One of the things that always strikes me about the jobs space is that most people think it’s decidedly unsexy when compared to the other “Web 2.0″ stuff that’s going on. It isn’t photosharing, it isn’t social bookmarking, and it isn’t an AJAX-infested online office suite, so why would someone want to be involved?
I myself got involved in the jobs space because I saw a business need that wasn’t being well-served… In short, I didn’t do it because I loved the recruiting/human resources game or because it was an exciting technical challenge, but because I felt that I could create a great product that people would buy. There are business-geeks and webtech-geeks… And I’m certainly a little of both. But it was definitely my inner business geek that drove me into this industry.
But, in my first few days at Jobster, my opinion on the sexiness of the jobs space is starting to change… And yours should too. Below are a few random points to consider:
- Jason Goldberg, our CEO (who is just a year older than I am), is a finalist of for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year. Here’s the press release. Jason said in the meeting the other day that honor wasn’t for him, but rather for Jobster as a whole.
- As I’ve been ramping up, the Jobster .com development team has been wrapping up our next release. One of our VPs suggested to one of the team members that he should take a day or two off because he’d been working so hard. His response was that he’d rather dive into something new to keep his momentum. People here just plain love their jobs.
- In a management meeting yesterday, Jason said that Jobster was heavily discussed at a recruiting conference. During a presentation to hundreds of recruiters, a speaker asked people to raise their hand if they hadn’t heard of Jobster. Not a single hand went up. For a product that has barely existed for 12 months, that’s downright amazing. Jobster is turning the industry on its ear. You can’t get sexier than that.
- Everyone here is scary smart. Huge swaths of the team come from the technology companies that are considered by many to be where the dream jobs are. Think about that for a minute… People are leaving places like Amazon and Microsoft to go work in the jobs space.
- Jobster is generating lots of revenue. Where many Web 2.0 companies struggle with revenue-models, customers are tripping over themselves to buy our product. The sweet curve of sales growth is pretty darn sexy, especially when stock options are involved.
So, scoff at the jobs space if you like. But changing an industry that is measured in the tens of billions of dollars is pretty darn sexy if you ask me.
