King (08:39)

Mmm. Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (08:55)

that I know how to do my job better.

Ashley King (08:58)

Well, and not only that, what is the possible story that they could tell that would impact my actual work product? I mean, inspiration, man, but that's what I'm saying. These are all like fluff pieces. None of this is targeted for what I came and had to pay for for that name to be on that stage.

Desiree Goldey (09:03)

Well, you could do, I mean, could do... Okay, yeah. I know.

And these conferences

are so expensive right now.

Ashley King (09:18)

they're hella

expensive. If we don't get paid to go, we don't go.

Like it's

Desiree Goldey (09:22)

I know!

Ashley King (09:23)

And so, but again, it's just, it's one of those things where I'm like, we've gotten so off the ball of what the purpose was that communities like the void that conferences fill.

Desiree Goldey (09:23)

know!

Yeah.

Ashley King (09:36)

And it's just been replaced with how can we profit? How can we get you to spend money? How can we market? How can we? And again, it's all of this priming detail. None of this actual like education. Let's make a flipping difference detail. And to me, that's that's why I love and again, not a free ad, but maybe that's why I love Recfest is because Recfest is not investing on trying to get

Desiree Goldey (09:41)

Yeah.

Ugh.

Bye!

Ashley King (10:00)

these biggie names so that way they can up the ticket price so they can make a profit. They might, I don't know, but they haven't to date. And so to me,

Desiree Goldey (10:02)

Yeah!

Ashley King (10:08)

being able to actually talk to the person that walked off the stage that's an author to talk to the Kat Kibbins, the Aaron Matthews, the people in seat that are actually doing it. Again, it just makes so much of a difference. And at the end of the day, I think it really shows that you're for people, not for profit, because making profit in the conference space is easy. It's really not that hard. There's a method. There's a whole entire algorithm to all of it. It's simple. What's hard is actually making people

Desiree Goldey (10:21)

It does.

⁓ so easy. Great.

Yeah. Yeah.

Ashley King (10:38)

who live and dwell in this space, have a decent time, have takeaways, make applicability and want to come back.

the hard

Desiree Goldey (10:46)

Yeah.

You're a gambler, but I want you to stop having these conferences in Vegas. Can we go somewhere else? I know, see? I knew you're...

Ashley King (10:54)

I disagree. I so disagree. As a mother of two,

whose partner will not gamble if it was to like every time I put down a penny, he's like, that was three hours of work. Like, I don't need you doing ratio math business like while I'm out here counting cards like,

Desiree Goldey (11:02)

HEEEH!

I love it. I knew you were gonna argue with me.

I knew you were gonna argue with me. I knew it. Yeah, I knew it. I know. I know.

Ashley King (11:18)

I love me some vagui because it has something for everybody. Like, and if it don't, you can

just sit in that hotel and just linger, you know, cranberry style. And I'm not mad at it. Yeah, that is a very clean NOLA if you've never been is like the comparison I would say. It's just a clean NOLA.

Desiree Goldey (11:26)

Whatever, Nashville was awesome, I'm sorry.

Yeah, it's a very clean, it's

very nice. You know, so as we get into the education and sorry, I digress, but I think about some of the really strong speakers we saw and who we're going to see it transform that we and I just want people to really think as they're building these conferences, not to regurgitate the same people, right?

Ashley King (11:58)

Hmm.

Desiree Goldey (11:59)

Get some new fresh voices out there. There's a ton of people in this space, right? So get some fresh speakers out there, And not everybody wants to speak. Not everybody wants to be on stage, but I think approaching some of these people who have, and I hate to use this as a key metric, but have some decent following,

Ashley King (12:08)

Sure.

Yeah, no, I agree.

I, well, here's my thing is like, we've got to get the people already in the mix, right? Like, it's not something where you can just find a good speaker and be like, okay, talk about this. It needs to be the other way around, which I feel is what they're doing with the McConaughey's of the world. We need to be people who are already in it that can speak well. And that's where we need the transition. But the people who are in it,

Desiree Goldey (12:27)

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Correct. Correct. Correct.

Ashley King (12:46)

are not often the people that have a bajillion gazillion following because they're in it. And exactly. And so, I mean, you do have the Bonnies and the Tajals of this world that are like out there what they're doing the content and stuff like that. That's where your girl fails. But the one thing that I think about

Desiree Goldey (12:49)

Right. They're doing the work.

Ashley King (13:07)

the whole conference portion of everything is just, I think we also need to start if the purpose was always community, education, and inspiration and innovation, like that little pot. To me, I think we need to see different mediums. I think everything is a talk at you 30 minute slideshow. I think we need to have interactive sessions. I think they need to be things where we're actually communicating in a room.

and having contact, theory and learning from one another. I think whenever I think of a rec fest, I feel like that's the next step. I feel like the next step is creating rooms that actually inhabit this, facilitate it versus just an educated, well-known practitioner speaking at you. ⁓ Something to where they actually, I would love to see them change a stage into like a workshop.

Desiree Goldey (13:57)

Yeah.

Ashley King (14:03)

room that's just consistently facilitated.

Desiree Goldey (14:04)

Yeah, how about doing a workshop? Yeah, like

doing a workshop room. How about takeaways? How about a handout? Like the one thing...

Ashley King (14:12)

Well, I mean, and

some of the people do it, but I think if you organized it around that, because then that to me says we're intentional about learning, we're intentional about wanting this to be a space. Enter Jamie Leonard. Sorry.

Desiree Goldey (14:17)

Sure. Right. Right. Right. work you do in Talent Ed,

I know when you do the work with Talent Ed and as we talk about that, like that's some of the things that we could take away. How do you do a right intake call? How do you do? Because I think that recruiters

don't understand the fundamentals of how to do this work, right? Like they don't understand the basics. so maybe there's a stage that's like recruiter education stage, And you're workshopping all day or you're doing some of that. I think that would be super impressive. think...

Ashley King (14:42)

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (14:55)

For me, I would go to that conference in a heartbeat. obviously we participate in that conference, but I would be on that stage telling people not how to do your job better, but definitely give you the insight of how you can move forward and level up your game, if that makes sense.

Ashley King (15:12)

Yeah,

Desiree Goldey (15:13)

I want to get a little bit before we jump into Inspire and like that innovation period, I want to talk a little bit about, what the feeling should be when you go into these conferences and how that spiel that they give you on may not change you, It may not affect you

Ashley King (15:25)

Mm-hmm.

Desiree Goldey (15:31)

and what happens if it actually does and that's the Inspire piece.

Ashley King (15:35)

Yeah, so I think whenever we think of the talks or the spiels I think we first need to separate who is here for what and what's their motive so like 90 percent of speakers at your average conference is going to be some part of tech or tool that also had a booth that now gets talk time because they paid so much xyz amount so the first thing you need to know is this person is not an actual talent practitioner but someone around tools products

Desiree Goldey (15:56)

Right.

Ashley King (16:04)

whatever, their whole kit and caboodle, and I say this all the time, I'm gonna say it again, is to profit off of your practice dysfunction. The only time you need XYZ tool is whenever XYZ doesn't work in your practice. That's why the tools you need are different for every business, are different for every whatever it may be you go into. And so with that in mind, you need to kind of have discretion almost with the talks you're hearing, not to say that you should

Desiree Goldey (16:30)

Yeah.

Ashley King (16:33)

be like, I'm not gonna learn, la la la la la. But to say like, I need to get in the perspective of this person, so that way I'm not just absorbing all this and thinking, my God, this is the only solution that can do it. No, this is the solution that they're serving you because it serves them. And so sometimes I think we need to get out of the head space of thinking everyone on stage is a hero and knows everything. And that's not to say that a lot of people think that, but it is to say that I've seen so many people

Desiree Goldey (16:51)

Absolutely.

Ashley King (17:03)

who are an Aaron Matthews, who are a Kat Kibbin that is a practitioner, that is a Dani Herrera, that knows their stuff, and people just walk out of the room. And then there are people who are like the software engineer of an HR tech tool, and everybody's swarming them.

Desiree Goldey (17:19)

Yeah.

Ashley King (17:19)

And it's like, I know they have status, I know they make profit, I know they have a booth and they have a name and it's recognized and all these other things that an individual practitioner may not. But at the end of the day, you're asking the right questions to the wrong person. And I think that we revere the wrong people because they hold the money clip and they hold the innovation sphere because they get to say what goes and what doesn't because they're the creator.

Desiree Goldey (17:35)

Right.

It's so funny, I was talking to somebody and

they were like, I don't know why I'm listening to a speaker from XYZ company that has 10,000 employees when I have five. It's totally different. There's no relevance at all. You don't have any systems, you don't have anything to do. Like you're a lone talent person sitting and they have 30 or 40 recruiters.

Ashley King (17:56)

Yeah, like where's the relevance? Yeah. Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (18:11)

Like it's not the same situation, right? And so that's when it gets really tricky, right? And so this is when I go to these conferences, I'm like, I don't really want to see somebody that's not in my lane, right? cause it's just not relevant to me. ⁓

Ashley King (18:12)

Yeah.

Yeah.

And

I don't mind seeing people outside of the lane, but they better have a hyper relevance to what their perspective is bringing if we're not because like I do like it whenever they're like and I'm an io psych person but io psych isn't necessarily specific to only HR, but I like it whenever they have an io smee. I like it whenever they have a data smee like those type of things. But again, their purpose is hyper fixated on HR and TA and the audience versus some of these others

Desiree Goldey (18:34)

Right. Correct. Alright. Correct. Right.

Yeah.

Yeah, I like that. Me too.

All right.

Ashley King (18:58)

the motive isn't the audience. The motive is to get the audience to purchase something. And that's a very different motive. Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (19:03)

Yeah. It's a very different thing. Very different motive.

It's not education. It is for profit. Please remember that. We said it here. All right. So we're going to talk about this. We're going to talk a little bit about women and conferences a little bit because I really want it for us as a woman-owned podcast. We always want to dig into the issues around safety and concern.

Ashley King (19:14)

You

Desiree Goldey (19:30)

And conferences are still a dangerous place for women. These places are crazy. I don't think about it now at 51, but when I was in my 30s, these places were dangerous.

Ashley King (19:35)

Yeah.

sad news it like still is ⁓ so and also spoilers this is our talent outside of the box talking point as well so we'll do that here now just a little out of order team but that's cool we're gonna roll with the people but yeah no i think that ⁓

Desiree Goldey (19:46)

No.

Ashley King (20:01)

Whenever people use like a event or a organization or whatever it may be to kind of shill their behaviors because people have let their guards down. And so it's kind of like that with a conference. People think we're here for work, so a lot of people will set down their drink. A lot of people will go say, my room's XYZ.

Desiree Goldey (20:20)

Yeah.

Ashley King (20:24)

number you can come and say hey because you know it shouldn't be that crucial we're at a work event it's for conference it's for community learning engagement and innovation like hello we just named what it's here for and none of them are what typically happens next and so I will say trigger warning to audience if you are wanting to skip this you can but the giving of Rufelin and drugs is still very very prevalent at many many

Desiree Goldey (20:50)

Yeah.

Ashley King (20:53)

conferences. I myself attended a conference, I can't remember if it was 2017 or 2019, it was a specific company that again profits off of Dysfunction. I won't say their name on here, but they are probably the biggest competitor to LinkedIn that we have now that other companies have been acquired in Gobblebop. So large organization hosted an event in Austin. The third party vendor that they used to do all the photography

and host like you know like the picture rooms where you can get your own pictures done. I had put drugs in one of my recruiter's drinks.

Desiree Goldey (21:23)

Yeah.

⁓ my god!

Ashley King (21:31)

Yes.

Desiree Goldey (21:31)

Ashley!

Ashley King (21:32)

And so the hard part here is usually in a professional setting, it's not, especially with your own employees, it's not usually, or not even your own employees, but whatever, it's not typical that you like party with them or like see them in this light. So at first it was more of just like, ⁓ think she just likes to party. Like I'm not gonna judge. I'm not, you know, whatever. But then whenever it came like 20, 30 minutes later after this interaction at the cameras, and I started to realize what was happening.

Desiree Goldey (21:44)

Right, right.

All right.

Ashley King (21:59)

I remember looking at her in the face and I was like, are you like, have you had any drugs? And it was like her feet just like fell out from under her as I was holding. And she was a teeny tiny little pocket rocket, thanks goodness. But we had to carry her all the way back to the hotel and.

Desiree Goldey (22:07)

⁓ my gosh.

This is a horrible story and I'm sorry if it triggered

anybody on listening to us, but listen, I want to tell people today that women's safety is just, it's still a problem. And it has been for my lifetime, my mom's lifetime, everybody's lifetime, Ashley's lifetime. It is a serious, serious thing in this United States and the world.

Ashley King (22:32)

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (22:39)

And in this we focus on it and these conferences should do the same is Really thinking about that safety for those individuals I can't say enough

this hits me in my heart that someone would go through that And this story is horrible. I almost want to like end the call like it's really that bad I feel for people who have these things because trauma lasts forever

Ashley King (23:04)

Mm-hmm.

Desiree Goldey (23:04)

Right?

And it takes, it takes so much to get over that. And so I don't want to get into too much of that, but I do think that we need to be thinking about the safety and concerns for women at these conferences, because it's a thing, especially in a city you've never been in, right? Or first time.

Ashley King (23:17)

Well, and

especially a city you've

never been in and I will say I don't know that it was only women if I'm being candid. ⁓ I've seen men recruiters be roofied as well and so no need to apologize it's more of just a kind of more of a call out of a PSA of like hey sometimes people just have mal intent and again this was the third party that was doing the picture room it wasn't actually someone tied to ACL or the company that was hosting or anything like that so

Desiree Goldey (23:25)

Okay.

Okay, I am sorry. ⁓

Now, right now.

Yeah.

Alright.

Ashley King (23:48)

And again, their reaction to it was, well, that was a third party. We can't control that. Which then is how I started becoming very, very selective with the conferences that I would go to, that I would endorse, that I would speak at, that I would host for sure. And it's based around that because after that was whenever I started noticing who has put preventative measures in place, who has given talking points to like, hey, just because someone's dressed cute on their night out and maybe not like how you'd see them in the office, that is not considered

Desiree Goldey (23:53)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Ashley King (24:18)

consent. it's not like Yale's Night on the Town, loose goose, maybe that's how they dress out of work and you just never knew. Like again, it's something to kind of give perspective to the idea of like, everybody has different perceptions of what is happening. Just because we're at a good conference, having fun, being cool, going to dinner, sadly doesn't mean that you can necessarily put down your guard because other people will take up that opportunity to

Desiree Goldey (24:31)

Yeah.

You know, it's funny

Ashley King (24:44)

exploit

Desiree Goldey (24:45)

that

Ashley King (24:45)

that. ⁓

Desiree Goldey (24:45)

you, we are talking about this because Danny put out a great post, Danny Herrera for everybody that's listening, put out a great post about Comic-Con and how they make their things so accessible. I think we're not doing enough of that either, right? I know, right? No, right, like, it's disability, check.

Ashley King (24:51)

Mmm.

Yes.

Yeah, and we're supposed to be the police that do it and we're like not even holding our own line. Yeah

Desiree Goldey (25:09)

LGBTQ, plus I'm part of that community by the way, I just can't say it. Tech, know what I mean? Disabilities, all the things, like there were so many things wrapped up in that post about what they're doing successfully. I have not seen that in TA conferences so far.

Ashley King (25:10)

Check.

Mercy Sakes.

Mm-hmm.

Desiree Goldey (25:30)

You doing anything to really promote that? Because there's all these disabilities out here, folks. Here's the community that you're trying to serve, serve it.

Ashley King (25:41)

Yeah, agreed. Because honestly, anytime you have a conference that isn't going to be available virtually, it's automatically right off the bat going to have a hard time for inclusion. Because now that means those who can't travel or have autoimmune disease or like such a list of things ⁓ can no longer participate. And so it's just giving FOMO, which, you know,

Desiree Goldey (25:41)

Serve it!

Yes!

Yes. Yeah.

Ashley King (26:01)

For some people, they have to cut their losses. They have to say, okay, well, we have to do this, we have to do that. Not that it's okay, not that that's the thing, but that's what I think we hear the most.

Desiree Goldey (26:08)

But if you, but

if we're going to have an in-person event, let's make it at least somewhat accessible to most that truly show up. Right? Let's do that. Right? Let's try to make it inclusive. And I'm going to use Katie and Jackie's term here, but let's make it inclusive AF. Right? Because that's important. That's super, super important. So now I want to get to the inspired part as we

Ashley King (26:17)

Yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (26:35)

start to round out this episode, but the inspire and innovate and do something once you've learned something, what are your thoughts on how you take away something that you really needed from that event and implement it now? Now, what do do with that information that you took a bunch of notes, you come back and you're like, I have this notebook. What do I do with it?

Ashley King (26:59)

Yeah, so I think there's a few things. One, you have to think of the headspace that you're in as you're absorbing and learning, right? Like that's always going to prime what we take in because if you just had a conversation that gives you a little bit of recency bias, you're going to pay attention to one end of this talk that you may not even catch the other end. And so that's another reason why I think virtual has its niceties because it can be recorded, it can be rewatched, you can digest it multiple times. And so that kind of allows for that learning and applicability and even sharing with your team.

Desiree Goldey (27:24)

Night.

Ashley King (27:29)

So I will say that I am of the kinesthetic teaching belief that you see one you learn one see one do one Type of mentality or do one teach one however you want it to be but basically there are three stages to all of it Which is like you get the awareness you learn of it You get to actually participate you are kinesthetically learning within it and then teaching someone which is ensuring that the applicability that you have the range to be able to take

it and apply it to different situations and teach others. So to me, think whenever you follow that framework, like whatever you take, you can really make it land and expand for your team, for your issues. But I think the overall thing is you can take as much as you want. Just remember, again, not everyone's motivation is to actually help you solve the problem that you came there with. It might be solve adjacent, it might say it solves some symptoms, but

But we've really, really got to get better at being able to take different ideas and different constructs and different foundations and meshing it.

Desiree Goldey (28:32)

I love that

you brought up symptom versus solution because to me that is what I think we take away from most of these things is like, it solves the symptom, right? So like we will, yeah, and then we walk away and we're like, but I don't really have a solution, right? Yeah, and so taking that symptom and then building out what that solution is, it's key.

Ashley King (28:46)

that's all of it.

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (28:59)

And I think that people forget that all the time. We're like, ⁓ you know, the lady from, I don't know, I'm not going to use a name, but some big company really gave me the symptom, you know, that the answer to my data problem, right? But you don't have the right things to even implement that thing. So what is your solution from what that person talks to you about, right? How do you figure that for your organization?

Ashley King (29:25)

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (29:25)

And

that's a key point that I think people miss. They're like, my god, I'm failing at life because they're doing it so well. It's not that they're doing it ultimately well. What they've done is taking a problem and figuring out a really ⁓ good solution for their organization. Right? Yeah.

Ashley King (29:44)

Exactly. And those are

people who are able to take bits and pieces and MacGyver because that's really all it is, is having the agility to be like, okay, I built this box last time. I can take the same materials to build a circle this time. Like, how do you go from one to the next? And once you've identified that foundation of like, so I go through the process of I'm hearing something, I'm wondering if that could be a solution. I'm researching that something. What they just said to me is not the only Bible.

Desiree Goldey (29:49)

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

Ashley King (30:13)

I've got to go out, seek it for myself, like kind of autonomously learn and teach myself what is that I want to bring to the table with that. And then kind of going from there to be quite frank because to me that's how I mean there are people on stage who are not actually accurate about what they're talking about. Sorry, like I've

Desiree Goldey (30:31)

Absolutely! It's like

Ashley King (30:33)

Yeah like

Desiree Goldey (30:34)

right?

Like, what are you talking about?

Ashley King (30:35)

Yeah, so like that's the other thing. Well,

they sound...

good. Like they're talking a lot, but they ain't saying much. And so there are some times that you just, I would highly suggest maybe always integrate this into your conference practice. Look that shit up once it's done, like Google it, be like, is this actually going to help or is this going to hurt? Cause again, I've, I've heard all the different things anytime someone uses, what is it? Operational conditioning and then use like positive or negative reinforcement in the wrong way.

Desiree Goldey (30:40)

Right. Right.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Ashley King (31:07)

your girl like has a tizzy. I'm like please stop.

Desiree Goldey (31:10)

So we did a really good job

of planning for Recfest. I think we were really on top of it and I'm a planner and get a little crazy, But like I do think that there is a place if you're going to a conference, even as an individual, there should be a plan and a focus. Who are you going to see? Why are you trying to learn that thing? What are you hoping to take away from that?

Right. And, and then once you get all that information, collecting that data and saying like, okay, what made sense to me? What didn't make sense to me? How can I figure this out? for my organization, it's going to be essential. And that takes some planning kids. Like just don't show up and hug your friends. Like, you know what I mean? Like have a plan when you go into these things, actually, we are almost at time. Is there anything else you think we should talk about on this note?

Ashley King (31:33)

Mm-hmm.

No.

⁓

If I have to think of anything else about conferences, I would just say go, be safe, know what you want to go for. And honestly, like, okay, I kind of agree with that, but I'm also the opposite of So like, I don't plan, I hate planning. I actually think it's trash. I'd rather just show up and then just like let whatever happen happen. Which is why I enjoy going with Dez is because she has everything planned. So I just get to show up and be like, this is great. This is number one thing. I love this so much. So, hey, even if you don't show up with a plan, just like go out and go where.

Desiree Goldey (32:13)

I know.

Ashley King (32:28)

heart desires but I think my big message isn't necessarily to the conference goers, my big message aside from the PSA, but my big message is to the conference creators. Like get real people who know real stuff and care about the real job and then on top of that start taking care of your real customers by saying hey we're aware that this is a cultural problem in the US overall regardless of what kind of conference it's for and so because we

Desiree Goldey (32:29)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yes.

Yes.

Ashley King (32:58)

know that data, we're going to take extra precautions. Here's the little nail strip that you can put in your drink and make sure that there's no roofie in it. Like here's your go bag and it had like it's easy to do those type of things. It's just a matter of do you care too? And again to your point and to Dani's point, it's really not something that we don't...

Desiree Goldey (33:03)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Ashley King (33:16)

that we see in the HR culture as we should, we see it in other venues and in other groups where, you know, they've had exploitative instances to where it evokes that. But why are we waiting for that? Why are we waiting for that circumstance? Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (33:28)

Yeah, we're waiting. Why are we being reactive? Be proactive,

folks. And so this is my message again to conference creators as well. It's like, let's be proactive Recfest I think has broken the mold a little bit. So let somebody else take it to the next level. Let's do something really awesome.

Anna Morgan's doing some great things out there. There are some really great moments happening that we don't have to be subjected to the traditional vendor goer relationship. We can build this to be a better conference experience for all. And let's do it. Why not do that thing? And if you're going to invest the time and the energy and your team's time to build these conferences,

Ashley King (33:50)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Desiree Goldey (34:14)

because they take a lot of freaking work, right? Build it responsibly, build it with that PSA that we talked about, build it with all the things that you need to say, and build it with people in the real world of talent and HR. Build it with people doing this work day to day, every day, and can speak to the things that people actually care about.

Ashley King (34:17)

yeah.

Mm-hmm. Please.

Desiree Goldey (34:39)

Right? So important,

Ashley King (34:40)

No, you're good. All I would say on the last note is just like, hey, don't make us come out of this podcasting box to come get this shit right. Someone just do it right. All right.

My bad.

Desiree Goldey (34:51)

Outside the

Box, is where we talk about the cognitive side of what we've been talking about. Today was about HR conferences, and I will leave it up to Ashley King.

Ashley King (35:00)

You know, mine's gonna be a weird one today, which that's every day, so what else is new for this crowd? I would actually say,

I think the thing that we should focus on today for the social psychology side whenever it comes to conferences is probably actually effort justification and specifically the ideas of like what does it take to actually get a person to want to commit money to go listen to people that they've never met and go fly somewhere else and actually use that as an investment that is an actual like psychological algorithmic type of

process, effort justification is. Like we have to have enough logic and reason for it to justify the effort we're putting forth. So whenever we're talking about these conference creators, whenever we're talking about people who are building the table and just need people to show up, what you're asking them to do is measure and justify how much effort they're willing to put in. So if you don't have a good brand, if you aren't safe, if you're always doing Matthew McConaughey, which like he's cute. So first time

yes, second time, ⁓ but all these other things, Ryan Reynolds we can do twice, but all the other things is just like if you're not meeting the mark it's because the effort doesn't justify like the means that you're providing. So to my conference goers, my who's Katy Perry?

Desiree Goldey (36:07)

No.

HA!

I'm Katy Perry, by the way.

that's my, my pass is Katy Perry. ⁓ no, that's my wife's.

Ashley King (36:28)

I thought you said it was Kelly Rowland or something.

Who was the one that you said that was your pick in our first episode? Don't make me go back to it.

Desiree Goldey (36:38)

my god, I

can't imagine what I said with Katy Perry. ⁓ I don't know. ⁓ Whatever.

Ashley King (36:42)

No, it wasn't Katy Perry, but she's with Trudeau right now. So they're busy on a yacht with jeans. ⁓

This podcast is getting away from us. So we're going to end on the fact that, you know, hey, get conferences, right? So talentless doesn't have to come out here and do it because good God. And I'm saying this in my serious voice because I mean it. Like we need safe, good spaces with great practitioners to talk about real ish and really get stuff done because our space needs it. And we can't just have any more commercializing of it.

Desiree Goldey (36:52)

Ayas!

Yes.

Ashley King (37:12)

because it's all synthetic and we're not getting anything done. Okay, love you, bye.

Desiree Goldey (37:15)

Thank you and so much. Thank you for

joining us on another episode of the talentless podcast. Please follow us on our website, talentlesspodcast.com. We're all wherever you find a podcast, that's where we're at. Follow us on IG, Blue Sky, LinkedIn. We're everywhere and we have a Patreon and we will soon have a merch store. You want to rock talentless. we do have a, ⁓ we have it.

Ashley King (37:40)

we do. It's already up. Yeah, shout out to Rita.

Desiree Goldey (37:44)

Shout out to our assistant Rita. ⁓

Ashley King (37:44)

She's making the cut this episode. Woo woo, Rita, Rita.

Desiree Goldey (37:50)

We do have a merch store if you want to buy talentless merch now. So we'll see you next time. Bye.