Discover why traditional recruiting methods fail to find exceptional talent and learn how intentional, inclusive hiring practices can transform your company's culture and innovation capacity.
Her Story
About Ashley
Ashley Vallett is the Founder and CEO of Technacity Group, a boutique tech recruiting firm built on the belief that the best companies are built by the people most often overlooked. After her second layoff in late 2019, she launched her LLC the very next day. She funded the venture with a personal loan and placed her first candidate within weeks. That momentum has never stopped.
Today, Technacity Group is a trusted partner to early-stage startups from pre-seed through Series C, filling critical founding roles in software engineering, product, and design.
Ashley's edge comes from more than tenure. A first-generation college graduate who learned the value of hard work early, she brings a rare combination of grit, integrity, and genuine care to every search. She is selective by design, choosing to work with founders who align with her values and understand the importance of building diverse and inclusive teams. That conviction has shaped a niche within the video game industry, where she has helped expand access for underrepresented talent and partnered with the studio behind one of the most awarded mobile games of all time.
Her advocacy extends well beyond her own business. Ashley serves as an Ambassador for Women in Games (WIGI) and is an active member of Gaingels, the venture syndicate supporting LGBTQIA+ founders and allies. She was recognized as the Best Woman-Owned Recruitment Company - West Coast in 2024, A Rising Star in Tech by Advancing Women in Technology in 2023, and the Best Gaming Recruitment Company in 2023.
Off the clock, Ashley recharges with travel, wine tasting, and time with her partner and two English bulldogs. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Communication and Media Studies from California State University, Long Beach.
Her company is named for the quality she refuses to leave at the door. The tenacity is real, and so are the results.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Ashley
01What do you attribute your success to?
Honestly? My father. He raised me in a competitive environment and taught me the value of hard work through manual labor at a young age. That upbringing gave me something that has never worn off. A belief that effort is the one thing fully within your control, and that no one is coming to hand you what you haven't earned. As a first-generation college graduate, I had to figure out a lot on my own, and that early foundation made the difference.
Beyond that, I attribute my success to staying true to who I am. I've never tried to be the biggest firm or chase every opportunity. I've been selective, I've been consistent, and I've built relationships based on trust. That combination — grit from my roots and integrity in my practice — is what Technacity is built on.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best career advice I ever received was to bet on myself. It came from a mentor at a moment when I had just been laid off for the second time and was genuinely questioning whether I was meant to be in this industry at all. He didn't offer sympathy. He offered a challenge, and I love a challenge! I registered my company the next day.
That advice didn't just rebuild my confidence; it helped reframe the whole situation. A layoff stopped being something that happened to me and became what finally pushed me to build something of my own. That advice became the foundation for everything I've built. Technacity Group exists because I had people who believed I was worth betting on before I fully did.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
The advice I wish someone had given me earlier is: do not compromise on your value. Know what you bring to the table, charge what you deserve, and refuse to make yourself smaller so others feel bigger. Get curious. Ask questions. Speak up in rooms where you feel like you shouldn't have to. If you're passionate about something, take the risk — because passion without action stays a dream. The women who have made the biggest impact in this industry are not the ones who waited for permission. Lastly, show up as your authentic self, so the people who are looking for you can find you.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
The biggest challenge right now is also the biggest opportunity: the market has fundamentally shifted, and the companies that adapt fastest will win. We went from a candidate-driven frenzy to a market where startups are far more deliberate about every hire — which means the bar for recruiters has risen significantly. You can't just move fast anymore. You have to move smart. For me, that means going deeper with fewer clients, really understanding the business, the culture, and the kind of person who will actually thrive there.
AI is the other conversation everyone in recruiting is having right now. The tools are changing fast, and recruiters who treat that as a threat will struggle. I see it as a filter. AI can surface candidates, but it cannot build trust, read between the lines of a conversation, or advocate for someone whose resume doesn't tell their whole story. That human layer is exactly where I operate, and it matters more than ever when you're placing a Head of Engineering at a twelve-person startup where one wrong hire can set the company back six months.
The opportunity I'm most excited about is the growing number of diverse founders building from scratch. Early-stage startups are where culture gets set, and when the person at the top has lived experience as a woman, a person of color, or an LGBTQ+ founder, that shapes everything — who they hire, how they lead, what they build. Being the recruiter who helps them staff those first critical teams is one of the most meaningful things I do.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Integrity, honesty, and transparency. In recruiting, your reputation is everything, and mine is built on telling the truth even when it costs me. I don't oversell a role. I don't oversell a candidate. I give people the real picture and let them make informed decisions. That approach has cost me deals in the short term and built relationships that have lasted years. I'll take that trade every time. Personally, those same values shape how I show up for the people I care about. Authenticity matters deeply to me. I work hard to make sure my words and my actions consistently align, in business and in life.
Her Content Hub
Articles by Ashley
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.
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