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Ghosted to hired: Katie’s vision for ethical, profitable recruiting · AI for Founders with Ryan Estes

0:00
Hi everyone. Welcome back to AI for Founders.
0:02
I'm Ryan Estes and today's episode is about to flip your
0:05
entire hiring mindset upside down.
0:08
My guest is Katie Clark Fortunato, the powerhouse Co
0:12
founder of Jobstream. She's not just building
0:15
software, she's rethinking the whole idea of talent pipelines.
0:19
You know, all those job applicants your company ghosted?
0:22
Katie says they're not dead ends, they're your greatest
0:24
untapped asset. In this episode, we talk about
0:27
using AI to reengage rejected candidates, convert them into
0:31
new hires, and even turn them into revenue streams.
0:34
That's right, revenue from people you didn't hire.
0:37
She breaks down how the Jobstream engine a modular tech
0:40
stack that puts AI behind the scenes and the human experience
0:44
front and center. It's smart, it's actionable, and
0:47
it just might save your employer brand from a dumpster fire.
0:50
Let's get into it. But first, some business.
0:52
This episode for AI for founders is brought to you by Kick
0:55
Caster, the podcast agency for entrepreneurs.
0:58
If you're a founder, you already know building your brand is a
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All right, Katie, thank you so much for joining me.
2:45
I know you want me to call you Smiley, but I'm just
2:47
uncomfortable with it. I'm.
2:49
Very uncomfortable with it and I hope my college friends don't
2:52
say this. I love that.
2:54
Why did they call you smiley? I'm assuming because you smile a
2:57
lot. Oh my gosh, I didn't know you
3:00
were going to ask me that. Wait, so the, the real reason is
3:04
there was a boy. He actually, he owns a really
3:08
successful cybersecurity company now and he told his roommate
3:14
that. I made him smile and then they
3:16
all called me that forever. They still do is.
3:19
He the one that got away or what?
3:22
I'm sorry. Is he the one that got away?
3:24
No. No, no, no, not at all.
3:26
I know I met my husband on Bumble.
3:30
Nice, incredible. So we met through Hampton and I.
3:33
I don't have the affiliate link. I'm not giving a shout out to
3:37
Hampton or encouraging anyone to go, although it's been great for
3:41
me. But what's your experience been
3:42
like on Hampton? Hampton is, so I'm going to
3:46
remember two months in. I would say kind of like any
3:50
other subscription, you kind of get out of it what you put in.
3:53
I've tried to make a concentrated effort to at least
3:57
once a week check in, see who's in my DMS, but see what is the
4:02
chatter. My go to channel is the AI talk
4:06
and obviously being in the AI world, I'm I'm looking for the
4:12
nerdiest of nerds vibe coding out and building the coolest
4:16
things together. So that's what I'm looking for.
4:19
I've also met a few really great people like yourself.
4:24
Well, thanks Katie, and it is really cool to connect with
4:26
people on there. Like and shout out to Pete Cena
4:28
and Dave Siffery. They're always crushing in that
4:31
AI channel. You know, one thing that I think
4:33
that it really stressed to me was like the the need for that
4:37
kind of like connection with peers is huge.
4:40
And I know they're kind of moving to like an in person
4:42
model. So I'm not sure what they're
4:45
doing in Denver, but I just started going to a bunch of
4:47
different events and it's been so cool.
4:49
You know, I mean, I, I find myself being the guy at the, the
4:52
bar that just talks to the first person I find for the whole
4:56
night. So you, if I'm just there in the
4:58
capacity, it's like, Hey, how can I help you?
4:59
What are you working on? It's just it's so fun to to be
5:02
curious about what people are up to.
5:04
It is. And just looking at other
5:07
professional communities is, you know, there's the the kind of
5:11
legacy YPO it's I feel like a little bit more rigorous when
5:16
you're looking and evaluating these kinds of communities.
5:18
And the slack nature of Hampton just kind of fits into my
5:22
everyday, you know? Totally, totally agree.
5:26
Amazing. So I want to talk about your
5:28
your company or at least use your company as context to kind
5:32
of get to know you a little bit. So I know you've got kind of a
5:36
legacy company and you're also splintering off and going in
5:39
some like really new innovative directions.
5:41
So tell us a little bit about the business.
5:44
Yes. So the business that I'm working
5:46
on right now, it's called job stream.
5:47
It's an AI matching technology and it's a new category.
5:54
Imagine if I think we've all been here, but we apply to a
5:58
job, we get rejected and we get that little we regret to inform
6:03
you subject line and then that's it.
6:07
Imagine if there was, we regret to inform you and here's three
6:12
more jobs from our network that we think you would be a perfect
6:16
fit for. And that just created this
6:20
amazing brand engagement that went from such a negative black
6:24
hole experience into something really positive and powerful.
6:28
So what Jobstream is doing is connecting at contacts from your
6:34
applicant tracking system, your CRM, any job seeker candidate
6:39
and connecting them with over 5 million live jobs from employers
6:43
who are actively, actively looking for candidates to fill
6:47
roles. It's incredible.
6:49
And you know, if anybody's kind of dealt with the hiring process
6:52
right now, it's a bear. You know, with your options, you
6:55
put it on LinkedIn, you get 2000 applications overnight or Indeed
7:00
or any of the kind of major job boards.
7:02
It's really hard, you know, and you go through the process, you
7:05
whittle it down from 2000 to one person.
7:07
That can be kind of exhausting. And one thing I know that we've
7:10
talked about is that it's tough when you have three or four
7:13
people that you really 3 candidates, you're like, God,
7:15
they're all great. It's just kind of a gut check
7:17
and you go with a person like what do you do with those other
7:20
people? And this is a perfect
7:21
opportunity to give them these, these, these resources.
7:24
Is that kind of the the spirit of the thing?
7:27
Yeah, the spirit of it is, you know, and take also maybe like a
7:30
legacy brand, they've built up a few years worth of contacts and
7:35
on average every job gets about 400 applications.
7:39
And the recruiters are really only looking at the 1st 20 that
7:43
come in and they're spending 20 seconds just screening it if
7:47
they're not using AI, which they they should.
7:51
But what happens to the 98% of people who are not even getting
7:56
seen? And I read something on Forbes
7:58
that it's only 3% of candidates ever even receive a note back
8:04
like an e-mail saying we regret to inform you.
8:06
So the etiquette, the experience, it has really
8:11
changed and in a in a bad way. So job stream is kind of that it
8:16
creates new value within the ecosystem of what your hiring
8:21
process and talent process already is.
8:23
You bet. So it is.
8:24
There's financial incentive for brands to use it as well.
8:27
Is that right? Is that basically the business
8:29
model? So the business model is you are
8:33
really capitalizing on ROI, whereas you spend, let's take a
8:39
company who has a recruitment marketing budget.
8:41
They are paying on LinkedIn and Indeed to publish their job,
8:46
casting a wide net, trying to get as many applicants as
8:48
possible. And they only care about the one
8:51
person who gets the role. So they spent all this money
8:54
upfront and then ask a ask a business, what do you do with
8:58
the people who get rejected? Well, nothing.
9:00
And I had this chat with a client a few days ago.
9:04
It's like, well, then after the jobs close, what happens to
9:06
that, that that list in that data?
9:09
Well, nothing. It just sits there.
9:10
So this becomes your way to tap back into the database that
9:16
you've already invested in and built and re engage those
9:21
people. Take your dormant list and you
9:24
know that they came to you looking for a job, why not offer
9:27
them another job? To your point about
9:30
monetization, there is ROI that happens there.
9:34
On the other hand, this is a new category as well that's called
9:38
affiliate. And very much like the creator
9:41
affiliate market, it's referring jobs from other paying
9:45
advertisers. So that creates a, a income, a
9:51
revenue stream that the company never knew they had and consider
9:56
at a high volume as we're seeing, you know, these real
10:01
people who are looking for real jobs, They are motivated to find
10:04
something. And you're not only helping
10:06
them, but you know, you're, you're getting that data on them
10:11
and what they're looking for so that you can go back and re
10:13
engage with them at the right place at the right time.
10:16
You know, 'cause you know, like they're going to be clicking,
10:19
you know what they're looking for, you know what kind of
10:21
companies they want to work for, and now you have that perfect
10:23
role. AI match.
10:27
Still cool. It's so cool.
10:29
It's like the it's, it's the marketplace that was right under
10:31
your nose the whole time, you know, because you have large
10:34
supply side and then you just the demand is very small.
10:38
But then there's this whole other opportunity.
10:40
So let me walk through it. I'm I'm interviewing for a job.
10:44
I interview Sally. I really like her, but I'm not
10:46
going to hire her. So I send kind of a a polite
10:49
letter saying, Hey, we're it's not going to work for this time,
10:52
but we think you'd be great candidates for this, this and
10:55
this position if you want to check that out.
10:57
So because if she goes through Sally goes through higher or
11:02
goes through this one link, you know, ends up getting hired,
11:05
then is there a Commission on my side?
11:07
And then also is that where job stream gets paid?
11:11
So right you can make you can make your Commission in two
11:14
ways. 1 is on the click, so very traditional cost per click type
11:18
of advertising. The second is on the apply and
11:22
take a very hard to fill role like nursing for example.
11:27
Some of those payouts are $100 just to get somebody to apply
11:31
and if they complete the process they have a credentials like we
11:34
don't really know what happens on the hiring decision side, but
11:37
that is how motivated employers are that they would pay $100 to
11:41
have you apply. That's real money.
11:46
That's that's it's incredible and it's such a smart idea.
11:49
How'd you come up with this? So our business, our parent
11:53
company is called Higher Innovations and our core
11:56
business is Recruitix. And Recruitix was started about
11:59
13 years ago from kind of an early day indeed engineer and
12:05
with our company. And we started programmatic
12:08
advertising for jobs and kind of looking at the trends and what
12:12
was happening with traditional ad tech and martech.
12:15
It just wasn't happening for jobs.
12:18
And you know, if I might rag on our AI world for a minute, AI
12:23
hasn't quite figured it out this time either.
12:26
And so, you know, we're hoping to keep disrupting in in that
12:30
category as well. But the programmatic company is
12:34
currently working with over 200 Fortune 500 companies on their
12:39
talent strategy and they're managing their marketing spend.
12:42
They're doing smart targeting to try to get the right candidates
12:45
through the door. And I got into this because I'm
12:49
a second generation part of what is a family business.
12:52
And this was also not my career up until two years ago.
12:56
But I felt really like just so aligned with the mission and
13:00
where I was at the time and felt like I had the chops.
13:03
So applied for a role. I actually started Telivity,
13:07
which is a another startup under the umbrella.
13:10
And Telivity is AB to B marketplace.
13:13
It has thousands of software and technologies for hiring.
13:18
And what you can see right now is this technology is just
13:22
changing so quickly. The tools are getting so much
13:25
more sophisticated. There's a lot of like bundling
13:29
in the industry. So and navigating that is really
13:32
hard and Telivity brings clarity to how do I build my talent tech
13:38
stack, how do I optimize, how do I save money on the hiring
13:43
process and how do I retain my people.
13:47
Yeah, so cool. So who all from your family do
13:51
you work with? Well, we have Aceo, His name is
13:55
Adam Stafford. We are not related.
13:59
I work with our board and the board is comprised of a few
14:04
family members and weirdly I report to my father.
14:11
How does that go? It's all right.
14:14
I mean, when we're when we're at home, we were, you know, father
14:19
daughter. When we're at work, we are real
14:21
business partners and you know, I'm, I just feel so fortunate to
14:27
be in this position. But honestly, it's a great
14:29
working relationship and the board and, and he are very open
14:34
to kind of the next generation and ways of thinking.
14:37
And I think if I brought anything to our organization, I
14:41
worked at some big companies bringing rigorous process and
14:45
methodology and the a plan for optimization and continued
14:50
improvement is really helping us stay connected in this weird AI
14:53
world of like, how do we keep innovating with a very digital
14:58
like savvy new next generation coming in.
15:03
So I feel it poised to help lead that type of transformation
15:09
across the companies. It's so.
15:11
Cool it. You know, my my daughter's
15:13
heading off to study business in the fall as a freshman in
15:17
Mizzou, and it would be an absolute dream if she came out
15:21
of that and came work with me. What, what, what, what are some
15:24
ways I could absolutely blow that up?
15:26
How do you do that wrong? You know how you do that wrong?
15:31
You have her go and try to find a job, go through the process,
15:36
go through the applying and she's going to first hand see
15:40
how hard it is to get a bottom rung job.
15:46
It's not to say you need to know somebody to get a job, although
15:50
we do know that referrals is the number one way of getting hired.
15:55
So there's something to that, but it's also you want to try to
15:59
build a tool kit of skills. And what's great about this next
16:06
generation is they are, they have aptitude and agency.
16:09
They do, I think there is, I feel for them because you know,
16:13
their headlines of AI is taking the jobs.
16:15
But, and I'm not on this podcast to say that either AI is not
16:19
taking your jobs. It's AI is a very powerful tool
16:23
to help humans. So wherever she can get that
16:26
experience building is amazing. And I know you're a builder, so
16:29
I don't know why she wouldn't come work for you.
16:33
Yeah, I'd make her work for it, though.
16:34
You're going to have to interview with with HR.
16:40
You know, one thing that's important to me as I'm choosing
16:44
projects and and what to work on is kind of this Buddhist idea of
16:47
right livelihood. Like it's important for me to,
16:50
to do things in a way that I guess it's just acceptable to my
16:54
own moral compass, you know, And like hiring for sure.
16:57
And recruiting always seem like a very interesting space,
17:00
largely because it was so hard for me.
17:03
It's very hard for me. I actually early on, I kind of
17:06
took myself out of the hiring process really early because I
17:09
had the tendency to fall in love with everybody I'm talking to.
17:11
And I, I can't make a like a unbiased decision, you know, I'm
17:15
like, oh, they, they're trying so hard, you know.
17:19
And so I really think that this is an interesting place because
17:22
it's a way with job stream, It's a way to show kindness and
17:27
opportunity for people that you're rejecting.
17:30
And I maybe I have a problem with, with that too.
17:33
Maybe not a problem, but a challenge with rejecting people.
17:36
So how do you kind of like frame your work?
17:39
Is there kind of a Does it feel morally satisfying?
17:46
So hiring, hiring, it has just transformed so much.
17:52
And at the center of it, what we need is a person to come and
17:56
work for a business. So taking the entire human
18:00
aspects out of it is really not what we're trying to do.
18:03
We are using AI to like cut through the noise to get to the
18:06
right people so that we can have those amazing conversations and
18:09
fall in love with all the candidates.
18:11
What I tell other founders or people who are just starting out
18:15
to build their team, create a process like everyone's going to
18:19
get interviewed the same way. Not every candidate has the same
18:22
questions, right? But everybody's going to have to
18:25
submit and go through the HR interview first.
18:31
If you have HR and pre qualify before it gets to the CEO.
18:36
I would say to you, Ryan, you know, or anybody who falls in
18:40
love with every candidate, spend more time on their references,
18:43
spend twice as much time. And I just kind of made it a
18:47
rule. I want a minimum of three
18:49
references. I do them myself and I call a
18:52
manager, I call a peer and I call a subordinate or a client
18:55
partner. This, this has saved me so many
19:01
hours, time, money. I mean, having to go back to the
19:04
drawing board each time. Like I just get a real sense of
19:07
who this candidate is because they know that I'm going to love
19:09
them when I see them. You know, they've already made
19:12
it through. But getting that first hand
19:15
reference is is crucial. Yeah, those are tough, isn't it,
19:22
when you're following up with references and they're just
19:23
like, I can confirm that they did work here.
19:26
Yes, that's all I'm going to say.
19:28
You're like, OK, say less. So there is a yeah, I've learned
19:35
as a founder, there is a, there's a lot of subtext in
19:41
language and how you talk about your people.
19:44
And, you know, you asked how I approach it.
19:47
I just like our our belief. And my belief is that you cannot
19:52
have a great company without great talent and the right
19:54
talent that you need. So figure out, you know,
19:59
especially a founder has the privilege of building out this
20:02
culture. What is the dream world I want
20:05
to create for me and my team? Where do I want to be spending
20:08
the majority of my time every day?
20:10
It's an amazing opportunity to reset two things, right?
20:14
And and then there's also that the rejection thing.
20:19
But I mean, I always think as a kid, like you grow up in two
20:23
kinds of families, the ones who wrote thank you notes and the
20:25
ones who don't and. That is, you know, I'm on the we
20:30
write handwritten thing, you know, it's side.
20:32
So it's etiquette. It's a it's also, I mentioned
20:37
Bumble earlier, but they had a study that a not getting asked
20:43
out for a second date is not as worse of a feeling as not
20:48
hearing back from an interview. So that's worse.
20:51
Like getting rejected and ghosted is a worse emotional
20:56
toll than not getting asked out on a second date.
20:59
That's how I should have but. I believe it.
21:04
You know, I believe it. It's, it's, yeah.
21:08
And, you know, I, I've had interviews that I felt really
21:11
good about, you know, like, oh, this is happening and then you
21:13
don't get the job or you have a terrible interview.
21:16
You're like, I blew it. And you're, and then you get
21:18
offered the job. You know, there's so many
21:20
variables. And maybe you could speak to
21:22
that because from your chair, you're seeing, oh, thousands and
21:26
thousands of jobs Now for the recent college grads, let's say
21:29
in America, what they're hearing is AI is going to take your job.
21:33
Like you said. They're also seeing that like
21:35
the global workforce is being activated at massive scale.
21:39
You know, you there's folks from South Africa to Nigeria to
21:44
Mexico to the Philippines that are all willing to work American
21:48
hours and are willing to work at a fraction of the cost.
21:51
So what is the good news, perhaps, about the job market
21:56
for American grads right now? So for American grads right now,
22:01
I think they have an amazing opportunity being so already
22:05
digitally savvy and that can really help older organizations
22:11
with that digital transformation.
22:13
So I think they have this kind of like native, like I grew up
22:15
with technology more so than millennials.
22:19
So I think they have that as an advantage.
22:21
If there is a student coming out of school and they have 0
22:26
experience and they have this college degree and no
22:29
experience. I would say you just have to
22:34
find a job where you can learn skills and learn something
22:38
different. My first job, I was scooping ice
22:40
cream and making sandwiches. And I learned how to make the
22:45
perfect bite of that sandwich. And some people might
22:49
thoughtlessly put a sandwich together and and eat it, but you
22:52
know, this is a skill. It started that and then it was
22:55
interacting with customers. And then it was, oh, OK.
22:59
Like this local community started to recognize me.
23:02
I was their ice cream girl and I knew what flavor they wanted.
23:05
And I started learning relationship skills and of
23:09
course, business as well. Would you like 2 scoops or
23:12
three? OK, that'll be $10 actually, you
23:16
know, so you learn through all kinds of jobs where you can get
23:22
your hands on skills. And I think back to your
23:25
daughter or anybody's daughter in this case, if you have a
23:32
family business, I think it's a, it could be a really beautiful
23:35
thing to to create this multi generational workforce that I
23:41
think that's nice. And then the other thing that
23:43
I'm seeing creators, I haven't tried this myself, creators on
23:47
Instagram talking about snatching up every kind of blue
23:51
collar job and creating this conglomerate of services related
23:56
jobs and streamlining the operations with a digital like
24:01
center system. And you know, like if, if I was,
24:05
if I was looking for a plumbing business, I wouldn't just try to
24:08
find one. I would try to find 10 within a
24:10
30 mile radius and I would optimize the entire inner
24:14
workings of the company like that.
24:15
I think it would be a great business.
24:17
We will never not need that. 100% yeah.
24:21
I mean, it's, I think that's such great advice, you know, for
24:24
folks is like, you know, shoot for the moon, but like, settle
24:27
for the dirt. Because when my daughter was 14,
24:31
I, I pulled some strings with a buddy of mine who owns a couple
24:33
of restaurants. Like, she's 14, but she wants to
24:35
work. So hired Boy, did they, you
24:38
know, she was bussing tables in a really busy restaurant till
24:41
like, midnight sometimes. And she'd get off and be like,
24:44
Daddy, it's really hard. It sucks.
24:46
I'm like, yeah, yeah. I was like, having a job
24:50
sometimes is about learning what you don't want to do so that you
24:53
can go in the direction that you do.
24:55
So she's studying finance. OK, well, and finances, there
25:00
are plenty of jobs in finance and people will always need
25:03
banking and we will always need to manage money and wealth.
25:06
And that can go in so many directions.
25:10
You know, I, I see in the media, it's just, it looks really stark
25:14
for them. I think it was like 60% of
25:16
college grads are unemployed from this year.
25:19
Yeah. Crazy.
25:22
We're some of the best OK job stream.
25:25
How big is the team and how did you finance this project?
25:28
Is it is it independently financed?
25:30
Was it kind of brought up under the the parent organization?
25:34
So it was brought up under the parent organization and about
25:39
six months ago we launched this innovation lab and under the
25:42
premise of how can we keep innovating for our existing
25:47
clients. The number one thing that we
25:49
hear that organizations are having is it's like the number
25:53
one business challenge overall. It's really hard to hire the
25:57
right people or I can't hire the right people.
26:01
And what they mean is like cost effectively quickly enough
26:04
etcetera. On the second problem, it's how
26:08
do I retain my great talent. And again, we see this in the
26:12
headlights with the headlines with the the meta talent war
26:16
that's going on and the hundreds of millions of dollars that is
26:20
being thrown at top AI engineers.
26:24
It's a real war on talent. And I think that's not changing.
26:30
So we started thinking about how can we help our clients with
26:36
every aspect of their talent, you know, process.
26:41
And there is a whole litany of problems.
26:44
It's, you know, you started out saying a tsunami of job
26:49
applications. And I'd say probably the biggest
26:52
risk today, and if I was a founder, I would check right
26:55
away, is do you have cyber defenses in your hiring process?
27:01
And sometimes we don't think of that.
27:04
But right now, what's going on? The FBI sent out a public
27:08
service announcement saying you have to be careful for the
27:12
cybersecurity IT hires. They are hacking every step of
27:16
your hiring process. They are getting into your
27:18
companies. They are in IT, learning your
27:21
systems, taking your code, taking your money and funneling
27:25
it back to the regime in China as well.
27:28
So hiring north. Korea.
27:30
North Korea, Yeah, It's so crazy.
27:34
I mean, hiring, if you don't have these safeguards in place,
27:39
one of those bad actors could take out your whole company.
27:44
So This is why we need to care about the hiring experience.
27:47
And there's a few things like you can do that.
27:50
Are they sound like common sense, But when you're moving so
27:52
fast, they get missed. And you know, every founder
27:56
should be thinking, should be thinking this way, like putting
28:00
those checks and balances in place.
28:03
Yeah, those are the the big stories I was actually thinking
28:06
about. They want to talk to you about
28:07
that. North Korean spies are
28:09
infiltrating companies with remote jobs and stealing
28:12
everything. And then what's going on with
28:15
Zuckerberg where he's offering senior AI developers like NBA
28:20
level contracts, you know, $10 million signing bonuses and
28:24
like, it's, it's pretty crazy. And I, I wonder if that's just
28:29
symptomatic. I, I hate to get doom and gloom
28:32
or I hate to admit that I love to get doom and gloom.
28:36
But it sure certainly seems like a part of what AI is going to
28:39
bring is like a new super elite class that, that lives in some
28:44
kind of like God Mode while the rest of us have like really cool
28:50
tools and delicious meals, you know, served to us by robots.
28:54
It's it's fascinating. I really hope the world isn't
28:57
going in that direction so far, but certainly there is.
29:04
There's cybersecurity risk, there's fraud, there's bad
29:08
actors, there's just like it. It also is a national security
29:13
issue. So one of our partners is close
29:17
to helping with drones and creating these, like, drones in
29:23
combat. What we discovered is they have
29:26
an amazing community of top AI engineers, MIT, Harvard,
29:32
everything. And, you know, I think what
29:36
you're also saying is like, you really need good and trusted
29:40
talent to run your company, and that's why Facebook is shelling
29:43
out a lot of money. Yeah.
29:50
Amazing. I I'm ready for the founder
29:52
Challenge questions. Are you ready for the Founder
29:55
Challenge? Questions, Katie.
29:57
I hope so. I hope they are not about my
29:59
nicknames anymore. No, and shout out to your
30:03
husband. I I, I I felt like I was like
30:06
talking about whatever what's his name in college for way too
30:09
long. We forgot about him a long time
30:12
ago. All right, Smiley, here we go.
30:16
We've got we've got 4 categories to choose from.
30:21
OK, we have tough and unfiltered, we have scandalous
30:24
and risky, we have explosive and intriguing and we have raw
30:29
philosophy and self reflection. What category would you like?
30:34
What was the first one? Let's do that one.
30:37
Health and unfiltered. You got it.
30:40
OK, And this this is brought to you by kidcaster.com.
30:43
These are the founder challenge questions.
30:46
So what's the worst advice you've ever taken from a mentor
30:50
or advisor? The worst advice I've ever taken
30:55
is to copy the way that that person did it.
30:59
And this is when I was learning and, you know, rising the ranks.
31:04
And sometimes you're pressured to do what your boss tells you,
31:07
and in some cases, yes you should.
31:10
In others, you were hired to do a job and there is something
31:13
that you know that they don't 'cause you're on the inside of
31:16
your job. And not only that, just have a
31:20
core set of values, like if it goes against your grain, don't
31:24
do it. And if you say no, what is the
31:27
worst that could happen? Likely it'll get reassigned or
31:32
you figure out a way around it. Find a compromise, Negotiate it.
31:39
What part of your startup do you still feel like you're
31:42
bullshitting through? What am I bullshitting through?
31:49
So the AI matching, it really works.
31:54
The part that I can't control is how the algorithm keeps
31:59
changing. So we need to stay on top of
32:02
that. And, you know, what are these AI
32:05
sources? What changes are they making?
32:07
And that's the part that's the unknown.
32:11
Luckily, we're on top of it. We're keeping up with it.
32:16
I think somebody the other day had said, wow, the matching is
32:19
really good. It's like going to Indeed and
32:21
looking for the job that you want.
32:23
I was like, see, like, that's it.
32:26
That's cool. And is there a way to safeguard
32:29
that or put guardrails on it by using multiple LLMS and like
32:33
frost matching? What's What's the secret sauce
32:35
without giving away the secret sauce?
32:37
I'm not going to give away the secret sauce, but of course we
32:40
need guardrails. Yes, I want to start introducing
32:43
layers and LLMS and different agents and different like fact
32:49
checking things. I think what is the difference
32:53
though is we're sitting on a network of data that is almost
32:57
bigger than anywhere else and that's our jobs network.
33:01
That's our proprietary stream of job openings that are coming
33:06
from actively promoting employers that like the data
33:10
element. And this kind of understanding
33:13
of the hiring cycles is I think, what really differentiates us.
33:18
Yeah, cool. What's a metric you publicly
33:21
celebrated but privately you knew was meaningless?
33:27
When we doubled our send rate, it got us much closer to product
33:34
market fit and we doubled it in a day.
33:38
And at that time, the number was like we only had made 600
33:44
matches. And so it went from 300 to 600.
33:49
But why that was so amazing was because it validated the
33:54
technology and the product in that instance, whereas like
33:59
until we got to that point, we weren't able to have that
34:02
percentage of success. So I was like we doubled our, we
34:06
doubled our business and it was at the time only 600 so.
34:14
I love it, but that's also you got to celebrate the small wins
34:16
because a wins a win. You know, that's right.
34:20
You know, if I, if I, if I won, win 5 bucks on a bet with my
34:24
son, it's only 5 bucks, but it's worth so much more because it's
34:27
a win. Totally.
34:33
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defining together. Nice.
35:48
You know, I had the pleasure to talk to amazing women that our
35:51
founders CEOs on this show. What's your experience been like
35:55
as a woman and a founder? So I feel like I had always
36:01
reported into women, worked for some really high-powered career
36:08
women and you know, those were my role models as a founder.
36:12
It's totally different. And when I was running Tlivity,
36:16
we built that marketplace. I told you of a couple thousand
36:22
HR technology companies and I said, I wanna do a dinner in New
36:26
York City. And we've got tons of people in
36:28
New York. And I found five people out of
36:32
2000 who were women in New York. And then I looked, then I dug
36:37
into the data and was like, so how many women are founders of
36:40
the companies that we're talking to?
36:42
2% and then I started getting really interested in that
36:47
number. Why is that and I just think
36:50
we're I hope the tide's turning but you know the women are now
36:55
on more boards than ever. I think I've seen the most
36:58
fundraising towards women based companies over the past two
37:02
years in venture capital. So I think it's changing.
37:05
I think it's heading in the right direction.
37:08
I think it's what is weird is being in a room full of men
37:14
who've been used to being in a room full of men.
37:18
And, you know, I think at first I felt like the note taker, but
37:25
that's not why I'm here. So I, you know, I feel like I
37:29
have to try harder than others to get my points across.
37:33
The way I do that is I try to speak very much in in terms of
37:38
numbers and that seems to help move the needle when it when I
37:43
need to. But yeah, it's totally weird.
37:47
I'd say what's different about the millennials, millennial, but
37:52
like our the majority of our mothers probably weren't as they
37:58
weren't in the workforce for as long.
38:00
And I can say on my hand on like almost every single one of my
38:04
friends is working with kids and balancing it all.
38:12
And so it's just different. Yeah, it is.
38:16
And I think it is generational for sure.
38:17
I mean the boomers it's it's still kind of it's it was rare.
38:21
But I mean it's it's hard for me to have like a real gauge on it
38:24
because I mean I had Co founders that are women clients that are
38:27
women. Like it never never struck me.
38:29
But I like to ask that question because I'm curious if it's
38:33
like, if it might just be a preference, like do you, how is
38:36
it with your friends? Do you think women are just not
38:39
interested in like founding companies as much?
38:43
I mean, we're speaking broadly in generalizations here.
38:45
I know. But it's it's interesting.
38:47
What do you think? Well, what I'm seeing with this
38:51
next generation in particular is they're all very entrepreneurial
38:56
and enterprising and they're figuring out how to create
39:01
revenue streams for themselves. And I'm not talking about they
39:04
want to start a company. They're just learning
39:06
independently. How can I like, what is the
39:08
skill? And that's the thing that people
39:11
want from me that I can sell. So I feel like I see more of
39:14
that. And I think the creator economy,
39:17
influencer economy is, is really helping create this new vertical
39:21
of entrepreneurship. Do I think women don't want to?
39:26
No, I think women do want to. I think it comes down to life,
39:32
like who's got the, the logistics of life?
39:35
Who's picking up our children at 3:00 in the afternoon?
39:39
Remote work has changed the game and for the better.
39:43
I don't think I'd be in my seat if we didn't have a remote work
39:47
policy. And you know, I, I love it so
39:51
much. Our head of growth, she is a
39:53
digital nomad. And I say if the company's
39:55
growing and she's everywhere, it, it can work.
39:58
It doesn't work for all companies.
40:00
For ours, it's it's doing OK. So and that's why we created
40:04
anywhere August. So in August, we all, you know,
40:09
find our corner and pocket of the world and and work remote
40:12
and it's something that we like, love to share.
40:16
So cool, you know, and for any female potential founders that
40:21
are listening, 1 great thing about founding your company is
40:24
you get to decide when you pick up and drop off your kids.
40:27
You know, my, my wife and I operated a business that we own
40:33
for the entire time that our kids were growing up.
40:36
And it was so wonderful for our family.
40:38
It was just great, you know? It's an interesting dynamic.
40:43
Couple of questions here for you.
40:44
This has been really cool. I love that you were out here
40:47
doing podcast interviews, really putting yourself out out into
40:51
the the world and putting the company on your shoulders.
40:54
Why is founder LED marketing important to you?
40:58
Founder LED marketing, it's important because you need
41:00
visibility, but I also want to connect with people who really
41:04
have this problem with their hiring and know that they, you
41:09
know, have somebody who is, is got, you know, the, the backings
41:13
of a very deep understanding of how to fix the problem.
41:19
And, you know, I think, I don't know, I think it's, I think I
41:27
lost the question. So founder LED marketing.
41:33
Yeah. OK.
41:34
So I think founder LED marketing is important because, you know,
41:39
you're you are the person who knows what the problems are the
41:44
best, if that makes sense. Yeah.
41:46
And you must have visibility to have a successful business.
41:53
And not only that, what we're doing at Jobstream and across
41:57
the board at Higher Innovations is changing people's lives.
42:01
We're helping people. I mean, I don't know, we cannot
42:05
have our homes, our cars, do anything without a job and an
42:09
income. So when you think about that,
42:12
it's your livelihood. It's important for people to
42:17
show up and be passionate if they are.
42:19
And that's why I'm really excited to talk about our work.
42:22
But, you know, hiring is everywhere.
42:25
I, you know, on every level the NFL is a hiring problem and
42:32
we're obsessed with it. Totally.
42:35
And what are some red flags if people are out there applying
42:38
for jobs, what are some red flags that this job, this
42:41
company, this is a bad fit for you?
42:44
So what I would look at is what is called an employer brand and
42:48
their employer brand is their brand, but what did employees
42:52
say about the company? And if founders don't know what
42:55
employer brand is, you have an amazing opportunity to be really
42:59
good at it and figuring out what are the values that and culture
43:04
that you want in your company. You, you need to make sure
43:06
you're marketing that and it's out for the world to see.
43:09
So I would say red flags to look for go to Reddit, go to
43:14
Glassdoor, go to indeed, go to Facebook.
43:16
What are people saying who are inside the company about working
43:20
there? What you can do if you get to
43:22
the interview stage is ask, you know, what's what's the tenor of
43:25
these people? Why is the role open?
43:27
Is it a new position or did someone leave?
43:29
There are clues everywhere. So I think there's a lot of
43:34
online discovery and also for for a brand, it's actually
43:39
something you really need to manage.
43:41
And it's this kind of debate is this sits with the marketing
43:45
team. Does this sit with the HR team?
43:47
It sits with, it sits with the top Because if it's not coming
43:52
from the founder who's overseeing HR, it's not going to
43:55
happen. And bad brand reputation could
44:00
have a real material cost on your bottom line, all because
44:05
you ghosted a candidate in the wrong way.
44:08
Well, and founders don't let the HR team merge with the marketing
44:12
team. I had some guy telling me a way
44:14
to do a LinkedIn hack for your your brand page by hosting fake
44:19
jobs because applicants have to like the page in order to submit
44:23
an application. So they're like, yeah, you could
44:26
get like 20,000 followers on your LinkedIn page.
44:28
And like, dude, that's so dark. Don't do that to people.
44:32
Make them apply for a job that doesn't exist so you can get
44:35
LinkedIn likes. Like all the things.
44:38
And absolutely. And people are doing that to
44:40
mine data and it's not right. And a job stream.
44:43
We, we actually don't work with LinkedIn.
44:45
We don't work with Indeed. We're really kind of striving
44:50
for a better experience because, you know, candidates deserve
44:53
that. It's hard to be a candidate.
44:55
It's hard to hire the right people, but it is hard to be a
44:57
job seeker right now. So yeah, those are other signals
45:01
to watch out for. Usually you can tell if they
45:04
like expire and then get reposted.
45:08
Yeah, totally. Watch out for that.
45:10
OK? As we're coming to time.
45:11
You've been so generous. I really appreciate it.
45:13
Katie, this has been so fun. If you could put anything on a
45:16
billboard in Times Square, what would it be?
45:19
OK, can I have two things I paid?
45:23
22 billboards, all right. Without having any politics as
45:28
part of this, but it's make hiring human again.
45:33
And I think that's just because we've gotten lost in technology.
45:37
It has become so easy to 1 kit click apply to all the jobs that
45:42
you see. And you know, for the reason
45:45
that you just said, people companies are using using jobs
45:50
as data collection. So there's a lot of, you know,
45:54
let's let's bring the human back.
45:56
And then the second thing I would say is just because in my
46:01
spare time, I'm a serial vibe coder.
46:04
But anybody who's not thinking this way, it's a little bit
46:07
meant to scare you, but automate yourself before AI automates
46:12
you. And I loved your you had a host
46:15
on a few weeks ago and it was like automate one feeling
46:19
overwhelmed, automate one process every day.
46:21
And that is so true. And everyone should be learning,
46:26
upskilling, becoming the master in their role with AIA is not
46:30
going to replace you if you can own it.
46:34
Amazing what what are you vibe coding?
46:36
Are you doing little projects or you're doing like agent support
46:40
and stuff for work? Both, and I'd say 11 tip for
46:46
founders is if you want to stay innovative, give your entire
46:50
team a license to Lovable or Replit.
46:54
My team loves Lovable and so that's why we use that, but also
46:57
our CEO and I like Replit as well.
47:01
But Lovable makes it easy to bring those ideas into the
47:04
prototype stage without having to get your design resources,
47:09
your engineers pulled off of the things that they're doing.
47:13
And it also has just made communicating new ideas so much
47:18
easier. And it's less of like a, a, a
47:22
brief on a board. It's here's what it looks like
47:26
we should do this. That's been amazing.
47:30
So that's what I'm that's what I'm always vibe coding the
47:32
things I'm vibe coding. I've got a litany of projects,
47:38
but many are solving the same kind of problems and hiring.
47:43
But and this is also like a teaser for our road map.
47:45
But like there's, you know, companies, employees are kind of
47:52
becoming more fractional, the gig economy and something like
47:57
40% of people also have a second job.
48:00
And it's very challenging for companies to manage this.
48:03
And back to the cyber risk and fraud and compliance, companies
48:09
don't really manage their contractors the same way they
48:11
manage their employees. And why is that?
48:13
You know, it's, it doesn't, it doesn't make any sense because
48:17
in some ways they're still representative of your company.
48:20
They still need to have the training.
48:22
They still need to know who the brand is.
48:24
So I'm vibe coding this product to help centralized that and it
48:30
connects HR, people, managers, budgets, everything.
48:36
It's so cool. I love contractors too.
48:38
They're so talented, you know, they, they, yeah, it, it's a
48:41
different mindset, you know, and it's a lot like a founder mount
48:44
mindset. When you're a contractor, you're
48:45
like, OK, my, my work is my client, you know, So what are we
48:50
going to do? I love it.
48:52
We do live vibe coding on here sometimes, which is so fun.
48:55
We'll just come with up with an idea and prototype it and, and
48:59
get an MVP and we, we shoot for 1/2 an hour.
49:03
And I, I would really be interested in other founders.
49:05
Please reach out to me on what kind of little side projects
49:08
you're doing with vibe coding because I found it to be, you
49:11
know, 1 incredibly like creative and liberating, but also really
49:16
helps you understand like what people want and how they're
49:19
using different tools. I made this cool little app.
49:23
I used agent mode for GPT to go scrape this website that has all
49:27
these health and Wellness providers here in Denver.
49:30
So it's like acupuncturist, therapist, massage therapist,
49:34
all these kind of people, their picture, their contact info, all
49:37
that. And then I created this little
49:39
app that was like vibe Wellness. So you just you answer a little
49:43
quiz about like what you're into, what you like, what, what
49:46
modalities work for you. And then it matches you based
49:50
on, you know, the attributes of of all these therapists.
49:53
And it's like, and so I published it just to see like
49:56
what would happen. I think 2300 clicks, you know,
50:00
so, So what I'm looking for now is like you, you put something
50:04
like this into the world. It's going to have initial, you
50:06
know, hit for like people are hitting it.
50:08
Maybe they're sharing it with their friend or whatever.
50:10
But if it dips, but if it has another resurgent again, this is
50:14
a a great kind of signal that like you have the the smidgen of
50:19
product market fit, like you at least have found an audience
50:22
that sees this is novel enough to engage with it.
50:25
So, you know, for founders like testing tools, like you really
50:28
got to start vibe coding and and for me to to just engage in
50:32
something completely out out of my sphere, you know, Wellness or
50:35
whatever. It's just a fun little thing,
50:37
you know? It sounds fun, but as you're
50:40
talking, so this Wellness revolution is also overtaking
50:44
the workforce and it's becoming a core retention tactic.
50:49
So I feel like you've got a market, Ryan, where if you
50:53
haven't already thought of this already, but going to employers
50:56
and saying, hey, I've got this really cool Wellness tool.
50:59
It doesn't cost you anything and it's going to help your
51:03
employees find and connect to the resources that personally
51:06
are meaningful to them. But I feel like you have
51:10
something there. I'm.
51:12
Gonna publish it exactly like that and report back to you to
51:15
see what they say. OK.
51:18
Amazing Katie, this has been so fun.
51:21
Where can people connect with you online?
51:23
Connect with me on LinkedIn or check out higherinnovations.com
51:28
is our holding company. That's oh wait I just joined
51:35
TikTok. OK.
51:37
All right. You going to you going to put
51:38
some content out there of. Course, I've been posting every
51:41
day for the last week. See how it goes.
51:44
I'll find you on there. Yeah, OK.
51:47
Thanks so much, Katie. I really appreciate it.
51:49
Ryan, thanks for having me. Hey founders, let me ask you
51:53
this. Are you building with AI or
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