Allison Dunsmore
Seismic
“The future of talent operations isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about building teams and systems that are ready to handle whatever comes next.”
Allison Dunsmore has been named to the Talent 100, Class of 2026, the annual award recognizing up to 100 leaders in each category of talent acquisition. Honorees are nominated by peers or found by committees that look for excellent work wherever it happens, then chosen for the depth of their craft and their impact on hiring. This is Allison's story.
Allison Dunsmore, Director, Talent Operations at Seismic, did not set out to build a career in talent operations. She began in sales roles in New York City, where she discovered something that would shape everything that followed: the parts of the job she loved most were not about closing deals, but about working with people, organizing processes, and supporting teams behind the scenes. That realization sent her back to school for a master’s degree in Human Resources Management, determined to pivot into a field that felt like a better fit.
Breaking into HR was not immediate. It took persistence before she landed an entry-level role as a recruiting coordinator at PwC, but once she was inside, her instinct for improving the candidate experience stood out quickly. Noticing that candidates asked the same questions again and again, she began building structured “candidate information kits” that answered them proactively. What started as a personal efficiency hack spread across the coordinator team and caught the attention of leadership.
That initiative carried her into one of the earliest iterations of PwC’s recruitment marketing function, and from there she built a career at the intersection of storytelling, employer brand, and recruiting operations, helping organizations explain who they are, what they offer, and why candidates should care. Her work expanded across industries and specialties along the way, including hiring for highly unique roles ranging from flight attendants and pilots to veterinary professionals. Those experiences deepened her appreciation for the complexity behind every hiring process, and gradually pulled her further into Talent Acquisition Operations: improving systems, refining workflows, and designing processes that make life easier for recruiters and candidates alike.
Building Structure Out of Complexity
Today at Seismic, Allison leads Talent Operations through a Talent Solutions team that functions as both a support hub and a strategic engine for improvement. Her team fields employee and recruiter questions, identifies patterns in the feedback, and turns recurring challenges into scalable process and technology solutions. It is a role that blends service, systems thinking, and continuous improvement, right in her wheelhouse.
What energizes her most right now is the opportunity to build structure out of complexity. Talent operations sits at the center of countless moving pieces, from technology and process to policy and people, and Allison thrives on listening closely to what employees and recruiters are experiencing, then translating that feedback into practical solutions that make work smoother at scale. Whether she is refining how tools are used, clarifying processes, or improving how information flows, the motivation is the same: turning friction into clarity.
She is especially energized by leading a highly technical team within HR, one that not only solves day-to-day problems but also thinks proactively about how systems and processes can evolve as the company grows. Helping her team develop that operational muscle while holding on to a strong service mindset is a balance she finds both challenging and deeply rewarding.
How Recruiting Is Changing
From her vantage point in talent operations, Allison sees AI accelerating change without replacing the human core of recruiting. She views it as a powerful enabler of efficiency, particularly in the operational and administrative layers of talent work, where automation can reduce manual tasks, improve data organization, and help teams move faster with fewer errors. For operations leaders, that creates space to focus on higher-impact work: optimizing systems, improving user experience, and designing smarter processes.
With that speed, though, comes uncertainty. The rapid pace of technological change means talent teams are often building the plane while flying it, and for Allison the key is not having every answer upfront. It is being willing to test, learn, and adapt quickly.
AI may change how the work gets done, but it does not remove the need for thoughtful design, strong communication, and a deep understanding of how people actually experience hiring and HR processes. In many ways, she believes, it raises the bar for operations leaders to be even more intentional.
Allison’s Advice for 2026
As organizations navigate constant change, Allison’s advice to talent leaders is simple but powerful: be flexible, and do not wait for perfect information. The pace of change, especially around AI and evolving workplace expectations, means leaders rarely have complete clarity before they have to decide. She encourages talent leaders to move forward with the best information they have, knowing they can adjust as they learn more, because progress, even imperfect progress, is usually better than standing still.
Mindset matters just as much, in her view. Leaders who model adaptability, curiosity, and resilience make it easier for their teams to do the same. Change is inevitable, but how teams respond to it is a choice. For Allison, the future of talent operations is not about having all the answers. It is about building teams and systems that are ready to handle whatever comes next.
The Talent 100 exists to celebrate the people shaping the future of how the world hires, and few embody that better than Allison. We are honored to welcome Allison Dunsmore to the Talent 100, Class of 2026, and grateful for the experience, perspective, and craft they bring to this community. Congratulations, Allison. Welcome to the Talent 100.
About the Talent 100
The Talent 100 is an annual list spotlighting the leaders who push HR and talent acquisition forward, organized by Noon AI. Honorees are selected through peer nominations and independent selection committees. Selection is entirely merit-based, with no fees or pay-to-play requirements.