Sabrina Gutierrez

Aside from having the best partner in the world who is my biggest cheerleader and thinks the world of me even when I have my doubts, I believe it's the open-mindedness that I've retained growing up from a really young age, just being open to all these different experiences. Being open to novelty has been the reason why there have been so many different doors in front of me, and why I've had so many different doors to choose from. I come from a family of nurses and people that play it safe, but I broke the mold. It was tough, and I got so much pushback over so many years. During harder times, I didn't think I should have just done everything that my aunts, my mom, and everyone that came before them had done. But I'm happy that I went this route. This is my version of freedom and flexibility.

My creative writing teacher in high school told me to trust my gut, because I have a good one. I remember one time I had emailed her in distress about what path to take, and my mental health was kind of in decline as it was my senior year. I was really scattered as far as what I was going to be pursuing, and I wish I had just listened to her. She basically told me that I was in my head, that writers always live in their heads, and to trust my gut because I have a good one. I maybe didn't listen to her advice right away, but it stuck with me. Ever since I moved to San Francisco almost three years ago for love, on a whim, having known my partner all but eight months, I picked everything up and moved from Los Angeles just trusting my gut. My habit of trusting my gut since then hasn't steered me wrong yet.

In the recruiting industry, the lifespan of a recruiter is projected to be very short. There's some statistic online that says something like 50% of recruiters in two years will not be recruiters anymore, and that's just the nature of sales. But what helped me not get completely lost in the sauce and make sure I didn't look at it as just a sales job is to find a niche that genuinely interests you and always be learning. Honestly, just know yourself and create your own style of building relationships with people, because recruiting is all relationship-based. These are not transactions. You can make a living off of recruiting, but at the end of the day, you really can't put a dollar amount on just creating human relationships. People will see through that really quickly. People will be able to tell if you're reading off a checklist on what question to ask next. Just take a genuine interest in yourself, know yourself, know what works best for you, how to stay active, and be receptive to what people are saying. Take a genuine interest in whatever you're doing, because if you don't have that, then what's the point?

There's definitely a talent vacuum right now. For the longest time, for many years, my industry was dominated by the older generations of boots-on-the-ground controls technicians, and this older generation is retiring. There seems to be this disconnect because there aren't many schools and academies that specialize in my niche. In the last couple of decades, there's been this movement towards HVAC controls and building automation, which helps with energy efficiency and green savings. In the last decade or so, as the United States has made strides to become more energy efficient and green energy, at least in some areas, there's a much higher demand for not just HVAC, but HVAC controls. The niche that I'm in is finding technicians that do that work at the intersection between HVAC and computer systems and technology. I work in a niche where I will never be without job orders. There's more work than we have, which is a great problem for me, but it's why it's so much work. It puts me in a unique position where, being an owner of my own company, I get to be picky about the clients that I work with.

I would say integrity. I would say follow-through, which I feel kind of goes hand-in-hand with integrity. I've had to learn flexibility, but flexibility is important for sure. I would say just be good to others. As long as you do everything with good intentions and you're not trying to hurt anybody, I really think that you can do anything you want.