Skills & HiringVishnu Gopal

CTO, MobME.

Technology Mentor at Startup Village.

About meTechnology guy. Initial engineer who worked on SlideShare. HCI from UCL, UK.

Let’s jump in.

Skills & Hiring

Skillsnoun. the ability to do something well. expertise.

SkillsDifferent from acquired knowledge. Also not purely “experience”.

Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies. Gartner 2013.

SkillsExpertise in “in memory analytics” is different from a degree in Computer Science.

SkillsSkill development is also hard because of the increasing scale of technology inventions.

Computer Programming

DevOpsTDD

Agile

Design Patterns

Functional Languages

Premature optimisationLiterate

Programming

SkillsSeveral of the programming skills were only refined in the last 10 years. How do you build expertise in it?

SkillsWhat we need is a new framework to think about skills

Perpetual BetaSkills should be developed throughout one’s life. !Not to be acquired once but constantly developed.

SkillsA professional should think of himself as a startup. Constantly reinventing himself. Always learning.

Which of these should you learn?

SkillsThis is the same answer I give to startups. Pick something you are interested in. Pick something that has potential.

SkillsBut in life, things don’t go always as planned. So if that happens to you, pivot.

Btech

HCITech Guy

UX Guy(Persevere)

(Pivot)

Btech

HCITech Guy

UX Guy(Persevere)

(Pivot)

Pivot happened here

SkillsAs a professional, think of lifelong learning through multiple changing careers. Pivot & persevere based on learning.

Skills<small break for questions>

HiringMobME made 20Cr in top-line revenue last year. We started in 2005. We’re a 100+ person company.

Almost all great hires are through referrals. !We’ve had some success in campus hiring, but it’s too much of cost.

Direct Interviews

Referrals

Campus Hiring

Remote Consultants

Hiring Events

Direct Interviews

Referrals

Campus Hiring

Remote Consultants

Hiring Events

50+

30+

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<5

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Getting great referrals is the secret sauce for us. !To do that, we needed to build a great “company culture” !MobME as a “cool place to work”.

HiringIt is very difficult to find skilled talent. Very difficult for people outside Kerala to adjust to life here.

HiringMuch, much better if we had local talent. People who could learn new skills well. But not there yet.

HiringSo with Startup Village, we’re doing something to make a difference.

College Bootcamps Grade Zero

Entrepreneurs Funding & $$$

Startup Village has always been laser-focused on entrepreneurs.

College Bootcamps Grade Zero

Entrepreneurs Funding & $$$

We’re investing 21Cr into building this ecosystem in 2015-16.

Fab lab In cooperation with MIT Bits & Atoms Centre, a world-class Fab lab in SV.

College Bootcamps Grade Zero

Entrepreneurs Funding & $$$

But we want to cater to people who miss this funnel too. Turn them into skilled professionals. Because the ecosystem will demand it.

HiringWe’re thinking of build a skill development product for students & professionals. Still in early alpha stage.

HiringSo do come talk to me about it :)

Skills & HiringFinis. Questions?