Being an Engineer
Being an Engineer
S7E24 Larry Copponi | The Most Important Skill To Get Hired As An Engineer
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For more than 40 years, Larry Copponi has been working at the intersection of engineering talent and product innovation. Today, he serves as Vice President of Staffing Solutions at Spanner Product Development, where he helps companies across industries assemble the engineering teams they need to bring complex products to life.
Larry’s work spans sectors including consumer electronics, robotics, renewable energy, life sciences, and medical devices. His team specializes in placing highly skilled professionals—mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, product designers, industrial designers, and quality engineers—into organizations that are racing to transform ideas into real-world products. By deeply understanding both the technical landscape and the people who power it, Larry plays a critical role in helping companies scale their engineering capabilities.
Before joining Spanner, Larry spent more than 14 years as Division Manager at Pro Source Inc., supporting companies with contract engineering talent and CAD professionals to keep product development projects on schedule. Earlier in his career, he helped build recruiting and sales teams at TriMech Solutions, where he launched new recruiting initiatives focused on engineering and technical sales professionals.
Across decades in the recruiting and staffing industry, Larry has built a reputation for understanding the real needs of engineering organizations—matching the right talent to the right challenges and helping companies deliver products to market faster. His career offers a rare vantage point on how engineering teams evolve, how companies compete for talent, and what separates organizations that build strong technical cultures from those that struggle to grow.
In this conversation, Larry shares lessons from decades of working alongside engineering leaders, insights into the hiring challenges facing technical organizations today, and practical advice for both companies looking to build great teams and engineers navigating their careers.
LINKS:
Larry Copponi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/larry-copponivpstaffingsolutionsspannerpd/
Spanner Website: https://www.spannerpd.com/
Aaron Moncur, host
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I work with mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, designers, but the advent of CAD has allowed engineers to do a lot more with less, but companies can do a lot more with less resources,
Aaron Moncur:Hello, and welcome to another exciting episode of the Being an Engineer podcast. Today, our guest is Larry Copponi, who has spent more than four decades helping engineering organizations find the right people to build great products as VP of Staffing Solutions at Spanner Product Development, Larry works with companies across consumer electronics, robotics, renewable energy, and medical technology to place highly specialized engineering talent from mechanical and electrical engineers to product designers and quality experts with a career that includes leadership roles at ProSource Inc and TriMex Solutions. Larry has developed a unique perspective on how great teams are built and what it takes to move products from concept to market successfully. Larry, thanks so much for being with us today.
Larry Copponi:Oh, you're welcome, Aaron. It's nice to be here.
Aaron Moncur:So, what? Tell us a little bit about your, your role right now, Larry, and, and how you got into this role.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, so that's, um, that's a good question. It's a little confusing, actually, because when people see that I'm VP of staff and for Spanner, Spanner is a product development company, so most people think I'm recruiting directly for Spanner, and that's really not what I'm doing on my job. So it started by I worked for a company called Pros Horse for 30 years, and the company shut down. The owner wanted to retire and just didn't want to go on anymore. So I found myself about two and a November of 2023 I found myself out looking for a new role put something on LinkedIn, and the team, the executive team at Spanner, contacted me and said they've been thinking about doing a recruiting model around their business. So one thing led to another, we did some calls and we put a deal together. So my job is to go out and it's I create, I'm creating a separate revenue stream for Spanner under the Spanner umbrella. My job is to go out and find companies that are looking to hire resources, and then also I go out and find candidates and put the two together. So my job is to go outside of the Spanner ecosystem and generate a revenue stream for Spanner.
Aaron Moncur:Okay, so for example, if my company pipeline needed to hire an engineer, I could approach you, Larry, and say, 'Hey, I need an automation engineer, and you'd be able to go out and find that engineer, help me establish interviews, and go through that process, and ultimately hire it, and then there's, you know, some transaction pipeline pays spanner for that service, and that's that's how you generate revenue,
Larry Copponi:correct? It's either, so I have contractors as well as full-time employees, so on. If it was a full-time employee, we would charge a percentage of the first year's salary. If it was a contractor, we would charge you an hourly bill rate.
Aaron Moncur:Got it? Okay. All right. And you've been doing basically this same thing, in some form or another, for four decades now.
Larry Copponi:Well, I used to be, I used to be a little proud of that, how long I was doing it for. But, yeah, over, I started my career in recruiting in 1984 So,
Aaron Moncur:wow,
Larry Copponi:yeah, and I love what I do. I, I'm just going to keep on doing it, because it's to me, it's a passion for me, and you know, as well as a living, but it's become.. I've made a lot of nice friends over the years. It's amazing the amount of contacts I've made. Over, yeah, this is my.. this is my 42nd year doing this, coming up on my 42nd year. So, it's pretty, pretty incredible where I started and where I am now, and the folks I've met along the way, and companies I've worked with, it's been amazing between startups and well-established companies. So, yeah, it's been an incredible journey. I'm a pretty lucky guy, actually. Yeah,
Aaron Moncur:and how long has your recruiting been focused on engineers?
Larry Copponi:From the beginning,
Aaron Moncur:that's brilliant.
Larry Copponi:So, it's hardcore, it's mechanical engineers, electrical embedded software engineers, not so much with it, but most of my clients are building a product, so it's a physical product, hardware, and that's that's kind of how I ended up with Spanner at the end here. So, yeah,
Aaron Moncur:you're in a unique position to analyze trends and kind of see holistically in the industry, you know, different patterns and things that are happening. How, how has hiring changed? How have engineering companies like changed the structure of how they hire engineers over the years, if at all? Maybe it's the same as it was 40 years ago.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, well, yeah, so company. Still, call me. In the beginning, there was no.. there was.. it used to be.. I used to physically deliver resumes. Believe it or not, I'd have a resume in my office, and if a client needed somebody, I'd actually hand deliver the resume. That's how antiquated it was back then. But it worked, and actually, in some ways, it was a little bit more effective, because I.. they were forced to meet with me, so they were forced to actually accept a meeting from me, and me go out now with email and everything. A lot of managers just want me to email a resume, and I prefer.. well, when I was in the Bay Area, working the Bay Area, I would prefer to go out and meet with the clients, and now it's physically not possible. But yeah, we had physically delivering resumes at the beginning, and then we had this thing called fax machines, so we used to fax resumes through these machines, and the paper would get curled up, and and then we went to email, and now we're at a point where you know we're using LinkedIn and other avenues of sending resumes, so it has evolved over the years, and in some ways it's made our jobs a lot easier, so yeah.
Aaron Moncur:How about the types of engineers? Has that changed much over the years? I mean, you mentioned what your focus is these days. Are you seeing like more nuance at all, or more general engineering hiring being made? How has that changed?
Larry Copponi:Yeah, again, going back years ago, companies used to use drafters, designers, I mean, basically on drafting boards, that's how it started out. So, you'd have drafters, designers, and then you'd have over the wall, you'd have checkers, so you'd have people redlining up drawings, and so I think what's happened with the advent of CAD, it's allowed companies to be more efficient, so they don't have to hire 15 or 20 people in the department, they can use three or four people to do the work of what they used to have to have 15 or 20 people doing it, so I would say, you know, I work with mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, designers, but the advent of CAD has allowed engineers to do a lot more with less, the companies can do a lot more with less resources.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, it'll be interesting to see how that trend continues even further with AI coming into the picture. I know there's some companies out there right now, for example, creating applications that will do checks on your drawings, right? AI drawing reviews, which would be not just drawing reviews, I guess. Creating the drawings really is what that focuses, which would be amazing.
Larry Copponi:I think it's going to allow people without degrees to do what people with degrees can do. Now, I see that trend a little bit. Now we're still in the early stages, was still in that first in and of AI. We don't know where it's going to end up.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah,
Larry Copponi:but it has changed. It's even with my job, I can rewrite job descriptions, I can put it into a Gemini or Chat GPT or Claude, and I can compose a nice letter using AI, and I think engineers are going to find effective ways. You're still going to have to navigate through the engineering problems, but I think AI is going to allow everyone to be more effective. Now, is that going to eliminate some jobs? Like, I know when you know script, script writers in Hollywood, I mean, that, that those jobs are going to be really at the front, front end of jobs that may not need.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, a lot of change is coming, that's for sure. I think that this episode is going to be really interesting for engineers who are now or in the future going to be looking for a job, because we're definitely going to talk about what you've learned and how engineers can be most effective finding a job or maybe improving their employment, and then from from the hiring side, for the you hiring managers out there, I think that we'll have some great insights from Larry on how to be most effective finding and hiring engineers, so let's, let's maybe start there from the hiring side. What are what are some things that companies who seem to attract consistently great engineering talent, what are they doing versus companies that maybe they're they're struggling a little bit to find great engineers.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, that's a great question. Well, I think it starts with the with the management of the company and the philosophy and what they can offer to their employees. It's like building.. I always relate, because I was a baseball player in college, I always related to putting a team together in sports. I happen to be from Boston, and you know, putting it like the Patriots always, for 20 years, they had a coach, a Bill Belichick, who had a great plan and a great philosophy, and how to put a team together. Same goes with, with great organizations in, in business. I think it, I think it starts from a, from the top, so a good management stuff.
Unknown:Style
Larry Copponi:and creating a culture where people can learn less, you mentioned you don't micromanage people when we started this, less micromanagement, and then having a having a great product helps, you have to have a product that people need and want, so I think it all starts from the management team can create a good, good culture.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, that's an interesting point about the product itself. I hadn't even thought about that, really. But have you seen that either the product or the culture are bigger drivers than the other, or are they kind of equal, like if I have, you know, not maybe not the most interesting product in the world, maybe I'm manufacturing staples, I don't know, something like that, but we just have an amazing culture, and everyone recognizes that it's truly a stellar place to work, versus if, if you're developing the next surgical robot, but it's a, it's kind of widely known that, hey, this is not a great place to work. It's kind of a toxic culture. Which one wins?
Larry Copponi:Well, that's a great question, too. I think I think you have to have a good product, because if you have a great culture and you don't have a great product that people aren't going to buy, then culture is only going to take the company so far, of course, having a great culture and a great product, or a great culture, or a mediocre culture and a great product, where people are excited about what they're doing, they're challenged, that's I think, I think a great, a great product is probably more essential than a great culture, but
Aaron Moncur:or attracting engineers,
Larry Copponi:yes. Yeah,
Aaron Moncur:interesting. Okay, I would have guessed the opposite. That's really interesting to hear from the from the front line. What's actually happening? How about mistakes that companies make when they're trying to hire engineers? What are like the top two or three mistakes that you can help hiring managers avoid,
Larry Copponi:yeah, yeah. Well, hired too quickly companies that just.. and that's not happening right now. Companies are actually, because I'm actually coaching companies that, hey, take your time, don't feel like you have to hire the first person I send them. So I usually present three, I go through a whole question line of questions. line of questioning, so I qualify that the manager, and I actually, I feel like I'm educating them sometimes. I said, you know, you, why are you looking for somebody? Do you really need somebody on this role? What's the process of bringing somebody on? What's the ramp up time? So I go through a whole.. I have a whole question here that I asked these, the managers, because sometimes managers don't really know why they're hiring somebody, they just, they think they need to hire somebody because somebody left the company. So I go through and make sure that they, they have a bot, I have a buy-in from them, because I don't want to spend three months looking for somebody if they don't really know the reasons they want, they're the reason they want to bring somebody on, so that makes
Aaron Moncur:great.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, I make them convince me why they need somebody.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, yeah, I mean, right there, you're going from from a vendor to a partner, right? Yes, you're helping them identify what's the commercial reason that you actually need someone,
Larry Copponi:and I'm trying to build trust, you know. I always.. I'm more.. I feel like I'm more of an advisor at times to them. Yeah, and sometimes they'll come back and say, you know what, you're right, maybe we don't need to hire somebody for this particular role, let's wait till next time. But it also builds trust from my end to them, you know, with me.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, absolutely.
Unknown:Yeah,
Aaron Moncur:yeah, you're not out just to make a buck, you're trying to help them, and that comes through loud and clear.
Larry Copponi:Yes, yeah.
Aaron Moncur:Okay, so let's look at it from the engineers' side now. Engineers who maybe they're already gainfully employed, but they're keeping their options open, right, looking for something better, or maybe they're actively looking for a new job right now. I've heard from many engineers who are out of work, right? They're looking for something right now that they're just sending resumes and resumes out there, and like nothing, right? They don't get any response, they don't know, they don't really understand what the process is like. Is it just some AI agent that's going through these, and I'm not putting the right keywords in there, what help us understand the process right now that engineers go through, like behind the scenes. What's really happening?
Larry Copponi:Yeah, and it is a challenging time right now. I think there's, I think there's more people than ever looking for jobs, and a lot more people looking for the same jobs. So, and I would say I would contend, you know, you mentioned they're sending resumes out. I'm, I'm counseling people now, and coaching people, and telling, coaching my, the candidates I'm working with, that I contend that LinkedIn is a lot more important than a resume these days, because recruiters are using LinkedIn more than ever, and I even say that at some point resumes will become obsolete, there'll be. Different form of presenting your credentials to a company, so I always tell them to build a good, robust LinkedIn profile with a nice summary on top, and then a list of your, your different jobs, chronic, chronologically in order, but yeah, it is very challenging. AI is becoming more essential in the job search, where clients are using AI to block out certain people that don't have the right keywords in there, so yeah, it's, it's a challenge in time.
Aaron Moncur:How do you learn which keywords are the right ones to put in a resume? Is it, is it very, very job specific, I early bird tickets for PDX 2026 end in just a few days. Tickets are regularly $375 but for the next few days they are only $165 That sale ends may 31 then ticket sales close completely until August, where they'll only be available at their regular price. So, if you're thinking about attending PDX this year, this is your last chance to save over 50% on your registration. To learn more or secure your spot, visit PD Expo dot engineer, that's PD E X P O dot engineer.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, and I've, I've, when I, when I read, when I work with folks, I always tell them, you know, make sure you write, write your resume, as long as they're not fabricating things, write your resume according to the job, and that helps. And then I always ask them to put a summary of their skill sets together for me in a separate document. So, tell a story about yourself, besides the resume, send the resume, but also send me a summary, and that's worked fantastic over the years. So, I asked them for a separate summary, so I can send the resume along with that summary of their skill sets and what they're really good at, and I asked them to do it in their own words. I can't, I can't write their story for them.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah,
Larry Copponi:yeah,
Aaron Moncur:I like that you mentioned LinkedIn. I've been going through the hiring process right, right now. Actually, this morning I spoke with a candidate. This is a marketing position that I'm hiring for right now, but I put a job post out there, and a few, you know, Indeed, and Zip Recruiter, and a couple of those resume hiring websites, and we probably got, I don't know, 30 resumes, 30 applicants within four or five days, something like that. I refuse to look at any of the resumes, especially since this was a marketing position. I was like, I'm just gonna see who actually reaches out to me, you know, show me your marketing skills. Yeah, and so I didn't look at anyone, and there was this one gal who reached out to me, and she was sharp and clearly had researched my company, and it was on LinkedIn that she reached out to me, and I spoke with her this morning, and I mean, I don't, haven't pulled the trigger quite yet, but she seems great, and LinkedIn is a
Larry Copponi:great story, Aaron, that is such, and I, you know, one of the things I also tell when they, when, when a candidate interviews with the company, they think it went well at the end of the interview, ask for the job. Most people don't ask for the job. It's like, I think I can do this work if offered the job I really want, and I'll accept
Aaron Moncur:it. I love that. I love
Larry Copponi:that of what the example that you just use, that somebody reached out to. If they're a marketing person, they should be reaching out. So,
Aaron Moncur:yeah, definitely, I I've hired, you know, a lot of people over the years, and I kind of want to feel courted, like I want to feel like you, the candidate, really want this job, and not like I'm just one in, you know, 50 companies that you're just throwing stuff, spaghetti on the wall, see if something sticks. So, yeah, I love that. That's a great pro tip. Ask for the job if you feel like the interview went well at the end.
Larry Copponi:Yeah,
Aaron Moncur:yeah. All right. Is there anything that you can advise, especially younger engineers, to do early on in their careers to like set them up for success as far as getting hired,
Larry Copponi:yeah, and I'm getting a lot of that right now, because a lot of my clients at my age, a lot of my clients have kids that are graduating from college, and I get it almost three or four times a week. How can you, in this time of year, we get, we're coming to graduation time, where people getting out in their, they've gone through four years of school. I mean, I went through four years of school, and when I got out, I didn't know what to do. You know, where do you look? You know, obviously, we go back to LinkedIn. Make sure you put a good LinkedIn profile together, even if it's about projects you did at school, internships, those kinds of things, the kind of classes you took. I mean, obviously a person. Coming out of school doesn't have a lot of job history that they can put on a resume or LinkedIn. The other thing they can do is network with their parents' friends, because a lot of, lot of the kids' parents are in business, and you can just put the word out that way. Reach out, reach out to people that you know, their parents in general networking, I mean, there's a, there's a whole, you know, you go to go to meetups, there's meetups you can go to, make sure you can, and if you see a company that's advertising, send an email to that to the to the owner or the CEO of that company, don't be afraid to go up the ladder rather than deal with the managers, you'll be surprised how little CEOs and senior level people get contacted, so I, I do it myself. I contact leadership people, and you know they like, I think they like Nikki just said, somebody contacted you directly.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, yep, yeah, it shows initiative, and the fact that, like, this person really truly is interested, they're not just throwing resumes at the wall and seeing, seeing what sticks. I love your comment about, like, get to know people, right? Get out there and network, meet people. Everything we do happens with and through people. So engineers who are just sending resumes out into a black hole probably have a much lower chance of getting an interview than an engineer who's going to go out and find the right person at that company and try to establish some sort of relationship with him or her,
Larry Copponi:and it shows how resourceful someone can be. I think resourcefulness is so important these days, and being aggressive, I think that's that's a great, without being overly aggressive, just being direct and contacting, which shows that company this person's reaching out to us, they're going to be good for us in the long run.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, right. Yeah. Have you seen much difference in how startups and established companies hire engineers?
Larry Copponi:Hmm. Well, first of all, I have a - I have a daughter. My daughter is a recruiter for Google, and I kid with her every once, so I said,'You have an easy job. Google gets two, two or 3 million resumes a year, so it's a little.. yeah, they do, and they only hire about 20,000 maybe a year. So that's do the math. that's about 1% of the resumes they get with startups. I would say there's different. Some people just want to work for a startup, they don't want to work for a meta group, you know, one of the big seven out there. So companies, I would say, you know, it just depends on the per on the candidate themselves, you know, looking for candidates. I would say Google has a little bit better chance of hiring people because of the because of the name, but that doesn't always give them an advantage. If somebody's really good, somebody's really good technically, they can work for a startup or or well-established company. So it just depends on the candidate, and some people are better suited for a startup company as opposed to a larger company. Yeah, somebody, somebody with many years of experience may not want to work for, for a startup, they may want to just go to work at Google.
Aaron Moncur:You mentioned coaching your, your customers, the companies who are trying to hire someone, and do you do you also coach the engineers that you work with, and what kind of coaching do you do with them?
Larry Copponi:Yeah, that's that's a really good point. And most of the time I'm coaching them with their, with their soft skills, their technical skills, or they are what they are. I can't really help them with that. I'm not a technical person, but I can help them with my head. I'll give you an example of someone I was talking to about a month ago. I was interviewing that person, and he was talking incessantly. He taught what I told him, he was talking without periods. I said,"You, you have to stop and pause a bit. So, those soft skills, I said, "If you're doing all the talking, you can't learn about the company when you're interviewing there, so slow down, and he's like, "Wow, nobody ever told me that before. I appreciate that. So, sometimes, sometimes I have to have a tough conversation with someone, but after I, after I go through the process with them, they understand. I, and I had another person two weeks ago told me he doesn't do any social media. I said I didn't see your resume on LinkedIn. He says, I don't have a LinkedIn profile. I'm like, you know, the client even asked why doesn't he have a LinkedIn profile, and they wouldn't even talk to him. So that I told him, I said, it's not a social media thing, that's part of the, that's like a resume these days. So, yeah, I have to have an occasional conversation, but I think most people appreciate that.
Aaron Moncur:Absolutely, that's great. Shoot, I had a thought while you were talking about that. Let's see, you were talking about coaching
Larry Copponi:periods.
Aaron Moncur:Oh, that's what it was. Yes. Okay, I have to share just a short story here to emphasize. The point that you just made, which is that engineers, not just engineers, anyone really needs to stop talking and listen, ask some questions. Right? I interviewed a guy, this was years ago, probably a decade ago, and we, it was just a phone interview, so we got on the call and this guy started talking, and he didn't stop, he just kept going, kept talking, kept talking, and after a few minutes, I thought to myself, man, I would really like to, like, kind of stop this guy and ask him questions. He's telling me all this stuff, most of which I don't care about. Let me ask the questions I do care about, but he's not given me an opportunity to break in, and I almost interrupted him, and then I thought, you know, what, I'm just gonna see how long he goes. It became like a kind of a game for me. I thought, how long is this guy gonna go before he stops talking? And Larry, it was a full 20 minutes before this guy stopped, just a continuous stream of consciousness for for 20 solid minutes, and I just sat there in awe, you know, like, wow, clearly this is not someone that I want to work with. That was an interesting experiment. 20 minutes, all right, guy, thanks for your time. I gotta go now, you know. It was just an immediate no for me.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, it's painful. It's, and I sometimes I don't think that person realizes, because I think they get nervous and they want to get as much information out as possible, but I coach them. I said, you know what? If you're talking to me like this, you're not going to get this job that I'm sending you on. So, let's, let's, let's circle back, let's slow down a little bit, and let's talk about the important things. And then ask a question to the client. So, it's a two, you know, I always tell people it's a two-way conversation, not a one way, so you have to, to get information, you can't be doing all the talking, so
Aaron Moncur:absolutely,
Larry Copponi:it's a good lesson, and it's, yeah, it's, it's a turn off if you just keep on talking, so, oh
Aaron Moncur:yeah, big, big time, like you're talking to a salesperson, they just don't shut up, yeah, I love when candidates ask me a question, you know, it shows they're interested in the company, depending on a question, it shows that they've actually done their research already. So, come prepared with questions. I think that's a great strategy.
Larry Copponi:And I always start with a personal question about somebody, or about their, you know, what they like to do in their free time, or, you know, have you done any, have you been away, have you gone on any trips lately, and that kind of gets things rolling a little bit, same thing with clients. I do the same thing with my people that are hiring people for me, so I always get to a little bit better that way.
Aaron Moncur:Let's talk about that a little bit. You seem to have a personal touch that I mean, I can imagine how your business might feel pretty transactional these days, where everything's digital, right, sending resumes back and forth, all the applications are online. How do you bring a personal touch into that interaction, and how have you seen it improve the outcome? Pipeline now offers procurement of custom machined parts at significantly lower costs without sacrificing speed or quality. We design and build custom machines ourselves, so we consume a lot of precision machined components. Over the past several years, we developed a proven overseas supply chain to support that work, and in 2025 we successfully piloted that capability with select customers. Now we're opening it up more broadly. If you'd like to see how our prices and lead times compare, send us a drawing or two for quote. Visit Team pipeline.us or message me directly on LinkedIn.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, that's that's a really good point there. And I try to deal directly with managers, I try to get around, you know, I don't like to deal with HR or procurement people. I try to deal directly with the decision makers, and when they tell me just to send resumes, that really it's not going to work, you know. I have to, I want to understand exactly what you're looking for. I'll send you the best three candidates I have. I'll kind of set it up where I'm in control a little bit, but letting them just make the decision. So, I'll send you my ideal client is I get to send them three resumes, they interview three people, they get down to two candidates, and then decide on the one. Doesn't always work that way, but I try to guide them and try to save them time. I said, you don't want to, you don't want 20 or 30 resumes for me. If you want 20 or 30 resumes, that's I'm not the person for you. So I try to guide them along, and and then tell them a little background on my, tell them a little story about my background. I've been doing this for a long time. I'm pretty comfortable that I could find you the right person. I'm not perfect, but I should be able to find you the right person after I understand what you're looking for. So
Aaron Moncur:I love that you have the confidence. To tell people when appropriate. Hey, that's not going to work for me, right? You're not just going to accept anyone, you're kind of choosing your customers as well, because their process is not set up in an efficient way. I mean, it could be you who looks bad at the end of that, so you need to make sure things are set up for success from the beginning.
Larry Copponi:And again, I go through a qualifying list of questions with them, like, how long has the job been open for? If they tell me it's been open for six months, then I'm like, well, what makes you think that I can find somebody miraculously after six months? So those are those are some of the questions I ask
Aaron Moncur:Larry. I'm getting a sense, and I mean this in a very complimentary way, so please don't take it otherwise, but I'm getting the sense that you're as much of a salesperson as you are a recruiting professional,
Larry Copponi:and I still have to sell. I do both sides, right? Right now with Spanner, I'm doing the recruiting and the business development side, so I have to go out. The sales part is finding clients, the recruiting part is finding candidates, but I also have to sell candidates to take the job with the client,
Aaron Moncur:yeah, and
Larry Copponi:vice versa. So, sometimes a client is is not sure, and sometimes a candidate is not. Sometimes a candidate gets a, gets an offer, and they're not sure if they want that particular offer. And I don't have to, I don't really want to be that person that tries to sell them on taking the job, just so I can get earn a fee. I want them to give me a good reason why they might not want the job, and if they don't want the job, then that's okay too. I don't want them to take a job and then leave two months into the role, because that doesn't, that doesn't help me either.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, right.
Larry Copponi:So some ways I have to sell the candidates and the in the, in the candidates.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, I think that's fantastic, and a skill set that not that many people have, so working with someone who does have that skill set is immensely valuable. Let's see, I had.. oh, I know what it was. How have you seen in-person versus remote work change, especially, you know, post-COVID? Has it kind of gone back to pretty much all in office at this point, or has there been a more permanent shift for like hybrid work or remote work for engineers?
Larry Copponi:Well, I think I think candidates are driving this because they get so used to doing remote work, so a lot of candidates are dictating to the companies, they're pushing the companies, but the companies are also pushing the candidates to come back to work. So, there's been a trend over the last six to nine months to get, especially if you're building a product, because it's hard to do a remote job if you're not on site building a robot or a piece of hardware, you have to be there, so at least, at least three or four days a week, so it's not totally on site, but especially in the Bay Area, it's so bad commuting wise that people, people just can't get to the office within an hour and a half, so it depends on the location. I happen to be in a business where my business, I can do everything remote, although I do miss going on site and walking the floors of my clients that helped me a lot, but I'm in Wilmington, North Carolina, and most of my business is up in Boston and North Carolina in the Bay Area, so but back to the engineers, I would say that I think you have to be in clients are asking their people, there are candidates that come in on site every day, especially mechanical engineer or electric and electrical engineer, there's a lot of communication during the day that you just can't get glimo.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, the hands on aspect, right? If you need to go in and build something, I mean, you can't do that remotely,
Larry Copponi:yeah, with a 3D printer, or you're going to a machine shop, so yeah, definitely have to be there.
Aaron Moncur:Have you seen the mindsets of engineers, applicants change much over the years? I mean, like, this is.. I don't know. I hear this a lot, and I'm never sure the degree to which it's actually true, right? People kind of bag on the younger generation, oh, they just want everything handed to them, and they don't have good work ethic. They're not willing to put in the time. They just want everything to be handed to them on a silver platter. Have you found that to be true? Or are you know people looking for jobs now, are they every bit as, as good work ethic and hard working as they were 20 3040 years ago.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, I think I mean, I think a lot of the work-life balance came out of a Google and Meta, where they're giving out free food, they're feeding people, there's ping pong tables, there's a foosball, there's, you know, all kinds of fun stuff. I think I think that trend is over. I think people would rather come in and do the work, and the young people want to work. I don't see that. I don't see that lack of work. I don't see people that, that they want to work hard and they want to build products. The people that I'm talking to every day, they're serious about work, they're diligent, they're contacting me on a weekly basis. Hey, I want to, I want to work. I don't mind going in and. Know, I'll move wherever I have to move, so I, I kind of, you know, it was a trend for a while, bringing, you know, bringing pets into work. I mean, that's that's not as popular as it used to be.
Aaron Moncur:Interesting.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, I think I think companies are just providing, like I said before, they want to, they're providing a good challenge and a good problem to a to build a product they want to want to create a good work culture and solve problems for for consumers, that's what it's all about.
Aaron Moncur:If you're going to put a billboard up and millions of engineering applicants were going to see this billboard and you could only fit, you know, a few words or a short sentence on it. What would that be?
Larry Copponi:That's not one of the questions you sent me, Aaron. I was supposed to be prepared for this.
Aaron Moncur:This is a curveball. That's right.
Larry Copponi:That's a good one. How would a billboard, how to attract clients, or how to track candidates
Aaron Moncur:of what, what the engineers should, the mindset that they should have, like going into an interview, what what should be their mindset, looking for a job, what's what's like the best thing that they can do to prepare themselves? It's an unfair question, because there's never a best thing, right? It's always like a bunch of things that you need to do to prepare, but is there any one thing that comes to mind that stands out to you? Is you have to be doing this one thing if you're looking for a job and you want to be successful right now.
Larry Copponi:Well, I would say right now is learn as much about AI as possible, because that's become the buzzword, the buzzword out there. How do you use, how do you utilize a AI effectively to make your job easier. I've found ways. I'm not a technical person, but I've already found many, many ways using AI to help my job become more effective. So, how do you use it with the tools if you're using CAD design? If you're using SolidWorks or Pro Engineer on the mechanical side or Creo, how do you utilize those tools using AI to make you more effective, so in or in my job, How do we, how do I make myself more effective as a, as a business development person and a recruiter with less people around me? How do I use AI to amplify my message? Yeah, so I would say that's one of the things you could, you could utilize, and AI is like I said, still in the infancy of it's, uh, we're still in the first or second inning of a nine inning game with, with AI.
Aaron Moncur:Well, there have been some real gems that you've shared already, Larry, both for hiring managers and engineers who are applying for work, looking for their next opportunity. I think everyone listening to this is going to take away something of value from it, from from your end. What is something that would be helpful or valuable to you that our audience listening to this right now could do? Now, I think that the easy answer is, if you're looking for a job, contact me and we'll work together. But outside of that, is there anything else that you're looking for that could be helpful, useful for you.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, and I do have an answer for this one. Thank you for that question. I would say sharpen your soft skills, your how you present yourself, dress professionally for an interview, dress, you know, you have to work, you don't have to wear a tie, most companies aren't asking for you to wear a tie, but make sure you make a great first impression when you're going out on an interview. I would say the technical skills are already there. If you've gone through a four year, if you've got a four year degree or a two year degree, you've already proven to that company you've got the technical skills. What can you do on the soft skill side? What can you do to make yourself amplify yourself? Or how do you.. how do you.. it's.. it's really.. you're in a competition with other candidates, so how do you differentiate yourself? And I think the soft skills do that. How do you.. how do you become more resourceful? Ask great questions, eye to eye, you know, looking that person in the eye, make sure you.. you.. you maintain good eye contact and a good posture, because body language tells us, tells a lot about somebody. You don't want to be slumped over or looking around, the looking around. Don't have any distractions, like if most interviews, most first interviews now are video, just like we're doing. So don't have any distractions around you. Make sure that the things in the background are really something that doesn't turn somebody off, don't have a cat coming across or a dog barking in the background, or kids. So
Aaron Moncur:that's a great pro tip. The
Larry Copponi:make sure you present yourself like you're in a regular office and not put things around.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, yeah, make your background look nice, given that so many of these first interviews are web based now.
Larry Copponi:Yeah, great, most of them are, and then when you, you know, when you go into an interview, take a notebook with you, show up early. I've got a whole list of interview tips for people, tips and tricks that I can share with you at some point too.
Aaron Moncur:Terrific. Well, on that note, How can people get in touch with you?
Larry Copponi:Yeah, so my my email address is Larry underscore Copponi, so it's Larry underscore c o p p o n i at spanner p d.com and I'll share my phone number. I don't mind that I still have a, I have San Jose number, even though I'm in North Carolina, it's 408-300-8799 Terrific.
Aaron Moncur:All
Larry Copponi:right. Obviously, my LinkedIn profile - people can, can, can connect with me there. Yep.
Aaron Moncur:And we'll have a link to your LinkedIn profile in the show notes as well.
Larry Copponi:Great.
Aaron Moncur:All right. Well, Larry, this has been great. Thank you so much. Is any party words, anything else that you'd like to go over before we wrap this up.
Larry Copponi:Well, I think there's still many companies out there that are looking for great resources. Every company I work with is looking for another team player that can help them, so even if a company isn't hiring, don't be afraid to contact someone at that company, and be aggressive in your job search, because it's, it's a, it's a very competitive landscape out there right now.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, get to know the people, establish those relationships.
Larry Copponi:Yeah,
Aaron Moncur:Terrific. Okay, Larry. Thank you so much.
Larry Copponi:All right, Aaron, thank you.
Aaron Moncur:I'm Aaron Moncur, founder of Pipeline Design and Engineering. If you liked what you heard today, please share the episode to learn how your team can leverage our team's expertise developing advanced manufacturing processes, automated machines, and custom fixtures complemented with product design and R&D services. Visit us at Team pipeline.us to join a vibrant community of engineers online. Visit the Wave dot engineer. Thank you for listening. Being an engineer has more than 300 episodes, and you don't have to listen to them in order. If you're dealing with a specific challenge right now, there's a good chance we've already interviewed an engineer who's been through it. You can jump around, search by topic, and listen to what's most relevant to you. See you on the next episode.
