In workplaces around the country, recruiters and HR compliance teams work in parallel when working together collaboratively would lead to better results and prevent headaches for both. In this DE Talk Live minisode, Mike Bazinet, Director of Talent Acquisition at Affordable Care, shares his experience in ensuring recruitment and compliance teams work together to understand each other’s roles and goals, as well as to form policies that benefit both parties. Take a look at this thought-provoking snippet from his presentation at DEAMcon24, which took place in New Orleans last April.

Mike Bazinet presents on-stage at DirectEmployers 2024 Annual Meeting & Conference in New Orleans.
Mike Bazinet:
I talk a lot about recruiting and I love recruiting in this environment, but two things that recruiters I think need to know, efficiencies and outreach. When you break it all down, that’s really what it is. It’s nothing more than that. Now, of course, there’s things underneath each of these words, but it’s really becoming efficient with how you work and how you do your job. And it’s about outreach, which is the fun part of recruiting outreach to me, is when you get out from behind that desk. As an Air Force recruiter, when I was recruiting for the US Air Force, the Air Force called it getting stuck behind a desk. Don’t get stuck behind a desk, get out there, talk to people. And we did. But I understand also how hard that can be in high volume recruiting. I know it’s not easy. I know it’s tough.
Timing is everything for us. And when we’re on the road, we’re not on the phone, we’re not making contact, we’re not doing anything we feel in our hearts, but we really are doing a lot and we’re spreading the word. We’re trying to get out there and recruit the right way into areas that don’t know who we are. Areas that need to hear from us, areas that need opportunities, we need to go out to them and talk to them. But that’s all it is. But what do you get out of that? Recruiters, I promise you this, you’ll be a better recruiter for it. You’ll be more well-rounded and you’ll be more marketable. Before I came into this space, I could recruit in small companies, I could do things like staffing companies, I could do that. But when I became a recruiter in this space, thousands of opportunities opened for me as a recruiter.
I was a better recruiter. And I will tell you now, the recruiters I trained at Grifols, I will take every single one of them and stack ’em up against any recruiter in the country because they’re efficient and they know how to outreach and they do it effectively. And when I came to Affordable Care, I took a team of recruiters that knew nothing about compliance, and they are better recruiters for it. And they wanted to come here today, and I wish they could have because these were recruiters who had no knowledge of what we do. And today they’re more marketable. And I would stack them up against anyone again too, because they’re efficient and they know how to outreach. You’ll lower your time to offer, your time to fill. You’ll have quality hires coming in the door if you do this, if you work together and you become, I say expert sources here, but a friend of mine said something a minute ago, that you’ll become a talent advisor.
And that’s what you need to be as recruiters, not recruiters. You need to be talent advisors. And you can’t advise if you don’t know this. So, I implore all recruiters to learn it. Compliance experts, what do you get out of this? Ready for this confidence in your recruitment program, confidence in your recruiters that they’re doing the right thing every single day. Confidence in data management techniques, that they’re following them. You don’t have to worry. They’re happening. They’re following the processes. They’re dispositioning candidates the way they’re supposed to do because you worked with them to build that.
Listen to the full episode for more great insight from this presentation and register to see Mike on stage again at DEAMcon25 in Scottsdale, May 21-23! Stay tuned for another episode of the DE Talk podcast in the coming weeks with Scott Sanders, CEO & President of the National Association of State Workforce Agencies (NASWA). Subscribe to our emails or sign up to receive text alerts to be notified when new episodes are released!
- DE Talk Unplugged | Aligning Compliance & Recruitment Efforts - April 7, 2025
- U.S. Department of Labor Announces Catherine Eschbach as Director of OFCCP - March 24, 2025
- 2025 HIRE Vets Medallion Award Application Period Open Through April 30 - March 24, 2025