Five Years of Recruitment, Sharpen "Headhunting" Solutions for Digital Talents

There is still a gap in the demand and availability of digital talent in Indonesia. Search and post job vacancies in jobportal still considered less effective and efficient.

Method head hunting be a better approach for the company, it's just that this process is still done manually which requires human labor. As a result, it is difficult to measure and limit the potential of the interview process and the time required. The opportunity was worked on by Recruits who positioned themselves as headhunter for digital talent since 2016 by utilizing technology.

Ekrut Co-Founder and CEO Steven Suliawan said, the market share of job vacancies is currently many who run their business with many specializations, ranging from chefs for restaurants, excavator operators for mining companies, to a software engineer for startups. Recruits take a different position due to the focus on digital talent.

"With a more focused focus, we can be more detailed in managing data, so that we can make things easier tech talent in finding work with skill-set which is more suitable for the candidate," he told DailySocial.

Ekrut itself began operating at the end of 2016 as jobportal for digital talent with solutions head hunting. The company has sharpened this solution again since 2018 until now for three reasons, namely expertise, market share and technology.

In terms of expertise, the Ekrut team is supported by experience founder who is engaged in VC, head hunting, and startups, it is very relevant to focus on the technology startup ecosystem. Next, in terms of market share, the growth of digital talent and the demand from companies for this talent is increasing, considering the growth of companies that are starting to implement their services digitally.

“Finally, from a technological perspective, with resource we are very limited, we also have to be careful in choosing products, so that our technology can truly be used.use. One of them is the system data science we can produce output it would be better (our case is accurate) if we included input detailed ones."

Ekrut innovates to develop technology data science systems so that the recruitment process becomes more effective. This solution is increasingly needed by companies because getting digital talent in a short time is still difficult to achieve.

To support services head huntingAccording to him, it is stated that currently the company has released the Talent Search Service. This product allows a company to directly sourcing and invite interviews with talents that Ekrut has screened. This step is also an added value that differentiates Ekrut from competitors because it has a concept instant sourcing and pre-screened talent.

Apart from that, his party also provides consultations to both parties, namely the company and the candidate. This is different from other players, most of whom only focus on the company and often candidates are overlooked or not helped.

“We ensure that our candidates are actively looking for work and have gone through the process screening methods we. Companies can do it easily sourcing candidates and immediately invite interviews with candidates who have been recruited filter. "

Ekrut solutions have been used by various companies. Some of them are LinkAja, Tokopedia, BCA Finance, Garena, Generali, RedDoorz, Bluebird, Gojek, and OVO.

According to Steven, the profession most sought after by companies through Ekrut is Backend Engineer, Java Developer, Mobile Engineer, Product Manager, Software Engineer, Frontend Engineerand Android Developer.

“Most of the job vacancies available at Ekrut are in the PDEM category (Product, Data, Engineer, Marketing). Many companies are looking for tech talents in the field software engineering, product management, data science, as well digital marketing & communications. "

Outside the PDEM category, he continued, there are still many job vacancies non-tech which is still relevant and still needed by technology companies. For example, Business Operations, Finance Officer, Human Resources, Business Development, General Affairsand Account executive.

With a B2B business like this, Ekrut can grow positively. Although Steven did not elaborate further, Ekrut has now almost reached the point of profitability.

“It is relatively different from 2020, in 2020 burn rate we're down fourfold. Whereas revenue we are still increasing three times compared to last year.”

These conditions mean that companies are not in a hurry to raise new funding. Ekrut announced last time Pre-Series A . funding with an undisclosed amount led by Venturra Capital in April 2019. "Even though Ekrut is currently not actively looking funding, we always 'open' for fundraising options. "

The impact of the presence of unicorn startups

According to him, in the five years that Ekrut has been operating, the startup ecosystem has become much more mature. In the past, companies really had to “plead” to digital talents to want to work at their company. This condition has changed because supply has increased significantly. Companies are starting to try to focus more on profitability.

“We're seeing a healthier balance between supply and demand. Now find out engineer with five years of experience it is relatively easier than five years ago, where the majority engineer still only have 1-2 years of work experience.”

“Thank you too decacorn and unicorn, through them quality tech talents "We are also improving," continued Steven.

The need for digital talent has increased since the pandemic because many companies are required to carry out digital transformation. According to Ekrut's internal data, the company's demand for professional talent grew to its peak in the second quarter of 2021 at 40,62%.

The most frequent job vacancies during the first half of this year are finance and insurance. "In my opinion, during the current pandemic, more and more startups are being more careful about burn rate, request a software engineer is still continuing to grow slowly, although not as aggressively as in 2015."

"Supply for tech talent also continues to increase along with demand existing, this brings a healthier balance within supply and demand, " he concluded.

In Indonesia, players jobportal Other specific ones also provide digital talent searches for quite diverse white collar workers. Some of the players are Kalibrr, UrbanHire, Glints, and LinkedIn.

Nine million digital talents by 2030

As is known, the need for digital talent continues to be boosted by the government because it is one of the keys to digital transformation. The government targets the number of skilled digital talents it can reach nine million people by 2030 coming. In order to achieve this figure, cooperation between government institutions and the private sector is needed.

At the government level, the Ministry of Education and Culture, Research and Technology contributed through the Directorate General of Higher Education in introducing the Independent Campus policy, specifically for entrepreneurial activities or digital startups. Meanwhile, from the private sector, Tokopedia, for example, is holding a certified internship program in the fields of Software Engineering, Marketing and Business Development to support the Merdeka Campus.

Based on The Global Startup Ecosystem 2020, Jakarta was named the second best startup ecosystem in the Top 100 Emerging Ecosystems after Mumbai, India. The indicators used in the assessment are startup performance, funding, market reach and digital talent. Of the four indicators, digital talent has the lowest value.

Therefore, this data shows that the need for digital talent in Indonesia will increase in the future, so there is an urgency for collaboration between government, digital platforms and academics in developing digital talent and achieving the target of 9 million skilled digital talents by 2030.