kerryxwang

Giving references is an established part of the hiring process, so we believe that folks who don't want to promote themselves in other ways will be comfortable giving their references to their prospective employers earlier. Reference feedback collected on Searchlight is not public.

We've heard from hiring managers that since LinkedIn endorsements are public and not contextualized, it's hard to understand endorsers' motivation and honesty. Searchlight references are private (hidden to the candidate but viewable to employers that candidates give permission to), tied to a specific work experience and specific work relationship, and ask specific questions.

Regarding our landing page, that's a great point! We are a candidate driven product, but we are first focused on employer adoption. That adds legitimacy to our platform when Searchlight reaches out to candidates. In the future, we plan to allow candidates to initiate the Searchlight process themselves - we have already gotten requests from current Searchlight candidates to build this feature.

I hear your hesitation to provide references early. It's a new hiring approach. But we've seen that with our positive messaging and candidate engagement process, candidates see Searchlight as an opportunity to stand out. We try to minimize the burden on candidates and references by saving the answers so references don't have to do it again. As our credibility grows over time, we hope that everyone will feel comfortable making a Searchlight profile.