Page 364 - James Caan - The Real Deal

The Real Deal

I arranged to meet the winner at Cipriani’s. Carina Sacher was
in her late twenties and had set up her own recruitment agency
specialising in reception staff. She had been a receptionist herself
and knew the difference between good and bad temps. Her staff
were better trained, better mannered and she had no trouble
finding clients, but she had one problem – she wasn’t making
money. She had researched my career and was convinced I was the
one person who could help her turn her recruitment business
around.
‘How have you been able to afford this lunch if your business is
in trouble?’
‘My old boss has been very supportive and he’s paid for it. I told
him you were the guy I needed.’
What a story! ‘How can I help you then?’
‘Just tell me where I’m going wrong.’
As we talked, I thought I’d identified the problem: she knew an
awful lot about being a receptionist but not all that much about
recruitment. For instance, she knew what an agency paid the temp
because she had been one, but not what the temp agency billed the
client. When I asked her what her margin was, she had to confess
she wasn’t really sure. The more she talked the more I thought the
best thing she could do was to put her agency on hold while she
got a job in recruitment and learned the ropes.
I was able to introduce her to people I knew in the industry and
helped her get a job in recruitment. I heard from her a couple of
months after she started her new job and she told me she could
already see where she had been going wrong and what she would
do differently in the future. After paying that much to get my
attention, I was glad she felt I had helped.
Dragons’ Den has had a big impact in the UK, but I was
nevertheless surprised when the producers told us that we would
be making a Christmas Day special. It was their biggest show of
the night on the biggest TV-watching day of the year. We were

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