Getting a job right after college is hard but Visable has a solution

Matt Longley, Charlie Sido and Ben Schuster feel your pain.
They remember what it was like to be Johns Hopkins seniors looking for a job. For liberal arts majors, there are many different directions to go.
“The job search process for us when we were students was really confusing and really frustrating,” Longley said.
When he got a job, Longley ended up being a recruiter at Johns Hopkins who found out what it was like on the other side of the table. He realized that recruiters didn’t have much info about students, and also noticed that small and medium-sized businesses weren’t very well represented.
The two experiences helped to form the basis for Visable, a platform that’s designed to make it easier both for college kids to navigate the job search process, and for recruiters to reach college kids.
Visable’s web app has a space where students can input their resume and relevant skills for recruiters to see. That side is scheduled to launch this week. Visable is starting by signing up students at Baltimore-area colleges, including their alma mater, plus University of Maryland, Loyola, Towson, UMBC, Goucher and Morgan State.
Meanwhile, the employer-facing allows recruiters to post opportunities, and see the applicants that are out there before attending a job fair. With the info provided, the companies can also use data to identify students who match what they’re looking for. That side, which has about 30 employers signed up, is scheduled to launch in the coming weeks. It’s a mix of bigger firms like Alcoa, Geico and Hershey, as well as smaller firms.
Visable feels they can target those small and medium-sized businesses, who often skip career fairs altogether due to the time commitment.
“We’re hoping we can help to match up overwhelming supply with overwhelming demand,” Longley said.
The team of three has been working on the project for about two years, but work ramped up in 2015 with their participation in AccelerateBaltimore. Along with mentors, Longley said the three-month program helped them get involved with the larger startup community for the first time. They worked closely with Brinkbit, a company developing platform to build video games.
“They’re in a totally different space, but we still learned a ton from each other,” Longley said.
Using the platform will be free to students and college career centers who want to connect using the platform. Longley said the company is in the midst of testing its business model, in which Visable will charge recruiters per post, or at an overall subscription rate.