The Use Case Podcast: Storytelling About Jobamax With Alexandre Guenoun

Music:  00:02

Welcome to RecruitingDaily’s Use Case Podcast, a show dedicated to the storytelling that happens or should happen when practitioners purchase technology. Each episode is designed to inspire new ways and ideas to make your business better, as we speak with the brightest minds in recruitment and HR tech. That’s what we do. Here’s your host, William Tincup.

William:  00:25

Ladies and gentlemen, this is William Tincup and you are listening to the Use Case Podcast. Today we have Alexandre, he’s going to pronounce his name correctly, from Jobamax. And we’re going to be learning all about the use case, the business case for why people would you use Jobamax. And that’s pronounced or spelled Jobamax for those that are wondering the spelling of the company’s name. So Alexandre, pronounce your name the correct way, and also introduce both yourself and Jobamax.

Alexandre:  01:01

Hi William, thank you so much for having me today. So my name is Alexandre Guenoun, and I am the current Founder and CEO of Jobamax. Jobamax is the first professional ecosystem for Gen Z and it has been launched a few days ago in the Apple Store. Jobamax came to my mind from nowhere two years ago when I was still in college and it was really far from what it is now.

William:  01:27

So ecosystem for Gen Z. A, that’s just fascinating on so many levels. But also you’re teaching, what were you teaching?

Alexandre:  01:36

So I was in the preparatory class in Paris, in France at [inaudible 00:01:43] Business School. And then when I got this idea I just drop out to focus myself at 100% on Jobamax, because I really believed in this projects since day one. And so I couldn’t manage both things in the same time, it took me too much effort. So I wanted to focus myself really on Jobamax so that’s why after this, I took classes certificate at HEC Paris at Cornell University at Yale to build the toolbox for successfully lead this company into the right direction. But I didn’t got like graduated from a university.

William:  02:29

Well most of the smart entrepreneurs drop out. So first of all, you’re already in the elite company. The smart ones start and then fall in love with an idea, and then they leave. That’s just the way that is. So when you say ecosystem for Gen Z, so let’s define Gen Z. And the last I looked it was eight years old to 25 years old. What do you define it as?

Alexandre:  02:58

So our current target that could use Jobamax is actually 18-25 years old, but we deeply believe that in the following years even the people that are 16 will use Jobamax later when they will be able to look for jobs. So we think on the long-term. But yeah, our target is really 18-25 years old.

William:  03:27

So in the ecosystem, when you say ecosystem let’s just make sure that the audience understands how you’re defining that, what do you mean? So Gen Z we’ve defined, check. We understand the audience 18 to 25, it’ll dip a little bit below that. Now obviously that number will change over time. What is the ecosystem?

Alexandre:  03:50

So it includes a quality social networking place, a job marketplace, and a new learning streaming platform. So our goal was to create an ecosystem where people would be not only looking for jobs, not only networking, not only learning but they can do everything into a single app. So we created this job marketplace platform inside the app, where you will be able to look for jobs based on algorithms that will match you with the right job based on your skills. You also have a networking place where it’ll be like mostly audio rooms that we create using AI that will match you based on your profile with 50 people for two weeks, okay?

Alexandre:  04:47

So it’s clearly like a specific room and you’ll be able to create a powerful network and a quality network during those two weeks. You’ll be able to chat with those people, and at the end of the two weeks we take you out of these networking rooms and we place you into another one with other people so you can expand your network, but always keeping our premise which is a quality network and not a quantity network. And we also have a new learning platform. So we have master classes that we shot at Jobamax. We for the moment created four master classes, one on negotiation, one on diversity, one on saving the planet, and another one on how to find a job.

Alexandre:  05:38

We got amazing guests that were volunteered to speak on the app. And based on this we created tools 15-minute videos just like episodes. And the first season of all tools is a masterclass that is freely available on the app. And we also have online courses section, and we are affiliated with Udemy so we have the courses. And based on your profile we show you the right courses that you could take to elevate to provide and get maybe other jobs.

William:  06:16

Yeah. And some of that’s just building your skills too, right?

Alexandre:  06:20

Yeah, exactly. That’s what I meant.

William:  06:23

So what’s interesting is when you say networking, learning, and jobs, historically I would say something, this is LinkedIn light or LinkedIn for Gen Z. Of course, you’re not trying to build LinkedIn for anybody. But it is interesting because this is when we talk about Gen Z, these are digital natives, they grew up with the internet, they grew up swiping, working, playing with iPhones and iPads, et cetera. And so you’ve mentioned a number of times so far that this is an app. Which is really interesting because an app is obviously something that’s mobile first, it’s on their phone, it’s on their tablet, et cetera. So tell us a little bit about the audience and how digital natives or Gen Z is just different than previous generations.

Alexandre:  07:16

Yeah. So we all know that Gen Z grew up with phones in the hands. So clearly it makes sense to create a mobile app because now when they look for a job they’re always using the phone more than their computer to look for jobs, more than website. They are diverse job bots, they are also on networking platform, social networks. Because 55% of recruitment are made through job bots and 45% are made through networking, which can be on phone or outside external network. So it really makes sense for us to create a mobile app.

Alexandre:  08:05

And we just want it to be easy for people to use and to look for job anywhere, anytime, at bed, when taking maybe the subway, when going to school, at [inaudible 00:08:20] time, like any times they will be able to apply for jobs. And there were some things that was really interesting and that were some things that we really wanted to do in our app. And it also led the possibility because it’s an app and recruiters will be also able to use the app. So they also will be able to look for talents anytime and anywhere they want and not only at office. So it’s also a possibility for them to find the talent in a different way that they was doing right now at work.

William:  09:00

I love it, because it’s always on. And you most of Gen Z, both my sons fall in into that generation, and they always have their devices. So I mean their devices literally I would say go to bed with them, but that’s probably not completely accurate but they’re always on. So it just makes sense that that ecosystem is always available. And again, not just for jobs but for networking and for learning and skills development, et cetera.

William:  09:30

Okay. So there’s a couple things that I want to ask. On one level it’s, what do employers like when you look at this obviously you’re dealing with the candidate side. But if you were to flip this and look at it from the employers, like what do they need to do to make themselves more attractive to Gen Z?

Alexandre:  09:50

So now we understood that Gen Z like to know the culture of the company before applying for a job. So most of the people who apply for a job are making research about the company. Something that we wanted to implement into app is the possibility for recruiters and companies to showcase their brand using five images. They can showcase their project, their team offices, their culture and by doing so it’ll also be possible for Gen Z to look for the culture before applying for a job and without having to do any research. So it’s really quick process for them.

Alexandre:  10:41

And following this, we wanted to create a user experience coming from nowhere using the swiping functionality and the entire app as been customized and tailored based on the needs of both recruiters and job seekers. So it really took time for us, almost two years to create this app because we wanted it to be efficient for both sites. So we really taken into accounts all the reviews from recruiters and job seekers.

Alexandre:  11:16

And so by doing this, we wanted to make the recruitment more efficient than it is now on the society we are on. And we wanted it to be really quick. We wanted the quality and we wanted also to avoid the fee that company have to pay a lot to sponsor our job or to post a job on the platform. So we wanted by doing all the three elements it took a lot of time to create this app, but this is exactly what we wanted to do.

William:  11:52

So I love the images. I love that idea because the written word it’s, I think all of our attention span regardless of age, all of our attention span is just a little bit shorter these days than it was a few years ago. But I love the images. And I love that you give people, you give employers five images or five ways to render whatever they want, whatever they feel like rendering. And so I love that.

William:  12:21

Did you do that because you saw the audience needed something different like, “Okay. They can go read a review somewhere if they want to.” But they’re visually oriented. They’re on Snapchat, they’re on TikTok, they’re on Instagram, they’re whatever and they’re visually oriented and so images make more sense or small videos make more sense, et cetera.

Alexandre:  12:45

It really started from a friend of mine actually that was looking for a job. And he was skipping almost all the jobs until he find out a company he actually knows. Because most companies are not Google or Facebook, the name doesn’t spot to you like it’s logical. So I was like, “But maybe this company is nice.” He said, “Yeah, but I don’t know it.” So I said, “Okay. So what should be good to do is that the company can showcase at least their project so we can know maybe it’s a tech company, maybe it’s going to be an industrial company, maybe it’s a healthcare company. Can be anything from a name.”

Alexandre:  13:37

So I really wanted it to be easy for job seekers to understand what the company is about, to understand who’s in the team, is it a big team, is the small team? How maybe are the offices where the job seekers would be working so he can know also if it’s, for example, a big corporation or small one, is it remote work? Is it not remote work? And also the culture, they can showcase anything that they would like maybe they can state some quote, they can state whatever they want into an image. But by doing this, it makes the job much more attractive since the moment you see it.

Alexandre:  14:24

And if those picture are attractive, if you are interested to know more about the job then you have a little button called job description, you just click on it. There is this tab that is going to flip, and then you will be able to see the entire job description, the salary, the type of work, the location, the benefits, whatever you want. And so by doing this we just made it easier for job seekers to look for a company. And we also improve the company’s brand and authority through job seekers and especially Gen Z job seekers.

William:  15:08

Well I love that. It would be really interesting as a company to use memes as a way-

Alexandre:  15:16

And it can be.

William:  15:16

… As a way to mix it in. Kind of make some fun, you know how I mean?

Alexandre:  15:18

Yeah. It can be. Can be anything.

William:  15:21

It can be anything. I love that because you’re leaving it up to the company to then decide what positions you the best with this audience. You know what’s interesting is you’re dealing with first job or what we typically in the States call early stage career. So it’s folks anywhere to 25, they might have already had a couple jobs but they’re early stage in their career.

Alexandre:  15:47

Yeah.

William:  15:47

So what do you see that they need? So obviously you’re helping them with networking and understanding all of that and getting the most out of that. Learning with your relationship, with skills development, getting them on some learning paths, making them more attractive skills wise and also matching them up with opportunities and jobs. What else do you think early stage career folks need? And need from you if not now but in the future?

Alexandre:  16:17

I think they really need a fast process. Why? Because they don’t have time right now. Because most of them are spending 15-minute dollars on any job application because they got costed too much and they don’t have time spend too much time on a job application. So what we wanted to do was to create a really quick process for them so they can see the picture of the job, if they don’t like they can swipe left, like refuse it. Or they can click into the job description and then apply.

Alexandre:  16:51

So by doing this we wanted to keep the process really fast. And by doing so a user will be able to apply to maybe 100 jobs in a few minutes. And maybe got a job of his dream really quickly and without spending too much time applying to jobs, going to external website, entering all his information again and again on different website. And it can keep everything on track because we also have a tracking part on the app for the job seeker. So we’ll be able to track in real-time if the application is still pending, if it has been refused or if it’s accepted. And then you can move to steps two, which is interview process or calling.

Alexandre:  17:44

And I really realized that many people and even the people around me, when they look for jobs they apply to maybe 50 jobs and they got no response sometimes. And it keeps their hope because they really hope maybe the company hasn’t seen their profit yet and they’re going to get a response. And most of the companies have already skipped the profile. So what we wanted to do is to make an end to this, no more costing. It’s either yes either and no. And if it’s no, you can move on to other jobs, because it’s not because you’ve been refused by your jobs that you will know not find the right job for you.

Alexandre:  18:25

So we have this slogan at Jobamax, which is a [inaudible 00:18:30] candidate for an [inaudible 00:18:31] company. This is something that we really want to do is based on the matching, we will show you the right companies based on your profile. And so you will be able to go on the company with who you feel well inside and you will not leave after channels because a lot of job-hopping with the early stage careers professionals.

William:  19:00

So like the dating sites have a double blind, right? Where I’ll show interest in somebody and they’ll show interest in somebody, and if both people show interest then they can obviously move forward and do whatever. Do you see Jobamax in that way that where hiring managers and recruiters show interest in a candidate, candidate also shows interest in them and then there’s a match that way?

Alexandre:  19:30

Not exactly. Because this was actually the first thing I wanted to do is to make this matching algorithm like we can see on dating apps. But then I realized they can miss each other, which is often the case in some dating apps you can never match with the profile because one of the parties never seen the profile of the other one. So the thing is the recruiter is going to post a job, okay?

Alexandre:  20:01

He’s going to fill all the information and he’s going to post the jobs. Or maybe we already have the job in database and they can only call us and we will make it for them. So we will put the jobs, the jobs is online, the job seekers will be able to go and based on the profile they will be able to apply or not to the jobs. Let’s say they apply to the jobs, then the recruiter on this side is going to see only the people who apply for the jobs.

William:  20:29

Got it.

Alexandre:  20:30

Okay? So he will be able to sort out the applicants on the platform. And then if some people are interested and they both are interested into each other, I mean they want to approach to step two, they can go to the chatting session, they can chat together. The recruiter is able to ask alternative documents, such as English proficiency, such as some diploma, et cetera. And they can also make a phone call on the app or they can also make a video call on the app.

Alexandre:  21:07

This is one part. There is the second part, which is the sourcing option. The recruiter will be able to turn on the sourcing from the app, which is really intuitive. And they will be able based on any features they want, any keywords they want to see and have access to our entire database. And they will be able to straight contact job seekers. So there is two elements, which is application and sourcing.

William:  21:38

I love that. Well it gives everybody, again was as if you’re sourcing you can reach out to somebody and then present an opportunity. They can go back and look at the app. They might have seen it. It might not have come up or they might have not given that their full attention, et cetera. So it gives them an opportunity to then find that talent, put the opportunity in front of them. So I love that.

William:  22:03

I want to ask about COVID. And in the sense of COVID’s changed all of our lives, got that. But how have you seen it with the community that you deal with, with Gen Z? You’re in it every day, you see pre-COVID and you obviously see it while COVID is going on. What are some of the changes that you’ve seen in the talent as a result of what we’ve been going through?

Alexandre:  22:33

Now they look for jobs online, mostly onlines. They also a lot of people are looking for a flexible schedule which is remote work, maybe a few days a week, maybe a day a week, or maybe a full-time remote jobs. So it means people are applying to jobs from mostly any location. Some people in the U.S. that are living maybe in the Eastern Coast would be able to apply for jobs in the Western Coast. And so it makes more chances for a company to find the right talent, because there are more people who might be applying for a job.

Alexandre:  23:19

And to go back to Jobamax, based on this we also have these criterias that when you are looking for jobs you can select any location around the world. So you can place your own current location and place a feature like around three kilometers from my home. Or you can also place any location, like for example I’m in Paris and I can look for a job in Los Angeles or I can look for a job in San Francisco, I can look for a job anywhere. And we want to give this possibility for people to look for jobs anywhere around the world.

Alexandre:  23:57

For today, today we are only launching in California for now, but the process in our goal is quickly to expand to other cities across the States and other countries. And so it will give the opportunity for people from other country that might have sometimes they have some [inaudible 00:24:17], and doing so they work at other companies and other locations. And by doing so we want to give them also the opportunity to look for jobs on another location and without those barriers that we often see. Like, for example, let’s say I’m in the UK and I look for jobs in the U.S it may be really hard for me to find one actually. And on Jobamax I only have to change my location and boom! I can apply to jobs straight away without too much things to change.

William:  24:53

I love that. I love everything that you’ve built by the way. I love it.

Alexandre:  24:57

Thank you.

William:  24:57

I’m glad you dropped out of school. And I’m sure that that probably ruffled some of the feathers of your family and all that stuff, but I think you’ve built something amazing. And thank you so much for coming on the Use Case Podcast.

Alexandre:  25:12

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me today. It was a real pleasure for me.

William:  25:17

Vice versa. And thanks for everyone listening to the Use Case Podcast. Until next time.

Music:  25:21

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