How Elly helped Saval Talent Acquisition Consulting remove the bottlenecks in executive recruiting, enabling Sara Valderrama to focus on high-value candidate interactions

The Problem

As an executive-level recruiter and founder of her own consulting practice, Sara Valderrama manages detailed search processes and high-stakes candidate evaluations. Her work spans intake calls, screening, executive interviews, and creating comprehensive candidate summaries, all while supporting clients who often lack established recruiting infrastructure.

“When you’re trying to do so many things at once, you’re always looking for ways to improve the efficiency of your processes,” she shared.

Despite her experience, one part of the workflow consistently slowed everything down: creating detailed candidate summaries. Managing note-taking, staying present in conversations, and ensuring accuracy had become a constant struggle.

“It was always the bottleneck,” Sara explained. “You’re trying to speak with somebody during the interview, but then you’re focusing on taking notes or typing the notes… it is hard to take the notes at the same time you’re trying to talk with the candidate.”

Her clients felt the pain too. When she implemented new processes for a large organization with only two recruiters, the inefficiency became even more noticeable. They needed a better way to stay organized, reduce back-and-forth with candidates, and improve overall candidate experience without adding more hours to the day.

The Solution

Sara discovered Elly on LinkedIn and immediately saw potential.

“I loved it from the very beginning.”

Once she tested Elly’s AI note taker, it quickly became a core part of her interviewing workflow. She integrated it directly with her calendars, created separate workflows for interview and intake calls, and customized her summary templates based on each client or role.

“Candidates can choose the time that is most convenient, and as soon as they select it, Elly is added automatically. I do not even have to think about it.”

What made the biggest impact was the ability to stay fully present with candidates while keeping her conversational interview style, instead of pausing to type or trying to recall forgotten questions later.

“I want to dedicate that time to learning about the candidate, not just taking notes,” she said. “I get really good feedback from candidates because it does not feel like an interrogation.”

She also valued that the tool was designed specifically for recruiters.

“There are other recording tools, but they are not recruiting specific. I like the fact that this is made by recruiters for recruiters.”

When she introduced Elly to her client’s internal recruiting team, the reaction was immediate.

“They loved it. The recruiters were like, ‘Oh my gosh, thank you so much. This is saving so much time.’”

The Results

With Elly capturing the conversation and organizing key details, Sara significantly reduced the time she spent assembling her detailed executive-level candidate summaries.

Instead of relying on memory, handwritten notes, or manual typing, she can revisit conversations, verify details, and build summaries with confidence that nothing was missed.

“Sometimes before Elly I had to call candidates back because I forgot to ask something. Now I can just go back to the notes or check the video. I made the process more efficient and the candidate experience much better.”

The impact extends beyond her own workflow. Candidates have asked her for Elly’s link after experiencing how seamless it was. Recruiters at her client organizations have adopted it. Even executives she interviews have asked to share the tool with their own companies.

“For the type of positions I hire for, Elly helps me manage all the other tasks while I keep the human part of the decision process.”

Her only wish:

“More minutes. Definitely more minutes,” she said. “I would use it for everything.”