Founded by Will Houghteling, Strive Talent runs a hiring platform that emphasizes cognitive assessments, work-sample tests and structured interviews to select candidates based on ability and potential rather than pedigrees. The company outsources its cognitive-assessment component to an undisclosed Los Angeles–based provider while performing interviews and other assessments in-house. Strive launched in January and ran an extensive pilot at Uber and a subsequent pilot with a large undisclosed national retail bank. Its model focuses on middle-skilled roles (sales and customer service) that pay at least $40,000 per year, and employers pay Strive a placement fee of 10–20% of first-year salary. About 70% of applicants to date lacked a college degree and 70% were minorities; Strive also offers short training, interview prep and industry-specific toolkits to prepare candidates. The company says the seed funding will be used to further develop the hiring platform, assessment toolkits, and expand sales and marketing and services offerings. Strive is a Santa Monica, CA-based platform that automates the technical hiring process. The company’s platform allows companies to source qualified software developers, test their coding skills, and hire more effectively. Strive is advancing this platform to further automate technical hiring workflows. The company received an investment from the Cornerstone Innovation Fund; the amount was not disclosed. The Cornerstone Innovation Fund is the strategic venture arm of Cornerstone OnDemand, a provider of cloud-based talent management software solutions. The fund focuses on investing in and collaborating with next-generation cloud startups and provides mentorship, distribution, and resources to support portfolio companies.

Total raised

$4M

Funding rounds

2

Latest round

Seed

Latest activity

Jan 2018