Tech Valley Recruiting's Story: Half an Hour Saved Per Candidate Report with Atlas

About Tech Valley Recruiting

Tech Valley Recruiting is a specialist recruiting firm focused on the manufacturing sector in upstate New York. Working primarily with smaller organisations,  typically those with sub-200 employees, minimal HR infrastructure, or none at all, Tech Valley helps businesses navigate the challenges of finding skilled leaders and engineers in a competitive talent market.

The firm’s focus is on filling roles that matter most to a company’s growth curve, with a level of depth and personalisation that larger agencies rarely offer.

We spoke with Leo Pulcher, founder of Tech Valley Recruiting, about how Atlas became the backbone of his candidate process, his business development strategy, and his competitive edge.

Watch the full interview below, or continue reading to learn more!

Why Leo Went Looking for a Tool That Tied Everything Together

Before Atlas, Leo was no stranger to recruitment technology. As a self-described early adopter, he had experimented with note-taker apps, ATS platforms, and AI-assisted transcription tools. The problem wasn’t a lack of options; it was that none of them worked together. He said:

I would have note-taker apps, but they didn’t necessarily coordinate well with my ATS, or I would have an ATS that maybe had additional capabilities, but didn’t have the recorder component. And then none of them really had the reverse search component that was anything really beyond Boolean.

He’d also been relying on manual note-taking during candidate calls, a process that was both time-consuming and unreliable. Important details risked being lost between a scribbled notepad and whatever made it into the ATS. As a solo recruiter with no support staff, every gap in his process was a gap he had to close himself.

Atlas came onto Leo’s radar through the Elite Recruiter podcast, and the timing was good. He was already demoing other platforms when he discovered Atlas and joined the waitlist. 

 Frankly, it’s one of the few that actually lived up to the potential and the demo. Many kinds of oversell their capabilities.

Onboarding in Minutes

Getting started with Atlas required almost no heavy lifting. For Leo, coming from an ATS that he describes as having “a disgusting amount of features that you had to practically be a coder to figure out,” the contrast was immediate.

“Everything’s pretty easy with Atlas,” he says. “There’s really not a ton to really do once you kind of get your prompts in there and everything’s working well.”

When questions did come up, the support team was quick to respond, including help connecting his RingCentral integration. 

Your team has been extremely responsive in reaching out. It’s been phenomenal. The backend support just adds more and more and more to your product.

How Atlas Changed the Way Leo Runs Candidate Interviews

The most immediate shift Leo experienced was in how candidate data was captured and used. Where he had previously been “furiously scribbling” notes during interviews and then hoping he’d transcribed enough of it accurately into his ATS, Atlas now does that work automatically.

The impact goes beyond convenience. “Even data that has just come across in conversations that maybe I didn’t pick up initially, or maybe I didn’t jot notes down on, that ended up becoming important later to the hiring manager, I’ve been able to resurface again from those conversations just through the easy search tool,” Leo explains.

The candidate reports themselves are a particular highlight. Leo customises each one to the specific role and client, right down to the prompts and summary structure. 

I want them to feel like everything is completely customised and personalised to that role, because it is.

The reports also include a gap analysis, which hiring managers have responded to well: they want to know what a candidate might need training on, not just where they shine.

Leo’s use of Atlas extends well beyond structured interviews. With RingCentral connected, all of his inbound and outbound phone calls are automatically transcribed and captured, a feature he calls his second favourite in the platform.

It also keeps client relationships clean. When a client contradicts something they said earlier in the process, Leo can go straight back to the transcript: 

I can go right back into that transcript, and you can take a look at it, and then you can talk about what’s changed with them to make sure that you’re properly aligned. It’s honestly like I have an assistant every month.

How Atlas Became Leo’s Most Powerful Business Development Tool

Leo doesn’t just use Atlas to serve his clients; he uses it to win them. When speaking with prospective clients, he demonstrates the platform using sample candidates, showing them exactly what they’ll receive instead of the standard email-and-resume approach most agencies rely on. The results have been striking. 

Up until last week, 90% of the people that I spoke to directly who used outside agencies engaged in a demo with me. And over half moved on to an agreement.

The feedback from those conversations is consistent. Leo says prospects are often shocked by what they see and describes reactions unlike anything he had encountered before. He considers the tool such a strong differentiator that he avoids sharing its name with direct competitors, believing that if they adopted it, it would narrow the advantage he can offer his clients.

What Doubled Productivity Looks Like in Practice

Without formally tracking metrics, Leo describes Atlas’s impact in practical terms: faster workflows, less manual effort, and a noticeable boost in daily productivity. He explains that every candidate presentation now saves him significant time by reducing the need for prompt adjustments, editing, and manual write-ups. Automated task reminders have also helped him stay organised and keep conversations moving without relying on handwritten notes or transcription work.

“When I’m having a busy day, it probably doubles my productivity throughout that day at least,” he says.

Looking ahead, Leo believes reverse search could become the next major unlock. As he continues migrating his candidate database from his previous ATS, he says the feature has already surfaced strong candidates he otherwise would not have considered.

The reverse search, when I’ve toyed around with it, seems like it’s going to be extremely impactful. It really does pull up people that I didn’t even think about. I see that one being the next game changer.

The Most Impactful Software of Leo’s Career

After 12 years in the business, Leo is unequivocal about where Atlas sits in his toolkit. He calls it the most impactful software he has ever used, describing the gap between Atlas and everything else as a lap ahead, with the next closest being little more than Zoom transcription.

His advice to recruiters considering the switch centres on one question: Are you willing to lean into technology? For those who are, and particularly for solo desk recruiters, he says the decision is simple.

It’s an absolute no-brainer.