Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Enabling women’s workforce participation | Neha Bagaria @ HerKey
267 Plays2 years ago
Neha Bagaria is a Wharton alumnus who started her first entrepreneurial venture soon after graduating. The experience of sitting at home after becoming a mother changed her mission in life and she decided to solve the problem of India’s low female workforce participation rates. She talks about her journey of building HerKey.
Read the text version of the episode.
Read more about HerKey:-
1.How HerKey opens windows of opportunities for women
2.Overcoming the challenges: What is holding back women’s employment in India
3.Gender pay gap is a complex issue with no easy solutions, says JobsForher CEO
4.Bengaluru Mom’s Platform Helps 3.5 Million Women Join the Workforce After Career Breaks
5.Career engagement platform herkey secures $4m funding from kalaari, 360 one asset
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Neha's Journey
00:00:00
Speaker
Hi, I'm Neha Bagaria, the founder and CEO of Herki, formerly Jobs for Her.
00:00:18
Speaker
What happens when a highly driven, intelligent and ambitious woman is forced to leave the workforce to look after her family?
Herki's Mission and Fundraising
00:00:25
Speaker
She becomes an entrepreneur and affords for good. Neha Bagarya is a Wharton alumnus who started her first entrepreneurial venture soon after graduating. The experience of sitting at home after becoming a mother changed her mission in life and she decided to solve the problem of India's low female workforce participation rates.
00:00:43
Speaker
In this conversation, she shares how she started her key as a platform to help women get back to the workforce and bootstrapped it to scale and how they now intend to truly disrupt the space after their recent $4 million fund raise. Stay tuned and subscribe to the Founder Thesis Podcast on any audio streaming app to learn how disruptive founders are changing the world one problem at a time.
Business Model and Target Industries
00:01:14
Speaker
Congratulations on the four million fundraise. You're coming fresh out of a fundraise. Let me start with this question. What's your elevator pitch for her key formerly jobs for her to a VC investor? Well, it's actually about building India's largest career engagement platform for women so that we make sure that women stay engaged with their careers and they unlock their true economic potential.
00:01:41
Speaker
So now, if I were a VC, I would want to know the question which every VC has, show me the money. How do you monetize?
00:01:52
Speaker
And the monetization possibilities when you're unlocking the economic potential of women are tremendous. In fact, we are already a profitable, scalable business model where our predominant revenue comes from corporates who are looking at recruiting women talent and increasing the number of women in the workplace. But now with the move to Herkey, we're also looking at how do we work with corporates, not just for the recruitment strategies,
00:02:19
Speaker
but as well for the retention and advancement strategies for the women talent. Also, as we go forward, there are huge monetization possibilities when it comes to learning opportunities for women during their career stages.
Community Building and Cultural Impact
00:02:37
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. So I want to zoom in on some of these. So I understand the recruitment as a revenue source, fairly straightforward, well-proven model.
00:02:51
Speaker
Though I would wonder, how much value are you able to capture here? Because a typical job portal doesn't capture much value, which are discovery platforms. I mean, let's say if it starts from, let's say, a discovery platform, like a job portal on the one hand. And then on the other hand, like a recruitment firm, like say, Michael Page, ABC. So Michael Page, ABC would get anywhere from 10% to 15% of the salary
00:03:19
Speaker
as the value they capture. Whereas for a job portal, it might be 0.1% or 1%, something in that range. So how much value are you able to capture?
00:03:29
Speaker
Absolutely. So we are desperately closer to a recruitment platform versus a recruitment agency. In fact, recruitment agencies like ABC use our platform to be able to reach out to the candidates. And the idea is again, if you think about the model, it will be similar to a LinkedIn sort of a model where you create the platform and you make sure that the value you carry, the value you bring is from the plume of business that will happen on it.
00:03:55
Speaker
by creating a global platform. So yes, apps are a transaction. In fact, we want to make it as cost effective and efficient for our companies to hire huge volumes of women from the platform. But the monetization actually comes from ensuring the scale happens in the volume.
00:04:15
Speaker
And are there functional areas that are more prevalent, for example, tech hiring or sales hiring or customer support or operations? We see a general trend towards our top industries and top functional areas where companies are hiring.
00:04:35
Speaker
want to hire women in huge numbers. And that would, of course, include industries like tech, education, BPO call centers, manufacturing, pharma, retail. But then again, we also see industries like electronics and semiconductors, etc., where there are less women currently, or the automotive industry. Because there are less women, companies are putting in more effort to hire more women.
00:05:02
Speaker
Okay. Okay. Okay. Got it. And how do you acquire the supply of talent here? Like, you know, for a company to pay you to post a job would only make sense if there is a good supply of talent, which is applying for the job. So what's the way in which you are acquiring supply?
00:05:22
Speaker
Absolutely. I mean, we have a database of
Global Inspirations and Challenges
00:05:24
Speaker
three and a half million women on the platform already. And this was in a bootstrapped manner over a period of time. And that was one of the big things that we were able to crack, right? Because this is a database of three and a half million women who are interested in their careers in India.
00:05:40
Speaker
And for that, we actually run a lot of different kind of marketing strategies. We employ, for example, social media extremely effectively in which it's not just about here's a job apply for it. It's a lot about also converting passive job seekers into active job seekers, women who are not sure they can and should work to get them over the fence to have the desire to work.
00:06:06
Speaker
Plus, we work a lot with a lot of different partners in the women's space in order to get them to reach out to their women databases and start inspiring them for their careers. And thirdly, we have a very strong ambassador program where we actually have women on the ground working with their local communities to get them over their roadblocks and obstacles. Okay. Which of these is getting launched first between communities and learning?
00:06:36
Speaker
So we have a version of Opportunities Learning in Communities all three of the current platform even today. But we are doing a much deeper dive into communities in the new version of the product. And what does that look like? What are you building for communities?
00:06:54
Speaker
Well, when it comes to communities, we actually want to give women a safe space for them to be able to share from their career point of view. So it's not just about actually showcasing, which will of course be a small part of it, where you put yourself out there and you gain followers like the way you do on social media platforms, but the community on Herkey is going to be more of a supportive
00:07:15
Speaker
a community where if you have any challenges that you're facing in your career, you will find your tribe of women over here. You will be able to reach out to women who are going through similar challenges or who have gone through it and help you through it. So the community will actually consist of three people, three types of people. There will be employers who are there to give you the jobs that you need. There will be experts who will be there to give you the learning that you need, but the most important is each other who will be able to give you the support that you need.
00:07:46
Speaker
So would
Policy Suggestions and Personal Insights
00:07:49
Speaker
this be in the way, I'm just trying to visualize what it would look like. Would it look like the way LinkedIn does where I post something and people comment or like or whatever. So if I am stuck somewhere, I post about it and other women will comment and so on. Is this what it would look like? So there are lots of different options right now that we're considering and we're on the Android board. So you'd be able to see more by the end of the year. I'm just wondering,
00:08:17
Speaker
You want employers also to be on the platform. Wouldn't you need to let men in? A lot of the employers would be men. Of course. No, of course. Absolutely. Men are not the enemy. We've never ever been the enemy. In fact, one of the core values of JobSaha has always been be pro women but not anti men.
00:08:40
Speaker
And the reason is because, I mean, this is not an anti-main crusade at all. Frankly, if we get more women into the workplace, the people who will benefit the most would be the men, you know, as employers, as husbands, as fathers, as brothers, and as allies. So on the platform, we see men being a very important part. You know, they will come in, like we said, they will come in as employers, they will come in as experts. When it comes to each other, they will come in as allies.
00:09:10
Speaker
and mentors. And we will, of course, figure out how to tread this fine balance in terms of what, of course, men can do on the platform and what they can't, because at the end of the day, the platform is for career advancement of women. So the men will be at the platform in terms of eating that journey of advancing women's careers.
00:09:32
Speaker
Got it. So the account of a man will have a slightly different user interface and different permissions and actions. Right. Got it. Okay. Okay. Interesting. Okay. So essentially what you're trying to do is like a LinkedIn for women in a way.
00:09:51
Speaker
Sure, in many ways, yes. And in many ways, no, right? I mean, so in many ways, absolutely, we need to figure out how can we use the strengths of LinkedIn to leverage it for women. Yeah, because today, if you look at, you know, user statistics are about 20% of users on LinkedIn are women.
00:10:10
Speaker
I imagine a platform like that, where 100% of the users are women. What can that do for the women community? And in that same breath, then how is it not LinkedIn for women as well? Because LinkedIn was not built for the kind of challenges and problems that women go through in their journeys.
00:10:31
Speaker
especially the fact that LinkedIn was built for our currently working profession. And which is why you see such low participation rates for women because women have such low participation rates in the workplace. So the Herki platform will be built not just for women who are currently working, but for women who aspire to work for the bulk of women
Tech Approach and Initial Growth
00:10:53
Speaker
talent, which is 85% of your women graduates in India, which is outside the workplace.
00:11:09
Speaker
I'm guessing the product itself would be very similar to a LinkedIn kind of a product, just that the content would be different. Content and the context as well, which means that there are different layers of sensitivity, of sensibilities that you need to build in, which will be very different. I mean, those are the nuanced approaches. For example,
00:11:19
Speaker
How do we also cater to them?
00:11:31
Speaker
LinkedIn versus Facebook. Yeah, the premise is the same. They're both social network platforms. But the context is completely different. And because the context is different, there are lots of different features that you do build out for it. Okay. Interesting.
00:11:52
Speaker
Is it proven that something like this can succeed, a woman-centric social network or career network? Is there some global example of this?
00:12:06
Speaker
Luckily, we have some good comms playing out in the US. The US is maybe a couple of decades ahead of us when it comes to the DNI journey and when it comes to increasing women's participation rates. They also started off very low a couple of generations ago and they managed to boost that up to now there are 55% of women participation rates.
00:12:31
Speaker
And so over there, we actually have a unicorn in the women's career space in terms of CHIEF, which is a women's network only for extremely senior women professionals. There's also a tactical mom project, which is, as the name suggests, it's called Moms Careers. It's a tactical fairy god boss, which is also a network for women and was recently acquired by the MUNES.
00:12:58
Speaker
Okay, these are all like digital products. Okay, interesting. Okay, I had no idea this space had so many large established companies. It's still very, very, very small number compared to the general currencies, you know, and usually the general space was built by men for men of men.
00:13:18
Speaker
There's a lot of work still to be done in the women's career space and I think with this funding we're going to be able to start building that kind of interest and attention to the space that is required to first grow the space and get more players in. So you said 85% of women in India are out of the workforce. Why is this number so high?
00:13:41
Speaker
So that's the number in urban India, by the way. Overall, women participation rates in India are 20%. But in urban India, it's only 15%, which means as a family becomes more affluent in India, the chances of that woman working becomes lower.
00:13:55
Speaker
And the reason is really social. Yeah, because I mean, first of all, the woman is brought up in a way to think that her one and only priority is family, you know, and caretaker. Families expect that from that woman. And then employers have a lot of biases as well. So at different stage, once the life stage, if you look at the numbers, about 100 out of 100 college grads, 40 of them are women today, which is incredible.
00:14:24
Speaker
Yeah, that is the work that was done by our mother's generation. Out of those 40, only 8 even start their careers. The rest of them, usually they get married right after they graduate or they move to another city and the career never takes off. Out of those 8, 4 of them drop out within 3 years, which is usually when motherhood strikes and they will never return. And that is why our women participation rates are so low.
00:14:50
Speaker
Okay. So how do you change this then? I mean, this is more about changing the mindset of the families, right? More than the women. I'm assuming that there would be a desire inside the women to work, but the environment around her doesn't support.
00:15:09
Speaker
Yeah, so frankly,
Pandemic Impact and Future Plans
00:15:12
Speaker
for the last eight years, I always say that I feel like our biggest job has been in changing mindsets. And we do need to change the mindsets of the entire ecosystem. But I do think that it needs to start with changing the mindset of that woman.
00:15:27
Speaker
We don't need to wait for any knights in shining armor to come and save us and rescue us. I feel like if you give women the right narrative, the right tools, the right resources, then they'll be able to stand up and state that, hey, I do want to work and this is why I want to work.
00:15:47
Speaker
Also, once we start showcasing these women's stories, instead of portraying women as either goddesses or ablanari, and we start showcasing women as a woman who is juggling between her career and her family and still managing just fine, once we start showcasing these kind of narratives, families will realise that not only should they support their women's careers, but also be proud of it.
00:16:12
Speaker
So it's a lot about changing narratives, which is something that a strong community like this can do.
00:16:19
Speaker
Okay, got it. Interesting. I was reading somewhere that, you know, the maternity, paid maternity leave used to be three months and then it was increased to six months and that actually caused a dip in participation because corporates are reluctant to hire women because they know that in case of pregnancy, there is a six-month payout which will be on the hook for it. What do you think about that?
00:16:48
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely, Akshay. I know of enough companies where they have actually reduced hiring of women who are at a marriageable slash childbearing age because they're doing those candidates. All they can think about is
00:17:07
Speaker
Six months. Six months, we don't have a TV with her, okay? And we said it's a big retrant to hiring women, so we've actually made it worse. And also think about the message that we're sending out to parents, right? We're saying that, oh yeah, absolutely, a child has been born, that a woman should take six months off from her career, but the father, the father doesn't need to take any paternity leave.
00:17:29
Speaker
No man did it, but it's so sad for everybody. It's sad for that woman, of course, because those companies are going to hire her. It's sad for the man too, because those companies don't feel that the man has had a baby. You know, her ambition is something I need to lead to them too. So if he did want to go in the direction of giving more support to parents, first of all, we have to change again the narrative and the way we're thinking about it, right? We need to provide more support to working parents.
00:17:59
Speaker
If you want to provide a support to working parents, then have a Sticks much parent in leave policy instead. Will I let the couple decide that maybe that woman takes three months off and then the father takes three months off?
00:18:14
Speaker
Interesting. That's an interesting. I think there's no country in the world which has implemented this yet. Lots of Scandinavian countries. There are lots of Scandinavian countries where women participation rates are very high, like about 80%. A lot of them look at, they have, and those are very good to study in terms of what they're doing right.
00:18:33
Speaker
to really support women's careers. And a lot of them look at it like this, right? It's working parents. How do you make sure that this parent can leave? How do you make sure that the government is also supporting companies to provide that kind of leave? And how do you even look at, for example, companies in Scandinavia, they usually work during school hours.
00:18:55
Speaker
Okay. There are timings at work, coincide with the timings of school so that parents can again, you know, drop their kids to school, get to work, and then be done with the work. They pick up the kids, spend time with them. It feels like a really ideal world, but if you, if Scandinavia could get there, one day India can too.
00:19:16
Speaker
Right. Interesting. Okay. Tell me about how, you know, you've been through a similar journey where you left the workforce before you started the hierarchy. Tell me about your own journey. Yeah, well, well, so I mean, I graduated from Wharton. And of course, when I graduated, I felt like there was no difference between a man or a woman apply for the same jobs, decided to take the audition or the internship part instead.
00:19:46
Speaker
Started my first company while I was still in my last semester at college. It was called Paragon. That was my first baby. And it was an educational company. I actually became the College Board representative for India at the age of 21. Came back and started this educational center to bring the advancement program back to India.
00:20:06
Speaker
Because when we had all got abroad to study, we never got any credit for the work that we had done in Indian high school. And that's a huge waste of time, money, and effort. So from the APs back to India, that center up, kids' work. High school kids in India started taking AP credits, did that for two years. And that's when. What is this thing of AP credits, advanced placement? This sounds very foreign to me. I've never studied abroad, so I'm not familiar with this.
00:20:36
Speaker
I don't know if in Japan they have the APs, but it's the American system of education. The way you have IB or E-levels or HSC in India, in America, the orders program is called APs. And if you have APs in your high school, you actually don't need to repeat those classes when you go to an American university. Otherwise, from an Indian high school system, when you go to America, you have to repeat a lot of the stuff that you'd already done.
00:21:08
Speaker
That's a pretty big waste of time and effort. And how do you prove it to the college that you have already studied this in India?
00:21:17
Speaker
So the College Board, which gives the AP
Leadership and Organizational Culture
00:21:19
Speaker
exams, that's the same board that gives the SAT exams. So these are standardized global tests. But India never did not offer the APs. No Indian schools offered the APs. There were nowhere to take the APs. So during my last semester at college, I actually convinced the College Board that we need to offer this in India, convinced a school in India to become an AP testing center.
00:21:42
Speaker
And Das Bhatia Bhan's Facebook program back to India and got Indian high school students to prepare for the APs and give those tests. Okay. So like if you want to prove that you already studied biology, then you give the biology AP test and earn the credit for it. Okay. And IB students and E-level students can get that credit. Yeah. But at that time, we're talking about 2003, they were more IB level.
00:22:09
Speaker
So I did that for two years. And for me, that's when the first life stage hit, which was marriage. And I moved from Bombay to Bangalore. And Paribhar was a very physical offline educational center. I couldn't keep that going.
00:22:26
Speaker
And at that point, I made the very difficult decision of closing that down and joining my husband's family business because my husband's family business was in pharmaceutical manufacturing. Completely different area that I've been working on before. But frankly, as a business student, same business principles apply.
00:22:47
Speaker
Yeah. And it was also a very interesting stage of growth at the company. And so I jumped on board. We were acquiring facilities in Sweden and the US, so got very involved in that. You know, as a former finance student, it was very interesting to be in M&A deals on the buy side.
00:23:04
Speaker
Interesting. And then did that for five years. Never thought I'd stop, frankly. Even when I, you know, got pregnant, I worked in my nine months. I told everyone I'd be back in 40 days. I have famous last words. Like I did not even.
00:23:21
Speaker
I had 14 weeks later, I said, no, maybe three months, three months later, I said, maybe a year. And a year later, I was a raging full-time mom and I said, forget it, you know, I'm going to be a full-time mom just the way my mom was and my mother-in-law was, frankly. All the other women I knew around me, we can't all, you know, quit working to really be there for the children. And I found I needed to do that too.
00:23:46
Speaker
And yeah, I quit. That break ended up big for three and a half years during which time I had a second baby. And when the second child came into my life, things changed again, you know, because it was the first time that I had to shift my attention from my first born. And then realize that the heavens didn't fall down. It was actually good for him. And also by then a lot of frustration has heaped in.
00:24:14
Speaker
Yeah, so I started looking at all the careers of all my peers, my former classmates and mainly the men who keep their careers with their head and started wondering, what the hell? I didn't work so hard and study so hard to finally be in the same place that my mother wasn't.
00:24:34
Speaker
Right. And so one day I realized that if I want to be a happy mother, I have to be a happy person. And for that, I needed to get back to work. So it was really for the sanity of all those around me, I decided to jump back. And for me, it was easy, right? Because I had a family business that I could jump back to.
00:24:55
Speaker
So I literally arm twisted my husband into giving me a job back and got back. Did that for one year and that one year of getting back to work was the eye opening year for me because it was just a great experience to restart my career. It was good for me, it was good for the kids, it was good for my husband and it was great for the company.
00:25:15
Speaker
And that made me start questioning and interrogating every woman I knew that, why aren't you getting back to work? Why aren't you getting back to work? And the kind of challenges I started hearing, I was like, this is crazy. Like, we have to figure out, like, if we lose out on this talent pool, we are losing out on this, on a talent pool of qualified, experienced, capable, ambitious women. So we need to figure out how do we get them back to work? And that's really where the idea of Chop Suher came about.
00:25:43
Speaker
And you were not from a tech background, but you wanted to build this as an online business. So how did you actually go about building it up? You had not done marketing before. To build an online business, you need tech and you need marketing to acquire customers. How did you learn these skills? Tell me about building it up.
00:26:07
Speaker
Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean, that was a pretty critical decision, right? The decision to build it up as a tech platform. It was definitely not my first choice and first course of action. But when I started looking at the numbers that we needed to solve for, you know, I mean, by one statistic, there were 20 million women who needed to restart their careers in India.
00:26:31
Speaker
I finally had to take that hard call that, look, either I can better it as an offline business, which is something that I was comfortable with and I had worked with and I knew how to do. But then I would be able to impact the lives of thousands.
00:26:45
Speaker
Or I can build this, I can leverage technology and build this as an online platform, and then I can impact the lives of millions. And finally, the idea was to change that diversity needle, to push that diversity needle in India and get more women in the workplace.
00:27:01
Speaker
had to build it for millions. Frankly was my younger brother who was also running the tech startup at that time. He's the one who really convinced me that I had to build it as a tech startup. Over the years, many times I definitely cursed him several times. But I do see why it was extremely important that we look at leveraging technology. I think it's extremely important to realize also that look
00:27:26
Speaker
that same technology that feels so alien to a woman who has been on a break, that same technology has made it so easy to pick up the skills that you need in order to learn. So when it comes to marketing, by the way, I graduated from Wharton in finance marketing and management of information system, all of which are coming to use now, but there was no digital marketing at that time.
00:27:51
Speaker
So again, I use the technology to learn. The kind of online upskilling that is available for anyone who wants to learn is immense. So I just upskilled, upskilled, upskilled myself in marketing. The other thing I really needed to understand was from an HR point of view.
00:28:09
Speaker
to really figure out what is it that is lacking and how do we bridge those gaps. So I also had very strong mentors and advisors in place and that really helped as well in not just filling the gaps of knowledge and expertise, but also identifying the gaps in knowledge and expertise, which I could then upskill myself in. Okay. How did you build 3.5 million users?
00:28:37
Speaker
Well, by walking on it every single day. No, I think it's really the premise. The first 10,000 users. Let's just start with that.
00:28:51
Speaker
Sure. The first 10,000 user story was completely organic, first of all. We didn't do any paid marketing in the whole first year. Because we first wanted to make sure that our value proposition is working. There is that actual need out there that women want and they will come to us for. So our big, big thing that we pushed out was content marketing.
00:29:21
Speaker
Yeah, because we had to use very strong narratives to shake up the ecosystem and get those women to get up and realize that, hey, this is for them. Also, what really helped was our laser sharp focus. In the beginning of the first year, the platform was only for women who are on a career break in Bangalore.
00:29:46
Speaker
Okay. And because we did that, the kind of content that we put in place, the kind of marketing that we put in place was so personal and customized to that woman that we saw huge organic growth in our user base.
00:30:00
Speaker
And by content, are you talking of blogs on your site or also like other social media platform posts? No, blogs of course, but more importantly, a lot of social media campaigns that we ran. So for example, one of the campaigns that we ran was on difficult conversation. And we got women to share what kind of difficult conversations they'd had to have to restart their careers. Yeah, those difficult conversations could have been
00:30:24
Speaker
with their husbands, with their kids, with their mother-in-laws, with their, with themselves, with employers, you know, so that that also gets women to realize what kind of difficult conversations they can and should have in order to get back. There was a huge vibranity that came about in these different campaigns and that helped really push the needle. Okay, interesting.
00:30:46
Speaker
And you were using your personal network in order to get the jobs which were getting listed there. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, absolutely. So luckily, being from the entrepreneurial space, we are also in touch with a huge number of entrepreneurs, a huge number of business people. And the business side of it is
00:31:07
Speaker
That was my 40. The debt not journey and you pick up those skills and you hire those skills, the business was my 40. So I completely tapped every network of mine to just get companies to come and hire women returnees on the platform. We started off with 20 companies, by the way.
00:31:26
Speaker
today we have like 10,000 companies, okay, on the platform. But in the beginning, that was a bigger challenge option, you know, because, again, this was only for women returnees. Yeah, so we actually the whole first year, we didn't, for us, our sales, and by the way, the person who, who heads my sales department today, is that person's employee number two. And the first full year,
00:31:56
Speaker
Her version of sales was just calling her companies and convincing them to come and list their jobs for free on the platform, but for the fact that this is for women attorneys only. And that took a lot of convincing to get companies to realise why they should hire women attorneys.
00:32:11
Speaker
Over there, the reason is also because a lot of the platforms that had come before us, they had taken a very social angle to the space, but that's where the business degree helped. I recognise the fact that the businesses are there for the bottom line and we need to make them see how this would help the bottom line.
00:32:32
Speaker
Yeah, so once we started projecting this database as a talent pool of women who are qualified, experienced, capable, they have a desire to prove themselves again and they can join companies with no notice period. Just when we really got their interest and they started posting the jobs in the beginning for free and then by the end of the year, they were paying us for it. Amazing. Okay. And by when did you break even?
00:33:01
Speaker
Well, I think the pandemic is what really helped us to break even. Yeah. Because with the pandemic, for the first time, we saw this huge wave of women hiring that happened, you know, because for the first time, the biggest barrier to women's careers was gone and that's flexibility. Yeah. Travel and just
00:33:28
Speaker
the flexible mindset. Until then, if a woman asked for flexibility, companies used to take that very negatively. And companies were not at all okay with any sort of remote work or part-time work or freelance work, very few opportunities over there. But the pandemic forced every company to figure out how to work remotely.
00:33:52
Speaker
And companies started seeing the benefits of remote work. Right, Ranthi? If you really look at the future of work now, it's hybrid. Yeah, I don't think it's full-time in the office or it's full-time from home. The future is actually hybrid. And that is really what women needed and what did all these years. So just for the company to have a flexible mindset, which said that, okay, fine, you know, if my child is sick today, can I work from?
00:34:16
Speaker
Or, you know, over, like, say, during summer holidays, can I work part-time from the office and part-time from? Like, different flexible work arrangements like that. And once that flexibility was removed from being a barrier to women's success, that suddenly opened up the floodgate. And we turned profitable because of the huge demand that we saw.
00:34:41
Speaker
Also, we saw that women were now ready. Because in so many families, the sole breadwinner was a man. So many people lost their jobs. And suddenly families are that women's are realizing that, look, there's this qualified period's talent lying at home. Why don't we support her career as well and get her into the workplace too? So all around it is actually a watershed moment for women's careers.
00:35:07
Speaker
A lot of founders I speak to have pretty much gone back to work from office now. You know, while during pandemic, everyone used to talk about the new normal. But it seems to me that it was a little overhyped, the new normal. People mostly seem to be going back to office. What have you seen? Are you seeing that flexibility? No, so people are definitely going back into the office, but they're going back into the office with a very different mindset.
00:35:35
Speaker
Again, it's a much more flexible mindset with which they're going back into the office. So many companies, for example, are using hybrid working arrangements very effectively. It'll attract better talent to reduce infrastructure costs and to increase employee satisfaction.
00:35:53
Speaker
Most companies have figured out, for example, one day a week can be work from home or on an emergency basis, you can work from home. The work from home piece of a work arrangement is here to stay. It won't be 100% work from home, but it will be a varying degree of what a company allows, but it's not going away. Okay.
00:36:17
Speaker
Have you seen the flexibility dropping? Because you would probably have that data when people post jobs, they would indicate how flexible they are. Have you seen that?
00:36:26
Speaker
So what we've seen dropping is the jobs that were completely remote, which had of course skyrocketed during the pandemic. And what we've seen dropping is the fact that earlier companies were open to hiring talent from anywhere, any city. Now they're back to at least hiring talent from their own cities.
00:36:48
Speaker
But that being said, the kind of opportunities that did create virtual remote opportunities, that's still much larger. Even though overall that number, that growth has reduced, in an absolute sense, the kind of opportunities that are available for remote working is much larger than it was pre-pandemic. Yeah, because that mindset change has happened at a fundamental level. And many businesses are looking at it as a great cost-saving method.
00:37:17
Speaker
Yeah, got it. Interesting. You've raised this 4 million. What do you want to use it for? Is it for product? Is it for marketing? What is it for?
00:37:30
Speaker
The money that we raise is really to build the platform that will take us from the $3.5 million to $30 million. So the chunk of that investment will go into building the tech and product. In fact, the first thing that we did was get our CTO onboard.
00:37:49
Speaker
I'm home with the investment and he comes with 20 plus years of experience in building global products, global technology teams and we're very excited about what we can build with him. And of course, the second thing that we will use the funding for is to build a database itself. We will also use the funding for starting to develop a lot of the other strategic initiators, like the different learning programs that are required for women.
00:38:17
Speaker
You will create the content in-house, or is it going to be user-generated, crowd-sourced learning content?
00:38:24
Speaker
So we've always built the platform as a marketplace model. We don't believe in the fact that we need to do everything ourselves. We always feel that let's leverage what is out there, contextualize it, curate it for women, and then scale that. Because if we build it ourselves, we are limited in terms of our own imagination and our own expertise.
00:38:48
Speaker
want to open up huge learning opportunities for women. So today also on the platform, we have about 800 plus learning partners. So we are working with a lot of them to curate these programs and offer them to women.
00:39:01
Speaker
How do you monetize this? Like you take a percentage of sales or you charge them a fees for advertising on the platform? Support models work. We work on again promoting these learning partners during which time we have subscription models for putting them out there.
00:39:20
Speaker
Plus, whenever we're curating these programs with them, we'll take a percentage of sales and the sales could be either to that woman, but also we work a lot with different corporates for their learning needs for their women talent.
00:39:32
Speaker
Okay. How does your sales happen? I'm taking an example of, let's say, SaaS companies. In SaaS companies, there are two ways in which the cell one is a more self-serve model where people come in for a free trial and then they swipe a card and they start paying, which typically works when you're more, like, say,
00:39:56
Speaker
SME focused and then you have companies which sell largely through an account executive who will give a demo and onboard you and you will have a client success team and all that. How does the sales work for you? We have both. We have our online offerings by which any company can come, you know, buy something that we call hot jobs, get their jobs bookstayed and priority listed and so that they can get more applicants for those jobs.
00:40:26
Speaker
We also have much larger subscription models for which we have a field sales team. We call them our bare plans. You know, it's branding, engagement, and recruitment. And that's what we do. And our field sales team actually works in selling that to our large enterprises where they can opt for different subscription models in terms of how much they want to be branded, how much they want to engage with the talent pool, and what kind of recruitment requirements that they have.
00:40:53
Speaker
So I'm assuming the sales happening through the sales team would be like a major chunk of your sales, right? The sales service sales would be a pretty small chunk. Currently, but the sales service sales is going pretty significantly. Okay. And sales service is largely like an SME product who just wants to quickly hire somebody. Okay. Interesting. So you'd like to actually do something?
00:41:21
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. I will. What do you see as your role in her key? There are some founders who say that I'm the product guy. I'm the custodian of the product. And there are some people who are like sales first, who are out there leading the sales team from the front, talking to the customers. So different founders have different type of focus areas.
00:41:49
Speaker
What kind of a founder are you? What's your focus area? What is your role in Turkey?
00:41:57
Speaker
Well, okay, so I guess as a founder and CEO, you're used to wearing so many different hats. In fact, frankly, at some point to the others, you have worn every hat in the organization. Then it's difficult to choose which baby belongs to you in the organization. But I do feel that overall, I think being the culture custodian is the most important.
00:42:23
Speaker
Yeah, because finally, with what, you know, whatever, nothing scales as much as culture, right? We need to make sure that as we scale, as we grow, as we have more offerings, more product lines, bigger team, et cetera, the culture of the organization is key of why do we do what we do? So I think if my role, my biggest role in the organization is constantly keeping a focus on the why.
00:42:51
Speaker
in every little thing that we do. In fact, we are constantly encouraging every team member, no matter what level and what designation, every team member to constantly question why. Why are you doing what we are doing for everything that we put out there? Because otherwise, at the end of the day, it just becomes action.
00:43:11
Speaker
When it comes to culture, goal-setting, visioning, strategy, I need those sit only with me.
00:43:23
Speaker
My other, I have a very, very strong core team. And they are masters in product and in tech and in marketing and in sales and in customer service and in operations and in HR and in finance. But I think the overall why sits with me. So you want to make sure that you remain a mission driven organization. And that mission resonates throughout the organization. It was so important to get the right investors in.
00:43:50
Speaker
Yeah, because we also made that very, very clear in the pitch that absolutely, this is about making money and huge money and all of that, but it's a tech for good. It's a whole premise of doing well by doing good and wanted those investors who believe in that as well. You're not finding, look at that, right? We got Vani Kola's comment who has been through the journey of being the most ferocious female VC in India.
00:44:18
Speaker
Right. And even in 361, finally, we have a woman board member from 361. So in fact, our new board, we have the man who is the diversity on our board. Interesting. Okay. What's your head count now? We are about 100 plus.
00:44:41
Speaker
Wow. So what are some of the things you're doing to maintain the culture as the company grows beyond let's say 50 people that it's no longer possible for you to personally make sure that everyone is aligned with the mission and stuff like that. So how do you scale? No, so when it comes to the hiring process, by the way, one of the assessment criteria for every hiring process is alignment to our values and our culture.
00:45:07
Speaker
Yeah, part of every hiring process, part of every evaluation, every review, every appraisal. Okay, it is always about also how a 9% percent to the overall vision and values the company. Part of my induction training for every new joinee
00:45:26
Speaker
Really, I just focus on the why, that entire induction. Every town hall that we have, you know, when we talk about our quarterly reviews, when we talk about our annual plan, when we talk about important announcements, we constantly bring it to the why and we constantly talk about the culture behind the country. So it is a lot of constant and consistent messaging that we've learned.
00:45:47
Speaker
What are some of the tools you use to manage people? Some people use OKRs as a tool. We use OKRs as well. And they've been very effective. Because with OKRs, again, we keep telling people that this is about finally achieving the objectives. It's not about driving actions. The actions have to give you the objectives. So the OKRs are superb in that.
00:46:13
Speaker
because you're forced to think from an objective manner. So every team has their different OKRs and then we have overall company OKRs as well. What do you do for inspiration? Do you read books? Do you listen to podcasts? Or do you talk to people? Where do you get your own inspiration from?
00:46:38
Speaker
Well, frankly, when you run a platform like Herki, it's incredible the kind of inspiration that you get on a daily basis. I mean, the kind of stories every week, you know, we run stories of women who are getting back to work. And that is extremely inspirational to hear the stories.
00:46:59
Speaker
And that brings us to the end of this conversation. I want to ask you for a favor now. Did you like listening to this show? I'd love to hear your feedback about it. Do you have your own startup ideas? I'd love to hear them. Do you have questions for any of the guests that you heard about in this show? I'd love to get your questions and pass them on to the guests. Write to me at adatthepodium.in. That's adatthepodium.in.