Barb Hyman, CEO & Founder of Sapia AI: $21 Million Raised to Build the Future of AI-Powered Recruiting

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Barb Hyman, CEO & Founder of Sapia AI, a recruiting technology platform that's raised over $21 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Revolutionizing Hiring: Sapia AI leverages natural language processing (NLP) to create an engaging, efficient, and bias-free hiring process, replacing traditional resumes with AI-driven candidate assessments.


• Impact of AI Adoption: The rise of AI, particularly after November 2022, has significantly accelerated interest in Sapia’s technology, although the company has been pioneering AI-driven hiring since 2018.


• Navigating Category Creation: Sapia AI is a new category called "Smart Interviewer," but the challenge has been in positioning it within existing HR tech categories. The focus is now on customer storytelling to convey its unique value.


• Empathy in Enterprise Sales: Barb emphasizes the importance of "enterprise empathy" when selling AI into HR, recognizing the significant change management required and celebrating success only when the customer does.


• Candidate Experience as a Marketing Tool: The virality of Sapia AI’s candidate experience has led to organic growth, with candidates often referring the product to key decision-makers within organizations.


• Global Expansion Strategy: Sapia AI has strategically focused on the EMEA market due to its sophisticated approach to AI regulation and the high demand for inclusive, bias-free hiring processes.

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