HR’s helping hand

Mike Veronesi of TALENThire.com, based in Atlanta, Georgia, US explains more about the company’s operations in this exclusive Q&A interview.

HRM. Can you give me TALENThire.com in 10 words or less?
MV. TALENThire.com is your “one stop shop” for all contingent recruiting needs.

HRM. What is TALENThire.com?
MV. TALENThire.com is the leading recruiting marketplace designed by Recruiting and HR Executives to manage their external recruiting resources while saving thousands of dollars in recruiting fees. We manage a growing base of 500+ recruiting partners subscribed to our members-only site, providing hiring companies a single point for billing, contact, and contracts. Hiring companies post their fee approved positions for free along with the flat fee they are willing to pay for the hire. Hiring companies are in full control of their recruiting budgets (with the ability to generate revenue), and staffing/recruiting firms have a virtually unlimited client list.

HRM. How long have you been around?
MV. We conceptualized the idea in late 2003, and after numerous focus groups and beta testing, we launched the product in the Fall of 2004.

HRM. Who do you work with? Independent Recruiters, Corporate HR, Sourcers, Job Boards, Staffing Agencies? Do you see yourself competing with contingency contract firms or independent recruiters?
MV. Our clients include Corporate HR and Recruiting, Staffing/Recruiting firms, as well as independent recruiters. We work with companies who are challenged with their current outsourced recruiting efforts, providing a streamlined process to manage their vendors, provide them with a single point for billing, and world class client service—while successfully filling those hard to fill positions at a significant cost and time savings. For our supplying/recruiting companies, we offer an unmatched opportunity for placing their highly sought after candidates, and revenue streams previously unattainable.

HRM. It is becoming more difficult to find top quality candidates. Everyone says their process is what matters, but they can’t all be true. Without using marketing speak, what is actually different about how you generate results?
MV. The major difference in process is our ability to seamlessly introduce literally hundreds of additional recruiting and staffing firms to our hiring companies with virtually no additional expenses – it is a “recruiters on demand” model. Our approach is quite simple – we engage those recruiting and staffing firms with proven results with our hiring companies, and each recruiting firm is rated upon each successful placement.

HRM. Please explain your background in recruiting and what led to the creation of TALENThire.com?
MV. I have been working in the recruitment and human resource sector since graduating from Binghamton University in 1993. While working in and consulting with companies ranging from entrepreneurial endeavors to the Fortune 100, I have always considered recruitment my passion and always consider myself a recruiter at heart.

After merging my Atlanta-based recruitment consulting firm with a business colleague, the decision was made that our current services offering would not allow the scale of a product venture. With the addition of another colleague came the conceptualization of TALENThire.com. Sourcehire, our initial thought on a name, became reality through a four hour whiteboard event at one of our favorite restaurants in town. We came out of the meeting with our initial design for TALENThire.com, and a couple to-go boxes.

In order to transform the theory and design into a successful product, we knew we needed potential clients to tell us exactly what they needed in this type of system. We moved forward with an initial focus group with companies such as Cingular Wireless, Earthlink, Motorola, Today’s Staffing, CCI, Marketworks Inc., etc. The three plus hour focus group was a dynamic event—we collectively left with new knowledge of unidentified needs in the recruiting space, as well as a better defined framework for a successful web based recruiting product. Knowing we were close to proving our concept, we followed it with another focus group followed by live beta testing, and launched the site in late 2004.

HRM. How does your service assist HR departments and executive search firms in their hunt for talent?
MV. Our hiring companies are able to take advantage of streamlined vendor management with their external search vendors. With hundreds of recruiting vendors on the system, our clients receive qualified candidates from a multitude of sources. These sources are managed by our relationship managers, providing a single point of contact. We not only manage the relationship between hiring company and recruiting vendor, but also provide a single point of billing—resulting in tremendous time savings.

HR is also able to directly impact recruiting expenses by utilizing our “name your fee” pricing model. With current fee structures as high as 35% with their outside vendors, our clients enjoy larger talent pools with lower fees, resulting in better talent and tremendous cost savings.

An untapped feature of TALENThire.com allows corporate HR and recruiting to submit their “silver and bronze” candidates to other hiring firms, resulting in not only cost savings, but true revenue to corporate HR. By leveraging internal talent, HR can become a true profit center.

Executive search firms benefit by obtaining immediate “approved vendor” status with top hiring companies, as well as an additional resource for the talent they have chosen to represent. In addition, our relationship managers assist with the search firm’s submittals and ensure feedback is prompt and accurate.

HRM. About how many clients do you currently serve and what types of businesses are they (search firms, staffing firms, HR/corporate clients)?
MV. We currently have over 500 clients on the site with a combination between supply and demand— recruiting firms and hiring companies. With demand firms such as Motorola, Cingular Wireless, Scientific Atlanta, American Express Incentive Services, and AOL, supplying firms are eager to become members of the system. A continued goal of ours is achieving that delicate balance of supply and demand with the right specialized supply, from diversity to rocket scientist suppliers. Because of our unique model, our clients span virtually all types of businesses and industries.

HRM. How would a jobseeker go about using TALENThire.com’s services?
MV. We are a strict B2B service—the only way a jobseeker is able to utilize TALENThire.com is through a top recruiting service representing them that is a member of TALENThire.com.

HRM. What other types of services do you offer your clients?
MV. We have spent the predominance of our time with clients through our relationship managers ensuring we have the best possible system available to our clients. Over this next year, our service offering will include consulting on how to leverage our hiring company’s internal database to generate revenue. We additionally will offer outplacement services when a client is going through a downsizing. We have found an exceptional opportunity for our clients to offset those costs utilizing TALENThire.com by submitting along their displaced candidates, generating revenue in the process, not to mention the goodwill created.

HRM. How much do TALENThire.com’s services cost?
MV. Our supplying firms pay a low monthly subscription with the option for an annual agreement, and multiple discounts for additional users and per site licensing pricing. Hiring companies enjoy free job postings and varying service level agreements. In addition, hiring companies only pay the fee they post for a successful placement, just like traditional contingency recruiting agreements – companies only pay for success upon hire.

HRM. Are there any other areas of the recruiting process that TALENThire.com is interested in becoming involved with?
MV. Definitely. We provide a fantastic service in supplying qualified, interested, and available talent to our hiring clients. As we grow, our plan is to fine-tune the screening function and continually add strategic sourcing resources for our clients. We additionally will aggressively pursue any and all areas our clients would like to see us involved with.

HRM. Who are your competitors and how do you separate yourselves from them?
MV. When we originally created TALENThire.com, we were aware of one pseudo competitor who had designed a system where suppliers could submit candidates to their openings and agree to their individual terms. The hiring companies still deal with their vendors on an individual basis, utilize the same fee structures, and spend virtually the same amount of time they would without the “system”.

In addition, there are a few staffing firms that have historically offered a similar service to ours; however, these firms create thinner and thinner margins through a distribution model where they compete with their vendors, which results in lower quality of candidates to hiring firms, and again, more time spent on the process.

Over the past six months, we’ve seen a couple other competitors pop up with similar business models, adding further credibility to our model. However, since we were first to market with this innovative product, we are known in the industry as being the innovator, and have two years of lead time on virtually any competitor. Competitor’s systems we have checked out have only strengthened our value proposition to our clients. We were fortunate to have the focus groups early on to capitalize on these shortcomings in the market. No one else has figured out a way for corporate HR to turn a profit, or a completely vendor neutral system such as TALENThire.com. Armed with this knowledge and a dedication to the client experience, we are well poised in the space.

HRM. What do you feel is the biggest problem facing HR departments and search firms today?
MV. The biggest problem facing HR departments today is influence—influence to assist in steering the overall direction of the organization, and credibility in their department as it relates to the organization. HR has long been viewed an administrative cost center within organizations, and the challenge is to demonstrate how they understand a P&L statement, and have the ability to influence it through cost saving measures, excellence in bringing on the right talent, and the potential of revenue through a system like TALENThire.com. By demonstrating this expertise, HR will be in a better position to lead and accept the responsibility of being a key contributor with strategic direction. With the pending talent shortage, HR and recruiting will become more of an integral part of this strategic direction through their hiring efforts.

Search firms’ challenge is finding new business—many larger organizations have approved vendor lists that can prohibit new talent providers from supplying them with the talent they need. In fact, we’ve had clients with a three-year waiting list. In addition, we proactively seek specialized vendors at our client’s request. This often results in search firms who may not be on the “radar” to submit the best possible candidates to open positions, where in the past, these firms were stuck in limbo.

HRM. Does TALENThire.com plan to unveil any new products in 2007 or are there any intentions for any form of expansion at the company in the near future?
MV. TALENThire.com V 2.0 is scheduled for release in early Q4. We have added additional administrative tools to better assist our clients and their hiring process, as well as some major enhancements to the client experience. Since we are integrating with some larger players, we have also built XML into V2.0 to ensure scalability. Because of the intimate relationships we have with our clients, as well as in-house development, we are in a unique position to make necessary changes to the system and implement them rapidly. Once such change is the ability of hiring companies to set their candidate feedback intervals—this results in defined feedback for the supply firm and candidate, as well as the hiring company’s commitment to fill the position.