Becky Gavin
Bose
“The human touch and factor in recruiting is still just as important.”
Becky Gavin has been named to the Talent 100, Class of 2026, the annual award recognizing the 100 most exceptional leaders and practitioners in talent acquisition. Honorees are selected by the Talent 100 committee from thousands of nominations and candidates across the industry, chosen for the impact of their work, the depth of their craft, and their influence on the future of recruiting. This is Becky's story.
Rebecca Gavin never set out to become a recruiter, she simply wanted a job with normal hours. Fresh out of college and working for an events and marketing company, she was giving up her nights and weekends to the job, so she reached out to a friend at a staffing agency hoping for a lead on any corporate Monday-through-Friday role.
The next day, her friend called back with a question of her own: "Do you want to be a recruiter?" "I didn't really know what a recruiter does," Gavin recalls. She interviewed anyway, and the next thing she knew, she was a recruiter. "It fell in my lap just like everybody else," she says.
Learning From Great Leaders
Gavin credits two managers with shaping the trajectory that followed. The first was at that initial staffing agency job, where she absorbed the fundamentals of the craft. "They taught me pretty much everything I know about recruiting," she says.
The second came at the job before she joined Bose, a leader who pushed her beyond tactical execution and into strategic leadership. Between them, those two managers built the foundation for the leader she has become.
The Application Avalanche
The recruiting landscape has shifted dramatically in the past year, Gavin observes. AI has produced what she calls "the application avalanche" that every company is now managing, and countless tools have emerged to help teams navigate the flood and evaluate talent appropriately.
What technology has not done is replace the core of the work. "The human touch and factor in recruiting is still just as important," she says. Recruiters still have to vet capabilities, probe problem-solving skills, and read all the nuances that separate good candidates from great ones. The tools have changed; the mission has not.
Advice for Talent Leaders
Gavin's counsel to other talent leaders is direct: adopt AI now. "It's here, it's not going anywhere," she says. The real challenge is working out how to evaluate talent effectively while optimizing time.
She expects the technology to lift the administrative burden off recruiters, with scheduling, back-and-forth emails, and the profession's other familiar pain points increasingly handled by automation. That shift frees recruiters to concentrate on "the elements that matter, like what talent really requires and where they need to go and the future skill sets we really need to be building up." Less time on logistics means more time on strategy, a transformation she believes will redefine the profession rather than diminish it.
The Talent 100 exists to celebrate the people shaping the future of how the world hires, and few embody that better than Becky. We are honored to welcome Becky Gavin to the Talent 100, Class of 2026, and grateful for the experience, perspective, and craft they bring to this community. Congratulations, Becky. 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.
