Recruiting in a whiplash market: Beth Wolfe on fraud, pay corrections, and building real connections

Thomas chats with Beth Wolfe, Senior Director of Recruiting at Daxko, about today’s volatile hiring market, candidate trust issues, and recruiter best practices.

Beth shares her 12-year journey at Daxko through global growth and acquisitions, overseeing a recruiting team in the US and India and contributing to roughly 700+ hires as the company grew from about 150 to 850 employees.

They discuss the post-2022 swing from candidate-driven to employer-driven conditions, COVID-era overhiring, and a compensation “market correction” after inflated salaries and frequent counter-offers. Beth advises job seekers to personalize outreach, leverage mutual connections, and follow up politely, especially amid rising fraudulent applications enabled by AI. They cover fraud signals such as new email accounts, VPN use, VoIP numbers, camera-off interviews, and even purchased verified LinkedIn profiles, stressing recruiter intuition.

Beth attributes her career progression to tenacity, grit, curiosity, and courage, and recommends reading broadly, citing “Good to Great” and “Inspired” (Marty Cagan).

00:00 Welcome and introductions

01:04 Beth Wolfe background

01:59 700 hires at daxko

03:14 Day in the life

06:36 Why the market swings

09:17 Getting noticed by recruiters

12:14 Networking beyond Linkedin

15:21 Covid hangover and pay reset

35:56 Networking reciprocity

36:20 Approaching recruiters right

39:16 Beyond linkedin networks

41:28 Polite persistent followups

42:27 Market correction reality

46:26 Salary context and surveys

22:30 Career growth traits

55:17 Candidates respect feedback

59:22 Fraud signals in remote hiring

01:03:40 Spotting deepfake patterns

01:13:48 Wrap up and thanks

Gary Alterson on agentic SOCs, AI spend control, and building Sovereign AI

Thomas chats with Gary Alterson on the Cybersecurity Recruiter Podcast, covering Gary’s 30-year security career and why AI makes the current era especially impactful.

Gary describes Armor’s AI-embracing approach, including an agentic SOC that automates roughly 80-90% of triage, while outlining customer challenges with AI adoption: data privacy/security, runaway token spend, and inconsistent output quality.

He explains Armor’s Sovereign AI platform (sovai.com), which centralizes API keys, routes tasks across different models (including private models that avoid sending customer data to public models), enforces policies and budgets, improves prompts, provides prebuilt agent swarms and workflows, and shares development plans internally.

They discuss hiring for curiosity and self-starting traits, career advice: say yes, prioritize ruthlessly, find mentors and time management. Gary’s recommendation: the Manager Tools and Career Tools podcasts.

00:00 Welcome and banter

00:36 Guest intro and background

01:43 30 years in security

03:24 AI in the SOC today

04:52 AI risks and costs

07:37 Model routing and controls

12:52 Talent still matters

16:22 What is sovereign AI

20:04 Customer success and support

24:48 Career advice for SOC

31:07 Time management tactics

34:08 Standing out to advance

39:29 Books and podcasts

41:07 Wrap up and thanks

Nexo - Executive, GTM & Cybersecurity Recruitment https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomaspropen/

Protecting Student Data, Leading Security Teams, and Keeping Up With AI: Jeff Bailey on Security Leadership

Thomas chats with Jeff Bailey on the Cybersecurity Recruiter podcast about his career path from GameStop into security roles at Simmons Bank and now as Director of Security and IT at Apptegy, a K–12 communications platform focused on protecting sensitive student data across all 50 states’ regulations.

They discuss how rapidly evolving AI models (including Fable and Opus) are changing security work, vendor risk/GRC reviews as SaaS apps add AI features, and how teams can build small internal tools instead of buying expensive products.

Jeff shares leadership lessons on perception and trust: making security approachable (including his bright shirts), encouraging reporting, and empowering experts to challenge him, while managing workload to prevent burnout by aiming for 80% capacity.

They also cover AI’s impact on learning, CTF competitions, and parenting in an AI-saturated world. Book recommendation: “Time Management for Mortals” by Oliver Burkeman; Jeff also recommends Adam Grant’s work.

00:00 Welcome and Catch Up

00:52 Jeff Bailey Career Intro

01:36 ADHD and Security Culture

03:27 Director Role at Apptegy

04:42 Fable vs Opus AI Talk

07:57 Kids Growing Up With AI

09:36 Token Costs and IPO Pricing

11:06 Purpose Protecting Student Data

13:54 Leadership and Approachability

18:32 Empowering Experts on Your Team

20:03 Avoiding Burnout at 80%

21:22 AI Like the Cloud Shift

22:28 New AI Security Reviews

23:06 Vendor Acronyms and Confusion

23:56 Adapt or Get Left Behind

25:50 AI Slop in Customer Touch

28:45 Using AI for Real Gains

31:30 CTFs and AI Cheating

33:07 Learning Still Needs Struggle

35:56 Book Picks and Wrap Up

For Executive, GTM, Cybersecurity searches, contact Tom: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomaspropen/