Gild

Gild INTRODUCTIONMartin: Hi, today we are in  San Francisco, in the Gild office. Sheeroy, who are you and what do you do?Sheeroy: So, Im Sheeroy Desai. Im the co-founder and CEO of Gild. At Gild what we do is we help our customers, which are companies from startups all the way to very large enterprises. We have a software solution that helps them find, engage and end up hiring software engineers.Martin: Great!Martin: What is your background?Sheeroy: My background. I actually grew up in  Pakistan  and I came to the  US  to go to college. I went to MIT and got electrical engineering which I never used. I was fortunate enough that I graduated from the university right at the time when IT/software boom was just starting, which was the late 1980s. My first job was actually  at a startup, even though back then I didnt know what a startup was.Martin: Was it called a startup?Sheeroy: No, it wasnt. That wasnt even called a startup. It was just I thought it was just a small company. It was like 40 person company and I worked for it and I wasnt even quite sure what they did. But it turned out to be one of the very early companies that was pioneering in IT services. And it eventually became a company called  Cambridge Technology Partners, which went public and eventually got bought up by Novell.But anyway, I was there for about 3 years when we were very small and it was great training ground to just learn everything about, you know, I did some amount of engineering but really rapidly moved on to product development/product management. And then actually even I got a chance to engage a little bit of marketing and sales.So from there, a number of us who are actually mapped up at Cambridge Technology in the early days and worked together, about 5 of us, ended up leaving and regrouped and started a company called Sapient. That was in, like 91. And then I spent the next 17 years of my life at Sapient in various capacities, from again, doing product, management, client management, to opening new offices, to eventually doing international expansion, and then I spent the last 7 years as a Chief Operating Officer there.We took the company public, so by the time I left, it was over a 5,000 person company. Its still listed on the NASDAQ today, I think its about 13,000 people. Its enormous.So that was, you know, a really great experience in many, many different ways. I mean, taking a company from startup all the way to IPO and beyond. You know, obviously youll be able to side our ups and our downs. Because we also lived through the dot com bust and then survived that, so it was a lot of learning in those 17 years.Then, ultimately I left. I think I was really burnt out, quite frankly, after all that time in the company. And especially at least in the last at least 11 years, I was really being involved in running a public company that takes a toll after a while. And I was really missing being an entrepreneur again, doing something small again.My problem was that I didn t know what I wanted to do and I looked at a lot of smaller companies, or startups, and I just couldnt get passionate, excited about anything.Ultimately, I really came to comfort of doing a lot of soul searching. I came to the conclusion of what I was truly excited and passionate about is what we do here at Gild, which is really helping companies in. Let me back up and say it this way, which is the way, companies find talent and the way professionals find opportunities is one area that actually still the underlined way it works, the underlined processes, the structure, hasnt really changed in last 100 years. We rely in the same artifacts, whether thats a resume or LinkedIn profile now, whether thats an interview, we still do those things. There is no better way to get insights into people and to make better decisions. We use machine learning and analytics help our shopping experience for everything else today. But when it comes to shopping, lets call it for technology professionals or profession in general, we are still in the dark ages. So it was really that insight that prompted me to start Gild, and this was about a little over 3 years ago, at this point. Well, Luca and I got together and we kind of, he had his own startup and I was kind of thinking about doing this. And we got together and decide to initially focus on software engineers and here we are today.Martin: Great! How did you come up with this name and what are other alternative names did you think about?Sheeroy: We thought about like a million of them. We probably made a list of about 100 different names. You know the challenge today in coming up with the name is probably a couple of full. Number one, its very hard to find a real word that can be used as a name because theyre all taken. So a lot of companies make up names, right. The second challenge, even if you make up a name, is getting the URL. So quite frankly, these challenge for us wasnt being able to come up with names that we liked, that were creative, but actually being able to secure a URL and we wanted a dot-com URL. So ultimately, things converged towards Gild. The reason we like the name Gild because its a play on the word Guild, with a U, GUILD. The whole idea that there could be guild of technologist or the guild of other types of professions that we are trying to help. So that was the idea behind, but guild.com was taken and we couldnt get it but gild.com, GILD.com was taken but we were actually able to secure at a very reasonable price. So, thats how we ended up with the name.Martin: Great!BUSINESS MODEL OF GILDMartin: Can you briefly describe how the business model is working?Sheeroy: The business model is simple. The business model is really a SaaS, enterprise SaaS model. Our customers pay us for basically getting access to our database. So what we have, at the end of the day, is we have a database of over 11 million software engineers from around the world, for whom we have generated all kinds of public information, ranging from just a profile, a biographical information, all the way to downloading and analyzing  a new open source, code contribution that they may have. To analyzing their activity on QA forums, to analyzing the twitter feed. So we analyze anything possible about a software engineer and then trying to arrive to insights from that.Over time obviously, insights are getting better because the more data you have, the more correlations you have, the better are your predictions. Since ultimately we are really trying to make predictions around how good is a software engineer, how in demand might they be, and how likely is it that they move to a different job or opportunity.So those are the analytics that we provide to our customers, but then we also give them access to all the detailed data that weve collected on someone.  This is a highly rich profile. So with our software called Gild Source, you get access to all of these. Then there are some work flow built in there as well, so you can do a lot of relationship building with the candidates, you can do all kinds, you know think of it as almost like a CRM system for hiring. So you have a database and a CRM system, all combined together, and our customers get access to that and they just pay us on subscription base.Martin: Is it only for full time employees that you are trying to match with the employers, or is it also for project related kind of matching?Sheeroy: So, we dont distinguish. We are simply out there, looking for information on software engineers and trying to tell a customer how good they might be. Im sure many of them are looking for freelance opportunities and probably majority of them are looking for full time opportunities. But we dont differentiate between the two.Martin: Because I would imagine, if you distinguish between the two, then you can say that theres some kind of trigger or analytics behind that. Okay, that theres an 80 % chance that person would be willing to switch his jo b.Sheeroy: Right. I think we probably can if we have enough data that we probably could analyze it and be able to say, we think this person is more interested in a full time opportunity or this person is more interested in, you know some kind of part time or consulting. We dont do that. Thats an interesting idea. Something that our customers really havent brought up to us. And thats one of the things we really rely on quite a bit is, our customers.Very early on in the company, we made a decision to invest very heavily on what is today called Customer Success. Where 4 or 3 years ago, people refer it as customer service, we call it customer success from the start. The whole idea was not just so that we are making sure that our customers are successful in using our product but also, it builds a deep relationship so we truly understand, get feedback on the product. And thats really important to us.Martin: Theres one very interesting algorithm that you are using. Can you tell us a little bit more how this matching into supply and demand works.Sheeroy: I mean, its number one out of many algorithms over here. We started off very simple. In the first iteration of the algorithm really was all about just trying to tell our customers of how good some of them might be.The first iteration, that Luca built, was purely based on analyzing a software engineers open source code. So we would actually download the entire code repository that we would find, we parse it so we knew what programming languages they were using, how many lines of codes that were written, and then we would run analytics, basic analytics from the quality of the code, how extensive was the code, how well documented it is, etc. And based on those analytics, build issues of algorithms which would say, heres how good we think this software engineer is. It is heck of a lot more sophisticated today, 3 years later.So the software contribution is on the component of what we do, as I said, we also analyze activity and the level of activity on things like Stack Exchange, which is QA site. Then we start looking also at things, where the other developers that this individual is working with. So sometimes they collaborate on open source projects. Or maybe they are answering questions, or going back and forth with another developer, who is also very highly rated. Now, its like birds of feather flock together, so people of similar types tend to work together. So, if you are collaborating or working with really high engineers, chances are youre pretty too. Thats an additional insight we can grasp.And then it has gotten even more sophisticated because as we develop a very large database of what I called fact based software engineers. So now we can based on looking at quality of code or based on looking at their QA activity, etc., we can say that, in fact this software engineer is really very capable. But we can also start looking at matching people biographical backgrounds with the quality that  we think they are. So over time, weve also been able to get insights into Okay if we see a correlation on Im giving an example, I am not saying this is true, but an example maybe that anyone who worked at a certain company during the late 1990s as a software engineer, the chances are We see correlation that a lot of engineers there at that time were very high quality. So chances are, if we know nothing about you, all that we know is that you worked at that company in the late 1990s, now we can start making prediction that likelihood is reasonable that youre probably a pretty good software engineer. So analytics and as I said, there are many, many algorithms out here and the overall quality of the analytics and the complexity of the analytics, has gone up quite a bit over the course of the last 3 years.Martin: When you were a very young startup understanding your customer needs etc, its very important and you also said that the customer success is very important for you. How did you try to understand what the customers really want in the early days?Sheeroy: You know, it is still a challenge, not just early days, because, and I think this is the conundrum, because customers are great at telling you what is wrong with your product, what they dont like. They are very great at telling you how to tweak a certain feature, about what they like to see. That is good.Martin: Evolutionary stepSheeroy: Evolution stuff, they are very good at that. What customers are not very good at is revolutionary stuff. Because a lot of times, they dont know what they dont really need. So its really interesting because of what we focus on a lot. This is a trap, I think a lot of companies and entrepreneurs get into it, which is you start focusing on the recommendations that the customers are making.We tend to focus more on the pain that the customer has: what is not working for them, what is the problem. And then, Luca, the product team is doing an awesome job, of analyzing all the things th at are not going well for the customers to come up with a unique solution. We always ask ourselves: Can we address this need in a way that no one else has. Can we address them in a unique way that is going to be significantly better than what anyone else is doing? Thats the first place we go. If we cant do that, then the question  can we just get rid of the pain? But what we have found is, if you pay a lot of attention So what really comes down to all of this is being close to your customer and enough of your customer so you can see the patterns, where is the most pain.  Where are they most unhappy? And then being able to really look at ourselves Okay, is there a unique way in which we address that. So thats how we come up with the revolutionary solutions, and thats hard. That takes time.Martin: Would you describe the Gild business model more of a local market place or would you say its a more global market place where I can find and hire developers from another country?Sheeroy: I ts global. Our database is 100% global. So thats number one, the database is totally global. You can search developers anywhere. In terms of how customers implement that obviously smaller companies are more regional. They are looking to hire potentially in 1 or 2 locations. And our larger customers are more global. Theyre looking to hire people anywhere. Now having said all that, I think there are such a shortage of software engineers, they are such in high demand, we are even seeing startups now looking for software engineers anywhere in the world. You know, we are such a great example, actually more than half of our engineers team are actually in Europe, in  Milan. So, were seeing even smaller startups, 50 people or so, having operations in multiple continents.Martin: When you started, what were the minimum features that you that you tried to develop in the product and ship to the market in order to understand what the needs are, so you can decide for a revenue model etc.Sheeroy: The minimum features when we first started was basically was search and results. That really was the minimal things we were trying to do, which is a reasonably easy interface by which you can say: Okay I am looking for an iOS engineer in  San Francisco  or the Bay area; and then being able to give them results that are relevant to that search and having analytics be good enough that they would make sense.I remember reviewing the first version of the product, it was really rough. The UI (user interface) was extremely rough, we made a lot of assumptions. But I do think among things we did well was, we immediately start taking it to market. We just started talking to tons and tons of prospects, showing it to them, getting their feedback and then about 3 months later, we actually started charging customers. Not because honestly that I thought the product was so great that we should be charging. But again, a startup is all about testing a hypothesis, right. First half of the hypothesis w as, if we give this level of intelligence is anybody going to care? That was getting anybody to say, this is great, I really like it. So second half of the hypothesis was, has anyone willing to pay for it. Thats why we start charging for it. And within a couple of months we had actually. I think within 2 months were like 20+ paying customers. So like Okay, this is working, people are paying for it.Martin: How did you solve this hen egg problem? Because when you started, this is basically a type of market place which is connected by some kind of scoring algorithm. How did you create the first 1,000 or 2,000 of developers and their first 50 100 companies.Sheeroy: Its a great question, which comes first, the hen or the egg. Actually, right before we started doing what were doing, the Gild Source business, the prior incarnation of our business actually was, we were building a website where software engineers could come and take coding challenges and puzzles and write code and we would analyze that code. So thats truly trying to build a market place. On the one hand, trying to get the software engineers, on the other hand trying to get customers and kind of have supply and demand. That is very challenging. It was actually an outflow from them, which is as we kind of work on there for months and months and we finally realized Gosh, we were trying to build a two sided market is very hard because just the value proposition for the software engineers wasnt compelling if there werent any employers. And for employers its not very compelling if you dont have at least tens of thousands of software engineers that they can search and choose from. That was a big problem.Thats how initially, Luca came up with the idea. He said. Well, lets address the supplier issue just by creating profiles for this software engineers by looking at their public activity. So in a way, we started creating an inventory of software engineers, so then we can then just focused on building out the c ustomers side of it. The initial thought was we would go back and build a community of software engineers but as we continue to move down, we realized, we dont really need to do that. So thats how we got going.CORPORATE STRATEGYMartin: Sheeroy, lets talk about the corporate strategy. Youre currently have this kind of market for software developers. What are your thought on adding other verticals and whether you can also apply this kind of data driven decision process.Sheeroy: We started a company so that eventually we solve the problem of hiring any professions, not just software engineers. So that remains our mission over time. We want to provide this level of analytics and insight into any professional. Lots of challenges to it.Weve been thinking about this for a while, and we have a viewpoint on how we can eventually get there. Which is a secret, Im not going to share that. What Im thinking is on that. But no, we obviously have been thinking about that and well continue in the lo ng term to execute towards that. So thats one answer.Second answer is, were building a company here for the long term. In the way we think about ourselves and talk about ourselves, we want to build a company, this type of problem were trying to solve its not going to get solved overnight. Its going to take some time. So were Okay with that. We are in no rush to just get there tomorrow. With that realization, we also have realized that, if you want to build a very large company, theres a saying if you want to build a monopoly, a broad monopoly, first you got to build a monopoly in a small market. Get that going, get that right, and then  you have the opportunity to build a monopoly in the greater market.So thats what were trying to do, were really trying to get it right in software engineering. And really understand what it takes to win and be successful there. Because once we have all the answers there then duplicating this to other professions would be a lot easier for us.Martin: I n terms of competitive advantage, would you rather say that Gild has the advantage of having  a large network effects, or is it more that Gild scoring system is the key source?Sheeroy: I think our competitive advantage is our analytics. I mean no one else that Im aware of, no other competitor I mean competitors are doing very resourceful things, they are competitors who are aggregating profiles. So to your point earlier, Ill go on LinkedIn and scraping it, Ill go scrape Twitter, and Ill go scrape Facebook, and Ill try to give you an aggregated profile, and we do all that. But no one is doing is really the additional insight of really telling you how good some of us and why we really think this person is good and what they are good at. Why they are in high demand or not, or when they might be looking for a job. Those are analytics that no other competitors are providing. That remains our competitive advantage.Martin: Great!MARKET DEVELOPMENTMartin: Tell me about market development. C an you give us a brief overview of how you perceived the kind of market and the players in the market and what is currently happening over there?Sheeroy: So we play in kind of Recruiting HR market. Like most markets, its   fairly saturated, theres a lot of noise. Its a noise in market, which is a few are the head of HR, a few head of recruiting acquisition in a company. Chances are high, you probably get a 5-10 emails, voicemails a day telling you, Oh, I have this new amazing thing. A challenge for them, the challenge for us how do you actually get yourself above that noise level. Theres no easy answer to this. I mean I wish I could say, Heres the magic that we came up. But theres no easy magical answer to this. It is a number of things.For us, what we did is number one, that I think is a little bit unique and different than I see some other startups doing. We do all the normal stuff you would expect us to do: we do contact marketing, we do lead generation, and we do lead nurturing and all that stuff.But I think some of the things that we did differently is, we focus on brand building very early on in the life cycle of the company. So, we were only in the market less than a year, when we were able to get a business cover page story on the New York Times on Gild. That was huge. Probably when I think back in my career like years and years and years from now, Im most likely will remember that Sunday morning, getting the New York Times and right there on the cover. I mean, that doesnt happen very often. That was a good nine months of effort on our part. We had to cultivate a relationship with the New York Times, we had to stay on them, we had to give them really meaningful story that they could write about. It took a lot of effort, a lot of time, and a lot of money, I guess in some ways. I got to get to invest in PR, as an example. A lot of startups dont believe in that stuff and I understand why they say that. But I think in our case, thats one example of many di fferent things that weve done that have allowed us to stand up above everyone else. And as you know, Id say, I think, one of the things that has distinguish us and hopefully will continue to distinguish us, is our efforts and our emphasis on brand building, which is a long term payoffs. It doesnt payoff short term.Martin: Okay.ADVICE TO ENTREPRENEURS FROM SHEEROY DESAI In San Francisco, we meet co-founder and CEO of Gild, Sheeroy Desai. He shares his story how Gild was founded and how the current business model works, as well as what the current plans are for the near future, and some advice for young entrepreneurs.The transcript of the interview is provided below.INTRODUCTIONMartin: Hi, today we are in  San Francisco, in the Gild office. Sheeroy, who are you and what do you do?Sheeroy: So, Im Sheeroy Desai. Im the co-founder and CEO of Gild. At Gild what we do is we help our customers, which are companies from startups all the way to very large enterprises. We have a software solution that helps them find, engage and end up hiring software engineers.Martin: Great!Martin: What is your background?Sheeroy: My background. I actually grew up in  Pakistan  and I came to the  US  to go to college. I went to MIT and got electrical engineering which I never used. I was fortunate enough that I graduated from the university right at the time when IT/software boom was just starting, which was the late 1980s. My first job was actually  at a startup, even though back then I didnt know what a startup was.Martin: Was it called a startup?Sheeroy: No, it wasnt. That wasnt even called a startup. It was just I thought it was just a small company. It was like 40 person company and I worked for it and I wasnt even quite sure what they did. But it turned out to be one of the very early companies that was pioneering in IT services. And it eventually became a company called  Cambridge Technology Partners, which went public and eventually got bought up by Novell.But anyway, I was there for about 3 years when we were very small and it was great training ground to just learn everything about, you know, I did some amount of engineering but really rapidly moved on to product development/product management. And then actually even I got a chance to engage a little bit of marketing and sales.So from there, a number of us who are actually mapped up at Cambr idge Technology in the early days and worked together, about 5 of us, ended up leaving and regrouped and started a company called Sapient. That was in, like 91. And then I spent the next 17 years of my life at Sapient in various capacities, from again, doing product, management, client management, to opening new offices, to eventually doing international expansion, and then I spent the last 7 years as a Chief Operating Officer there.We took the company public, so by the time I left, it was over a 5,000 person company. Its still listed on the NASDAQ today, I think its about 13,000 people. Its enormous.So that was, you know, a really great experience in many, many different ways. I mean, taking a company from startup all the way to IPO and beyond. You know, obviously youll be able to side our ups and our downs. Because we also lived through the dot com bust and then survived that, so it was a lot of learning in those 17 years.Then, ultimately I left. I think I was really burnt out, qu ite frankly, after all that time in the company. And especially at least in the last at least 11 years, I was really being involved in running a public company that takes a toll after a while. And I was really missing being an entrepreneur again, doing something small again.My problem was that I didnt know what I wanted to do and I looked at a lot of smaller companies, or startups, and I just couldnt get passionate, excited about anything.Ultimately, I really came to comfort of doing a lot of soul searching. I came to the conclusion of what I was truly excited and passionate about is what we do here at Gild, which is really helping companies in. Let me back up and say it this way, which is the way, companies find talent and the way professionals find opportunities is one area that actually still the underlined way it works, the underlined processes, the structure, hasnt really changed in last 100 years. We rely in the same artifacts, whether thats a resume or LinkedIn profile now, w hether thats an interview, we still do those things. There is no better way to get insights into people and to make better decisions. We use machine learning and analytics help our shopping experience for everything else today. But when it comes to shopping, lets call it for technology professionals or profession in general, we are still in the dark ages. So it was really that insight that prompted me to start Gild, and this was about a little over 3 years ago, at this point. Well, Luca and I got together and we kind of, he had his own startup and I was kind of thinking about doing this. And we got together and decide to initially focus on software engineers and here we are today.Martin: Great! How did you come up with this name and what are other alternative names did you think about?Sheeroy: We thought about like a million of them. We probably made a list of about 100 different names. You know the challenge today in coming up with the name is probably a couple of full. Number one, its very hard to find a real word that can be used as a name because theyre all taken. So a lot of companies make up names, right. The second challenge, even if you make up a name, is getting the URL. So quite frankly, these challenge for us wasnt being able to come up with names that we liked, that were creative, but actually being able to secure a URL and we wanted a dot-com URL. So ultimately, things converged towards Gild. The reason we like the name Gild because its a play on the word Guild, with a U, GUILD. The whole idea that there could be guild of technologist or the guild of other types of professions that we are trying to help. So that was the idea behind, but guild.com was taken and we couldnt get it but gild.com, GILD.com was taken but we were actually able to secure at a very reasonable price. So, thats how we ended up with the name.Martin: Great!BUSINESS MODEL OF GILDMartin: Can you briefly describe how the business model is working?Sheeroy: The business model is sim ple. The business model is really a SaaS, enterprise SaaS model. Our customers pay us for basically getting access to our database. So what we have, at the end of the day, is we have a database of over 11 million software engineers from around the world, for whom we have generated all kinds of public information, ranging from just a profile, a biographical information, all the way to downloading and analyzing  a new open source, code contribution that they may have. To analyzing their activity on QA forums, to analyzing the twitter feed. So we analyze anything possible about a software engineer and then trying to arrive to insights from that.Over time obviously, insights are getting better because the more data you have, the more correlations you have, the better are your predictions. Since ultimately we are really trying to make predictions around how good is a software engineer, how in demand might they be, and how likely is it that they move to a different job or opportunity.So t hose are the analytics that we provide to our customers, but then we also give them access to all the detailed data that weve collected on someone.  This is a highly rich profile. So with our software called Gild Source, you get access to all of these. Then there are some work flow built in there as well, so you can do a lot of relationship building with the candidates, you can do all kinds, you know think of it as almost like a CRM system for hiring. So you have a database and a CRM system, all combined together, and our customers get access to that and they just pay us on subscription base.Martin: Is it only for full time employees that you are trying to match with the employers, or is it also for project related kind of matching?Sheeroy: So, we dont distinguish. We are simply out there, looking for information on software engineers and trying to tell a customer how good they might be. Im sure many of them are looking for freelance opportunities and probably majority of them are l ooking for full time opportunities. But we dont differentiate between the two.Martin: Because I would imagine, if you distinguish between the two, then you can say that theres some kind of trigger or analytics behind that. Okay, that theres an 80 % chance that person would be willing to switch his job.Sheeroy: Right. I think we probably can if we have enough data that we probably could analyze it and be able to say, we think this person is more interested in a full time opportunity or this person is more interested in, you know some kind of part time or consulting. We dont do that. Thats an interesting idea. Something that our customers really havent brought up to us. And thats one of the things we really rely on quite a bit is, our customers.Very early on in the company, we made a decision to invest very heavily on what is today called Customer Success. Where 4 or 3 years ago, people refer it as customer service, we call it customer success from the start. The whole idea was not ju st so that we are making sure that our customers are successful in using our product but also, it builds a deep relationship so we truly understand, get feedback on the product. And thats really important to us.Martin: Theres one very interesting algorithm that you are using. Can you tell us a little bit more how this matching into supply and demand works.Sheeroy: I mean, its number one out of many algorithms over here. We started off very simple. In the first iteration of the algorithm really was all about just trying to tell our customers of how good some of them might be.The first iteration, that Luca built, was purely based on analyzing a software engineers open source code. So we would actually download the entire code repository that we would find, we parse it so we knew what programming languages they were using, how many lines of codes that were written, and then we would run analytics, basic analytics from the quality of the code, how extensive was the code, how well docume nted it is, etc. And based on those analytics, build issues of algorithms which would say, heres how good we think this software engineer is. It is heck of a lot more sophisticated today, 3 years later.So the software contribution is on the component of what we do, as I said, we also analyze activity and the level of activity on things like Stack Exchange, which is QA site. Then we start looking also at things, where the other developers that this individual is working with. So sometimes they collaborate on open source projects. Or maybe they are answering questions, or going back and forth with another developer, who is also very highly rated. Now, its like birds of feather flock together, so people of similar types tend to work together. So, if you are collaborating or working with really high engineers, chances are youre pretty too. Thats an additional insight we can grasp.And then it has gotten even more sophisticated because as we develop a very large database of what I called fact based software engineers. So now we can based on looking at quality of code or based on looking at their QA activity, etc., we can say that, in fact this software engineer is really very capable. But we can also start looking at matching people biographical backgrounds with the quality that  we think they are. So over time, weve also been able to get insights into Okay if we see a correlation on Im giving an example, I am not saying this is true, but an example maybe that anyone who worked at a certain company during the late 1990s as a software engineer, the chances are We see correlation that a lot of engineers there at that time were very high quality. So chances are, if we know nothing about you, all that we know is that you worked at that company in the late 1990s, now we can start making prediction that likelihood is reasonable that youre probably a pretty good software engineer. So analytics and as I said, there are many, many algorithms out here and the overall quality of the analytics and the complexity of the analytics, has gone up quite a bit over the course of the last 3 years.Martin: When you were a very young startup understanding your customer needs etc, its very important and you also said that the customer success is very important for you. How did you try to understand what the customers really want in the early days?Sheeroy: You know, it is still a challenge, not just early days, because, and I think this is the conundrum, because customers are great at telling you what is wrong with your product, what they dont like. They are very great at telling you how to tweak a certain feature, about what they like to see. That is good.Martin: Evolutionary stepSheeroy: Evolution stuff, they are very good at that. What customers are not very good at is revolutionary stuff. Because a lot of times, they dont know what they dont really need. So its really interesting because of what we focus on a lot. This is a trap, I think a lot of companies and ent repreneurs get into it, which is you start focusing on the recommendations that the customers are making.We tend to focus more on the pain that the customer has: what is not working for them, what is the problem. And then, Luca, the product team is doing an awesome job, of analyzing all the things that are not going well for the customers to come up with a unique solution. We always ask ourselves: Can we address this need in a way that no one else has. Can we address them in a unique way that is going to be significantly better than what anyone else is doing? Thats the first place we go. If we cant do that, then the question  can we just get rid of the pain? But what we have found is, if you pay a lot of attention So what really comes down to all of this is being close to your customer and enough of your customer so you can see the patterns, where is the most pain.  Where are they most unhappy? And then being able to really look at ourselves Okay, is there a unique way in which we address that. So thats how we come up with the revolutionary solutions, and thats hard. That takes time.Martin: Would you describe the Gild business model more of a local market place or would you say its a more global market place where I can find and hire developers from another country?Sheeroy: Its global. Our database is 100% global. So thats number one, the database is totally global. You can search developers anywhere. In terms of how customers implement that obviously smaller companies are more regional. They are looking to hire potentially in 1 or 2 locations. And our larger customers are more global. Theyre looking to hire people anywhere. Now having said all that, I think there are such a shortage of software engineers, they are such in high demand, we are even seeing startups now looking for software engineers anywhere in the world. You know, we are such a great example, actually more than half of our engineers team are actually in Europe, in  Milan. So, were seeing even smaller startups, 50 people or so, having operations in multiple continents.Martin: When you started, what were the minimum features that you that you tried to develop in the product and ship to the market in order to understand what the needs are, so you can decide for a revenue model etc.Sheeroy: The minimum features when we first started was basically was search and results. That really was the minimal things we were trying to do, which is a reasonably easy interface by which you can say: Okay I am looking for an iOS engineer in  San Francisco  or the Bay area; and then being able to give them results that are relevant to that search and having analytics be good enough that they would make sense.I remember reviewing the first version of the product, it was really rough. The UI (user interface) was extremely rough, we made a lot of assumptions. But I do think among things we did well was, we immediately start taking it to market. We just started talking to tons and tons of prospe cts, showing it to them, getting their feedback and then about 3 months later, we actually started charging customers. Not because honestly that I thought the product was so great that we should be charging. But again, a startup is all about testing a hypothesis, right. First half of the hypothesis was, if we give this level of intelligence is anybody going to care? That was getting anybody to say, this is great, I really like it. So second half of the hypothesis was, has anyone willing to pay for it. Thats why we start charging for it. And within a couple of months we had actually. I think within 2 months were like 20+ paying customers. So like Okay, this is working, people are paying for it.Martin: How did you solve this hen egg problem? Because when you started, this is basically a type of market place which is connected by some kind of scoring algorithm. How did you create the first 1,000 or 2,000 of developers and their first 50 100 companies.Sheeroy: Its a great question, whi ch comes first, the hen or the egg. Actually, right before we started doing what were doing, the Gild Source business, the prior incarnation of our business actually was, we were building a website where software engineers could come and take coding challenges and puzzles and write code and we would analyze that code. So thats truly trying to build a market place. On the one hand, trying to get the software engineers, on the other hand trying to get customers and kind of have supply and demand. That is very challenging. It was actually an outflow from them, which is as we kind of work on there for months and months and we finally realized Gosh, we were trying to build a two sided market is very hard because just the value proposition for the software engineers wasnt compelling if there werent any employers. And for employers its not very compelling if you dont have at least tens of thousands of software engineers that they can search and choose from. That was a big problem.Thats how initially, Luca came up with the idea. He said. Well, lets address the supplier issue just by creating profiles for this software engineers by looking at their public activity. So in a way, we started creating an inventory of software engineers, so then we can then just focused on building out the customers side of it. The initial thought was we would go back and build a community of software engineers but as we continue to move down, we realized, we dont really need to do that. So thats how we got going.CORPORATE STRATEGYMartin: Sheeroy, lets talk about the corporate strategy. Youre currently have this kind of market for software developers. What are your thought on adding other verticals and whether you can also apply this kind of data driven decision process.Sheeroy: We started a company so that eventually we solve the problem of hiring any professions, not just software engineers. So that remains our mission over time. We want to provide this level of analytics and insight into any professional. Lots of challenges to it.Weve been thinking about this for a while, and we have a viewpoint on how we can eventually get there. Which is a secret, Im not going to share that. What Im thinking is on that. But no, we obviously have been thinking about that and well continue in the long term to execute towards that. So thats one answer.Second answer is, were building a company here for the long term. In the way we think about ourselves and talk about ourselves, we want to build a company, this type of problem were trying to solve its not going to get solved overnight. Its going to take some time. So were Okay with that. We are in no rush to just get there tomorrow. With that realization, we also have realized that, if you want to build a very large company, theres a saying if you want to build a monopoly, a broad monopoly, first you got to build a monopoly in a small market. Get that going, get that right, and then  you have the opportunity to build a monopoly in the greater market.So thats what were trying to do, were really trying to get it right in software engineering. And really understand what it takes to win and be successful there. Because once we have all the answers there then duplicating this to other professions would be a lot easier for us.Martin: In terms of competitive advantage, would you rather say that Gild has the advantage of having  a large network effects, or is it more that Gild scoring system is the key source?Sheeroy: I think our competitive advantage is our analytics. I mean no one else that Im aware of, no other competitor I mean competitors are doing very resourceful things, they are competitors who are aggregating profiles. So to your point earlier, Ill go on LinkedIn and scraping it, Ill go scrape Twitter, and Ill go scrape Facebook, and Ill try to give you an aggregated profile, and we do all that. But no one is doing is really the additional insight of really telling you how good some of us and why we really thin k this person is good and what they are good at. Why they are in high demand or not, or when they might be looking for a job. Those are analytics that no other competitors are providing. That remains our competitive advantage.Martin: Great!MARKET DEVELOPMENTMartin: Tell me about market development. Can you give us a brief overview of how you perceived the kind of market and the players in the market and what is currently happening over there?Sheeroy: So we play in kind of Recruiting HR market. Like most markets, its   fairly saturated, theres a lot of noise. Its a noise in market, which is a few are the head of HR, a few head of recruiting acquisition in a company. Chances are high, you probably get a 5-10 emails, voicemails a day telling you, Oh, I have this new amazing thing. A challenge for them, the challenge for us how do you actually get yourself above that noise level. Theres no easy answer to this. I mean I wish I could say, Heres the magic that we came up. But theres no eas y magical answer to this. It is a number of things.For us, what we did is number one, that I think is a little bit unique and different than I see some other startups doing. We do all the normal stuff you would expect us to do: we do contact marketing, we do lead generation, and we do lead nurturing and all that stuff.But I think some of the things that we did differently is, we focus on brand building very early on in the life cycle of the company. So, we were only in the market less than a year, when we were able to get a business cover page story on the New York Times on Gild. That was huge. Probably when I think back in my career like years and years and years from now, Im most likely will remember that Sunday morning, getting the New York Times and right there on the cover. I mean, that doesnt happen very often. That was a good nine months of effort on our part. We had to cultivate a relationship with the New York Times, we had to stay on them, we had to give them really meanin gful story that they could write about. It took a lot of effort, a lot of time, and a lot of money, I guess in some ways. I got to get to invest in PR, as an example. A lot of startups dont believe in that stuff and I understand why they say that. But I think in our case, thats one example of many different things that weve done that have allowed us to stand up above everyone else. And as you know, Id say, I think, one of the things that has distinguish us and hopefully will continue to distinguish us, is our efforts and our emphasis on brand building, which is a long term payoffs. It doesnt payoff short term.Martin: Okay.ADVICE TO ENTREPRENEURS FROM SHEEROY DESAIMartin: For our readers, we always try to share some knowledge, so they make less errors when they start their companies. What would be your advice when starting a company? Maybe you can also talk about when starting a market place.Sheeroy: Starting a company, a couple of things I could probably go on for a while. Just imag ine a couple of things.One of the things that I said earlier, which is dont be afraid to put your product into market early. I think one of the mistakes, entrepreneurs make is that they want to put out a highly polished product and get it right. The fact that matters, you wont get it right, you just wont. Because you dont know, you dont know what the market really wants. So dont worry too much about that, get a product on the market and then get real feedback. So thats the first thing I would say. Thats a process of constantly iterating until you achieved product market fit. Stay really focused on that. So, thats not a unique advice that Im giving, lots of people do that. But its harder than what people think it is.The other thing is, and maybe this is a little more what I see here in the Valley. So Im trying to give some slightly different advice. Theres a lot of   focus on fundraising. Of course, especially if you are going to be a SaaS startup or something like that, theres a lot of investment you need to make, and the revenue is kind of trickle in slowly. So, believe me from first hand, I totally understand that financing has a key role. But I do think theres a tendency to get a little bit consumed by financing and worry a lot about evaluation and this and that. From all my experience, I can tell you, worry about the quality of the investor, someone whos going to be a long term partner. Someone you trust and youre going enjoy working with for 10 years because thats what youre signing up for. I think a lot of people get focused on evaluation and the amount they raise, and things like that. I kind of emphasized enough spend really time vetting the investor. If it is a VC firm, vet the partner. This is someone you really want to be talking to on a Sunday evening because thats going to happen. This is the person you want to be seeing at least once a month and this is going to happen because you got to spend a lot of time with this person. So thats the other pi ece of advice Id give.Market place is tough. I mean, what Id say is learn from us and learn from others whove done the same thing, which is youve got to  create a supply somewhere. I think the best way to get a market place going is to create that supply artificially.In our case, it was really aggregating and creating these profiles, which end up really being our business. Thats the funny thing, because we havent gone back to building a market place. But, I would say, try to figure out how to artificially create one side of the market and then go aggressively create the other side. The other side hopefully should be the side that pays, so you can start monetizing.Martin: From my understanding, a lot of people when trying to start a market place, they can start by artificially creating some kind of supply. Like some people, what I would call a good artificial supplier, which is real. And some others are trying putting fake profiles, which from my understanding, the majority of people are doing that. What would you recommend, I mean obviously, the artificial supplier would be supported but in most cases it wont work. Would it?Sheeroy: I think it depends on the market place. This is a question of what happens when the rubber actually hits the road, right? What do you actually do? There is no easy answer. I think each market place is a little bit different, but what I would say is, number one is be clear where you are going to generate your revenues from. That part you cant fake. What you got to make sure number one is what is going to be valuable value proposition. Get that value proposition right, then on the flip side, can you generate that artificially. There are many different ways to do it artificially, you dont have to have   a huge market. Say, I wanted to build a food delivery startup in  San Francisco. Think what I would worry about most is who is going to want the service and are they willing to pay for it. I could artificially put up hundred restaurant s, you can order from any of these restaurants, and the people start ordering, then I got to make sure maybe its me once the order comes in, is running to the restaurant and getting the food or I have some freelancers thats doing that for me. The other side doesnt need to know how you are satisfying the demand. So those are many ways in which you can create artificial supply without really, you dont have 1,000 restaurants. You dont have any agreement with 1,000 restaurants but the buying side doesnt need to know that.So those are the creative things about. So thats why I think market place is tough and I have a lot of admiration for people who pull off market places. Uber, for example has done great. Until you have a startup where you dealt with a market place problem, I dont think you understand, how logistically hard it is to pull something like that off.Martin: Sheeroy, thank you very much for your time. When you hire the next time one of your great employees, whether its a techi e or a finance guy, maybe you should be thinking more about data driven recruiting. Thank you very much!

How to Handle a College Deferral

HomeApplyApplicationsEarly Admissions: Deferred But Not DeterredThis page may contain affiliate links.Dec 13, 2019Preparing college applications is an arduous and stressful process. Taking tests, writing essays and seeking letters of recommendation require months of preparation. Some students choose to apply early (early decision and/or early action) and may berewarded with a decision of early admittance to a school of their top choice. If your student applied early that news is being delivered any day now. What is College Deferral? Unfortunately, even for many of the most talented students, the news from admissions officers may be one of deferral. What exactly is deferral and what is the best way to manage one? The admissions committee’s mandate is to put together a talented group of motivated and highly diverse young people who will contribute to campus life and ultimately be successful graduates. When deciding upon early applicants, the admissions committee has yet to see the larger, regular decision, applicant pool. Aside from a number of stand-out applicants who do receive early admission, a number of suitable candidates may be deferred so that the admissions committee can consider them in light of the total applicant pool. When a student is deferred, he or she will receive an â€Å"admit† or â€Å"deny† decision at the same time as regular decision applicants. What to Do When Youre Deferred It is possible to improve one’s chances of admission. Here are just a few helpful suggestions: If you have not interviewed, now is the time to do it†¦preferably on campus. Make sure you practice your interview skills and familiarize yourself withquestions that might be expectedwith a seasoned interviewer until you are confident that your skills are strong. If you can, visit the campus again. Attend an information session, often given by a member of the admissions committee and ask questionssuch as, â€Å"What percent of students are typically admitted after being deferred?† and â€Å"Is there anything I can do that might increase my chances of gaining admission?† Not only will this earmark you as a deferred candidate, but the information session speaker may note your visit and strong school interest in your application file. When you application is reevaluated, that interest will shine through. Since schools are more inclined to extend offers to students they believe will accept admission, this is critical. Without becoming a nuisance, keep the admissions committee abreast of any new accomplishmentson a regular basis. Ask someone who has not read your application to read it and offer constructive criticism.Doing so will give you a fresh perspective on what’s working or not working in your application. Perhaps, unknowingly, you gave the wrong impression or neglected to include something important. Not only will you hopefully be able to â€Å"fix it† by sending the school some clarification, but you may also be able to head off a similar miscommunication at another school. Given the competitive nature of college admissions, it is smart to research and apply regular decision to other schools (hopefully you have this list and have been working on these applications all along). While a deferral is far from ideal, it can, if properly managed, still lead to admission. Advice From the Professionals Update: We’re sharing great advice from a member of ourPaying For College 101 group,who is also a college admissions officer†¦ â€Å"A word of advice from a college admissions officer – if there is a question about an application decision, the student should be the one to call about it. There are a variety of reasons so I’ll just list a few: privacy laws; it’s their future so they should take ownership; they deserve to hear answers first hand not second hand filtered by a parent or counselor; students need to learn to advocate for themselves; parents have to begin backing off from doing important things for their soon to be of legal age children. Not always easy to do and yes I’ve been there done that so can speak from both personal and professional experience.† Other counselors have offered this advice†¦ â€Å"For students who have been deferred, they can contact the school and ask if they can send in additional information to be reviewed as part of the regular decision process. If so, they should consider highlighting any new academic or extracurricular achievements, submit an additional letter of recommendation, and 1st quarter grades. In whatever they write, they should make sure to clearly articulate what makes the school so special and how they will contribute to the school community.

A Trip At The New World - 2005 Words

Japes traveled for almost three days before he arrived in the new world, a relaxing trip as the meandering trail passed many beautiful country estates a far cry from the bustling metropolis and quite unexpected. When he finally arrived at the new hotel, he was surprised by the quaint elegance. This would be the first time he worked at a Hilltop Hotel a chain known for its unparalleled commitment to customer service. He was welcomed to the hotel by a nice young bellman, his new boss, however, was on vacation, just the same he was determined to evaluate the lay of the land on his own. Although Japes served in hotels for a number of years he had never been an â€Å"executive†. In fact, he was unsure as to what that even meant, but would soon find†¦show more content†¦The lobby and front entrance were quite beautiful and truly fit into the town, the back of the house, however, was in terrible disrepair. The cafeteria was all dark grey concrete with a small salad bar set t o the side. It looked like a prison cell. The laundry area and housekeeping department were also all in concrete. The building was much older than he had thought, although it looked almost new on the outside. Japes entire focus changed from the hotel to the servers managing the hotel. He had been enamored with the excitement in the activities of the guests and the servers with whom he worked. Now, he was more curious about the managers he oversaw than the servers who interacted with the guests. It was a tremendous change in perspective. Japes wanted to have fun as he enjoyed in his previous jobs, but he also wanted to be a leader. His next introduction was to Bobbin. Bobbin was the reservation manager who worked at the hotel for many years. She was a happy server and possibly a bit of a racer at heart. She was quite active within the hotel and a true friend to Japes. Bobbin lived in the town her entire life and knew everybody in the community. This relationship gave him great insight not only into the hotel world, but also in the community. The last server that he met that day was the front office manager Nod. Japes couldn t describe the type of server that Nod was. At first sight he app eared to be a worker. He wasShow MoreRelatedEducational Trip841 Words   |  4 PagesINTRODUCTION Going on a Educational trip means more than simply leaving the school grounds. Educational trips should always have a major educational element, but the impact of Educational trips can extend much further. 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It is the most important criticisms against ACTA, it seeks toRead MoreA Visit On A Road Trip Across Canada1507 Words   |  7 PagesVisit On A Road Trip Across Canada As the second largest country in the world, you better believe that Canada has plenty of roads for road trips! From the beautiful Rocky Mountains in the west, the Maritime towns along the east, and the tundras of the north, Canada has just about everything. The most daunting task might be trying to figure out just where exactly you want to go on a road trip. To help you figure it out, here is a list of 15 amazing places to visit while on a road trip across CanadaRead MoreStudy Abroad Influences A Student s Life From Personal Growth1244 Words   |  5 PagesSUMMARY The goal of this study is to see how study abroad influences a student s life from personal growth to academia. 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Were Dragons Inspired by Dinosaurs

In the 10,000 or so years since human beings became civilized, virtually every culture in the world has referenced supernatural monsters in its folk tales—and some of these monsters take the form of scaly, winged, fire-breathing reptiles. Dragons, as theyre known in the West, are usually depicted as huge, dangerous, and fiercely antisocial, and they almost always wind up being killed by the proverbial knight in shining armor at the end of a backbreaking quest. Before we explore the link between dragons and dinosaurs, its important to establish exactly what a dragon is. The word dragon comes from the Greek drà ¡kÃ… n, which means serpent or water-snake—and, in fact, the earliest mythological dragons resemble snakes more than they do dinosaurs or pterosaurs  (flying reptiles).  Its also important to recognize that dragons arent unique to the Western tradition. These monsters feature heavily in Asian mythology, where they go by the Chinese name là ³ng. What Inspired the Dragon Myth? Identifying the precise source of the dragon myth for any particular culture is a near-impossible task; after all, we werent around 5,000 years ago to eavesdrop on conversations or listen to folk tales passed down through countless generations. That said, there are three likely possibilities. Dragons were mixed-and-matched from the most frightening predators of the day. Until only a few hundred years ago, human life was nasty, brutish, and short, and many adults and children met their end at the teeth (and claws) of vicious wildlife. Since the details of dragon anatomy vary from culture to culture, it may be that these monsters were assembled piecemeal from familiar, fearsome predators: for example, the head of a crocodile, the scales of a snake, the pelt of a tiger, and the wings of an eagle.Dragons were inspired by the discovery of giant fossils. Ancient civilizations could easily have stumbled across the bones of long-extinct dinosaurs or the mammalian megafauna of the Cenozoic Era. Just like modern paleontologists, these accidental fossil-hunters may have been inspired to visually reconstruct dragons by piecing together bleached skulls and backbones. As with the above theory, this would explain why so many dragons are chimeras that seem to have been assembled from the body parts of various animals.Dragons were loosely based on recently extinct mammals and reptiles. This is the shakiest, but the most romantic, of all dragon theories. If the very earliest humans had an oral tradition, they may well have passed down accounts of creatures that went extinct 10,000 years ago, at the end of the last Ice Age. If this theory is true, the dragon legend could have been inspired by dozens of creatures, such as the giant ground sloth and the saber-tooth tiger in the Americas to the giant monitor lizard Megalania in Australia, which at 25 feet long and two tons certainly attained dragon-like sizes. Dinosaurs and Dragons in the Modern Era There arent many (lets be honest, any) paleontologists who believe that the dragon legend was invented by ancient human beings who glimpsed a living, breathing dinosaur and passed the story down through countless generations. However, that hasnt prevented scientists from having a little fun with the dragon myth, which explains recent dinosaur names like Dracorex and Dracopelta and (further east) Dilong and Guanlong, which incorporate the là ³ng root corresponding to the Chinese word for dragon. Dragons may never have existed, but they can still be resurrected, at least partway, in dinosaur form.

Are Gender Roles Forced Upon Us - 1435 Words

Are Gender Roles Forced Upon Us? In American culture in the 1950s, men were the predominant head of the household and women were expected to cook, care for their kids, and clean. This is an excellent example of gender roles, and how they control certain aspects of life. Gender roles are, according to multiple sources, the way people behave, what they do or say to express being a female or male. (â€Å"Gender Identity†; Blackstone; Understanding Gender) They are forced upon an individual from the day they are born even in the most trivial of terms of putting baby boys in blue clothes and baby girls in pink. Throughout that person’s life from then on, they will face cultural expectations every day to act according to their sex. Gender roles can often be confusing and hurtful,many stores are moving away from assigning products to a specific gender, but not only can gender roles affect a person’s behavior, it can play a huge role in transgenderism. Many people confus e the definition of gender and sex. â€Å"Gender, on the other hand, refers to the meanings, values, and characteristics that people ascribe to different sexes. Sex is a biological concept, determined on the basis of individual s primary sex characteristics.† (Blackstone) Society gives social cues on the appropriate behavior for each sex. For example, women are to exert more feminine traits such as being dependent, emotional, passive, innocent, nurturing, and/or self-critical. On the contrary, men should be moreShow MoreRelatedAre Gender Roles Forced Upon Us?1482 Words   |  6 PagesAre Gender Roles Forced Upon Us? Remember the 50s in America, how men were the predominant head of the household and women were expected to cook, watch their kids, and clean? This is an excellent example of gender roles, and how they control some aspects of life. Gender roles according to multiple sources are, the way people behave, what they do and say, to express being a female or male. (â€Å"Gender Identity†, Blackstone, Gender Spectrum). They are forced upon an individual from the day thatRead MoreReligion, Religion And Religion Essay1690 Words   |  7 PagesIn Western society, religion plays a vital role in maintaining traditionalism. For instance, growing up as a Christian, I was taught that God loves everyone and forgives us of our sins, but he also condemns homosexuality and gives the consequence for such a lifestyle. Leviticus 20:13 mentions that â€Å"If a man lies with a male as he lies with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death. Their blood {shall be} upon them†. Basically, I believe that the BibleRead MoreEssay A Western Identity Crisis739 Words   |  3 Pagesimmigrants and is known for its population from a wide array of cultural backgrounds. Living in a westernized society that is so diverse, we are forced to choose an identity for ourselves at one point or another in our lives. 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Personal Statement Essay - 961 Words

People who know me typically find out pretty quickly that next to my passion for medicine, I am actually one of the world’s hugest computer geeks. In fact, when I first entered college, I toyed with the idea of studying computer science before I realized that the study of the human body was so much more exciting because it allows me to combine my fervor for computers and merge it with my interest in medicine. Once I began medical school, I started to see the human body like the hardware of a computer system. For example, the nervous system - the midbrain is the CPU and the cortex acts as RAM. The spinal cord acts as the motherboard, creating a system for impulses to travel back and forth. The eyes and ears act like the mouse and†¦show more content†¦Once that diagnosis has been hypothesized, appropriate treatment acts as the debugging phase. If a treatment plan is not working, then another diagnosis needs to be developed. 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Factory Near Housing Area Free Essays

An international company is planning to set up a factory near your housing area. The proposed factory however, is believed to be environmentally hazardous. It will pollute the environment through thermal pollution, chemical pollution, air pollution, and noise pollution. We will write a custom essay sample on Factory Near Housing Area or any similar topic only for you Order Now Write a persuasive essay urging people in your neighborhood to protest against the set up of the factory. Based on Macmillan English Dictionary, pollution is the process of damaging the air, water, or land with chemicals or other substances. Pollution even started from the prehistoric times when man created the first fires. But nowadays, it was the  industrial revolution  that gave birth to environmental pollution. The emergence of great factories and consumption of immense quantities of  coal  and other  fossil fuels gave rise to unprecedented  air pollution  and the large volume of industrial  chemical  discharges added to the growing load of untreated human waste. Therefore, is it suitable for factories to be build near the housing area? People in the community should show their concerns and attention to this matter because setting up an environmentally hazardous factory near their house is extremely unreasonable. There are many kind of pollution caused by factory. One of it is thermal pollution, another form of water pollution. Like other form of water pollution, thermal pollution is widespread, effecting many rivers, lakes and stream around the world. It happens when there is increase of temperature in the stream, river or lake. Factories involve in thermal pollution when they dump water used to cool their machinery. As we all know, water used for cooling the machine warms to five to ten Celsius degree before dumped back into river or lake where it come from. When water temperature rises from normal temperature, the plants and animals lived in the water will die because they had been adapted to live in a certain range of temperature only. Increase in temperature cause them to die. Therefore, we shouldn’t allow this to happen because it will affect the stability of the ecosystem which also leads to decreasing food source. As we know it, many hazardous chemicals are used in factories during the production process, after which they are dumped into rivers and lakes. Issues about factories that did not dispose their chemical wastes in the correct way are also very common in these days. Unused chemical substances were disposed into the rivers illegally. This had eventually endangered the water species in the river and destroyed the drinking water sources of the people. As a result, more than 40% of the rivers in China are considered unfit for drinking, while 64% of major cities and towns have  seriously polluted groundwater. We can’t let this happen in our housing area because water is a very important source for us to live. Therefore building a factory near the housing area is not supposed to happen. Besides, noise pollution is also one of the pollution that is contributed by factory. Machine in the factory produce very loud noises which can affect the health and behavior of a person. This is because unwanted noise can damage physiological and psychological health. For example, people will face many health problems such as annoyance and aggression,  hypertension, high stress levels,  tinnitus, hearing loss, sleep disturbances, and other harmful effects due to the exposure of loud noise. Therefore, if the factory is just around the corner, the possibility for the community to be effected by the loud noise is very high. It is very risky to let the community facing those loud noises as it will affect their live eventually. Another pollution that caused by factory operation is air pollution. With accelerating urban and industrial growth, vast amount of harmful waste product has been released into the atmosphere by the irresponsible citizen. The most common gaseous pollutants are  carbon monoxide,  carbon dioxide, chlorofluorocarbons  (CFCs) and  nitrogen oxides. Factories involve in air pollution when the burning of various fuels in the factory emits poisonous gasses to the atmosphere and eventually damage the air quality. Besides that, dust that comes from cement kilns, lime kilns, stone crushing and asbestos factories are also the main causes of breathing problems and lung diseases in our country. This shows that low quality of air increase the risk for the community to be infected by disease. Therefore, factory should be build far away from the housing area to ensure the healthy environment can be built in the neighborhood. Our environment means the surrounding of our house where we live together with our neighbors. To produce a healthy environment for us and the people around us, we should cooperate with each other and prevent any unpleasant force from disturbing our healthy life. In this situation, we should get up and protest against the set up of the factory because the damages that come with the factory are just too awful. It may increase the spreading of disease and disturb the balance nature of our neighborhood. Therefore we need to be united in order to provide a better living for our community. How to cite Factory Near Housing Area, Papers