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Cory Salmela has had a riveting professional journey, from being an athlete to coaching the US biathlon team, and then establishing a successful recruiting agency, Salmela.

Salmela was built in 2006, by Cory Salmela to transform how companies recruit talent as well as help professionals navigate their career paths. Since its inception, their unique insight and innovative recruiting solutions have helped higher-ups and company owners attract and retain their dream team. Their services are even more significant amid the great resignation as higher-ups and company owners globally have been struggling with the reality of labor shortages and the widespread return-to-office employee reluctance.

Cory built his career from the ground up, starting as an athlete and then transitioning to be a national team coach for the US biathlon team in 1991, which is centered on cross-country skiing and rifle shooting winter sports. Simultaneously, he enrolled in the University of Minnesota Duluth, where he graduated with a BSc in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in 1994. Although he had a successful career as an Olympics coach, he wanted something that had more stability. Reflecting on his sports career, he said, "After 2002, I just kind of found myself completely burnt out. I was always living out of a suitcase and traveling on the circuit to training camps all over the world."

After 11 successful seasons, he left the US Biathlon team as a coach. He got a job in the pharmaceutical industry as a sales representative in 2003, which helped him seamlessly transition into the corporate world. This experience gave him in-depth knowledge about the processes in the healthcare sector as a whole, which would later impact his entrepreneurial aspirations. Furthermore, his experience as an employee made him realize he wasn't cut out to be in the traditional corporate world. Three years later, he got laid off from his sales role and started engaging with a lot of recruiters for other job openings which gave him insight into the recruiting industry. "That's the first time I had recruiters call me, I started talking to them about things like what the job is about and how it worked and and so on." he stated.

Cory Salmela
Cory Salmela Cory Salmela

On march 29, 2006, Med Search Network was launched with his wife Kara Salmela. "I was in italy, when I got the idea about this agency. I started the business based on those conversations I had with HR officers. I created time away from my busy schedule to craft a business plan, use our home as collateral for funds and purchase a recruiting franchise." Cory stated. After six months of sheer determination and persistence, without having an income they made their first placement. The company name was later changed to Salmela.

Under Cory's leadership, Salmela has experienced radical growth, especially in the last few years where they achieved about 200% growth rate. The remarkable results were due to their people-centered robust methodology for the hiring process, their world class metrics and extensive experience in the recruitment space.

He attributes a lot of his success to the qualities he has always been adhering to, like Integrity, honesty, authenticity, ingenuity, creativity, and accountability. Reflecting on the success of the agency, Cory said, "for me, 15 years in the business means doing the right things, being effective and consistent on my promises and treating people with respect. I believe all these helped me to establish credibility and reliability in the industry. Today I feel more accountable and responsible to deliver the expectations of my customers."