Leadership In Law Podcast

S03E124 Building Resilient, High-Performing Teams with Walter Sabrin

• Marilyn Jenkins • Season 3 • Episode 124

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Growth gets exciting when your hiring stops holding you back. We sit down with Walter Sabrin, Chief Talent Officer at Venture Employer Solutions, to unpack how law firms can scale fast by building global teams that actually strengthen quality, culture, and client experience. Walter shares the story of guiding a company from 120 to 45,000 employees and the lessons learned about nearshore talent, cost discipline, and the power of people-first leadership.

We dig into the moments that changed his approach: discovering nearshore teams in Colombia that match U.S. quality, aligning on time zones for real collaboration, and translating core values like speed and ownership across borders. Walter explains why training should be a partnership, how to structure recruitment process outsourcing for legal roles, and what to demand from providers on security, readiness, and performance. You’ll hear how bilingual professionals elevate intake, improve trust, and unlock growth with Spanish-speaking clients across the U.S.

The conversation also tackles the hiring market’s new reality: candidates skip interviews, salary isn’t the tiebreaker, and retention now depends on clear communication and respect. Walter outlines practical steps for law firm leaders, tight role definitions, consistent interview scorecards, thoughtful onboarding, and simple, recurring leadership updates. 

Reach Walter here:
www.linkedin.com/in/waltersabrin/
www.vensure.com 
www.solvoglobal.com 
www.hirefinder.com 
www.linkedin.com/in/waltersabrin

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SPEAKER_00:

The Leadership in Law Podcast is here to equip you with the knowledge and tools you need to build a successful and fulfilling legal practice.

SPEAKER_02:

Welcome to another episode of the Leadership in Law Podcast. I'm your host, Marilyn Jenkins. Please join me in welcoming my guest, Walter Sabrin, to the show today. Walter is the chief talent officer at Venture Employer Solutions, where he leads global talent strategy across a network of companies, including Solvo Global and Hirefinder. A former professional tennis player, turned talent strategist, Walter has spent more than 20 years building high-performing teams, designing scalable people systems, and helping businesses grow through the power of great talent. At Solvo Global, he helped pioneer a near shore talent model focused on both excellence and empathy. At Hirefinder, he's driving data-driven recruiting strategies across competitive industries like mortgage, healthcare, and tech. Walter's known for his storytelling, his people first leadership style, and his belief that when you unlock human potential, business success naturally follows. I'm excited to have you here, Walter. Welcome.

SPEAKER_03:

Wow. Who is that you're talking about, by the way? Who is that person? Malin, thank you so much for inviting me, for speaking with me. I'm really excited. I've heard such great things about you. I really appreciate it. And thank you for that great introduction.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you. I appreciate you being here. But yeah, absolutely amazing. And I just love the last line. Unlock human potential, business success naturally follows. That is so fantastic.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I have been on an incredible journey, yet started as a failed tennis player, got into sales, sales leadership when I realized I couldn't make money playing tennis, then realized, hey, wait a minute. I'm doing everything that recruiters are doing. So let me check that industry out. Fell in love. I don't know if it chose me or I chose it, but I've now been in recruiting for about 20 years. And seven years ago, Marilyn, I joined a rocket ship of a company. I just got on at the right time. When I joined Venture Employer Solutions, we had about 120 employees. Things were good, they were making money. And you ready for this? I'm glad that you're sitting down. Are you ready? Okay. Yep, I'm ready. We now, seven years later, we have 45,000 employees. Wow. That is amazing. We started only as a domestic company. Okay. We're now in 32 countries, 45,000 employees. We focus on any industry, but our big industries is legal, healthcare, staffing companies. Um, but we are totally agnostic, but it's just been a series of hyper growth years, year over year. And yeah, I admit it, and as a a talent acquisition kind of a person, to hire that many people, to we make acquisitions, it's just been such an exciting portion of my career. The best spot in my whole career.

SPEAKER_02:

Wow, that's astronomical to think of hiring 44,800 and oh my gosh. Wow.

SPEAKER_03:

Isn't that nuts? Yeah, isn't that nuts?

SPEAKER_02:

That is absolutely nuts. Now you talk a bit about quality, cost effectiveness, and culture with near shore hiring and near shore solutions. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? And that's got to be part of your strategy, I'm sure.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes. And also part of my learning curve. Because before I found Venture, and Venture found me, I was an excellent recruiter. I say that humbly, but I was good. But only in the 50 states. I was 100% domestic, never recruited any. Maybe I found someone in Canada once or twice, but basically the 50 states. Two weeks after I got two weeks I joined after I joined Venture, my CEO Alex Campos calls me up and he says, I think we just acquired, I think we just acquired an international staffing firm. They're in Medellin, Colombia. Go check it out. Go check it out. Alex, I've only done US recruit. I mean, you know that, and I don't speak Spanish. He goes, Yeah, I know, just go down, go down. So I go there, and literally we have a house, not even an office building. We have 12 people in a house working for a couple of U.S. clients. So I thought it was crazy. Then I found out two things. I found out one, how cost-effective it is to hire people outside the country. Okay. I had heard about that, India, the Philippines. I'd heard about offshoring. We call Colombia near shoring because they're the same time zone as us, and it's a three-hour, two and a half hour flight direct, so it's easy. We call it near shoring. But then I learned, and Marilyn, I'm just gonna be honest, I was an obnoxious, ignorant United States citizen person who didn't think that the same or better quality took place outside the United States. And I a lot of people feel that way. Yeah, Marilyn, I met these folks, and you know what I learned? They're just like us. Some of them are great, some of them are not so great, and some of them are terrible, just like the United States. Literally the same. And in my recruiting endeavors in the US, I'm always looking for the great people. So we did the same thing in Colombia, and we expanded to Argentina, and then we expanded to Peru and Honduras and Jamaica and all these countries. And yes, the culture, it's different in different countries. So, yes, so in the same vein, we try to keep ventures culture intact no matter where we are in the world. Things like we move fast, things uh and you don't need permission to do everything. Let's get things out the door before they're perfect. We want that to be our culture everywhere. But yes, there are cultural differences. And when we go into a country, a new country, we learn the culture of the people first. That's like the forget, we know we will find great workers, great people who could be a paralegal, who can do help customer service. We know that we'll find that. So what we do first is we look to meet the folks, meet the be, get to know who do they live with. In some countries, Marilyn, they live with three generations in their house. And sometimes a 25-year-old in that house could be the primary caretaker and provider for everybody. So it's very different. And you bring up the culture, and I'm sorry I went a little off into the into a tangent, but the culture is very important, and we need to treat people a little differently, whether we are in India or Jamaica or Columbia.

SPEAKER_02:

I absolutely agree. I have international staff as well, and almost everyone I know does. And it actually maze for a great company culture. You get to learn so much about different things. And we have in our team meeting, we literally play Pictionary a few rounds, right? You have to concede if you've got a you try to draw something they don't have in their country. Okay, nobody gets a point, you move on. But it is fun to be able to learn more about other comp countries. I love that you're doing that to get that culture down first so you find the fit for your company.

SPEAKER_03:

I didn't realize that so many of us here in the States, we and look, my parents were born in Paris, France, just for an example. And it's amazing how many people have a preference. Like they would like their staff to live in Brazil, to live in Portugal. They have a preference. So now we're in such a great position to be able to provide. We can provide payroll, we could provide the recruiting, establishing the offices, all that in all these countries. And Marilyn, look, selfishly, for me, I'd been to five continents in the seven years. How amazing! I'm seeing cows in the middle of the street in India. Uh, I'm seeing monkeys on the side of the road in Kenya. This is a New York guy who again, who again was literally shut out my perception of the world as a great talent pool. I was just not seeing it, not, or maybe I just was choosing to not hear and see it. But yeah, my eyes have been opened.

SPEAKER_02:

Wow, and and I think that's there's also a very the benefit for everyone doing some international travel. There is so much out there, but I agree with you as far as the talent. It was, I know a lot of people that do international, especially Columbia has great people and amazing worth work ethic. So to think that we have it all is small-minded. Yeah, I love that you're doing that. So if you're thinking about obviously, we can if someone is growing fast, they can contact venture and you can help place people with them. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, no, totally. Again, I heard a great statistic the other the other day. We have placed, you ready for this? We've placed 800 different titles, different job positions across all the organizations. Marilyn, I'm a recruiter. I didn't even know there were 800 jobs in the world, let alone we've placed them in, yes, so we we provide offshore, near shore talent, uh payroll. We could be the employer of record. We can we have some of our clients. I don't know what you choose, Marilyn, but some of our clients, they really want their people in an office. They want them, they want their staff to come to our office, have supervisors, have top-level security. But some of our clients are like, yeah, let them work from home if it's if they're comfortable. Oh, they're you were happy. So we can provide either or okay.

SPEAKER_02:

As you you double check like the internet speed and the equipment and that sort of thing to make sure that they are prepped and ready. Do you do any, do you do any like pre-training if someone wants someone that to do is say an account management position? Do you do that training if you're gonna be the employer of hire or and then if you're not and they want to be the employer, how do you handle that?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, so now that we've placed so many folks in so many different roles, I'm not gonna say we're experts in every position or every industry. Definitely not that. However, what we find, Marilyn, is it's a true partnership to train your people. We find that the clients who want to train their people, the way they train anyone, whether they're coming into their office in Chicago or whether they're starting a new position in Buenos Aires, that the training is so important from the beginning. So we will help, we will lend assistance, we'll offer technology, but typically it's a partnership of both of us training from the beginning. So just like any hire, and then you got a great employee who knows what they're doing, and we're off to the races.

SPEAKER_02:

I see. I love it. I love it. So when we think about you've helped a lot of organizations scale and grow, what is the biggest hiring mistake that you've seen that firms make when they first start growing fast?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Not taking care, not listening, and not communicating to their people. What's the harm in having a monthly or quarterly update where your CEO, managing director, the top person in your organization, whether it's 10 minutes or an hour, but giving your employees a vision of what's going on, because we have grown so fast. I feel that if we didn't alert everyone, what's going on, what's happening, what happened last quarter, I think people would be scared and nervous because we are moving so fast. So to me, the communication, and this is something that I feel, in my opinion, post-COVID, the communication has improved, and I think it's because it had to, because the employees had enough, they had enough of being kept in the dark, and I think they raised their hand and said, you know what? You don't hold all the cards. Like, you know, it takes two to tango. The employer and the employee need to get together to get the job done. And I think most employers have listened to that message and are doing a much better job. At least that's what I'm hearing out there in the marketplace. But I would commend my company for doing just that, having those communication lines open in a two-way frequency.

SPEAKER_02:

I love that. And it also plays into the thing that appreci people appreciation will keep your employees happy longer than money heard being seen.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Look, I feel it's a mess out there in the hiring world, Marilyn. It is really tough. Whether we have candidates, no showing interviews, they're just not showing up. They're not showing up to the first day of work. It is really tough. It's very difficult to find people. If anyone in your audience feels that's what they're going through, just a tough time in hiring, reach out to me. I'm not trying to sell anything. We could just talk about it. I've got a lot of experience and ideas to help and that. What's more difficult, Marilyn, these days? Keeping your people. And you just said, you just said it. I think you said it great. Got to keep your people happy, engaged, part of the equation, because if not, down the road, they will. There's a company down the road who will pay the same. It's not about money anymore. It's not all about money anymore these days. And culture and communication are vital. Uh, so sometimes hiring the people, you could get that done, but that retention piece is very difficult.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, especially if there's other opportunities, people just want to be feel appreciated. I think, yeah, money is part of it, but I agree with you. I think they want to be appreciated and heard, and does need to be part of your culture. I'm just surprised that people would take the time to schedule an interview and then not show up. I would be frustrated with that.

SPEAKER_03:

Not show up, Marilyn. Is that crazy? There was, there was, there was a McDonald's, there is a McDonald's in the Midwest. I think in Michigan, there's a McDonald's that's paying$50 to get candidates to show up to the interview. You get the job, you don't get the job, it doesn't matter. They get$50 for taking the interview. That's how desperate, and I use the word desperate. Maybe some people will use the word smart. I don't know, but they were so desperate to get candidates to show up for interviews, they were paying them to come.

SPEAKER_02:

That is crazy.

SPEAKER_03:

It's a different it's a different time, but you know what it you know what it shows? First of all, there are lots of companies out there who are offering interviews. And unfortunately, yeah, if you don't show up and you don't call to me, that's a lack of professionalism. But it shows that they're getting other job opportunities, other interviews, you know, are coming their way. Marilyn, I have countless stories of companies paying more money and not making the hire because of the culture, because of the candidate experience during the interview process. Money is not the most important thing every day. And if I could yell that from a mountaintop, because that's changed. That's a newish thing here in the US at least, but all across the world, it used to be whoever paid the most would typically get the hire. That's not the case anymore, not all the time.

SPEAKER_02:

And do you find that it's been a backlash from that quiet quitting that happened after COVID kind of thing? And so people are being more picky about the type of places, the type of jobs that they take.

SPEAKER_03:

I do. I yes, what 100%. Again, there was nothing good about COVID, absolutely nothing. However, it did wake up as a result. It woke up a lot of people on the employee side, and it gave them the idea that wait a minute, I have choices. I have choices in my career. I don't need to be miserable and stuck here if an employer is not at least appreciating my effort, appreciating my collaboration. And that in turn has created, again, an employer population of needing to be a little more attentive to their people. Which I think is eventually and it is now turning into a positive thing.

SPEAKER_02:

I agree. And do you feel like that's generational when it comes to who's doing it and who's not?

SPEAKER_03:

Yes. There are some old school people, by the way, on both sides. On employee, on employer side. There are some. That was my head legal counsel calling me who I did not answer, Marilyn, but I apologize. Yeah, no, no, she'll have to wait. But yes, you know, some old school folks on both sides, and some like recent college grads, people coming in, coming into the workplace who have changed the landscape. So the landscape is evolving, I think, in a positive after a negative direction with the quiet quiz quitting, the great resignation, no showing, maybe being a little unprofessional on both sides of the coin. I think we're heading in a positive direction. And I do feel that in the next generation or two, it's only going to be better. Nothing's perfect, but at least it'll be better.

SPEAKER_02:

Nice. I love that. Talking about your process, the recruitment process outsourcing, can you give us a bit more details on that for anybody that's listening that's not very familiar with that term and how it works?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, sure. And I'll focus it a little bit on the international piece, if you don't mind, only because yeah, I think people have less of a less of an understanding. But under venture, we have a company called Salvo Global. And at Salvo, we have we have the same recruiting style as any US hiring firm. We will meet with a company, we will find out what are you looking for? Who are you looking for? What are your must-haves, your non-negotiables? What are the soft skills, the hard skills? We take down a job requisition, if you would, just like any company. We learn it, we don't charge you anything, and we go out and we hunt, maybe not the best term, but we source, we look for people who fill uh you know those ingredients of what who you're looking for. We introduce them to you with a resume, a video, a summary of our meeting with them, and we let you interview them. And if you interview and you like them, you hire them. And whether it's you're whether you're looking for one person, a hundred people, or a thousand people, we are equipped to fill those orders. Now, obviously, a thousand people may take a few months, and if you're hiring seven or eight people, may take a few weeks, but we will submit the folks to you for your viewing pleasure and then for your decision if you want to bring them on board or not.

SPEAKER_02:

Now, can they choose the country? Sorry to interrupt you. Can they choose the country based on if we wanted to say I want to keep them in my time zone?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. And that's a great way to put it because we really know the countries that have the top talent in certain categories. So if you tell us they have to be in Peru, now look, there could be a good reason for it, and we'll work with you. And if it has to be Peru, it has to be Peru. But if you tell us we need them on the central standard time zone, that gives us a little more flexibility because you want you want to be able to visit them, you want to be able to speak to them during normal business hours. We'll work with you either way. Yes.

SPEAKER_02:

I love that. I love that. And so if I mean, if I don't have a choice of country, I'm just like, this is somebody. I've got a seat. They've got to need, I need a button a seat right now. Get me somebody. Yeah. Yeah. So then you can go to your whole pool, right?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, but we go to the whole pool. You know, we certainly ask qualifying questions. What's most important to you, Marilyn? Is it cost? Is it tenure? Is it education? Is so we will then take that information, which will then determine it, it'll be a big determinating factor on where we go, who we present. And again, you get to meet them before through video, through a video conference, teams, zoom call. So you get to meet them, you can interview them, just like you would interview anyone else anywhere, just maybe not in person.

SPEAKER_02:

I love that. Now, thinking about where someone might be as far as any of our listeners that are looking at growing. So maybe that's their growth plan for 2026 or even now, because we're coming into some, it's been a good year for a lot of industries. What at what point would there should they look and see there, you know, what things working on their in-house recruiting that makes it reach its limit? So to hire you guys and have some money to come in and do it?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, great, great question. Look, I'm gonna give you my opinion here, but I think business owners are selling them selling themselves short if they are not a global company. It is so easy now to be global, and we are in a global market, whether we like it or not. It is a fact. It it is not a US economy anymore that we're in, my opinion. We are in a global economy, and to find top talent at 65% less than US wages, I'm having a hard time figuring out why a company would not be very open to looking more into that, becoming a global company, having a global employee base. By the way, we're not looking to replace anyone in your you on the US side. So whether you are U.S. recruiters, they're working, they're not where it's great, it's not. Why not add to your global presence? Because what I have found, Marilyn, is that these global workers, these global employees are adding more than just doing their job. They're bringing a whole different perspective to the organization that is making that organization flourish much more. We have statistics on how our clients are flourishing, having nothing to do with us really, having nothing to do with finding the person or interviewing the person. But once the employees are on board, our clients are learning a lot of different ways to go about doing their business. And it's improving their effectiveness, not just their cost effectiveness, but it's improving their operations, their marketing, their compliance, et cetera.

SPEAKER_02:

And I've found that you they in many instances get a lot more done. They're driven. I have several A players. We call them A players because they're just, I mean, they're just amazing. And they come in just blazing to do work, and they're they do bring a great refreshment to the whole team as well. We have a great time. And I definitely encourage if anybody's thinking about going offshore, reach out to Walter because it's been wonderful for me. I've got great talent and my clients like it and they enjoy working with the client.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, and specifically in the legal space, a lot of people don't realize that attorneys outside the United States sometimes are not on the same pay scale. So an attorney in Argentina, an attorney in Colombia will make more money, they will have a higher status being working for a US company. And they didn't pass the bar in California, but they can be a paralegal, legal assistant, they can consult in many different ways, and they are attorneys where they live. And it has been a tremendous boom for U.S. law firms to hire a lot of whether it be legal assistants, legal secretaries, paralegals with specialties as well. And yeah, look, right, that they're so happy, they're so empathetic. It's such a I have to be careful in saying this because look, again, we have great people in the United States, but we have to realize there's great people, like a players outside who are a breath of fresh air. And you know what I found the only difference is, Marilyn? They speak one more language than I do. That's it, they are fully bilingual, depending upon where they live. But in Latin America, obviously, they speak Spanish. And in today's market, we've also found that is a tremendous bonus to be able to speak. Yes, to be able to speak to your Hispanic clients in their native tongue is a great add-on, or just an added value that's not spoken about a lot, but it really is a big bonus.

SPEAKER_02:

It's a huge bonus for me to be able to speak in your native language and not have to have the nuance of did I translate my that in my head correctly? You're giving your clients such an amazingly better service. I absolutely agree.

SPEAKER_03:

Look, I don't embarrassingly, I don't speak Spanish. I don't speak another language. So I, because I'm disabled speaking languages, I had to get the new AirPods, okay, that have a translation feature. It's embarrassing. But but to have people on your team, on your staff who can speak multiple different languages, again, I consider it a big bonus.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's a game changer in your market if you're in a law firm and you have that, especially in a lot of the states. So you'll get more business if you can you have someone that can speak their language. I love that. I love everything we've talked about here today. And I just have to say I wholeheartedly agree with you. And even for in tank people, if anybody's listening to this, you definitely want to reach out. It's worth looking at if you're in a growth process, 65% less than U.S. citizens, U.S. workers, it's worth it for growing your business and increasing your profits at the same time. So I love the conversation. I know my listeners may want to reach out to you and connect with you, talk about how they can use your services to expand their team. Where'd be the best place to do that?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, thanks. And Marilyn, if you ever want me back, I also enjoyed it. I'd be happy to bring up other subjects in the hiring paradigm. Uh, anything to do with hiring, retaining. I have some good ideas, whether it be internal referral bonuses, job fares. I will I'd be very happy. And you ready for this, Marilyn? You want to ask how to reach out to me? I believe I am the only Walter Sabron on the planet. I really I there's no other Walter Sabron, and that's S A Bismboy R-I-N on LinkedIn. There's no other one. Hopefully, no one's going to create one now, but you can basically reach out to me on LinkedIn. You can go to venture.com, V-E-N-S-U-R-E.com, and salvoglobal.com as well. Those are the best places to reach out. But if anyone wants to connect, reach out to me on LinkedIn. I'd be happy to speak to them. If you mention Marilyn, the podcast, I will speak with you. Uh no charge. I'll give some good consulting advice, whether we do business or not, that's irrelevant. Um, but if I can help some of your listeners, Marilyn, I'd be very happy to.

SPEAKER_02:

Fantastic. I love that. I just checked, and all of those links are going to be in the show notes. And this has been this has been a very good conversation. I really appreciate you coming on the show. And yeah, I think we need to talk about the HR stuff and retention. Because once you get an A player, you want to keep them. So we'll definitely plan to bring you back to the show at a later date and talk about that.

SPEAKER_03:

It'd be my pleasure, Marilyn. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01:

Thanks for joining me today for this episode. As we wrap up, I'd love for you to do two things. First, subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode. And if you find value here, I'd love it if you would rate it and review it. That really does make a difference in helping other people to discover this podcast. Second, you can connect with me on LinkedIn to keep up with what I'm currently learning and thinking about. And if you're ready to take the next step with a digital strategist to help you grow your law firm, I'd be honored to help you. Just go to Law Marketingzone.com to book a call with me. Stay tuned for our next episode next week. Until then, as always, thanks for listening to Leadership in Law Podcast, and be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts so you don't miss the next episode.

SPEAKER_00:

Thanks for joining us on another episode of the Leadership in Law Podcast. Remember, you're not alone on this journey. There's a whole community of law firm owners out there facing similar challenges and striving for the same thing. Head over to our website at LawMarketingZone.com. From there, connect with other listeners, access valuable resources, and stay up to date on the Linux episode. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us to review on your favorite podcast platform. Until next time.

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Marilyn Jenkins

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