# Adrian Russo

**VP of People & Talent · Talent Acquisition Executive**

Senior People & Talent executive with 15+ years building and scaling talent acquisition, recruiting operations, and people functions inside venture-backed, high-growth startups.

- Website: https://adrian.recruitlocator.com
- Email: adrian@recruitlocator.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrianrusso82/

## Open to roles

VP of Talent · VP of People & Talent · VP of Talent Acquisition · Chief Talent Officer · Head of Talent · first People & Talent executive at venture-backed startups (Series A–D, 30–500 employees).

## Expertise

Talent acquisition strategy, recruiting operations, executive & technical search, org design, leveling and compensation banding, workforce planning, employer branding, global hiring expansion (PEO/EOR across 10+ countries), AI-enabled and data-driven recruiting, people operations, founder and investor advisory.

## Selected experience

- **Swish Analytics — VP of Talent (2022–Present).** Built first People & Talent function. Scaled 30 → 220+ employees. 30% cost-per-hire reduction. Compliant hiring across 10+ countries.
- **Caribou (MotoRefi, YC) — Director of Talent Acquisition / first Head of Talent (2021–2022).** Scaled 156 → 500+ employees pre-Series C at $1B valuation. Candidate NPS 72% → 88%.
- **T-Rex Solutions — Director of Talent Acquisition (2019–2021).** 400+ specialized hires for U.S. Decennial Census. 40% TA spend reduction; $670K annual savings.
- **Fonteva — Talent Acquisition Leader.** Time-to-hire 45+ days → 11 days; ~3× org growth in under two years.
- **RecruitLocator — Co-Founder.** SaaS recruiting platform; 500+ paid licenses in 18 months.
- **ChangeEngine — Advisory Member.**