Parchment had ambitious plans to revolutionize the exchange of student records when it was founded in 2001.
The company started in California where they believed they could attract top software engineering talent to architect, build and support a solution that would eventually serve millions of students globally.
The venture backed start-up had limited capitol and needed a cost-effective way to get the people they needed. In those early days, Parchment competed along side larger tech companies like Facebook, Google and Yahoo – all of whom had far greater resources and the buzz to attract the best software engineers. This made it challenging for Parchment and forced them to look at alternative ways to acquire talent.
In 2005, Parchment would engage EdTechTalent and began building a team in E. Europe. The team rapidly increased Parchment’s ability to scale its product and attend to the demand of both K12 and Higher Education customers.
Parchment’s strategy was one that is very common among EdTechTalent clients. In the U.S., they hired several key people to lead the development effort. Then, they built a team of strong mid-level developers and QA via EdTechTalent. This not only helped them save costs (roughly 50%), but it also allowed them to grow the team as was warranted by customer demand.
15 years later, Parchment continues to utilize EdTechTalent and has retained several members of the team that first joined back in 2005.