Recruiting
Recruiting for government and defense roles.
Ayla runs the search for you, on the same market data as the software. The founder runs it personally, and you see the evidence behind every name.
a market brief comes first · no fee unless you go ahead
your market brief · liveevery figure is queried live from OPM data, job listings and our own candidate pool
How an engagement runs.
You can stop after step one at no cost.
timing and fee
set in writing, per search
- 1
Market brief
Free. Who else is hiring the role, what they pay, and how hard the search will be.
- 2
Scope and terms
In writing, before sourcing starts.
- 3
Shortlist
Each name comes with the evidence for it, and a note on who we passed on and why.
- 4
Close
We stay on it through the start date. You keep the brief and the notes.
The roles we recruit for
Engineering, program, product and leadership roles at agencies, primes and defense startups. We take on a small number of searches at a time.
- Technical and program
- Program managers, systems and software engineers, analysts
- Defense product and design
- Mission-fluent product managers, designers, engineers
- Contractor and public-sector leadership
- Capture, delivery, state CIO and CISO, data leads
What you receive
Everything is written down, and everything stays with you after the search closes.
- A market brief for the role
- Who else is hiring it, what they advertise, and how hard the search will be
- A shortlist with the evidence for each name
- Why each person is on the list, and who we passed on and why
- A weekly update while the search runs
- Who has been approached, who has replied, what changed in the market
- Support through the offer and the start date
- The brief and the notes are yours to keep
Questions a hiring lead asks
What do I actually get?
A market brief before any fee, then a shortlist where every name comes with the evidence for it and a note on who we passed on. We stay on the search through interviews, offer and start date, and you keep the brief and the notes.
How is this different from a generalist agency?
We work one market and we run the data underneath it. Ayla observes 470,000+ government and contractor postings from 640+ official sources, so a search starts from who is hiring, where, and at what, rather than from a keyword pass over a résumé database.
Which roles do you run?
Program, engineering, product, design, data and leadership hires at agencies, primes and defense-market startups. If a role is not one we can genuinely reach, we say so on the first call rather than taking the search and going quiet.
What does it cost?
Quoted against the specific role, in writing, before the search begins. Nothing is owed for the market brief, and nothing is owed if you stop after it.
Can I just use your software instead?
Yes. The Ayla platform is the same market and the same data with your own hands on it, from $199 per seat per month. Teams with a recruiter in-house usually take that. Teams with a role open and no recruiting function take this.
Send us the role
Tell us the role, the location and how long it has been open. You get a market brief and a yes or no within a business day.