Work It Baby is SNOBS’ appreciation page for fine lookin’ Australian men who work hard, and look damn good while they’re at it! Oh yeah, and it’s also a way for ‘the men folk’ to promote their business or themselves professionally. It’s only fair, right?
Businessman’s name: Riges Younan
Job description: CEO
Business name: 2Vouch
Location: Melbourne
Find him online: twitter.com/rigesyounan
The business world has become very “social” in recent times, with social media, social marketing and more. 2Vouch is described as a ‘social recruiting platform’ – what does that mean?
Social Recruiting harnesses the evolution of Web 2.0 technologies and social media. That means utilising tools – like social networks Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter – for business. You can also count blogs and videos, YouTube for example, as Web 2.0 technologies we use to communicate, engage, inform and recruit our future workforce.
So that’s the blah, blah definition [laughs]. What does that really mean? We have built a website where you can easily refer jobs to your friends and get paid a reward if they get hired.
What kind of reward are we talking?
Our referrers can earn anywhere from $1400-$2800 bucks, if they refer someone to a job and that person gets hired. One of the good things about 2Vouch.com is that the referrer can take the cash reward or donate some or all of their rewards to one of our charity partners like the Breast Cancer Foundation.
Given it’s never been harder to attract, recruit and retain staff… how popular are you in employer circles? Do you have some people screaming, “Off with his head!”?
Yep, it’s really bizarre, I have to wear a disguise in the Melbourne CBD. There have been instances where I’ve been followed by female HR managers around the city screaming at me to stay away from their people, so my strategy is to lead them into dark bars and by the time we finish drinks they tend to see things from my perspective.
I’m joking, of course. On a serious note, we help companies find good people – not take them away!
How flighty are employees these days; do you have any stats on the number of people not actively searching but willing to change jobs in an instant?
I’ve been a head hunter for over 10 years; working in London, New York and Australia and my experience tells me that in a good economy 90% of people would always consider a better career opportunity.
However, in a down economy people are much more concerned about keeping their jobs and having security. So at moment many people are staying put, but that won’t last long as skills shortages are a long term demographics-based issue and the power will soon return back to the candidate.
So, how long do you think you’ll stay in this job for?
Well, who knows, maybe this interview will get me some full-time modelling work in PC magazine… I’m going for the ‘geek chic’ look so I’m hoping your readers post positive comments because this interview is going into my portfolio [laughs].
ARTICLE UPDATE 10/07/09: As suspected, Riges did get itchy feet and business has changed slightly. You’ll now find him working on Peerlo http://peerlo.com/
If you know a hot businessman, contact SNOBS. Not only will we all get to look at the cutie you sit next to or buy lunch, stationary, or legal advice from … this is also a great way for dashing gentlemen (and rugged ‘salt of the earth’ types) to score some well-deserved promotion. Go on, do him a favour and submit his details now!
