Transforming the Recruiting Experience: Our Investment in Paradox

We are in the midst of a fundamental shift in the labor market. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated structural economic trends like the rise of ecommerce and the gig economy driving substantially increased demand for deskless workers, early retirement, desire for flexible work, etc. With a record 20 million workers quitting their jobs just in the last six months, companies are struggling to keep up with the velocity of hiring necessary to fill the gaps. Recruiters are overworked and under-equipped to handle the needs of modern hiring, particularly in the hourly segment, which leads to reduced operating hours, higher overtime, and lost revenue opportunities.

At the same time, the candidate experience is extremely opaque and challenging. Candidates struggle to understand which openings fit their skills and preferences. After applying, candidates don’t hear back for weeks when they need a job in the next few days. Communication and interview scheduling are inefficient as applicants go back and forth over email or play phone tag with the recruiters.

Speed and efficiency are paramount in today’s hiring process, yet incumbent recruiting solutions have not matched the evolving needs of candidates and hiring managers, and talent teams still spend an astonishing 80% of their time on administrative tasks.

Paradox’s Solution

Paradox’s AI assistant, “Olivia,” automates all of a recruiter’s administrative tasks – applicant FAQs, candidate screening, meeting scheduling, onboarding communications, and more. It offers a superior, mobile-first experience for candidates. Olivia communicates directly with candidates through any mobile messaging channel, providing automated reminders and instantaneous responses using NLP, enabling candidates to seamlessly apply, interview, and begin a job in a matter of days, all through their phone.

All customers we spoke with expressed genuine love for the product, calling it the most important solution in their technology stack. Customers of all sizes, from large global enterprises to SMBs, praised the product’s ease of use, slick user interface, and intelligent AI functionality They saw time to contact decrease from days to hours, time to hire reduced by over 50%, and significantly lower cost of hiring. Once hiring managers begin using the product, it was difficult for them to imagine life without it. It’s no wonder that leading companies like McDonald’s, Lowe’s, Wendy’s, Unilever, and Nestle are customers.

Stripes Co-Leads Paradox’s $200M Series C Financing

As we built a relationship with Paradox, we were particularly impressed with Paradox’s Founder and CEO, Aaron Matos. Aaron has a deep commitment to HR and has nearly 3 decades of experience in the field, previously founding two companies that make recruiting a better process for all parties. Aaron has been extremely thoughtful in building out all aspects of the business, particularly the talent on the executive team and board, which includes former executives or Workday, SAP, and Taleo.

At Stripes, we have seen rapid adoption of conversational AI in sectors like sales and marketing, which drove our partnership with Emotive, and HR tech is the next frontier. We believe that amazing products and customer-obsessed teams are the foundation of a great business and it’s clear that Paradox has both of these ingredients. Through our experiences with the Paradox team and discussions with customers, we’ve witnessed firsthand the magic of their product and the team’s commitment to putting the customer first and delivering real outcomes according to their pain points.

Stripes is thrilled to partner with Paradox as they continue to transform the recruiting process for both candidates and recruiters!