Big Data Payday
We wish there was a way to automate these ridiculous podcast episode descriptions, but until then, we'll have to be content with talking about recruitment automation. Most notably this week:
Two automated scheduling startups got (additional) funding.
Another big data solution made it to unicorn status.
Stimulus checks aren't the problem
The US Chamber isn't letting a good crisis go to waste.
and TikTok ends the week with industry folks lining up to give the social media app an unwarranted tongue bath.
As always, your favorite podcast is powered by Jobvite, Sovren, and JobAdx.
PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION sponsored by:
Disability Solutions is your RPO partner for the disability community, from source to hire.
INTRO (1s):
`Hide your kids! Lock the doors! You're listening to HR’s most dangerous podcast. Chad Sowash and Joel Cheeseman are here to punch the recruiting industry, right where it hurts! Complete with breaking news, brash opinion and loads of snark, buckle up boys and girls, it's time for the Chad and Cheese podcast.
Joel (30s):
Oh yeah. Coming at you from the home office in beautiful majestic Cleveland, Ohio, what's up boys and girls? It's your favorite podcast AKA the Chad and Cheese podcast. This is your co-host Joel "mistake on the lake" Cheeseman. And this is
Chad (46s):
Chad "I'm sounding silky smooth" Sowash.
Joel (49s):
Well Indeed on this week's show more funding flows into startups, maybe the extra unemployment wasn't the problem? And TED talk is here to save all our asses. Thank God. No thank God.
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JobAdX (1m 48s):
That's J O B adx.com/get-started-today.
Joel (1m 53s):
Cleveland's beautiful. This time of year, isn't it? Oh
Chad (1m 56s):
My God. It was hot as fuck yesterday today. Jesus, what the hell? Luckily we do have the, the, the breeze off the lake. That was, that was nice, but damn it was hot.
Joel (2m 6s):
A little humidity that might've been due to the giant storm that was coming through and disrupted our baseball game that was not played, which makes me very sad. But we had a good time with our friends. So why are we in Cleveland Chad?
Chad (2m 21s):
We're in Cleveland to visit with our friends over here at Evergreen. Evergreen podcast and we're building out the HR channel with a bunch of podcasts. You all know and love, you know, the Matt Alders, you know, the Crazy and the Kings, Jim Strouds and we got more podcasts coming, adding to the channel. So we're
Joel (2m 43s):
How many podcasts there are and employment who knew there was so much fricking content. Oh, well, let's get to shout outs. So I'll start with just Cleveland hospitality. The city has treated us very well. Similarly to Chicago last week, and a shout out to all the folks at Evergreen and especially super chef Michael Simon. We had some Cleveland barbecue. Yeah. It's actually a thing. If you're in Cleveland, head to fourth street. Yep. And check out Mabel's barbecue.
Chad (3m 13s):
It's delish.
Joel (3m 15s):
Order the ribs beer
Chad (3m 16s):
Great beer on tap. Oh, it was amazing. It was amazing. And as a matter of fact, Steven you should take Faith there for her birthday. Take her to take her to Cleveland. Happy 29th birthday Faith. That that's something that makes sure that the Steven does. Okay? Mabels.
Joel (3m 33s):
Oh, I can feel the love now. Walks by the lake, head to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Chad (3m 40s):
Yeah. That'd be a nice trip.
Joel (3m 42s):
Go see the Christmas Story House, that's a highlight for me. Shout out to Axios. I don't know if you saw this in the news, but the web property that you probably know for simple brief news, it's also thoughtful is going local. They're coming to a local market near you and they're bringing job boards with them.
Chad (3m 60s):
Hello?
Joel (4m 0s):
Yes. Job boards are back in the Axios network. Not exactly sure how this will work? The it's spotty. It's spot in best the exact roll out of this, but we'll be watching. Yeah. Everyone thinks just slap a job board on it and it's going to be boats and hoes and champagne and cocaine. We'll see Axios. We'll see.
Chad (4m 23s):
Gotcha. You can't just put a ring on it, baby. You just can't put a ring on it. Shout out to European show. Number two. That's right. Kids, Joel and Lievin and myself were actually joined my Adam Gordon. That's right the mad Scott himself. And he was mad because Scotland was kicked out of the tournament. Not to mention also really pissed off that England beat Germany. Two-nil. Yeah, that was, that was not a great day for Adam
Joel (4m 51s):
My ancestry DNA profile says I should be rooting for England. So I guess I'm semi glad that they won. Surprised that France lost. I had been watching the final 16, which is pretty interesting. That was a shocker, I guess.
Chad (5m 5s):
So Mbappe, who was like the world cup, he was like the star for France. Right. And he just could not find his groove. He had plenty of shots on goal. He missed that last penalty shots. You know, they went into extra, extra innings. I guess you could say missed the penalty shot. I mean, that kid right now, he's gotta be on suicide watch.
Joel (5m 26s):
How do you feel about the penalty shot? Are you for it, against it? Do you say, Hey, just let him, let him play until they die. Do you like you like you like the shootout?
Chad (5m 33s):
Yeah. I do like shootout. I, I think that, that adds some excitement not to mention they've already played what, you know, at that point they'd they'd played like three hours.
Joel (5m 41s):
Yeah.
Chad (5m 42s):
So it was like, fuck man. So yeah, no, I dig it. Yeah.
Joel (5m 45s):
I think I'm a sudden death kind of guy. I like, just play until you're dead. Somebody is going to score at some point. So anyway, so what do we got? We got England. We got Switzerland?
Chad (5m 59s):
Belgium.
Joel (5m 59s):
Belgium.
Chad (5m 60s):
Italy. Belgium and Italy are actually playing.
Joel (6m 3s):
You're in Italy. You're a fan of Italy. You think they could a surprise a lot of people.
Chad (6m 6s):
They're young. They are incredibly talented. Belgium is obviously their number one team in the world, but I think Italy has a chance, but whoever comes out of it, they don't have to play France. So the left side of the bracket just got easier,
Joel (6m 22s):
Young and talented. You kind of described our show in describing Italy's soccer team. Shout out to a free shit. We're at the end of the month, we're going to name a winner for some free whiskey and beer here soon.
Chad (6m 35s):
Mayonaise.
Joel (6m 35s):
If you haven't headed to Chadcheese.com/free, we got t-shirts by Emissary. We got beer by Adzuna and we got whiskey by our friends at Sovren. So if you haven't done that yet, go out and do it.
Chad (6m 49s):
Cheese.com/free. Not to mention, also reach out to us on social media, LinkedIn, Twitter, hashtag Chadcheese. We enjoy hearing the feedback, stories and whatever you guys got to say. So like it, hate it. That's awesome. Just hit us on the socials.
Joel (7m 6s):
Yup. Yup. You mentioned Faith who celebrated a birthday recently? We got some other birthdays coming up. China Gorman. Oh, we're good money on Vegas. Vegas has opened up. So maybe she'll do it up there out on the strip. Also our buddy and fan of the show, Josh Akers celebrates a birthday July 2nd.
Chad (7m 25s):
He's gonna be 60 isn't here?
Joel (7m 29s):
So I don't know if we should be talking. I don't know. I don't know. Young and talented only goes so far.
Chad (7m 35s):
Oh, let me go ahead, ahead and pivot over to a shout out to Amazon. No shit, Cheeseman. I'm shouting out to Amazon who acquired Art 19, a podcast distribution and monetization platform. Last week we talked about Spotify, Facebook, Apple going hard into podcasts. I mean, this is the medium right here, baby. And now, you know, it is because Amazon is getting into this shit.
Joel (8m 2s):
Sorry. You were shouting out to Amazon? Did I dream that? I had a little bit to drink last night. I'm not sure what the hell is going on. This must be, yeah, this is the hangover. Shout out.
Chad (8m 14s):
I might have to ask Dave or engineer to get me a bucket. I had way too much to drink.
Joel (8m 18s):
If you go home and there's an Amazon box at your door, be, be very careful. Be very careful.
Chad (8m 23s):
Have my neighbor open it.
Joel (8m 25s):
Let's get into some topics. Shall we, oh man, holy shit. The money is flowing. Damn like the whiskey last night. All right. So we'll start with the high dollar beneficiary of some money. So Canada based HR software startup Vizier. Did I say that right? I think so has raised 125 million in series E funding bringing total funding to 216 million and valuing the company at unicorn alert $1 billion. That's B B B billion. Goldman Sachs asset management led the round and was joined by investors, including Sorenson Capital, Foundation Capital, Summit Partners, blah, blah, blah, found in 2010.
Joel (9m 11s):
The company has built a big data engine to ingest ingest. Yes, this is the company's language, not mine and analyze information from disparate human resources and related applications to develop more accurate profiles of people and departments.
Chad (9m 27s):
Messy.
Joel (9m 28s):
Places like Workday. They plug their shit in and get the data useful when considering, remuneration, promotions and wider hiring budgets. The solution that Vizier provides is a big data engine, again, that has built a, that can connect with a variety of platforms. Actually, I just talked about that. So what do you think about Vizier, Chad? I assume you'll edit that last part out more big data. Remember we talked about Apna who did something very similar everyone's into the data.
Chad (9m 57s):
So this is a messy, messy business, but making sense of the data from multiple systems, it's something that is not easy. And obviously they need a shit ton of cash to be able to make it happen. And this is, this is a workforce data management play, but they're also spinning this into business analytics. So I think it's much smarter to go at the business side of the house than just focused on HR. It's all business. It's what we can do to retain better production, better output who needs to, you know, hit the bricks and then also on the talent side. So I think these guys, the way that they're looking at this platform, isn't what we're used to because everybody tries to focus heavily just on the HR piece and with taking this much money, there's no way in hell an applicant tracking system or any of those platforms are going to buy them.
Chad (10m 52s):
Right. They need, they needed behemoths fucking system buying them, or they just need to integrate with everybody. So yeah, this is, I think this is an interesting, an interesting platform. It's all analytics, the SAP or Oracle by them.
Joel (11m 8s):
Yeah. A lot of this trend is the work from home thing, like big brother, AKA, your employer wants to keep tabs on you. And this is a way to do that. And if they can track your work and what you're doing and success rates, then it makes their job a lot easier. If they're not breathing down your neck all the time with you in the office. I do love the fact that they're branching out into other other industries. I think all they need to do now is slap on Amazon's automated firing software and they don't even need an HR department. It'll just handle everything for it.
Chad (11m 43s):
Yeah. I don't know if you know or not, but that didn't work very well for Amazon? They do have more than 12 million employee histories across 75 countries loaded into the platform. So the thing for me is I wonder how much money they're actually spending in on the cybersecurity side of the house? Because a lot of the data, like if you're in an applicant tracking system, you're not getting social, right? For the most part, you're not getting, you're not getting data that is really sensitive. This is going to be sensitive data. They're going to add all these different streams, so they need to lock this down pretty hard. Overall though, it's a big fucking payday for them.
Joel (12m 23s):
Big data payday if you will.
Chad (12m 25s):
Yes.
Joel (12m 25s):
All right. Scheduling, who knew, who knew? So Good Time firing squad alum, you said it was our second firing squad. We were going down memory lane last night. Okay. Is firing squad Good Time added 9.5 million to its series a funding bringing the total round to 16.7 million. I'm guessing they had to hit some milestones before they got the rest of the money. The San Fran based company intends to use the funds to accelerate the innovation for its hiring slash candidate experience solutions and go to market growth in a wide range of industries, talent acquisition teams at Zoom, Instacart, and Dropbox among others use Good Time to reach savings and hiring expenditures.
Joel (13m 9s):
The company was founded in 2016. Automated scheduling? It sounds like a feature to me, but maybe this is a fucking product?
Chad (13m 16s):
Yeah, no, this is a feature. This is not a product. The thing that I can't understand is how they are jamming DEI into this. You're seeing diversity, equity, and inclusion on everything much like you saw AI, like two or three years back.,
Joel (13m 30s):
It's on their PR?
Chad (13m 31s):
Yes It's on their PR, it's on their website and it's like, scheduling will help you with your DEI. Where's the fucking correlation here? So again, I think there's a lot of reaching going on, but this is a lot of money for a scheduling tool.
Joel (13m 47s):
Yeah. Yeah. And they don't reveal much in terms of it being anything beyond scheduling. I know that this is an incredible challenge for companies, but if I'm Good Time and sell this shit now, because this feature is being built into every chat bot, a lot, ATS is CRMs. They're closing in on the point where nobody wants it because they can build it themselves.
Chad (14m 14s):
They might've just taken too much money. They might've just priced themselves out of actually getting acquired because they took more money. And because they are a feature, they're not, this is not a platform.
Joel (14m 23s):
Yup. Yup. You know, they say most companies don't die because they have too little money. They die because they have too much money.
Chad (14m 31s):
Yes.
Joel (14m 32s):
Good Time we'll be watching. Well, there's another scheduling software out of San Francisco. Oh my God. Prelude maker of hiring software raises 1.2 million in seed funding so they're like Good Time five years ago. Fuel Capital Jack Altman, Sam Altman, and Elad, Gil invested, formerly known as Interview Schedule. The company looks to make scheduling job interviews a little easier. Founded in 2017, the company has now raised 2.4 million to date according to founder and CEO Will Loffor. The company decided to rebrand because it hopes to do more than just scheduling. At least they've got a clue on that. And the company is looking to grow the platform to handle everything from initial email, outreach to a candidate, to the actual hiring process.
Joel (15m 21s):
Yeah.
Chad (15m 22s):
So a quote from the prelude CEO, he said there is no tool in the market, he sees, that specifically targets the scheduling and logistics issues, recruiters and candidates face. Does he have his eyes closed? I mean, this is baked into a lot of platforms already.
Joel (15m 43s):
Yep.
Chad (15m 43s):
We just talked about Good Time, right? I mean, how can you say this? There's no tool like this in the market. It's actually this young. I mean, it's not like he's got a real verbose toolset.
Joel (15m 57s):
Yeah. He needs to get really comfortable with the word niche or niche. However you want to say it, they need to go big time into healthcare or industrials or you name it. They need to be really good at a certain vertical. And I think about our buddy at Apple Chat, Adam, who started as a really broad vision and now just as healthcare and apparently does a really good business, just doing that. So if I were advising Prelude, which I'm not, I would say, I would say, go niche, boys and girls.
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Joel (17m 34s):
How's your hangover doing?
Chad (17m 36s):
I need more water.
Joel (17m 37s):
Yeah.
Chad (17m 38s):
Dave do we have an IV? Is there an IV around?
Joel (17m 40s):
There's not enough water in Lake Erie? Yeah, I'll go. I'll grab that IV for you. Thank you. We have a third. We have a, I lied. That's good. I, it we're a professional podcast now. Well, Chad and we've been talking a lot about state benefits and seven states we talked about cutoff federal funding.
Chad (17m 59s):
The red states?
Joel (17m 59s):
I mean the Republican states, the red states. Yes. A lot of those states thinking that, well, if we just cut off the extra money, all these lazy asses, we'll get back to work and we can go back to the way things were. Well, the New York Times did an article that caught my attention that goes into sort of a progress report, I guess, of how this is going. So they focused on Missouri, a Missouri scrap federal pay to the unemployed saying it kept people out of the labor market. But so far workers still seem to be choosy. Workforce Development officials said they had seen virtually no uptick in applicants since the government's announcement, which ended a $300 weekly supplement to other state benefits.
Joel (18m 43s):
And the online job site Indeed found that in states that have abandoned the federal benefits clicks on job postings were below the national average.
Chad (18m 52s):
What?!
Joel (18m 52s):
Why businesses are having such trouble hiring when 9.3 million people were unemployed in May is a puzzle that has generated lots of speculation, but little hard evidence. Chad, you've done your own little evidence, right? What have you found in this quagmire dilemma?
Chad (19m 10s):
Yeah, I think it's fairly simple kids that it's not a bunch of lazy asses on the couch, not wanting to do something right. It is a people who want paid more, or they don't want to go back to the same shitty job. And we've seen news reports of individuals during this year re-skilling, going into different industries, not wanting to do restaurant stuff anymore, not wanting to do what they were doing before and getting paid less. So, you know, I think this is going to be again, red alert, red alert, raise your fucking wages. Look at our wages or the past 50 years, we have not seen the uptick that we were promised by trickle down economics.
Chad (19m 54s):
We've got to do something to be able to pay these people a living wage. Yeah.
Joel (19m 58s):
Yeah. I think you touched on that piece, but I still think childcare issues are still a thing with a lot of people. I think there's still fear of COVID and what that can do. And I think that's the year has made people step back and really analyze what do I, what do I want to do with the rest of my life? And really think about that. I wouldn't be surprised if we've seen an uptick in applications to college. MBA programs. Maybe up-skilling with trades? I also think that for the first time in maybe our lifetime labor has the upper hand and I think in some way they realize that we're in demand now. We're actually in a position of strength. I don't think there's a cumulative labor secret labor union of everyone in this, but I think they do think, wow, I'm in control.
Joel (20m 44s):
I can take a little time. I can get that job when I want it. Make sure it's the right job. Salaries keep going up every, every week I'm learning about a new employer, raising minimum wage. I can quit and you know, by the way, I can drive an Uber or gig for that extra $300 a week possibly and still be okay. So the dynamics here are really, really interesting. Again, New York Times pointed out that it's still very early to make any sort of concrete, you know, explanation to any of this. But it is a fascinating story that we keep talking about every week. And it will only get more curious or curiouser for however. The U S chamber seems to think that they have maybe some answers.
Joel (21m 25s):
Announced this week, the US Chamber of Commerce will lead an initiative aimed at both industries and the government to address quote "a deepening worker shortage crisis" end quote. Through the initiative named America Works, that's clever and has probably never been used before. The chamber says it will push for policy changes at the federal and state levels to remove barriers, to work, including increasing the number of visas available to immigrants, improving federal investment in job training programs and expanding access to affordable childcare. It will also work hard to scale employer side solutions, including its own training programs. Sound Pretty good to me Chad
Chad (22m 3s):
Yeah, what's going to happen here is, the chamber, who's a lobby group for corporate America, right? Is a they're going to go out and they're going to try to get money from the taxpayers to re-skill all of these individuals. So it's corporate welfare is what it is. So the US chamber, who's very good at this. Very good at this. They want your money, your tax money. So they want us, you and I to pay for this re-skilling as opposed to the motherfuckers who are actually making the goddamn products, the goddamn money and the ones who were getting 30 million a year, right? The CEO's who were bloated. And they have crazy ass wages and salaries but yet their lobby group, the fucking US chamber go figure they that's what they're spinning into.
Chad (22m 54s):
All this other stuff is just, it's all fluff, right? Well, we've got our own training, whatever you're going to try to get money from the government to pay for this asshole.
Joel (23m 2s):
Never let a good crisis go to waste. And just as I mentioned, that labor is in the catbird seat for the first time in terms of negotiation, the chamber is looking at this and saying, Hey, there's an opportunity here for us to get a little cabbage, a little cheese. And yeah, it sounds really good though. A lot of politicians, a lot of people like to talk about all this shit that they're spitting. So I wouldn't be surprised if, if they get what they're looking for, you know, reminds me of, remember the whole meme stock, Game Stop thing. And everyone's like, oh, this is power to the people. This is the little guy. And then it came out later like, well, a lot of institutions were sort of gaming the system as well with the retail investors.
Joel (23m 44s):
And this feels like the chamber taking advantage of a macro economic trend and getting a little bit of theirs.
Chad (23m 51s):
It's easy. It's easy actually to go on news programs and actually say, this is what the people need. We need to re-skill, there's a skills gap. And, and, and again, we talked to Suresh over at Columbia, right? Yeah. And he talks about, you know, there is no skills gap. You know what you need to do? You need to pay people more. So the people are there, you just got to pay for it.
Joel (24m 12s):
So you're saying the U S chamber, won't say this?
Chad (24m 15s):
No fucking way. I need another. They'll just take more money out of our pocket, which is they're really good at,
Joel (24m 21s):
Can I get some more water over here, please?
Chad (24m 25s):
One thing that I think is going to be nice. Is as we transition into this new hybrid, whatever the hell they call these days is this third workplace. Have you heard of this thing?
Joel (24m 39s):
I have heard of it. And you shared a story on the newsfeed. It's quite intriguing, how human beings are adapting to the new world and the things that they're doing. What did you see in that?
Chad (24m 50s):
Yeah, so people aren't working from the office. They're not working from home either. They're working from everywhere. Dave,
Joel (24m 59s):
Dave actually came our soundboard guy came in to get my Shaker Yeti for more water, I'll take more water.
Chad (25m 7s):
I love that guy.
Joel (25m 10s):
Thank you, Dave, go back to the soundboarding.
Chad (25m 13s):
We are getting spoiled!
Joel (25m 14s):
Dave needs a new workplace too!
Chad (25m 20s):
But I'll give you a great example. So we're talking about not working from the office, not working from home. My brother-in-law right now is working out of his RV. Him and his wife are actually going across country. They're working out of their RV, right? You have these companies like Work Chew that we talked about several months ago, where you can actually put an app on your phone and you can see what different hotels, what restaurants have workspaces that are set aside. And then they have discounts for food and free coffee and all that other fun stuff. So, you know, we're all sick and tired of being at home and working from home. Totally get that.
Chad (25m 60s):
Everybody's like, oh, I need to get out! The office isn't the answer, for everybody. So I think this is pretty fucking cool. I, myself love getting out, going downtown in Columbus and doing work just in different, different areas. This is what this is.
Joel (26m 15s):
Sure. I think it all leads to sort of the customized work, work environments and the company losing control over what that looks like and the companies I think that can adapt too. Yeah, go on your RV tour. As long as your work is done and we can access you. And thankfully with 5g and technology and you know, Elan, Elan's going to plug us all in here soon with his satellite network. Our ability to do work at any time, all around the world is going to be something will happen. I think that companies are struggling with this, but I think that the trend seems to be, if you don't allow for flexibility and giving what people want, they're g