The Website That Is Helping Companies Find Diverse Talent Diversity-hiring platform Jopwell debunks the 'pipeline problem.'
This story appears in the June 2017 issue of Entrepreneur. Subscribe »
When companies say they don't have the resources for diversity recruiting, it hurts our ears," says Porter Braswell, who spent years at Goldman Sachs, where he was regularly asked to help with diversity outreach. Nevertheless, diversity-light companies say it frequently, often invoking what is known as "the pipeline problem" -- a claim that diverse talent is a scarce resource and largely elusive.
Related: Why You Need to Focus on Diversity Before It's Too Late
So Braswell and fellow Goldman alum Ryan Williams created Jopwell, a platform that connects black, Latino and Native American job seekers with career opportunities. "We want to say, "Jopwell is the pipeline, so you can't say there's a problem,'" says Braswell.
The platform is free for minority students and professionals on the job hunt and open to all. Users create intensely detailed profiles about experience and interests. They can explore companies as easily as companies can search for candidates. But what sets Jopwell apart is its scale. By creating a massive, industry-agnostic pool of both candidates and companies -- including Netflix, Spotify, Airbnb, Microsoft, BlackRock, The New York Times and Goldman Sachs -- there's a greater opportunity for valuable discovery. The percentage of Jopwell applicants who receive an offer from partner companies is up to 20 times greater than the hiring yield from typical recruiting efforts. And 86 percent of those candidates accept.
Related: 7 Things Both Job Seekers and Job Providers Should Know for a More Effective Hiring Process
"Diversity is about the bottom line, and companies know that," Williams says. "Companies in the top quartile of workforce diversity are 30 percent more likely to outperform their non-diverse counterparts. So it's not about knocking on doors and saying, "Do you know diversity can help you perform better?' It's about starting from a mutual understanding, and helping them get serious about their efforts."
