What it Means to be an Embedded Recruiter

ACELR8 was not always an embedded recruitment service. In 2015, before ACELR8 Embedded began, we started as a traditional recruitment agency while working on a project with Contentful.

Michael (CEO, ACELR8) and the Founders of Contentful believed that there was a need for startups to bring Talent Partners in to own the whole recruitment process, champion the start-up culture, and collaborate with the teams to scale them.

Agencies took a too distant approach to the hiring process and culture aspect, while startups could not justify hiring an in-house recruiter at such an early stage. The solution? ACELR8 provides a temporary recruiter, embedded within the company. This way, our clients get a skilled, experienced, and fully committed recruiter for as long as they need. 

With that, ACELR8 Embedded was born. At first, we worked onsite at Contentful and became part of the team, growing with the same beliefs and passion as the internal team. Then, we began to share our talents with other clients, creating the embedded model which we still use today.

Startups need Embedded Talent Partners now more than ever. As companies scale at speed and trained recruiters are in a shortage, "plug-and-play" support is an essential part of any scaling start-up.

Why is ACELR8 Embedded so Successful?

On top of offering a flexible hiring model, embedded is cost-efficient. 

On average, a start-up saves up to 46% on costs with ACELR8 compared to a traditional agency.

Additionally, our hiring approach is flexible by design. We adapt to your recruitment needs and hiring culture, making us a more versatile option than traditional agencies. 

What our customers also love is that we have an impact from Week 1. We also strive to fully understand the startup culture and challenge the hiring processes to create a sustainable talent acquisition culture, adapted to their needs.

So what does this mean for our recruiters? How do ACELR8’s Talent Partners spend their time? Before we explain the benefits of being an ACELR8 recruiter, let’s first look at what makes ACELR8 special.

ACELR8 in a Nutshell

ACELR8 is a Talent Firm for startups, powered by humans and software. We built the foundations of our Embedded model, and are now preparing for the future.

Our Successes:

🚀 +100% growth YoY consistently over the last three years

🙌🏾 A diverse team of 45 people, from 19 different nationalities

🌍 Three countries (Germany, UK, Portugal) - and more to come!

As a next step, our goal for 2022 is to scale our Embedded teams in Berlin and London, create new features for ACELR8 Compass, scale all our learning & growth tools, and expand internationally.

The Embedded model has extremely high potential, giving us the opportunity and space to grow worldwide. One of the best proofs of success for us is the fact that the large majority of our business comes from word of mouth.

As an embedded talent partner, what does all this mean for you?

Five Benefits of Being an Embedded Talent Partner at ACELR8

1. Gain Expertise at Speed

You will be under an unlimited contract with us while exploring different startups. Our team loves the fact that in the space of only two years, they have had the chance to work with up to four different startups. The duration of the project - between 6 to 9 months - is ideal to successfully hire teams while implementing sustainable hiring strategies. It is also a great chance to build up your network.

A Talent Partner gains expertise working in different environments, solving a wide scope of hiring challenges. They also get to learn from the best people in their fields as they work directly with the Head of People, CPO, CTO, or the Founders themselves. Our client portfolio includes the best start-ups and scale-ups of the European scene: Klarna, Clue, Artsy, Soundcloud, Maze, Grover, Wonder, and more!

2. Ownership With Impact

We give you full trust and ownership of the project, with space to explore ideas. We will also give you support in weekly 1:1s and squad meetings, join you on onboarding, and give you access to our Playbooks and Academy. We are there for you anytime if you have questions on the project, but we will never micromanage.

The size and growth stage of our clients (Series A, B, C) means that they need proactive recruiters who are able to see the big picture and that you can truly change the growth of a start-up thanks to your expertise.

A great example of our impact is Annie Li at Blinkist. She wrote this excellent summary of how her work benefitted her client for years to come.

Longterm Impact of a Talent Partner

3. A Significant Career Boost

You will learn a lot from the role itself, but our big focus is to offer you the tools and processes to accelerate your career. We created transparent growth paths & salary bands in ACELR8 Grow as well as regular performance plans (every 6 months) to make sure we have space to discuss your growth plans.

Your progression will also be discussed during your 1:1s, which are supported by Lattice.

You are free to participate in great initiatives like our Champions Program to build your personal recruiter brand, Masterclasses with Founders, Talking Talent, and other Marketing events via ACELR8 to boost your career.

4. Knowledge Sharing

As a company, our big focus is also on continuous learning.

You will get to attend ACELR8 Academy (once a month), squad meetings, and Lunch Q&As to increase and share your knowledge. On top of that, you will have an L&D budget of €500 that you can use at your convenience: Along with this, you will get excellent, well-honed advice from our ACELR8 Recruiting Playbooks.

At ACELR8, you have the space to grow your career in many directions. Additionally, we’re always scaling up, which means that the longer you stay with us, the more opportunities will present themselves to you. 

5. Our Team

The number one reason our team loves ACELR8 is our people. Over the past few years, we have created an open culture where sharing and teamwork are at the core of our mindset. 

Our team is diverse, but we are willing to do even more and to educate people around us. To do that, we created a DEI team that you are free to join.

Last but not least, we organise monthly squad events & quarterly ACELR8 celebrations to gather the whole team, making sure that all of us can celebrate together no matter our location. 

Hybrid Remote Working

Most of our clients are based in Berlin or London for now and have adopted a hybrid setup. We have the same strategy as we want people to have the freedom to choose to work from:

• ACELR8 office in London or Berlin - it is always open and we organise our team events there
• From home - we provide a home-office budget to ensure you have a cozy and productive working environment
• Your client office, depending on the remote set-up they adopted

You also have the freedom to work up to 3 months of the year from another EU country.

How Do We Match You With the Right Client?

Your Growth Goals & Preferences

When analyzing potential clients, we are mindful of your career growth and preferences. Some of our Talent Partners absolutely love chaotic environments, others need more structure. Some love a mix of diverse roles, some love hiring purely software engineers. We always do our best to match your preferences with the start-up environment and your seniority level.

Client Qualification

Ludovico, our BD Lead, always has a first call with the potential customer to pre-qualify their hiring needs, culture, hiring infrastructure, and expectations. He will also present our way of working and success criteria to make sure we are aligned and set for success.

Then, Engagement Managers discuss more with the Head of TA or Founder of the start-up to understand, in detail, what kind of recruiter they need. We then make sure that the company’s TA infrastructure will set the Talent partner for success, that the roles are matching the expertise of our Talent Partners, and that their values are aligned with our DNA.‍

About Renewals‍

Most of our clients will renew their contract with us. We will always ask you if you want to go on with the same client or try out a new start-up before making the decision. Our policy is that a Talent Partner should stay a maximum of 9 months with a start-up, unless you feel that the start-up provides you with an interesting enough challenge to continue. ‍

Next steps?‍

We are happy to discuss your expectations, the role, and our model more in detail 🙌🏾 Feel free to answer us on LinkedIn and we will organise a video call in the next few days.

Our interview process is straightforward, with three steps, and includes meeting 5 different people from ACELR8!

1. Introduction call with our Co-Founder or an Engagement Manager
2. Expertise interview with Engagement Manager and one Talent Partner
3. Value interviews with a Talent Partner (30 minutes) + CEO interview (45 minutes)

If you’re interested, please reach out to us through LinkedIn or our careers page.