I’m Chandel, head of global supply and strategic partnerships at Joveo. I have a habit of finding mistakes everywhere – not because I enjoy criticism, but because problems are just patterns waiting to be solved.
I asked an Uber driver where he found his job. “LinkedIn,” he said. Most people would stop there. I kept digging.
Why LinkedIn over Indeed or ZipRecruiter? Was he actively job searching or just browsing? Did he plan to leave his previous job, or did opportunity find him?
His answers revealed a pattern I see everywhere: what we think are random decisions are actually predictable behaviors.
Reverse Engineering Everything
I have this habit of reverse engineering systems I use daily. When I order from DoorDash, I think about what happens behind that click. How does my order connect to the restaurant? How does the restaurant alert the driver? How does real-time tracking actually work?
Four industries – BCG, HR tech, SaaS, ad tech, ed tech – showed me the same truth: what looks chaotic usually follows clear patterns. Most people see randomness because they’re standing too close to the system.
At Joveo, I found leaders who think like I do. When we identified that traditional job board dependence was limiting our quality control, we didn’t form a committee. We launched Joveo as a direct source.
Think From Candidate Perspective, Not Recruiter Perspective
Here’s where most recruitment marketing goes wrong: we think like recruiters, not like candidates. We optimize for job boards because that’s how we’ve always done it. We chase Google and Meta because that’s what everyone else does.
But walk through a truck driver’s actual day. When he opens his eyes until he closes them at night, where are the touchpoints where a clickable ad could reach him? Not on LinkedIn – probably on community forums, social platforms his industry actually uses, maybe even TikTok during his breaks.
I launched TikTok for recruitment marketing and people thought I was experimenting. Now it’s part of our core strategy. Not because TikTok is trendy, but because our target candidates are there.
Right now we have 13 different sub-channels in supply. Previously it used to be just job boards. Everyone’s advertising on job boards, nothing new about that. It doesn’t even make a dent.
Execute Small, Expand Fast
The best advice I ever received came from KJ: “Find a solution rather than crying about it.”
When a problem surfaces, I don’t spend four months documenting and consulting. I think briefly, then execute immediately at the smallest possible scale. If that execution works, I expand. Then expand again. Each expansion doubles the impact while my team takes ownership, freeing my mind to identify the next pattern.
This approach didn’t work everywhere. Previous bosses called it impulsive. They preferred extensive analysis, stakeholder buy-in, and phased rollouts. I was thinking three steps ahead while they were still planning step one.
Our NextGen Approach
Right now we’re executing our NextGen project. Till now we were heavily reliant on external supply partners. We launched Joveo as a source – not CPA, but CPQA.
People say a lot about cost per qualified application. We have a full-fledged model around CPQA. It’s not just a $2,000 spend. Right now it’s spending above $200,000 a month, and it’s been two months since it started.
I’m not saying I won’t rely on external supply partners like Indeed, Zip, ZipRecruiter. I love them. I’ll be relying more on my own because I can only do so much when something is going through any vendor. I can’t filter those applications until they’re coming toward me.
Through our own source, I can do hyper-personalized filtering. Not just “did the JD match those seven keywords?” Because of AI, those things are very easy. Within five seconds, you can create a resume that exactly matches a JD. How can you filter there?
It should be very hyper-personalized. Pick up small nuances in job descriptions and see if the resume matches. That’s the actual matching we should do.
Competing With The Best Globally
I don’t treat competitors as just people in the recruitment marketing space. I compete with the programmatic giants of consumer marketing. They are awesome folks. Those are my competition.
When you’re benchmarking against the best globally rather than just your industry, innovation becomes mandatory. Why settle for incremental improvements when exponential patterns exist in adjacent markets?
This perspective drives my team’s adaptive thinking. We’re not just asking what’s next in recruitment marketing. We’re asking what’s next in marketing, period, then figuring out how those innovations apply to finding talent.
Curious what the rest of our leaders have to say? Explore the full series on YouTube.
Video Transcript
We’re here with Chandel, the head of supply and strategic partnerships. You have a track record of scaling from zero to millions of dollars. Previous experience at BCG, Unacademy and deep expertise in HR tech, SaaS, Ad-Tech and EdTech. There’s a lot of tech in there. Strong believer in first principles thinking, data-driven execution and team-driven landscapes and leaderships. So we’re gonna talk a little bit about scaling and strategic growth. You’ve scaled product line and partnerships across industries. What drives your approach to building new business from the ground up? Majority of the businesses that I have grown, good part was we have already seen or used them in our daily life. Normally let’s say if we are ordering something from DoorDash, we get these items. We understand, okay, this is the item, we use it. But how cool it is to understand how that actually happens. What happens behind that door when you’re actually clicking on the app, how it’s getting related to the restaurant, how restaurant is making sure that they’re informing the delivery person to pick it up. How delivery person is executing the same while he’s bringing, he’s keeping updating, keep updating us. When the executive is here, they message us that, okay, hey I’m here. That drives me, okay, wow. I’m actually doing something which I can see because I have a habit of finding mistakes everywhere. It gave me the opportunity to actually work around it. There’s a possibility what I am thinking about the mistake was something which is not at all possible to be sorted around. But still I would always love to give a try. I’ve heard from KJ is whenever there’s a problem, find a solution rather than crying about it. So I think that really helped me whenever something was in BCG previously, even Joveo. Whenever a problem is thrown, even yesterday I was taking a interview of Uber driver. Where did you find a job? Those are the kind of connections that really helps me understand because let’s say right now I’m heading the function. That means I’m sitting like very far from the actual ground line. What’s really happening? This way when I’m actually connecting to the downstream folks, I can actually understand what the pain point is, how they are thinking. It’s not just on pain point. How did you apply it on Joveo? It must be LinkedIn, Jen? Yeah, LinkedIn. No, that’s the question. Why LinkedIn? Why not Indeed? Why not Google jobs? Why not anything else? It’s not just about where did you apply? It’s also about why a particular kind of person thinks or applying from a particular place. And what were you doing at that time? Were you not doing anything? Or were you thinking of leaving your current organization? See, everything is pattern in this world. Everything is pattern. We all think that okay, everything is random, nothing is random. It’s all pattern. The second we hit the right nodes, we find the pattern, things get easy to solve. So yeah, that’s how I try. Yeah, I like that. That’s so true too. So I know– Very simple, yeah. Yeah, there was, Joveo was a company that I was interested in. I had talked to them and my previous employer is maybe bringing them on as technology. I was like, “Ah, I wonder what they’re up to?” And then there was a job. So I applied to it. Happened to be there. Right, you lead our global supply and partnerships initiatives. What role does your team play in delivering greater customer lifetime value? We are in the recruitment marketing space. That means we have to market and bring traffic. That traffic will further convert towards applications. It’s been going on for so long. I think I wasn’t even born since these things are going on. I would like to see what the new value that we are creating, that’s very important rather than what we have been doing or the things that we normally do. I’m not proud of the normal stuff that’s been going on for so long. Like everyone is advertising on job boards. Like nothing new about that. Like it doesn’t even make a dent. It’s all the new stuff. Like I was always intrigued that, okay, Quora works a lot, should work a lot because Quora has a lot of people discussing about a particular topic. Reddit people are posting a lot about something. So that was a commentary driven approach that we are trying to do. Then we were like, okay, social, when we say social, it’s always just cutting around Google and Meta. Why not TikTok? Why not Snapchat? Why not in South Asian countries like Line? Why not Grab? We are a global organization. We need to think from global perspective rather than just from a particular region specific perspective. Then there’s an American approach or an European approach or an Asian approach. We have to think whenever we are thinking about what’s the whole industry and what? There’s a goal in my mind which I always think that rather than thinking from a recruiter marketing approach, think from a candidate approach. It’s a very long, long short. Like think of let’s say if Amazon wants to hire a truck driver for their delivery. I would really like to understand from Canada that who this driver is when he opens his eyes, till the time he closes his eyes in the night. What all are the touch points where I can put an ad which is clickable? Nothing about how great that should be. Like now I’m not thinking from a job board. Now I’m not thinking from a recruiter marketing perspective. I’m just thinking from candidate because if we start thinking from that, see everything comes boiling down to candidate. And normally our approach is always that, okay, let us find people on these sources. But we are finding again candidate on these sources. Even I’m doing this thing wrong right now because even I haven’t formulated everything. Trying to get in through the community approach, social marketing approach, influencer marketing approach. Right now we have 13 different sub channels in supply. Previously it was used to be just, and even majority of our industry is just job boards. And it’s just they want to say that, hey, we are doing cool. They say Google and Facebook. That’s not no longer cool. Like this enormous number of new stuff that we do, which I say that, okay, that’s cool. When I started TikTok on recruiter marketing, like seven months back or something, I was like, yeah, that’s cool. So I think where I would really like to be towards will be that how do I think from a candidate when he opens his eyes, by the time he closes his eyes, all the touch points where I can put a clickable ad and find that candidate. So that’s where I want the supply function of Joveo should look like. Yeah, it’s the candidate blueprint or the fingerprint. Exactly. I can really understand that. Yeah, I love that. You’re known for applying principles first thinking to go to market and growth strategies. How was this approach, how has this approach worked? Meaningful outcomes in current and past roles you’ve had. Good thing was in this organization, my boss has the same approach. So this worked well. Two of my bosses have the same approach. First was Shehzad, second was KJ. Previously they used to hate me because they were like, okay, are you dumb? Because first principle is basically thinking common sense. Do something which is literally visible in front of you rather than doing all the Sho-sha stuff. But because some people they have experience, they’re like, okay, we’ll do things in the hard way. I’m like this stuff in front of you. Why not jump over it, try to solve it. Like a lot of times whenever a problem is thrown towards us, you’ll find a lot of people, they just think that, okay, let me do a lot of thinking. Then let me do a lot of documentation. Then let me do a lot of consultation around people. And then after four months, I’ll start doing something about it. That’s actually a great approach. What has worked for me is do thinking. You got an idea, execute it right away at a smaller, like very small minute level. So nothing bad can go wrong. If that execution works well, expand it, expand it, expand it, keep clicking on it, keep double clicking on it, keep double clicking on it. That way you’re not waiting for four months for an idea to pop up. And now because one thing has expanded, so after it has expanded twice, now I don’t have to do anything. Now my team will take over it. Now again, I have the mind which is free. I can again think about, okay, what’s the next cool thing that needs to be done. So it has worked here well. It didn’t work like in my last organization. Like my boss used to hate me whenever I used to say something around strategy, that okay, why we are not doing through this strategy? And then at one point of time, I was like, okay, I need to leave this organization. They are leaving things which are just in front of them. Well, I’m glad you found the right home, at Joveo. We’re good, glad to have you. And that type of thinking. Strategic leadership is a major theme for you. How do you develop effective strategic leadership? And how would you advise others leading change in fast-paced environments? I’m not even sure that I’m the best one for strategic leadership. Because even I keep changing myself every now and then. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad. The one good thing which I feel I do good around is adaptive thinking with innovation. I think that’s the only thing which I’m good at and which my team also follows, because I’m always like, okay, I don’t like things where a person is coming and say, why didn’t you thought about that? I’m all like, okay, I should be thinking about what should happen after three steps. Not one step, three steps. I should be thinking ahead of that. And I should be thinking around innovation. Anything which my competitors, and I don’t even treat competitors as just like people in the same recruitment marketing space. I try to compete with the programatics of the world of consumer marketing. They are the awesome folks. Those are my competition. The current ones, I really don’t treat them as competition. So I try to be innovative from that perspective. How are the new things that they are thinking through? So yeah, I think till the time you are innovating enough and you are thinking through that, okay, what are the next kind of stuff that’s going to happen around everything that you are doing or everything that’s been going in the industry? I think you’ll land in a nice place. I’m not sure, great, but yeah. Yeah, I think that adaptive thinking with strategic leadership that you said is so important because you’re always thinking ahead. You’re adapting to what’s happening in the environment. You’re thinking like the consumer or the candidate. In that case, and then you’re fulfilling the need of what a company would need from a recruitment marketing strategy and supply. I think that’s so important to have that type of thinking in your role. You’ve worked with a wide variety of organizations. What’s one lesson that stayed with you throughout it? Everything is easy. Everything is soluble. I like that. That’s a good lesson. Why do you say it’s easy and solvable? You get into it, you see stuff, you’ll find problems, you execute it. I’ve been in four industries. I think I’ve done cool enough to get through it in a nice manner. So I don’t think I’m the most smartest folks in Joveo. Still, I think if I did that, then it was an easy job. Till then you are thinking from a solution perspective rather than crying that, okay, it’s hard. Okay, great. What’s next for you and your team? I have to settle into that one. Yeah, so next, right now we are working around, actually it’s our next project is NextGen in the supply team that we are executing from 1st of March. Till now we were heavily reliant on external supply partners. Cool thing right now today, as of today right now is we launched and we have launched before, but this time again we have launched Joveo as the source. That is not CPA, that is CPQA. People say a lot about CPQA, you must have heard, like everyone must have heard in the industry, cost per qualified application, cost per qualified application. We have launched a full fledged model around cost per qualified application. It’s not just like it’s, oh, it’s about $2,000 spent or something. Right now it’s spending above $200,000 a month and it’s been two months since it’s been going on. Thats are next gen project. I’m not saying I’m not going to rely on our external supply partners like Indeed, ZEP, Ziploc rotor, Talent, Jobcase. I love them, I will be relying on them. It’s just I’ll be relying more on my own. And this is because this is through our own source and I’m not thinking from a money perspective. I’m thinking from a perspective that, see, I can only do so much when something is going through, let’s say any of my window, because I can’t filter those applications. Tell them it’s coming towards me. Oh, here I can filter the application. That okay, exactly I can do hyper personalized filter, filterization, not just okay, did the JD match those seven keywords, did the experience match, like, because of AI coming in, those things are very easy. Like within five seconds, you can create a JD, you can create a resume, which is exactly same for JD. How can you match? How can you do the filtration there? It should be very hyper personalized, like even JD is small, small nuances, you have to pick and then try to see that, okay, does the resume match with that or not? Those are the actual things that we should match. And that’s what we are doing right now. Joveo as a source, which is picking up, it’s not the highest spending publisher as of now. But from what I anticipated, it’s doing like far, far better. Like just I think four days back or something, I was showing, I was opening our Mojo and showing that, okay, the top publisher that we are spending, it was in the top five. So that’s the next gen for Joveo from a supplier perspective. Relying more on source, on a source that we can generate, that we are 100% sure about the quality. The quantity these days, it’s not like it’s not a problem. But quality is something if we focus, that will give you higher quantity. I’m not sure how much higher you can get quality, I can literally, how it is, why these things people were not hired? Because I know we send the right candidates. So that kind of conference, I really want our team, our customer success team, our sales team, everyone in Joveo should have that, okay, we know what the kind of candidates that we send will convert. And that really helps the client. Like I don’t think clients need just any candidate, like even clients’ end goal is hire. So this is just a next step towards that. Great. How can people get in touch with you before we get into our rapid fire questions, what’s the best way to reach out to you? LinkedIn, I’m pretty active. All right, LinkedIn’s the way. So are you ready, rapid fire Q&A? Yeah. Go to market or start usp? What gets you fired up? Go to market. Okay. A product or company you would love to reverse engineer. Google. All right. Just give me a little snippet on what you would do there differently. I love their search engine. But a lot of things even right now when they are doing with Gemini coming into the picture, I think we can still do a lot more. I’m not trying, I’m not saying that, okay, let’s put everything in a single place, but it can be stacked better. That’s what I feel. Most memorable business milestone? It’s a very small one actually. There are still seats, the most memorable one. That was when I used to work in India. I just converted from an intern to an associate. There was a company named Jugnu. They were into the ride-healing business. There I think I converted close to what? 7,000 riders on Jugnu platform within one and a half month. And that was a six month kind of a goal. So I have done a lot more and a lot more bigger stuff, but that’s very near and dear to me because that’s when I just, and because of that project, I got converted from an intern to an associate. So yeah, I think that’s still the most memorable one for me. Yeah, that definitely helped your career and moved you out. That’s a great one. One word to describe the future of HR tech? Recruiting tech. Innovation. Innovation. Yeah, that’s where it’s lacking. That’s where it needs to not double down, but like quadruple down. Yeah, love that answer. All right, Chandel, thank you. Thanks, Jen. Thanks for spending time. Yeah.
