The wheel of the talent acquisition machine never stops turning and last week was no exception, with Yello, Textio, and Sense all grabbing new rounds of funding, Todoist releasing a Slack-competitor called Twist, and Google for Jobs launching its quest to become the one job board to rule them all. In other news, it turns out women-founded companies have more women employees, the so-called skills gap might be a lot of hot air, and Unilever is tossing resumes in favor of algorithms.
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NEWS & COMMENTARY
Google For Jobs Launches Quest to Become One Job Board to Rule Them All (FastCompany): “Starting today, when you search something like “jobs near me” or “restaurant jobs in Chicago,” you’ll be ushered to a new part of Google Search that falls under the umbrella Google for Jobs. Here, you can further specify the opportunity you’re looking for, and Google will list opportunities from some of the largest employer databases on the web (including every site mentioned at the top of this article).”
Women-Founded Tech Startups Have Twice as Many Women (LA Times): “With an average of 48% female workers, women-led firms have nearly twice the industry average and outpace some of the nation’s largest tech companies in gender diversity including Google (31%), Facebook (33%) and Uber (36%), according to the study by online start-up investing platform FundersClub that surveyed 85 U.S.-based tech start-ups.”
Is Talk of the So-Called Skills Gap Overblown? (Business Insider):“Heidi Shierholz, former chief economist at the Labor Department, has a great saying when it comes to an alleged "skills gap" in the job market: "If you hear an employer complain they can’t find skilled workers, always ask, at what wage?"
At Unilever, Resumes Are Out and Algorithms are in (Fox Business): "A radical hiring experiment is under way at the London-based maker of Dove soap and Axe deodorant. To diversify its candidate pool for early-career roles that are a fast track to management, Unilever has ditched resumes and traditional campus recruiting. Its new process relies on algorithms to sort applicants and targets young potential hires where they spend much of their time: their smartphones."
Augmented Writing Startup Textio Raises $20M Series C (Techcrunch): “With a platform that helps recruiters to improve the content of their postings, the company has shown that small tweaks in the language can make a big difference in response rates and the quality of applicants that apply. Now as it looks to expand beyond recruiting and job postings, Textio has raised $20 million in new funding led by Scale Venture Partners, with participation from existing investors Bloomberg Beta, Cowboy Ventures, Emergence Capital, and Upside Partnership.”
Chicago-based Yello Raises $31M in Deal Led by JMI Capital (Crain’s Chicago): “Yello has more than 130 employees and has raised about $42 million. It's the latest in a string of about a dozen follow-on investments of at least $10 million in Chicago, a sign that the climate for building tech companies is maturing. Lack of large follow-up funding rounds is often cited by entrepreneurs and venture investors alike as a challenge to building companies here.”
Sense Raises $10M to Improve Contractor Communications (Venturebeat): “The San Francisco-based startup provides software as a service (SaaS) to automate communication throughout the freelance worker’s job cycle. Agencies can send personalized messages via text or email to welcome new employees, check in on the first day and after, solicit feedback, and surface new opportunities when a job ends. Analytics also aggregate feedback and provide insight into engagement levels.”
INFOGRAPHIC OF THE WEEK
Meet the American Out of Work (Brookings Institute)
MUST LISTEN PODCAST
The Talent Pool Your Company Probably Overlooks (HBR Ideacast)
And the sloth selfie to end all sloth selfies:
Perfect Sloth Selfie pic.twitter.com/QLKfNdii4t
— Land of cuteness (@landpsychology) June 23, 2017