There’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes before a talented person is placed in a great job opportunity.
Of course, everyone knows what fantastic advocates our recruiters are for our talent. And they are also trusted resources for our clients. But did you know that before our recruiters set up interviews with prospective candidates, there is a “sourcer”—or shall we say “sourceress” at work?
A person who does sourcing dives deep into our pool of talented creatives, searching for just the right individuals to match up with the best job opportunities. They vet, interview, and make sure that our candidates are of the highest quality before they pass them on to our recruiting team.
Many of you have already had some great conversations with our sourcer-ess, Karen Streeby. If you haven’t had a chance to chat with her yet, get to know her via our interview.
Tell us about yourself!
I went to school at the University of Idaho for graphic design. It was old school—we used rubylith! Unfortunately, I had a terrible instructor. I got really turned off by graphic design and switched over to communication studies because I didn’t have to take a lot of math. I transferred to University of Iowa as a junior and graduated with a degree in communication studies. After graduation, I moved back to Idaho and landed a job as an advertising proofreader. Later, I decided to move to the big city and packed up a U-Haul and headed to Seattle. I worked in various jobs as a temp, and then as an artist representative and a recruiter.
What is your role at Allovus? What do you do?
I work behind the scenes on sourcing. I’m tasked with finding people that fit the type of roles that we fill. I do Intake, vetting, referrals, interviewing, and qualifying, making sure we have the talent pool we need to fill the reqs that come in. I’m also passively sourcing too, looking to find great candidates for future positions.
Do you have a philosophy regarding your work?
It’s all about work/life balance. The reason I’m here is because of my relationships with Hayley and Viviane; we go way back. I share the same values that Hayley does. Putting family and relationships first—those values hold strong. I love that we can help other people achieve that.
What is your favorite part of your job?
The people! My co-workers and the talented people we get to work with. It’s so interesting to see our employees’ artwork and how they think. I love the variety of people we get to work with and the cool stuff our clients have for them to work on.
What project have you worked on that you’re most proud of?
I worked on the Impact Sourcing in Action: Autism Empowerment Kit. It’s the most impactful and meaningful thing I’ve ever done.
That sounds amazing. How did that come about?
One year, I attended the Microsoft vendor summit which they have every year. The main speaker was the chief accessibility officer. The focus of her speech was on disability hiring. I was so interested in the program that I wanted to know more. So, I networked and reached out to the person who’d organized the summit. He connected me with the Microsoft Responsible Sourcing Manager. He and I talked, and we hit it off. He has a personal connection to dyslexia, and I’ve got a child on the autism spectrum. He was tasked to come up with a toolkit for the 3rd party supply chain to hire and support people on the spectrum. I landed myself a freelance project creating this toolkit! Later, I got a position as a job coach for people with disabilities in Seattle for a non-profit called Provail. Part of my work there included supporting the folks hired through the autism hiring program at Microsoft. It was cool to help support the program.
What do you like to do when you’re not working?
We recently moved to Gig Harbor, so with our kids being 7 and 10, we are enjoying exploring the city. We can walk the trails in the forest, ride bikes, go to the Gig Harbor History Museum, and spend lots of time doing activities that are all new and exciting in this place.
