By Priyanka Saxena Ray, Study World, Global Buzz Makers
Inquisitive in nature, Rachit Jain, Founder and CEO, youth4work, in his early years of employment, felt that young professionals were allocated responsibilities and portfolios that didn’t match their innate strengths. In fact, he observed that almost 80 per cent of the youth were dissatisfied because they were placed in unsuitable departments. Thus he floated his own venture where the right kind of talent met with the right kind of job profile. Read on to know details about his successful journey–
How and when did the idea of ‘youth4work’ took birth? How convinced were you with its success while you were floating it?
I kick-started my career in the elite positions in Mahindra Group and was one of the top most and fastest growing performers. But, I found that companies are hiring and fitting people in the job roles randomly — the basis of hiring, career paths that a youngster experiences is pretty
broken in India. I really believe that if people are found and made to do work that match their talent, they can perform and do wonders and actually live a better life. There is a serious missing link and zero technology being used in the way talents are identified and hired. I soon resolved to venture for a start-up that could address the countless problems of youngsters as regard their career and education. Thus, I entered into the virgin market and christened it “youth4work”. I have always been convinced about its success as I strongly believe that the world does not use enough technology to help people make the second most important decision of their life i.e., their careers (first being marriage, I guess)!! I think everyone is unique; every individual has his/her own skills and talents, which cannot be shown on a resume or by a common degree. If people can identify their own skills vis-à-vis the others, improve them and showcase them, there are tons of opportunities out there. Trust me, it is extremely hard to find and hire people as an employer. Thus if people are working in areas where they are passionate and skilled, they cannot just make their career grow but also attain true job satisfaction.
Were you expecting the response you received or was it a surprise to you too? What are the unique features of the platform and the services offered?
The surprising factor was the pace at which we grew and that too all naturally and via word-of mouth. We now impact 1.2 million youngsters across India and about 100k outside India as well. Our services offered can broadly be categorised under online education (youth4work offers online certification courses); Prep tests (we offer competitive exam test for both academic and job purpose) and talent acquisition (we help employers find the right talent).
Since conception, have you evolved and added some new features to ‘youth4work’? Can you please share details of the same with us?
Youth4work is a youth centric platform where assessment is a tool that helps identify the talent that each individual pursues and how good or bad they are amongst the others who have a similar talent. There are basically three aspects of our product — prepare/assess yourself, improve yourself and showcase yourself. Under prepare / assess aspect, we actually help the youth to prepare for exams and assess their own skills. The ‘improve’ aspect is based on their skills, rank and pursuit based on which we suggest the right online course to people. Under the ‘showcase’ aspect, the tested and ranked profiles are showcased and can be searched easily online on our platform. Apart from skill tests, which are free for all, we monetise on freemium models on prep and online courses and connect youth to companies.
What value does the platform adds to job seekers, freshers and trainees?
We are a youth portal, which allows people to self assess and form communities of like-skilled people. If you understand yourself, learn and improve yourself. Career opportunities will be a by product. All that a youth from anywhere in India has to do to start is give a free online test at www.Youth4work.com.
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How does it help youth from the manual skills background or people with low literacy levels in seeking jobs? Do you only offer online assessment or offer services like English tutorials?
Personalization for each and every user, enabling people to connect and be compared with like-talented, like-profiled people is some of our calling cards. We use advanced machine learning and big data algorithms for enabling the site to function easily for youth from all backgrounds and skill levels. Using a phone, people can test and compare themselves with their peers. We do not have a single employability test for all — we have 50 different talent tests.
For example, a person with data entry skills will give a test for data entry and be compared with people having that same skill. Yes, we offer online certification programmes for improving written and verbal English communication skills. Not only this, we also provide assessments to track the progress of the candidates in the respective programme.
Does Youth4work has any role to play in the dream project (skill development) of our PM? Please elaborate.
We are actually doing a lot for Prime minister Modi’s vision of Skilled India
We are a youth portal that allows people to self assess and form Communities of likeskilled people. If you understand yourself , learn and improve yourself .
We are innovation award winners on NSDC l We are working closely with Skill India Mission and have already signed MOUs with multiple SSCs — RASCI, TSSC etc. l We are enabling a.Youth across India who are preparing for Govt. Skill certificates to prepare for the final certification and exams b.We enable companies to find and contact Skill certified people We are slowly and steadily becoming the defacto platform for Skill India to aid education and find skilled people jobs across India
It’s the era of start-ups and you have managed to make a mark for yourself. Any advice you have for the youngsters out there who too are keen on starting a venture?
A word of caution would entail not to get driven by the fancy word “entrepreneur” and the flamboyant appeal of becoming the CEO of a start-up. It’s not a cakewalk to have money minting business but a long journey of trials and tribulations involving the goal of carving a niche for yourself along with making difference to the society at large. Last but not the least, believe in yourself, for if you don’t others would have an even difficult time doing it for you.
How conducive, in your opinion, is the economic and political scenario in our country for a start-up venture? Are start-ups taken seriously and given the due importance?
The everyday feedback we get from users is phenomenal. We, as a team, love the positive impact that we are able to make in people’s lives. This itself witnesses the brilliant scope of start-ups in India. I think with the whole Digital India campaign, millions will come online. I think if youth4work can help some of them identify, improve their skills and aid in finding the right opportunities, then the impact will be bigger than anyone could ever imagine.
Is there any more information that you would like to share with us?
We do not want to be positioned as a job site as we feel that the opportunity and the need is bigger. The need is to build people intelligence, which personalises information and guides people to connect and collaborate. That is important as about 300 million people will enter India’s workforce in the next few years. We would like to be the de facto platform where every youngster in India who is connected to the Internet comes to improve themselves and become part of a talent community.