1 00:00:06,970 --> 00:00:07,550 I call. 2 00:00:07,690 --> 00:00:11,940 So I like to start things off just ask you a little bit about your background. 3 00:00:12,280 --> 00:00:12,580 Yes. 4 00:00:12,580 --> 00:00:16,330 Can you tell us who you are and what your background is. 5 00:00:16,330 --> 00:00:16,610 Sure. 6 00:00:16,630 --> 00:00:23,890 Hi I'm Nick Levingston co-founder and CEO of hernot spend about 10 years in this human resources industry 7 00:00:24,040 --> 00:00:27,330 in Princeton and recruiting and corporate talent acquisition. 8 00:00:27,340 --> 00:00:32,200 I start with the agency side and then moved in-house working at you know larger positions like MTV Networks 9 00:00:32,360 --> 00:00:37,130 and then most recently hypergrowth technology firms here in the Bay Area. 10 00:00:37,390 --> 00:00:43,020 I like to move on and help them grow from 60 to 360 employees and just a couple of years. 11 00:00:43,210 --> 00:00:43,560 Awesome. 12 00:00:43,570 --> 00:00:44,390 OK cool. 13 00:00:44,530 --> 00:00:51,370 So I have one of the first questions on my mind just like what do you think is the difference between 14 00:00:51,610 --> 00:00:56,960 technical and non-technical interviewing for candidates that are even more technical. 15 00:00:59,320 --> 00:01:07,150 Well I think any any technical roles and this could be in finance this could be in engineering or product. 16 00:01:07,200 --> 00:01:11,450 You know I think the hiring manager is looking at people's problem to solve problems solving abilities 17 00:01:11,530 --> 00:01:17,770 and you know because a lot of times the there are people who can figure things out and whether that's 18 00:01:18,150 --> 00:01:22,690 you know coding something that's never been built before or whether that's kind of re-engineering an 19 00:01:22,690 --> 00:01:27,270 existing process to be more efficient or more beneficial to the company. 20 00:01:27,360 --> 00:01:31,280 You know in looking for the mines that can help connect the dots to a new solution. 21 00:01:31,270 --> 00:01:37,590 And so I think technical interviews in particular whether it be coding exercises or go white white working 22 00:01:38,320 --> 00:01:45,400 they're looking for people that can can can break down a problem and elegantly speak through a solution. 23 00:01:45,400 --> 00:01:50,450 And even if it's not be the right solution you can find time limits. 24 00:01:50,630 --> 00:01:56,380 Not looking for someone who can take what they've given speaks through an elegant solution. 25 00:01:56,420 --> 00:02:02,170 And if there's a change or something you know a curve ball and the question that they can use that information 26 00:02:02,240 --> 00:02:08,410 to incorporate that into their model and then you know provide an update to whatever solution that they 27 00:02:08,410 --> 00:02:09,080 recommend. 28 00:02:09,250 --> 00:02:10,180 Cool. 29 00:02:10,300 --> 00:02:16,380 So what do you think there's anything different about people who are looking to get started in you know 30 00:02:16,390 --> 00:02:18,910 sort of more technical careers. 31 00:02:18,910 --> 00:02:24,690 I mean you don't have for example I don't know a big code based show where a lot of projects. 32 00:02:25,440 --> 00:02:31,030 Yeah I think one of the one of the benefits to folks interested in the transition into a career in say 33 00:02:31,030 --> 00:02:34,910 engineering or web development is that there are a lot of resources out there available. 34 00:02:35,140 --> 00:02:41,140 And even if your day job may not be coding you have the ability if you're interested and passionate 35 00:02:41,140 --> 00:02:47,170 about making that transition to to hone your skills to learn some of those tools and technologies on 36 00:02:47,170 --> 00:02:48,570 the side. 37 00:02:48,880 --> 00:02:54,430 I think employers are hesitant to take a risk on hiring someone who hasn't shown enough initiative to 38 00:02:54,430 --> 00:02:55,580 do that on their own. 39 00:02:55,630 --> 00:02:59,230 They don't want to be the company that teaches you everything from scratch. 40 00:02:59,500 --> 00:03:04,990 But they do want someone with a good foundation that they that is willing and able and motivated to 41 00:03:04,990 --> 00:03:07,180 learn and enroll. 42 00:03:07,210 --> 00:03:14,050 And so I think Job need a junior or recent graduate or a new coder who is transitioning from a different 43 00:03:14,050 --> 00:03:20,280 career path they need to overcome the gap that is you know we know you're new. 44 00:03:20,380 --> 00:03:24,640 We know we're open to training investing in our in our in our employees. 45 00:03:24,880 --> 00:03:26,930 But we want to make the right bet. 46 00:03:26,980 --> 00:03:31,510 And if you think about it that way you need to be able to convince the hiring manager or interview team 47 00:03:31,900 --> 00:03:34,230 that you've got a good fit nation. 48 00:03:34,360 --> 00:03:38,250 You've got some of the fundamentals but what more importantly do you have them. 49 00:03:38,260 --> 00:03:45,190 You've shown that you can't be you know gone above and beyond staying up at night. 50 00:03:45,190 --> 00:03:51,910 You've got this lab at home and you've done what you can with the tools available to you to maximize 51 00:03:51,910 --> 00:03:52,300 that. 52 00:03:52,390 --> 00:03:58,210 So you so you want to show that you have learned things but also build things that kind of the idea. 53 00:03:58,630 --> 00:04:04,540 Yeah I mean I think every good you know every recruiter is excited when they see on a resume or a link 54 00:04:04,540 --> 00:04:09,520 to a lab right that that someone has their day job and maybe they're coding something that isn't so 55 00:04:09,520 --> 00:04:13,260 sexy they're working at a lot of memorization where they're focused on a very particular thing. 56 00:04:13,420 --> 00:04:18,130 But it's to get this portfolio at home with the lab that shows that they are exploring new technologies 57 00:04:18,430 --> 00:04:23,560 that they've dabbled with you know Python or Ruby on Rails or any of these kind of new technologies 58 00:04:23,560 --> 00:04:26,950 even if it's outside of their day to day technology. 59 00:04:27,250 --> 00:04:32,470 That's the kind of engineering you're looking for someone that's keeping them keeping an eye on the 60 00:04:32,470 --> 00:04:37,070 next tools and technologies that are going to make that organization successful and more scalable. 61 00:04:37,210 --> 00:04:37,890 That's really right. 62 00:04:37,890 --> 00:04:43,330 I remember this from our previous conversations that we didn't record which is that you love this lab 63 00:04:43,420 --> 00:04:46,040 you love when people have a laugh. 64 00:04:46,060 --> 00:04:51,070 Well that's the that's the benefit I mean a resume you look at a resume it's it's it's you know from 65 00:04:51,070 --> 00:04:55,450 the dawn of time people are applying and interviewing you know the resume is a static piece of paper 66 00:04:55,480 --> 00:05:02,910 which you know has buzzwords and such but you know nowadays resumes are reviewed on computers and hyperlink 67 00:05:02,920 --> 00:05:08,590 can say so much more than the text on a resume right in saying that you know designers that showcase 68 00:05:08,590 --> 00:05:10,420 their dribble or advanced profiles. 69 00:05:10,420 --> 00:05:11,860 That's that's their portfolio. 70 00:05:11,860 --> 00:05:14,580 You've got engineers that now want to get that. 71 00:05:14,590 --> 00:05:16,710 That's their real portfolio. 72 00:05:16,900 --> 00:05:21,430 And one of the challenges we find is that there's a lot of other roles in organization marketing operations 73 00:05:21,430 --> 00:05:29,180 sales where they don't have a portfolio working well and a lot of their you know talent that they bring 74 00:05:29,200 --> 00:05:33,650 to the company are their communication and project management and some of these softer skills. 75 00:05:33,670 --> 00:05:37,720 And so one of the things we're doing at home it was trying to get a sounding board to other professionals 76 00:05:37,720 --> 00:05:42,900 to have a portfolio if you will to take employers to offer their resumes. 77 00:05:43,060 --> 00:05:43,480 Cool. 78 00:05:43,480 --> 00:05:44,680 All right. 79 00:05:44,820 --> 00:05:50,350 All right well then that's a good segue because you know I want to give you a chance to tell people 80 00:05:50,350 --> 00:05:54,610 who are watching this about what it's for how they can take advantage of. 81 00:05:56,080 --> 00:06:03,790 Sure so Hona is a resource for jobseekers who are active or professionals who are in the middle of their 82 00:06:03,790 --> 00:06:05,670 career looking to make a transition. 83 00:06:05,680 --> 00:06:10,510 Maybe you're looking to change a role maybe looking at changing industry maybe or changing location. 84 00:06:10,540 --> 00:06:15,880 Any one of those things alone can be very difficult in terms of career transition. 85 00:06:15,880 --> 00:06:20,280 And many times we see job seekers doing more than just one of those at a time. 86 00:06:20,290 --> 00:06:25,900 So what we what we've built is a marketplace that connects jobseekers with subject matter experts in 87 00:06:25,900 --> 00:06:30,440 marketing finance accounting engineering et cetera that work at Great companies. 88 00:06:30,440 --> 00:06:37,270 So we've got experts who worked at tumblr at Uber at Microsoft our sales force right to make themselves 89 00:06:37,270 --> 00:06:42,130 available nights and weekends to do rigorous mock interviews to jobseekers. 90 00:06:42,400 --> 00:06:49,360 And because these aren't tied to an actual job at their company they're able to get real time feedback 91 00:06:49,600 --> 00:06:52,750 advice after the conversation takes place. 92 00:06:52,750 --> 00:06:57,610 And so you know job seekers not only do you have access to these great working professionals who are 93 00:06:57,610 --> 00:07:00,990 hiring managers and interview all day at their day jobs. 94 00:07:01,540 --> 00:07:07,150 They get the career advice and the real time feedback that you don't typically get as part of a real 95 00:07:07,390 --> 00:07:12,790 job application or job interview because there's liabilities associated with a job they don't want to 96 00:07:12,790 --> 00:07:17,130 tell you why why you didn't get the job and sort's difficult to improve your skills. 97 00:07:17,140 --> 00:07:20,440 So it's a tool for improving your interview skills. 98 00:07:20,860 --> 00:07:24,650 Yeah not only is it a tool for improving your actual interview skills. 99 00:07:24,670 --> 00:07:30,520 What we do is after the conversation takes place job seekers can extract highlights or excerpts from 100 00:07:30,520 --> 00:07:36,670 that live conversation and attach those answers to their HORNIK profile and attach that profile to their 101 00:07:36,670 --> 00:07:38,480 resume or cover letter. 102 00:07:38,550 --> 00:07:42,270 Are you going to Linked In profile to say hey listen you have my resume. 103 00:07:42,340 --> 00:07:47,620 But listen to me talking about Google Analytics listen to me talking about overcoming an objection from 104 00:07:47,620 --> 00:07:48,560 a customer. 105 00:07:48,560 --> 00:07:55,240 Now listen to me answering a question from her rigorous mock interview about you know putting together 106 00:07:55,240 --> 00:08:00,460 a real time programmatic media buy or an online client of hers. 107 00:08:00,850 --> 00:08:06,580 Ever see a friction between recruiters who may have heard about it. 108 00:08:06,810 --> 00:08:11,940 You get a tweet from a candidate and say what's the tone if they know. 109 00:08:11,940 --> 00:08:13,960 I don't know if I'm gonna go check that out. 110 00:08:14,590 --> 00:08:17,930 Well we're actually we're actually providing a lot of value to recruiters. 111 00:08:18,150 --> 00:08:23,350 Workers spent eight seconds looking at a resume to decide if they want to invest another 20 minutes 112 00:08:24,090 --> 00:08:27,130 and 20 minutes would be it by the form of a phone interview. 113 00:08:27,160 --> 00:08:32,500 The problem is Phone interviews are it take time and we're going to ask you so many incoordination and 114 00:08:32,500 --> 00:08:39,670 so what we're giving is a chance for a recruiter to hear within 30 seconds the enthusiasm the passion 115 00:08:39,790 --> 00:08:45,460 the soft skills that they really want to understand from the applicant without having to invest 30 minutes 116 00:08:45,460 --> 00:08:47,010 of time talking to that person. 117 00:08:47,020 --> 00:08:52,210 So maybe I mean just coming from my experience like where it's hard to get her attention to get there 118 00:08:52,210 --> 00:08:59,200 being with me mean do you think that maybe this is a good tool or a good part of your profile to showcase. 119 00:08:59,200 --> 00:09:05,160 Once you're sort of in a networking situation where you actually have a a message for example a job 120 00:09:05,160 --> 00:09:10,930 recruiter or directly and say hey this is my portfolio you might be familiar with it yet but it's a 121 00:09:10,930 --> 00:09:14,530 really cool way to get to know me a little bit more in-depth without having to actually interview me 122 00:09:14,530 --> 00:09:15,830 or something like that. 123 00:09:16,270 --> 00:09:17,160 Exactly that. 124 00:09:17,170 --> 00:09:22,220 And also we talked about being in a career transition if you're looking to change anything about you 125 00:09:22,210 --> 00:09:24,150 know if you're looking to do something different than what. 126 00:09:24,210 --> 00:09:24,820 Exactly. 127 00:09:24,850 --> 00:09:25,680 Exactly. 128 00:09:25,740 --> 00:09:31,480 But for this is that platform where you can be proactive and get in front of those known weaknesses 129 00:09:31,480 --> 00:09:36,580 or known gaps to say hey listen yes I've been a marketing manager of pharmaceutical industry. 130 00:09:36,610 --> 00:09:42,320 I'm really passionate about getting into advertising technology and want to be a market manager there. 131 00:09:42,370 --> 00:09:44,740 This is what I've done to learn about tech. 132 00:09:44,740 --> 00:09:48,670 These are the events I've gone to here this is my daily groggery and you can articulate that at the 133 00:09:48,670 --> 00:09:53,500 beginning of the process because a recruiter is going to look at your resume and say oh no an attack 134 00:09:53,830 --> 00:09:57,130 or no industry X you know. 135 00:09:57,350 --> 00:09:59,340 Yeah yeah totally. 136 00:09:59,500 --> 00:10:06,570 So you know one thing I was wondering also something like Is there anything that you would want to like. 137 00:10:06,640 --> 00:10:07,550 Do you tweet. 138 00:10:07,600 --> 00:10:08,740 You know do you. 139 00:10:09,090 --> 00:10:10,610 I don't know anything that you do. 140 00:10:10,720 --> 00:10:15,130 You know you let people know what's going on in your head in the world the job. 141 00:10:15,190 --> 00:10:16,170 And. 142 00:10:17,010 --> 00:10:20,850 Yeah we were trying to get better at that. 143 00:10:21,220 --> 00:10:27,060 You know it's interesting there's a lot of there's a lot of career advice out there. 144 00:10:27,080 --> 00:10:28,210 Right. 145 00:10:28,450 --> 00:10:37,480 I think what we're trying to do though is is make it a bit more realistic and more modern and rather 146 00:10:37,480 --> 00:10:40,480 than hearing it from from a career coach or a career counselor. 147 00:10:40,480 --> 00:10:44,680 What we want to give it you know a job seeker the ability to hear that from someone who is a hiring 148 00:10:44,680 --> 00:10:48,540 manager during the day from someone who does an interview. 149 00:10:48,570 --> 00:10:53,480 And you know top top flight and the company is to have a very high bar for talent. 150 00:10:53,770 --> 00:11:00,060 And you know the conversation through it goes well with these experts that expert can then recommend 151 00:11:00,060 --> 00:11:03,360 you to to work and to work at temblor et cetera. 152 00:11:03,540 --> 00:11:05,170 So it could be that you asked. 153 00:11:05,250 --> 00:11:07,440 Well it's not an interview at one of those companies. 154 00:11:07,500 --> 00:11:14,610 It's a chance to you know to go through the ringer and you know if you perform well not only can you 155 00:11:14,610 --> 00:11:21,450 leverage the answers that you do well on your profile but you could also you know give a good impression 156 00:11:21,450 --> 00:11:23,740 with the decision maker and one of these firms. 157 00:11:23,760 --> 00:11:24,610 Cool. 158 00:11:24,610 --> 00:11:27,200 All right well thanks for taking the interview. 159 00:11:27,210 --> 00:11:29,220 I know that people appreciate that. 160 00:11:29,310 --> 00:11:30,000 All right. 161 00:11:30,000 --> 00:11:30,850 Thanks for the opportunity.