I’m Prateek, head of technology at Joveo. I’ve been CTO at MoBolt and co-founder at KaamWork, but what gets me up in the morning is solving real recruiting problems with technology that doesn’t suck.

Recruitment tech is about to change in a big way. And honestly, it’s about time.

Start With The Customer. Always.

People ask me how we approach building products at Joveo. The answer is pretty straightforward: we start with the customer.

I know that sounds obvious, but you’d be surprised how many companies build first and ask questions later. We get feedback from users, we understand what they actually need, we do market research to see where things are heading.

Then, and this is important, we make sure we can actually build it. There’s no point in promising something our team can’t deliver.

When all of that lines up, that’s our product roadmap. Keep it simple.

Before We Jump Onto Any Solution

New trends pop up every day in tech. AI this, blockchain that, whatever the next shiny thing is.

Before we jump on anything, we do rigorous testing. We talk to customers, we run experiments, we dig into whether it actually solves a real problem or if it’s just noise.

That’s how we separate long-term innovative solutions from short term hype. And trust me, there’s a lot of hype.

Any Customer Feedback Beats Market Research

We’re lucky at Joveo. Our customers actually talk to us. They tell us what’s working, what isn’t, what they need next.

We have this thing called the Customer Happiness Index that we run every quarter. Real feedback from real users and any customer feedback is better than any amount of market research you can do.

We’re fortunate that our customers’ wishes align with our long-term vision. That makes it easier to incorporate their feedback into our roadmap.

I’m Going To Let You In On a Secret

We’re working on something big right now. I’m sure it won’t be secret for long, and everyone will know about it.

We’re building a high-volume hiring solution that’s agentic in nature. It incorporates attraction, engagement, and conversion all into a single product.

Most companies out there have point solutions. They solve only one piece of the puzzle. But I don’t think there are many companies that have an agentic experience which stitches together all these point solutions for high-volume hiring. The first of its kind.

We’re Completely Transforming Our Team

AI isn’t just a feature we’re adding to products. It’s changing how our team works every day.

We’re using it to help us innovate faster, solve problems faster. We’ve always tried to stay on the cutting edge of technology, but AI gives us a whole new way to push boundaries.

There’s a lot of AI innovation going on internally, both in terms of product building and transforming how people work.

There Are Too Many to Choose From

People always ask about favorite tools or technologies.There are too many, but if I have to pick one underrated thing, it’s infrastructure as code.

It makes creating new infrastructure for new geographies so much easier. Otherwise what takes months now takes hours. We assume it always works, but it’s truly magical. And I don’t think we talk about it enough.

For launches I’m proud of, again, there are too many to pick from. The MoBolt mobile apply technology which we built and was later acquired. At Joveo, our Unified Analytics is definitely one of our coolest products, which really solves analytics problems that no other product does.

Transformative

If I had to describe where recruitment tech is heading in one word: transformative.

I believe we’re at an inflection point where we have the technology to truly change recruitment technology into what we always wished the industry could be. We’re going to try our best to push that boundary.

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Video Transcript

Jennifer: I’m here with Prateek, Head of Technology for Joveo. You drive Joveo’s vision and execution of AI-powered tech platform and engineering infrastructure. Great role. Previous CTO at MoBolt and Co-founder of kaam.work. And we’re gonna talk a little bit about innovation, prioritization, product leadership, and building the future to get it ready in recruitment technology. So in an industry that is rapidly evolving, how do you define tech supremacy and what does it take to stay ahead?

Prateek: At Joveo, we define tech supremacy as our ability to innovate, to use our innovative approach to build solutions that solve real world recruiting problems. What it takes, what it takes is our ability to get feedback from our customer. We foster a lot of innovation, right? And then we do a lot of market research to make sure that all of our products are at the forefront of innovation. Another key thing is the agility, our agility to adapt. Whenever there is a new trend in the market or whenever there is a new innovative solution. So that’s what it takes.

Jennifer: Okay. You’ve built enterprise applications across multiple companies. How do you approach creating and managing Joveo’s product roadmap? What factors influence your decisions?

Prataeek: The most important factor in building solutions at Joveo or any other, you know companies that I have worked at before is the customer. So we always start with the customer, we get their feedback, we understand what is that they need. We also do a lot of market research, we understand the market trends. And the last but not the least, we also do a lot of alignment with our internal teams to make sure that our products are feasible, that it can be built right. And when we combine all of this, that is what leads to our product roadmap.

Jennifer: Aright, keep it straight forward. Listen to the customer and build from there, I love that. With new trends and ideas emerging every day, how do you distinguish between short-lived hype and innovating that actually belongs in the Joveo platform?

Prateek: That’s a good one. Whenever there is a new thing which comes in the market, before we jump onto the solution, we do a lot of rigorous testing. We get feedback from the user, we talk to our customers, we do a lot of research, right. And that helps us distinguish long-term innovative solutions and short-term, just hype.

Jennifer: Great, yeah, there’s so much out there. It’s almost hard to decipher and discern what’s really going to last and what’s gonna be important and what makes the most sense. Joveo puts a lot of emphasis on client feedback, including our quarterly customer happiness index. How do you integrate that input into the development cycle without losing sight of long-term goals?

Prateek: Yeah, so all of our customer feedback, I would say we are blessed to get feedback from our customers. And any customer feedback is better than, you know any amount of market research you can do. So we always build with the customer as the center and we are fortunate enough to have customers whose wishes and demands very much aligns with our long-term vision. So it’s never a contention. So it’s whatever, you know whatever we get feedback, all of that is aligned with our long-term vision and that makes us, a lot easier for us to incorporate those into our roadmap.

Jennifer: Great. You’ve helped shape some of the most transformative products in our space. Looking ahead, what excites you most about what Joveo is building next?

Prateek: Okay, I’m going to let you in a secret. I’m sure it will not be secret and everyone will know about it. We are working on launching a groundbreaking, high-volume hiring solution. So we are building one-of-its-kind, which will incorporate attraction, engagement, and conversion – all into a single high volume product, which will be agentic in nature.

Jennifer: I might go back to staffing once its high-volume staffing. Just kidding, I’m staying at Joveo. I’m not leaving. But that would make life so much easier.

Prateek: When I think about high volume hiring, the peaks, you know having to prepare for that, the recruitment marketing that goes into it. And then there’s such a fine window of when you execute on that strategy and then get to that high volume hiring, like that would solve so many challenges. And there are a lot of platforms or companies who have, I would say, point solutions, right? But I don’t think there are, you know, many companies who have a agentic experience, which stitches together all these point solutions, which solves for high volume hiring. And that’s the first of its kind. I would agree with that. That is when you’re in it and trying to deliver it, it’s a little stressful, so anything to make that easier.

Jennifer: What’s next for product engineering at Joveo?

Prateek: I’m going to talk about the team. And we talked about the product, right? So one of the, you know, things we are doing right now is we are completely transforming our team. And we are using a lot of AI, which helps us innovate faster, solve our customer problem faster, right. And we have always been at the, I would say, cutting edge of the technology. Like we have always used the latest technologies, tools, right? But with AI, we have another opportunity to push that boundary further. So there’s a lot of AI, I would say innovation going internally, both in terms of product building, as well as transforming the people.

Jennifer: Yeah, that’s great. I love that. So before we get into our rapid fire Q&A, how can people get in touch with you?

Prateek: How they can get in touch with me is my email. And, if you want to learn more about Joveo, you should visit our website. We are also planning to launch an engineering blog soon, where you will find the latest tech innovations we are working on.

Jennifer: Ohh, that’s great. That’ll be exciting. All right, rapid fire, Q&A, you ready?

Prateek: Yes. All right.

Jennifer: Early morning stand up or a late night build session?

Prateek: Early morning stand up, I’m a morning person.

Jennifer: Yeah. We differ in that way, Prateek. I’m not a morning person. A piece of underrated tech that you actually admire.

Prateek: I think there are a lot of techs, a lot of tech. I would say one, like if I have to just say one thing, I would definitely say infrastructure is core. It makes creating new infrastructure for you know, for new job offices so much easier. Like otherwise it just takes what takes months, now takes hours, right? And a lot of that, we assume it always works, right? But it’s truly magical and I don’t think we talk about it every day.

Jennifer: Yeah, that’s great. Glad I thought off that one. Most rewarding feature you’ve launched.

Prateek: Again, there are too many. There are too many, but if I have to just pick one, I would definitely say, you know, the MoBolt mobile apply technology, which we built and which was, you know, acquired. And at Joveo, I would say Unified Analytics. That’s definitely one of our coolest product, which really solves the problem of analytics, which no other product does.

Jennifer: Yeah, it truly does. And you know, I always had this dream in my head sitting in the practitioner seat of having the analytics that we have inside the platform. And I would always ask my tech team to say, can we get this in the tech stack? And it was, you know, with the APIs and things like that being expensive, defeated, and it’s so cool that we have that Unified Analytics at Joveo. That’s hands down what sold me, coming to the company. Future of recruitment tech in one word.

Prateek: Transformative. And I believe, again, I’m going to elaborate on that, right? I believe we are at a inflection point where we have the technology to truly completely change the recruitment technology, right? What we always wished the industry to be. And we will try our best to push that boundary.

Jennifer: Yeah, I love that. Thank you, Prateek. It’s been great sitting with you and getting some questions answered and spending time. I appreciate it. Thank you.