Frequently Asked Questions
Digitalent, the AI/ML executive search firm, places senior AI, machine learning and research leaders and individual contributors into VC-backed startups from seed to Series C in the US and Australia, and into established companies in the UK. These are the questions we are asked most often about how that works.
About Digitalent
- What is Digitalent?
- Digitalent is a specialist AI/ML executive search firm. We place senior AI, machine learning and research leaders and individual contributors into VC-backed startups from seed to Series C, and into established companies building AI capability, across the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. 500+ AI/ML placements since January 2021.
- What kind of companies do you work with?
- Two kinds, in all three markets. VC-backed startups from seed to Series C, usually hiring a founding or early senior technical person. And established companies building AI capability, from a first AI Lead through to moving an existing engineering organisation to AI-native ways of working. We have made 500+ AI/ML placements since January 2021.
- What roles do you place?
- Three kinds of hire. Executive and leadership appointments such as Head of AI, VP of Machine Learning and Director of AI Engineering. Founding-level hires: founding research engineers, founding forward deployed engineers and founding AI engineers, the first technical hire a company makes in a new area. And senior individual contributors across applied ML, research, ML infrastructure, agentic AI, computer vision and robotics.
- Can you work with a stealth startup?
- Yes, and a good share of our clients are. We run the search confidentially and do not name you until either the candidate is a long way through your process, or you tell us we can. You decide when that happens, not us. Several case studies on this site stay anonymous for the same reason.
- Can you work with companies that are not startups?
- Yes. A good share of our clients are established companies adding AI capability for the first time, going through an AI transformation, or hiring their first AI team. Our UK work is almost entirely with established companies rather than startups.
How a search works
- How quickly can you deliver a shortlist?
- Brief to shortlist is approx. one week. Brief to offer is approx. three weeks for a permanent (full-time) hire and approx. one week for a contract hire.
- How quickly can you deliver a shortlist on a retained search?
- Brief to shortlist is approx. one week. Brief to offer is approx. three weeks on a retained search.
- Do you work retained or contingent?
- Both, and they buy different things. Retained buys a full market map, direct approaches to people who are not looking, and sustained work on your brief alone, with the fee split in thirds: a third on engagement, a third on shortlist, a third on placement. Contingent works the reachable market quickly, with no fee until you hire someone. Payable when the candidate signs their employment contract, or on their start date. Retained suits scarce and senior hires; contingent suits most permanent (full-time) roles.
- What level of role do you run retained?
- Executive and leadership appointments, and genuinely scarce specialists at any level. Chief AI Officer, VP of AI, VP of Machine Learning, Head of AI, Head of Machine Learning, Director of AI Engineering, Head of Research and Head of MLOps, alongside founding hires where the pool is small enough that the search has to be exhaustive.
- Do you handle contractor payroll and compliance?
- Yes. Compliance, timesheets and payroll are handled by us for the length of the engagement, included in the margin rather than charged on top. Timesheets run through our own online portal. UK contract work runs through Digitalent Recruitment Limited, including IR35 status conversations where they apply.
Synergy
- What is Synergy?
- Synergy is how we run a search when you do not have time to sit in first-stage interviews. We run and record the first-stage interviews, so you shortlist on your own schedule instead of sitting in calls. We agree the questions with you up front, interview every candidate against them, and send you the recordings alongside the CV and, where the role needs one, a technical assessment.
- What do the interview recordings actually give me?
- Full first-stage interviews, unedited, that you can watch and rewatch whenever suits you and share with anyone internally who needs a view. They are password protected and timestamped, so you can jump straight to the answer you care about rather than sitting through the whole session.
- How much time does Synergy save?
- Clients typically save 20+ hours per hire, because the first-stage interviews happen without you in the room and the shortlist arrives as something you can review asynchronously.
- How does Synergy work commercially?
- A small non-refundable deposit, offset against the final fee. It sits between retained and contingent: more committed than a contingent search, without a full retainer.
Hiring in the US
- Do you place in New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles?
- Yes. 300+ of our 500+ AI/ML placements have been in the US, concentrated in the San Francisco Bay Area, New York and Los Angeles. We also place US-wide, wherever a client is hiring, including remotely.
- Do you work US hours?
- Yes. Searches for US clients run to US time zones throughout, for calls, interviews and offer conversations.
- Do you place H-1B or relocating candidates?
- Yes, though whether we can on any given search is driven entirely by the client. Some clients will sponsor and some will not, so we establish that at the kickoff call and screen to it from the start rather than finding out at offer stage. Where a client is open to it, we place candidates who need sponsorship and candidates relocating to the US.
- How do your fees work for a US hire?
- For a permanent (full-time) hire the fee is a percentage of the candidate’s starting base salary. The percentage depends on the seniority of the role, the difficulty of the search and whether you engage us exclusively, retained or contingent, and is agreed with you in writing before we start. On a retained search the fee is split in thirds: a third on engagement, a third on shortlist, a third on placement.
Hiring in New York
- What AI and machine learning roles do you place in New York?
- Research and applied roles at the senior end: founding research engineers, research scientists, machine learning engineers, forward deployed engineers, and the leadership above them, including Heads of AI, VPs of Machine Learning and Chief AI Officers. New York work skews more towards research than our other US cities.
- How is hiring AI talent in New York different from the Bay Area?
- The pool is smaller and less picked over, but the competition is different rather than weaker. In the Bay Area you are usually bidding against another lab or a frontier model company. In New York you are frequently bidding against quantitative finance as well, which changes what the offer has to look like and means compensation benchmarks from West Coast startups can mislead you.
- Can you hire in New York for a company still in stealth?
- Yes, and it is a large part of what we do there. We have placed a founding research engineer at a Series A lab in New York while it was still in stealth, then built the research bench around them. The search runs confidentially and you decide when your name is used.
- Do New York candidates have to already be in New York?
- Often not, and insisting on it can shrink an already small pool to nothing. Where a research direction has only a few hundred credible people worldwide, most of them are somewhere else. We agree at kickoff whether relocation and sponsorship are on the table, and screen to that from the first approach rather than discovering it at offer stage.
Hiring in London
- What AI and machine learning roles do you place in London?
- AI and machine learning engineers, research engineers and scientists, agentic AI and forward deployed engineers, and the leadership above them: AI Leads, Heads of AI and VPs of Machine Learning. We also place software engineers who work AI-natively, which in London is a large and growing part of the market.
- Do we actually need to hire in London?
- Often not, and it is the question worth asking before the search starts rather than after. London salaries for senior AI and machine learning people run well ahead of the rest of the UK, and a role written as London-only rules out strong people in Manchester, Bristol, Edinburgh and Cambridge who would work to a London team. We place UK-wide, so we will tell you what the same hire looks like outside London before you commit to the premium.
- Who are we competing with for AI talent in London?
- More than in any other European city, the frontier labs. Several have London offices and they hire the same research people you are after. Beyond that, quantitative finance has been hiring machine learning talent in London for far longer than the startup scene has, and pays on a different basis. Benchmarking a London offer against other startups alone is how good candidates get lost late.
- Will candidates accept hybrid or fully remote in London?
- It depends on the seniority and how scarce the skill is. For a common skill you can set the pattern. For a research direction where the credible pool is small, the candidate sets it, and insisting on four days in an office can quietly halve your shortlist. We establish this at kickoff and screen to it rather than discovering it at offer stage.
Hiring in Sydney
- What AI and machine learning roles do you place in Sydney?
- Senior machine learning and AI engineers, applied and research scientists, agentic AI and forward deployed engineers, and the leadership above them: AI Leads, Heads of Machine Learning and Heads of Data Science. Sydney work skews more towards applied AI in a product than towards pure research.
- How does hiring AI talent in Sydney compare with Melbourne?
- Sydney has the larger concentration of venture-backed startups and financial services AI work, and Melbourne more of the enterprise and research-adjacent hiring. In practice the pools overlap heavily and plenty of people will consider either, so a search that treats them as one market with two centres usually reaches more of the right people than one that does not.
- Should we hire in Sydney or offshore the work?
- It depends on whether the hire is the first one. A first senior AI hire sets the technical bar for everyone after them, and that is very hard to do from a distance. Once there is someone in place who can assess the work, distributed hiring becomes far more workable. We will say which of the two you are in rather than take the brief either way.
- Who runs a Sydney search, and in which time zone?
- Dillan Leslie-Rowe, Co-Founder of Digitalent Australia, runs Australian searches personally and in Sydney time (AEST/AEDT), from the first call through to the offer conversation. There is no handover to somebody in another time zone.
Hiring in the UK
- Where in the UK do you place?
- UK-wide, with 100+ UK AI/ML placements to date. We have clients in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Bristol, and we also work with UK companies hiring remotely across Europe.
- What is Digitalent's legal entity in the UK?
- Digitalent Recruitment Limited, company number 10894480, registered in England and Wales.
Hiring in Australia
- Where in Australia do you place?
- Sydney and Melbourne primarily, with 100+ Australian AI/ML placements to date. We also have clients in Brisbane, the Gold Coast, Canberra and Perth, and we work Australia-wide. Australian searches are led by Dillan Leslie-Rowe, co-founder of Digitalent Australia.
- What is Digitalent's legal entity in Australia?
- Digitalent Australia Pty Ltd, ACN 626 902 789, registered in Australia.
Question not answered here?
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