From Military Command to Staffing Success: Stennett Rey’s Leadership Transformation

Anthony Codispoti : Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes and be inspired by how they’ve overcome adversity. My name is Anthony Codispoti and today’s guest is Stennett Rey, owner and strategic partner at Pride Staff San Diego. They’re a top staffing agency that connects skilled professionals with temporary and permanent opportunities. Pride staff is known for matching people and roles like office administration, finance, human resources and more.

The agency has earned the Best of Staffing Client and Talent Diamond Award, placing it among the best in the industry. Stenet began his career in human capital, consulting and change management, leading efforts in leadership development and talent growth for various organizations. He also held significant roles in the U.S. Armed Forces, working in human resources and business development. Today he applies those lessons to help Pride staff continue improving workplaces and strengthening communities.

He holds a Masters in Business from USC Marshall School of Business and a Masters in Legal Studies from Arizona State University. Now before we get into all that good stuff, today’s episode is brought to you by my company, Add Back Benefits Agency, where we offer very specific and unique employee benefits that are both great for your team and fiscally optimized for your bottom line. One recent client was able to add over $900 per employee per year in extra cash flow by implementing one of our innovative programs. Results vary for each company and some organizations may not be eligible.

To find out if your company qualifies, contact us today at addbackbenefits.com. Alright, back to our guest today, owner and strategic partner of Pride staff San Diego, Stennett Ray. I appreciate you making the time to share your story today.

Stennett Rey : Thank you, Anthony, and thanks for having me, and I’ll look forward to this conversation. I think it’ll be a great evening.

Anthony Codispoti : I’m excited too. I guess I want to start out first by saying thank you for your service. How long were you in the military and which branch did you serve?

Stennett Rey : Thank you for that acknowledgement, Anthony. I was at 29 years service for the United States Marine Corps. So it’s a great, great, what I would call personal achievement for me and the family, but it really taught me a lot about myself and how to engage with the world around me.

Anthony Codispoti : When you say it was a personal achievement for yourself and your family, can you say more about what that means?

Stennett Rey : Yes, as most folks know in the military, you’re always involved in something, whether you’re training or you’re preparing for some form of deployment. And I think throughout the years, there’s quite a bit of sacrifice that goes on not only for the individual, but for the family.

Your family, whether you’re married and have children, or you’re extended family, the folks who you left after high school or college, whatever it is. So to get through it and get to the other side with an honorable discharge, whether you do four years, 20 years or 30 years is quite the accomplishment. And I wouldn’t be where I am today without that time that I spent in the military.

Anthony Codispoti : What’s something valuable that you learned during your time in the military that’s useful to you today? One of the main things is discipline.

Stennett Rey : And sometimes when we hear the word discipline, you automatically go to the negative aspect of the word, right? That definition where it just seems that there’s a negative connotation. But the military really teaches you that it’s not just about discipline and being good. It’s about being more disciplined in your actions, whether those are the way you make decisions or whether you approach the work that has to be done. And then being very consistent. So I think discipline, consistency and accountability are three of the things that I learned the most to apply in the military.

Anthony Codispoti : So if I’ve got my timeline here correct, you concluded your service back in May of 2023. So just a couple years ago. What was behind the decision to move on into a new chapter of life?

Stennett Rey : For active enlisted persons, you really have 30 years. And there are some instances where you can receive a waiver to serve beyond 30 years. So you’ll have some enlisted members that can do that.

But I was getting towards the end. I had a great conversation with my family because we’ve done quite a bit of prep, making sure that my education was established and that was completed prior to transition. And we thought about where is it that we want to live post-military? My wife is from San Diego, so that became the number one place on the list.

And we made that family decision because with kids going into high school and everything, looking at their stability, we just had to make the decision on whether we wanted to move on more time or whether it was time for us to plant roots and stick around and do some things that for the family instead of going for another two or three years as I could research. I love my time. Don’t get me wrong, Anthony. I love wearing a uniform. I love the job that I was doing. But at some point, you have to figure out what’s the next step for you.

Anthony Codispoti : I guess I think the surprise is I didn’t realize that we’ve got quite a bit of echo. Did you hear that, Stennet? I don’t hear the echo. You don’t. Okay. All right. We’ll edit this part out.

I guess the part that surprises me, excuse me, Stennet, is I didn’t realize that the Marine Corps had a limit 30 years for service. It seems a little counterintuitive. You would kind of want your best people to stick around and continue on in leadership roles. What’s the thought process there? Are you aware?

Stennett Rey : My understanding of it is there’s a limited number of folks who can join the military. There has to be a point where you reach service limitations. For an enlisted service member, your service limitations are 30 years.

That’s not to say that you couldn’t get a waiver. For instance, if at the 29-year mark, instead of retiring, I had submitted for another position, and that position allows you to submit a waiver to serve beyond 30 years, and that would have been a consideration by the Marine Corps to say, okay, in this specific instance, because you were going on to a position of increased responsibility, we will approve a waiver for a service that can serve beyond 30 years as an enlisted Marine. As an officer, there are a few different rules. Officers can serve beyond 30 years, and a lot of them do. You look at your general officers and flag officers, a lot of them have 30-plus years in military. You are retaining that corporate knowledge, but on the enlisted side, there has to be a service limitation. Other people have opportunities to get promoted into positions of increased responsibility.

Anthony Codispoti : I really enjoy providing advice, consultation, to anyone. I was looking to get into the consulting space. If you remember back in 2023, things were changing in business with the incorporation of artificial intelligence, technologies of businesses.

We’re trying to figure out how they were going to incorporate these technologies. Headcounts across the consulting space were either staying steady or were being reduced. As I was going through the transition, I was also taking a look at business opportunities to invest in a business. I was reviewing a few businesses to get into more on a passive side, because consulting is really where I want it to be.

As I was reviewing P &Ls and asking questions to business owners, I found myself thinking, well, if this person ran a business for the last 10 years and they could absolutely do a bit more to be profitable, why aren’t I taking a chance on myself? And so that kind of switched the model for me. And I said, I’m going to take a look at something that inspires me, something that I feel passionate about and find a way to be involved as a business owner. That’s what got me to this side of the entrepreneur journey, if you will.

Anthony Codispoti : You looked at different companies, maybe multiple in the staffing space, but you ultimately decided to purchase a franchise in the Pride staff family. Why Pride staff? What did you like that you saw there?

Stennett Rey : Yeah, Pride staff, their values aligned very well with what I experienced in the report. We have our on a courage commitment every day, come in and try to do the best to serve others. And that’s what service is all about. When I first spoke to the previous owner of this office, he was just telling me how great of an organization Pride staff was and how the corporate office was really invested each individual owner being successful. And there’s a lot of people that say that they’re invested, but when I went for my, what we call the discovery day, it brought it all. I mean, their values aligned with exactly the type of organization that I’m going to be a part of and help to represent the mission statement, focusing on what clients value most resonated with me. And after that conversation, I said, sign me up.

So it was a two-way street up there. I said, sign me up. They said, would you like to come on board? So that’s that’s how I got to be here.

Anthony Codispoti : And so we’re purchasing a brand new franchise or were you acquiring one that had already existed? Yes, this office has existed San Diego here for 20 plus years.

Stennett Rey : I’m the third owner of this office.

Anthony Codispoti : And that probably came with a lot of advantages, you know, a team that already knew the ropes knew what they were doing. You’re walking into a situation where you’ve got a client base already. Am I correct in that?

Stennett Rey : So it has its pros and cons. I think the pros were an established system. We never were some folks working here. But I would tell you, Anthony, that all of those employees are gone and I have a new team here. The advantage of purchasing an established office is, yes, you have some clients.

That you can rely on. So I didn’t have to go out and build and do a lot of business development right away. I had a little bit of a runway to learn about the business and how to apply what I wanted to do to the structure that was already here. But this is a people’s business. And I also recognize that the previous owner had some clients that were clients only because of him and his wife. So there was a bit of a drop off in some of our clients because those relationships, I just it wasn’t the same. Not because we couldn’t deliver, but, you know, if you’re in a people business, it really is about the folks that you have established your trust with and all those things. So we had to do some work, but it was definitely a lot easier than coming in and opening a brand new office.

Anthony Codispoti : Well, and that staff turnover, I’m sure, wasn’t easy to manage either. But it sounds like I’m sort of connecting the dots here that maybe that was done intentionally. You had in mind a certain culture that you wanted to instill there, and you had to make sure that you had the right people in place for that. Absolutely.

Stennett Rey : You know, making sure that first off, taking a look at how things were, you know, the activities of the office and then figuring out what each person was doing and then trying to establish, you know, some of the new norms for the office. You know, some of that can be challenging because folks get comfortable.

And I recognize that. And so, you know, I did my best to take my time and hiring, which is what I did. And I found a phenomenal team that was willing to come in and do the work that needed to be done to grow as a business.

And they’re doing a great job now, but you’re right. You know, the change management side of it is absolutely relevant. Whenever you have a new person coming in that wants to establish a new culture.

Anthony Codispoti : And so, what were some of the things, whether it’s here or, you know, the work that you were doing in the military that you found helpful in terms of recruiting and retaining folks?

Stennett Rey : And what I found helpful is, first off, being understanding what it is you really want to do. What are you looking for? This is the role, but what type of individual are you looking for? I think sometimes we skip over that part.

We say, well, this is the position. I’ll figure it out. I’ll bring someone in and hopefully I can get them to fit into the activities that need to be conducted every day. Whereas I take a different approach. I go, you know, really what I’m looking for is, you know, some attributes, right? Are you someone that just doesn’t say they’re a hard work?

But there’s proof, there’s tangible proof of your work. Let’s talk through that. Are you a people person? Can you have a conversation? Are you okay with picking up the phone and cold calling? Because that’s a bit of what we do as well.

Are you good at maintaining their relationship? Because that’s really what this business is about. So those are the things I’m really focused on. And in business, as you know, you’re walking a tightrope sometimes where you want the person to show up with everything, but that’s not always going to happen. As an owner or anyone in a decision-making space, you have to be willing to train and develop.

And that’s the thing in the military that I’ve used and brought that over. Listen, people come to you with a set of skills and it’s your job as the owner to get them the other part of the way there. So I took a really good approach and saying, hey, I’m going to bring in, and I’m also going to provide this training and development as a foundation so you can grow within the organization. And what I’ve found is that for those who really took to that type of model, they’re still here and they’re still working really hard.

Anthony Codispoti : So let’s talk a little bit about how you handled that turnover in terms of the client side. What were some strategies that you found successful in kind of building up that client stable again?

Stennett Rey : One of them is being genuine. If I could use just something that I prospect told me yesterday, discovery meeting, and at the end of it, at the end of the meeting, I said, hey, do you have any questions? This person says, I don’t have any questions, but what I can tell you is after talking to you and having this conversation, I trust you.

Anthony Codispoti : And I like the little way the conversation is going. And so for me, that has been the best part of this job is to be able to have a face-to-face conversation with someone.

Stennett Rey : And as a business owner, yes, I want your business, but I’m also here to help your business grow and to provide any type of consultation I can when it comes to staffing. And if I need to help you use any business, understand how to improve and increase your staff and do that in a way that allows you to grow and remain, have a consistent staff, then that’s what I’m going to do. So for me, it’s been all about those relationships. And that’s how we’ve been able to generate new clients is they trust us and they like what you do. I can’t put a price tag on that.

Anthony Codispoti : And actually, I want to hear more about this because I know you’ve got a lot of experience in change management. And I want to hear more about how you’re able to leverage that experience in helping clients kind of navigate the hiring process, especially now with everything that’s going on, the economy being really uncertain.

Stennett Rey : Yeah, it is. That’s a big one right there, Anthony. I don’t even know where to start. Well, I’ll start with this is, first off, is helping people understand when we call because there’s quite a bit of cold calls going on from the office.

It’s pulling doors. And a lot of times you’re greeted with, Hey, listen, we don’t have time, we have a staffing agency. But the way we like to position ourselves is, first off, having another relationship with the staffing agency is great.

But we’re always here to provide a bit of consultation. Is there anything that you want to review when it comes to how you screen and hire individuals? And usually once we get into those types of conversations, we’re able to review kind of their entire process.

And we can have a really good conversation about why their process may not be successful. Sometimes it’s the amount of time that companies are taking to review resumes. Are you are you reviewing them every day?

Do you have a list of attributes that you’re looking for that align with, you know, knowledge, skills and abilities to find the right person? Is that happening across the board? And when it isn’t, and we sit down and we talk about it, is your job description, is it asking for too much and your compensation doesn’t match what you’re asking?

That could be part of the issue. So we really like to analyze what a company is doing and then help them, you know, come up with a plan to be successful. Now, I do want to be the person that helps in that effort. But I really do believe that at the end of the day, if I can help you solve one of your issues and help you be more successful, we all win, right? And business will come. I absolutely believe the business will come. They’re helping them recognize where they need to change some of their policies and their procedures in order to be successful is a win for me. I also win for them.

Anthony Codispoti : So we touched on this a bit in the intro, Stenet, but I want to kind of get into more details about more specifically the services that you provide, the types of clients that are a good fit for you, the geographies that you serve.

Stennett Rey : Yeah. So pride staff, each one of the offices, we have our own territory. So for those familiar with San Diego, I have a large territory. I mean, I go from Del Mar Fairgrounds, you know, all the way south to the border and pretty much East Indian Incorporated. So if I had to put a number on the number, you know, the zip codes I have, I think we’re up to 35 zip codes that I cover here in San Diego. The industries, let’s say for instance, you know, I cover some medical manufacturing companies, some aerospace companies, I have small companies like, you know, attorney’s offices, doctor’s offices, things like that. I have a few companies that they assemble and manufacture things. And then I have a few warehouses. So those are the majority of the core business. But to your point, you know, what does pride staff offer?

Well, we have, you know, three different offerings. We have temporary staffing, which is, you know, anywhere from one to, you know, you name the bank how many days where an office might say, you know, call me and say, you know, Stennon, my front desk person is going on vacation for two weeks. We really can’t afford not to have someone. Do you have a great administrative person who can come in and fill in for two weeks? That would be an example of temporary, temporary assignment. Our temp temp, the higher work, a lot of the manufacturing space uses it because it’s an opportunity, especially when they have a training program and certification program, they use staffing to screen if I’m qualified individuals, they go in on a temporary basis. And at the end of the temporary assignment, if they are a fit for the culture, then they have the opportunity to convert to a full-time employee of that company.

I love that. That’s that’s the I would take those temp to hires all day every day because it provides opportunity and stability for people. And then our last offering is direct hire, where, for instance, you know, we had a company that was looking for a system administrator to very specialized role. They wanted them to have a certain level of experience in some of our legacy technologies. And so they called us. And so we found them a few candidates and they hired and direct hire is more of a once we find screen and present if they like that person, then that person becomes an employee right away of that company. So those are our three offerings.

Anthony Codispoti : And I think we just got a small glimpse into that conversation we’re telling us about before yesterday where the gentleman said, I don’t have any questions, but I trust you because you said something there that really caught my ear was like, Oh, I love those temp to hires because that gives the workers stability.

There wasn’t a mention of that’s the most profitable one for me. In some respects, like you’ve lost kind of that recurring. Obviously, you’re charging a fee for that service to to make, you know, your time worthwhile. But, you know, you’re losing that position as like an ongoing like billing event. But your your your priorities are different. I love giving that employee the opportunity to have steady work going forward.

Stennett Rey : Absolutely, Anthony. You know, we this office, we receive a lot of calls. I mean, last week, I was out of the office for a few days, but I still have the application on my laptop so I can see what the activity is and by 11 in the morning, we had 75 calls to the office. And, and you know, some of the stories can be heartbreaking.

It puts you on a bit of emotional roller coaster because we want to be able to help everybody. Right. And we know that the majority of folks want to be contributing members of society, but you can’t do that if you’re not working. Right. So what role can we play in that and make sure that folks have an opportunity? We take that very seriously. And it’s something that I wish that I could help everyone. I can’t. But when we do, it’s a great field. It is really a great field.

Anthony Codispoti : Well, that’s interesting to dive into the human side of the applicants here. You’ve got more folks coming to you than you’re able to place at times. And sometimes you just you don’t have open positions or maybe they don’t have the experience that lines up or what other kinds of things do you run into there?

Stennett Rey : Yeah, mostly we do run into we don’t have as many positions as we would like. And I look in the mirror when that happens and go, Hey, that’s our job.

Right. That’s my job as the owner here and the person responsible for business development is to go out and find more opportunities. But sometimes it is it does get back to a knowledge skills or experience. And what we do in some of those cases, even when we don’t have something for an individual right away, we still get them on boarded. And when I have an opportunity that requires general labor and knowledge or just general knowledge, I’ll call those individuals up and I’ll say, I have a two day assignment.

This is something you say that you may want to get into maybe a little bit of change from what you’ve been doing in the past, but I think it’s a great opportunity for you. And so we’ll get them out there. And sometimes we have to even talk them into it, Anthony, but you know, my analogy is this is that whenever you have a significant other, it seems like more people are interested in. And that’s my analogy for a job. When you have a job, most people are very interested in it, right?

Because, you know, it doesn’t come off as, you know, me and his knee, right? And so I say, listen, this may not be your dream job, but it may be the opportunity that provides you another door that you can hold it. That usually ends up helping about.

Anthony Codispoti : I love that. That’s a funny way to describe it. What do you see is sort of the future growth trajectory for you at Pride Staff San Diego? Where do you see this going the next couple of years?

Stennett Rey : Well, that definitely depends on the economy, right? I do think that, you know, we’ll have positive growth. Last year, first full year in operation, we saw growth. This year started off well. We’ll still grow, maybe not as fast as you anticipated, but you know, going into year three, I anticipate that we’ll see at least a 30% growth. Outgrowth margin here at San Diego.

Anthony Codispoti : That’s significant. What are the big leverage that you’re able to pull to affect that growth?

Stennett Rey : One of the things I’m focusing more on this year has been our story and marketing, really helping the greater San Diego understand Pride Staff is here, so increasing that brand awareness and then getting out there and having more conversations with businesses and network events, because those are the interactions I absolutely believe has helped us in our growth so far. And then of course, there’s the delivery, right? It’s not just, are you out there establishing relationships?

But what are you doing once you get out of the relationship? When someone calls you, it’s Pride Staff San Diego delivering on our promise. And that’s what we try to do in every instance is deliver. And I think that that delivery allows us to be word of mouth where people go, but we need staffing. I want to be your number one choice for staffing. And there are a lot of, you know, big companies in the room, but I want to be amongst that conversation. That’s what we’re working on.

Anthony Codispoti : I’d like to go in just a little bit of a different direction for a moment, Stennett, and talk about a serious challenge that you’ve overcome in your life. Could be something personal, could be professional, maybe the two intertwine. How’d you get through that? And what did you learn?

Stennett Rey : Yeah, you know, the one I want to talk about really, you know, answer one of your questions about, you know, why I left the military. You know, my son, you know, I have four children, you know, two adult children and two teenagers. My son Tyson, he was having some pediatric migraines, restitution in Okinawa, Japan. They didn’t have the doctors. They were on islands, so he had to come back to the States.

And I came back here to California. He had a pediatric urologist, but he kept getting his headaches that developed into, you know, facial tics and things like that. His mom is the wonderful advocate, kept pushing for, pushing for more studies, possibly another scan to make sure that there wasn’t anything going on. We finally got him in for an MRI. And this was December of 2022. And we’re going for the scan.

It’s right before Christmas. I’ve got work. I drive down to the hospital, the MRI. I get back to the house.

My wife calls me. She’s crying. She says, you got to go back to the hospital and go through the emergency. And I’m like, what is going on? And so they found a tumor, they found a brain tumor. So I take my son back down there and the docs, they go in and do another scan again, come back out and let us know, like, hey, he has a tumor. we need to take it out. We’re going to keep them here in the hospital because they have some things that they have to do to prep.

So, you know, here I am. In one instance, I was prepping for Christmas because you know, I had some Marines over, you know, cook in, have family over. And all of that changed in about 24 hours. And we were in the hospital. We spent Christmas in the hospital. A couple of days later, my son went through hand brain surgery. It was successful. It had just attached to his brainstem. So, we got it in time.

Phenomenal team here at Rady’s Children’s. And, you know, after that, it was more about recovery. It’s interesting because if I had to backtrack the story a little bit, I had the opportunity to compete to stay in the same positions I discussed. But all those positions were just comes, you know, my family wasn’t going to do the game.

And so, I had to make the decision on whether I was going to become a G. L. Vassler or just go there and be stationed either at Virginia or Carolina. I never was staying with the family. I made the decision to stay with the family. And it absolutely worked out because I would have received that call from my wife on the phone while I was on these coats.

She had something that was going on with my son. I never had to fly back and I wouldn’t have been able to be the support for me and the family. And I think that in all of it, me being here and present helped my son stand up, walk, do all the things he had to do to get discharged before New Year’s. And when you talk about an experience, it really helped me refocus on what’s important in life. What’s important in life is your family and people.

We could chase, we could chase accolades, we could chase positions, we could do all those things. And for some people, that’s the way that they’re on that billet. And what it showed me is that we take from granted, sometimes the people on the family, we have allowed us. And it refocused my energies on, like, I’m where I’m supposed to be because I made the right decision for my family, not just for me.

And I’ve taken that lesson and I’ve used it every day since when I talked to you. Like, that’s the analysis of your life, where are your priorities? Are they aligning with your actions? And I do that every day. So it’s been, it was an eye-opener, but it definitely resented me and resented my family. Wow.

Anthony Codispoti : What a powerful story, Stephen. I’m glad to hear that. First of all, how was your son today?

Stennett Rey : He’s great. I mean, he goes in for his MRIs every nine months now because once that happens, you’re on this kind of treatment plan and observation for about five years. But he’s doing well. He’s a wrestler. He’s actually on an Oklahoma now at OSU, finishing up his fourth day at Cannes, flying back tonight. So it’s a thank God for that. I’ll support you.

Anthony Codispoti : So he’s made a great recovery. I mean, when you’re telling me, you know, kind of helping him learn to walk again, and now he’s competing in a wrestling tournament half the country away. That’s a great trajectory there.

Stennett Rey : I am, I’m so proud of him. You know, a lot of times you hear folks say, you know, my who’s your hero? My son is absolutely because because of the person he’s becoming. But also, you know, I think a lot of times we look at our children and think that they’re not very resilient. And that can be further from the truth.

That kid taught me that you can do anything to say a lie to man is poised throughout the entire thing. So we have to acknowledge, you know, the greatness, whether you’re you’re five or you’re 85. Right. Acknowledging the greatness of people that exist right now. It’s seeing that positive that positive side of things.

Anthony Codispoti : I love that. How, how do you think this experience with your son kind of shows up in your day to day at Pride staff? You know, so talk about refocusing priorities and like, how does this show up for you in a day to day basis? It’s a great question.

Stennett Rey : I think part of it is always remembering that we are in a people business. And sometimes there are the phrases we people where they are and all these things. But what I tell the team here is everyone who walks through our door calls us. Let’s let’s let’s be engaged with them. Let’s learn about them. Let’s see where we can help. Can we help everyone?

No, we can’t. But acknowledge that this person is bringing something good to the table. Or else they would never call us. Right. There’s no need to call the staffing agency.

Work and they’re calling us because they think that we can assist them. And so seeing that side, my son absolutely reminds me and this is the thing in the military as well. You have to spend 29 years in military. You really do learn to engage with people and where to develop them and observe them with all these things. But also because you were trying to build a team, you’re always looking for qualities that make your team stronger.

And this is no different. Anyone calls us stepping back for a second, understanding what is it that they want and then finding out a bit more about them really helps us to add value to them and set them up for success. So I think that what happened at the center really helped me focus on making sure that you pay attention to people.

Right. Listen to them. And then try to help them as best as possible. And if you can’t, this is the toughest part. Be honest with them. Be honest with them when you can’t help them because that goes well as well.

Anthony Codispoti : It has to be the hardest part. These people have come to you and they’re looking for that purpose, that meaning that you want to be a contributing member of society. A lot of cases they may look at you as sort of their last chance and you’ve got to be the one to kind of deliver the tough news.

Stennett Rey : That’s right. And it does happen on a regular basis. I mean, we’ve had some stories here recently. I won’t put them out there, but very sad, very sad stories. Sometimes you just have to turn around and go, listen, I don’t, I can’t help you. But the great thing about being in business is because I network with so many other businesses, sometimes we provide referrals outside.

They say, hey, we can’t help you. But if you’re interested, I will send your resume over to X company who may be looking for someone with your skill. So that’s the other side of it right now. Are we just telling people, no, are we providing them with other opportunities?

And that’s really the way we run it here in this office is if I can’t help you, I’m going to point you into the right of someone or source that can help.

Anthony Codispoti : Thinking more about what your son went through and what you went through alongside of him. I wonder if you notice that you respond differently in stressful situations now.

Stennett Rey : Well, I do. I think that you go through your stages of life, right? I’ve always been a pretty calm person. You want to be the calm in the center of the storm. When things are personal, though, it really is a little bit different. You know, that was the first time I’ve had that significant of a medical issue with any of my children. And it definitely rocked me. It forced me to think about these differently. And the one thing I’ll say is that, you know, through all of it, you just have to go back and figure out what kind of person we’re going to be.

All right. Are you going to be the person that is presented with a challenge? And you’re going to let that challenge stop you or are you going to use it as fuel to get through it, be a better person and do all those things.

So you’re right. I mean, when you have something significant like that impact you, it does have a way of messing with your mind from time to time. But the lessons that I learned from it every single day, I applied here. And I do have a different perspective because of it. And I think that it’s helping grow as a person. But, you know, if you can become a better person, then everything else you can become better like better businessmen, better husband, you can. I think that it’s good.

Anthony Codispoti : What’s your superpower style?

Stennett Rey : Well, you know, I think my superpower is more on the strategic side, understanding having a strategic mindset, but staying grounded in the present. And if that makes sense, being able to see kind of where the organization is going or where it needs to go. And then in the moment developing a plan of action and then taking those steps and keeping those steps consistent so that when we meet that challenge in two or three years, we’re ready prepared because our processes are in place.

People are aware they have knowledge and all that. So I think that that’s been the greatest gift that I’ve been able to at least acknowledge of myself that I’m able to look forward and then take action for us to stay successful.

Anthony Codispoti : What’s the best decision you’ve ever made for your business?

Stennett Rey : Wow. Well, the best decision I made was is probably my my second and my first and third hires. The first one was her name is Anna recent college grad. Absolutely took a chance on her based on what we heard what she told me during the phone screen and bringing her on and I would tell you this Anthony, again to the generational discussion. I think every generation special. And it bring a lot of value to everyday life. Are we different? Absolutely. Right.

But sometimes we have to celebrate those differences is opportunity to see the potential of where these individuals are going to go. And it has to be the most mature 22 year old. I would put her in charge of anything right now. And actually she’s worth helping me work a very large project. And then, you know, another one was Desiree. She said my third hire coming back into the workforce. They have absolutely been forced multipliers in this office. I could not operate this office without them. Right. So that comes to decisions. Those two those are two of my best decisions.

Anthony Codispoti : So best decisions now kind of thinking back to maybe some things that at the time look like mistakes that you made. But now when you look at the rear of your mirror, you’ve got some gratitude for them and realize that actually helped to steer you in a different direction or somehow led to something positive.

Stennett Rey : Let’s see. Well, you know, a couple of things here. You definitely make some some interesting decisions in the first part of business. Right. Some of it is due to your lack of knowledge or you kind of rushing through some things. I have to get this done. But one of them I did keep one employee from the previous owner. She had a lot of knowledge of things that had to be done in the office. But then I think I used her as a crux.

Right. So I wasn’t learning as much about the business as I should. And then last year, July, she got an offer to go back to where she found a lot of success with a previous employer. So then I was forced to learn more about the business because I assumed all those responsibilities. And so I think that that decision to keep her on delayed my growth as well. But then once she was gone, I really dug in and learned the aspects of the business so that I could be the one to train and help folks as they come into the office. So with that decision there, while it was a comfort based decision, it’s like what we like to call it in the military, it was comfort based to keep her around. It absolutely worked out for me when she left and forced me to learn more, which makes me a better consultant to other businesses.

I was telling you I was on a discovery call yesterday meeting and to be able to speak from experience to a company who’s been in business for three or four months. At the end of it, they’re just thankful. And that’s a great, that’s a great feeling because it’s an ongoing conversation that we’re going to have. Because now I do have some experience and I can impart on others.

Anthony Codispoti : So when you went through that, the departure of that key employee, who knew kind of different parts of the business that you weren’t as familiar with yet, and then you were forced to become familiar with those things, was there anything sort of big picture or strategic wise where you were like, oh, now I see how this connects to that. And I’ve got an idea for how we can make something in here better.

Stennett Rey : Absolutely. One part of it was how do we integrate technologies and use the technology stacks that Brightestap has. And the one thing I was not doing was leveraging technology to make sure that the work that my team has to do every day is not as labor intensive.

Whether you’re inputting data at the end of the day, answering phone calls, a number of things. And what I ended up doing was I started speaking more to our customer experience team at Brightestap Home Office and said, hey, we have this tech stat. Let’s sit down and talk about how I can incorporate it into our everyday activities to make things a bit easier for the team. So strategically, now I’m starting to think of, hey, time is money, right? And every minute that my team is doing a non-revenue generating activity, we’re actually losing. And so how can I leverage the new technologies to reduce that time and increase what we bring in as an office? So that strategically was okay. Let’s take advantage of what’s out there and let’s incorporate it as possible.

Anthony Codispoti : So you’re talking about your tech stack and everybody loves talking about AI today. Are you guys leveraging that in any ways yet?

Stennett Rey : You are. Not to the extent that I think some folks think. You know, as a staffing agency, I don’t use any type of AI to screen through resumes because as a staffing agency, I could be hiring for 10 different roles. And we review every resume because let’s say you apply to be a machine operator, but you have great experience as an accounts payable person. So now you’re in the wrong bin, but I’m hiring for an accounts payable. So I’m going to pull you out of the machine operator bin.

I’m going to call you and say, hey, listen, you’re not, you don’t have the experience for this role, but you absolutely have the experience for this role. So we don’t use our technology, you know, any type of AI for screening, but we do for other things like scheduling and things like that. So if we have mass scheduling, it needs to go on. So a tech stack for that for consistent communication.

We’d use some chat bots and some other things to make sure that we continue to communicate and engage our communities and associates. So there are areas where we’ve incorporated it, but as I was talking to the team this morning, it’s a tool. It’s one of our tools that does try that.

Anthony Codispoti : Could you see yourself at some point using AI to help screen those applications and resumes? Is it occurs to me that the AI would also be able to pick up on the fact that they had that, you know, accounts payable experience in their background?

Stennett Rey : If there are tools that come online that help to do that, I would absolutely take a look at them and at least, you know, use them and incorporate them for a short period of time. I think the challenge right now in me is that quite a few job seekers are using AI to create their resumes that are aligned with job descriptions. So the resume looks great.

It doesn’t necessarily mean that they have the skills that are on the resume. So that’s where you get back to you. Unless you have an AI program that can weed some of that out, you know, what’s really going on is AI screen and AI.

So that’s where the person comes in, right? You’re asking these questions. And for us, the great thing we do is we create challenging interview questions. And what we find is that when we use some of these questions, you’re really able to determine the skills and the abilities of the individual or whether they align with that job. So what that does for us is it cuts down on a number of bad candidates we submit, right? And we only submit candidates who absolutely need to know the skills and abilities that our clients love.

Anthony Codispoti : Give me an example of these challenging interview questions that you asked that helps to kind of filter through folks.

Stennett Rey : You know, sometimes you can have a question that may say, may I ask you to respond in a yes or no? Like say, for instance, we have a machine operator role where you have to have experience with a five-axis CNC machine and you have to understand the coding. So instead of just asking if you have the experience, I may ask, you know, can you talk to me about how you program the G code into this five-axis machine prior to the shift? And so they have to walk me through the process, right? So it’s those types of questions where I’m really asking you a question where you have to either walk me through it or give me an experience. Talk to me about, you know, in the start, you know, format, you know, what was the situation? What was the task? What was the accident? And what was your, you know, result, right? After all of it. So we ask those types of questions when we get to our screenings and interviews because we want to be able to present a qualified candidate.

Anthony Codispoti : Stan, do you spend much time on personal development?

Stennett Rey : I do. I absolutely do. What does that look like for you? You know, I try to make sure that I’m either listening to a book or reading a book or on a, you know, listening to a podcast every day. You have any favorites? You know, the book I just finished is the one thing. If you’ve heard of that one, you know, Gary Keller, that one is a very good book because I wanted to, again, organize my own life, right? Make sure that I’m doing the right things and prioritizing the right activities. After listening to the book, I sat down and go, okay, what’s the one thing that I need to be doing as a business owner for success? And it really helped me focus and break those things down into different areas and go, you can’t be great at everything. But too often we try to be great at everything and do a bunch of things, you know, five to six balls, but eventually you’ll drop one or two.

And so as someone who wants to be successful, someone who wants to grow, how do your activities every day align with that one thing you want to accomplish? And it really helped me to do that. So it was a phenomenal book. You know, you have that one and then the AI Daily Brief. I love listening to that as well because it’s me in tune with what’s going on with these technologies that are impacting business across the book. Not just business, just whether it’s education, business, personal life. AI is impacting all of us and to be able to remain aware of where it’s going in the future is very important. It’s critical for all of us.

Anthony Codispoti : How about some daily practices that you use to either get yourself started or keep yourself on track during the day, Stan?

Stennett Rey : You know, I try to get into the office here. You know, I have my daily, you know, I have my daily word that I sit down and read before I start the day and I’ll take a look at my time blocking and what needs to be accomplished for the day. I’ll do that the first thing as soon as I sit down in the office and then just have a couple of minutes to think through the okay, what are the priorities and, you know, as I think, think through your question. I think the biggest thing we skip every day is an understanding of what we want to accomplish by the end of it.

Right. And when you have the end state in mind and everything else that you have on your, in your time block or your list of things to do, you should align with that. And so being very aware of those things every day has become a practice of mine because I don’t want to have a helter-skeleton mind. I want to be focused in or in those areas that are going to help us, help us grow. So that’s really what my day and some of the habits that I’ve created here.

Anthony Codispoti : So most entrepreneurs I’ve met, myself included, we tend to have a bit of a shiny object syndrome. Right. And especially with all the books and the podcasts that you consume, you’re getting lots of like great ideas either directly presented to you, you know, case studies, or you hear a story and you’re like, oh, I could apply that to my business in this way. I guess my first question, Sten, it is, does that happen to you?

And then the second question is, if it does, how do you sort of create a filter so it’s not like, you know, the 10 ideas from this latest podcast or latest audio book are going to be things that you try to get your team to implement this week?

Stennett Rey : You’re right. I mean, we are in the information age. There is information coming at us from everywhere. I do find myself getting pulled in a couple of different directions. I mean, almost every audio book, every book and podcast has a good idea.

Right. And I love good ideas and perspectives. But in order to keep me focused, I do have a small group of business owners and we speak probably three or four days a week. And in those conversations, it helps me refocus on what needs to be done because it’s in business, especially this type of business.

Sales has got to be your number one goal. So when the discussion starts to drift away from that, it’s good to have fellow entrepreneurs who are able to help get you back on track and really prioritize the efforts that you need. And understand that there may be a different time to incorporate some of those ideas, right? And then maybe put that in a bin that goes, hey, in the next six to 12 months, I’m going to focus in that area. But right now I need to be focused right here in this moment on this one day.

Anthony Codispoti : Here’s a little system that I’ve set up for myself. Curious if something like this works for you or if you’ve got ideas on how to improve it. Because I have lots of ideas that come to me like, oh, this, I got to do this right away. But now I forced myself to sit down and either write it out or type it out. Full description of it. Slowing down to do that helps my brain think about, okay, where are the gaps in this?

Where are the holes? What wasn’t I originally thinking when this brilliant idea first popped into my head? And if it still looks good after I’ve taken the time to do that, then I’ve got to hit pause for at least one week. Do nothing with it. I can continue thinking about it, but I’m not telling anybody about it. I’m not going to my team. I’m not putting action in place. And if I come back to it a week from now and it’s still a good idea, okay, now I can think about next steps.

I can think about a plan to sort of get my team involved in helping me roll this out. Because sometimes it’s just the excitement of sort of the new idea that feels really cool and you want to run with it. And if it still seems good after a week, there might be something to it.

Stennett Rey : That’s a great way of looking at it, Anthony. I mean, you are open to new things, right? But also very aware that sometimes trying to incorporate too many things at the same time creates more chaos and confusion for your team. So I do like your patience and okay, I’m going to step back for a second. I’m going to think about it and then I’m going to wait some time before I even present it. I think that that’s great.

I’m going to have to incorporate that as well. But I’m similar to you. I’m a very deliberate decision maker. And especially when it comes to changing things and involve more than one person because that could be quite challenging.

Anthony Codispoti : All right, Sten, and I just got one more question for you here. But before I ask it, I want to do two things. First of all, everyone listening today, I want to invite you to hit the follow button on your favorite podcast app. We’ve had a great conversation here today with Stenet Ray from Pride Staff San Diego. And I want you to continue to get more great conversations and content like this in your feed. Stenet, I also want to let people know the best way to get in touch with you or to follow your story. What would that be?

Stennett Rey : Definitely LinkedIn is a great way to find me. If you Stenet Ray, S-T-E-N-N-E-T-T, last name, R-E-Y, keep me a connection there on LinkedIn. Be more than happy to engage with anyone and create new connections. The other way is, Sray at PrideStaff.com is a great way to get in touch with me as well. I’m open to speaking to anyone about any topic of just having conversations with folks.

Anthony Codispoti : And I’ll include those links in the show notes for everybody. Okay, last question for you, Stenet. You and I reconnect a year from now and you’re excited. You’re celebrating something. What’s that thing that you’re celebrating?

Stennett Rey : Yeah, next year, if we link back up, and the one thing I would be celebrating is growth in our business. Our brand here in San Diego. If you could come back on and you say, hey, Stenet, what does it look like to you there in San Diego as far as staffing goes? And to be able to say to you, number one, we reached that 30% growth mark that we were shooting for and anticipated.

But number two, we have grown our business organically through relationships and that our reputation collides with the values that we all carry off. If I’m able to say that, and I’ll be over the moon, right?

Anthony Codispoti : I love it. Well, I made myself a note to follow up in a year and see how you’re coming with that. Well, Stenet Ray from Pride Staff San Diego, I want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. I really appreciate it.

Stennett Rey : Thank you, Anthony. It’s been great. I’ll definitely be listening to you and your podcast as a rotation here because you definitely have some great stories that I think anyone can learn from. So I appreciate you get by spending some time.

Anthony Codispoti : Much appreciated. Folks, that’s a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories podcast. Thanks for running with us today.