Endorse.me, a technology startup created by two 2011 Notre Dame graduates, provides employers with confidential information about potential employees, offering an advantage to students in strengthening their candidacy and to employers in hiring the very best talent before their competitors.
James Ingallinera and Trey Griffith piloted the idea in spring 2012 and introduced approximately 2,000 students to it in its initial stages. Today, Endorse.me is available on 18 college campuses, including Notre Dame.
"We are the platform for this confidential information that is invaluable for recruiters in helping them find the best candidates and for students in dramatically strengthening their candidacy, that can't be on LinkedIn," Ingallinera, CEO of Endorse.me, said. "It's a big market opportunity that's been overlooked and bucks the trend of information becoming more social and open in the online professional space today."
Ingallinera said the startup raised $300,000 in May 2012 from angel investors and continued to test different applications for the software to discover where the greatest demand was located.
"Ultimately, there was the most demand in the online professional space, specifically within campus recruiting, and we focused our efforts on that," he said.
TechCrunch, a media property dedicated to profiling startups, described Endorse.me as, "a secure, online platform through which [students] can share confidential information with prospective employers, and, in turn, give companies a better way to identify and hire top collegiate talent."
Freshman Anna Gebhardt began working as the Notre Dame Campus Liaison in mid-February.
"Once I heard of the opportunity to work for a startup where I would be able to have a real impact and say in key decisions, I was eager to apply and stand out among the other candidates," she said.
Gebhardt said they are targeting college students at the top universities and colleges who are interested in working in today's most competitive industries: technology and finance.
"We are expecting students to adopt the idea as more useful way of sharing necessary information that recruiters may not be able to access without Endorse.me," Ingallinera said. "The goal is to have students providing the link on their resume, during interviews, on LinkedIn and all throughout the recruiting process."
In the long term, Ingallinera said the company wants to expand beyond campus recruiting to the rest of the workforce until Endorse.me is something that is used in every hiring decision for the broader job market.
"We're especially interested in students who are currently juniors and will be entering internship programs on Wall Street or in Silicon Valley for this summer," Ingallinera said.
Students interested in joining the Endorse.me team can contact Ingallinera at james@endorse.me
