the “Zigsaw” story

Ever imagined that a comment in Facebook can land you a job offer??? Well, that’s what, we at Zigsaw Consultancy services are trying to do. With our vision to simplify the process of recruitment both for the recruiters as well as candidates, we are all set to #RevolutionizeRecruitment forever
The recruitment sector is highly disorganized. There are people who need Jobs & then there are companies that need candidates. The good thing from a business perspective is that both are willing to pay & business exists on both the models. We intend to create an online community where Job seekers can openly & independently interact with Employers.
From the Clients’ perspective, If I were to explain our product to you; I would ask you to imagine. Imagine a world, where when you need someone to do a particular Job, you reach out to a magic box. That magic box understands your requirements, quantifies it, evaluates the available options & delivers the best results. Now, imagine all this on auto-pilot mode. This magic-box is what we are creating at Zigsaw. A total platform to endorse evaluates, verify & select, all at your finger-tips. At Zigsaw, we are #RevolutinizingRecruitment.
Inspiration to start-up?
I was preparing for CAT in my final year. All of the scores in the preparatory tests predicted a percentile of 99% in the CAT exam. My exam went well but I scored only 83%. I studied closely the normalization methodology discussed on various platforms. I also came to know that the bell curve hypothesis is valid only for infinite data points & would lead to inconsistent results if done on a finite data segment. Even for my friends, the scores were a little unexpected(both ways). On the other hand, scores of my lobby mates for GRE & GMAT were consistent with their expectations. It is also a well-accepted fact in the IIT fraternity that the IITians of the 90s were super-brilliant than their counterparts today. Although some may argue otherwise, I think it is unfair to take the cream out based on easy/average questions. I think it is of utmost importance that we come up with a smarter algorithm to rate aspirants for every exam. If you are to select the top 1%, this can be only done with tougher questions that draw a clear distinction between the top 1% & the next 1%. We wanted to develop a smarter algorithm so that every smart guy is flagged & no brilliance goes unnoticed.
We are a strong believer in the impact of Social Media on Recruitment and this practice is increasingly finding favor in different cities. We have created various Facebook groups, each city-specific to connect job and internship seekers with potential employers. We have been built these groups from scratch to a total of 40k members in the last 4 months would give you an idea of the effort we have put in this group. These groups have a huge engagement and have landed many people in their dream job /internship. These are no-spam open groups where recruiters can post their requirements and connect with Job seekers of their choice. Our Facebook groups are growing at approximately 500 members per day
How are we different? 

  • We evaluate skills through self-evaluation, peer evaluation & expert evaluation. This unique strategy helps us in creating a repository of pre-evaluated profiles which saves time & effort for the recruiter.
  • Gamification: We are building a game around recruitment and are incentivizing the whole system of sourcing applications through referrals. The system of referrals from the existing user network makes it easy for hiring the right person for the right job.

Future of Recruitment?
Have you played Clash of Clans? Candy Crush? Enjoyed the house competitiveness in Harry Potter? This is exactly what we would like to do with recruitment. To build a game that is engaging and helps people get Jobs. A demo version of the proposed game can be viewed at www.zigsaw.in/gamify
(Username: demo, password: demo)
Personal Journey
It wasn’t easy. All the more for me because I was handling an independent HR role at my previous organization. Finding a technical cofounder gave me my first start-up blues. I tried finding a technical partner through the existing portals, my personal network, social media & all the ways I could think. Unfortunately, I wasn’t successful and although it was difficult I am glad that I started anyways. Honestly, this was a major reason that highlighted the need for a smarter need and we started focussing on recruitment. I realized that It is difficult to convince people to experience a new way when they have been using the traditional methods of recruitment for years. We have been stopped at doors and shown out. Not listened to and been dismissed as bogus. But in the end, we have always prevailed. I think the feedback from Job seekers has been our biggest strength and has been something that has helped us through times when business wasn’t good.
Having catered to clients like pagalguy.com, UBER, Indiamart, HRH Group, Miraj Group, Grey Orange Robotics, Urban Clap, Razorpay, and many other notable companies in the past, we are all set to change the face of recruitment forever. We have conducted 3 major events to date
1. Udaipur Job Festival: An offline Job Festival in Udaipur saw participation from 9 companies like Ziphop, Alien Tech Solutions, Spericon 3D, Rakhadu, etc.
2. Internship Festival (13 companies): Apart from the online nature of the festival, an offline internship festival was organized at SVNIT. It saw participation from companies like Urban Clap, Wedding Plz, Reval Regal, Career Crucible, etc.
3. Job Carnival: 62 Job openings from the likes of UBER, Mahindra Finance, Exide Life, August Infotech were shared over a span of 3 days.
Revolutionizing Recruitment
If you look closely, you will observe that Uber, the world’s largest taxi company, owns no vehicles. Facebook, the world’s most popular media owner, creates no content. Alibaba, the most valuable retailer, has no inventory. And Airbnb, the world’s largest accommodation provider, owns no real estate. We want to be the Job portal that owns no data. People refer their friends & colleagues for Job openings. This, I believe can the smartest & the fastest way of finding the right person for the Right Job
The team
Currently, we are a core team of 2 members, me & Shristi, we have believed in hiring interns for getting work done. We have had interns from top colleges like IIT-Kanpur, BITS-Pilani, IIT-BHU, SVNIT, MNIT, VNIT & TAPMI. I believe it works brilliantly; interns create momentum & leave us with a lot of ideas, and “out-of-the-box” ideas is what I think will separate us from the other players in recruitment. If I look back now, I see a very rich pedigree of sweet that has gone in building what we are today.
What do you see ahead for Zigsaw? I would like to take you to that one scene in the movie where Brad Pitt is leading the boat on the attack on Troy and there is one soldier who asks him, what do you see ahead?. He says, immortality……. I am not undermining the challenges that lay ahead, I am not saying it would be easy. We are just stating that with our ideas to change and boundless energy; sooner or later; We will #RevolutionizeRecruitment

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