HiredGrad, an online platform bridging skilled gradates and professionals with companies, will be expanding its international business to include a solution for learning & development for corporates in India. The startup had raised $280,000 in funding from angels in UK, Italy, Middle-East and India last year same time, and is in talks to raise more funds to fuel its expansion.
Currently, they help Indian companies that have problems finding talent domestically with specific skills by sourcing talent from international markets. The company fills a large gap of talent shortage across industries for short-term projects. It helps candidates in exposure of working in multiple countries without emigrating.
“HiredGrad brings to the market its unique network of university student and alumni societies coupled with matching technology. Talent on HiredGrad is mobile and willing to travel to engage in the best opportunities and therefore having access to a globally mobile pool of talent is a distinct advantage for HiredGrad,” says Lee Cooper, who’s Director at Investigo, a leading recruitment agency in the UK and now advisor for HiredGrad.
Their proprietary algorithmic matching system driven by machine learning matches companies with candidates from abroad for fit, which is the main challenge with international recruiting.
“We’ve had many interesting companies such as Anthill Ventures, Indian Money, etc., hire via us. We even had CureFit asking for football coaches, trainers and nutritionists from abroad”, says Krishna, Chief Commercial Officer at HiredGrad.
The company was founded in 2015 by Krishna Venkata and Andrea Bonaceto who were themselves international students in London. They understood that creating robust international linkages between developing and developed markets will facilitate much-needed knowledge transfer. This can be achieved by hiring specialized talent or training by experts from developed markets.
“We both really identify with this problem because of our mutual experience of meeting in a country different from our home countries, and sharing perspectives and knowledge. This ultimately ended up in us starting HiredGrad” says Andrea, CEO of HiredGrad. Currently, HiredGrad does this between UK and India and has offices in both London and Bangalore.
Focus on Asia
After having successfully piloted international hiring for a few companies in India, HiredGrad’s online network of talent has expanded to include professors too from the UK universities and business schools they work with. Now companies in India and rest of developing Asia can bring in professors from top UK universities and business schools for their training challenges too.
Clearly, HiredGrad’s focus on Asia makes commercial sense. In the context of shifting global economic dynamics, Asia is poised to grow tremendously but skills of existing workforces are becoming obsolete in the face of new technologies. “Corporates would benefit immensely from an outsider’s perspective on what the workforce of the future is actually like and solving the business problems at hand with tried and tested solutions with expert help from developed markets” says Varun Baliga, who works in the L&D division of Ernst & Young in Bangalore.
With these trends in its favour, there is huge scope for professors from Western universities and business schools in skilling, reskilling and upskilling of existing workforces of Asian companies. Alessandro Lanteri, a professor at Hult Business School in London, who is now a part of HiredGrad’s professor network says, “In a flat, globalized world, innovation happens everywhere and can scale up very fast. As a professor in a global business school, it's critical that I constantly test the global best practices in a variety of contexts as well as scout emerging economies for new business models and challenges to the status quo.”
Currently, they help Indian companies that have problems finding talent domestically with specific skills by sourcing talent from international markets. The company fills a large gap of talent shortage across industries for short-term projects. It helps candidates in exposure of working in multiple countries without emigrating.
“HiredGrad brings to the market its unique network of university student and alumni societies coupled with matching technology. Talent on HiredGrad is mobile and willing to travel to engage in the best opportunities and therefore having access to a globally mobile pool of talent is a distinct advantage for HiredGrad,” says Lee Cooper, who’s Director at Investigo, a leading recruitment agency in the UK and now advisor for HiredGrad.
Their proprietary algorithmic matching system driven by machine learning matches companies with candidates from abroad for fit, which is the main challenge with international recruiting.
“We’ve had many interesting companies such as Anthill Ventures, Indian Money, etc., hire via us. We even had CureFit asking for football coaches, trainers and nutritionists from abroad”, says Krishna, Chief Commercial Officer at HiredGrad.
The company was founded in 2015 by Krishna Venkata and Andrea Bonaceto who were themselves international students in London. They understood that creating robust international linkages between developing and developed markets will facilitate much-needed knowledge transfer. This can be achieved by hiring specialized talent or training by experts from developed markets.
“We both really identify with this problem because of our mutual experience of meeting in a country different from our home countries, and sharing perspectives and knowledge. This ultimately ended up in us starting HiredGrad” says Andrea, CEO of HiredGrad. Currently, HiredGrad does this between UK and India and has offices in both London and Bangalore.
Focus on Asia
After having successfully piloted international hiring for a few companies in India, HiredGrad’s online network of talent has expanded to include professors too from the UK universities and business schools they work with. Now companies in India and rest of developing Asia can bring in professors from top UK universities and business schools for their training challenges too.
Clearly, HiredGrad’s focus on Asia makes commercial sense. In the context of shifting global economic dynamics, Asia is poised to grow tremendously but skills of existing workforces are becoming obsolete in the face of new technologies. “Corporates would benefit immensely from an outsider’s perspective on what the workforce of the future is actually like and solving the business problems at hand with tried and tested solutions with expert help from developed markets” says Varun Baliga, who works in the L&D division of Ernst & Young in Bangalore.
With these trends in its favour, there is huge scope for professors from Western universities and business schools in skilling, reskilling and upskilling of existing workforces of Asian companies. Alessandro Lanteri, a professor at Hult Business School in London, who is now a part of HiredGrad’s professor network says, “In a flat, globalized world, innovation happens everywhere and can scale up very fast. As a professor in a global business school, it's critical that I constantly test the global best practices in a variety of contexts as well as scout emerging economies for new business models and challenges to the status quo.”
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