Recruiting

aronow.io

Astronomer

Attentive

Aven

Benchling

Boulevard

Brightline brings virtual behavioral and mental health care to kids and teens, with a focus on also supporting families. They have no waitlists, provide customized plans, and work with families to track progress together.

Brightline

Brigit

Calm

Census

Clever

CloudTrucks

Coder is a remote infrastructure development platform that makes working with code easier than ever. Coder enables everyone from industry rookies to experts to develop code faster than ever before, using templatized starting points and ultra-secure workspaces.

Coder

Cohere

Cointracker

Color

Costanoa Ventures

Decimal

Deel is payroll for modern business. No matter where you're hiring, Deel helps customers run payroll, supporting 150+ countries with hundreds of worldwide experts. Deel helps their customers know that hiring, paying, and managing stayed compliant and easy in their all-in-one platform.

Deel

Deepnote

Deliveroo

Docker

Dune

Duolingo

EightSleep is more than a mattress company - it's a suite of products devoted to sleep fitness. Their goal is to make sure that your sleep is as high-performing as you are, helping you meet and exceed the bar for excellence in your waking life. Athletes and scientists alike love their range of highly customizable sleep tech because it helps them live healthier.

EightSleep

Format One

FullStory

Galileo

Ironclad

Juni

Linear

Marqeta is a modern card issuing platform dedicated to empowering innovators to launch their products to the world. They have over a decade of experience as a trusted, high-tech solution for builders who need simple, scalable payment solutions.

Marqeta

Mastodon

Modern Treasury

Monte Carlo is a Series D data observability company helping its customers accelerate the adoption of data to eliminate downtime. 

Monte Carlo

Multiverse

Notion is the go-to for notes, tasks, wikis, and databases, blending everyday work apps into one. It serves as an all-in-one workspace for note-taking, task management, and project management. 

Notion

Compensation software that offers 5,000+ companies clarity for every pay decision.

OpenComp

Opendoor

Plato

PostHog

PostHog is an open source analytics platform. Their product is used by product, engineering, and marketing teams to understand user behavior, including product analytics, session recording, user paths, a/b testing, heatmaps, and more. The suite, founded through Y Combinator in 2020, has since been installed by over 10,000 companies.

Pragma Platform

Pulley

Quora

Ramp

Readme

Replit

Retool

Scratchpad

Sequoia

Sift

Snyk

Sourcegraph

Stytch

Talentful

Treasury Prime

VanMoof is a Dutch e-bike company creating stylish, feature-rich city bikes. They're the fastest growing bike company in the world, with an active community in over 50 cities worldwide.

VanMoof

Vantage

Veev

Verkada

WeTransfer

Zippin

Culture

Engineering

Product

Jeremy Lyons


All RecOps roles call for, at a minimum, an advanced knowledge of Microsoft Excel and/or Google Sheets. With 450+ functions, it can be hard to know where to start and which ones to learn.

To help, here is a list of formulas we recommend you know:

### VLOOKUP / XLOOKUP / HLOOKUP

 - The staple has always been VLOOKUP to find information across a
   vertical column and check it with search criteria. XLOOKUP eliminates
   some of the restrictions of VLOOKUP and offers greater flexibility.

- Used heavily in spreadsheets to find information.
    

### TRUE/FALSE
    
-  These often appear when checking lists or in other formulas to determine exact match or a relational match.
    
-   Used heavily to checklists
    

### IF especially IFERROR and IFNA
    

-   The IF family is especially effective if you checklists. Using IFERROR or IFNA are helpful when trying to have information stand out.
    
-   Used heavily in checking lists
    

### COUNT especially COUNTIF and COUNTA
    

-   Like the name suggests, it counts values. When building tables without using Pivot Tables, using these can be helpful.
    

### QUERY
    

-   Allows you to extract and manipulate data from a table or range of cells based on specific criteria.
    
-   Very useful when dealing with a massive table and multiple inputs.
    

### ARRAYFORMULA
    

-   Allows you to apply a formula to an entire range of cells at once, without having to manually copy and paste the formula into each cell.
    

### IMPORTRANGE
    

-   Allows you to important information from another workbook (Excel) or sheet (Google Sheets).
    
-   Extremely useful if you need to filter and manipulate data from a master spreadsheet that many people use at the same time.
    

### INDEX
    

-   Allows you to retrieve a value or a range of values from a specific location within a table or range of cells. Often used in combination with other functions like MATCH or IF, to search for specific data within a table or range and retrieve the corresponding values.
    
-   When trying to calculate team data, this function is fantastic.
    

### MATCH
    

-   Allows you to search for a specific value in a range of cells, and return the relative position of that value within the range.
    
-   Can be helpful in various tasks, such as looking up data in a table or validating user inputs.
    

-   Advanced-level formulas to be comfortable with are:
    

### QUERY(IMPORTRANGE())
    

-   Allows you to import data from another workbook or sheet spreadsheet and then filter and manipulate that data using SQL-like queries.
    
-   Fantastic if you want to pull in information from a master spreadsheet but only want a few columns.
    

### INDEX(MATCH())
    

-   Allows you to search for specific data within a table or range and retrieve the corresponding values.
    
-   Powerful alternative to V or XLOOKUP for searching for specific data within a table or range, and retrieving the corresponding values. It can be beneficial in large datasets where manual searching can be time-consuming and error-prone.

With 450+ functions between multiple spreadsheet tools, it can be hard for RecOps professionals know where to start and which ones to learn. To help, we've created a list of formulas we recommend you know.

The 11 Most Important Formulas to Know for RecOps and Data

Halden Pfearsen

We’ve compiled the following list of resources you'll be able to use to grow your data knowledge or find information for your stakeholders:

**Books:**

-   [How Charts Lie: Getting Smarter about Visual Information by Alberto Cairo](https://www.amazon.com/How-Charts-Lie-Getting-Information-ebook/dp/B07P88R6DW/ref=sr_1_1?gclid=Cj0KCQiAx6ugBhCcARIsAGNmMbhbiL1PZoFy44-pHr9emY_tYfDQVgL8t_8r63py_DsWCEYn0AhKPZ4aAglAEALw_wcB&hvadid=338881486269&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9030959&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=17589077887488862357&hvtargid=kwd-671762044713&hydadcr=3173_10390882&keywords=how+charts+lie&qid=1678495588&sr=8-1)
    
-   [Storytelling with Data: A Data Visualization Guide for Business Professionals by Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic](https://www.amazon.com/Storytelling-with-Data-audiobook/dp/B079H3ZJJZ/ref=sr_1_1?crid=36DKWYQXZT18S&keywords=Storytelling+with+Data%3A+A+Data+Visualization+Guide+for+Business+Professionals+by+Cole+Nussbaumer+Knaflic&qid=1678495614&sprefix=storytelling+with+data+a+data+visualization+guide+for+business+professionals+by+cole+nussbaumer+knaflic%2Caps%2C144&sr=8-1)
    
-   [Effective Data Storytelling: How to Drive Change with Data, Narrative and Visuals by Brent Dykes](https://www.amazon.com/Effective-Data-Storytelling-Narrative-Visuals/dp/1119615712/ref=sr_1_1?crid=35ERU5XZ1OAU5&keywords=Effective+Data+Storytelling%3A+How+to+Drive+Change+with+Data%2C+Narrative+and+Visuals+by+Brent+Dykes&qid=1678495634&s=audible&sprefix=effective+data+storytelling+how+to+drive+change+with+data%2C+narrative+and+visuals+by+brent+dykes%2Caudible%2C137&sr=1-1)
    

**Websites:**

-   [Level.fyi](http://level.fyi/)
    
-   [Comprehensive.io](https://www.comprehensive.io/)
    
-   [Salary.com](https://www.salary.com/)
    
-   [30 Best Salary Sites to Know Your Worth in 2023](https://www.tealhq.com/post/best-salary-information-websites)
    

**Excel/Google Sheets Learning:**

-   Ben Collins -  [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/@benlcollins)  /  [Website](https://www.benlcollins.com/)
    
-   Prolific Oaktree -  [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/@ProlificOaktree)  /  [Website](https://www.prolificoaktree.com/home/)
    
-   [Sheets Help - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/@SheetsHelp)
    

**Metrics to Track:**

-   [GitLab’s Talent Acquisition Performance Indicators](https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/hiring/performance_indicators/)

**Reporting:**

-   [Ashby Offer Acceptance Rate Trend Report](https://www.ashbyhq.com/blog/recruiting/2023-trends-report-offer-acceptance-rates)

Looking to become a better data analyst? We’ve compiled some resources to grow your data knowledge and find information for your stakeholders.

Ashby's RecOps Data Resource Round-Up

Shannon Ogborn

A job description often calls for years of experience in a particular role. But, frequently, I’ve found that those role titles don’t have as much to do with the skills needed for the job as they sound. This often bars excellent candidates from the pipeline. Luckily, it’s a problem with a fix.

When you calibrate with hiring managers, focus on the true minimum requirements. What does a role actually entail? What “requirements” are really just nice to have? What are the competencies required to do the job well? Looking for the same minimum requirements across the board helps keep the whole process more equitable, and it gives sourcers more freedom. 

Of course, you won’t move a profile forward if they don't meet the minimum requirements. But when you’ve thought critically about the true minimum requirements, you can find someone who’s met those bars in non-traditional ways. 

If you want someone with a year of software engineering experience, maybe that could be updated to say “or technical experience or coding.” This will broaden the requirement to include folks from less traditional backgrounds. They could nail the interview, they could be the best performer on the team, but unless you think critically about what the requirements are, you are counting that person out before they can even be considered.

This type of calibration includes more people, invites more diversity of backgrounds, and helps you create a team capable of true innovation.


Are you relying on years of experience, or something deeper?

What Are Your True Minimum Requirements?

An excellent outreach strategy requires a screen-in mindset.

A screen-out mindset is where you look at a candidate profile with the framing: *“What about this person does not meet my criteria?”*

A screen-in mindset is where you look at a candidate profile with the framing: *“What about this person would match or add value to the gaps that we have right now?”*

Instead of trying to eliminate people who fall short of the ideal profile, I'm trying to find reasons people would qualify. Screening-in helps a lot with diversity and really increases that diversity pipeline. Part of why I do that is because I’m never looking for the “perfect” candidate.

> I once hired an engineer who had been an analyst for several years. He had no formal software engineering background. But I noticed that he’d done engineering coursework in college, along with a few other traits that really fit the role.
> 
> He performed the best on the interviews of any candidate I ever put through. Had I been looking for the perfect person, I would've missed out on the best fit.

Screening-in helps recruiters challenge our own biases without lowering the bar for excellence. It gets rid of arbitrary barriers, like specific role titles, or only hiring for specific companies, while focusing on the skills needed to actually do the job.

Starting from a place of screening-in can change your entire outreach mindset. If you want a better top-of-funnel, start there.


An excellent outreach strategy requires a screen-in mindset.

Screen-In vs Screen-Out Mindsets – There Is A Right Answer

Laura Li

Looking to break out of the LinkedIn bubble? Ashby’s consulting team has put together this list of sourcing locations you might not have thought of.

1.  Skill-relevant Slack communities

2.  MeetUp communities
    
3.  Github, Dribble, and other coding websites
> **Break-In Talent** If you’re open to hobbyists, you come across gems of talent that aren’t full-time engineers, but would like to be.

4.  School websites
 
5.  “First 50” groups
> **Kicking Off With a Team** If you’re hiring for an early-stage startup, there are many people who want to get in on the ground floor - first 50 groups will help you find them.
    

6.  Programs for under-represented populations
> **Great Groups** Identity-specific schools, clubs, bootcamps, and classes are a great way to source great talent from specific populations.

7.  Hackathons
    
8.  Quora
    
9.  Gyms and fitness studios
> **Go Where The Talent Is** If you have a role that requires heavy physical work an ad at a gym might do some “heavy lifting.”

10.  eSports tournaments
    
11.  Relevant subreddits
    
12.  “Jams”
> **Coding and More** While “code jams” were once the purview of just engineers, “jams” have expanded into all kinds of roles and areas of expertise.

13.  Message boards and interest groups for role-related certifications
    
14.  ResearchGate
> **True Experts** Need to hire for a scientific or research-focused role? ResearchGate is often called “Facebook for academics.”

15.  Skill, job, or interest-related Facebook groups
    
16.  College cafes for new grad roles
> **More Than Career Fairs** You’ll find students about to enter the job market in many campus-adjacent areas. An old fashioned posting on a coffee shop tackboard is a great start. So is checking to see if the campus has a career center that shares open job listings.

17.  Facebook career pages in the local market
    
18.  Specific interest meetups
> **Think Beyond Role-Focused Meetups** What does your ideal candidate do for fun? You might find excellent engineers at a robotics club or great content marketers at a writing workshop.

19.  Industry or skill-related panels and speaking events
    
20.  Running an ad in an interest-specific newsletter

We've put together this list of sourcing locations you might not have thought of - and we're updating it regularly!

Recruiting

Snippets

The 11 Most Important Formulas to Know for RecOps and Data

Ashby's RecOps Data Resource Round-Up

What Are Your True Minimum Requirements?

Screen-In vs Screen-Out Mindsets – There Is A Right Answer

Ashby’s “Less Obvious” Sourcing List

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Developers

Recruiting

Snippets

The 11 Most Important Formulas to Know for RecOps and Data

Ashby's RecOps Data Resource Round-Up

What Are Your True Minimum Requirements?

Screen-In vs Screen-Out Mindsets – There Is A Right Answer

Ashby’s “Less Obvious” Sourcing List

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