How we built an automatic matching machine to connect talent to startups that are hiring — with zero lines of code.
In mid-March, the impact of the #coronavirus pandemic began to spread rapidly around the world, affecting our lives, livelihoods, the global economy, and shaking up our startup ecosystem here in Israel. With the unemployment rate rising quickly, we wanted to find a way to help talented jobseekers connect with startups that were hiring, both within and beyond our portfolio. So we launched the Aleph Anti-Viral campaign.
We wanted to act fast and efficiently and help as many people as possible. In other words, we worked in hackathon mode. Hackathon mode meant, in addition to keeping long hours, focusing on shipping products rather than perfecting them. We moved fast and set up both backend (infrastructure) and frontend (user interface) quickly, without writing a single line of “real” code.
To that end, we used tools and processes that we employ on a regular basis at Aleph to provide services at scale to our portfolio companies as well as to the high tech ecosystem. We created a specialized matching system to automatically connect the right jobseeker with the relevant open position at a startup.
It might sound complicated, but honestly, there’s nothing too sophisticated in what we did, as you can see in the details below. There is no need for an engineering background to achieve the results shared here. Indeed, Bar Schneidman, Eden Shochat’s new executive assistant, helped us build a significant part of this product.
A few people have already found jobs through this initiative and there are dozens of ongoing introductions. Some 500 jobseekers have applied and more than 60 startups have joined. You can still join us here.
Our Anti-Viral Campaign is essentially a simple app with three separate interfaces:
- Creating a user profile — this is how we gather the necessary information about each and every jobseeker and startup that signs up for the service.
- Viewing profiles — this is the full database with filtered information that can be shared with both parties.
- Messaging via emails for enabling communication between the parties.
Our Toolbox (with descriptions borrowed from Google Search results so you’ll have the relevant context)
It’s important to note that we have no relationship of any kind with the companies mentioned below, and we recommend them while acknowledging that they all have some annoying limitations. There are other alternatives; the following are simply the services that we used. Each site offers a free version as well as a paid version. If you are doing something basic, or experimenting with low volumes, the free versions might be enough. But keep in mind that we used the paid versions for the Anti-Viral campaign because they offer more advanced features.
- Typeform — Typeform is conversational. It’s interactive. It’s more engaging. Create interactive experiences for your audience — get more responses. High completion rates. Easy To use. Beautiful designs. Mobile friendly. Beautiful UX.
- Airtable — Organize anything, with anyone. Powerful filtering, sorting and grouping gives you the freedom to arrange your work. Handles any content you throw at them. Add attachments, long text notes and checkboxes. Calendar views. Multiple projects. Real-time collaboration.
- Zapier — Helping you work better: focusing on what really matters. Automate the rest. More than 2,000 apps. Simple setup. No coding required. 99.99% Up-time. Automation Built to Scale.
- Gmail — you have probably all heard of this already 🙂
We started by creating a sign-up form with Typeform, directing users from question to question based on their previous answers. For example, the first question asks if you are a jobseeker or a startup. If you are a jobseeker, you are directed to specific questions that include asking for your LinkedIn profile and your desired role. If you are a startup looking to hire, the entire flow of creating a user profile is completely different and is based on your open positions. The responses are automatically sent to our Airtable database, where all the information is stored.
Our Airtable database also serves as our user interface to view all profiles. It contains a table for every user type. In this case, we have two user types: job seekers and startups. Using filtered views, an Airtable feature, we then created a unique, personalized interface that presents each startup with relevant candidates based on the open positions at their particular company, while also taking into account the candidate’s preferences.
The startups can search through their unique interface of candidates for those who seem most relevant, and then send those people an email directly through our system using a unique anonymous address that is forwarded to a candidate’s personal email. This ensures that we can protect the privacy of all jobseekers and not expose their personal emails without their permission. When candidates receive the email about a job opportunity, they can choose to whom and how they respond.
But how do Typeform, Airtable and Gmail all communicate? Zapier enables you to direct different applications to talk to each other without requiring a single line of code. In this case, it notifies us whenever a new jobseeker or startup joins the Anti-Viral Campaign, and also allows us to act upon these notifications. For example, as soon as a new talent applies, their information is automatically entered into a filtered list on our Airtable database for new applicants. Zapier then gets a notification, and sends the applicant an automatic welcome message from Bar’s personal Gmail account. It also updates this action back in our Airtable database so we know the welcome email has indeed been sent.
And that’s all.
Aleph was using no-coding tools like these long before I joined nearly three years ago. Today, new Aleph employees are “trained” as no-coding developers in order to help them manage their workflow in a more productive and efficient manner. We are now working on taking this approach to a whole new level as part of our philosophy of staying lean and scaling with more technology rather than with more people. That’s why we built Ampliphy, our Aleph value generator. It’s essentially the platform of tools, automation and software we developed internally to leverage our unique global network to provide meaningful services and value at scale to our portfolio companies and the entire Israeli high tech ecosystem. Some of these tools and services are built on no-coding platforms that anyone can use to gain superpowers.
More specifically, Tamuz Vardi and I, Aleph’s talent team (AKA TalPod), have been working with all of the above platforms for a while now, as part of our journey to become an impactful, tech-driven “talent agency” serving our portfolio companies. We use no-coding tools for things like automatic follow-ups, including feedback collection, for introductions facilitated between our portfolio companies and candidates. For more on our mission and business model, see our previous blog on #SkinInTheGame and how we put our money where our mouth is when it comes to talent acquisition.
Finally, you might be wondering why a developer like myself would choose no-code platforms when I can “simply”’ write the code myself. Well, they say that necessity is the mother of invention. As the sole developer on our talent team, in order to serve Aleph, our portfolio companies and the talents working with us, I have to find creative ways to scale myself and enable other non-engineers on the team to do the same. Harnessing these tools, and combining them with my development skills, turned out to be a game-changer, allowing me to get much more work done in less time. It also empowered me to teach non-developers how to take advantage of the next generation of software platforms to scale themselves and find superpowers of their own.
