Liz Wessel loves helping people get hired. She is a Talent Acquisition Leader and the Co-Founder and CEO of WayUp, the go-to platform used by millions of early-career professionals to get hired, and by thousands of employers to scale their early career recruiting without scaling their recruiting teams–all with an emphasis on diversity and candidate experience.
Founded in July 2014, WayUp is a venture-backed startup based in NYC that has raised over $30M and was named by CNN as one of the 30 most innovative companies changing the world. Liz has been featured in Forbes 30U30, the “18 Coolest Women in Silicon Valley” by Business Insider, and NY Business Journal’s “Most Influential Women.” Liz has been a speaker at TedX, TechCrunch Disrupt, SXSW & more.
@TalentTechLabs caught up with @WayUp Co-Founder and CEO, @lizwessel. Get to know the person behind the title and find out why job-seekers and employers alike love the platform: Click To TweetTalent Tech Labs caught up with Liz for a brief chat.
How has the talent acquisition landscape changed since WayUp’s inception and how have those changes impacted WayUp? Most companies now realize they no longer need more applicants into their funnel–their issue is more about the process for screening. As a result, we shifted from being a sourcing-platform to having a Sourcing + Screening (+Coaching) offering, which has truly been a differentiator for our clients.
How does WayUp fit into an employer’s existing ATS and CRM platforms? We fully integrate and work with all ATS and/or CRM platforms, and can even function as a Campus CRM.
What happens when an employer signs up with WayUp? First, we work with them to understand their goals, then put together a hiring plan. We will manage much of the sourcing (especially diversity sourcing) and all of the screening. This ensures they’re providing the best candidate experience while hitting hiring goals– both overall hiring goals and diversity hiring goals. Ultimately, resulting in a lower cost per hire and reduced time to hire.
What is the best way to calculate cost-per-hire? It’s a tricky process with many contributing factors and we’ve created a free calculator to make it easy. You can download it at http://bit.ly/33zFdsh.
WayUp is a member of the Talent Tech Labs Technology Provider Advisory Program (TPA). Why did you make the decision to partner with us? For you industry expertise and a need for help with navigating the RPO and Channel Partnership landscape.
What can we expect from WayUp in 2020? We will continue to scale our flagship offering “Source, Screen & Coach.”
Now, let’s get to know a little bit about the person behind the CEO title. Twenty questions, here we go!
1. Hometown: NYC
2. First business idea: Sold two dollar bills for $5 in elementary school and would always sell out.
3. Who would play you in a movie about your entrepreneurial journey?
Sandra Bullock (Type A personality, yet laid back)
4. Last song you played: “You Don’t Know Me” by Ben Folds
5. Must read for entrepreneurs: Shoe Dog by Phil Knight
6. Favorite podcast: I don’t listen to podcasts — only Audible
7. Best thing a client said to you: Hard to choose. Last week a client said, “I’ve tried every campus tool to get my diversity numbers up, and none come close to what you guys delivered for me over the last 2 months.”
8. First full-time hire: Nikki Schlecker, Growth Strategy
9. Favorite blog: I prefer newsletters–avc.com (Fred Wilson) and Fortune Term Sheet.
10. Your last failure: Happens daily. Today I had a VP candidate take themself out of the running.
11. Describe your leadership style: Transparent
12. Favorite recruiting hack: Ask a good candidate who their best manager was and then try to recruit that person if there’s an open role for them.
13. Fill in the blanks. Being an entrepreneur requires a lot of trial and error and less procrastination/delays.
14. Ebook or paperback: Ebook
15. What’s your superpower? Speed (Everyone tells me I’m insanely quick at most things I do as it relates to work.)
16. Favorite productivity tool: Captio
17. What are you learning right now? Personally: mentalism; Professionally: channel partnerships
18. Favorite lunch spot: La Pecora Bianca (NoMad)
19. Describe the culture at WayUp: Passionate
20. Coffee or tea: Coffee
Learn more about WayUp in our newest issue of Provider Insight Report: Calculating Cost Per Hire for Early Career Professionals.