Talent,
sent.
Talisent is an NZ recruitment agency for tech and skilled trades — run by a recruiter with ten years in IT and cybersecurity, rebuilt with an AI back office. You brief the role once; we send a shortlist worth your interview time, at a flat fee we publish up front.
Remote-first, NZ-wide · shortlists inside ten working days · fees published below · 90-day guarantee
Why “Talisent”?
Look closer — it's talent with is sitting in the middle. Talent is sent. Not advertised, not hoped for, not left on a job board for a month. Found, checked, and sent to you. The whole business model fits in eight letters.
Two desks.
Same discipline.
Both run the same engine: direct search, verified shortlists, flat fees. What changes is how we check the work.
IT & Cyber
For CTOs and IT managers tired of keyword-matched CVs from recruiters who can't read code.
- Software engineering frontend · backend · mobile · leads
- Cybersecurity analysts · engineers · pen testers · GRC
- Cloud & infrastructure DevOps · SRE · Azure & AWS architects
- Data & AI data engineers · ML & AI engineers
- IT management network · systems · delivery · heads-of
Every candidate is screened by a security professional with ten years in NZ tech — not a keyword filter.
Trades
For owner-operators and site managers whose ad has been up a month while the work backs up.
- Electricians industrial · commercial · solar
- Builders & carpenters foremen · leading hands · quals
- Plumbers, gasfitters & drainlayers certifying · licensed
- Painters & decorators trade-qualified
- Site & ops leadership foremen · supervisors · ops managers
Licences verified on the public registers (EWRB / PGDB / LBP) before you see a name.
Brief once.
Interview twice. Hire.
No ad-and-pray. We search direct — people already doing the job well somewhere else, who aren't reading job boards.
Brief
Thirty minutes on the role, the team and what “great” looks like. We'll tell you straight if the salary and the wish-list don't match the market — before you spend six weeks finding out.
Search
The AI back office maps the market and finds the people; a human recruiter approaches them directly. Every candidate is interviewed, reference-checked, and — trades — licence-verified on the public register, or — tech — screened by someone who's actually held the job.
Sent
Three to five people inside ten working days, each with our honest read: strengths, gaps, salary expectation, notice period. No CV spam. If we wouldn't hire them, we don't send them.
Flat fees,
published.
AI does the grind, so our costs are lower — and we pass it on instead of pocketing it. Invoiced only when your hire starts.
| First-year base salary | Our flat fee | Typical agency at 15% |
|---|---|---|
| Under $70k | $5,500 | |
| $70k – $100k | $7,500 | |
| $100k – $140k | $10,500 | |
| Over $140k | $14,000 |
All fees exclude GST and are invoiced on your hire's start date — nothing up front, nothing on shortlist. Prefer a classic percentage engagement for a retained or genuinely hard search? We run those too — ask.
90-day guarantee
If a placement doesn't work out in the first 90 days, we replace them free — with a sliding refund if we can't.
Contractors
Flat finder's fee — $2,000 for engagements up to three months, $3,500 beyond. The contractor engages you directly; no margin skimmed off their hours.
Three roles or more
Sign three or more roles at once and take 10% off the total. Hiring a whole crew is the one time bulk should cost less.
For candidates
Get sent somewhere better.
You're good at what you do and too busy doing it to job-hunt — on the tools or in the terminal. Tell us once what you want: pay, location or remote days, the kind of outfit you do your best work in. We bring the roles to you.
- Your CV goes nowhere without your say-so — every send, every time.
- Straight answers on pay. We tell you what the market actually offers.
- Interview prep from people who've sat on the hiring side.
- Free for candidates, always. The employer pays us.
Contact
Have a role?
Talent is sent.
Email the role and you'll get a same-working-day reply with a market read and the exact fee from the table above. If we don't think we can fill it, we'll say so and cost you nothing.
hello@talisent.nzAuckland, New Zealand · placements NZ-wide · remote-first by design