The story of JobBindr…
It was March 2016, and by many accounts I was living the dream. I had a cushy job in San Francisco, working as an accountant for a mid-size tech company. I’d collected a solid sum in my savings account and had my own place in sunny San Bruno, about 20 minutes outside the city.
Two weeks later, I was jobless in Los Angeles, CA, with a credit card full of moving expenses. So begins my story — and what would later become the story of JobBindr.
My move from Silicon Valley to Los Angeles was not completely on a whim. My now fiancée had started nursing school, and I knew I wanted to be with her. With a couple years’ experience in Accounting at fast-paced startups, I thought it wouldn’t be too difficult to pick up my next gig.
Turns out, that was a little optimistic.
As the new kid in town lacking a network or familiarity with the LA tech scene, it was like finding my first job all over again. The internet was my only tool, so I used it. Indeed, Monster, Careerbuilder, AngelList, Craigslist, LinkedIn, Ziprecruiter, Glassdoor — you name it, I was likely on there. I applied to way over 100 jobs and, finally, began to hear back back by phone, text, or email.
But that’s when the real difficulty began.
I would get calls back from So-and-So, who was interested in me for the role of such-and-such. Who is this again? I couldn’t remember where I had applied, which versions of my various resumes and cover letters I had submitted, how much the job paid, what the company did, what the position was, and so on. I just couldn’t keep it all straight.
Worst yet, when I did get calls or interviews, it was abundantly clear that I was not the one in power. It’s a familiar story to anyone who’s been on an interview: the employer had what I wanted — the job — and they were testing me to see if I was worth it. As I struggled to research each company, anticipating interview questions and crafting the answers I thought they wanted, I was struck by how unequal the access to information was between me and my potential employer. I provided them with a job application and resume, nicely organized for their convenience. Mr. Interviewer sat back and relaxed with his online system listing the job candidates with all the information the could want about them, designed to make comparisons easy. Everything he needed to know was right there at his fingertips.
I hated every part the job search: it was stressful and chaotic, yet my life literally depended on it. When I finally managed to land a gig I was happy with, I moved on and tried to erase the nasty memories of the job search from my mind.
Fast forward to November 2016. My company was moving its operations out of state and closing the California office. I had to find a new job again!
At this point, I had no choice but to kick it into gear again. This time, however, I was going to do it right: organizing everything and track every detail about the jobs I’ve applied to. Since I was surely not the first person to face this problem, I looked around for existing solutions.
I began searching “easiest way to stay organized during job search,” “job search organizational tools,” and similar variants, but the results were outdated or incomplete. I called everyone I knew who had been on a job search in the past year or two to ask them how they stayed organized during their job search. Each person seemed to have their own idiosyncratic methods for dealing with the same problem. There was literally no single solution for this extremely common problem. Unbelievable.
Then I thought about my interviewers, and their softwares and databases with all the information about their applicants. Above all, their access to information — well organized and all in one place — gave them the clear upper hand in the interviewing process. From my previous jobs, I knew they used similar tools to manage their applicants, implementing Applicant Tracking Software (ATS) tools to keep track of all of the potential candidates, job postings, files, communications, and notes. Why don’t Job Seekers have something similar?
I described the problem to my best friend, Richard, during our weekly tradition of Friday night whiskey-and-business-ideas. We quickly realized how common the problem must be. If we could figure out a solution, we’d be helping everyone we knew had faced at one time or another. The inkling of a business idea was born…
So, taking the lead from the interviews I’d been on, I started a spreadsheet and repeated the following daily routine:
- Browse my top 15 job boards,
- Apply to a selection of jobs,
- Log the URL, date applied, job title, company, location, and salary in my spreadsheet.
- Sit back and wait for replies.
For each job, I took detailed notes, all in one place. I did research on some of the companies beforehand and plugged this into my spreadsheet as well. I had created a well-functioning system, and it started to pay off. As I began hearing back from employers (in person and via phone), my conversations were going much more smoothly. After a while, it felt like I was actually interviewing THEM. On more than one instance I even withdrew or ended the interview early: they did not meet my criteria and I would not settle.
It might sound crazy, but it follows simply from JobBindr’s vision: Job applicants are equal players in the market — they are businesses themselves.
Think about it for a second.
When a job seeker goes on a job search, they are like a business looking for a customer — the employer — that is willing to pay them for their services. You start out with a marketing brochure — your resume, a description of your services — your cover letter, and maybe a website showing your past work for other customers — your LinkedIn or personal website. If you’ve done a good enough job with these first steps, it leads to your sales pitch — the phone or on-site interview, and lastly, the sale — the job offer. And just as businesses can function much more effectively with the right tools for organizing their essential operations, applicants should be able to handle the job search much better with the right organizational tools tailored to the job search process.
As veterans of the stressful job search process, Richard and I decided that job seekers should not ever have to experience what I once did. The job search process is broken, and the job seeker too often gets the short end of the stick. Our goal is to clean it up and teach job seekers that it’s not that hard when you have the right tools and know-how. That’s the mission of JobBindr: to empower job seekers with organized, easy-to-use information, putting them on equal footing with employers.
JobBindr is a platform that allows you to log and keep track of your job applications and the details and documents involved, regardless of where you applied. From managing your to-do’s for an employer, researching a company before an interview, taking notes during your interviews, etc., JobBindr assists the job seeker so that they they never miss a beat or come off as disorganized or unprofessional.
Our Beta will be available before the end of the year, so keep a look out and sign up to be alerted at www.jobbindr.com.
