The Talent You Are Looking For Is Not in the Room
Why Your Best Talent Isn't on Your Job Board—And How to Find Them
The Talent You Are Looking For Is Not in the Room
By Ashley Vallett, Founder & CEO, Technacity Group
There is a conversation that happens in almost every early-stage startup boardroom when it is time to scale. The founders sit down, look at their aggressive growth targets, and say, "We need the best talent out there. We need people who have done this before."
And then, almost inevitably, they start looking in the exact same places they have always looked. They tap into their personal networks. They ask their current engineers who they know. They post the job description on the same three job boards and wait for the applications to roll in.
Then they wonder why their team looks, thinks, and solves problems exactly the same way they do.
If you want to build a transformative company—especially in hyper-competitive, innovative spaces like tech and gaming—you have to accept a hard truth: the talent you are looking for is probably not in the room. More importantly, they are probably not trying to get into yours.
The Myth of the "Pipeline Problem"
For years, the tech and gaming industries have leaned on a convenient excuse for their lack of diversity: the pipeline problem. The argument suggests that there simply are not enough qualified women, people of color, or LGBTQ+ individuals to fill these highly technical roles.
As someone who has spent more than a decade in recruiting and built a firm specifically to challenge this narrative, I can tell you definitively that the pipeline is not broken. The pipeline is simply pointed at the wrong door.
The most exceptional talent—the engineers, designers, and product leaders who can truly move the needle for your company—is often heads-down doing brilliant work somewhere else. They are passive candidates. They are not scrolling job boards, and they are certainly not relying on the insular "who-knows-who" networks that have historically kept underrepresented groups locked out of top-tier opportunities.
If you are only hiring from your immediate network, you are not hiring the best talent. You are simply hiring the most visible talent.
Recruiting as an Act of Connection
When I founded Technacity Group in 2019, I did so because I was tired of watching recruiting be treated as a purely transactional numbers game. I had been laid off for the second time, and I realized the industry I was working in had become fundamentally disconnected from the human side of hiring.
I started my company the very next day with a personal loan and a singular belief: recruiting is not about filling a seat; it is an act of connection.
When you connect a brilliant, underrepresented software engineer with a founder who values their unique perspective, you are doing more than solving a hiring gap. You are changing the trajectory of that person's career. You are changing the culture of the company they join. Ultimately, you are changing the products they will build for the world.
We saw this firsthand when we partnered with a social impact startup that had just closed its Series A funding round. The company had a massive mission and only seven full-time employees. Within ten months, we placed one-third of its entire engineering team. More importantly, we increased the team's diversity by 80%. Those engineers did not simply fill roles; they became some of the longest-tenured members of the company, helping define its culture and carry its mission forward through turbulent markets.
That is what happens when you stop relying on the easy network and start recruiting with intention.
How to Hire Outside the Room
So, how do you actually find the talent that is not in the room? It requires a fundamental shift in how you approach hiring.
- Stop relying on inbound applications. The best candidates are passive. You have to go to them. That means investing in targeted, customized sourcing strategies that actively seek out diverse talent pools.
- Look beyond traditional pedigree. If your requirement for a role is "five years at a FAANG company," you are automatically filtering out incredible talent that took a nontraditional path. Look for grit, adaptability, and the ability to solve complex problems rather than brand-name résumé stamps. As a first-generation college graduate who had to figure out the corporate world on my own, I know that resilience often outweighs pedigree.
- Build an inclusive culture before you hire. You cannot recruit diverse talent into a homogeneous culture and expect them to thrive. You have to do the internal work first. When candidates look at your leadership team, your board, and your policies, they need to see that equity is not just a buzzword but a business imperative.
The Future Is Built by the Overlooked
Innovative industries such as tech and gaming are responsible for building the platforms, tools, and experiences that define our modern world. If those products are built by a homogeneous group of people, they will inevitably reflect a homogeneous worldview.
The people who have historically been overlooked in these spaces are not just waiting for an invitation to the table. They are already doing the work. They are already building the future.
As leaders, founders, and hiring managers, our job is not to wait for them to knock on our door. Our job is to go find them, connect with them, and recognize that one of the best things we can do for our companies is to hire the people who are not already in the room.
